. Witherspoon returned
to the library after going to the door with Colton. He sat down,
stretched forth his feet, meditated for a few moments, and said: "The
bark on a beech tree was never any closer than that old man, and yet
he is kind-hearted."

"When kindness doesn't cost anything, I suppose," Henry suggested.

"Yes, that's true. He spoke of the wonderful showing of the charities
of this city as though he were a prime mover in them, when, in fact, I
don't think he ever contributed more than a barrel of flour in any one
year. But he is a good business man, and if there were more like him
there would be fewer bankrupts."

Ellen appeared at the door. "Henry, mother and I are going to your
room to pay you a call."

"All right, I'll go up with you. Won't you come, father?"

"No, I believe not. Think I'll read a while and go to bed."

Henry's room was bright with a gladsome fire. On the table had been
set a vase of moss roses, and beside the vase lay an old black pipe,
tied with a blue ribbon. The young man laughed, and the girl said:

"Mother's doings. Ugh! the nasty thing!"

"If my son smoked a pipe when he was in exile," Mrs. Witherspoon
replied, "he can do so now. None of the privileges of a strange land
shall be denied him in his own home."

She sat in an easy-chair and was slowly rocking. To man a
rocking-chair is a remembrancer of a mother's affection.

"Light your pipe, my son."

"No, not now, mother."

Ellen sat on an arm of Henry's chair. "Your hair would curl if you
were to encourage it," she remarked.

"Has anybody said anything about curly hair?" he asked.

"No, but I was just thinking that yours might curl."

"Do you want me to look like Brooks?"

She frowned. "He kinks his with a hot poker. I don't like pretty men."

"How about handsome men?"

"Oh, I have to like them. You are a handsome man, you know."

"Nonsense," he replied.

"Your grandmother was a very handsome woman," said Mrs. Witherspoon.
"She had jet-black hair, and her teeth were like pearls. Ellen, what
did Mr. Coglin say when you gave him the slippers?" Mr. Coglin was a
clergyman.

"Oh, he thanked me, of course. He couldn't very well have said, 'Take
them away.'"

"But did you tell him that you embroidered them with your own hands?"

"Yes, I told him."

"Then what did he say?"

"He pretended to be greatly surprised, and said something, but I have
forgotten what it was. Mrs. Brooks is awful tiresome with her 'Yes,