my preparations, and was sitting on the poop rail,
intently scanning the slowly approaching junk through the ship's
telescope, and taking due note of such details and particulars as were
thus brought within my ken, when the slight rustle of feminine garments
at my side caused me to lower the glass. Mrs Vansittart was standing
at my elbow. She was still very pale, and her eyelids were swollen and
red with recent weeping, but she smiled wanly as she offered me her
hand.

"Walter," she said, and there was a tremor in her voice as she spoke,
while the blood surged up into her cheeks for a moment--"I want to
apologise. I am afraid--"

"No, certainly not, dear lady!" I cried, seizing her hand; "you must
not dream of such a thing. On the contrary, it is for me to apologise
to you for my sudden and violent ebullition of temper; and I do, most
heartily. I cannot imagine what it was that possessed me just then,
but--"

Her smile broadened and brightened a little as she raised her left hand
to silence me.

"You must let me speak, Walter--let me say what I want to say," she
resumed. "Anthea has been talking to me, and she said things that have
opened my eyes to what I fear I must call my own folly. She has made me
see that I have been altogether wrong in my attitude toward Julius. She
has shown me that in the blindness and intensity of my affection for
him--he is my only son, you know, Walter--I have indulged him and
allowed him to have his own way in everything to such an extent that,
unless we are all very careful, he will be utterly spoiled, ruined, and
rendered totally unfit to go out into the world and take a worthy place
there when the time comes for him to do so. There have been occasions
before to-day when I have been troubled by suspicions that something was
going wrong with the dear boy, that I was not doing my duty toward him
as a wise mother should, but it was not until within the last half-hour
that my eyes have been completely opened; and now I intend to adopt an
entirely different attitude toward him. But the trouble is that I don't
know how to set about it. How were you brought up, Walter?"

I could not avoid smiling at the naivete of this question, yet I could
also sympathise with the questioner.

"Well," said I, "naturally I loved my parents, and they as naturally
loved me, but they never allowed their affection to blind them to the
little childish faults and failings which, like all other chil