ell his mother and Mary.

"Stop that,--right away!" exclaimed Mrs. Kimper, as soon as Tom got
fairly into his story. "Your father ain't goin' to be laughed at in his
own house, by his own family, while I'm around to stand up for him."

"Oh, stuff!" exclaimed Tom, in amazement. Then he laughed as he
reverted to his father's efforts at correct pronunciation, and
continued his story. Suddenly he was startled by seeing his mother
snatch a stump of a fire-shovel from the hearth and brandish it over
his head.

"You give up that talk right away!" exclaimed the woman. "Your father
is astonishin' the life out of me ev'ry day by the new way he's talkin'
an' livin'. He's the best man in this town; I don't care if he _has_
been in the penitentiary, I'm not goin' to hear a bit of fun made of
him, not even by one of his own young ones."

All the brute in Tom's nature came to the surface in an instant, yet
his amazement kept him silent and staring. It was such a slight,
feeble, contemptible figure, that of the woman who was threatening to
punish him,--him, Tom Kimper, whom few men in town would care to meet
in a trial of strength. It set Tom to thinking; he said afterwards the
spectacle was enough to make a brickbat wake up and think. At last he
exclaimed, tenderly,--

"Mother!"

The woman dropped her weapon and burst into tears, sobbing aloud,--

"You never said it that way before."

Tom was so astonished by what he saw and heard that he shuffled up to
his mother and awkwardly placed his clumsy hand upon her cheek. In an
instant his mother's arms were around his neck so tight that Tom feared
he was being strangled.

"Oh, Tom, Tom! what's got into me? What's got into both of us?
Ev'rythin's diff'rent to what it used to be. It's carryin' me right off
my feet sometimes. I don't know how to stand it all, an' yet I
wouldn't have it no other way for nothin'."

Tom could not explain, but he did something a great deal better; for
the first time since he ceased being a baby and his mother began to
tire of him, he acted affectionately to the woman who was leaning upon
him. He put his strong arm around her, and repeated the single word
"Mother" often and earnestly. As for Mrs. Kimper, no further
explanation seemed necessary.

After mother and son had become entirely in accord, through methods
which only Heaven and mothers understand, Mrs. Kimper began to make
preparations for the family's mid-day meal. While she worked, her
daugh