d to lower his rent or give further time for payment,
or if sickness invades any of these cottages, to seek out the sufferer,
to afford the remedies, and by his countenance, his kindness, and
advice, to alleviate their trouble. Here it is, a positive duty arising
from their relative situations of landlord and tenant. The tenants
support the owner, the landlord protects the tenants: the duties are
reciprocal.

"With _us_ the duties, as far as Christian duties can be said to be
optional, are voluntary; and the voluntary discharge of duties, like
the voluntary support of religion, we know, from sad experience, to be
sometimes imperfectly performed, at others intermitted, and often wholly
neglected. Oh! it is a happy country this, a great and a good country;
and how base, how wicked, how diabolical it is to try to set such
a family as this against their best friends, their pastor and their
landlord; to instil dissatisfaction and distrust into their simple
minds, and to teach them to loathe the hand, that proffers nothing but
regard or relief. It is shocking, isn't it?"

"That's what I often say, Sir," said Mrs. Hodgins, "to my old man, to
keep away from them Chartists."

"Chartists! dear, who are they? I never heard of them."

"Why, Sir, they are the men that want the five pints."

"Five pints! why you don't say so; oh! they are bad men, have nothing to
do with them. Five pints! why that is two quarts and a half; that is
too much to drink if it was water; and if any thing else, it is beastly
drunkenness. Have nothing to do with them."

"Oh! no, Sir, it is five points of law."

"Tut--tut--tut! what have you got to do with law, my dear?"

"By gosh, Aunty," said Mr. Slick, "you had better not cut that pie: you
will find it rather sour in the apple sarce, and tough in the paste, I
tell _you_."

"Yes, Sir," she replied, "but they are a unsettling of his mind. What
shall I do? for I don't like these night meetings, and he always comes
home from 'em cross and sour-like."

"Well, I am sorry to hear that," said Mr. Hopewell, "I wish I could see
him; but I can't, for I am bound on a journey. I am sorry to hear
it, dear. Sam, this country is so beautiful, so highly cultivated, so
adorned by nature and art, and contains so much comfort and happiness,
that it resembles almost the garden of Eden. But, Sam, the Serpent is
here, the Serpent is here beyond a doubt. It changes its shape, and
alters its name, and takes a new colou