Her husband, putting his hands behind his back, and throwing back his chin, was about to follow her.

Philip, who had remained for the last moment mute and white as stone, turned abruptly; and his grief taking rather the tone of rage than supplication, he threw himself before his master, and, laying his hand on his shoulder, said: "I leave you--do not let it be with a curse.

I conjure you, have mercy on me!" Mr.Plaskwith stopped; and had Philip then taken but a milder tone, all had been well.

But, accustomed from childhood to command--all his fierce passions loose within him--despising the very man he thus implored--the boy ruined his own cause.

Indignant at the silence of Mr.Plaskwith, and too blinded by his emotions to see that in that silence there was relenting, he suddenly shook the little man with a vehemence that almost overset him, and cried: "You, who demand for five years my bones and blood--my body and soul--a slave to your vile trade--do you deny me bread for a mother's lips ?" Trembling with anger, and perhaps fear, Mr.Plaskwith extricated himself from the gripe of Philip, and, hurrying from the shop, said, as he banged the door: "Beg my pardon for this to-night, or out you go to-morrow, neck and crop! Zounds! a pretty pass the world's come to! I don't believe a word about your mother.