You'll find you can't fight your lot in life, J'rome Edwards; you ain't got standin' room enough outside it." "I don't want to fight my lot in life," Jerome replied, defiantly, "but I thought I'd go to school this winter." "You won't grub a bit better for one more winter of schoolin'," said his uncle, "and there's another reason--your mother, she's gettin' older, an' Elmira, she's a good-lookin' girl, but she's gettin' wore to skin an' bones.

They're both on 'em workin' too hard.

You'd ought to try to have 'em let up a little more." "I wouldn't have either of 'em lift a finger, if I could help it, the Lord knows!" Jerome cried, bitterly.
Ozias nodded, grimly.

"Women wa'n't calculated to work as hard as men, nohow," he said.

"Seems as if a man that's got hands, an' is willin', might be let to keep the worst of it off 'em, but he ain't.
Seems as if I might have been able to do somethin' for Ann when Abel quit, but I wa'n't.
"There's one thing I've got to be thankful for, an' that is--a hard Providence ain't been able to hurt Belindy any more than it would a feather piller.