like this! Mrs. Mesurier came over to her husband, and put her arm
tenderly on his shoulder.

"Never mind, dear. I'm sure he didn't mean to talk like that. He is a
good boy at heart, but you don't understand each other."

"Mary dear, we will talk no more of it to-night," he replied; "I will
try and put it from me. You go to bed. I will finish my diary, and be
up in a few minutes."

When he was alone, he sat still a little while, with a great lonely pain
on his face, and almost visibly upon it too the smart of the wounded
pride of his haughty nature. Never in his life had he been spoken to
like that,--and by his own son! The pang of it was almost more than he
could bear. But presently he had so far mastered himself as to take up
his pen and continue his writing. When that was finished, he opened his
Bible and read his wonted chapter. It was just the simple twenty-third
psalm: "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want." It was his favourite
psalm, and always had a remarkable tranquillising effect upon him. James
Mesurier's faith in God was very great. Then he knelt down and prayed in
silence,--prayed with a great love for his disobedient children; and,
when he rose from his knees, anger and pain had been washed away from
his face, and a serenity that is not of this world was there instead.




CHAPTER II