silk, and take the second text for your motto, so you'll remember to be
properly grateful. This is the second text." She put her hands on his
shoulders and said in a loud, exultant voice, "My soul is escaped as a
bird out of the snare of the fowler. The snare is broken and I am
escaped."

For answer the boy pulled her eagerly to the window and pointed to a young
pine-tree that stood near the house.

"Sister, that tree's just as old as I be. I've prayed to God, and I've
promised myself that before it's as tall, as the ridge-pole of the house,
I'll be on my way."

As this scene came before his eyes, the white-haired man, leaning against
the great pine, looked up at the lofty crown of green wreathing the
giant's head and shook his fist at it. He hated every inch of its height,
for every inch meant an enforced renunciation that had brought him
bitterness and a sense of failure.

His sister had died the year after she had given him the double text, and
his father the year after that. He was left thus, the sole support of his
ailing mother, who transferred to the silent, sullen boy the irresistible
rule of complaining weakness with which she had governed his father. It
was thought she could not live long, and the boy stood in terror of a
sudden death brought on by displeasure at some act of his. In the end,
however, she died quietly in her bed, an old woman of seventy-three,
nursed by her daughter-in-law, the widow of Jehiel's only brother. Her
place in the house was taken by Jehiel's sister-in-law, a sickly, helpless
woman, alone in the would except for Jehiel, and all the neighbors
congratulated him on having a housekeeper ready to his hand. He said