"Only the mice, father, as usual; do, father, try to sleep. I watch
carefully; there is nothing to fear."

"Ay, ay, men and mice all the same; nothing but waste. When I am gone,
Sarah, keep what you will have; it won't be much, Sarah, my poor girl,
it won't be much; just enough to need care; but KEEP IT; don't lend
it, or give it, or spend it; you are fond of spending, my poor girl;
see that huge fire, enough for three nights; early bad habits. When
we lived in a small house and were poor, it was then you learned to be
extravagant; I had no money then, so did not know its value."

"But we were happier then, father," said Sarah Bond; "we were so
cheerful and happy then, and so many poor people blessed my dear
mother, and Mary"--

"Hiss--ss," uttered the dying miser; "don't dare mention your sister,
who disgraced me by marrying a pauper; a pauper who threatened my
life, because I would not give him my money to save him from starving;
but he _did not_ get the old father-in-law's gold; no; he _starved,
and_"--

The words thus uttered by her father, who she knew had not many hours
to live--uttered, too, with such demoniac bitterness--forced the
gentle, patient woman to start from her seal, and pass rapidly across
the room to the side of his bed, where she sank upon her knees, and
seized his shrunken hands in hers. "Father!" she exclaimed, "I have
been your child for forty years, and you have said, that during that
period, by no act of my own, have I _ever_ angered you. Is it not so?"
The old man withdrew one hand gently, turned himself round, and looked