help.”

“What on earth should I do with nine hundred a year?” Irving exclaimed.

“Save it for your law school fund,” said Lawrence.

Irving shrugged his shoulders grandly. “Oh, I can earn money.”

Lawrence gave him an affectionate push. “Tut!” he said. “Be good to
yourself once in a while.”

It was a happy family that evening. The uncle and the aunt rejoiced in
the good news, even while regretting the separation.

Mr. Upton, the younger brother of the boys’ father, who had been the
village clergyman, shared his brother’s tastes; he read good books, he
would travel to hear a celebrated man speak, he had ideas which were not
bounded by his farm. He had encouraged Irving as well as Lawrence to
seek a university education. The two boys were proud, eager to free
themselves from dependence on the uncle and aunt who, after their
father’s death, had given them a home. Irving had worked his way through
college, hardly ever asking for help; he had been a capable scholar and
the faculty had found for him backward students in need of tutoring.

Meanwhile, Mr. Upton had been busily engaged in developing and
increasing his farm; that he was beginning to be prosperous Irving was
aware; that he did not more earnestly insist upon helping his nephews
stimulated their spirit of independence. They knew that they had been
left penniless; Irving sometimes suspected his uncle of parsimony, yet
this was a trait so incongruous with Mr. Upton’s genial nature that