supper, and goes to bed, feeling his day has not been wasted. I
meant to spare you. I was wrong. You shall go through the mill as
I went through it. If at the end of two years you've done well
with your time, learned something--learned to be a man, at all
events--you can come to me and thank me."

"I'm afraid, sir," suggested Grindley junior, whose handsome face
during the last few minutes had grown very white, "I might not make
a very satisfactory grocer. You see, sir, I've had no experience."

"I am glad you have some sense," returned his father drily. "You
are quite right. Even a grocer's business requires learning. It
will cost me a little money; but it will be the last I shall ever
spend upon you. For the first year you will have to be
apprenticed, and I shall allow you something to live on. It shall
be more than I had at your age--we'll say a pound a week. After
that I shall expect you to keep yourself."

Grindley senior rose. "You need not give me your answer till the
evening. You are of age. I have no control over you unless you
are willing to agree. You can go my way, or you can go your own."

Young Grindley, who had inherited a good deal of his father's grit,
felt very much inclined to go his own; but, hampered on the other
hand by the sweetness of disposition he had inherited from his
mother, was unable to withstand the argument of that lady's tears,
so that evening accepted old Grindley's terms, asking only as a
favour that the scene of his probation might be in some out-of-the-
way neighbourhood where there would be little chance of his being
met by old friends.