"When I went to Princeton with the shoats I found Mr.
Peale painting Dr. Witherspoon, and he gave me the paints
and the ivory."

"Ye'll say I suppose too that ye wrote this," demanded
the squire, indicating the letter.

"I'll not deny it."

"Though ye could not sign the covenant?"

Fownes once more shrugged his shoulders. "'T is a fool
would sign a bond," he asserted.

"Better a fool than a knave," retorted Mr. Meredith, angered
by Charles' manner. "Janice, give the rogue back
the letter and picture. No daughter of Lambert Meredith
accepts gifts from her father's bond-servants."

The man flushed, while evidently struggling to control his
temper, and Janice, both in pity for him, as well as in desire
for possession of the picture, for gifts were rare indeed in
those days, begged--

"Oh, dadda, mayn't I keep it?"

"Mr. Meredith," said Charles, speaking with evident repression,
"the present was given only with the respect--"
he hesitated as if for words and then continued--"the respect