rocking-chair. If it had been anyone else who had "talked back" at him,
he would have made quick work of them, for he was of that class of tyrant
who pride themselves on being self-made, and have an undue respect for
their own judgment and importance. But the woman who had ventured to
challenge his cold-blooded remarks about his dead son's wife, now
hastening over the snow to the house her husband had left under a cloud
eight years before, had no fear of him, and, maybe, no deep regard for
him. He respected her, as did all who knew her--a very reticent,
thoughtful, busy being, who had been like a well of comfort to so many
that had drunk and passed on out of her life, out of time and time's
experiences. Seventy-nine years saw her still upstanding, strong, full
of work, and fuller of life's knowledge. It was she who had sent the
horses and sleigh for "Gassy," when the old man, having read the letter
that Cassy had written him, said that she could "freeze at the station"
for all of him. Aunt Kate had said nothing then, but, when the time
came, by her orders the sleigh and horses were at the station; and the
old man had made no direct protest, for she was the one person he had
never dominated nor bullied. If she had only talked, he would have worn
her down, for he was fond of talking, and it was said by those who were
cynical and incredulous about him that he had gone to prayer-meetings,
had been a local preacher, only to hear his own voice. Probably if there
had been any politics in the West in his day, he would have been a
politician, though it would have been too costly for his taste, and
religion was very cheap; it enabled him to refuse to join in many forms
of expenditure, on the ground that he "did not hold by such things."

In Aunt Kate, the sister of his wife, dead so many years ago, he had
found a spirit stronger than his own. He valued her; he had said more
than once, to those who he thought would never repeat it to her, that
she was a "great woman"; but self-interest was the mainspring of his