recover her old self her placid household activity how could she the objects among which her mind had moved complacently were all gone � all the little hopes and schemes and speculations all the pleasant little cares about her treasures which had made this world quite to her for a quarter of a century since she had made her first purchase of the sugar had been suddenly snatched away from her and she remained bewildered in this empty life why that should have happened to her had not happened to other women remained an question by which she expressed her perpetual comparison of the past with the present it was piteous to see the comely stout woman getting thinner and more worn under a bodily as well as mental restlessness which made her often wander about the empty house after her work was done until becoming alarmed about her would seek her and bring her down by telling her how it vexed tom that she was her health by never sitting down and resting herself x et amid this helpless there was a touching trait of humble self which made feel tenderly toward her poor mother amid all the little wearing caused by her mental she would let do none of the work that was heaviest and most to the hands and was quite when attempted to relieve her from her grate brushing and let it alone my dear your hands get as hard as hard she would say it s your mother s place to do that i can t do the sewing � my eyes fail me and she would still brush and carefully tend s hair which she had become reconciled to in spite of its refusal to curl now it was so long and was not her pet child and in would have been ths mill on the better if she had been quite different yet the womanly heart so bruised in its small personal desires found a future to rest on in the life of this young thing and the mother pleased herself with wearing out her own hands to save the hands that had so much more life in them but the constant presence of her mother s bewilderment was less to than that of her father s sullen depression as long as the was upon him and it seemed as if he might always be in a condition of dependence � as long as he was still only half awakened to his trouble had felt the strong tide of pitying love almost as an inspiration a new power that would make the most life easy for his sake but now instead of dependence there had come a hard of purpose in strange contrast with his old vehement and high spirit and this lasted from day to day and from week to week the dull eye never brightening any eagerness or any joy it is something cruelly incomprehensible to youthful natures this sombre ness in middle aged and elderly people whose life has in disappointment and discontent to whose faces a smile be comes so strange that the sad lines all about the lips and brow seem to take no notice of it and it away again for want of a welcome why will they not up and be glad sometimes thinks young it would be so easy if they only liked to do it and these leaden clouds that never part are apt to create impatience even in the filial affection that streams forth in nothing but tenderness and pity in the time of more obvious affliction mr lingered nowhere away from home he hurried away from market he refused all invitations to stay and chat as in old times in the houses where he called on business he could not be reconciled with his lot there was no attitude in which his pride did not feel its and in all behavior toward him whether kind or cold he detected an allusion to the change in his circumstances even the days in which came to ride round the land and inquire into the business were not so black to him as those market days on which he had met several who had accepted a composition from him to save something toward the of those was the object toward which he was now bending all his thoughts and efforts and under the influence of this all compelling demand of his nature the somewhat promise man who hated to be or to any one else in his own house was gradually into the of mrs could not ths kill on the enough to satisfy him in their food and firing and he eat nothing himself but what was of the quality tom though depressed and strongly by his father s and the of home entered thoroughly into his father s feelings about paying the and the poor lad brought his first quarters money with a delicious sense of achievement and gave it to his father to put into the tin box which held the the little store of sovereigns in the tin box seemed to be the only sight that brought a faint beam of pleasure into the miller s eyes � faint and transient for it was soon by the thought that the time would be long � perhaps longer than life � before the narrow could remove the hateful of debt a of more than five hundred pounds with the interest seemed a deep pit to fill with the thirty shillings a week even when tom s probable were to be added on this point there was entire community of feeling in the four widely beings who sat round the dying fire of sticks which made a cheap warmth for them on the verge of mrs carried the proud integrity of the in her blood and had been brought up to think that to wrong people of their money which was another phrase 