Squire. Mr.
Hazeldean, who was indeed really offended at the boy's obstinate refusal
to make the _amende honorable_ to Randal Leslie, at first only bestowed
a hearty curse or two on the pride and ingratitude both of mother and
son. It may be supposed, however, that his second thoughts were more
gentle, since that evening, though he did not go himself to the widow,
he sent his "Harry." Now, though Harry was sometimes austere and
_brusque_ enough on her own account, and in such business as might
especially be transacted between herself and the cottagers, yet she
never appeared as the delegate of her lord except in the capacity of a
herald-of-peace and mediating angel. It was with good heart, too, that
she undertook this mission, since, as we have seen, both mother and son
were great favorites of hers. She entered the cottage with the
friendliest beam in her bright blue eye, and it was with the softest
tone of her frank cordial voice that she accosted the widow. But she was
no more successful than the Steward had been. The truth is, that I don't
believe the haughtiest duke in the three kingdoms is really so proud as
your plain English rural peasant, nor half so hard to propitiate and
deal with when his sense of dignity is ruffled. Nor are there many of my
own literary brethren (thin-skinned creatures though we are) so
sensitively alive to the Public Opinion, wisely despised by Dr.
Riccabocca, as the same peasant. He can endure a good deal of contumely
sometimes, it is true, from his superiors, (though, thank Heaven! _that_
he rarely meets with unjustly;) but to be looked down upon, and mocked,
and pointed at by his own equals--his own little world--cuts him to the
soul. And if you can succeed in breaking his pride, and destroying this
sensitiveness, then he is a lost being. He can never recover his
self-esteem, and you have chucked him half way--a stolid, inert, sullen
victim--to the perdition of the prison or the convict-ship.

Of this stuff was the nature both of the widow and her son. Had the
honey of Plato flowed from the tongue of Mrs. Hazeldean, it could not
have turned into sweetness the bitter spirit upon which it descended.
But Mrs. Hazeldean, though an excellent woman, was rather a bluff,
plain-spoken one--and, after all, she had some little feeling for the
son of a gentleman, and a decayed fallen gentleman, who, even by Lenny's
account, had been assailed without any intelligible provocation; nor
could she, with