ng
sentence:

'What I think and say is this. Laws is made for to keep some folks
fra' harming others. Press-gangs and coast-guards harm me i' my
business, and keep me fra' getting what I want. Theerefore, what I
think and say is this: Measter Cholmley should put down press-gangs
and coast-guards. If that theere isn't reason I ax yo' to tell me
what is? an' if Measter Cholmley don't do what I ax him, he may go
whistle for my vote, he may.'

At this period in his conversation, Bell Robson interfered; not in
the least from any feeling of disgust or annoyance, or dread of what
he might say or do if he went on drinking, but simply as a matter of
health. Sylvia, too, was in no way annoyed; not only with her
father, but with every man whom she knew, excepting her cousin
Philip, was it a matter of course to drink till their ideas became
confused. So she simply put her wheel aside, as preparatory to going
to bed, when her mother said, in a more decided tone than that which
she had used on any other occasion but this, and similar ones--

'Come, measter, you've had as much as is good for you.'

'Let a' be! Let a' be,' said he, clutching at the bottle of spirits,
but perhaps rather more good-humoured with what he had drunk than he
was before; he jerked a little more into his glass before his wife
carried it off, and locked it up in the cupboard, putting the key in
her pocket, and then he said, winking at Philip--

'Eh! my man. Niver gie a woman t' whip hand o'er yo'! Yo' seen what
it brings a man to; but for a' that I'll vote for Cholmley, an'
d----t' press-gang!'

He had to shout out the last after Philip, for Hepburn, really
anxious to please his aunt, and disliking drinking habits himself by
constitution, was already at the door, and setting out on his return
home, thinking, it must be confessed, far more of the character of
Sylvia's shake of the hand than of the parting words of either his
uncle or aunt.

CHAPTER V

STORY OF THE PRESS-GANG

For a few days after the evening mentioned in the last chapter the
weather was dull. Not in quick, sudden showers did the rain come
down, but in constant drizzle, blotting out all colour from the
surrounding landscape, and filling the air with fine gray mist,
until people breathed more water than air. At such times the
consciousness of the nearness of the vast unseen sea acted as a
dreary depression to the spirits; but besides acting on the nerves
of the excitable, such