never presented itself.

Jan's troubles were pointed out to her as the obvious results of Jan's
sins. How could he expect a blessing on a boat bought as he had bought
The Solan? And what was the use of helping a man who was always so
unfortunate? If Peter did not regard misfortune as a sin, he drew away
from it as if it were something even worse. Sometimes God blesses a
man through poverty, sometimes through riches, but until the rod
blossoms even good Christians call it a chastening rod. Margaret had a
dread of making her child share Jan's evil destiny: perhaps she was
afraid of it for herself. Self is such an omnipresent god, that it is
easy to worship him in the dark, and to obey him almost unconsciously.
When Margaret recovered from her faint, she was inclined to think she
deserved praise for what she called her self-denial. She knew also
that her father would be satisfied with her conduct, and Peter's
satisfaction took tangible forms. He had given her L100 when she broke
up her home and left Jan; she certainly looked for some money
equivalent for her present obedience. And yet she was quite positive
this latter consideration had in no way at all influenced her
decision; she was sure of that; only, there could be no harm in
reflecting that a duty done would have its reward.

As for Jan, he let people say whatever they chose to say about him. To
Tulloch and to Michael Snorro he described the tempest, and the
desperation with which he had fought for his boat and his life; but
defended himself to no one else. Day after day he passed in the
retreat which Snorro had made him, and lying there he could plainly
hear the men in Peter's store talk about him. Often he met the same
men in Torr's at night, and he laughed bitterly to himself at their
double tongues. There are few natures that would have been improved by
such a discipline; to a man who had lost all faith in himself, it was
a moral suicide.

Down, down, down, with the rapidity with which fine men go to
ruin, went Jan. Every little thing seemed to help him to the bottom;
yes, even such a trifle as his shabby clothes. But shabby clothes
were not a trifle to Jan. There are men as well as women who put on
respectability with respectable raiment; Jan was of that class. He
was meanly dressed and he felt mean, and he had no money to buy a
new suit. All Snorro's small savings he had used long before for
one purpose or another, and his wages were barely sufficient to
bu