to drive about now and then, because she was not so strong as she used
to be, and could not walk far. And let me, thought Amaryllis, let me be
able to give her a watch, for other people have watches, and my mother
has not got one, and it does seem so strange it should be so after all
the hard work she has done. Let me, too, get her some nice things to
eat, some fish and wine, for she cannot eat our plain bacon now every
day, she has not got an appetite, and her teeth too are bad, and I
should so like to give her a set of artificial teeth that her food might
do her more good. But what I really want is that she may be happy, and
be like my mother herself really is when she is herself. Give my father
money enough to pay his creditors, for I know that though he is so quiet
and says nothing, these debts are wearing him out, and I know he wishes
to pay them, and does not willingly keep them waiting. He is so patient,
and so good, and bears everything, I am sure no one was ever like him,
and it is so dreadful to see him work, work, work, every day from five
o'clock in the morning, and yet to be always worried with these debts
and people that will not let him have peace one single day. Do, please,
let him have less work to do, it makes me miserable to see him in the
rain, and he is not young now, and sometimes carrying such heavy things,
great pieces of timber and large trusses of hay, and making his back
ache digging. Surely it must soon be time for him to leave off working,
he has done such a lot, and I do not think he can see quite so well as
he used to, because he holds the paper so close to his eyes. Please let
him leave off working soon now and have some rest and change, and go
about with my mother, and when he is at home not have anything more to
do than his garden, because he is so fond of that; let him love the
flowers again as he used to, and plant some more, and have nothing
harder to do than to gather the fruit from the trees he has planted. And
let me get him some new books to read, because I know he is so fond of
books; he has not had a new book for so long. Let him go to London and
see people and things, and life, because I know he is full of ideas and
thoughts though he works and digs, and that is what would do him good.
Give him some money now at last, now he has worked all these years,
forty years on this farm, and ever so much work before that; do give him
some money at last. Do make my grandfather kinder to h