e cottage, without work
to do."

"What should I do wi'out my work, Jack? noa, lad, I must work as long as
I can, or I should die o' pure idleness. But I needn't work at a stall.
I'm fifty now, and although I ha' got another fifteen years' work in me,
I hope, my bones bean't as liss as they was. Thou might give me the job
as underground viewer. I can put in a prop or see to the firing o' a
shot wi' any man. Oi've told my mates you want to have me and the old
woman oop at th' house, and they'll know that if I stop underground it
be o' my own choice. I know, lad, it wouldn't be roight for me to be a
getting droonk at the "Chequers" and thou manager; but I ha' told t' old
'ooman that I will swear off liquor altogether."

"No, no, dad!" Jack said, affected at this proof of Bill Haden's desire
to do what he could towards maintaining his dignity. "I wouldn't think
o't. If you and mother feel that you'd be more happy and comfortable
here--and maybe you are right, I didn't think over the matter from thy
side as well as my own, as I ought to have done--of course you shall
stay here; and, of course, you shall have a berth as under-viewer. As
for swearing off drink altogether, I wouldn't ask it of you, though I do
wish you could resolve never to drink too much again. You ha' been used
to go to the "Chequers" every night for nigh forty years, and you
couldn't give it up now. You would pine away without somewhere to go to.
However, this must be understood, whenever you like to come up to me I
shall be glad to see you, and I shall expect you on Sundays to dinner if
on no other day; and whenever the time shall come when you feel, dad,
that you'd rather give up work, there will be a cottage for you and
mother somewhere handy to me, and enough to live comfortably and free
from care."

"That's a bargain, lad, and I'm roight glad it be off my mind, for I
ha' been bothering over't ever since thee spoke to me last."

The same evening Jack had a long talk with Harry. His friend, although
healthy, was by no means physically strong, and found the work of a
miner almost beyond him. He had never taken to the life as Jack had
done, and his friend knew that for the last year or two he had been
turning his thoughts in other directions, and that of all things he
would like to be a schoolmaster. He had for years read and studied a
good deal, and Mr. Dodgson said that with a year in a training college
he would be able to pass. He had often talked t