y a poor,
unprotected widow like me--might, at least, come into your house about
her necessary business without being insulted; I thought that if there
was one house above another where I ought to expect protection, it is
yours. It's your duty, I think, to protect them that's livin' upon
this property, and strugglin' to pay you, or him that employs you, the
hard-earned rent that keeps them in poverty and hardship. I think, sir,
it ought to be your duty, as I said, to protect me, and such as me,
rather than leave us exposed to the abominable proposals of your son."

"How is this?" said Val; "where are you, Phil?"

Phil entered with a grin on him, that betrayed very clearly the morals
of the father, as well as of himself. There was not the slightest
appearance of shame or confusion about him; on the contrary, he looked
upon the matter as a good joke, but, by no means, so good as if it had
been successful.

"Phil," said his father, barely restraining a smile, "is it possible
that you could dare to insult Mrs. Tyrrell under this roof?"

"D--n my honor, a confounded lie," replied Phil; "she wanted me to lend
her the money, and because I did not, she told you I made proposals to
her. All revenge and a lie."

Mrs. Tyrrell looked at him--"Well," said she, "if there is a just God
in heaven, you will be made an example of yet. Oh! little they know that
own this property, and every other property like it--of the insults,
and hardships, and oppressions, that their tenantry must suffer in
their absence from them that's placed over them; and without any one to
protect them or appeal to for satisfaction or relief--sir, that villain
in the shape of your son--that cowardly villain knows that the words he
insulted me in are not yet cowld upon his lips."

"I have reason to put every confidence in what my son says," replied
Val very coolly, "and he is not a villain, Mrs. Tyrrell--so I wish you a
good morning, ma'am!"

This virtuous poor woman flushed with a sense of outraged modesty, with
scorn and indignation, left the room; and with a distracted mind and
a breaking heart, sought her orphan, whose innocent face of wonder she
bedewed on her return home with tears of the bitterest sorrow.

It is not our intention to describe at full length the several
melancholy scenes which occurred between poverty and dependence on one
side and cold, cruel, insolent authority, on the other. It is needless
and would be painful to tell how much age