outskirts of Sidmouth.

If she would have taken boarders, she could have obtained far higher
terms, for good schools were scarce; but this she would not do, and her
pupils all lived within distances where they could walk backwards and
forwards to their homes. Her evenings she devoted to her son, and,
though the education which she was enabled to give him would be
considered meagre, indeed, in these days of universal cramming, he
learned as much as the average boy of the period.

He would have learned more had he followed her desires, and devoted the
time when she was engaged in teaching to his books; but this he did not
do. For a few hours in the day he would work vigorously at his lessons.
The rest of his time he spent either on the seashore, or in the boats
of the fishermen; and he could swim, row, or handle a boat under sail
in all weather, as well or better than any lad in the village of his
own age.

His disposition was a happy one, and he was a general favourite among
the boatmen. He had not, as yet, made up his mind as to his future. His
mother wanted him to follow his father's profession. He himself longed
to go to sea, but he had promised his mother that he would never do so
without her consent, and that consent he had no hope of obtaining.

The better-class people in the village shook their heads gravely over
James Walsham, and prophesied no good things of him. They considered
that he demeaned himself greatly by association with the fisher boys,
and more than once he had fallen into disgrace, with the more quiet
minded of the inhabitants, by mischievous pranks. His reputation that
way once established, every bit of mischief in the place, which could
not be clearly traced to someone else, was put down to him; and as he
was not one who would peach upon others to save himself, he was seldom
in a position to prove his innocence.

The parson had once called upon Mrs. Walsham, and had talked to her
gravely over her son's delinquencies, but his success had not been
equal to his anticipations. Mrs. Walsham had stood up warmly for her
son.

"The boy may get into mischief sometimes, Mr. Allanby, but it is the
nature of boys to do so. James is a good boy, upright and honourable,
and would not tell a lie under any consideration. What is he to do? If
I could afford to send him to a good school it would be a different
thing, but that you know I cannot do. From nine in the morning, until
five in the afternoon, my tim