Uncle Henry soothingly addressed the mother: "Sis," (he always addressed her as "Sis,"), "Alfred's not going to England. He has walked many dusty roads, like myself, and he's all the better for it, but you can't walk back from England. I've told him so. Alfred's going to stay right here in this country. He's all right. He's going with a circus. He's a better circus manager than plenty of them that's making money. When he gets a little older, hard behind the ears, we're going to get up a company and start him out right. I've talked it all over with Grimes and two or three other friends. Now you and John just let that boy alone. He'll come out all right."
The mother said: "Alfred has promised me he will not go with another circus. It keeps us worried all the time. I'm afraid something will happen him."
"Yes, something will happen him, and you take it from me, it will happen here or there, and it's more liable to happen here than there. Say, Sis, come on, be a sensible woman. Never drive your boys away. Never coax them to lie."
"Why, I haven't coaxed Alfred to lie," quickly answered the mother.
"Say, Sis, you've been coaxing that boy to lie since he was able to paddle his own canoe. Your coaxing him to do that, he will never do. That is, stay at home and paint wagons, houses or boats. Give him his way. He'll have it anyhow, you see if he don't. If he wants to start a grocery, I'll loan him the money. But, he'll never make a groceryman. Suppose they'd tried to make a preacher out me," (and all laughed), Uncle Henry said, "Yes, you laugh at the very idea of it. Let me tell you something, and I hope Alfred's high-falutin' preacher uncles and others won't get red in the face when they hear of it. If you all keep caterwauling Alfred around, he wouldn't amount to three hurrahs in Halifax."
"He may work for Doctor Hawkes forty years longer and he will be no better off than a living. There's no hope for a boy in working for a man like Doctor Hawkes. The Doctor's all right but he never assisted a human being to better himself. He's like all other rich men. He just uses men to pile it up for himself, and any man that can't pile it up for himself, or don't make a big try to do so, needs shingling. I never had any relatives to pull me back, and I never had any to put me forward."
"Where is your brother and his wife?" someone asked Uncle Henry.
"Wheeling cinders," came quick as a flash.
"Oh, Uncle Henry, I am surprised."
"Well, the reason I say that, is, they told me that people that did certain things would sure go there"—and he pointed downwards—"and they did those very things so what can I say when you ask me where they are?"