“I do not want more, thank you,” said the man: “you have lived in this old house a long while, have you not?”
“Why, yes, we have,” said James; “it is near fifty years since we first came. Pray have you been here before?”
“How can you ask?” said Kate, “such an out-of-the-way place as it is.”
“I used to know it quite well, when I was a boy: I lived not far from here, then,” said the seaman.
“There now, wife,” said James.
“Lived near here!” said Kate: “why when you were a boy, there could not have been a house within three miles of this: pray what was your name?”
“I will tell you by and by,” said the man: “but can you tell me where Charles and Ned Grant are gone? I used to play with them when we were young, and I love them very much.”
“Charles and Ned Grant!” said both the old folks at once, “why who should they be but our own boys! they have left us a long while now. Charles went a long way off, where he could get more work than in this land; and Ned lives at a farm of his own, and has a wife and child.”
“You had a son John, who went to sea, had you not?” said the man.
“Oh, yes, and a dear son he was: when you came in you put me so in mind of him,” said Kate; “but we fear he must be dead now, for he never writes to us or comes to see us.”