"Canada!" he echoed impatiently. "I think you fellows think that the soil is made of gold in Canada. What do you, of all people, want to go dancing off to Canada for? You're not a practical farmer, and even if you were there'd be better chances for you in the old country than in all the Canadas in the world."
"Well, you know more about these things than I do, sir," said Gotch respectfully. "And I don't say as I should want to go if it was all in the air like. But there's 'er brother's offer open to me. He'll put me into the way of doing as well as he done himself, if I can take a bit of money out with me. He's a well-to-do man, and he wasn't no better than me when he went over there ten years ago."
"Well, and ain't I giving you the offer of being a well-to-do man, without pulling up stakes and starting again in a new country? What more can a man want than to have a good home and situation secured to him, on which he can marry and bring up a family, and work that he's fitted for and likes? You do like your work, don't you?"
"Yes, sir, I should like it better than anything, if——"
"If what?"
"Well, I hope you won't take it amiss what I says, sir; but every man what's worth anything likes to be his own master, sir. It don't mean that he's any complaint to make of them as he serves; and I haven't no complaint—far otherwise. I've done my best by you, sir, and knowed as I should get credit for it, and be well treated, as I 'ave been most handsome, by your kind offer. But it isn't just what I want, sir, and I make bold to say so, hoping not to be misunderstood."
"Oh, you're not misunderstood," said the Squire, unsoftened by this straightforward speech. "The fact is that you've got some pestilent socialistic notion in your head that I'm very sorry to see there. I didn't think it of you, Gotch, and I don't like it. I don't like it at all. It's ungrateful."
"I'm sure I shouldn't wish to be that, sir."
"But you are that. Don't you see that you are? A master has his duty towards those under him, and in my case I'm going out of my way to do more than my duty to you. But a man has his duty towards his master too. That's what seems to be forgotten now-a-days. It's all self. I'm offering you something that ninety-nine men out of a hundred would jump at in your position, and you throw it in my face. You won't be any happier as your own master, I can tell you that. You've learnt your Catechism, and you know what it says about doing your duty in the state of life to which you are called. You are called plainly to the state of life in which you can do your share in keeping up the institutions that have made this country what it is; and you won't be doing right if you try to go outside it."
"Well, you'll excuse me, sir, if I don't see things quite in the same light. As long as I'm in your service, sir, I'll do my duty as well as I know how. But every man has got a right to try and better himself, to my way of thinking, and I did hope as how you'd see that, and lend me a hand to do well for myself."