"But you are in a working dress, and not in a state to receive me, who never cleaned out the president's barn, milked his cow, or dug his potatoes, and you are smutty."
Thus saying, Morton rubbed his hand on the top of the bellows, and made an awful smut spot across the whole side of his face.
"Will that remove your scruples, old chum? How are you?"
"O, Mort, I'm so glad to see you!"
"Expected you'd be; that's what I came for; didn't come for anything else; 'kalkerlated,' as Uncle Tim would say, to make you glad."
Rich now introduced Morton to his father and uncle, who received him without any of the embarrassment that had overwhelmed Rich, and in a most hearty manner.
"You must excuse, Mr. Morton," said Clement, "my son's constraint upon first seeing you; it was occasioned by the recollection of the change in our circumstances, in consequence of which he cannot entertain as he would wish the friend he loves so dearly, and whom we have all learned through him to love, even before meeting. If we have been unfortunate, it is no more than has overtaken more deserving persons than ourselves, and our losses have neither chilled our hearts nor discouraged us from effort."
"We think," said Robert, "that as we earned all we have lost by our own industry, we can, by the same means, better our condition."
"I am sorry, Mr. Morton," said Clement, "to be obliged to keep my son till this horse is shod, as the owner is waiting, and there is a new shoe to make; but after that he will be at liberty.—Strike, Robert."