“It’s ’most more than I can understand after all.”
Chapter Thirty Four.
Winding up with a Dab of Clay.
To enter into the occurrences of the next few years would be to give the business career of young men, when the object of this book was to tell of some of the pleasant adventurous days passed by three boys and their friends in that beautiful rugged county in the far west of England which the sea wraps so warmly that winter is shorn of half his force.
It is only right to tell, though, that Mrs Marion, upon being taught by Mr Temple’s treatment of her nephew that the boy was what some would call a lad of parts, suddenly began to display a deep interest in him—in his clothes—in his linen; and Uncle Abram found her one day scolding poor Amanda the maid till she put her apron over her head and sat down on the floor and cried.
Uncle Abram stood smoking his pipe and sending puffs here and there as Aunt Marion’s tirade of bitterness went on.
“What’s matter?” he said at last.
“Matter!” cried the old lady fiercely. “Matter enough. Here’s this thoughtless, careless hussy actually been throwing away some specimens of ore that Will brought in. I declare it’s monstrous—that it is.”