"I will not have it. He shall not marry her!" again broke from the angry man. "He does it to defy me."
"There you are in error. It is you who have forced him into a position of estrangement, and apparent rebellion, because you will not suffer him to obey his own heart. He seeks his happiness in a way different from what you had mapped out; but it is his happiness, and he is better able to judge what conduces thereto than are you."
"I do know better than he. Does it lead to happiness to live separated from me—for I will never see him if he marries that hussy? Will it be to his happiness to see Hall pass away into other hands? Never, so help me God! shall he bring her over my threshold—certainly never as mistress. Answer me that."
The blood mounted to Luke's cheeks, and burnt there in two angry spots.
"Master Cleverdon," he said, and his voice assumed the authority of a priest, "your own wrongdoing is turning against you and yours. You did Urith's father a wrong, and you hate him and his daughter because you know that you were guilty towards him. You took from him the woman he loved, and who loved him, and sought to build your domestic happiness on broken hearts. You failed: you know by bitter experience how great was your failure; and, instead of being humbled thereby, and reproaching yourself, you become rancorous against his innocent child."
"You—you, say this! You beggar, whom I raised from the dunghill, fed, and clothed?"
"I say it," answered Luke, with calmness, but with the flame still in his cheek, "only because I am grateful to you for what you did me, and I would bring you to the most blessed, peace-giving, and hopeful state that exists—a state to which we must all come, sooner or later—some soon, some late, if ever we are to pass into the world of Light—a knowledge of self. Do not think that I reproach you for any other reason. You know that I speak the truth, but you will not admit it—bow your head and beat your breast, and submit to the will of God."
The Squire folded his arms and glared from under his heavy eyebrows at the audacious young man who presumed to hold up to him a mirror.
"You will not refrain from reading these banns?"