hover about her in an agitated manner, as she says, what a likely lad, what a fine lad, what a gay, good-humoured, clever lad he was ! Her second son would have been provided for at Chesney Wold, and would have been made steward in due season ; but he took, when he was a schoolboy, to constructing steam-engines out of saucepans, and setting birds to draw their own water, with the least possible amount of labor ; so assisting them with artful contrivance of hydraulic pressure, that a thirsty canary had only, in a literal sense, to put his shoulder to the wheel, and the job was done. This propensity gave Mrs. Rouncewell great uneasiness. She felt it, with a mother′s anguish, to be a move in the Wat Tyler direction : well knowing that Sir Leicester had that general impression of an aptitude for any art to which smoke and a tall chimney might be considered essential. But the doomed young rebel (otherwise a mild youth, and very persevering), showing no sign of grace as he got older ; but, on the contrary, constructing a model of a power-loom, she was fain, with many tears, to mention his backslidings to the baronet. “Mrs. Rouncewell,” said Sir Leicester, “I can never consent to argue, as you know, with any one on any subject. You had better get rid of your boy ; you had better get him into some Works. The iron country farther north is, I suppose, the congenial direction for a boy with these tendencies.” Farther north he went, and farther north he grew up ; and if Sir Leicester Dedlock ever saw him, when he came to Chesney Wold to visit his mother, or ever thought of him afterwards, it is certain that he only regarded him as one of a body of some odd thousand conspirators, swarthy and grim, who were in the habit of turning out by torch-light, two or three nights in the week, for unlawful purposes.
Nevertheless Mrs. Rouncewell′s son has, in the course of nature and art, grown up, and established himself, and married, and called unto him Mrs. Rouncewell′s grandson : who, being out of his apprenticeship, and home from a journey in far countries, whither he was sent to enlarge his knowledge and complete his preparation for the venture of this life, stands leaning against the chimney-piece this very day, in Mrs. Rouncewell′s room at Chesney Wold.
“And, again and again, I am glad to see you. Watt ! And, once again, I am glad to see you. Watt !” says Mrs. Rouncewell. “You are a fine young fellow. You are like your poor uncle George. Ah !”
Mrs. Rouncewell′s hands unquiet, as usual, on this reference.
“They say I am like my father, grandmother.”
“Like him, also, my dear, — but most like your poor uncle George ! And your dear father.” Mrs. Rouncewell folds her hands again. “He is well?”
“Thriving, grandmother, in every way.”
“I am thankful !” Mrs. Rouncewell is fond of her son, but has a plaintive feeling towards him—much as if he were a very honorable soldier, who had gone over to the enemy.
“He is quite happy ?” says she.
“Quite.”
“I am thankful ! So, he has brought you up to follow in his ways, and has sent you into foreign countries and the like ? Well, he knows best. There may be a world beyond Chesney Wold that I don′t understand. Though I am not young, either. And I have seen a quantity of good company too !”
