‘May I come in?’ said the mother, knocking at the door.

‘Oh yes, mamma.  Don’t you think baby is very like his father?’

’I dare say.  I do not know that I am good at tracing likenesses.  He certainly is like you.’

‘So much more like his father!’ said Hester.

After that there was a pause, and then the mother commenced her task in her most serious voice.  ’Hester, my child, you can understand that a duty may become so imperious that it must be performed.’

‘Yes,’ said Hester, pressing her lips close together ’I can understand that.’  There might be a duty very necessary for her to perform, though in the performance of it she should be driven to quarrel absolutely with her own mother.

‘So it is with me.  Whom do you think I love best in all the world?’

‘Papa.’

’I do love your father dearly, and I endeavour, by God’s grace, to do my duty by him, though, I fear, it is done imperfectly.  But, my child, our hearts, I think, yearn more to those who are younger than ourselves than to our elders.  We love best those whom we have cherished and protected, and whom we may perhaps still cherish and protect.  When I try to tear my heart away from the things of this vile world, it clings to you—­to you—­to you!’

Of course this could not be borne without an embrace ‘Oh, mamma!’ Hester exclaimed, throwing herself on her knees before her mother’s lap.

’If you suffer, must not I suffer?  If you rejoice, would I not fain rejoice with you if I could?  Did I not bring you into the world, my only one, and nursed you, and prayed for you, and watched you with all a mother’s care as you grew up among the troubles of the world?  Have you not known that my heart has been too soft towards you even for the due performance of my duties?’

‘You have always been good to me, mamma.’

’And am I altered now?  Do you think that a mother’s heart can be changed to her only child?’

‘No, mamma.’

’No, Hester.  That, I think, is impossible.  Though for the last twelve months I have not seen you day by day,—­though I have not prepared the food which you eat and the clothes which you wear, as I used to do,—­you have been as constantly in my mind.  You are still my child, my only child.’

‘Mamma, I know you love me.’

’I so love you as to know that I sin in so loving aught that is human.  And so loving you, must I not do my duty by you?  When love and duty both compel me to speak, how shall I be silent?’

‘You have said it, mamma,’ said Hester, slowly drawing herself up from off the ground.

’And is saying it once enough, when, as I think, the very soul, the immortal soul, of her who is of all the dearest to me depends on what I may say;—­may be saved, or, oh, perhaps lost for ever by the manner in which I may say it!  How am I not to speak when such thoughts as these are heavy within me?’