“’Stephen, I’m going to America.  My heart and hands were never made for trading and cotton-spinning.  I hev been raised on the land.  I hev lived on the land and eaten and drunk what the land gave me.  All my forefathers did the same, and the noise and smell of these new-fangled factories takes the heart out of me.  I hev a bit of brass left, and while I hev it I am going to buy me a farm where good land is sold by the acre and not by feet and inches.  Now, then, I’ll sell thee my mill, and its fifty looms, and heppen it may do cheerfully for thee what it will not do anyway for me.  Will tha buy it?’”

“Poor chap!” interrupted Harry.  “I know just how he felt.  I am sorry for him.”

“You needn’t be anything of that sort, Harry.  He is a big landowner now and a senator and a millionaire.  So save thy pity for someone that needs it.  As I was saying, he offered to sell his mill to thy father and thy father snapped at the offer, and it was settled there and then as they stood in Woodleigh meadows.”

“What did father pay for it?” asked Harry.

“Nay, my dear, I cannot tell thee.  Thy father never told his women folk what he made or what he spent.  It wasn’t likely.  But it was a fair bargain, no doubt, for when they had settled it, Ezra said, ’Good-bye, Stephen!  I shall not see thee again in this world!’ and he pulled out his watch and father took out his and they changed watches for the memory of each other.  Then they clasped hands and said farewell.  But they wrote to each other at every New Year, and when thy father died Ezra’s watch was sent back to him.  Then Ezra knew his friend had no longer any need to count time.  He had gone into Eternity.”

“It was a good custom, mother,” said John.  “It is a pity such customs are dying out.”

“They have to die, John,” answered Mrs. Hatton, “for there’s no friendships like that now.  People have newspapers and books dirt cheap and clubs just as cheap, and all kinds of balls to amuse them—­they never feel the need of a friend.  Just look at our John.  He has lots of acquaintances, but he does not want to change watches with any man—­does he, now?”

The young men laughed, and Harry said if they had let friends go they had not given up sweethearts.  Then Mrs. Hatton felt they were on dangerous ground, and she continued her story at once.

“Thy father and I had been nearly three years married then, and John was a baby ten months old.  I had not troubled myself much about debt or poverty or danger for the old Hall.  I was happy enough with my little son, and somehow I felt sure that Stephen Hatton would overget all his worries and anxieties.

“Now listen to me!  I woke up that night and I judged by the high moon that it was about midnight.  Then I nursed my baby and tucked him snugly in his cradle.  Thy father had not come to his bed but that was no care to me; he often sat reading or figuring half the night through.  It was Stephen Hatton’s way—­but suddenly I heard a voice—­the voice of a man praying.  That is a sound, my dears, you can never mistake.  When the soul speaks to its God and its Father, it has a different voice to the one a man uses with his fellowmen, when he talks to them about warps and yarns and shillings.