Of late, however, there had been growing friction between Cuthbert and his father.  The youth, who had remained longer a boy in his secluded life than he would have done had his lot been cast in a wider sphere, was awakening at last to the stirrings of manhood within him, and was chafing against the fetters, both physical and spiritual, laid upon him by the life he was forced to lead through the tyrannical will of his father.  He was beginning, in a semi-conscious fashion, to pant for freedom, and to rebel against the harsh paternal yoke.

When a struggle of wills commences, the friction continues a long while before the spark is produced; but when some unwonted contest has ignited this, the flame often bursts out in wonderful fury, and the whole scene is thence forward changed.

If the old man’s blood was up today, Cuthbert’s was no less so.  He shook himself free for a moment from his father’s grasp and stood before him, tall, upright, indignant, no fear in his face, but a deep anger and pain; and his words were spoken with great emphasis and deliberation.

“I will swear nothing of all that.  I claim for myself the right of a man to judge for myself and act for myself.  I am a boy no longer; I have reached man’s estate.  I will be threatened and intimidated no longer by any man, even though he be my father.  I am ready and willing to leave your house this very day.  I am weary of the life here.  I would fain carve out fortune for myself.  It is plain that we cannot be agreed; wherefore it plainly behoves us to part.  Let me then go, but let me go in peace.  It may be when I return to these doors you may have learned to think more kindly of me.”

But the very calmness of these words only stung Nicholas to greater fury.  He had in full force that inherent belief, so deeply rooted in the minds of many of the sons of Rome, that conviction as well as submission could be compelled—­could be driven into the minds and consciences of recalcitrant sons and daughters by sheer force and might.  Gnashing his teeth in fury, he sprang once more upon his son, winding his strong arms about him, and fairly lifting him from the ground in his paroxysm of fury.

“Go! ay, we will see about that.  Go, and carry your false stories and falser thoughts out into the world, and pollute others as you yourself have been polluted! we will think of that anon.  Here thou art safe in thy father’s care, and it will be well to think further ere we let so rabid a heretic stray from these walls.  Wretched boy! the devil himself must sure have entered into thee.  But fiends have been exorcised before now.  It shall not be the fault of Nicholas Trevlyn if this one be not quickly forced to take flight!”