Year after year, until his mother died, he never failed in his kindness towards her, and the old dame was wont to express a kind of comic surprise at the womanish demeanour of her son.  He caught fish for his living, but a cramped piece of reasoning forced him to the conclusion that it would be wrong for him to shoot any more birds.  He said, “The birds was made by God, and God’s been good to me, and I am not going to hurt them.”  Sunday after Sunday in all weathers he strode off to the moor.  Wayfarers would meet him at night when the wind was hurling down from the Cheviots and bringing clouds of snow.  He had but one salutation for all who met him:  “Good night, my man; God bless you till the mornin’.”

Sometimes, when the paths were so foul that nothing but wading would take a man over the moor, Tommy was greatly puzzled about finding his way, and one night he and Musgrave walked unsuspectingly over a low cliff, and fell softly upon a great ridge of sand.  But these little misadventures did not by any means daunt Tommy.  His new religion was that he must be at chapel twice every Sunday, and at prayer-meetings as often through the week as Musgrave chose to take him.  To this he held.  The Squire’s pheasants suffered no longer, and Tommy’s big lurcher displayed a tendency towards virtue which earned him the admiration of all the gamekeepers on the estate.  Efforts were made to get the big man to pray at the ordinary love-feasts that were held in connection with the chapel, but he always said, “No; my Father and me has all our conversations to ourselves.  It is not as if God didn’t know; but I don’t think a blackguard like me should address Him face to face after the life I have led.”

The years went by, and Tommy’s shaggy beard showed signs of grizzling.  His huge limbs were more deliberate in their movement, and his low forehead had somehow or other acquired a certain spiritual aspect.  He wrought at his trade, saved money, and spent some in decorating his mother’s grave.  One night, when he was smoking his pipe with Musgrave, he said—­

“Christ died for all the lot of us, didn’t He?  That was a rare thing to do.  Now, suppose He says, when I meet Him, ’What are you doing here?  You have done nothing but go to chapel.’  Now, Mr. Musgrave, will you tell me this:  what should I say in a case of that sort?”

Old Musgrave wrinkled his wise brows and replied, “Thomas, my man, He knows your heart.  I suppose you think you ought to save life, or something of that kind, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir, that’s just what I do think,” said Thomas.

“Well, believe me, your chance will come.  Now let’s light up our pipes, and walk over the moor home, Thomas, and puzzle yourself no more about these things.”

A bad winter came, and the thundering seas broke so continually over the rocks that it was impossible for the men to get bait on their own rocks.  All day long the loungers walked the cliff edge, and watched the columns of spray hissing up from the black rocks.  Day after day the clouds seemed to mix themselves with the sea as they laid their grey shoulders to the water.  Money became scarce in the village, and the men who had savings had to help those who were poorer.  When things got almost too bad for bearing, Billy Armstrong said to one of his friends—­