“Have you?  Well, Thomas, why didn’t you bring her along?”

“She was not willing to come to this country,” returned Thomas.

“Then why did you come?”

“Because it was better to do so than to starve where I was.”

“It doesn’t matter about your wife, I suppose?”

“Why not?” Thomas spoke quickly, and knit his brows.

“If you couldn’t live in England, what is your wife to do?”

“I shall send her half of my wages.”

“Ah, that’s the calculation, is it?  But it seems to me that it would have been a saving in money as well as comfort, if she had come with you.  Does she know any thing about dairy work?”

“Yes, sir; she was raised on a dairy farm.”

“Then she’s a regular-bred English dairy maid?”

“She is, and none better in the world.”

“Just the person I want.  You must write home for her, Thomas, and tell her she must come over immediately.”

But Thomas shook his head.

“Won’t she come?”

“I cannot tell.  But she refused to come with me, although I repeatedly urged her.  She must now take her own course.  I felt, it to be my duty to her as well as to myself, to leave England for a better land; and if she thinks it her duty to stay behind, I must bear the separation the best way I can.”

“I hope you had no quarrel, Thomas?” said the farmer, in his blunt way.

“No, sir,” said Thomas, a little indignantly.  “We never had the slightest difference, except in this matter.”

“Then write home by the next steamer and ask her to join you, and she will be here by the earliest packet, and glad to come.”

But Thomas shook his head.  The man had his share of stubborn pride.

“As you will,” said the farmer.  “But I can tell you what, if she’d been my wife, I’d have taken her under my arm and brought her along in spite of all objections.  It’s too silly, this giving up to and being fretted about a woman’s whims and prejudices.  I’ll be bound, if you’d told her she must come, and packed her trunk for her to show that you were in earnest, she’d never have dreamed of staying behind.”

That evening Thomas wrote home to his wife all about the excellent place he had obtained, and was particular to say that he had agreed to remain for a year, and would send her half of his wages every month.  Not one word, however, did he mention of the conversation that had passed between him and the farmer; nor did he hint, even remotely, to her joining him in the United States.

All the next day Thomas thought about what the farmer had said, and thought how happy both he and Lizzy might be if she would only come over and take charge of the dairy.  The longer this idea remained present in his mind, the more deeply did it fix itself there.  On the second night he dreamed that Lizzy was with him, that she had come over in the very next packet, and that they were as happy as they could be.  He felt very bad when he awoke and found that it was only a dream.