“Eh, my lad, my lad!” Lisbeth burst out immediately, her wailing impulse returning, for grief in its freshness feels the need of associating its loss and its lament with every change of scene and incident, “thee’st got nobody now but thy old mother to torment thee and be a burden to thee.  Thy poor feyther ‘ull ne’er anger thee no more; an’ thy mother may’s well go arter him—­the sooner the better—­for I’m no good to nobody now.  One old coat ’ull do to patch another, but it’s good for nought else.  Thee’dst like to ha’ a wife to mend thy clothes an’ get thy victual, better nor thy old mother.  An’ I shall be nought but cumber, a-sittin’ i’ th’ chimney-corner. (Adam winced and moved uneasily; he dreaded, of all things, to hear his mother speak of Hetty.) But if thy feyther had lived, he’d ne’er ha’ wanted me to go to make room for another, for he could no more ha’ done wi’out me nor one side o’ the scissars can do wi’out th’ other.  Eh, we should ha’ been both flung away together, an’ then I shouldna ha’ seen this day, an’ one buryin’ ‘ud ha’ done for us both.”

Here Lisbeth paused, but Adam sat in pained silence—­he could not speak otherwise than tenderly to his mother to-day, but he could not help being irritated by this plaint.  It was not possible for poor Lisbeth to know how it affected Adam any more than it is possible for a wounded dog to know how his moans affect the nerves of his master.  Like all complaining women, she complained in the expectation of being soothed, and when Adam said nothing, she was only prompted to complain more bitterly.

“I know thee couldst do better wi’out me, for thee couldst go where thee likedst an’ marry them as thee likedst.  But I donna want to say thee nay, let thee bring home who thee wut; I’d ne’er open my lips to find faut, for when folks is old an’ o’ no use, they may think theirsens well off to get the bit an’ the sup, though they’n to swallow ill words wi’t.  An’ if thee’st set thy heart on a lass as’ll bring thee nought and waste all, when thee mightst ha’ them as ’ud make a man on thee, I’ll say nought, now thy feyther’s dead an’ drownded, for I’m no better nor an old haft when the blade’s gone.”

Adam, unable to bear this any longer, rose silently from the bench and walked out of the workshop into the kitchen.  But Lisbeth followed him.

“Thee wutna go upstairs an’ see thy feyther then?  I’n done everythin’ now, an’ he’d like thee to go an’ look at him, for he war allays so pleased when thee wast mild to him.”

Adam turned round at once and said, “Yes, mother; let us go upstairs.  Come, Seth, let us go together.”

They went upstairs, and for five minutes all was silence.  Then the key was turned again, and there was a sound of footsteps on the stairs.  But Adam did not come down again; he was too weary and worn-out to encounter more of his mother’s querulous grief, and he went to rest on his bed.  Lisbeth no sooner entered the kitchen and sat down than she threw her apron over her head, and began to cry and moan and rock herself as before.  Seth thought, “She will be quieter by and by, now we have been upstairs”; and he went into the back kitchen again, to tend his little fire, hoping that he should presently induce her to have some tea.