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He grinned, showing a grimy, and jeering and unpleasant red mouth and white teeth.

“I s’ll gi’e thee a dab ower th’ mouth,” said the mother of the baby grimly. He began to sing again, and she struck out at him.

“Now what’s to do?” said the father, staggering in.

The youth began to sing again. His sister stood sullen and furious.

“Why, does thatupset you?” asked the eldest Miss Rowbotham, sharply, of Emma the mother. “Good gracious, it hasn’t improved your temper. ”

Miss Bertha came in, and took the bonny baby.

The father sat big and unheeding in his chair, his eyes vacant, his physique wrecked. He let them do as they would, he fell to pieces. And yet some power, involuntary, like a curse, remained in him. The very ruin of him was like a lodestone that held them in its control. The wreck of him still dominated the house, in his dissolution even he compelled their being. They had never lived; his life, his will had always been upon them and contained them. They were only half-individuals.

The day after the christening he staggered in at the doorway declaring, in a loud voice, with joy in life still: “The daisies light up the earth, they clap their hands in multitudes, in praise of the morning. ” And his daughters shrank, sullen.