I dare say that Uncle Silas thought for a while that
he was a righteous man. He wished to have heaven and to escape hell, if
there were such places. But there were other things whose existence was
not speculative, of which some he coveted, and some he dreaded more, and
temptation came. 'Now if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver,
precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made
manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by
fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.' There
comes with old age a time when the heart is no longer fusible or malleable,
and must retain the form in which it has cooled down. 'He that is unjust,
let him be unjust still; he which is filthy, let him be filthy still.'
Dudley had disappeared; but in one of her letters, Meg, writing from her
Australian farm, says: 'There's a fella in toon as calls hisself Colbroke,
wi' a good hoose o' wood, 15 foot length, and as by 'bout as silling o' the
pearler o' Bartram--only lots o' rats, they do say, my lady--a bying and
sellin' of goold back and forred wi' the diggin foke and the marchants.
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