Page:Emma Speed Sampson--The shorn lamb.djvu/161



Philip Bolling's summer had been one of unceasing labor, mental and physical. He felt that if he could not assert his supremacy on his father's farm and make Old Abe understand that he was master he would deserve to be ruled by the blacks, having been weighed in the balance and found wanting. If his superior mentality and education could not make him the master then it was proof that he lacked character. Philip's boyhood had been one of meekly giving up and doing what his father commanded. It had been the only way to keep the peace, and peace for his mother had been the one idea. She had always entreated him to avoid quarrels, as she feared the vindictiveness of Aunt Peachy and her influence on Rolfe Bolling. She still feared it, and begged her son not to be rash in his treatment of Aunt Peachy's son, Old Abe, and his swarms of lazy, thieving offspring, headed by Young Abe and Little Abe.

Philip smiled at his mother's fears.