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 very much the same eyes. But the people who are good enough to criticize me without, perhaps, taking the trouble to ascertain even the facts of the case.

I have always said that I would not stir a finger to interfere with my boy Will, or any one else of that age, where the heart was concerned. They, for all their inexperience, must be the ultimate judges; the wisdom of instinct and so on and so forth. The responsibility on an outsider is too great even for advice; and the advice of a mother to the son who adores her. . . There is such a thing as having too much power put into one’s hands. I don’t say I’m right; but, if Will married a girl whom I considered the most unsuitable person in the world. . . So long as he loved her, and she loved him. . . Have I been inconsistent there? I have always said that for a boy of his tastes and upbringing some little money is essential as light and air. A truism! Have I been inconsistent here?

I don’t want to blow my own trumpet, as they say; and I resent this modern practice of proclaiming to the whole world how much one loves one’s own flesh and blood—as though it were something very new and wonderful; but you have never doubted that I would sell the clothes from off my back and the roof from over