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12 spirit had been constantly curbed by the mother, who dreaded to think of having any one of them leave her.

At Mrs. Russell's untimely death, life had changed for her sons as a summer sky changes when a cold and wild thunder storm rushes on. The pleasant home had been broken up by the harsh and dictatorial Job Dowling, a man who thought of nothing but to make money and save it. He took charge of everything, sold off the household treasures at the highest possible prices, placed the cash in the best of the Buffalo banks, and took the boys to live with him in a tumble-down cottage on a side street, presided over by an old Irishwoman, for Dowling was a bachelor.

The first strife had arisen from the selling of some little articles which had belonged to Mrs. Russell's personal effects, and which the boys wished to save as keepsakes. "It's all foolishness, a-keepin' of 'em," Job Dowling had cried. "I won't cater to no such softheartedness. I'll sell the things and put the money in the bank, where it will be a-drawin' interest;" and this he did with the majority of the articles. A few the boys hid, and these were all that were left to them when the final break-up came.