There were three to sit by the kitchen stove now and talk of an evening from half-past nine till ten, and they were the widow and Pat and Mike.

"It's Andy that makes me astonished quite," observed Mrs. O'Callaghan. "Here it is the first of December and him three months at Gineral Brady's and gettin' fat on it. He niver got fat to home, and that's what bates me."

"Well, mother, he's got a nice big room by himself to sleep in. The Physiology's down on crowding, and five boys in one bedroom ain't good for a nervous boy like Andy."

"Nor it ain't good for the rest of you, nayther," responded Mrs. O'Callaghan, with conviction.

"What do you say, b'ys? Shall we ask the landlord to put us on another room in the spring? He'll raise the rint on us if he does."

The widow regarded her sons attentively, and they, feeling the proud responsibility of being consulted by their mother, answered as she would have them.

"Then that's settled," said she. "The more room, the more rint. Any landlord can see that—a lawyer, anyway. Do you think, b'ys, Andy'll be a lawyer when he comes from college?"

"Why, mother?" asked Pat.

"'Cause I don't want him to be. He ain't got it in him to be comin' down hard and sharp on folks, and so he won't be a good wan. He'll be at the law loike little Jim at puddin's. You niver was to coort, was you, b'ys?"

Pat and Mike confessed that they had never been at court.

"I knowed you hadn't. I jist asked you. Well, you see, b'ys, them lawyers gets the witnesses up and asks 'em all sorts of impudent questions, and jist as good as tells 'em they lies quite often. Andy couldn't niver do the loikes of that. 'Tain't in him. Do you know, b'ys, folks can't do what ain't in 'em, no matter if they do go to college. Now little Jim's the wan for a lawyer. He'd be the wan to make a man forget his own name, and all on account of impudent questions."

Pat and Mike looked surprised. They were both fond of little Jim, Mike particularly so.

"I see you wonders at me, but little Jim's a-worryin' me. I don't know what to be doin' with him. B'ys, would you belave it? I can't teach him a thing. Burn the steak he will if I lave him with it, and Moike knows the sort of a bed he makes. He's clane out of the notion of that West P'int and bein' a foightin' man, and the teacher's down on him at the school for niver larnin' his lessons. And the fear's with me night and day that he'll get to be wan of them agitators yet."

Pat and Mike looked at each other. Never before had their mother said a word to them about any of their brothers. And while they looked at each other the brave little woman kept her eyes fixed on the stove.

"The first step to bein' an agitator," she resumed as if half to herself, "is niver to be doin' what you're set to do good. Then, of course, them you work for don't loike it, and small blame to 'em. And the nixt thing is to get turned off and somebody as will do it good put in your place. And then the nixt step is to go around tellin' iverybody you meets, whether you knows 'em or not, how you're down on your luck. And how it's a bad world with no chance in it for poor folks, when iverybody knows most of the rich folks begun poor, and if there's no chance for poor folks, how comes them that's rich now to be rich when they started poor? And then the nixt step is to make them that's content out of humor, rilin' 'em up with wishin' for what they've got no business with, seein' they hain't earned it. And that's all there is to it, for sure when you've got that far you're wan of them agitators."

The boys listened respectfully, and their mother went on: "Little Jim's got started that way. He's that far along that he don't do nothin' good he's set at only when it's a happen so. You can't depind on him. I've got to head him off from bein' an agitator, for he's your father's b'y, and I can't meet Tim in the nixt world if I let Jim get ahead of me. B'ys, will you help me? I've always been thinkin' I couldn't have your help; I must do it alone. But, b'ys, I can't do it alone." The little woman's countenance was anxious as she gazed into the sober faces of Pat and Mike.

Nothing but boys themselves, though with the reliability of men, they promised to help.

"I knowed you would," said the widow gratefully. "And now good night to you. It's gettin' late. But you've eased my moind wonderful. Just the spakin' out has done me good. Maybe he'll come through all roight yet."

The next morning Mrs. O'Callaghan rose with a face bright as ever, but Pat and Mike were still sober.

"Cheer up!" was her greeting as they came into the kitchen where she was already bustling about the stove. "Cheer up, and stand ready till I give you the word. I'm goin' to have wan more big try at Jim. You took such a load off me with your listenin' to me and promisin' to help that it's heartened me wonderful."

The two elder sons smiled. To be permitted to hearten their mother was to them a great privilege, and suddenly little Jim did not appear the hopeless case he had seemed when they went to bed the night before. They cheered up, and the three were pleasantly chatting when sleepy-eyed little Jim came out of the bedroom.

"Hurry, now, and get washed, and then set your table," said his mother kindly.

But little Jim was sulky.

"I'm tired of gettin' up early mornin's just to be doin' girl's work," he said.

Mrs. O'Callaghan nodded significantly at Pat and Mike. "What was that story, Moike, you was tellin' me about the smartest fellow in the Gineral's mess, before he got to be a gineral, you know, bein' so handy at all sorts of woman's work? Didn't you tell me the Gineral said there couldn't no woman come up to him?"

"I did, mother."

"I call that pretty foine. Beatin' the women at their own work. There was only wan man in the mess that could do it, you said?"

"Yes, mother," smiled Mike.

"I thought so. 'Tain't often you foind a rale handy man loike that. And he was the best foighter they had, too?"

"Yes, mother."

"I thought I remimbered all about it. Jim, here, can foight, but do woman's work he can't. That is, and do it good. He mostly gets the tablecloth crooked. No, he's no hand at the girl's work."

"I'll show you," thought little Jim. On a sudden the tablecloth was straight, and everything began to take its proper place on the table.

"Mother," ventured Pat, though he had not yet received the word, "the table's set pretty good this morning."

"So it is, Pat, so it is," responded the widow glancing it over.

"Maybe Jim can do girl's work after all."

"Maybe he can, Pat, but he'll have to prove it before he'll foind them that'll belave it. That's the way in this world. 'Tis not enough to be sayin' you can do this and that. You've got to prove it. And how will you prove it? By doin' it, of course."

Little Jim heard, though he did not seem to be listening, being intent on making things uncomfortable for Barney and Tommie as far as he could in a quiet way.

It was a passion with little Jim to prove things—not by his mother's method, but by his own. So far his disputes had been with boys of his own size and larger, and if they doubted what he said he was in the habit of proving his assertions with his fists. The result was that other boys either dodged him or agreed with him with suspicious readiness. His mother had given him a fair trial at the housework. He would prove to her that it was not because he could not, but because he would not, that he succeeded no better. He washed the dishes with care and put them shining on their shelves, and, a little later, poked his head out of the bedroom door into the kitchen.

"Mother," he said, "you think I can't make a bed good, don't you?"

The widow smiled. "I think you don't make it good," was her answer.

Jim's face darkened with resolution. "She thinks I can't," he said to himself. "I will, I guess."

With vim he set to work, and the bed was made in a trice. Little Jim stood off as far as he could and sharply eyed his work. "'Tain't done good," he snapped. And he tore it to pieces again. It took longer to make it the next time, for he was more careful, but still it didn't look right. He tore the clothes off it again, this time with a sigh. "Beds is awful," he said. "It's lots easier to lick a boy than to make a bed." And then he went at it again. The third time it was a trifle more presentable, and the school bell was ringing.

"I've got to go, and I hain't proved it to her," he said. "But I'll work till I do, see if I don't. And then when I have proved it to her I won't make no more beds."

Jim was no favorite at school, where he had fallen a whole room behind the class he had started with. His teacher usually wore a long-suffering air when she dealt with him.

"She looks like she thought I didn't know nothin' and never would," he said to himself that morning when he had taken his seat after a decided failure of a recitation. "I'll show her." And he set to work. His mind was all unused to study, and—that day he didn't show her.

"Who'd 'a' thought it was so hard to prove things?" he said at night. "There's another day a-comin', though."

Now some people are thankful for showing. To little Jim, showing was degrading. Suddenly his mother perceived this, and felt a relief she had not known before.

"Whativer else Jim's got or not got," she said, "he's got a backbone of his own, so he has. Let him work things out for himsilf. Will I be showin' him how to make a bed? I won't that. I've been praisin' him too much, intoirely. I see it now. Praise kapes Pat and Moike and Andy doin' their best to get more of it. But it makes little Jim aisy in his moind and scornful loike, so his nose is in the air all the toime and nothin' done. A very little praise will do Jim. And still less of fault-findin'," she added.

"B'ys," she announced that evening "Jim's took a turn. We'll stand off and watch him a bit. If he'll do roight for his own makin', sure and that'll be better than for us to be havin' a hand in it. Give him his head and plinty of chances to prove things, and when he has proved 'em, own up to it."

The two brightened. "I couldn't believe little Jim was so bad, mother," said Mike.

"Bad, is it? Sure and he ain't bad yet. And now's the toime to kape him from it. 'Tis little you can be doin' with a spoiled anything. Would you belave it? He made his bed three toimes this mornin' and done his best at it, and me a-seein' him through the crack of the door where it was open a bit. But I can't say nothin' to him nor show him how, for showin's not for the loike of him. And them that takes iverything hard that way comes out sometimes at the top of the hape. Provin' things is a lawyer's business. If Jim iver gets to be a lawyer, he'll be a good wan."

Mike, when he went to bed that night, looked down at the small red head of the future lawyer, snuggled down into the pillow, with the bedclothes close to his ears. "I'll not believe that Jim will ever come to harm," he said.