Lasses are cold comfort for sons. Eh? What?"

"To be sure; but I've given Steve my name. Any one not called Latrigg at
Up-Hill would seem like a stranger."

"I know how you feel about that. A squire in Seat-Sandal out of the old
name would have a very middling kind of time, I think. He'd have a sight
of ill-will at his back."

"Thou means with _them_!"

The squire nodded gravely; and after a minute's silence said, "It stands
to reason _they_ take an interest. I do in them. When I think of this or
that Sandal, or when I look up at their faces as I sit smoking beside
them, I'm sure I feel like their son; and I wouldn't grieve them any
more than if they were to be seen and talked to. It's none likely, then,
that _they_ forget. I know they don't."

"I'm quite of thy way of thinking, Sandal; but Steve will be called
Latrigg. He has never known any other name, thou sees."

"To be sure. Is Ducie willing?"

"Poor lass! She never names Steve's father. He'd no business in her
life, and he very soon went out of it. Stray souls will get into
families they have no business in, sometimes. They make a deal of
unhappiness when they do."

Sandal sat listening with a sympathetic face. He hoped Latrigg was going
to tell him something definite about his daughter's trouble; but the old