Blair Collection > Rhys Lewis, minister of Bethel

RHYS LEWIS. 279
sometliiDg hinted, -would it not be just as "well to take counsel
of a wiser man than myself; would it not be better to
to tell Abel Hughes the whole, and act upon his advice ? I did
not like the hint ; and so resolyed to take at least a few hours
to turn the matter over in my own mind before deciding upon
a course of action. I went home and retired early to rest, so
as to have leisure to reflect upon my discovery. The more I
thought of the occurrence, the more surely did the consideration
of expediency gain a footing Personal advantages, one by one,
insisted upon stating their claims, while duty— pure, clear, un-
selfish duty— was steadily pushed into the background. "Who
was he whom, when first I saw him, I called " the Irishman ? "
My uncle— full red-blooded brother to my own father. What
sort of a man was he ? One of the most cunning, lazy,
degraded scamps that ever trod the earth of Cambria. So
despicable did he appear to mother and Bob that both tried to
keep me completely ignorant of his existence. On the night
Seth died— when I met the depraved wretch near the Hall
park, and learnt from him our relationship —Bob, finding
he could no longer keep it from me, told me his history. From
early youth, Bob said, work had been distasteful to the man.
While honest people were about their duties he was in bed ;
and when they were at rest he would be prying up and down
the country. He never worked ; and yet he managed to live, eat
and drink— the latter especially. Where did he get the money
from ? It was he knew that ; although his neighbours were not
without a guess. They believed the game on the Hall estate
was made to pay tithe towards uncle James's maintenance.
Though he knew what it was to lodge at the county expense,
more than once, his power of deceiving the police and game-
keepers and escaping their clutches for so many years was a
marvel to all who knew him. My father was a competent
workman ; but he, too, was given to tipple, and to sit for hours
in the public house. Tippling begat idleness, and idleness begat
poverty, and poverty begat sons and daughters— harshness,
bitterness, bad temper, cruelty. With such a family, who
can tell the life my poor mother led before I saw the light of
day ? The trying task it must have been to live religiously
with the nefarious scoundrel, my father! I have already
noted, briefly, some of the cruelties practised on my beloved