`` Well , Master , it was this way . About twenty-two years ago -- WAS it twenty-two , Mother or twenty-four ? Yes , it was twenty-two -- 't was the same year our Jim was born and he 'd have been twenty-two if he 'd lived , poor little fellow . Well , Master , twenty-two years ago a couple of Italian pack peddlers came along and called at the Gordon place . The country was swarming with them then . I useter set the dog on one every day on an average . `` Well , these peddlers were man and wife , and the woman took sick up there at the Gordon place , and Janet Gordon took her in and nursed her . A baby was born the next day , and the woman died . Then the first thing anybody knew the father skipped clean out , pack and all , and was never seen or heard tell of afterwards . The Gordons were left with the fine youngster to their hands . Folks advised them to send him to the Orphan Asylum , and ` twould have been the wisest plan , but the Gordons were never fond of taking advice . Old James Gordon was living then , Thomas and Janet 's father , and he said he would never turn a child out of his door . He was a masterful old man and liked to be boss . Folks used to say he had a grudge against the sun 'cause it rose and set without his say so . Anyhow , they kept the baby . They called him Neil and had him baptized same as any Christian child . He 's always lived there . They did well enough by him . He was sent to school and taken to church and treated like one of themselves . Some folks think they made too much of him .
It does n't always do with that kind , for ` what 's bred in bone is mighty apt to come out in flesh , ' XXXXX ` taint kept down pretty well .
against as at by if like on to up without