The Argosy — page 23: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Village Blacksmith. II You may refine sugar, you may refine gold and silver, but there are some people it is impossible to refine. Mrs. Canter was one of them. The ten years she had lived as nurse in the Rector’s family had failed to refine her; the pains and troubles of motherhood, the loss of two children and the recent loss of her husband had all been equally powerless. The fire of affliction had no more effect on her than physical suffering; the pangs of maternity availed no more than the intercourse with the cultivated minds with which her position as nurse had brought her in contact. She was like a noisy, rushing river that no bounds can restrain, no science control, no act subdue ; she would run her course regardless of bounds, of science and of art. Her faults, however, were on the surface. A kinder heart than Norah Canter’s never beat; she had been invaluable as a nurse to Mrs. Ryot Tempest, and it was doubtful if any of her own children were as dear to her as the Rector’s son and daughter. Indeed, Norah would have confessed, if pressed, that Reginald Tempest still held the first place in her affections. If she sometimes erred on the side of severity with her own children, particularly since their father’s death, to the little Tempests she had ever been most indulgent ; and Mr. Ryot Tempest did not exaggerate when he maintained, as he often did, that she had utterly spoilt them both. Many had been the battles fought between father and nurse on this point in days of yore ; equally numerous the victories Norah won. It was with a sense of defeat similar to that he had frequently experienced when Norah reigned supreme over his nursery that Mr. Ryot Tempest now slowly and somewhat sadly wended his way home, his nerves too much shattered, after his encounter with Mrs, Canter, to continue his ride. On reaching home, he went straight to his study, in which room he spent most of his time; though what he studied was a matter of wonder to his friends, unless it was Lempritre’s Classical Dictionary and the Peerage, in both of which works he was qualified to pass a strict examination. For Mr. Ryot Tempest was nothing if not classical, and no one believed he obtained his classical knowledge direct from Homer and Virgil. As for the Peerage, to hear him talk, you would imagine every peer who was not connected with the Tempests was related to the Ryots. On the present occasion he did not feel equal to study of any kind, but sat down in an easy-chair to try and smooth his ruffled plumes after his encounter with this modern Xantippe, as he loved to call Mrs. Canter. He had not been in the house ten minutes before a servant entered to say a French nun wished to see him. Few interruptions would have been more irritating to Mr. Ryot Tempest’s already disturbed nervous system. Anything which reminded him of his wife’s religion and nationality was peculiarly distasteful to him. At GOnnGaoOo SS CO