and, sure enough, why should Andy worry himself any longer with the shop? As far as her poor reason went, Mrs. Lovell had nothing to oppose; but all her instincts were on the other side--she could not feel that it would be right. But Andy, when he made up his mind to a thing, was what people call hard-headed. His "I won't stand it any longer," meant more than this common form of speech on the lips of ordinary men. So he gave it out that he should quit business; and it was soon all over the village. Of course Tompkins and Lyon were well enough pleased, but there were a great many who heard of the shoemaker's determination with regret. In the face of all difficulties and annoyances, they had continued to depend on him for foot garniture, and were now haunted by unpleasant images of cramped toes, corns, bunyons, and all the varied ill attendant on badly made and badly fitting shoes, boots, and gaiters. The retirement of Andy, cross and unaccommodating as he had become, was felt, in many homes, to be a public calamity. "Don't think of such a thing, Mr. Lovell," said one. "We can't do without you," asserted another. "You'll not give up altogether," pleaded a third, almost coaxingly. But Andy Lovell was tired of working without any heart in his work; and more tired of the constant fret and worry attendant upon a business in which his mind had ceased to feel interest. So he kept to his resolution, and went on with his arrangements for closing the shop. "What are you going to do?" asked a neighbor. "Do?" Andy looked, in some surprise, at his interrogator. "Yes. What are you going to do? A man in good health, at your time of life, can't be idle. Rust will eat him up." "Rust?" Andy looked slightly bewildered. "What's this?" asked the neighbor, taking something from Andy's counter. "An old knife," was the reply. "It dropped out of the window two or three months ago and was lost. I picked it up this morning." "It's in a sorry condition," said the neighbor. "Half eaten up with rust, and good for nothing." "And yet," replied the shoemaker, "there was better stuff in that knife, before it was lost, than in any other knife in the shop."