A rural vignette follows a widow and her two children living in an isolated hollow on the moors, attending church and tending household tasks while sustaining quiet sorrow for the deceased husband. The narrative sketches their daily routines, the children's differing temperaments—one dutiful and domestic, the other ambitious and self-concerned—and the social scrutiny they endure. Scenes emphasize landscape, seasonal detail, and small domestic tensions that reveal gender expectations, class aspirations, familial affection, and the burdens of mourning within a close community.