Chapter 55 of Lorna Dune. This is a Leverox recording. All Leverox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Leverox.org. Recording by Daisy 55. Lorna Dune by R.D. Blackmore. Chapter 55. Getting into Chancery. Two of the Devonshire officers, Captain Pike and Dallin, now took command of the men who were left and ordered all to go home again. Commending much the bravery which had been displayed on all sides and the loyalty to the king and the English Constitution. This last word always seems to me to settle everything when said because nobody understands it and yet all can puzzle their neighbors. So the Devonshire men, having beams to sow, which they ought to have done on Good Friday, went home and our Somerset friends only stayed for two days more to backbite them. To me the whole thing was purely grievous, not from any sense of defeat, though that was bad enough, but from the pain and anguish caused by death and wounds and mourning. Surely we have woes enough, I used to think of an evening when the poor fellows could not sleep or rest or let others rest around them. Surely all this smells or wounds is not in sense men should pay to the God who made them. When it comes and is done with, may be a bliss to anyone, but the doubt of life or death, when a man lies, as it were, like a trunk upon a soft head and a grizzly head looks up at him and the groans of pain are cleaving him, this would be beyond all bearing. But for nature's sake, sweet hope. Jeremy Stickles lay and tossed and thrust up his feet in agony and bit with his lipless mouth to close and was proud to see blood upon them. He looked at us ever so many times as much as to say, fools, let me die, then I shall have some comfort. But we nodded at him sagely, especially the woman, trying to convey to him on no account to die yet, and then we talked to one another on purpose for him to hear us, how brave he was and not the man to knock under in a hurry and how he should have the victory yet and how well he looked considering. These things cheered him a little now, and a little more next time, and every time we went on so. He took it with less impatience. Then once, when he had been very quiet and not even tried to frown on us, Annie leaned over and kissed his forehead and spread the pillows and sheet with a curve as delicate as his own white ears, and then he feebly lifted hands and prayed to God to bless her. And after that he came round gently, though never to the man he had been and never to speak loud again. For a time, as I may have implied before, Master Stickel's authority and manner of living and duties had not been taken kindly by the people round our neighborhood. The manners of Eastland and Westland, and even that of Wolf Hanger, although just then our three were at issue about some rites of wreck, and the hanging of a sheep stiller, a man of no great eminence, yet claimed by each for the sake of his clothes. These three, having their rites impunged, or even superseded, as they declared by the quartering of soldiers in their neighborhood, united very kindly to oppose the King's Commissioner. However, Jeremy had contrived to conciliate the whole of them, not so much by anything engaging in his deportment or delicate address, as by holding out bright hopes that the plunder of the gloom glen might become disvisible among the adjoining manners. Now I have never discovered a thing which the Lord of Manners, at least in our part of the world, do not believe to belong to themselves, if only they could get their rites. And it did seem natural enough that if the dunes were ousted in a nice collection of prey remained, this should be parted among the people having ancient rites of plunder. Nevertheless, Master Jeremy knew that the soldiers would have the first of it and the King what they could not carry. And perhaps he was punished justly for language so misleading by the general indignation of the people all around us, not at his failure, but at himself, for that which he could not in no wise prevent. And the stewards of the manner rolled up to our house on purpose to reproach him and were greatly vexed with all of us because he was too ill to see them. To myself, though by rites the last to be thought of among so much pain and trouble, Jeremy's wound was a great misfortune in more ways than one. In the first place, it deferred my chance of imparting either to my mother or to Mistress Lorna my firm belief that the maid I loved was not sprung from the waste which had slain my father. Neither could he in any way have offended against her family. In this discovery I was yearning more and more to declare to them, being forced to see, even in the midst of all our warlike troubles, that a certain difference was grown betwixt them both and betwixt them and me. For although the words of the council had seemed to fail among us, being bravely met and scattered, yet our courage was but as wind flinging wide the tar seeds when the sour cast them from his bag. The crop may not come evenly, many places may long lie there and the field be all in patches, yet almost every vetch was bring and tiller out and stretch across the scatterings where the wind puffed. And so dear mother and darling Lorna now had been for many a day thinking, worrying and wearing about the matter between us, neither like to look at the other as they used to do, with mother admiring Lorna's eyes and grace and form of breeding and Lorna loving mother's goodness, softness and simplicity. And the saddest and most hurtful thing was that neither could ask the other of the shadow fallen between them, and so it went on and deepened. In the next place, Colonel Stickel's illness was a grievous thing to us and that we had no one now to command the troops. Ten of these were still alive and so well approved to us that they could never fancy art, whether for dinner or supper, without its being forthcoming, if they wanted trout they should have it. If collop venison or boar hand or salmon from Limemouth and Trent Sothe, or truffles from the Woodside, all these were at the warrior service until they lusted for something else. Even the wounded men ate nobly, all except poor Jeremy, who was forced to have a young elder shoot with the pit drawn for to feed him. In once, when they wanted pickled loach for my description of it, I took up my boy's sport again and prolonged them a good jar full. Therefore, none of them could complain and yet they were not satisfied, perhaps for wanton of complaining. Be that as it might, we knew that if they once resolved to go, as they might do at any time, with only a corporal over them, all our house and all our goods and all our own precious lives would and must be at the mercy of embittered enemies. For now the dunes, having driven back, as everyone said, five hundred men, though not thirty had ever fought with them, were in such feather all around the country that nothing was too good for them. Offerings poured in at the dune gate, faster than dunes could away with them, and the sympathy both of Devon and Somerset became almost oppressive.  But yet another case arose, and this the strongest one of all, to prove the need of Stickles' aid and calamity of his illness. And this came to our knowledge first, without much time to think of it, for two men appeared at our gate one day, stripped to their shirts, and void of horses and looking very sorrowful. Now having some fear of attack from the dunes, and scarce knowing what their tricks might be, we received these strangers cautiously, designed to know who they were before we let them see all our premises. However, it soon became plain to us that although they might not be honest fellows, at any rate they were not dunes, and so we took them in and fed and left them to tell their business.  These two very worthy fellows, named more than that by their own account, being downright martyrs, were come for the public benefit from the court of chancery, sending for everybody's good and boldly redressing evil. This court has a power of scent unknown to the common law practitioners, and slowly yet surely tracks this game, even as the great lumbering dogs, now introduced from Spain and called by some pointers, differ from the swift gaze hound, who sees his prey and runs him down in the manner of the common lawyers. If a man's ill fate should drive him to make a choice between these two, let him rather be chased by the hounds of law than tracked by the dogs of equity. Now, as it fell in a very black day, for all except the lawyers, his majesty's court of chancery, if that be what he called himself, gained scent of poor launder's life, and of all that might be made of it, whether through that brave young lord who ran into such pearl, or through any of his friends, or whether through that deep old counselor, whose game none of them had. None might penetrate, or through any disclosure of the Italian woman, or even of Jeremy himself, none just now could tell us. Only this truth was too clear. Chancery had heard of launder, and then had seen how rich she was, and never delaying in one thing had opened mouth and swallowed her. The dunes, with a share of that dry humor which was in them hereditary, had welcomed the two apparatus, AFB, the proper name for them, and led them kindly down the valley, and told them then to serve their wit. Misliking the look of things, these poor men began to farmer among their clothes, upon which the dunes cried, off with them, let us see if your message is he on your skins.  Neither were they sure at first, but that we should treat them so, for they had no knowledge of the west country, and thought it quite a godless place, wherein no writ was holding. We, however, confronted and cheered them so considerably that, in gratitude, they showed their wits to which they had struck like leeches. And these were twofold, one addressed to Mistress Dawn Lorna Dune, so-called, and bidding her keep in readiness to travel, whenever called upon, and commit herself to nobody, except the accredited messengers to the right honorable court, while the other was addressed to all subjects of his majesty, having custody of Lorna Dune or any power over her, and this last threatened and exhorted and held out hopes of recompense, if she were rendered truly. My mother and I held concentration over both these documents with a mixture of some wrath and fear, and a fork of great sorrow to stir them. And now, having Jeremy Stickles leave, which he gave with a nod when I told him all, and, at last, made him understand it, I laid bare to my mother as well what I knew as what I merely summarized, or guessed, concerning Lorna's parentage. All this she received were great tears and wonder and fervent thanks to God, and still more fervent praise of her son, who had nothing whatever to do with it. However, now the question was, how to act about these rits? And herein it was most unlucky that we could not have Master Stickles with his knowledge of the world, and especially of the law courts, to advise us what to do and to help in doing it. And firstly, of the first I said, we have rogues to deal with, but try we not to rogue them. To this, in some measure, dear mother agreed, though she could not see the gesture of it, yet thought that it might be wiser because of our want of practice. And then I said, now we are bound to tell Lorna and to serve her citation upon her, which these good fellows had given us. Then go, and do it thyself, my son. Mother replied with a mournful smile, misdouting what the end might be. So I took the slip of brown parchment and went to seek my darling. Lorna was in her favorite place, the little garden which she tended was such care and diligence. Seeing how the maiden loved it and was happy there, I had labored hard to fence it from the dangers of the wood. And here she had corrected me with better taste and sense of pleasure and the joys of musing. For I meant to shut out the brook and build my fence inside of it, but Lorna said no. If we must have a fence which could not but be injury, at any rate leave the stream inside and a pleasant bank beyond it. And soon I perceived that she was right, though not so much as afterwards. For the ferris of all things in a garden, and in summertime most useful, is a brook of crystal water, wherein a man may come and meditate, and the flowers may lean and see themselves, and the rays of the sun are purified. Now partly with her own white hands, and partly with Guinea's red ones, Lorna had made of this sunny spot a haven of beauty to dwell in. It was not only that colors lay in the harmony we would seek of them, neither was it the height of plants sloping to one another, nor even the delicate tone of foliage following suit and neighboring. Even the breathing of the wind, soft and gentle, in and out, moving things that need not move and passing longer, stark ones. Even this was not enough among the flush of fragrance to tell a man the reason of his quiet satisfaction. But so it shall be forever, as the river we float upon with wine and flowers and music is nothing at the wellspring but a bubble of our reason. Feeling many things, but thinking without much to guide me over the grass plates lay between, I went up to Lorna. She, in a shower of Damasque roses, raised her eyes and looked at me, and even now, in those sweet eyes so deep with loving kindness and soft maiden dreamings, there seemed to be a slight unwilling, half-confessed withdrawal, overcome by love and duty, yet a painful thing to see. Darling, I said, are your spirits good? Are you strong enough today to bear a tale of cruel sorrow, but which perhaps, when your tears are shed, will leave you all the happier? What can you mean? She answered trembling, not having been very strong of late, and now surprised at my manner.  Not very likely, I replied. Neither do I hope such a thing would leave you all the happier. Oh Lorna, if you can think that so quickly as you seem to have done, now you have every prospect and strong temptation to it. You are far, far above me in the world, and I have no right to claim you. Perhaps when you have heard these tidings, you will say, John Redd, be gone. Your life and mine are parted. Will I? cried Lorna, with all the brightness of her playful ways returning.  How shall I punish you for this? Am I to forsake every flower I have and not even know that the world goes round while I look up to you the whole day long and say, John, I love, love, love you.  And as she looked up at the finishing saying, you, so musically, I was much inclined to clasp her round but remembering who she was for both at which she seemed to surprise me. Mistress Lorna, I replied, with I know not what temptation, making litter of her caresses, though more than all my heart to me. Mistress Lorna, you must keep your rank and proper dignity. You must never look at me with anything but pity now. I shall look at you with pity, John, said Lorna, trying to laugh it off, yet not knowing what to make of it. If you talk any more of this nonsense, knowing me as you ought to do, I shall even begin to think that you and your friends are wary of me and of so long supporting me and are only seeking calls to send me back to my old misery. If it be so, I will go.  Here the great bright tears arose, but the maiden was too proud to sob. Sweetest of all sweet loves, I cried, for the sound of a tear defeated me. What possibility could make me ever give up on a dearest of our dearest, she answered. If you dearly love me, what possibility could ever make me give you up, dear? Upon that there was no more forbearing, but I kissed and clasped her, whether she were a countess or whether Queen of England, mine she was, at last in heart, and mine she should be holy. And she being of the same opinion, nothing was said between us. Now, Lorna, said I, as she hung on my arm, willing to trust me anywhere. Come to your little paint plant house and hear my moving story. No story can move me much, dear, she answered rather faintly. For any excitement stayed with her, since I know your strength of kindness, scarcely any tale, can move me. Unless it be of yourself, love, or of my poor mother. It is of your poor mother, darling. Can you bear to hear it? And yet I wonder why she did not say as much as of her father. Yes, I can bear anything, but although I cannot see her and have long forgotten, I could not bear to hear ill of her. There is no ill to hear, sweet child, except of evil done to her. Lorna, you are of an ill-starred race. Better than, better that than a wicked race, she answered, with her usual quickness leaping at conclusions. Tell me I am not a dune, and I will, but I cannot love you more. You are not a dune, my Lorna, for that at least I can answer, though I know not what your name is. And my father? Your father? What I mean is, your father and mine never met one another.  All this, coming as in one breath upon the sensitive maiden, was more than she could bear all at once, as any but a fool like me must, of course, have known. She lay back on the garden bench, with her black hair shed on the oak and bark, while her color went and came, and only by that, in her quivering breath, could anyone say that she lived and thought, and yet she pressed my hand with hers, that I might tell her all of it. End of Chapter 55. Recording by Daisy 55. Chapter 56 of Lorna Dune. This is the Liberox recording. All Liberox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Liberox.org. Recording by Daisy 55. Lorna Dune by R.D. Blackmore. Chapter 56. John becomes too popular. No flower that I have ever seen, either in shifting of light and shade, or in the pearly morning, may vie with a fair young woman's face when tender thought and quick emotions vary in which and beautify it. Thus my Lorna hawkened softly, almost without word or gesture, yet with sighs and glances telling in the pressure of my hand how each word was moving her. When at last, my tale was done, she turned away and wept bitterly for the sad fate of her parents. But to my surprise, she spoke not even a word of wrath or rancor. She seemed to take it all as fate. Lorna darling, I said at length, for men are more impatient in trials of time than women are. Do you not wish to know what your proper name is? How can it matter to me, John? She answered with a depth of grief which made me seem a trifle. It can never matter now when there are none to share it.  Dearest, I have you, she cried. You and only you, love.  All my life is one with yours. Oh John, how can I treat you so? Blushing through the weep of weeping and the gloom of pondering, yet she would not hide her eyes but folded me and dwelt on me. I cannot believe it in the pride of my joy, I whispered into one little ear that you could ever so love me, beauty as to give up the world for me. Would you give up your farm for me, John? cried Lorna, leaping back and looking with her wondrous power of light at me.  Of course I would, without two thoughts. You know it, you know it Lorna. It is true that I do. She answered in a tone of deepest sadness and it is this power of your love which has made me love you so. No good can come of it, no good. God's face is set against selfishness. As she spoke in that low tone I gazed at the clear lines of her face where every curve was perfect, not with love and wonder only but with a strange new sense of awe. Darling, I said, come near to me, give me surety against that for God's sake never frighten me with the thought that he would part us. Does it then so frighten you? She whispered, coming close to me. I know it dear. I have known it long but it never frightens me and makes me sad and very lonely till I can't remember. Till you can't remember what I asked with a long deep shutter for we are so superstitious. Until I do remember love that you will soon come back to me and be my own forever. This is what I always think of. This is what I hope for. Although her eyes were so glorious and beaming with eternity this distant sort of beautitude was not much to my liking. I wanted to have my love on earth and my dear wife in my own home and children in good time if God should please to send us any and then I would be to them exactly what my father was to me and besides all this I doubted much about being fit for heaven where no plugs are and no cattle unless sacrifice bulls went tither. Therefore I said, now kiss me Launa and don't talk any nonsense and the darling came and did it being kindly obedient as the other world often makes us. Your sweet love I said at this being slave to her soft obedience. Do you suppose I should be content to leave you until Elson? How on earth can I tell dear John what will be content with? You and only you said I. The whole of lies in a syllable. Now you know my entire want and what must be my comfort. But surely if I have money so and birth and rank and all sorts of grandeur you would never dare to think of me. She drew herself up with an air of pride as she gravely pronounced these words and gave me a scornful glance or tried and turned away as if to enter some grand cultural palace while I was so amazed and grieved in my raw simplicity especially after the way in which she had first received my news so loving and warm hearted that I never said a word but stared and thought how does she mean it? She saw the pain upon my forehead and the wonder in my eyes and leaving coach and palace too. Back she flew to me in a moment as simple as simplest milk made.   She cried with both arms around my neck and her lips upon my forehead. You have called yourself thick headed John and I never would believe it. But now I do with all my heart. Will you never know what I am love? No Lorna that I never shall. I can understand my mother well and one at least of my sisters both the snows girls very easily but you I never understood only love you all the more for it. They never tried to understand me if the result is that dear John and yet I am the very simplest of all foolish simple creatures. Nay I am wrong there and I yield the palm to you my dear to think that I can act so. No wonder they want me in London as an ornament for the stage John. Now in after days when I heard of Lorna as the richest and noblest and loveliest lady to be found in London. I often remember that little scene and recalled every word and gesture wondering what lay under it. Even now while it was quite impossible once to doubt those clear deep eyes and the bright lips trembling so. Nevertheless I felt how much the world would have to do with it and that the best and truest people cannot shake themselves quite free. However for the moment I was very proud and showed it. And here in differs fact from fancy things as they befall us from things as we would have them human ends from human hopes that the first are moved by a thousand and the last on two wheels only which being named our desire and fear. Hope of course is nothing more than desire with a telescope magnifying distant matters overlooking near ones opening one eye on the objects closing the other to all objections. And if hope be the future tense of desire the future affairs religion at least with too many of us. Whether I am right or wrong in these small moralities one thing is sure enough to wit that hope is the fastest traveler at any rate in the time of youth and so I hope to let Launa might be proved a blameless family an honorable rank and fortune and yet none the less for that love me and belong to me. So I let her into the house and she fell into my mother's arms and I left them to have a good cry of it with Annie ready to help them. If master stickers should not meant enough to gain his speech a little and declare to us all he knew I was to set our foot watch it riding upon horseback and there to hire a cart with wheels such as we had not begun as yet to use on Exmo for all our work went on board would with runners and with earth boards and many of us still looked upon wheels though mentioned in the Bible as the invention of the evil one and Pharaoh's a special property. Now instead of getting better colonel stickers grew worse and worse in spite of all our tenderness to him was simple and with nourishment and no poisonous Miss medicine such as doctors would have given him and the fault of this laid not with us but purely with himself and his unquite constitution for he rose to himself up to a perfect fever went through Lizzie's illness he learned the very thing which mother and Annie were hiding from him with the utmost care namely that Sergeant Blockham had taken upon himself to send direct to London by the chance of the officers a full report of what had happened and of the illness of his chief together with a urgent prayer for a full battalion of King's troops and a planetary commander. This Sergeant Blockham being senior of the surviving soldiers and a very worthy man in his way but a trifle over zealous has succeeded to the captaincy upon his master's disablement. Then with desire to serve his country and show his education he sat up most part of three nights and wrote this wonderful report by the aid of our stable Lanthorne. It was a very fine piece of work as three men to whom he read it but only one at a time pronounced being under seal of secrecy and all might have gone well with it if the author could only have held his tongue when near the ears of women but this was beyond his sense as it seems although so good a writer for having heard that our Lizzie was a famous judge of literature as indeed she told almost everyone he could not contain himself but must have her opinion upon his work. Lizzie sat on a log of wood and listened with all her ears up having made for viso that no one else should be there to interrupt her and she put in a syllable here and there and many a time she took out one for the sergeant overloaded his gun more often than under charged it like a liberal man of letters and then she declared the result so good so chased and the style to be so elegant and yet so fibrous that the sergeant broke his pipe in three and fell in love with her on the spot. Now this has led me out of the way as things are always done partly through their own perverfiveness partly through my kind desire to give fair turn to all of them and to all the people who do them. If anyone expects of me a strict and well-drilled story standing at attention all the time with hands at the side like two wings on my trunk and eyes going neither right nor left I trove that man has been disappointed many a page ago and has left me to my evil ways and if not I love his charity. Therefore let me seek his grace and get back and just begin again. That great dispatch was sent to London by the chance of the officers whom we fitted up with clothes and for three days fatten them which in strict justice they needed much as well as in point of equity. They were kind enough to be pleased with us and accepted out my new shirts generously and urgent as their business was another week as they both declared could do no harm to nobody and might set them upon their legs again and knowing although there were London men that fish do live in water these two fellas went fishing all day but never landed anything. However their holiday was cut short for the sergeant having finished now his narrative of proceedings was not the man to let it hang fire and be quenched perhaps by stickles. Therefore having done their business and served both citations these two good men had a painter of vitals put up by dear Annie and borrowing two of our horses rode to Dunster where they left them and hired on towards London. We had not time to like them much and so we did not miss them especially in our great anxiety about poor master stickles. Jeremy lay between life and death for at least a fourth night if the link of chain had flown upwards for half a link of chain it was which took him in the mouth so even one inch upwards the poor man could have needed no more except Parson Bolden for the bottom of his skull which holds the brain as in the egg cup must have clean gone from him but striking him horizontally and a little upon the skew the metal came out at the back of his neck and a powder not being strong I suppose it launched in his leather collar. Now the rest of this on hung in the wound or at least we thought so though since I have talked with a man of medicine I am not so sure of it and our chief aim was to purge this rust when rather we should have stopped the hole and let the oxide do its worst with a plug of new flesh on both sides of it. At last I prevailed upon him by argument that he must get better to save himself from being ignoble and unjustly superseded and here upon I revived sergeant blocks and more fiercely than Jeremy's self could have done and indeed to such a pitch that Jeremy almost forgave him and became much milder and after that his fever and the inflammation of his wound diminished very rapidly. However not knowing what might happen or even how soon poor Lorna might be taken from our power and fallen into lawyer's hands have caused to wish herself most heartily back among the robbers. I set forth one day for watch it taking advantage of the visitors of some troopers from an outpost who would make our house quite safe. I wrote alone being fully primed and having no misgivings for it was said that even the dunes have begun to fear me since I cast their covering through the door as above related and they could not believe but from my being still untouched although so large an object and the thickest of their fire both of gun and cannon that I must bear charm to life proof against ball and bullet. However I knew that Carvedon was not a likely man to hold any superstitions opinions and of him I had an instinctive dread although quite ready to face him. Riding along I meditated upon Lorna's history how many things were now beginning to unfold themselves which had been obscure and dark. For instance Sir Enzer Dunes consent or to say the least his indifference to her marriage to a yeelman which in a man so proud though died had greatly puzzled both of us. But now if she not only proved to be no grandchild of the Dunes but even descended from his enemy it was natural enough that he should feel no great repugnance to her emulation and that Lorna's father had been a foe to the house of Dunes I gathered from her mother's cry when she beheld the leader. Moreover the fact was supplied their motive and carried off the unfortunate little creature and ran her among them and as one of their own family yet hiding her true birth from her. She was a great card as we say when playing all fours at Christmas time and if one of them could marry her before she learned of right and wrong vast property enough to buy pardons for a thousand Dunes would be at their mercy and since I was to come to know Lorna better and she to know me thoroughly many things had been outspoken which her early vastness had kept covered for me. Attempts I mean to pledge her love to this one or that other some of which perhaps might have been successful if there had not been too many. And then as her beauty grew richer and richer Carvedune was smitten strongly and would hear of no one else as a suitor for her and by the terror of his claim drove off all the others. Here too made the explanation of a thing which seemed to be against the laws of human nature and upon which I longed but dared not to cross question Lorna. How could such a lovely girl although so young and brave and distant have escaped the vile affections of a lawless company? For now it was as clear as need be for any proven violence would have utterly but they let all claimed upon her grand estate at least as those claims must be urged before a court of equity and therefore all the elders with views upon her real estate kept strict watch on the youngers who confirmed their views to her personality. Now I do not mean to say that all this or the hundred other things which came crowding consideration were half as plain to me at the time as I have set them down above far be it for me to deceive you no so. No doubt my doubts were then dark and hazy like an old lamp full of fungus and I have trimmed them as when they burned with scissors sharpen long afterwards. All I mean to say is this that jogging along to a certain tune of the horses feet which we call three half pence and two pence I saw my way a little into some things which had puzzled me. When I knocked at the little door whose seal was gritty and grime with sand no one came for a very long time to answer me or to let me in. Not wishing to me unmanually I waited a long time and watched to see from which the wind was blowing and whose many lifts of waves thought the tide was half way out spoke to and refreshed me. After a while I knocked again for my horse was becoming hungry and a good while after that again a voice came through the keyhole who was that wishes to enter the boy who was at the pump said I when the carriage broke down at Doverton the boy that lives at a and some day you would come to seek him I remember certainly my little boy with the fair white skin I have desired to see him over many yes many times opening the door while saying this and then she started back in our fright that the little boy should have grown so you cannot be that little boy it's quite as possible why do you impose on me not only am I that little boy who made the water to flow for you till the new blue came upon the glass but also I come to tell you about your little girl come in you very great little boy she answered with her dark eyes brightened and I went in and looked at her she was altered by time as much as I was the slight and graceful shape was gone not that I remembered anything of her figure if you please for boys of twelve are not yet prone to the shapes of women but that her little straight gate has struck me as being so unlike our people now her time for walking was so past and transmitted to her children yet her face was calmly still and full of strong intelligence I gazed at her and she and me and we were sure of one another now are you pleased to eat she asked with a lime glance at the size of my mouth that is always first thing you people ask in these barbarous places I would tell you by and by I answered misliking this satire pun us but I might begin with a quart of L to enable me to speak madam very well one quiver of beer she called out to a little maid who was the eldest child no doubt it is to be expected sir bill bill bill all day long with you Englishman nay I replied not all day long if madam will excuse me only a pint at breakfast time and a pint and a half at eleven o'clock and a quart or so at dinner then no more to the afternoon and half a gallon at supper time I objected that well I suppose it is why she said with a air of resignation God knows but I do not understand it it is good for business as you say to preclude everything and it is good for us madam I answer with indignation for beer is my favorite beverage and I am a credit to be a madam and so are all who trusted and anyway you are young man if beer has made you grow so large I will put my children upon it it is too late for me to begin the smell of me is hateful now I only set down that to show how perverse those foreign people are they will drink their wretched heartless stuff such as they call claret or wine or meadow or what not with no more meaning than sour net stirred with the pulp from the cider press and strained through the calf of our bedding this is very well for them and as good as they deserve no doubt and mint perhaps by the will of God for those unhappy natives but to bring it over to England and set it against our whole rural not to speak of wines from Portugal and sell it at ten times the price as a cure for British vial and a great enlightenment this I say is the valourist feature of the age we live in Madam Benita O'Dam for the name of the man who turned the wheel proved to be John O'Dam showed me into a little room containing two chairs and a fur wood table and sat down on a three legged seat and studied me very steadfastly this she had a right to do and I having all my clothes on was not disconcentered it could not become me to repeat her judgment upon my appearance which she delivered as calmly as if I weighed pig in market and as proud as if her own pig and she asked me whether I had ever got rid of the black marks on my breast not wanting to talk about myself though very proud of doing so when time and season favored I let her back to that fearful night of the day when I first I had seen her she was not desirous to speak of because of her own little children however I drew her gradually to the recollection of Lorna and then of the little boy who died and the poor mother buried with him and her strong hot nature kindled as she dwelt upon these stains and my wrath waxed with me within me and we forgot reserve and prudence under the sense of so vile wrong she told me as nearly as might be the very same story which she had told to master Jeremy Stickles only she dwelt upon it more because of my knowing the unset and being a woman with an inkling for my situation she enlarged upon the little maid more than to dry Jeremy would you know her again? I asked being stirred by these accounts of Lorna when she was five years old would you know her as a full grown maiden? I think I should she answered it is not possible to say until one sees the person but from the eyes of the little girl I think that I must know her oh the poor young creature is it to be believed that the cannibals devout her what a people you are in this country meet, meet, meet and she raised her hands and eyes and heart at our carnivorous propensities to which she clearly attributed the disappearance of Lorna I could scarcely help laughing even after that sad story for though it is said at the present day and will doubtless be said hereafter that the dunes had devout a baby once as they came upon poor lock hill after fighting hard in the marketplace I knew that the tale was utterly false for cruel and brutal as they were their taste was very correct in choice and indeed one might say facetious nevertheless I could not stop to argue that matter with her the little maid has not been devout I said the mistress oh damn and now she is a tall young lady and as beautiful as can be if I sleep in your good hostel tonight after going to what your town will you come with me to old tomorrow and see your little maiden I would like and yet a fear this country is so barbarous I could eat my God there is much picking on my bones she surveyed herself so mingled a pity and admiration and the truth of her words was so apparent only that it would have taken a week to get at the bones before picking that I nearly lost good manners for she really seemed to suspect even me of countable inclination however at last I made her promise that I would not let her go presuming that master oh damn could by any means be persuaded to keep her company in the cart as priority demanded having little doubt that master oh damn was entirely at his wife's command I looked upon that matter as settled and set off for watch it to see the grave of Lorna's poor mother and to hire a cart for the morrow and hence so often happens with men I succeeded without any trouble of all hindrance where I had looked for both of them namely and finding a suitable cart whereas the other matter in which I could have expected no difficulty came very near to defeat me for when I heard that Lorna's father was the Earl of Duga as Benita impressed upon me with a strong enforcement as much as to say about her then I never thought but that everybody in watch it town must know all about the tombstones of the Countess of Duga however proved otherwise for Lord Duga had never lived at Wichit Grange as their place was called neither had his name become familiar as its owner because the Grange had only devolved to him at the end of a long entail when the last of the Fitzpains died out and though he liked the idea of it he had gone abroad without taking syson and upon news of his death John Jones a rich gentleman from land off had taken possession as next of right and hushed up all the story and though even at the worst of times a lady of high rank and wealth could not be robbed and as bad as murdered and then buried in a little place without moving some excitement yet had been given out on purpose and with diligence that this was only a foreign lady traveling for her health and pleasure along the sea coast of England and as the poor thing never spoke and several of her servants and she herself died in the collar of lace unlike any maid in England all witch it without hesitation pronounced her to be a foreigner and an English serving man and maid who might have cleared up everything either was bride by Master Jones or else decamped of their own accord with the relics of the baggage so the poor countess of Duga buried in an unknown grave with her pair of infants without a plate without a tombstone worse than all without a tear except from the hired Italian woman surely my poor Lorna came of an ill-starred family now in spite of all this if I had only taken Benita with me or even told her what I wished and craved her directions it could have been no trouble but I do assure you that among the stupid people that witch it compared with whom our folk of Ori exceeding a dense though being or as Hamlet's against dogberry what with one of them and another and a firm conviction of all the town that I could become only to wrestle I do assure you as I said before my parents almost went out of me and what vexed me yet more about it was that I saw my own mistake and coming myself to seek out the matter instead of sending some unknown person for my face and form were known at that time and still our soul to nine people out of every ten living in 40 miles of me not through any excellence or anything of good dessert and either the one or the other but simply because folks will be fools on the rivalry of wrestling the art is a fine one in itself and demands a little wit of brain as well as strength of body it binds the man who studies it to temperance and chastity to self respect and most of all to an even and sweet temper for I have thrown stronger men than myself when I was a mere sapping and before my strength grew hard on me through their loss of temper but though the artist an honest one surely they who excel then have a right like all the rest of mankind to their own private life be that way either and I will not speak too strongly for fear of indulging my own annoyance anyhow all witchet town carried ten times much to see John Redd as to show him what he wanted I was led to every public house instead of to the church yard and twenty tables were ready for me in lieu of a single gravestone Zuma Zet Thou Beest John Redd and Zuma Zet That Shall Be they called the zeal a differential man who the lives in Zuma Zet and in Zuma Zet The West Abon Ladd and so it went on till I was very though very much obliged to them dull and solid as I am and with a wild duck waiting for me at good mischievous old dams I saw that there was nothing for it but to yield to these good people and prove me a man of Zuma Zet by eating a dinner at their expense as for the church yard none would hear of it and I grieve for broaching the matter but how was I to meet Lona again without having done the thing of all things which I had promised to see too it would never do to tell her that so great was my popularity and so strong the desire to feed me that I could not attend to her mother least of all could I say that everyone and watch it knew John Redd while none had heard of the count as a duke that was about the truth as I hinted very delicately to Mrs. O'Donne that evening but she being vexed about her wild duck and not having English ideas on the matter of sport and so on made a poor unwitting face at me nevertheless Master O'Donne restored me to my self respect for he stared at me till I went to bed and he broke his nose with excitement for being in the leg and I thought to myself I wanted to know what the muscles were of a man who turned a wheel all day I had never seen a treadmill though they have one now an extra and it touched me much to learn whether it was good exercise and here in from what I saw of O'Donne I inclined to think that it does great harm as moving the muscles too much in a line and definitely without variety end of chapter 56 recording by Daisy 55 Chapter 57 of Lorna Doon this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Michelle Harris Lorna Doon by R.D. Blackmore Chapter 57 Lorna knows her nurse having obtained from Benita O'Donne a very close and full description of the place where her poor mistress lay and the marks whereby to know it I hastened to watch it the following morning before the sun was up or any people were about and so without interruption I was in the churchyard at sunrise in the farthest and darkest nook overgrown with grass there was to be a little bank of earth betoken the rounding off of a hapless life there was nothing to tell of rank or wealth of love or even pity nameless as a peasant lay the last as supposed of a mighty race only some unskillful hand probably master O'Donne's under his wife's teaching had carved a rude L and a router D upon a large pebble from the beach and set it up as a headstone I gathered a little grass for Lorna and a sprig of the weeping tree and then returned to the forest cat as Benita's lonely inn was called for the way is long from watch it to ore and though you may write it rapidly as the dunes had done on that fatal night to travel on wheels with one horse only is a matter of time and of prudence therefore we set out pretty early three of us and a baby who could not well be left behind the wife of the man who owned the cart had undertaken to mind the business and the other babies upon condition of having the keys of all the taps left with her as the manner of journeying over the moor has been described often enough already I will say no more except that we all arrived before dusk of the summer's day safe at Plover's Barrow's Mr. Benita was delighted with the change from her dull hard life and she made many excellent innovations such as seem natural to a foreigner looking at our country as luck would have it the first who came to meet us at the gate was Lorna with nothing whatever upon her head the weather being summerly but her beautiful hair shed round her and wearing a sweet white frock tucked in and showing her figure perfectly in her joy she ran straight up to the cart and then stopped and gazed at Benita and said to her oh the eyes the eyes she cried and was over the rail of the cart in a moment in spite of all her substance Lorna on the other hand looked at her with some doubt and wonder as though having right to know much about her and yet unable to do so but when the foreign woman said something in Roman language and flung new hay from the cart upon her as if in a romp of childhood the young maid cried and fell upon her breast and wept and after that looked round at us this being so there could be no doubt as to the power of proving Lady Lorna's birth and rights both by evidence and token for though we had not the necklace now thanks to Annie's wisdom we had the ring of heavy gold a very ancient relic with which my maid in her simple way had pledged herself to me and Benita knew this ring as well as she knew her own fingers having heard a long history about it and the effigy on it of the wild cat was the bearing of the House of Lorne for though Lorna's father was a nobleman of high and goodly lineage her mother was of yet more ancient and renowned descent being the last in line direct from the great and kingly chiefs of Lorne a wild and headstrong race they were and must have everything their own way hot blood was ever among them they were the last one household and their sovereignty which more than once had defied the king of Scotland waned and fell among themselves by continual quarreling and it was of a peace with this that the dunes who were an offset by the mother's side holding in co-partnerships some large property which had come by the spindle as we say should fall out with the Earl of Lorne the last but one of that title was Sir Insaur Dune but this instead of healing matters led to fiercer conflict I never could quite understand all the ins and outs of it which none but a lawyer may go through and keep his head at the end of it the motives of mankind are plainer than the motions they produce especially when charity such as found among us sits to judge the former and is never weary of it while reason does not care or title therefore it is enough to say that knowing Lorne to be direct in airship to vast property and bearing a special spite against the house of which she was the last the dunes had brought her up with full intention of lawful marriage and had carefully secluded her from the wildest of their young gallants of course if they had been next in succession the child would have gone down into trouble but there was an intercepting branch of some honest family and they being outlaws would have a poor chance though the law loves outlaws against them only Lorne was of the stock and Lorne they must marry and what a triumph against the old earl for a cursed dune to succeed him as for their outlawry great robberies and grand murders the various child nowadays must know that money heals the whole of that even if they had murdered people of a good position it would only cost about twice as much to prove their motives loyal but they had never slain any man above the rank of yeoman and folk even said that my father was the highest of their victims for the death of Lorne's mother and brother was never set to their account pure pleasure it is to any man to reflect upon all these things how truly we discern clear justice and how well we deal it if any poor man steals a sheep having ten children starving and regarding it as mountain game as a rich man does a hair to the gallows with him if a man of rank beats down a door smites the owner upon the head and honors the wife with attention it is a thing to be grateful for and to slouch smitten head the lower while we were full of these things and wondering what would happen next or what we ought ourselves to do another very important matter called for our attention this was no less than Annie's marriage to the squire faggots we had tried to put it off again for in spite of all advantages neither my mother nor myself had any real heart for it not that we dwelled upon Tom's shortcomings or rather perhaps his going too far at the time when he worked the road so all that was covered by the king's pardon and universal respect of the neighborhood but our scruple was this and the more we talked the more it grew upon us that we both had great misgivings as to his future steadiness for it would be a thousand pitties we said for a fine, well grown and pretty maiden such as our Annie was useful too in so many ways and lively and warm hearted and mistress of five hundred pounds to throw herself away on a man with a kind of a turn for drinking if that last were even hinted Annie would be most indignant and ask with cheeks as red as roses who had ever seen master faggots Annie the worst for liquor in need her own opinion was in truth that he took a great deal too little after all his hard work and hard writing and coming over the hills to be insulted and if ever it lay in her power and with no one to grudge him his trumpery glass she would see that poor Tom had the nourishment which his cough and his lungs required his lungs being quite as sound as mine this matter was out of all argument so mother and I looked at one another as much as to say let her go upstairs she will cry and come down more reasonable and while she was gone we used to say the same thing over and over again without perceiving a cure for it and we almost always finished up with the following reflection which sometimes came from mother's lips and sometimes from my own well, well, there is no telling none can say how a man may alter when he takes to matrimony but if we could only make Annie promise to be a little firm with him I fear that all this talk on our part only hurried matters forward Annie being more determined to get rid of her and at last Tom Fagus came and spoke as if he were on the king's road with a pistol at my head and one at mother's no more fast and loose he cried either one thing or the other I love the maid and she loves me and we will have one another either with your leave or without it how many more times am I to dance over these vile hills and leave my business and get nothing more than a sigh or a kiss and Tom I must wait for mother and promise for being straightforward you rids just treat me as I would treat you now I looked at my mother for a glance from her would have sent Tom out of the window but she checked me with her hand and said you have some ground of complaint sir I will not deny it now I will be as straightforward with you as even a rid is supposed to be my son and myself have all along disliked your marriage with Annie what we fear you will be have patience one moment if you please we do not fear you're taking to the highway life again for that you are too clever no doubt now that you have property but we fear that you will take to drinking and to squandering money there are many examples of this around us and we know what the fate of the wife is it has been hard to tell you this under our own roof and with our own here mother hesitated spirits and cider and beer I broke in out with it like a rid mother as he will have all of it spirits and cider and beer said mother very firmly after me and then she gave way and said you know Tom you are welcome to every drop and more of it now Tom must have had a far sweeter temper than ever I could claim for I should have thrust my glass away and never have taken another drop in the house where such a check had met me but instead of that master faggis replied with a pleasant smile I know that I am welcome good mother and to prove it I will have some more and there upon he mixed himself another glass of hollands with lemon and hot water yet pouring it very delicately oh I have been so miserable take a little more Tom said mother handing the bottle yes take a little more Tom if ever there was a sober man cried Tom complying with our request if ever there was in Christendom a man of perfect sobriety that man is now before you shall we say tomorrow week mother it will suit your washing day how very thoughtful you are Tom now John would never have thought of that in spite of all his steadiness certainly not I answered proudly when my time comes for Lorna to study Betty Muxworthy in this way the squire got over us and Farmer Nicholas Snow was sent for to counsel with mother about the matter and to set his two daughters sowing when the time for the wedding came there was such a stir and commotion as had never been known in the parish of ore since my father's marriage for Annie's beauty and kindliness had made her the pride of the neighborhood and the presence sent her around were enough to stock a shop with master Stickles who could now walk and who certainly owed his recovery with the blessing of God to Annie presented her with a mighty Bible silver clasped and very handsome beating the Parsons out and out and for which he had sent to Taunton even the common troopers having tasted her cookery many times to help out their poor rations clubbed together and must have given at least a week's pay turned out what they did for her this was no less than a silver pot well designed but suited surely rather to the bridegroom's taste and brides in a word everybody gave her things and now my Lorna came to me with a spring of tears in appealing eyes for she was still somewhat childish or rather I should say more childish now than when she lived in misery and she placed her little hand in mine and she was half afraid to speak and dropped her eyes for me to ask what is it little darling I asked as I saw her breath come fast for the smallest emotion moved her form you don't think John you don't think dear that you could lend me any money all I have got I answered how much do you want dear heart I have been calculating and I fear that I cannot do any good with less than ten pounds John here she looked up at me with the grandeur of the sum and not knowing what I could think of it but I kept my eyes from her ten pounds I said in my deepest voice on purpose to have it out in comfort when she should be frightened what can you want with ten pounds child that is my concern said Lorna plucking up her spirit at this when a lady asked for a loan no gentleman prized into the cause of her asking it that may be as may be ten pounds or twenty you shall have but I must know the purport then that you never shall know John I am very sorry for asking you it is not of the smallest consequence oh dear no here with she was running away oh dear yes I replied it is a very great consequence and I understand the whole of it you want to give that stupid Annie who has lost you a hundred thousand pounds and who is going to be married before us dear God only can tell why being my younger sister you want to give her a wedding present and you shall do it darling because it is so good of you don't you know your title love how humble you are with us humble folk you are lady Lorna something so far as I can make out yet and you ought not even to speak to us you will go away and disdain us if you please talk not like that John I will have nothing to do with it if it comes between you and me John you cannot help yourself said I and then she vowed that she could and would and rank and birth were banished from between our lips in no time what can I get her good enough I am sure I do not know she asked she has been so kind and good to me and she is such a darling how I shall miss her to be sure by the by you seem to think John that I shall be rich someday of course you will as rich is the French king who keeps ours would the Lord Chancellor trouble himself about you if you were poor then if I am rich perhaps you would lend me twenty pounds dear John ten pounds would be very mean for a wealthy person to give her to this I agreed upon condition that I should make the purchase myself whatever it might be for nothing could be easier to cheat Lorna about the cost until time should come for her paying me and this was better than to cheat her for the benefit of our family for this end and for many others I set off to Dulverton bearing more commissions more messages and more questions than a man of thrice my memory might carry so far as the corner where the saw pit is and to make things worse one girl or other would keep on running up to me or even after me she would start with something or other she had just thought of which she could not possibly do without in which I must be sure to remember as the most important of the whole to my dear mother who had partly outlived the exceeding value of trifles the most important matter seemed to ensure Uncle Ruben's countenance and presence at the marriage and if I succeeded in this I might well forget all the maidens trumpery I could have been wiser to tell me when they were out of hearing for I left her to fight her own battle with them and laughing at her predicament promised to do the best I could for all so far as my wits would go Uncle Ruben was not at home but Ruth who received me very kindly although without any expressions of joy was sure of his return in the afternoon and persuaded me to wait for him and by the time that I had finished the recollect of my orders even with paper to help me the old gentleman rode into the yard and was more surprised than pleased to see me but if he was surprised I was more than that I was utterly astonished at the change in his appearance since the last time I had seen him from a hail and rather heavy man gray haired but plump and ruddy he was altered to a shrunken wisen, trembling and almost decrepit figure instead of curly and calmly locks grizzled indeed but plentiful he had only a few blank white hairs scattered and flattened upon his forehead but the greatest change of all was in the expression of his eyes which had been so keen and restless and bright and a little sarcastic bright indeed they still were but with a slow unhealthy luster their keenness was turned to perpetual outlook the restlessness to a haggard want as for the humor which once gleamed there which people who fear it call sarcasm it had been succeeded by stares of terror and then mistrust and shrinking there was none of the interest in mankind which is needful even for satire now what can this be thought I to myself has the old man lost all his property or taken too much to strong waters come inside John Redd he said I will have a talk with you it is cold out here and it is too light come inside John Redd boy I followed him into a little dark room quite different from Ruth Huckabacks it was closed from the shop by an old division of boarding hung with tan canvas and the smell was very close and faint here there was a ledger desk and a couple of chairs and a stool take the stool said Uncle Ruben showing me in very quietly it is fitter for your height John wait a moment there is no hurry then he slipped out by another door and closing it quickly after him told the four man and waiting men that the business of the day was done they had better all go home at once and he would see to the fastenings of course they were only too glad to go but I wondered at his sending them with at least two hours of daylight left however that was no business of mine and I waited and pondered whether Fair Ruth ever came into this dirty room and if so how she kept her hands from it for Annie would have had it upside down in about two minutes and scrubbed and brushed and dusted until it looked quite another place and yet all this done without scolding and crossness which are the curse of clean women and ten times worse than the dustiest dust Uncle Ben came reeling in not from any power of liquor but because he was stiff from horseback and weak from work and worry let me be John let me be he said as I went to help him this is an unkind dreary place but many a hundred of good gold Carolus have been turned in this place John not a doubt about it sir I answered in my loud and cheerful manner and many another hundred sir and may you long enjoy them my boy do you wish me to die he asked coming up close to my stool and regarding me with a shrewd though blear eyed gaze many do do you John come said I don't ask such nonsense you know better than that Uncle Ben or else I am sorry for you I want you to live as long as possible for the sake of here I stopped for the sake of what John I knew it is not for my own sake for the sake of what my boy for the sake of Ruth I answered if you must have all the truth who is to mind her when you are gone but if you knew that I had gold or a manner of getting gold far more than ever the sailors got out of the Spanish galleons far more than ever was heard of and the secret was to be yours John yours after me and no other souls then you would wish me dead John here he eyed me as if a speck of dust in my eyes should not escape him you are wrong Uncle Ben altogether wrong for all the gold ever heard or dreamed of not a wish would cross my heart to rob you of one day of life at last he moved his eyes from mine but without any word or sign to show whether he believed or disbelieved then he went to a chair and sat with his chin upon the ledger desk as if the effort of probing me had been too much for his weary brain dreamed of all the gold ever dreamed of as if it were but a dream he muttered and then he closed his eyes to think good Uncle Ruben I said to him you have been a long way today sir do you a glass of good wine cousin Ruth knows where to find it how do you know how far I have been he asked with a vicious look at me and cousin Ruth you are very pat with my granddaughter's name young man it would be hard upon me sir not to know my own cousin's name very well let that go by you have behaved very badly to Ruth she loves you and you love her not at this I was so wholly amazed not at the thing itself I mean but at his knowledge of it that I could not say a single word but looked no doubt very foolish you may well be a shamed young man he cried with some triumph over me you are the biggest of all fools as well as a conceded cox comb what can you want more than Ruth she is a little damsel truly but finer men than you John Red with all your boasted strength and wrestling have wedded smaller maidens quality and value bots one inch of Ruth is worth all your seven feet put together now I am not seven feet high nor ever was six feet eight inches in my very prime of life and nothing vexes me so much is to make me out a giant and above human sympathy and human scale of weakness it cost me hard to hold my tongue which luckily is not in proportion to my stature and only for Ruth's sake but Uncle Ben being old and worn was vexed by not having any answer almost as much as a woman is you want me to go on he continued with a look of spite at me about my poor Ruth's love for you to feed your cursed vanity because a set of asses call you the finest man in England there is no maid I suppose who is not in love with you I believe you are as deep as you are long John Red this was a little too much for me any insult I could take with good will from a white haired man and one who was my relative unless it touched my love for Lorna or my conscious modesty now both of these were touched to the quick by the sentences of the old gentleman therefore without a word I went only making a bow to him but women who are beyond all doubt the mothers of all mischief also nurse that babe to sleep when he is too noisy and there was Ruth as I took my horse with a trunk of frippery on him poor little Ruth was at the bridle and rusting all the knobs of our town going harness with tears goodbye dear I said as she bent her head away from me shall I put you up on the saddle dear cousin rid you may take it lightly said Ruth turning full upon me according to your nature this was the only cutting thing the little soul ever said to me but oh cousin rid you have no idea of the pain you will leave behind you how can that be so Ruth when I am as good as ordered to be off the premises in the first place cousin rid grandfather will be angry with himself for having so ill used you and now he is so weak and poorly that he is always repenting in the next place until he admits his sorrow and when he has admitted it I shall scold myself for scolding him and then he will come round again and think that I was hard on him and end perhaps by hating you for he is like a woman now John that last little touch of self-knowledge in Ruth which she delivered with a gleam of some secret pleasantry made me stop and look closely at her but she pretended not to know it there is something in this child I thought very different from other girls what it is I cannot tell for one very seldom gets at it at any rate the upshot was that the good horse went back to stable and had another feed of corn while my wrath sank within me there are two things according to my experience which may not hold with another man fitted beyond any others to take hot tempers out of us the first is to see our favorite creatures feeding and licking up their food and happily snuffling over it yet sparing time to be grateful and showing taste and perception the other is to go gardening boldly in the spring of the year without any misgivings about it and hoping the utmost of everything if there be a third anodyne approaching these two in power it is to smoke good tobacco well and watch the setting of the moon and if this should only be over the sea the result is irresistible master Huckaback showed no special signs of joy at my return but received me with a little grunt which appeared to me to mean ah, I thought he would hardly be fool enough to go I told him how sorry I was for having in some way offended him and he answered that I did well to grieve for one of my offenses to this I made no reply as behoves a man dealing with cross and fractious people and presently he became better tempered and sent little Ruth for a bottle of wine she gave me a beautiful smile of thanks for my forbearance as she passed and I knew by her manner that she would bring the best bottle in all the cellar as I had but little time to spare although the days were long and light we were forced to take our wine with promptitude and rapidity and whether this loosened my uncle's tongue or whether he meant beforehand to speak is now almost uncertain but true it is that he brought his chair very near to mine after three or four glasses and sent Ruth away upon some errand which seemed of small importance at this I was vexed for the room always looked so different without her come Jack he said here's your health young fellow an obedient wife to you not that your wife will ever obey you though you are much too easy tempered even a bitter and stormy woman might live in peace with you Jack but never you give her the chance to try marry some sweet little thing if you can if not don't marry any ah we have the maid to suit you my lad in this old town of Doverton have you so sir but perhaps the maid might have the hair to suit me that you may take my word she has the color of this wine will prove it the little sly hussy has been to the cobweb arch of the cellar where she has no right to go for anyone under a magistrate however I am glad to see it and we will not spare it John after my time somebody whoever marries little Ruth will find some rare wines there I trow and perhaps not know the difference thinking of this the old man sighed and expected me to sigh after him but a sigh is not like a yawn infectious and we are all more prone to be sent to sleep than to sorrow by one another not but what a sigh sometimes may make us think of sighing well sir cried I in my sprightliest manner which rouses up most people here's to your health and dear little Ruth's and may you live to knock off the cobwebs from every bottle in under the arch Uncle Rubin your life and health sir with that I took my glass thoughtfully for it was wondrous good and Uncle Ben was pleased to see me dwelling pleasantly on the subject with parenthesis and self commune and oral judgment unpronounced though smacking of fine decision Curia vault adversari as the lawyers say let us have another glass and then we can think about it come now John said Uncle Ben laying his wrinkled hand on my knee when he saw that none could heat us I know that you have a sneaking fondness for my grandchild Ruth don't interrupt me now you have and to deny it will only provoke me I do like Ruth sir I said boldly for fear of misunderstanding but I do not love her very well that makes no difference liking may very soon be loving as some people call it when the maid has money to help her but if there be as there is in my case once for all John not a word I do not attempt to lead you into any engagement with little Ruth neither will I blame you though I may be disappointed if no such engagement should ever be but whether you will have my grandchild or whether you will not and such a chance is rarely offered to a fellow of your standing Uncle Ben despised all farmers in any case I have at least resolved to let you know my secret and for two good reasons the first is that it wears me out to dwell upon it all alone and the second is that I can trust you to fulfill a promise moreover you are my next of kin except among the womankind and you are just the man I want to help me in my enterprise and I will help you sir I answered fearing some conspiracy in anything that is true and loyal and according to the laws of the realm ha ha cried the old man laughing until his eyes ran over and spreading out his skinny hands upon his shining breeches thou has gone the same fools track as the rest even his spy stickles went and all his precious troopers landing of arms at Glenthorne and Linmouth escorted across the moor sounds of metal and booming noises ah but we managed it cleverly to cheat even those so near us disaffection at Taunton signs of insurrection at Dulverton revolutionary tanner at Dunster we set it all abroad right well and not even you to suspect our work though we thought at one time that you watched us now who do you suppose is at the bottom of all this fantasy all this western rebellion not that I say there is none mind but who is at the bottom of it either mother Meldrum said I being now a little angry or else old Nick himself nay old Uncle Reuben saying this master Huckaback cast back his coat and stood up and made the most of himself well cried I being now quite come to the limits of my intellect all Captain Stickles was right in calling you a rebel sir of course he was could so keen a man be wrong about an old fool like me but come and see our rebellion John I will trust you now with everything I will take no oath from you only your word to keep silence and most of all from your mother I will give you my word I said although liking not such pledges which make a man think as usual practices however I was now so curious that I thought of nothing else and scarcely could believe at all that Uncle Ben was quite right in his head take another glass of wine my son he cried with a cheerful countenance which made him look more than 10 years younger you shall come into partnership with me your strength will save us two horses and we always fear the horse work come and see our rebellion tonight but where am I to come and see it where am I to find it sir meet me he answered yet closing his hands and wrinkling without his forehead come alone of course and meet me at the wizard sloth at 10 tomorrow morning end of chapter 57 recording by Michelle Harris