  The swinging open of a great gate at the further end of the field disturbed the momentary silence which followed his words. The returning haymakers appeared on the scene, leading Roger at their head, and Innocent jumped up eagerly, glad of the interruption. "Here comes old Roger!" she cried,—"bless his heart! Now, Robin, you must try to look very stately! Are you going to ride home standing or sitting?" He was visibly annoyed at her light indifference. "Unless I may sit beside you with my arm round your waist, in the Pettigrew fashion, I'd rather stand!" he retorted. "You said Pettigrew's hands were always dirty—so are mine. I'd better keep my distance from you. One can't make hay and remain altogether as clean as a new pin!" She gave an impatient gesture. "You always take things up in the wrong way," she said—"I never thought you a bit like Pettigrew! Your hands are not really dirty!" "They are!" he answered, obstinately. "Besides, you don't want my arm round your waist, do you?" "Certainly not!" she replied, quickly. "Then I'll stand," he said;—"You shall be enthroned like a queen and He piled up the hay in the middle of the load till it made a high cushion where, in obedience to his gesture, Innocent seated herself. The men leading the horse were now close about the waggon, and one of them, grinning sheepishly at the girl, offered her a daintily-made wreath of wild roses, from which all the thorns had been carefully removed. "Looks prutty, don't it?" he said. She accepted it with a smile. "Is it for me? Oh, Larry, how nice of you! Am I to wear it?" "If ye loike!" This with another grin. She set it on her uncovered head and became at once a model for a Romney; the wild roses with their delicate pink and white against her brown hair suited the hues of her complexion and the tender grey of her eyes;—and when, thus adorned, she looked up at her companion, he was fain to turn away quickly lest his admiration should be too plainly made manifest before profane witnesses. Roger, meanwhile, was being harnessed to the waggon. He was a handsome creature of his kind, and he knew it. As he turned his bright soft glance from side to side with a conscious pride in himself and his surroundings, he seemed to be perfectly aware that the knots of bright red ribbon tied in his long and heavy mane meant some sort of festival. When all was done the haymakers gathered round. "Good luck to the last load, Mr. Clifford!" they shouted. "Good luck to you all!" answered Robin, cheerily. "Good luck t'ye, Miss!" and they raised their sun-browned faces to the girl as she looked down upon them. "As fine a crop and as fair a load next year!" "Good luck to you!" she responded—then suddenly bending a little forward she said almost breathlessly: "Please wish luck to Dad! He's not well—and he isn't here! Oh, please don't forget him!" They all stared at her for a moment, as if startled or surprised, then they all joined in a stentorian shout. "That's right, Miss! Good luck to the master! Many good years of life to him, and better crops every year!" She drew back, smiling her thanks, but there were tears in her eyes. And then they all started in a pretty procession—the men leading Roger, who paced along the meadow with equine dignity, shaking his ribbons now and again as if he were fully conscious of carrying something more valuable than mere hay,—and above them all smiled the girl's young face, framed in its soft brown hair and crowned with the wild roses, while at her side stood the very type of a model Englishman, with all the promise of splendid life and vigour in the build of his form, the set of his shoulders and the poise of his handsome head. It was a picture of youth and beauty and lovely nature set against the warm evening tint of the sky,—one of those pictures which, though drawn for the moment only on the minds of those who see it, is yet never forgotten. Arriving presently at a vast enclosure, in which already two loads of hay were being stacked, they were hailed with a cheery shout by several other labourers at work, and very soon a strong smell of beer began to mingle with the odour of the hay and the dewy scent of the elder flowers and sweet briar in the hedges close by. "Have a drop, Mr. Clifford!" said one tall, powerful-looking man who seemed to be a leader among the others, holding out a pewter tankard full and frothing over. Robin Clifford smiled and put his lips to it. "Just to your health, Landon!" he said—"I'm not a drinking man." "Haymaking's thirsty work," commented the other. "Will Miss Jocelyn do us the honour?" The girl made a wry little face. "I don't like beer, Mr. Landon," she said—"It's horrid stuff, even when it's home-brewed! I help to make it, you see!" She laughed gaily—they all laughed with her, and then there was a little altercation which ended in her putting her lips to the tankard just offered to Robin and sipping the merest fleck of its foam. Landon watched her,—and as she returned the cup, put his own mouth to the place hers had touched and drank the whole draught off greedily. Robin did not see his action, but the girl did, and a deep blush of offence suffused her cheeks. She rose, a little nervously. "I'll go in now," she said—"Dad must be alone by this time." "All right!" And Robin jumped lightly from the top of the load to the ground and put the ladder up for her to descend. She came down daintily, turning her back to him so that the hem of her neat white skirt fell like a little snowflake over each rung of the ladder, veiling not only her slim ankles but the very heels of her shoes. When she was nearly at the bottom, he caught her up and set her lightly on the ground. "There you are!" he said, with a laugh—"When you get into the house you can tell Uncle that you are a Rose Queen, a Hay Queen, and Queen of everything and everyone on Briar Farm, including your very humble servant, Robin Clifford!" "And your humblest of slaves, Ned Landon!" added Landon, with a quick glance, doffing his cap. "Mr. Clifford mustn't expect to have it all his own way!" "What the devil are you talking about?" demanded Robin, turning upon him with a sudden fierceness. Innocent gave him an appealing look. "Don't!—Oh, don't quarrel!" she whispered,—and with a parting nod to the whole party of workers she hurried away. With her disappearance came a brief pause among the men. Then Robin, turning away from Landon, proceeded to give various orders. He was a person in authority, and as everyone knew, was likely to be the owner of the farm when his uncle was dead. Landon went close up to him. "Mr. Clifford," he said, somewhat thickly, "you heard what I said just now? You mustn't expect to have it all your own way! There's other men after the girl as well as you!" Clifford glanced him up and down. "Yourself, I suppose?" he retorted. "And why not?" sneered Landon. "Only because there are two sides to every question," said Clifford, carelessly, with a laugh. "And no decision can be arrived at till both are heard!" He climbed up among the other men and set to work, stacking steadily, and singing in a fine soft baritone the old fifteenth-century song: "Yonder comes a courteous knight, "Jove you speed, fair ladye, he said, Landon looked up at him with a dark smile. "Those laugh best who laugh last!" he muttered, "And a whistling throstle has had its neck wrung before now!" Meanwhile Innocent had entered the farmhouse. Passing through the hall, which,—unaltered since the days of its original building,—was vaulted high and heavily timbered, she went first into the kitchen to see Priscilla, who, assisted by a couple of strong rosy-cheeked girls, did all the housework and cooking of the farm. She found that personage rolling out pastry and talking volubly as she rolled: "Ah! YOU'LL never come to much good, Jenny Spinner," she cried. "What with a muck of dirty dishes in one corner and a muddle of ragged clouts in another, you're the very model of a wife for a farm hand! Can't sew a gown for yerself neither, but bound to send it into town to be made for ye, and couldn't put a button on a pair of breeches for fear of 'urtin' yer delicate fingers! Well! God 'elp ye when the man comes as ye're lookin' for! He'll be a fool anyhow, for all men are that,—but he'll be twice a fool if he takes you for a life-satchel on his shoulders!" Jenny Spinner endured this tirade patiently, and went on with the washing-up in which she was engaged, only turning her head to look at Innocent as she appeared suddenly in the kitchen doorway, with her hair slightly dishevelled and the wreath of wild roses crowning her brows. "Priscilla, where's Dad?" she asked. "Lord save us, lovey! You gave me a real scare coming in like that with them roses on yer head like a pixie out of the woods! The master? He's just where the doctors left 'im, sittin' in his easy-chair and looking out o' window." "Was it—was it all right, do you think?" asked the girl, hesitatingly. "Now, lovey, don't ask me about doctors, 'cos I don't know nothin' and wants to know nothin', for they be close-tongued folk who never sez what they thinks lest they get their blessed selves into hot water. And whether it's all right or all wrong, I couldn't tell ye, for the two o' them went out together, and Mr. Slowton sez 'Good-arternoon, Miss Friday!' quite perlite like, and the other gentleman he lifts 'is 'at quite civil, so I should say 'twas all wrong. For if you mark me, lovey, men's allus extra perlite when they thinks there's goin' to be trouble, hopin' they'll get somethin' for theirselves out of it." Innocent hardly waited to hear her last words. "I'm going to Dad," she said, quickly, and disappeared. Priscilla Friday stopped for a minute in the rolling-cut of her pastry. Some great stress of thought appeared to be working behind her wrinkled brow, for she shook her head, pursed her lips and rolled up her eyes a great many times. Then she gave a short sigh and went on with her work. The farmhouse was a rambling old place, full of quaint corners, arches and odd little steps up and down leading to cupboards, mysterious recesses and devious winding ways which turned into dark narrow passages, branching right and left through the whole breadth of the house. It was along one of these that Innocent ran swiftly on leaving the kitchen, till she reached a closed door, where pausing, she listened a moment-then, hearing no sound, opened it and went softly in. The room she entered was filled with soft shadows of the gradually falling dusk, yet partially lit by a golden flame of the after-glow which shone through the open latticed window from the western sky. Close to the waning light sat the master of the farm, still clad in his smock frock, with his straw hat on the table beside him and his stick leaning against the arm of his chair. He was very quiet,—so quiet, that a late beam of the sun, touching the rough silver white of his hair, seemed almost obtrusive, as suggesting an interruption to the moveless peace of his attitude. Innocent stopped short, with a tremor of nervous fear. "Dad!" she said, softly. He turned towards her. "Ay, lass! What is it?" She did not answer, but came up and knelt down beside him, taking one of his brown wrinkled hands in her own and caressing it. The silence between them was unbroken for quite two or three minutes; then he said: "Last load in all safe?" "Yes, Dad!" "Not a drop of rain to wet it, and no hard words to toughen it, eh?" "No, Dad." She gave the answer a little hesitatingly. She was thinking of Ned Landon. He caught the slight falter in her voice and looked at her suspiciously. "Been quarrelling with Robin?" "Dear Dad, no! We're the best of friends." He loosened his hand from her clasp and patted her head with it. "That's right! That's as it should be! Be friends with Robin, child! Be friends!—be lovers!" She was silent. The after-glow warmed the tints of her hair to russet-gold and turned to a deeper pink the petals of the roses in the wreath she wore. He touched the blossoms and spoke with great gentleness. "Did Robin crown thee?" She looked up, smiling. "No, it's Larry's wreath." "Larry! Ay, poor Larry! A good lad—but he can eat for two and only work for one. 'Tis the way of men nowadays!" Another pause ensued, and the western gold of the sky began to fade into misty grey. "Dad," said the girl then, in a low tone—"Do tell me—what did the He lifted his head quickly, and his old eyes for a moment flashed as though suddenly illumined by a flame from within. "Say! What should he say, lass, but that I am old and must expect to die? It's natural enough—only I haven't thought about it. It's just that—I haven't thought about it!" "Why should you think about it?" she asked, with quick tenderness—"You will not die yet—not for many years. You are not so very old. And you are strong." He patted her head again. "Poor little wilding!" he said—"If you had your way I should live for ever, no doubt! But an' you were wise with modern wisdom, you would say I had already lived too long!" For answer, she drew down his hand and kissed it. "I do not want any modern wisdom," she said—"I am your little girl and A shadow flitted across his face and he moved uneasily. She looked up at him. "You will not tell me?" "Tell you what?" "All that the London doctor said." He was silent for a minute's space—then he answered. "Yes, I will tell you, but not now. To-night after supper will be time enough. And then—" "Yes—then?" she repeated, anxiously. "Then you shall know—you will have to know—" Here he broke off abruptly. "Innocent!" "Yes, Dad?" "How old are you now?" "Eighteen." "Ay, so you are!" And he looked at her searchingly. "Quite a woman! "I have always tried to learn," she said—"and I like studying things out of books—" "Ay! But there are worse things in life than ever were written in books," he answered, wearily—"things that people hide away and are ashamed to speak of! Ay, poor wilding! Things that I've tried to keep from you as long as possible—but—time presses, and, I shall have to speak—" She looked at him earnestly. Her face paled and her eyes grew dark and wondering. "Have I done anything wrong?" she asked. "You? No! Not you! You are not to blame, child! But you've heard the law set out in church on Sundays that 'The sins of the fathers shall be visited on the children even unto the third and fourth generation.' You've heard that?" "Yes, Dad!" "Ay!—and who dare say the fourth generation are to blame! Yet, though they are guiltless, they suffer most! No just God ever made such a law, though they say 'tis God speaking. I say 'tis the devil!" His voice grew harsh and loud, and finding his stick near his chair, he took hold of it and struck it against the ground to emphasise his words. "I say 'tis the devil!" The girl rose from her kneeling attitude and put her arms gently round his shoulders. "There, Dad!" she said soothingly,—"Don't worry! Church and church things seem to rub you up all the wrong way! Don't think about them! Supper will be ready in a little while and after supper we'll have a long talk. And then you'll tell me what the doctor said." His angry excitement subsided suddenly and his head sank on his breast. "Ay! After supper. Then—then I'll tell you what the doctor said." His speech faltered. He turned and looked out on the garden, full of luxuriant blossom, the colours of which were gradually merging into indistinguishable masses under the darkening grey of the dusk. She moved softly about the room, setting things straight, and lighting two candles in a pair of tall brass candlesticks which stood one on either side of a carved oak press. The room thus illumined showed itself to be a roughly-timbered apartment in the style of the earliest Tudor times, and all the furniture in it was of the same period. The thick gate-legged table—the curious chairs, picturesque, but uncomfortable—the two old dower chests—the quaint three-legged stools and upright settles, were a collection that would have been precious to the art dealer and curio hunter, as would the massive eight-day clock with its grotesquely painted face, delineating not only the hours and days but the lunar months, and possessing a sonorous chime which just now struck eight with a boom as deep as that of a cathedral bell. The sound appeared to startle the old farmer with a kind of shock, for he rose from his chair and grasped his stick, looking about him as though for the moment uncertain of his bearings. "How fast the hours go by!" he muttered, dreamily. "When we're young they don't count—but when we're old we know that every hour brings us nearer to the end-the end, the end of all! Another night closing in—and the last load cleared from the field—Innocent!" The name broke from his lips like a cry of suffering, and she ran to him trembling. "Dad, dear, what is it?" He caught her outstretched hands and held them close. "Nothing—nothing!" he answered, drawing his breath quick and hard—"Nothing, lass! No pain—no—not that! I'm only frightened! Frightened!—think of it!—me frightened who never knew fear! And I—I wouldn't tell it to anyone but you—I'm afraid of what's coming—of what's bound to come! 'Twould always have come, I know—but I never thought about it—it never seemed real! It never seemed real—" Here the door opened, admitting a flood of cheerful light from the outside passage, and Robin Clifford entered. "Hullo, Uncle! Supper's ready!" The old man's face changed instantly. Its worn and scared expression smoothed into a smile, and, loosening his hold of Innocent, he straightened himself and stood erect. "All right, my lad! You've worked pretty late!" "Yes, and we've not done yet. But we shall finish stacking tomorrow," answered Clifford—"Just now we're all tired and hungry." "Don't say you're thirsty!" said the old farmer, his smile broadening. "Oh, well! You'd better ask Landon,"—and Clifford's light laugh had a touch of scorn in it,—"he's the man for the beer! I hardly ever touch it—Innocent knows that." "More work's done on water after all," said Jocelyn. "The horses that draw for us and the cattle that make food for us prove that. But we think we're a bit higher than the beasts, and some of us get drunk to prove it! That's one of our strange ways as men! Come along, lad! And you, child,"—here he turned to Innocent—"run and tell Priscilla we're waiting in the Great Hall." He seemed to have suddenly lost all feebleness, and walked with a firm step into what he called the Great Hall, which was distinguished by this name from the lesser or entrance hall of the house. It was a nobly proportioned, very lofty apartment, richly timbered, the roof being supported by huge arched beams curiously and intricately carved. Long narrow boards on stout old trestles occupied the centre, and these were spread with cloths of coarse but spotlessly clean linen and furnished with antique plates, tankards and other vessels of pewter which would have sold for a far larger sum in the market than solid silver. A tall carved chair was set at the head of the largest table, and in this Farmer Jocelyn seated himself. The men now began to come in from the fields in their work-a-day clothes, escorted by Ned Landon, their only attempt at a toilet having been a wash and brush up in the outhouses; and soon the hall presented a scene of lively bustle and activity. Priscilla, entering it from the kitchen with her two assistants, brought in three huge smoking joints on enormous pewter dishes,—then followed other good things of all sorts,—vegetables, puddings, pasties, cakes and fruit, which Innocent helped to set out all along the boards in tempting array. It was a generous supper fit for a "Harvest Home"—yet it was only Farmer Jocelyn's ordinary way of celebrating the end of the haymaking,—the real harvest home was another and bigger festival yet to come. Robin Clifford began to carve a sirloin of beef,—Ned Landon, who was nearly opposite him, actively apportioned slices of roast pork, the delicacy most favoured by the majority, and when all the knives and forks were going and voices began to be loud and tongues discursive, Innocent slipped into a chair by Farmer Jocelyn and sat between him and Priscilla. For not only the farm hands but all the servants on the place were at table, this haymaking supper being the annual order of the household. The girl's small delicate head, with its coronal of wild roses, looked strange and incongruous among the rough specimens of manhood about her, and sometimes as the laughter became boisterous, or some bucolic witticism caught her ear, a faint flush coloured the paleness of her cheeks and a little nervous tremor ran through her frame. She drew as closely as she could to the old farmer, who sat rigidly upright and quiet, eating nothing but a morsel of bread with a bowl of hot salted milk Priscilla had put before him. Beer was served freely, and was passed from man to man in leather "blackjacks" such as were commonly used in olden times, but which are now considered mere curiosities. They were, however, ordinary wear at Briar Farm, and had been so since very early days. The Great Hall was lighted by tall windows reaching almost to the roof and traversed with shafts of solid stonework; the one immediately opposite Farmer Jocelyn's chair showed the very last parting glow of the sunset like a dull red gleam on a dark sea. For the rest, thick home-made candles of a torch shape fixed into iron sconces round the walls illumined the room, and burned with unsteady flare, giving rise to curious lights and shadows as though ghostly figures were passing to and fro, ruffling the air with their unseen presences. Priscilla Priday, her wizened yellow face just now reddened to the tint of a winter apple by her recent exertions in the kitchen, was not so much engaged in eating her supper as in watching her master. Her beady brown eyes roved from him to the slight delicate girl beside him with inquisitive alertness. She felt and saw that the old man's thoughts were far away, and that something of an unusual nature was troubling his mind. Priscilla was an odd-looking creature but faithful;—her attachments were strong, and her dislikes only a shade more violent,—and just now she entertained very uncomplimentary sentiments towards "them doctors" who had, as she surmised, put her master out of sorts with himself, and caused anxiety to the "darling child," as she invariably called Innocent when recommending her to the guidance of the Almighty in her daily and nightly prayers. Meanwhile the noise at the supper table grew louder and more incessant, and sundry deep potations of home-brewed ale began to do their work. One man, seated near Ned Landon, was holding forth in very slow thick accents on the subject of education: "Be eddicated!" he said, articulating his words with difficulty,—"That's what I says, boys! Be eddicated! Then everything's right for us! We can kick all the rich out into the mud and take their goods and enjoy 'em for ourselves. Eddication does it! Makes us all we wants to be,—members o' Parli'ment and what not! I've only one boy,—but he'll be eddicated as his father never was—" "And learn to despise his father!" said Robin, suddenly, his clear voice ringing out above the other's husky loquacity. "You're right! That's the best way to train a boy in the way he should go!" There was a brief silence. Then came a fresh murmur of voices and Ned "I don't agree with you, Mr. Clifford," he said—"There's no reason why a well-educated lad should despise his father." "But he often does," said Robin—"reason or no reason." "Well, you're educated yourself," retorted Landon, with a touch of envy,—"You won a scholarship at your grammar school, and you've been to a University." "What's that done for me?" demanded Robin, carelessly,—"Where has it put me? Just nowhere, but exactly where I might have stood all the time. I didn't learn farming at Oxford!" "But you didn't learn to despise your father either, did you, sir?" queried one of the farm hands, respectfully. "My father's dead," answered Robin, curtly,—"and I honour his memory." "So your own argument goes to the wall!" said Landon. "Education has not made you think less of him." "In my case, no," said Robin,—"but in dozens of other cases it works out differently. Besides, you've got to decide what education IS. The man who knows how to plough a field rightly is as usefully educated as the man who knows how to read a book, in my opinion." "Education," interposed a strong voice, "is first to learn one's place in the world and then know how to keep it!" All eyes turned towards the head of the table. It was Farmer Jocelyn who spoke, and he went on speaking: "What's called education nowadays," he said, "is a mere smattering and does no good. The children are taught, especially in small villages like ours, by men and women who often know less than the children themselves. What do you make of Danvers, for example, boys?" A roar of laughter went round the table. "Danvers!" exclaimed a huge red-faced fellow at the other end of the board,—"Why he talks yer 'ead off about what he's picked up here and there like, and when I asked him to tell me where my son is as went to Mexico, blowed if he didn't say it was a town somewheres near New York!" Another roar went round the table. Farmer Jocelyn smiled and held up his hand to enjoin silence. "Mr. Danvers is a teacher selected by the Government," he then observed, with mock gravity. "And if he teaches us that Mexico is a town near New York, we poor ignorant farm-folk are bound to believe him!" They all laughed again, and he continued: "I'm old enough, boys, to have seen many changes, and I tell you, all things considered, that the worst change is the education business, so far as the strength and the health of the country goes. That, and machine work. When I was a youngster, nearly every field-hand knew how to mow,—now we've trouble enough to find an extra man who can use a scythe. And you may put a machine on the grass as much as you like, you'll never get the quality that you'll get with a well-curved blade and a man's arm and hand wielding it. Longer work maybe, and risk of rain—but, taking the odds for and against, men are better than machines. Forty years we've scythed the grass on Briar Farm, and haven't we had the finest crops of hay in the county?" A chorus of gruff voices answered him: "Ay, Mister Jocelyn!" "That's right!" "I never 'member more'n two wet seasons and then we got last load in 'tween showers," observed one man, thoughtfully. "There ain't never been nothin' wrong with Briar Farm hay crops anyway—all the buyers knows that for thirty mile round," said another. "And the wheat and the corn and the barley and the oats the same," struck in the old farmer again—"all the seed sown by hand and the harvest reaped by hand, and every man and boy in the village or near it has found work enough to keep him in his native place, spring, summer, autumn and winter, isn't that so?" "Ay, ay!" "Never a day out o' work!" "Talk of unemployed trouble," went on Jocelyn, "if the old ways were kept up and work done in the old fashion, there'd be plenty for all England's men to do, and to feed fair and hearty! But the idea nowadays is to rush everything just to get finished with it, and then to play cards or football, and get drunk till the legs don't know whether it's land or water they're standing on! It's the wrong way about, boys! It's the wrong way about! You may hurry and scurry along as fast as you please, but you miss most good things by the way; and there's only one end to your racing—the grave! There's no such haste to drop into THAT, boys! It'll wait! It's always waiting! And the quicker you go the quicker you'll get to it! Take time while you're young! That time for me is past!" He lifted his head and looked round upon them all. There was a strange wild look in his old eyes,—and a sudden sense of awe fell on the rest of the company. Farmer Jocelyn seemed all at once removed from them to a height of dignity above his ordinary bearing. Innocent's rose-crowned head drooped, and tears sprang involuntarily to her eyes. She tried to hide them, not so well, however, but that Priscilla Priday saw them. "Now, lovey child!" she whispered,—"Don't take on! It's only the doctors that's made him low like and feelin' blue, and he ain't takin' sup or morsel, but we'll make him have a bite in his own room afterwards. Don't you swell your pretty eyes and make 'em red, for that won't suit me nor Mr. Robin neither, come, come!—that it won't!" Innocent put one of her little hands furtively under the board and pressed Priscilla's rough knuckles tenderly, but she said nothing. The silence was broken by one of the oldest men present, who rose, tankard in hand. "The time for good farming is never past!" he said, in a hearty voice—"And no one will ever beat Farmer Jocelyn at that! Full cups, boys! And the master's health! Long life to him!" The response was immediate, every man rising to his feet. None of them were particularly unsteady except Ned Landon, who nearly fell over the table as he got up, though he managed to straighten himself in time. "Farmer Jocelyn!" "To Briar Farm and the master!" "Health and good luck!" These salutations were roared loudly round the table, and then the whole company gave vent to a hearty 'Hip-hip-hurrah!' that roused echoes from the vaulted roof and made its flaring lights tremble. "One more!" shouted Landon, suddenly, turning his flushed face from side to side upon those immediately near him—"Miss Jocelyn!" There followed a deafening volley of cheering,—tankards clinked together and shone in the flickering light and every eye looked towards the girl, who, colouring deeply, shrank from the tumult around her like a leaf shivering in a storm-wind. Robin glanced at her with a half-jealous, half-anxious look, but her face was turned away from him. He lifted his tankard and, bowing towards her, drank the contents. When the toast was fully pledged, Farmer Jocelyn got up, amid much clapping of hands, stamping of feet and thumping on the boards. He waited till quiet was restored, and then, speaking in strong resonant accents, said: "Boys, I thank you! You're all boys to me, young and old, for you've worked on the farm so long that I seem to know your faces as well as I know the shape of the land and the trees on the ridges. You've wished me health and long life—and I take it that your wishes are honest—but I've had a long life already and mustn't expect much more of it. However, the farm will go on just the same whether I'm here or elsewhere,—and no man that works well on it will be turned away from it,—that I can promise you! And the advice I've always given to you I give to you again,—stick to the land and the work of the land! There's nothing finer in the world than the fresh air and the scent of the good brown earth that gives you the reward of your labour, always providing it is labour and not 'scamp' service. When I'm gone you'll perhaps remember what I say,—and think it not so badly said either. I thank you for your good wishes and"—here he hesitated—"my little girl here thanks you too. Next time you make the hay—if I'm not with you—I ask you to be as merry as you are to-night and to drink to my memory! For whenever one master of Briar Farm has gone there's always been another in his place!—and there always will be!" He paused,—then lifting a full tankard which had been put beside him, he drank a few drops of its contents—"God bless you all! May you long have the will to work and the health to enjoy the fruits of honest labour!" |
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