m conscience
possibly pricked to reply,--"what for, when it bean't the season? And if
a poor man did find a hear in his pocket i' the haytime, I should like
to know if ever a squire in the world would let 'un off with the stocks,
eh?"

This last question seemed a settler, and the wisdom of Gaffer Solomons
went down fifty per cent in the public opinion of Hazeldean.

"Maw be," said the gaffer--this time with a thrilling effect, which
restored his reputation,--"maw be some o' ye ha' been getting drunk, and
making beestises o' yoursel's!"

There was a dead pause, for this suggestion applied too generally to
be met with a solitary response. At last one of the women said, with a
meaning glance at her husband,

"God bless the squire; he'll make some on us happy women if that's all!"

There then arose an almost unanimous murmur of approbation among the
female part of the audience; and the men looked at each other, and then
at the phenomenon, with a very hang-dog expression of countenance.

"Or, maw be," resumed Gaffer Solomons, encouraged to a fourth suggestion
by the success of its predecessor,--"maw be some o' the misseses ha'
been making a rumpus, and scolding their good men. I heard say in
my granfeyther's time, arter old Mother Bang nigh died o' the
ducking-stool, them 'ere stocks were first made for the women, out o'
compassion like! And every one knows the squire is a koind-hearted man,
God bless 'un!"

"God bless 'un!" cried the men, heartily; and they gathered lovingly
round the phenomenon, like heathens of old round a tutelary temple. But
then there rose one shrill clamour among the females as they retreated
with involuntary steps towards the verge of the green, whence they
glared at Solomons and the phenomenon with eyes so sparkling, and
pointed at both with gestures so menacing, that Heaven only knows if a
morsel of either would have remained much longer to offend the eyes of
the justly-enraged matronage of Hazeldean, if fortunately Master Stirn,
the squire's right-hand man, had not come up in the nick of time.

Master Stirn was a formidable personage,--more formidable than the
squire himself,--as, indeed, a squire's right hand is generally more
formidable than the head can pretend to be. He inspired the greater awe,
because, like the stocks of which he was deputed guardian, his powers
were undefined and obscure, and he had no particular place in the
out-of-door establishment. He was not the steward, yet h