u will kindly excuse my bobby: it carries
grist to your mill. [Reiterated applause.] Well, but you will say,
'What's the squire driving at?' Why this, my friends: There was only one
worn-out, dilapidated, tumble-down thing in the parish of Hazeldean, and
it became an eyesore to me; so I saddled my hobby, and rode at it. Oh,
ho! you know what I mean now! Yes, but, neighbours, you need not have
taken it so to heart. That was a scurvy trick of some of you to hang me
in effigy, as they call it."

"It warn't you," cried a voice in the crowd, "it war Nick Stirn."

The squire recognized the voice of the tinker; but though he now guessed
at the ringleader, on that day of general amnesty he had the prudence
and magnanimity not to say, "Stand forth, Sprott: thou art the man."
Yet his gallant English spirit would not suffer him to come off at the
expense of his servant.

"If it was Nick Stirn you meant," said he, gravely, "more shame for you.
It showed some pluck to hang the master; but to hang the poor servant,
who only thought to do his duty, careless of what ill-will it brought
upon him, was a shabby trick,--so little like the lads of Hazeldean,
that I suspect the man who taught it to them was never born in the
parish. But let bygones be bygones. One thing is clear,--you don't take
kindly to my new pair of stocks! The stocks has been a stumbling-block
and a grievance, and there's no denying that we went on very pleasantly
without it. I may also say that, in spite of it, we have been coming
together again lately. And I can't tell you what good it did me to see
your children playing again on the green, and your honest faces, in
spite of the stocks, and those diabolical tracts you've been reading
lately, lighted up at the thought that something pleasant was going on
at the Hall. Do you know, neighbours, you put me in mind of an old story
which, besides applying to the parish, all who are married, and all who
intend to marry, will do well to recollect. A worthy couple, named John
and Joan, had lived happily together many a long year, till one unlucky
day they bought a new bolster. Joan said the bolster was too hard, and
John that it was too soft. So, of course, they quarrelled. After sulking
all day, they agreed to put the bolster between them at night." (Roars
of laughter amongst the men; the women did not know which way to look,
except, indeed, Mrs. Hazeldean, who, though she was more than usually
rosy, maintained her innocent