dful ones when fire and candle were never out, and every
one was a watcher in the shadow of death.

As the season advanced, Julius took precisely the position which Stephen
had foretold he would take. At first he deferred entirely to the squire;
he received his orders, and then saw them carried out. Very soon he
forgot to name the squire in the matter. He held consultations with the
head man, and talked with him about the mowing and harvesting, and the
sale of lambs and fleeces. The master's room was opened, and Julius sat
at the table to receive tenants and laborers. In the squire's chair it
was easy to feel that he was himself squire of Sandal-Side and Torver.

It was a most unhappy summer. Evils, like weeds, grow apace. There was
scarcely any interval between some long-honored custom and its
disappearance. To-day it was observed as it had been for a lifetime;
the next week it had passed away, and appeared to be forgotten. "Such
times I never saw," said Ann. "I have been at Sandal twenty-two years
come Martinmas, but I'm going to Beverley next feast."

"You'll not do it, Ann. It's but talk."

"Nay, but I'm set on it. I have taken the 'fastening penny,' and I'm
bound to make that good. Things are that trying here now, that I can't
abide them longer."

All summer servants were going and coming at Seat-Sandal; the very
foundations of its domestic life were broken up, and Charlotte's bright
face had a constant wrinkle of worry and annoyance. Sophia was careful
to point out the fact. "She has no housekeeping ability. Every thing is
in a mess. If I only durst take hold of things. But Charlotte is such a
spitfire, one does not like to offer help. I would be only too glad to
put things right, but I should give offence," etc. "The poison of asps
under the tongue," and a very little of it, can paralyze and irritate a
whole household.

Mowing-time and shearing-time and reaping-time came and went, but the
gay pastoral festivals brought none of their old-time pleasure. The men
in the fields did not like Julius in the squire's place, and they took
no pains to hide the fact. Then he came home with complaints. "They were
idle. They were disrespectful. The crops had fallen short." He could not
understand it; and when he had expressed some dissatisfaction on the
matter, the head man had told him, to take his grumbling to God
Almighty. "An insolent race, these statesmen and Dale shepherds," he
added; "if one of them owns ten acres