t just and patient
in adversity--with the poor labourer Acton, tried by luxury and wealth,
and proved to be apostate in prosperity: so she held her tongue, and
hitherto had been silent on a matter of so much local wonder as her
father's sudden wealth, in the midst of urgent curiosity and
extraordinary rumours.

Mary was kept quiet as we know, by superstition of a lower grade, the
dread of having money of the murdered, a thought she never breathed to
any but her husband; and to poor uninitiated Grace (who had not heard a
word of Ben's adventure), her answer about Mrs. Quarles and Mr. Jennings
in the dawn of the crock's first blessing, had been entirely
unintelligible: Mary, then, said never a word, but looked on dreadingly
to see the end.

As for Roger himself, he was too much in apprehension of a landlord's
claims, and of a task-master's extortions, to breath a syllable about
the business. So he hid his crock as best he could--we shall soon hear
how and where--took out sovereign after sovereign day by day, and made
his flush of instant wealth a mystery, a miracle, a legacy, good luck,
any thing, every thing but the truth: and he would turn fiercely round
to the frequent questioner with a "What's that to you?--Nobody's
business but mine:" and then would coaxingly add the implied bribe to
secresy, in his accustomed invitation--"And now, what'll you take?"--a
magical phrase, which could suffice to quell murmurs for the time, and
postponed curiosity to appetite. Thus the fact was still unknown, and
weighed on Roger's mind as a guilty concealment, an oppressive secret.
What if any found it out?

For immediate safety--the evening after his memorable first fifteen
hours of joy--he buried the crock deeply in a hole in his garden,
filling all up hard with stones and brick-bats; and when he had
smoothed it straight and workmanlike, remembered that he surely hadn't
kept out enough to last him; so up it had to come again--five more taken
out, and the crock was restored to its unquiet grave.

Scarcely had he done this, than it became dark, and he began to fancy
some one might have seen him hide it; those low mean tramps (never
before had he refused the wretched wayfarers his sympathy) were always
sneaking about, and would come and dig it up in the night: so he went
out in the dark and the rain, got at it with infinite trouble and a
broken pickaxe, and exultingly brought the crock in-doors; where he
buried it a third time, more