fore.

"Now, then," said he, "don't you think that by rights I should bake all
the same?"

"Oh, that will be skipped," she said, with a laugh; "and now go you and
make ready for the cakes, pastry, and sweetmeats, the baked meats and
the poultry, with which the people of Barnbury are to be made right
happy on New Year's day."

THE WATER-DEVIL

A MARINE TALE.

In the village of Riprock there was neither tavern nor inn, for it was
but a small place through which few travellers passed; but it could not
be said to be without a place of entertainment, for if by chance a
stranger--or two or three of them, for that matter--wished to stop at
Riprock for a meal, or to pass the night, there was the house of
blacksmith Fryker, which was understood to be always open to decent
travellers.

The blacksmith was a prominent man in the village, and his house was a
large one, with several spare bedrooms, and it was said by those who
had had an opportunity of judging, that nobody in the village lived
better than blacksmith Fryker and his family.

Into the village there came, late one autumn afternoon, a tall man, who
was travelling on foot, with a small valise hanging from his shoulder.
He had inquired for lodging for the night, had been directed to the
blacksmith's house, had arranged to stop there, had had his supper,
which greatly satisfied him, and was now sitting before the fire in the
large livingroom, smoking blacksmith Fryker's biggest pipe.

This stranger was a red-haired man, with a cheery expression, and a
pair of quick, bright eyes. He was slenderly but strongly built, and
was a good fellow, who would stand by, with his hands in the pockets of
his short pea-jacket, and right willingly tell one who was doing
something how the thing ought to be done.

But the traveller did not sit alone before the crackling fire of logs,
for the night being cool, a table was drawn near to one side of the
fire-place, and by this sat Mistress Fryker and her daughter Joanna,
both engaged in some sort of needle-work. The blacksmith sat between
the corner of the fire-place and this table, so that when he had
finished smoking his after-supper pipe, he might put on his spectacles
and read the weekly paper by the light of the big lamp. On the other
side of the stranger, whose chair was in front of the middle of the
fire-place, sat the school-master, Andrew Cardly by name; a middle-aged
man of sober and attentive aspect, and very glad