to the kiss and
the quarrel, to love which is one thing and marriage which is
another--Lord, how we drank! But she drank nothing. And for all her
terror the Rough could do no more with her than with a stone. Something
in her turned him cold every time. Suddenly up he gets. We'll have no
more of this,' he says, we'll go.' Combe Ivy would have had them stay,
but She's where she's used to lord it here,' says Rough, I'll take
her where I lord it, and teach her who's master,' And he pushes down
his chair and takes her hand and pulls her away; and out we tumble
after him. Combe Ivy cries to him to wait for the horses, but no,
We'll foot it,' says he, up hill and down dale as the crow flies, and
if she hates me now without a cause I swear she'll love me with one at
the end of the dance.' We're dancing them as far as the Wildbrooks; on
t'other side they may dance for themselves. Here they come
dancing--dance, you!" cried the guest, and whirled his torch like a
madman. And as he whirled and staggered, up the hill came the
wedding-party as tipsy as he was: a motley procession, waving torches
and garlands, winecups, flagons, colored napkins, shouting and singing
and beating on trenchers and salvers--on anything that they could
snatch from the table as they quitted it. They came in all their
bravery--in doublets of flame-colored silk and blue, in scarlet leather
and green velvet, in purple slashed with silver and crimson fringed
with bronze; but their vests were unlaced, their hose sagged, and silk
and velvet and leather were stained bright or dark with wine. Some had
stuck leaves and flowers in their hair, others had tied their forelocks
with ribbons like horses on a holiday, and one had torn his yellow
mantle in two and capered in advance, waving the halves in either hand
like monstrous banners, or the flapping wings of some golden bird of
prey. In the midst of them, pressing forward and pressed on by the riot
behind, was the Rough Master of Coates, and with him, always hanging a
little away and shrinking under her veil, Thea, whose right wrist he
grasped in his left hand. Breathless she was among the breathless
rabble, who, gaining the hilltop seized each other suddenly and broke
into antics, shaking their napkins and rattling on their plates. Their
voices were hoarse with laughter and drink, and their faces flushed
with it; only among those red and swollen faces, the bridegroom's, in
the flare of the torches, looked as blac