h isn't
trying in other ways: doesn't harass you in short. Such work is always
pleasant if you don't overdo it. Only, mind you, good mowing requires
some little skill. I'm a pretty good mower."

This talk brought us up to the house that was a-building, not a large
one, which stood at the end of a beautiful orchard surrounded by an old
stone wall. "O yes, I see," said Dick; "I remember, a beautiful place
for a house: but a starveling of a nineteenth century house stood there:
I am glad they are rebuilding: it's all stone, too, though it need not
have been in this part of the country: my word, though, they are making a
neat job of it: but I wouldn't have made it all ashlar."

Walter and Clara were already talking to a tall man clad in his mason's
blouse, who looked about forty, but was I daresay older, who had his
mallet and chisel in hand; there were at work in the shed and on the
scaffold about half a dozen men and two women, blouse-clad like the
carles, while a very pretty woman who was not in the work but was dressed
in an elegant suit of blue linen came sauntering up to us with her
knitting in her hand. She welcomed us and said, smiling: "So you are
come up from the water to see the Obstinate Refusers: where are you going
haymaking, neighbours?"

"O, right up above Oxford," said Dick; "it is rather a late country. But
what share have you got with the Refusers, pretty neighbour?"

Said she, with a laugh: "O, I am the lucky one who doesn't want to work;
though sometimes I get it, for I serve as model to Mistress Philippa
there when she wants one: she is our head carver; come and see her."

She led us up to the door of the unfinished house, where a rather little
woman was working with mallet and chisel on the wall near by. She seemed
very intent on what she was doing, and did not turn round when we came
up; but a taller woman, quite a girl she seemed, who was at work near by,
had already knocked off, and was standing looking from Clara to Dick with
delighted eyes. None of the others paid much heed to us.

The blue-clad girl laid her hand on the carver's shoulder and said: "Now
Philippa, if you gobble up your work like that, you will soon have none
to do; and what will become of you then?"

The carver turned round hurriedly and showed us the face of a woman of
forty (or so she seemed), and said rather pettishly, but in a sweet
voice:

"Don't talk nonsense, Kate, and don't interrupt me if you can help it."