n Onchan Hill.

To this Greeba would not consent; and as it chanced there was little
need, for when they got into Douglas the town was all astir with many
carriages and great troops of people making for the quay, so that no
one seemed so much as to see the little company of three that came
covered with dust out of the country roads.

"Aw, bad cess, what jeel is this?" said Chalse; and before they had
crossed the little market place by the harbor, where the bells of old
St. Matthew's rang out a merry peal, they learned for certain the
cause of the joyful commotion; for there they were all but run down
by the swaying and surging crowds, that came shouting and cheering by
the side of an open carriage, wherein sat a very old gentleman in the
uniform of a soldier. It was, as Adam had already divined, the new
Governor-General, Colonel Cornelius Smelt, newly arrived that day in
the island as the first direct representative of the English crown in
succession to the Lords of Man. And at that brave sight poor old
Chalse, who jumbled in his distraught brain the idea of Adam's late
position with that of his master the Duke of Athol, and saw nothing
but that this gentleman, in his fine rigging, was come in Adam's
place, and was even now on his way to Castletown to take possession
of Government House, and that the bellowing mob that not a month
before had doffed their caps before Adam's face, now shoved him off
the pavement without seeing him, stamped and raved and shook his fist
over the people, as if he would brain them.

They slept at Onchan that night, and next day they reached Kirk
Maughold. And coming on the straggling old house at Lague, after so
long an absence, Adam was visibly moved, saying he had seen many a
humiliation since the days when he lived in it, and might the Lord
make them profitable to his soul; but only let it please God to grant
him peace and content and daily bread, and there should be no more
going hence in the years that were left to him.

At that Greeba felt a tingling on both sides her heart, for her fears
were many of the welcome that awaited them.

It was nigh upon noon, and the men were out in the fields; but Mrs.
Fairbrother was at home, and she saw the three when they opened the
gate and came down under the elms.

"Now, I thought as much," she said within herself, "and I warrant I
know their errand."

Adam entered the house with what cheer of face he could command,
being hard set to keep ba