ple of stalwart
well-dressed men, engineers engaged upon the cutting of another lode or
drain many miles to the north, strolled down from the Toft farm to have
a chat with the great grey-haired wheelwright, who carried on a large
business now that a village had sprung up in the fen.

His delight was extreme to see the visitors, and they had hard work to
extricate their ringers from his grip.

"Think of you two coming to see me now! It caps owt."

"Why, of course we've come to see you, Hicky," said the taller of the
two. "How well you look!"

"Well! Hearty, Mester Dick, bless you! and the missus too. Hearty as
the squire and his lady, bless 'em. But your father looks sadly, Mester
Tom, sir. He don't wear as I should like to see un. He's wankle."
[Sickly.]

"Rheumatism, Hicky; that's all. He'll be better soon. I say, what's
that--a summer-house?" said Tom, pointing.

"That, Mester Tom! Why, you know?"

"Why, it's the old punt!" cried Dick.

"Ay, it's the owd poont, Mester Dick. What games yow did hev in her
too, eh?"

"Yes, Hicky," said Dick with a sigh. "Ah! those were happy days."

"They weer, lad; they weer. Owd poont got dry and cracked, and of no
use bud to go on the dreern, and who wanted to go on a dreern as had
been used to the mere?"

"No one, of course," said Dick, gazing across the fields and meadows
where he had once propelled the punt.

"Ay, no one, o' course, so Jacob sawed her i' two one day, and we set
her oop theer i' the garden for a summer-hoose, and Jacob painted her
green. I say, Mester Dick, ony think," added Hickathrift, laughing
violently.

"Think what? Don't laugh like that, Hicky, or you'll shake your head
off."

"Nay, not I, my lad; but it do mak' me laugh."

"What does?"

"Jacob's married!"

"No!"

"He is, Mester Dick, and theer's a babby."

"Never!" said Dick, laughing, to humour the great fellow, who wiped his
eyes and became quite solemn now.

"Yes, that he hes, Mester Dick, and you'd nivver guess what he's ca'd
him."

"Jacob, of course."

"Nay, Mester Dick; he's ca'd him Dave."

Dick and Tom went down to the wheelwright's again next day to chat over
old times--fishing, shooting, the netting at the decoy, and the like;
and heard how John Warren had lately died, a venerable old man, who
confessed at last how he had helped Dave Gittan in some of the outrages
when the drain was made, because he hated it, and said it would ruin
honest men.

But