ernacular as he rubbed the
hack's ears in the stable, his speech would have been much as
follows:--

"How cums it as I be all changed like, as tho' sum un had tuk and
rubbed all the downheartedness out o' me? Here I be, two days out
o' gaol, wi' nothin' in the world but the things I stands
in,--for in course I med just give up the bits o' things as is
left at Daddy Collins's--and they all draggled wi' the wet--and I
med be tuk in the mornin' and sent across the water; and yet I
feels sum how as peert as a yukkel. So fur as I can see, 'tis
jest nothin' but talkin' wi' our Master Tom. What a fine thing
'tis to be a schollard. And yet seemin'ly 'tis nothin' but talk
arter all's said and done. But 'tis allus the same; whenever I
gets talkin' wi' he, it all cums out as smooth as crame. Fust
time as ever I seen him since we wur bwys he talked just as a do
now; and then my poor mother died. Then he come in arter the
funeral, and talked me up agen, till I thought as I wur to hev
our cottage and all the land as I could do good by. But our
cottage wur tuk away, and my 'lotment besides. Then cum last
summer, and 'twur just the same agen arter his talk, but I got
dree months auver that job. And now 'ere I be wi un agen,
a-runnin' from the constable; and like to be tuk up and
transpworted, and 'tis just the same; and I s'pose 'twill be just
the same if ever I gets back, and sees un, and talks wi' un, if I
be gwine to be hung. 'Tis a wunnerful thing to be a schollard, to
be able to make things look all straight when they be ever so
akkerd and unked."

And then Harry left off rubbing the horse's ears; and, pulling
the damp piece of paper, which Tom had given him, out of his
breeches' pocket, proceeded to flatten it out tenderly on the
palm of his hand, and read it by the light of the dip, when the
landlady came to inform him that the gentlefolk wanted him in the
kitchen. So he folded his treasure up again, and went off to the
kitchen. He found Tom standing with his back to the fire, while
the lieutenant was sitting at the table, writing on a scrap of
paper, which the landlady had produced after much hunting over of
drawers. Tom began, with some little hesitation:--

"Oh, Harry, I've been talking matters over with my friend here,
and I've changed my mind. It won't do after all for you to stay
about at railway work, or anything of that sort. You see you
wouldn't be safe. They'd be sure to trace you, and you'd get into
trouble abo