remember
aal as hev bin said to 'em about the Indians, and the rest on't."
So the Captain and his abettors, having gained the constable as
an ally, prevailed; and Englebourn, much wondering at itself,
made ready for a general holiday.

CHAPTER XLVII

THE WEDDING-DAY

One-more-poor-man-un-done
One-more-poor-man-un-done

The belfry tower rocked and reeled, as that peal rang out, now
merry, now scornful, now plaintive, from whose narrow belfry
windows, into the bosom of the soft south-west wind, which was
playing round the old grey tower of Englebourn church. And the
wind caught the peal and played with it, and bore it away over
Rectory and village street, and many a homestead, and gently
waving field of ripening corn, and rich pasture and water-meadow,
and tall whispering woods of the Grange, and rolled it against
the hill-side, and up the slope past the clump of firs on the
Hawk's Lynch, till it died away on the wild stretches of common
beyond.

The ringers bent lustily to their work. There had been no such
ringing in Englebourn since the end of the great war. Not content
with the usual peal out of church, they came back again and again
in the afternoon, full of the good cheer which had been provided
for them; and again and again the wedding peal rang out from the
belfry in honour of their old comrade--

One-more-poor-man-un-done

One-more-poor-man-un-done

Such was the ungallant speech which for many generations had been
attributed to the Englebourn wedding-bells; when you had once
caught the words--as you would be sure to do from some
wide-mouthed grinning boy, lounging over the churchyard rails to
see the wedding pass--it would be impossible to persuade yourself
that they did, in fact, say anything else. Somehow, Harry Winburn
bore his undoing in the most heroic manner, and did his duty
throughout the trying day as a non-commissioned groom should. The
only part of the performance arranged by his captain which he
fairly resisted, was the proposed departure of himself and Patty
to the solitary post-chaise of Englebourn--a real old
yellow--with a pair of horses. East, after hearing the sergeant's
pleading on the subject of vehicles, at last allowed them to
drive off in a tax-cart, taking a small boy with them behind, to
bring it back.

As for the festivities, they went off without hitch, as such
affairs will, where the leaders of the revels have their hearts
in them. The children had all p