since all these years?'

'Oh, I've bin to Plymouth, I've bin to Dover--
I've bin ramblin', boys, the wide world over,'

the man answered cheerily. 'I reckon I know as much of Old England as
most.' He turned towards the children and winked boldly.

'I lay they told you a sight o' lies, then. I've been into England fur
as Wiltsheer once. I was cheated proper over a pair of hedgin'-gloves,'
said Hobden.

'There's fancy-talkin' everywhere. _You've_ cleaved to your own parts
pretty middlin' close, Ralph.'

'Can't shift an old tree 'thout it dyin',' Hobden chuckled. 'An' I be no
more anxious to die than you look to be to help me with my hops
tonight.'

The great man leaned against the brickwork of the roundel, and swung his
arms abroad. 'Hire me!' was all he said, and they stumped upstairs
laughing.

The children heard their shovels rasp on the cloth where the yellow hops
lie drying above the fires, and all the oast-house filled with the
sweet, sleepy smell as they were turned.

'Who is it?' Una whispered to the Bee Boy.

'Dunno, no more'n you--if _you_ dunno,' said he, and smiled.

The voices on the drying-floor talked and chuckled together, and the
heavy footsteps moved back and forth. Presently a hop-pocket dropped
through the press-hole overhead, and stiffened and fattened as they
shovelled it full. 'Clank!' went the press, and rammed the loose stuff
into tight cake.

'Gently!' they heard Hobden cry. 'You'll bust her crop if you lay on so.
You be as careless as Gleason's bull, Tom. Come an' sit by the fires.
She'll do now.'

They came down, and as Hobden opened the shutter to see if the potatoes
were done Tom Shoesmith said to the children, 'Put a plenty salt on 'em.
That'll show you the sort o' man _I_ be.' Again he winked, and again the
Bee Boy laughed and Una stared at Dan.

'_I_ know what sort o' man you be,' old Hobden grunted, groping for the
potatoes round the fire.

'Do ye?' Tom went on behind his back. 'Some of us can't abide
Horseshoes, or Church Bells, or Running Water; an', talkin' o' runnin'
water'--he turned to Hobden, who was backing out of the roundel--'d'you
mind the great floods at Robertsbridge, when the miller's man was
drowned in the street?'

'Middlin' well.' Old Hobden let himself down on the coals by the
fire-door. 'I was courtin' my woman on the Marsh that year. Carter to
Mus' Plum I was, gettin' ten shillin's week. Mine was a Marsh woman.'

'Won'erful odd-gates place----Romn