e yet awhile folks hadn't tore down the Images. They
couldn't abide cruel Canterbury Bells ringin' to Bulverhithe for more
pore men an' women to be burnded, nor the King's proud messenger ridin'
through the land givin' orders to tear down the Images. They couldn't
abide it no shape. Nor yet they couldn't get their boat an' crew to flit
by without Leave an' Good-will from Flesh an' Blood; an' Flesh an' Blood
came an' went about its own business the while the Marsh was swarvin'
up, an' swarvin' up with Pharisees from all England over, strivin' all
means to get through at Flesh an' Blood to tell 'em their sore need ...
I don't know as you've ever heard say Pharisees are like chickens?'

'My woman used to say that too,' said Hobden, folding his brown arms.

'They be. You run too many chickens together, an' the ground sickens,
like, an' you get a squat, an' your chickens die. Same way, you crowd
Pharisees all in one place--_they_ don't die, but Flesh an' Blood
walkin' among 'em is apt to sick up an' pine off. _They_ don't mean it,
an' Flesh an' Blood don't know it, but that's the truth--as I've heard.
The Pharisees through bein' all stenched up an' frighted, an' trying' to
come _through_ with their supplications, they nature-ally changed the
thin airs an' humours in Flesh an' Blood. It lay on the Marsh like
thunder. Men saw their churches ablaze with the wildfire in the windows
after dark; they saw their cattle scatterin' an' no man scarin'; their
sheep flockin' an' no man drivin'; their horses latherin' an' no man
leadin'; they saw the liddle low green lights more than ever in the
dik-sides; they heard the liddle feet patterin' more than ever round the
houses; an' night an' day, day an' night, 'twas all as though they were
bein' creeped up on, an' hinted at by Some One or other that couldn't
rightly shape their trouble. Oh, I lay they sweated! Man an' maid, woman
an' child, their nature done 'em no service all the weeks while the
Marsh was swarvin' up with Pharisees. But they was Flesh an' Blood, an'
Marsh men before all. They reckoned the signs sinnified trouble for the
Marsh. Or that the sea 'ud rear up against Dymchurch Wall an' they'd be
drownded like Old Winchelsea; or that the Plague was comin'. So they
looked for the meanin' in the sea or in the clouds--far an' high up.
They never thought to look near an' knee-high, where they could see
naught.

'Now there was a poor widow at Dymchurch under the Wall, which, lacking