him when he set was simply this: "Destroy and burn the creatures Of the
moon, for they are the root of your trouble. And thus, having shown you
a taste of my power, good people, adieu."'

'Did Mars really say all that?' Una whispered.

'Yes, and twice so much as that to any one who had ears to hear.
Briefly, he enlightened me that the plague was spread by the creatures
of the Moon. The Moon, our Lady of ill-aspect, was the offender. My own
poor wits showed me that I, Nick Culpeper, had the people in my charge,
God's good providence aiding me, and no time to lose neither.

'I posted up the hill, and broke into Hitheram's field amongst 'em all
at prayers.

'"Eureka, good people!" I cried, and cast down a dead mill-rat which I'd
found. "Here's your true enemy, revealed at last by the stars."

'"Nay, but I'm praying," says Jack. His face was as white as washed
silver.

'"There's a time for everything under the sun," says I. "If you would
stay the plague, take and kill your rats."

'"Oh, mad, stark mad!" says he, and wrings his hands.

'A fellow lay in the ditch beside him, who bellows that he'd as soon die
mad hunting rats as be preached to death on a cold fallow. They
laughed round him at this, but Jack Marget falls on his knees, and very
presumptuously petitions that he may be appointed to die to save the
rest of his people. This was enough to thrust 'em back into their
melancholy. '"You are an unfaithful shepherd, jack," I says. "Take a
bat" (which we call a stick in Sussex) "and kill a rat if you die before
sunrise. 'Twill save your people."

'"Aye, aye. Take a bat and kill a rat," he says ten times over, like
a child, which moved 'em to ungovernable motions of that hysterical
passion before mentioned, so that they laughed all, and at least
warmed their chill bloods at that very hour--one o'clock or a little
after--when the fires of life burn lowest. Truly there is a time for
everything; and the physician must work with it--ahem!--or miss his
cure. To be brief with you, I persuaded 'em, sick or sound, to have
at the whole generation of rats throughout the village. And there's a
reason for all things too, though the wise physician need not blab 'em
all. Imprimis, or firstly, the mere sport of it, which lasted ten days,
drew 'em most markedly out of their melancholy. I'd defy sorrowful
job himself to lament or scratch while he's routing rats from a rick.
Secundo, or secondly, the vehement act and operation of th