ld have done in such a case as mine is."

"Miss Erema, he was that long-headed that nobody could play leap-frog
with him. None of them ever cleared over his barrel. He walked into this
village fifty-five years back, this very month, with his spade upon his
shoulder and the knowledge of every body in his eye. They all put up
against him, but they never put him down; and in less than three months
he went to church, I do assure you, with the only daughter of the only
baker. After that he went into the baking line himself; he turned his
spade into a shovel, as he said, and he introduced new practices."

"Oh, Mrs. Busk, not adulteration?"

"No, miss, no! The very last thing he would think of. Only the good use
of potatoes in the bread, when flour was frightful bad and painful dear.
What is the best meal of the day? he used to reason. Dinner. And why?
Why, because of the potatoes. If I can make people take potato for their
breakfast, and potato for their supper too, I am giving them three meals
a day instead of one. And the health of the village corresponded to it."

"Oh, but, Mrs. Busk, he might have made them do it by persuasion, or at
least with their own knowledge--"

"No, miss, no! The whole nature of our people, Moonstock or out of it,
is never to take victuals by any sort of persuasion. If St. Paul was to
come and preach, 'Eat this or that,' all I had of it in the shop would
go rotten. They hate any meddling with their likings, and they suspect
doctor's rubbish in all of it."

"I am quite of their opinion," I replied; "and I am glad to hear of
their independence. I always used to hear that in England none of the
poor people dared have a will of their own."

Mrs. Busk lifted up her hands to express amazement at my ignorance,
and said that she "must run away and put the shutters up, or else the
policeman would come rapping, and look for a glass of beer, which he had
no right to till it came to the bottom of the firkin; and this one was
only tapped last Sunday week. Don't you ever think of the police, miss."

Probably this was good advice, and it quite agreed with the opinions
of others, and my own impressions as to the arrogant lethargy of "the
force," as they called themselves, in my father's case. Mrs. Busk had
more activity and intelligence in her little head than all the fat
sergeants and inspectors of the county, helmet, belt, and staff, and
all.

CHAPTER XLII

MASTER WITHYPOOL

At first I was muc