of the moment went),
spurred his great black horse away, and passed into the darkness.

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CHAPTER LXXIII

HOW TO GET OUT OF CHANCERY

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Things at this time so befell me, that I cannot tell one half; but
am like a boy who has left his lesson (to the master's very footfall)
unready, except with false excuses. And as this makes no good work, so
I lament upon my lingering, in the times when I might have got through
a good page, but went astray after trifles. However, every man must
do according to his intellect; and looking at the easy manner of
my constitution, I think that most men will regard me with pity and
goodwill for trying, more than with contempt and wrath for having tried
unworthily. Even as in the wrestling ring, whatever man did his best,
and made an honest conflict, I always laid him down with softness,
easing off his dusty fall.

But the thing which next betided me was not a fall of any sort; but
rather a most glorious rise to the summit of all fortune. For in good
truth it was no less than the return of Lorna--my Lorna, my own darling;
in wonderful health and spirits, and as glad as a bird to get back
again. It would have done any one good for a twelve-month to behold her
face and doings, and her beaming eyes and smile (not to mention blushes
also at my salutation), when this Queen of every heart ran about our
rooms again. She did love this, and she must see that, and where was our
old friend the cat? All the house was full of brightness, as if the sun
had come over the hill, and Lorna were his mirror.

My mother sat in an ancient chair, and wiped her cheeks, and looked at
her; and even Lizzie's eyes must dance to the freshness and joy of her
beauty. As for me, you might call me mad; for I ran out and flung my
best hat on the barn, and kissed mother Fry, till she made at me with
the sugar-nippers.

What a quantity of things Lorna had to tell us! And yet how often we
stopped her mouth--at least mother, I mean, and Lizzie--and she quite as
often would stop her own, running up in her joy to some one of us!
And then there arose the eating business--which people now call
"refreshment," in these dandyfied days of our language--for how was it
possible that our Lorna could have come all that way, and to her own
Exmoor, without being terribly hungry?

"Oh, I do love it all so much," said Lorna, now for the fiftieth time,
an