ose on four, and went into the passage to get his hat. In farmhouses
these places are called passages; in the smallest of villas, wretched
little villas not fit to be called houses, they are always "halls."

In the passage Mrs. Iden was waiting for him, and began to thump his
broad though bowed back with all her might.

"Sleep, sleep, sleep!" she cried, giving him a thump at each word.
"You've slept two hours. (Thump.) You sleep till you stupefy yourself
(thump), and then you go and dig. What's the use of digging? (Thump.)
Why don't you make some money? (Thump.) Talk and sleep! (Thump.) I hate
it. (Thump.) You've rubbed the paint off the wainscot with your sleep,
sleep, sleep (thump)--there's one of your hairs sticking to the paint
where your head goes. (Thump.) Anything more hateful--sleep (thump),
talk (thump), sleep (thump). Go on!"

She had thumped him down the passage, and across the covered-in court to
the door opening on the garden. There he paused to put on his hat--an
aged, battered hat--some sort of nondescript bowler, broken, grey,
weather-stained, very battered and very aged--a pitiful hat to put above
that broad, Shakespearian forehead. While he fitted it on he was thumped
severely: when he opened the door he paused, and involuntarily looked up
at the sky to see about the weather--a habit all country people
have--and so got more thumping, ending as he started out with a
tremendous push. He did not seem to resent the knocks, nor did the push
accelerate his pace; he took it very much as he took the March wind.

Mrs. Iden slammed the door, and went in to clear the dinner things, and
make ready for tea. Amaryllis helped her.

"He'll want his tea in half an hour," said Mrs. Iden. "What's the use of
his going out to work for half an hour?"

Amaryllis was silent. She was very fond of her father; he never did
anything wrong in her eyes, and she could have pointed out that when he
sat down to dinner at one he had already worked as many hours as Mrs.
Iden's model City gentleman in a whole day. His dinner at one was, in
effect, equivalent to their dinner at seven or eight, over which they
frequently lingered an hour or two. He would still go on labouring,
almost another half day. But she held her peace, for, on the other hand,
she could not contradict and argue with her mother, whom she knew had
had a wearisome life and perpetual disappointments.

Mrs. Iden grumbled on to herself, working herself into a more fie