entures. Things have happened to me that would
make you stare, if I could bring myself to tell them. Ah yes, I have
lived in stirring times. Fifty years ago men and women knew their minds;
and a dog could eat his dinner without a damask napkin."

Master Popplewell, who was of a good round form, and tucked his heels
over one another as he walked (which indicates a pleasant self-esteem),
now lit his long pipe and marched ahead, carefully gazing to the front
and far away; so that the young folk might have free boot and free
hand behind him. That they should have flutters of loving-kindness, and
crafty little breaths of whispering, and extraordinary gifts of just
looking at each other in time not to be looked at again, as well as a
strange sort of in and out of feeling, as if they were patterned with
the same zigzag--as the famous Herefordshire graft is made--and above
all the rest, that they should desire to have no one in the world to
look at them, was to be expected by a clever old codger, a tanner who
had realized a competence, and eaten many "tanner's pies." The which is
a good thing; and so much the better because it costs nothing save the
crust and the coal. But instead of any pretty little goings on such as
this worthy man made room for, to tell the stupid truth, this lad and
lass came down the long walk as far apart and as independent of one
another as two stakes of an espalier. There had not been a word gone
amiss between them, nor even a thought the wrong way of the grain; but
the pressure of fear and of prickly expectation was upon them both, and
kept them mute. The lad was afraid that he would get "nay," and the lass
was afraid that she could not give it.

The bower was quite at the end of the garden, through and beyond the
pot-herb part, and upon a little bank which overhung a little lane.
Here in this corner a good woman had contrived what women nearly always
understand the best, a little nook of pleasure and of perfume, after the
rank ranks of the kitchen-stuff. Not that these are to be disdained; far
otherwise; they indeed are the real business; and herein lies true test
of skill. But still the flowers may declare that they do smell better.
And not only were there flowers here, and little shrubs planted
sprucely, but also good grass, which is always softness, and soothes
the impatient eyes of men. And on this grass there stood, or hung, or
flowered, or did whatever it was meant to do, a beautiful weeping-as