to despatch a special cheese
to London in the road-waggon; it was made in thin vats (pronounced in
the dairy 'vates'), was soft, and eaten with radishes. Another hard
kind was oval-shaped, or like a pear; it was hung up in nets to
mature, and traded to the West Indies.

He looked to see when the moon changed in 'Moore's Almanac,' which was
kept for ready reference on the mantelpiece. Next to Bible and
Prayer-book comes old Moore's rubric in the farmhouse--that rubric
which declares the 'vox stellarum.' There are old folk who still
regret the amendments in the modern issue, and would have back again
the table which laid down when the influence of the constellations was
concentrated in each particular limb and portion of the body. In his
oaken cabinet Hilary had 'Moore' from the beginning of the century, or
farther back, for his fathers had saved them before him. On the narrow
margins during his own time he had jotted down notes of remarkable
weather and the events of the farm, and could tell you the very day
cow 'Beauty' calved twenty years ago.

I thought the ale good, but Hilary was certain it was not equal to
what he used to brew himself before he had so large an acreage to look
after, and indeed before the old style of farm-life went out of
fashion. Then he used to sit up all night watching--for brewing is a
critical operation--and looking out of doors now and then to pass the
long hours saw the changes of the sky, the constellations rising in
succession one after the other, and felt the slight variations of the
wind and of moisture or dryness in the air which predict the sunshine
or the shower of the coming day. He seemed to have thought a good deal
in those lonely watches; but he passed it off by referring to the
malting. Barn barley was best for malting--_i.e._ that which had been
stored in a barn and therefore kept perfectly dry, for ricks sometimes
get wet before they can be thatched. But barn barley was not often
come by nowadays, as one by one the old barns disappeared: burned
perhaps, and not rebuilt. He had ceased to brew for some time; Cicely
could, however, remember sipping the sweet wort, which is almost too
sweet for the palate after childhood.

They still baked a batch of bread occasionally, but not all that
was required. Cicely superintended the baking, passing the barm
through a sieve with a wisp of clean hay in it. The hay takes off
any sourness, and ensures it being perfectly sweet. She knew when