e to do?"

"Compensate him, burn the gorse, cut the bracken, and plant larch.
There are enough picturesque commons on the top of the hill, where the
soil is poor, and land is cheap. We don't want them in the valley.
Now I propose to give our minds to the restoration of the house, the
drains, the stables, and the home farm. Here are my estimates."

Though Mr. Crawley was so loyal a supporter of the regent of
Barracombe, yet John's projected improvements were far too
thorough-going to gain the approval of the pottering old retainers of
the Crewys family, though they were unable to question his knowledge
or his judgment.

"I telled 'im tu du things by the littles," said the woodman, who was
kept at work marking trees and saplings as he had never worked before;
though John was generous of help, and liberal of pay. "But lard, he
bain't one tu covet nobody's gude advice. I was vair terrified tu zee
arl he knowed about the drees. The squoire 'ee wur like a babe unbarn
beside 'un. He lukes me straight in the eyes, and 'Luke,' sezzee, 'us
'a' got tu git the place in vamous arder vur young Zur Peter,' sezzee,
'An' I be responsible, and danged but what 'a'll du't,' 'ee zays. An'
I touched my yead, zo, and I zays, 'Very gude, zur,' 'a zays. 'An' zo
'twill be, yu may depend on't.'"

Perhaps the unwonted stir and bustle, the coming and going of John
Crewys, the confusion of workmen, the novel interest of renovating and
restoring the old house, helped to brace and fortify Lady Mary during
the months which followed; months, nevertheless, of suspense and
anxiety, which reduced her almost to a shadow of her former self.

For Peter's career in South Africa proved an adventurous one.

He had the good luck to distinguish himself in a skirmish almost
immediately after his arrival, and to win not only the approval of his
noble relative and commander, but his commission. His next exploit,
however, ended rather disastrously, and Peter found himself a prisoner
in the now historic bird-cage at Pretoria, where he spent a dreary,
restless, and perhaps not wholly unprofitable time, in the society of
men greatly his superior in soldierly and other qualities.

John feared that his mother's resolution not to follow her boy must
inevitably be broken when the news of his capture reached Barracombe;
but perhaps Peter's letters had repeated the peremptory injunctions
of his telegram, for she never proposed to take the journey to South
Africa.

Th