now directed the attention
of our travellers to a small inn just before them. Mine host had not yet
retired to repose, and it was not necessary to knock twice before the
door was opened.

A bright fire, an officious landlady, a commiserate landlord, a warm
potation, and the promise of excellent beds, all appeared to our squire
to make ample amends for the intelligence that the inn was not licensed
to let post-horses; and mine host having promised forthwith to send
two stout fellows, a rope, and a cart-horse to bring the carriage under
shelter (for the squire valued the vehicle because it was twenty years
old), and moreover to have the harness repaired, and the horses ready
by an early hour the next day, the good humour of Mr. Brandon rose into
positive hilarity. Lucy retired under the auspices of the landlady to
bed; and the squire having drunk a bowl of bishop, and discovered a
thousand new virtues in Clifford, especially that of never interrupting
a good story, clapped the captain on the shoulder, and making him
promise not to leave the inn till he had seen him again, withdrew
also to the repose of his pillow. Clifford remained below, gazing
abstractedly on the fire for some time afterwards; nor was it till the
drowsy chambermaid had thrice informed him of the prepared comforts of
his bed, that he adjourned to his chamber. Even then it seems that sleep
did not visit his eyelids; for a wealthy grazier, who lay in the room
below, complained bitterly the next morning of some person walking
overhead "in all manner of strides, just for all the world like a
happarition in boots."

CHAPTER XXIII.

Viola. And dost thou love me?
Lysander.... Love thee, Viola? Do I not fly thee when my
being drinks Light from thine eyes?--that flight is all my answer!

The Bride, Act ii. sc. 1.

The curtain meditations of the squire had not been without the produce
of a resolve. His warm heart at once reopened to the liking he had
formerly conceived for Clifford; he longed for an opportunity to atone
for his past unkindness, and to testify his present gratitude; moreover,
he felt at once indignant at, and ashamed of, his late conduct in
joining the popular, and, as he now fully believed, the causeless
prepossession against his young friend, and before a more present and
a stronger sentiment his habitual deference for his brother's counsels
faded easily away. Coupled with thes