'Fog!' cried Colonel Harding sharply.

'Fog!' said the Baron, with emphasis. 'Ah, that explains the whole
affair. To be sure, now I remember, the weather has been too thick for a
man to see the head of his own horse. The Doones (if still there be any
Doones) could never have come abroad; that is as sure as simony. Master
Huckaback, for your good sake, I am heartily glad that this charge has
miscarried. I thoroughly understand it now. The fog explains the whole
of it.'

'Go back, my good fellow,' said Colonel Harding; 'and if the day is
clear enough, you will find all your things where you left them. I know,
from my own experience, what it is to be caught in an Exmoor fog.'

Uncle Reuben, by this time, was so put out, that he hardly knew what he
was saying.

'My lord, Sir Colonel, is this your justice! If I go to London myself
for it, the King shall know how his commission--how a man may be robbed,
and the justices prove that he ought to be hanged at back of it; that in
his good shire of Somerset--'

'Your pardon a moment, good sir,' De Whichehalse interrupted him; 'but I
was about (having heard your case) to mention what need be an obstacle,
and, I fear, would prove a fatal one, even if satisfactory proof were
afforded of a felony. The mal-feasance (if any) was laid in Somerset;
but we, two humble servants of His Majesty, are in commission of his
peace for the county of Devon only, and therefore could never deal with
it.'

'And why, in the name of God,' cried Uncle Reuben now carried at last
fairly beyond himself, 'why could you not say as much at first, and save
me all this waste of time and worry of my temper? Gentlemen, you are
all in league; all of you stick together. You think it fair sport for an
honest trader, who makes no shams as you do, to be robbed and wellnigh
murdered, so long as they who did it won the high birthright of felony.
If a poor sheep stealer, to save his children from dying of starvation,
had dared to look at a two-month lamb, he would swing on the Manor
gallows, and all of you cry "Good riddance!" But now, because good birth
and bad manners--' Here poor Uncle Ben, not being so strong as before
the Doones had played with him, began to foam at the mouth a little, and
his tongue went into the hollow where his short grey whiskers were.

I forget how we came out of it, only I was greatly shocked at bearding
of the gentry so, and mother scarce could see her way, when I told her
all about it