ey were
not likely to entertain much affection for the son of the man who had
banished them and confiscated their property. And it was not at all
impossible that desperate men, such as they were, having nothing to
lose, but estates to recover, and not being held by religion much,
should cast away all regard for the birth from which they had been cast
out, and make common cause with a Protestant rising, for the chance of
revenge and replacement.

However I do not mean to say that all these things occurred to me as
clearly as I have set them down; only that I was in general doubt, and
very sad perplexity. For mother was so warm, and innocent, and kind
so to every one, that knowing some little by this time of the English
constitution, I feared very greatly lest she should be punished for
harbouring malcontents. As well as possible I knew, that if any poor man
came to our door, and cried, 'Officers are after me; for God's sake take
and hide me,' mother would take him in at once, and conceal, and feed
him, even though he had been very violent; and, to tell the truth, so
would both my sisters, and so indeed would I do. Whence it will be clear
that we were not the sort of people to be safe among disturbances.

Before I could quite make up my mind how to act in this difficulty, and
how to get at the rights of it (for I would not spy after Uncle Reuben,
though I felt no great fear of the Wizard's Slough, and none of the man
with the white night-cap), a difference came again upon it, and a change
of chances. For Uncle Ben went away as suddenly as he first had come to
us, giving no reason for his departure, neither claiming the pony, and
indeed leaving something behind him of great value to my mother. For
he begged her to see to his young grand-daughter, until he could find
opportunity of fetching her safely to Dulverton. Mother was overjoyed
at this, as she could not help displaying; and Ruth was quite as much
delighted, although she durst not show it. For at Dulverton she had
to watch and keep such ward on the victuals, and the in and out of the
shopmen, that it went entirely against her heart, and she never could
enjoy herself. Truly she was an altered girl from the day she came to
us; catching our unsuspicious manners, and our free goodwill, and hearty
noise of laughing.

By this time, the harvest being done, and the thatching of the ricks
made sure against south-western tempests, and all the reapers being
gone, with good m