't do is for higher 'n you or me to
decide. If this was any man's work but yours I'd tell Duchy this night;
but bein' you, I'll keep mute. Awnly mind, when I comes this way a
fortnight hence, let me see these postes gone an' your plough an' cart
t' other side that wall. An' you'll thank me, when you've come to more
sense, for stoppin' this wild-goose chase. Now I'll have a drop o'
cider, if it's all the same to you."

Will opened a stone jar which lay under his coat at hand, and answered
as he poured cider into a horn mug for Mr. Vogwell--

"Here's your drink; but I won't take your orders, so I tell 'e. Damn the
Duchy, as steals moor an' common wheer it pleases an' then grudges a man
his toil."

"That's the spirit as'll land 'e in the poorhouse, Will Blanchard," said
Mr. Vogwell calmly; "and that's such a job as might send 'e to the
County Asylum," he added, pointing to the operations around him. "As to
damning Duchy," he continued, "you might as well damn the sun or moon.
They'd care as little. Theer 'm some varmints so small that, though they
bite 'e with all their might, you never knaw it; an' so 't is wi' you
an' Duchy. Mind now, a fortnight. Thank 'e--so gude cider as ever I
tasted; an' doan't 'e tear an' rage, my son. What's the use?"

"'Twould be use, though, if us all raged together."

"But you won't get none to follow. 'Tis all talk. Duchy haven't got no
bones to break or sawl to lose; an' moormen haven't got brains enough to
do aught in the matter but jaw."

"An' all for a royal prince, as doan't knaw difference between yether
an' fuzz, I lay," growled Will. "Small blame to moormen for being
radical-minded these days. Who wouldn't, treated same as us?"

"Best not talk on such high subjects, Will Blanchard, or you might get
in trouble. A fortnight, mind. Gude marnin' to 'e."

The Duchy's man rode off and Will stood angry and irresolute. Then,
seeing Mr. Vogwell was still observing him, he ostentatiously turned to
the cart and tipped up his load of earth. But when the representative of
power had disappeared--his horse and himself apparently sinking into
rather than behind a heather ridge--Will's energy died and his mood
changed. He had fooled himself about this enterprise until the present,
but he could no longer do so. Now he sat down on the earth he had
brought, let his horse drag the cart after it, as it wandered in search
of some green thing, and suffered a storm of futile indignation to
darken his