her to be gone and find the
difference between a good father and a bad husband.

"Go to the misery of your awn choosin'; go to him an' the rubbish-heap
he calls a farm! Thankless an' ontrue,--go,--an' look to me in the
future to keep you out of the poorhouse and no more. An' that for your
mother's sake--not yourn."

"Oh, Faither!" she cried, "doan't let them be the last words I hear 'pon
your lips. 'T is cruel, for sure I've been a gude darter to 'e, or tried
to be--an'--an'--please, dear faither, just say you wish us well--me an'
my husband. Please say that much. I doan't ax more."

But he rose and left her without any answer. It was then Phoebe's turn
to weep, and blinded with tears she slipped and hurt her knee getting
into the coach. Billy thereupon offered his aid, helped her, handed her
little white fox terrier m after her, and saw that the door was properly
closed.

"Be o' good cheer," he said, "though I caan't offer 'e much prospects of
easy life in double harness wi' Will Blanchard. But, as I used to say in
my church-gwaine days, 'God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.' Be it
as 'twill, I dare say theer 's many peaceful years o' calm,
black-wearin' widowhood afore 'e yet, for chaps like him do shorten
theer days a deal by such a tearin', high-coloured, passionate way of
life."

Mr. Blee opened the gate, the maids waved their handkerchiefs and wept,
and not far distant, as he heard the vehicle containing his daughter
depart, Mr. Lyddon would have given half that he had to recall the
spoken word. Phoebe once gone, his anger vanished and his love for her
won on him like sunshine after storm. Angry, indeed, he still was, but
with himself.

For Phoebe, curiosity and love dried her tears as she passed upward
towards the Moor. Then, the wild land reached, she put her head out of
the window and saw Newtake beech trees in the distance. Already the
foliage of them seemed a little tattered and thin, and their meagreness
of vesture and solitary appearance depressed the spectator again before
she arrived at them.

But the gate, thrown widely open, was reached at last, and there stood
Will and Mrs. Blanchard, Chris, Ted Chown, and the great bobtailed
sheep-dog, "Ship," to welcome her. With much emotion poor Phoebe
alighted, tottered and fell into the bear-hug of her husband, while the
women also kissed her and murmured over her in their sweet, broad Devon
tongue. Then something made Will laugh, and his merriment s