w were treacherous, and I
flung 'em back i' the faces o' them that offered 'em."

"You won't tell us what overtures?"

"I will not. It would do no good. It would mak no difference. Them they
concerned can look after theirseln."

"Ay, we'se look after werseln," said another voice. Joe Scott had
sauntered forth from the church to get a breath of fresh air, and there
he stood.

"I'll warrant _ye_, Joe," observed William, smiling.

"And I'll warrant my maister," was the answer.--"Young ladies,"
continued Joe, assuming a lordly air, "ye'd better go into th' house."

"I wonder what for?" inquired Shirley, to whom the overlooker's somewhat
pragmatical manners were familiar, and who was often at war with him;
for Joe, holding supercilious theories about women in general, resented
greatly, in his secret soul, the fact of his master and his master's
mill being, in a manner, under petticoat government, and had felt as
wormwood and gall certain business visits of the heiress to the Hollow's
counting-house.

"Because there is nought agate that fits women to be consarned in."

"Indeed! There is prayer and preaching agate in that church. Are we not
concerned in that?"

"Ye have been present neither at the prayer nor preaching, ma'am, if I
have observed aright. What I alluded to was politics. William Farren
here was touching on that subject, if I'm not mista'en."

"Well, what then? Politics are our habitual study, Joe. Do you know I
see a newspaper every day, and two of a Sunday?"

"I should think you'll read the marriages, probably, miss, and the
murders, and the accidents, and sich like?"

"I read the leading articles, Joe, and the foreign intelligence, and I
look over the market prices. In short, I read just what gentlemen read."

Joe looked as if he thought this talk was like the chattering of a pie.
He replied to it by a disdainful silence.

"Joe," continued Miss Keeldar, "I never yet could ascertain properly
whether you are a Whig or a Tory. Pray, which party has the honour of
your alliance?"

"It is rayther difficult to explain where you are sure not to be
understood," was Joe's haughty response; "but as to being a Tory, I'd as
soon be an old woman, or a young one, which is a more flimsier article
still. It is the Tories that carries on the war and ruins trade; and if
I be of any party--though political parties is all nonsense--I'm of
that which is most favourable to peace, and, by consequence, to the
mercanti