 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Rebecca Dittman, Liverpool United Kingdom. Web address, MercurialSpirit.co.uk The Trumpet Major, being a tale of the Trumpet Major John Loveday, a soldier in the war with Bonaparte, and Robert, his brother, first mate in the merchant service, by Thomas Hardy. Preface. The present tale is founded more largely on testimony, oral and written, than any other in this series. The external incidents which direct its course are mostly an unexaggerated reproduction of the recollections of old persons well known to the author in childhood, but now long dead, who were eyewitnesses of those scenes. If wholly transcribed, their recollections would have filled a volume thrice the length of the Trumpet Major. Down to the middle of this century and later, there were not wanting in the neighbourhood of the places more or less clearly indicated herein casual relics of the circumstances amid which the actions move, our preparations for defence against the threatened invasion of England by Bonaparte. An outhouse door riddled with bullet holes, which has been extemporised by a solitary man as a target for phylock practice when the landing was hourly expected. A heap of bricks and clods on a beacon hill, which had formed the chimney and walls of the hut occupied by the beacon-keeper, worm-eaten shafts and iron heads of pikes for the use of those who had no better weapons, ridges on the down thrown up during the encampment, fragments of volunteer uniform and other such lingering remains brought to my imagination in early childhood the state of affairs at the date of the war more vividly than volumes of history could have done. Those who have attempted to construct a coherent narrative of past times from the fragmentary information furnished by survivors are aware of the difficulty of ascertaining the true sequence of events indiscriminately recalled. For this purpose, the newspapers of the date were indispensable. Of other documents consulted, I may mention the satisfaction of those who love a true story that the address to all ranks and descriptions of Englishmen was transcribed from an original copy in a local museum, that the hieroglyphic portrait of a Napoleon existed as a print down to the present day in an old woman's cottage near Overcomb, that the particulars of the king's doing at his favourite watering place were augmented by details from records of the time. The drilling scene of the local militia received some additions from an account given in so grave a work as Gifford's History of the Wars of the French Revolution, London, 1817. But on reference to the history I find I was mistaken in supposing the account to be advanced as authentic or to refer to rural England. However, it does in a large degree accord with the local traditions of such scenes that I have heard recounted times without number, and the system of drill was tested by reference to the army regulations of 1801 and other military handbooks. Almost the whole narrative of the supposed landing of the French in the Bay is from oral relation, as aforementioned. Other proofs of the veracity of this chronicle have escaped my recollection. Thomas Hardy October 1895 End of Preface This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Rebecca Dittman, Liverpool United Kingdom Web Address MercurialSpirit.co.uk The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy Chapter 1 What was seen from the window overlooking the down? In the days of the high-waisted and muslin-gowned women when the vast amount of soldiering going on in the country was a cause of much trembling to the sex, there lived in a village near the Wessex Coast two ladies of good report, though unfortunately of limited means. The elder was a Mrs. Martha Garland, a landscape painter's widow, and the other was her only daughter Anne. Anne was fair, very fair, in a poetical sense, but in complexion she was of that particular tint between blonde and brunette, which is inconveniently left without a name. Her eyes were honest and inquiring, her mouth cleanly cut, and yet not classical, the middle point of her upper lip scarcely descending so far as it should have done by rights, so that at the merest pleasant thought, not to mention a smile, portions of two or three white teeth were uncovered, whether she would or not. Some people said that this was very attractive. She was graceful and slender, and though but little above five feet in height, could draw herself up to look tall. In her manner, in her comings and goings, in her I'll do this or I'll do that, she combined dignity with sweetness as no other girl could do, and any impressionable stranger youths who passed by were led to yearn for a windfall of speech from her, and to see at the same time that they would not get it. In short, beneath all that was charming and simple in this young woman, there lurked a real firmness, unperceived at first, as the speck of colour lurks unperceived in the heart of the palest parsley flower. She wore a white handkerchief to cover her white neck and a cap on her head with a pink ribbon round it, tied in a bow at the front. She had a great variety of these cap ribbons, the young men being fond of sending them to her as presents until they fell definitely in love with a special sweetheart elsewhere when they left off doing so. Between the border of her cap and her forehead were ranged a row of round brown curls like swallow's nests under eaves. She lived with her widowed mother in a portion of an ancient building formerly a manor house, but now a mill, which, being too large for his own requirements, the miller had found it convenient to divide and appropriate in part to these highly respectable tenants. With this dwelling Mrs. Garland's and Anne's ears were soothed morning, noon and night by the music of the mill. The wheels and cogs of which, being of wood, produced notes that might have borne in their minds a remote resemblance to the wooden tones of the stopped diapason in an organ. Occasionally, when the miller was bolting, there was added to these continuous sounds the cheerful clicking of the hopper, which did not deprive them of rest except when it was kept going all night. And over and above all this they had the pleasure of knowing that they're crept in through every crevice, door and window of their dwelling, however tightly closed, a subtle mist of super fine flower from the grinding room, quite invisible, but making its presence known in the course of time by giving a pallid and ghostly look to the best furniture. The miller frequently apologised to his tenants for the intrusion of this insidious dry fog, but the widow was of a friendly and thankful nature, and she said that she did not mind it at all, being as it was, not nasty dirt, but the blessed staff of life. By good humour of this sort, and in other ways, Mrs Garland acknowledged her friendship for her neighbour, with whom Anne and herself were associated to an extent which she could never have anticipated when, tempted by the lowliness of the rent, they first removed the thither after her husband's death from a larger house at the other end of the village. Those who have lived in remote places where there is what is called no society will comprehend the gradual levelling of distinctions that went on in this case at some sacrifice of gentility on the part of one household. The widow was sometimes sorry to find with what readiness Anne caught up some dialect word or accent from the miller and his friends, but he was so good and true-hearted a man, and she so easy-minded, unambitious a woman, that she would not make life a solitude for fastidious reasons. More than all, she had good ground for thinking that the miller secretly admired her, and this added a pecan seed to the situation. On a fine summer morning, when the leaves were warm under the sun and the more industrious bees abroad, diving into every blue and red cup that could possibly be considered a flower, Anne was sitting at the back window of her mother's portion of the house, measuring out lengths of worsted for a fringed rug that she was making, which lay about three-quarters finished beside her. The work, though chromatically brilliant, was tedious. A hearth rug was a thing which nobody worked at from morning to night. It was taken up and put down. It was in the chair, on the floor, across the handrail, under the bed, kicked here, kicked there, rolled away in the closet, brought out again, and so on more capriciously perhaps than any other homemade article. Nobody was expected to finish a rug within a calculable period, and the walls of the beginning became faded and historical before the end was reached. A sense of this inherent nature of worsted work, rather than idleness, led Anne to look rather frequently from the open casement. Immediately before her was the large, smooth mill pond, overfall and intruding into the hedge and into the road. The water, with its flowing leaves and spots of froth, was stealing away, like time, under the dark arch to tumble over the great slimy wheel within. On the other side of the mill pond was an open place called the Cross, because it was three-quarters of one, two lanes, and a cattle-drive meeting there. It was the general rendezvous and arena of the surrounding village. Behind this, a steep slope rose high into the sky, merging in a wide and open down, now littered with sheep, newly shorn. The upland, by its height, completely shouted the mill and village from north winds, making summers of springs, reducing winters to autumn temperatures, and permitting myrtle to flourish in the open air. The heaviness of noon pervaded the scene, and under its influence the sheep had ceased to feed. Nobody was standing at the cross, the few inhabitants being indoors at their dinner. No human being was on the down, and no human eye or interest but ants seemed to be concerned with it. The bees still worked on, and the butterflies did not rest from roving, their smallness seeming to shield them from the stagnating effect that this turning moment of day had on larger creatures. Otherwise, all was still. The girl glanced at the down and the sheep for no particular reason. The steep margin of turf and daisies rising above the roofs, chimneys, apple trees, and church tower of the hamlet around her bounded the view from her position, and it was necessary to look somewhere when she raised her head. While thus engaged in working and stopping her attention was attracted by the sudden rising and running away of the sheep squatted on the down, and there succeeded sounds of a heavy tramping over the hard sod which the sheep had quitted, the tramp being accompanied by a metallic jingle. Turning her eyes further she beheld two cavalry officers on bulky grey charges, armed and accoutred throughout, ascending the down at a point to the left where the incline was comparatively easy. The burnished chains of buckles and plates of their trappings shone like little looking glasses, and the blue, red, and white about them was unsubdued by weather or wear. The two troopers rode proudly on, as if nothing less than crowns and empires ever concerned their magnificent minds. They reached that part of the down which lay just in front of her where they came to a halt. In another minute there appeared behind them a group containing some half-dozen more of the same sort. These came on, halted, and dismounted likewise. Two of the soldiers then walked some distance onwards together when one stood still, the other advancing further and stretching a white line of tape between them. Two more of the men marched to another outlying point where they made marks in the ground. Thus they walked about and took distances, obviously according to some pre-concerted scheme. At the end of this systematic proceeding, one solitary horseman, a commissioned officer, if his uniform could be judged rightly at that distance, rode up the down, went over the ground, looked at what the others had done and seemed to think that it was good. And then the girl heard yet louder tramps and clankings, and she beheld rising from where the others had risen a whole column of cavalry in marching order. At a distance behind these came a cloud of dust enveloping more and more troops, their arms and accoutrements reflecting the sun through the haze in faint flashes, stars and streaks of light. The whole body approached slowly towards the plateau at the top of the down. Anne, through down her work and letting her eyes remain on the nearing masses of cavalry, the Worsteds getting entangled as they would, said, Mother! Mother! Come here! Here's such a fine sight! What does it mean? What can they be going to do up there? The mother, thus in vote, ran upstairs and came forward to the window. There was a woman of sanguine mouth and eye, unheroic manner and a pleasant general appearance, a little more tarnished as a surface, but not much worse in conter than the girl herself. Widow Garland's thoughts were those of the period. Can it be the French, she said, arranging herself for the extremist form of consternation? Can that arch-enemy of mankind have landed at last? It should be stated that at this time there were two arch-enemies of mankind, Satan as usual and Bonaparte, who had sprung up and eclipsed his elder rival altogether. Mrs. Garland alluded, of course, to the junior gentleman. It cannot be he, said Anne. Ah! There's Simon Burden, the man who watches at the beacon. He'll know! She waved her hand to an aged form of the same colour as the road who had just appeared beyond the mill pond and who, though active, was bowed to that degree which almost reproaches a feeling observer from standing upright. The arrival of the soldiery had drawn him out from his drop of drink at the Duke of York, as it had attracted Anne. At her call he crossed the mill bridge and came towards the window. Anne inquired of him what it all meant, but Simon Burden, without answering, continued to move on with parted gums, staring at the cavalry on his own private account with a concern that people often show about temporal phenomena when such matters can affect them but at a short time longer. You'll walk into the mill pond, said Anne. What are they doing? You were a soldier many years ago and ought to know. Don't ask me, Miss Anne, said the military relic, depositing his body against the wall one limit a time. I were only in the foot, you know, and never had a clear understanding of horses. I, I be an old man and of no judgement now. Some additional pressure, however, caused him to search further in his worm-eaten magazine of ideas, and he found that he did know in a dim, irresponsible way. The soldiers must have come there to camp. Those men they had seen first were the markers. They had come on before the rest to measure out the ground. He who had accompanied them was the quarter-master. And so you see they have got all the lines marked out by the time the regiment have come, he had it. And then they will, well-a-deary, who to suppose that Overcome would see such a day as this? And then they will, then, ah, ah, it's gone from me again, said Simon. Oh, ah, and then they will raise their tents, you know, and pick at their horses. That was it, so it was. By this time the column of horse had ascended into full view, and they formed a lively spectacle as they rode along the high ground in marching order, backed by the pale blue sky and lit by the southerly sun. Their uniform was bright and attractive, white buckskin pantaloons, three-quarter boots, scarlet shackles set off with laces, mustachios waxed to a needle-point, and above all, those richly ornamented blue jackets mantled with the historic police that fascination to women and encumbrances to the wearers themselves. "'Tis the Yorks who's ours,' said Simon Burden, brightening like a dying ember fan. Foreigners to a man, and enrolled long since my time, but as good hearty comrades they say as you'll find in the King's service. "'Here are more and different ones,' said Mrs. Garland. Other troops had during the last few minutes been ascending the down at a remota point and now drew near. These were of different weight and build from the others, lighter men in helmet hats with white plumes. "'I don't know which I like best,' said Anne. "'These, I think, after all.'" Simon, who had been looking hard at the latter, now said that they were the Dagoons. "'All Englishmen they,' said the old man, they lay at Budmouth Barracks a few years ago. "'They did, I remember it,' said Mrs. Garland. "'And lots of the chaps about here listed at the time,' said Simon. "'I can call to mind that there was, ah, tis gone from me again. However, all that's of little account now.'" The Dagoons passed in front of the lookers, on as the others had done, and their gay plumes, which had hung lazily during the ascent, swung to northwards as they reached the top, showing that on the summit a fresh breeze blew. "'But look across there,' said Anne. There had entered upon the down from another direction, several battalions afoot, in white cursey-mere breeches and cloth-gators. They seemed to be weary from a long march. The original black of their gaiters and boots being whitey-brown with dust. Presently came regimental wagons and the private canteen carts which followed at the end of a convoy. The space in front of the mill-pond was now occupied by nearly all the inhabitants of the village, who had turned out in alarm and remained for pleasure. Their eyes lighted up with interest in what they saw. Wappings and regimentals, war-horses and men, in towns and attraction, were here almost a sublimity. The troops filled to their lines, dismounted, and in quick time took off their accoutrements, rolled up their sheepskins, picketed and unbitted their horses, and made ready to erect the tents as soon as they could be taken from the wagons and brought forward. When this was done, at a given signal, the canvases flew up from the sod and thenceforth every man had a place in which to lay his head. Though nobody seemed to be looking on but the few at the window and in the village street, there were, as a matter of fact, many eyes converging upon that military arrival in its high and conspicuous position, not to mention the glances of birds and other wild creatures, men in distant gardens, women in orchards and at cottage doors, shepherds on remote hills, turnip-hoes in blue-green enclosures miles away, captains with spyglasses out at sea were regarding the picture keenly. Those three or four thousand men of machine-like movement, some of them swashbucklers by nature, others doubtless of a quiet shopkeeping disposition, who had inadvertently got into uniform, all of them had arrived from nobody new wear and hence were matter of great curiosity. They seemed to the mere eye to belong to a different order of beings from those who inhabited the valleys below. Apparently unconscious and careless of what all the world was doing elsewhere, they remained picturesquely engrossed in the business of making themselves a habitation on the isolated spot which they had chosen. Mrs. Garland was of her festive and sanguine turn of mind, a woman soon set up and soon set down, and the coming of the regiment quite excited her. She thought there was reason for putting on her best cap, thought that perhaps there was not, that she would hurry on the dinner and go out in the afternoon, and that she would, after all, do nothing unusual nor show any silly excitement whatever, since they were unbecoming in a mother and a widow. Thus circumscribing her intentions till she was toned down to an ordinary person of forty, Mrs. Garland accompanied her daughter downstairs to dine, saying, presently we will call on Miller Love Day and hear what he thinks of it all. End of chapter one. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Rebecca Dittman, Liverpool United Kingdom. Web address, MercurialSpirit.co.uk The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy. Chapter two. Somebody knocks and comes in. Miller Love Day was the representative on an ancient family of corngrinders, whose history is lost in the mists of antiquity. His ancestral line was contemporaneous with that of De Ross, Howard, and De La Zouche. But, owing to some trifling deficiency in the possessions of the House of Love Day, the individual names and intermarriages of its members were not recorded during the Middle Ages, and thus their private lives in any given century were uncertain. But it was known that the family had formed matrimonial alliances with farmers not so very small, and once with a gentleman, Tanner, who had for many years purchased after their death the horses of the most aristocratic persons in the county, fiery steeds that earlier in their career were valued at many hundred guineas. It was also ascertained that Mr. Love Day's great-grandparents had been eight in number, and his great-great-grandparents sixteen, every one who reached a years of discretion. At every stage backwards his sires and gammas thus doubled and doubled till they became a vast body of gothic ladies and gentlemen of the rank known as serfs or villains, full of importance to the country at large and ramifying through the unwritten history of England. His immediate father had greatly improved the value of their residence by building a new chimney and setting up an additional pair of millstones. Overcome mill presented at one end the appearance of a hard-working house slipping into the river, and at the other of an idle, genteel place half cloaked with creepers at this time of year and having no visible connection with flower. It had hips instead of gables, giving it a round-shouldered look, four chimneys with no smoke coming out of them, two zigzag cracks in the wall, several open windows with a looking-glass here and there inside, showing it's warped back to the passers-by, snowy dimity curtains waving in the draught, two mill doors, one above the other, enabling a person to step out upon nothing at a height of ten feet from the ground, a gaping arch vomiting the river and a lean, long-nosed fellow looking out from the mill doorway who was the hired grinder, except when a bulging fifteen-stone man occupied the same place, namely the miller himself. Behind the mill door and invisible to the mere wayfarer who did not visit the family were chalked addition and subtraction sums, many of them originally done wrong, and the figures half rubbed out and corrected, noughts being turned into nines and ones into twos. These were the miller's private calculations. There were also chalked in the same place rows and rows of strokes like open palings, representing the calculations of the grinder, who in his youthful ciphering studies have not gone so far as Arabic figures. In the court in front were two worn-out millstones, made useful again by being let in level with the ground. Here people stood to smoke and consider things in muddy weather, and cats slept on the clean surfaces when it was hot. In the large stubbard tree in the corner of the garden was erected a pole of larch fur which the miller had bought with others at a sale of small timber in dammer's wood one Christmas week. It rose from the upper boughs of the tree to about the height of a fisherman's mast, and on the top was a vein in the form of a sailor with his arm stretched out. When the sun shone upon this figure it could be seen that the greater part of his countenance was gone, and the paint washed from his body so far as to reveal that he had been a soldier in red before he became a sailor in blue. The image had, in fact, been John, one of our coming characters, and was then turned into Robert, another of them. This revolving piece of statuary could not, however, be relied on as a vein, owing to the neighbouring hill which formed variable currents of wind. The leafy and quieter wing of the millhouse was the part occupied by Mrs. Garland her daughter, who made up in summertime for the narrowness of their quarters by overflowing into the garden on stalls and chairs. The parlour or dining-room had a stone floor, a fact which the widow sought to disguise by double carpeting, lest the standing of Anne and herself should be lowered in the public eye. Here now the midday meal went lightly and mincingly on, as it does when there is no greedy carnivorous man to keep the dishes about, and was hanging on the clothes when somebody entered the passage as far as the chink of the parlour door, and tapped. This proceeding was probably adopted to kindly avoid giving trouble to Susan, the neighbour's pink daughter, who helped at Mrs. Garland's in the morning, but was at the moment particularly occupied in standing on the water-butt and gazing at the soldiers with an inhaling position of the mouth and circular eyes. There was a flutter in the little dining-room. The sensitiveness of habitual solitude makes heart beat for the preternaturally small reasons, and a guessing of who the visitor might be. It was some military gentleman from the camp perhaps. No, that was impossible. It was the parson. No, he would not come at dinner-time. It was the well-informed man who travelled with drapery and the best Birmingham earrings. Not at all. His time was not till Thursday at three. Before they could think further, the visitor moved forward another step, and the diners got a glimpse of him through the same friendly chink that had offered him a view of the garland dinner-table. Oh, it's only love-day! This approximation to nobody was the miller above mentioned, a hail-man of fifty-five or sixty. Hail all through, as were many in those days, and not merely veneered with purple by exhilarating vitals and drinks, though the latter were not at all despised by him. His face was indeed rather pale than otherwise, for he had just come from the mill. It was capable of immense changes of expression. Mobility was its essence. A roll of flesh forming a buttress to his nose on each side, and a deep ravine lying between his lower lip and the tumulus represented by his chin. These fleshy lumps moved stealthily, as if of their own accord, whenever his fancy was tickled. His eyes, having lighted on the tablecloth, plates and viens, he found himself in a position which had a sensible awkwardness for a modest man who always liked to enter only at seasonable times. The presence of a girl of such pleasantly soft ways as Anne Garland, she who could make apples seem like peaches, and throw over her shillings the glamour of Guinness when she paid him for flour. Dinner is over, neighbour Love Day. Please come in," said the widow, seeing his case. The miller said something about coming impresently, but Anne pressed him to stay, with the tender motion of her lips as it played on the verge of a solicitor's smile without quite lapsing into one, her habitual manner when speaking. Love Day took off his low-crowned hat and advanced. He had not come about pigs or fowl this time. You have been looking out like the rest of us, no doubt, Mrs. Garland, at the mampus of soldiers that have come upon the down. Well, one of the little horse-resumances, the dragoons, my son John's regiment, you know. The announcement, though it interested them, did not create such an effect as the father of John, who seemed to anticipate. But Anne, who liked to say pleasant things, replied, the dragoons looked nicer than the foot or the German cavalry either. They are a handsome body of man," said the miller in a disinterested voice. Faith, I didn't know they were coming, though it may be in the newspaper all the time. But old Derriman keeps it so long that we never know things till they be in everybody's mouth. This Derriman was a squireen living near who was chiefly distinguished in the present warlike times by having a nephew in the Yeomanry. We were told that the Yeomanry went along the Turnpike Road yesterday," said Anne, and they say they were a pretty sight and quite soldierly. Ah, well, they be not regulars," said miller Loveday, keeping back harsher criticism as uncalled for. But inflamed by the arrival of the dragoons, which had been the exciting cause of his call, his mind would not go to Yeomanry. John has not been home these five years," he said. And what rank does he hold now? said the widow. He's trumpet major, ma'am, and a good musician. The miller, who was a good father, went on to explain that John had seen some service too when the regiment was lying in the neighbourhood more than eleven years before, which put his father out of temper with him as he had wished him to follow on at the mill. But as the lad had enlisted seriously and as he had often said that he would be a soldier, the miller had thought that he would let Jack take his chance in the profession of his choice. Loveday had two sons, and the second was now brought into the conversation by a remark of Anne's that neither of them seemed to care for the miller's business. No, said Loveday, in a less-point tone. Robert, you see, must need gold to see. He is much younger than his brother, said Mrs Garland. About four years, the miller told her, his soldier son was two and thirty, and Bob was twenty-eight. When Bob returned from his present voyage, he was to be persuaded to stay and assist his grinder in the mill and go to see no more. A sailor miller, said Anne. Oh, he knows as much about mill business as I do, said Loveday. He was indented for it, you know, like John. But bless me, he continued, I am before my story. I'm come here particularly to ask you, ma'am, and you, and my honey, if you will join me and a few friends at a little homely supper that I shall gie to please the chap now he's come. I can do no less than have a bit of a randy, as the saying is, now that he's here, safe and sound. Mrs Garland wanted to catch her daughter's eye. She was in some doubt about her answer, but Anne's eye was not to be caught, for she hated hints, nods, and calculations of any kind and in matters which should be regulated by impulse. And the matron replied, if so be it is possible, we'll be there. You will tell us the day. He would, as soon as he had seen son John. To all be rather untidy, you know, owing to my having no woman folks in the house, and my man David is a poor, dunder-headed fellow for getting up a feast. Poor chap, his sight is bad, that's true, and he's very good at making the beds, and oiling the legs of chairs and other furniture, or I should have got rid of him years ago. You should have a woman to attend to the house, love-day, said the widow. Yes, I should, but, well, it is a fine day, neighbours, hark! I fancy I hear the noise of pots and pans up at the camp, or are my ears deceived me? Bore, fellows, they must be hungry. Good day, cha-mam! And the miller went away. All that afternoon, Overcom continued in a ferment of interest in the military investment, which brought the excitement of an invasion without strife. There were great discussions on the merits and appearance of the soldiery. The event opened up to the girls unbounded possibilities of adoring and being adored, and to the young men an embarrassment of dashing acquaintances which quite superseded falling in love. Thirteen of these lads incontinently stated within the space of a quarter of an hour that there was nothing in the world like going for a soldier. The young women stated little, but perhaps thought them all, though in justice they glanced round towards the encampment from the corners of their blue and brown eyes in the most immure and modest manner that could be desired. In the evening the village was lively with soldiers' wives. A tree full of starlings would not have rivaled the chatter that was going on. These ladies were very brilliantly dressed with more regard for colour than for material. Purple, red and blue bonnets were numerous with bunches of cox feathers, and one had on an Arcadian hat of green sarsenet turned up in front to show her cap underneath. It had once belonged to an officer's lady and was not so much stained except where the occasion of storm of rain, incidental to a military life, had caused the green to run and stagnate in curious watermarks like penicillas and islands. Some of the prettiest of these butterfly wives had been fortunate enough to get lodgings in the cottages and were thus spared the necessity of living in huts and tents on the down. Those who had not been so fortunate were not rendered more amiable by the success of their sisters-in-arms and called them names which brought forth retorts and rejoinders, till the end of these alternative remarks seemed dependent upon the close of the day. One of these new arrivals, who had a rosy nose and a slight thickness of voice which, as Anne said, she couldn't help poor thing, seemed to have seen so much of the world and to have been in so many campaigns that Anne would have liked to take her into their own house so as to acquire some of that practical knowledge of the history of England which the lady possessed and which could not be got from books. But the narrowness of Mrs. Garland's rooms absolutely forbade this and the houseless treasury of experience was obliged to look for quarters elsewhere. That night Anne retired early to bed. The events of the day, cheerful as they were in themselves, had been unusual enough to give her a slight headache. Before getting into bed she went to the window and lifted the white curtains that hung across it. The moon was shining, though not as yet into the valley, but just peeping above the ridge of the down where the white cones of the encampment were softly touched by its light. The quarter-guard and foremost tents showed themselves prominently, but the body of the camp, the office's tents, kitchens, canteen, and appurtenances in the rear were blotted out by the ground because of its height above her. She could discern the forms of one or two centuries moving to and fro across the disk of the moon at intervals. She could hear the frequent shuffling and tossing of the horses tied to the pickets, and in the other direction, the miles-long voice of the sea, whispering a louder note at those points of its length, were hampered in its ebb and flow by some jutting promontory or group of boulders. Louder sounds suddenly broke this approach to silence. They came from the camp of the dragoons, were taken up further to the right by the camp of the Hanoverians, and further on still by the body of infantry. It was the tattoo. Feeling no desire to sleep, she listened yet longer, looked at Charles's wanes swinging over the church tower, and the moon ascending higher and higher over the right-hand streets of tents, where instead of parade and bustle, there was nothing going on but snores and dreams. The tired soldiers lying by this time under their proper canvases, radiating like spokes from the pole of each tent. At last Anne gave up thinking and retired like the rest. The night wore on, and except for the occasional of the centuries, no voice was heard in the camp or in the village below. End of chapter 2 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Rebecca Dittman, Liverpool United Kingdom. Web address, MercurialSpirit.co.uk. The trumpet major by Thomas Hardy. Chapter 3 The Mill becomes an important centre of operations. The next morning Miss Garland awoke with an impression that something more than usual was going on, and she recognised as soon as she could clearly reason that the proceedings, whatever they might be, lay not far away from her bedroom window. The sounds were chiefly those of pickaxes and shovels. Anne got up and lifting the corner of the curtain about an inch, peeped out. A number of soldiers were busily engaged in making a zigzag path down the incline from the camp to the riverhead at the back of the house, and judging from the quantity of work already got through, they must have begun very early. Squads of men were working at several equidistant points in the proposed pathway, and by the time that Anne had dressed herself, each section of the length had been connected to the walls above and below it, so that a continuous and easy track was formed from the crest of the down to the bottom of the steep. The down rested on a bed of solid chalk, and the surface exposed by the road-makers formed a white ribbon, serpenting from top to bottom. Then the relays of working soldiers all disappeared, and not long after a troop of dragoons in watering order rode forward at the top and began to wind down the new path. They came lower and closer, and at last were immediately beneath her window, gathering themselves up on the space by the mill pond. A number of the horses entered it at the shallow part, drinking and splashing and tossing about. Perhaps as many as thirty, half of them with riders on their backs were in the water at one time. The thirsty animals drank, stamped, flounced, and drank again, letting the clear, cool water dribble luxuriously from their mouths. Miller Love Day was looking on from over his garden hedge, and many admiring villagers were gathered around. Gazing up higher, Anne saw other troops descending by the new road from the camp, those which had already been to the pond making room for these by withdrawing along the village lane and returning to the top of the circuitous route. Suddenly the Miller exclaimed, as in fulfilment of expectation, Ah, John me boy, good morning! and the reply of, Morning Father came from a well-mounted soldier near him who did not, however, form one of the watering party. Anne could not see his face very clearly, but she had no doubt that this was John Love Day. There were tones in the voice which reminded her of old times, those of her very infancy, when Johnny Love Day had been top boy in the village school, and had wanted to learn painting of her father. The deeps and shallows of the mill-pond being better known to him than to any other man in the camp, he had apparently come down on that account and was cautioning some of the horsemen against riding too far in towards the mill-head. Since her childhood and his enlistment, Anne had seen him only once, and then, but casually, when he was at home on a short furlough. His figure was not much change from what it had been, but the many sunrises and sunsets which had passed since that day, developing her from a comparative child to womanhood, had abstracted some of his angularities, readened his chin, and given him a foreign look. It was interesting to see what years of training and service had done for this man. Few would have supposed that the white and blue coats similar to miller and soldier covered the forms of father and son. Before the last troop of jagoons rode off, they were welcomed into the body of miller Love Day, who still stood in his outer garden, this being a plot lying below the mill-tail and stretching to the water-side. It was just the time of year when cherries arrived and hung in clusters under their dark leaves. While the troopers loitered on their horses and chatted to the miller across the stream, he gathered bunches of fruit and held them up over the garden hedge for the acceptance of anybody who would have them. Whereupon the soldiers rode into the water to where it had washed holes in the garden bank and, raining their horses there, caught the cherries in their forage-caps or received bunches of them on the ends of their switches with the dignified laugh that became marshal men when stooping to slightly boyish amusement. It was a cheerful, careless, unpremeditated half-hour which returned like the scent of a flower to the memories of some of those who enjoyed it, even at a distance of many years after when they lay wounded and weak in foreign lands. Then dragoons and horses wheeled off as the others had done, and the troops of the German legion and entered in panoramic procession the space below Anne's eyes as if on purpose to gratify her. These were notable by their mustachios and cues wound tightly with brown ribbon to the level of their broad shoulder blades. They were charmed, as the others had been, by the head and neck of Miss Garland in the little square window overlooking the scene of operations and saluted her with devoted foreign civility and in such overwhelming numbers that the modest girl suddenly withdrew herself into the room and had a private blush between the chest of drawers and the washing-stand. When she came downstairs her mother said, I have been thinking what I ought to wear to Miller Love-Days tonight. To Miller Love-Days, said Anne, Yes, the party is tonight. He has been in here this morning to tell me that he has seen his son and they have fixed this evening. Do you think we ought to go, mother? said Anne slowly and looking at the smaller features of the window-flowers. Why not? said Mrs. Garland. He will only have men there except ourselves, will he, and shall we be right to go along among them? Anne had not recovered from the ardent gaze of the gallant York-Houzards whose voices reached her even now in converse with Love-Days. La, Anne, how proud you are! said Widow Garland. Why, isn't he our nearest neighbour and our landlord, and don't he fetch our faggots from the wood and keep us in vegetables for next to nothing? That's true, said Anne. Well, we can't be distant with the man, and if the enemy land next autumn, as everybody says they will, we shall have to depend upon the Miller's wagon and horses. He's our only friend. Yes, so is, said Anne, and you had better go, mother, and I'll stay at home. They will all be men, and I don't like going. Mrs. Garland reflected. Well, if you don't want to go, I don't, she said. Perhaps as you are growing up it will be better to stay at home this time. Your father was a professional man certainly. Having spoken as a mother, she sighed as a woman. Do you sigh, mother? You are so prim and stiff about everything. Very well, we'll go. Oh, no, I am not sure that we ought. I did not promise, and there will be no trouble in keeping away. Anne apparently did not feel certain of her own opinion, and instead of supporting or contradicting looked thoughtfully down and abstractedly brought her hands together on her bosom till her fingers met tip to tip. As the day advanced the young woman and her mother became aware that great preparations were in progress in the miller's wing of the house. The partitioning between the love-days and the garlands was not very thorough, consisting in many cases of a simple screwing up of the doors in the dividing walls, and thus when the mill began any new performances they proclaimed themselves at once The smell of miller love-days pipe came down Mrs. Garland's chimney of an evening with the greatest regularity. Every time he poked his fire they knew from the vehemence or deliberateness of the blows the precise state of his mind. And when he wound his clock on Sunday nights the whir of that monitor reminded the widow to wind hers. This transit of noises was most perfect where love-days lobby joined Mrs. Garland's pantry. An Anne, who was occupied for some time in the latter apartment enjoyed the privilege of hearing the visitors arrive and catching stray sounds and words without the connecting phrases that made them entertaining to judge from the laughter they evoked. The arrivals passed through the house and went into the garden where they had tea in a large summer house an occasional blink of bright colour through the foliage of all that was visible of the assembly from Mrs. Garland's windows. When it grew dusk they all could be heard coming indoors to finish the evening in the parlour. Then there was an intensified continuation of the above-mentioned signs of enjoyment, talkings and whore-whores running upstairs and running down, a slamming of doors and a clinking of cups and glasses till the proudest adjoining tenant without friends on his own side of the partition might have been tempted to wish for entrance to that merry dwelling if only to know the cause of these fluctuations of hilarity and to see if the guests were really so numerous and the observations so very amusing as they seemed. The stagnation of life on the garland side of the party wall began to have a very gloomy effect by contrast. When about half past nine o'clock one of these tantalising bursts of gaiety had resounded for a longer time than usual and said I believe, mother, that you are wishing you had gone. I owned a feeling that it would have been very cheerful if we had joined in, said Mrs. Garland, in a hankering tone. It was rather too nice in listening to you and not going. The parson never calls upon us except in his spiritual capacity. Old Derriman is hardly gentile and there's nobody left to speak to. Lonely people must accept what company they can get or do without it altogether. That's not natural am and I am surprised to hear a young woman like you say such a thing. Nature will not be stifled in that way. Song and powerful chorus heard through partition. I declare the rom on the other side of the wall seems quite a paradise compared with this. You are quite a girl, said Anne, in slightly superior accents. Go in and join them by all means. Oh no, not now, said her mother, resignedly shaking her head. It is too late now. We ought to have taken advantage of the invitation. They would look hard at me as a poor mortal who had no real business there and the miller would say with his broad smile. Ah, you be obliged to come round. While the sociable and unaspiring Mrs. Garland continued thus to pass the evening in two places, her body in her own house and her mind in the millers, somebody knocked at the door and directly after the elder Love Day himself was admitted to the room. He was dressed in a suit between grand and gay which he used for such occasions as the present and his blue coat, yellow and red three lower buttons unfastened, steel-buckled shoes and speckled stockings became him very well in Mrs. Martha Garland's eyes. You're a servant, ma'am, said the miller, adopting as a matter of propriety the raised standards of politeness required by his higher costume. Now, begging your pardon, I can't have this. It is unnatural for you two ladies should be biding here and we under the same roof making merry without you. Your husband, poor man, lovey pictures that I would make to be sure would have been in with us long ago if he had been in your place. I can take no nay from you upon my honour. You and Madean must come in. If it be only for half an hour John and his friends have got passes till twelve o'clock tonight and save in a few of our own village folk the lowest visit for present is a very gentile German corporal. If you should hay any misgivings on the score of respectability, ma'am, we'll pack off the underbred ones into the back kitchen. Widow Garland and Anne looked yes at each other after this appeal. We'll follow you in a few minutes, said the elder, smiling, and she rose with Anne to go upstairs. No, I'll wait for you, said the miller doggedly, or perhaps you'll alter your minds again. While the mother and daughter were upstairs dressing and saying laughingly to each other well, we must go now as if they hadn't wished to go all evening. Other steps were heard in the passage and the miller cried from below, You're pardon, Mrs. Garland, but my son John has come to help Fetchy. Shall I ask him in till ye be ready? Certainly I shall be down in a minute, screamed Anne's mother voice towards the staircase. When she descended the outlet of the trumpet major appeared, halfway down the passage. There says John, said the miller simply, John, you can mind Mrs. Martha Garland very well. Very well indeed, said the dragoon coming a little further. I should have called to see her last time, but I was only home a week. How is your little girl, mom? Mrs. Garland said Anne was quite well. She is grown up now. She will be down in a moment. There was a slight noise of military heels without the door at which the trumpet major went and put his head outside and said, All right, coming in a minute when voices in the darkness replied, No, hurry. More friends, said Mrs. Garland. Oh, it's only Buck and Jones come to fetch me, said the soldier. Shall I ask him in a minute, Mrs. Garland, mom? Oh, yes, said the lady. And the two interesting forms of Trumpeter Buck and Sadler Sergeant Jones then came forward in the most friendly manner, where, upon other steps, were heard without, and it was discovered that Sergeant Master Taylor Brett and Farrier Extraordinary Johnson were outside, having come to fetch Mrs. Buck and Jones, as Buck and Jones had come to fetch the trumpet major. As there seemed a possibility that Mrs. Garland's small passage being choked up with human figures personally unknown to her, she was relieved to hear Anne coming downstairs. Here's my little girl, said Mrs. Garland, and the trumpet major looked with a sort of awe upon the muslin apparition who came forward and stood quite dumb before her. Anne recognised him as the trooper she had seen from her window and welcomed him kindly. There was something in his honest face which made her feel instantly at home with him. At this frankness of manner, Love Day, who was not a lady's man, blushed, and made some alteration in his bodily posture, began a sentence which had no end and showed quite a boy's embarrassment. Recovering himself he politely offered his arm which Anne took with very pretty grace. He conducted her through his comrades who glued themselves perpendicularly to the wall to let her pass, and then they went out the door, her mother following with the miller, and supported by the body of troopers the latter walking with the usual cavalry gate as if their thighs were rather too long for them. Thus they crossed the threshold of the millhouse, and up the passage, the paving of which was worn into a gutter by the ebb and flow of feet that had been going on there ever since Tudor times. End of Chapter 3 Chapter 4 of the Trumpet Major This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy Chapter 4 Who were present at the miller's little entertainment? When the group entered the presence of the company, the conversation was caused by the sight of new visitors, and, of course, by the charm of Anne's appearance, until the old men, who had daughters of their own, perceiving that she was only a half-form girl, resumed their tails in tosspotting with unconcern. Miller Love Day had fraternized with half the soldiers in the camp since their arrival, and the effect of this upon his party was striking both chromatically and otherwise. Those among the guests who first attracted the eye were the sergeants and the sergeant majors of Love Day's regiment. Fine hardy men, who sat facing the candles, entirely resigned to physical comfort. Then there were the other non-commissioned officers, a German, two Hungarians, and a Swede from the Foreign Hussars, young men with a look of sadness on their faces, as if they did not much like serving so far from home. All of them spoke English fairly well. Old age was represented by Simon Byrd and the pensioner, and the shady side of fifty, by Corporal Tullidge, his friend and neighbor, who was hard of hearing, and who sat with his hat on over a red cotton handkerchief that was wound several times round his head. These two veterans were employed as watchers at the neighboring beacon, which had lately been erected by the Lord Lieutenant, for firing whenever the descent on the coast would lead. They lived in a little hut on the hill, close by the heap of faggots, but tonight they had found deputies to watch in their stead. On a lower plane of experience and qualifications came neighbor James Comfort of the Volunteers, a soldier by courtesy but a blacksmith by rights. Also, William Tremlett and Anthony Cripplestraw of the local forces. The two latter men of war were as villagers, and looked upon the regulars from a humble position in the background. The remainder of the party was made up of a neighboring dareman or two and their wives, invited by the miller, as Anne was glad to see that she and her mother should not be the only women there. The elder Loveday apologized in a whisper to Mrs. Garland for the presence of the inferior villagers. But as they are learning to be brave defenders of their home and country, ma'am, as fast as you can master the drill, and it worked for me off and on these many years, I've asked a man and thought you'd excuse it. Certainly Miller Loveday, said the widow. And the same of old Burton and Tullidge. They have served well and long in the foot, and even now have a hard time of it up at the beacon in wet weather. So, after giving him a meal in the kitchen, I just asked a man to hear the singing. They faithfully promised that as soon as ever they'd come in, to run down here first in case we shouldn't see it. Tis worth while to be friendly with them, you see, though their tempers be queer. Quite worthwhile, Miller, said she. Anne was rather embarrassed by the presence of the regular military in such force, and at first confined her words to the gerryman's wife she was acquainted with, and to the two old soldiers of the parish. Why didn't she speak to me before, child? said one of these, elderly men with a hat, while she was talking to old Simon Burton. I met you in the lane yesterday, he added reproachfully, but you didn't notice me at all. I am very sorry for it, she said, but, being afraid to shout in such a company, the effect of her remark upon the corporal was as if she had not spoken at all. You was coming along with your head full of some high notions or other, no doubt, continued the uncompromising corporal in the same loud voice. Ah, to his young bucks that get all the notice nowadays, no folks are quite forgot. I can mind well enough how young Bob Love Day used to lie and wait for ye. Anne blushed deeply, and stopped his two excursive discourse by hastily saying that she always respected old folks like him. The corporal thought she inquired why he always kept his hat on and answered that it was because his head was injured at Valenciennes in July 93. We were trying to bomb down the tower and a piece of the shells struck me. I was no more nor less than a dead man for two days. If it hadn't been for that and my smashed arm I should have come home none the worse for my five-and-twenty-years service. You have got a silver platelet in your head, haven't ye, corporal? said Anthony Cripple-Straugh, who had drawn near. I have heard that the way they mortised your skull was a beautiful piece of workmanship. Perhaps the young lady would like to see the place? Tis a curious sight, Mrs. Anne. You don't see such a wound every day. No, thank you, said Anne hurriedly, dreading, as did all the young people of Overcombe, the spectacle of the corporal uncovered. He had never been seen in public without the hat and the handkerchief since his return in 94, and strange stories were told of the ghastliness of his appearance bareheaded, a little boy who had accidentally beheld him going to bed in that state having been frightened into fits. Well, if the young woman wanted to see your head, maybe she'd like to hear your arm, continued Cripple-Straugh earnest to please her. Hey, said the corporal, your arm hurt too, cried Anne. Knocked to a poo-me at the same time as my head, said Tullidge dispassionately, rattle your arm corporal and show her, said Cripple-Straugh. Yes, sure, said the corporal, raising the limb slowly, as if the glory of the exhibition had lost some of its novelty, though he was willing to oblige, twisting it mercilessly about with his right hand, he produced a crunching among the bones at every motion. Cripple-Straugh seemed to derive great satisfaction from the ghastly sound. How very shocking, said Anne, painfully anxious for him to leave off. Oh, it don't hurt him, bless, you do it, corporal, said Cripple-Straugh. Not a bit, said the corporal, still working his arm with great energy. There's no life in the bones at all, no life in them, I tell her, corporal, none at all. They be as loose as a bag of nine pins, explained Cripple-Straugh in continuation. You can feel him quite plain, Mrs. Anne. If you would like to, he'll undo a sleeve in a minute to oblige. Oh, no, no, please not, I quite understand, said the young woman. Does she want to hear or see him any more, don't she, the corporal inquired, with a sense that his time was getting wasted. Anne explained that she did not on any account and managed to escape from the corner. End of Chapter 4 Chapter 5 of The Trumpet Major. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy. Chapter 5. The Song and the Stranger. The Trumpet Major now contrived to face himself near her. Anne's presence having evidently been a great pleasure to him since the moment of his first seeing her. She was quite at her ease with him and asked him if he thought that Bonaparte really would come during the summer, and many other questions which the gallant Dragoon could not answer but which he nevertheless liked to be asked. William Trumlet, who had not enjoyed a sound night's rest since the First Council's menace had become known, grabbed his ears at the sound of this subject, and inquired if anyone had seen the terrible flat-bottom boats that the enemy were to cross in. My brother Robert saw several of them paddling about the shore the last time he passed the Straits of Dover, said the Trumpet Major, and he further startled the company by informing them that there were supposed to be more than 1,500 of these boats and that they would carry a hundred men apiece, so that a descent of 150,000 men might be expected any day as soon as Boney had brought his plans to bear. Laura Mercy-upon us, said William Trumlet. The night time is when they will try it if they try it at all, said Old Tullage, and the tone of one who's watched at the beacon must, in the nature of things, have given him comprehensive views of the situation. It is my belief that the point they will choose for making the shore is just over there, and he nodded hideous nearness to the house in which they were assembled, whereupon Fenceble Trumlet and Kerbalstraw of the locals tried to show no signs of trepidation. When do you think Tullby said volunteer comfort, the blacksmith? I can't answer to a day, said the corporal, but it will certainly be in a down-channel tide, and instead of pulling hard against it he'll let his boats drift, and that will bring him right into Budsmouth Bay. Tullby a beautiful stroke of war if so be it is quietly done. Beautiful, said Kerbalstraw, moving inside his clothes. But how if we should be all a bed corporal, you can't expect a man to be brave in a shirt, especially we locals that have only got so far as shoulder firelocks. He's not coming this summer, he'll never come at all, said a tall sergeant major decisively. Love Day the soldier was too much engaged in attending upon Anne and her mother to joining these surmises, be stirring himself to get the ladies some of the best liquor the house afforded, which had, as a matter of fact, crossed the channel as privately as Bonaparte wished his army to do, and had been landed on a dark night over the cliff. After this he asked Anne to sing, but though she had a very pretty voice and private performances of that nature she declined to oblige him, turning the subject by making a hesitating inquiry about his brother Robert, whom he had mentioned just before. Robert is as well as ever thank you, Miss Garland, he said. He is now made of the brig-puit, rather young for such a command, but the owner puts great trust in him. The trumpet major added, deepening his thoughts to profound review of the person discussed, Bob is in love. Anne looked conscious and listened attentively, but Love Day did not go on. Much, she asked. I can't exactly say. And the strange part of it is that he never tells us who the woman is. Nobody knows at all. He will tell, of course, said Anne, in the remote tone of a person with whose sex such matters had no connection whatsoever. Love Day shook his head and the tet-a-tet was put to an end by a burst of song from one of the sergeants, who was followed at his end of the song by others, each giving a diddy in his turn, the singer standing up in front of the table, stretching his chin into the air, as though to abstract every possible wrinkle from his throat, and then plunging into the melody. When this was over one of the foreign hussars, the gentile German of Miller Love Day's description, who called himself a Hungarian and in reality belonged to no definite country, performed at trumpet major Love Day's request the series of wild emotions that he denominated his national dance that Anne might see what it was like. Miss Garland was the flower of the whole company. The soldiers, one and all, foreign and English, seemed to be quite charmed by her presence, as indeed they might well be, considering how seldom they came into the society of such as she. Anne and her mother were just thinking of retiring to their own dwelling when Sergeant Stanner of the Anthe Foot, who was recruiting at Bud's Mouth, began a satirical song. When lawyers strived to heal and parson's practice what they preach, then Little Boney hillpounds down and marches men on London Town. Rolla come ro-rum, to-lo-lo-rum Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lay. When justices hold equal scales and rogues are only found in jails, then Little Boney hillpounds down and marches men on London Town. Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lo-rum Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lay. When rich men find their wealth accursed and fill their with the poor man's purse, then Little Boney hillpounds down and marches men on London Town. Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lo-rum Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lay. Poor Stanner. In spite of the satire he fell at the bloody Battle of Elbrera a few years after this pleasantly spent summer at the Georgian watering place, being mortally wounded and trampled down by a French Husser when the Brigade was deploying and to-lined under Beresford, while Miller Loveday was saying, well done, Mr. Stanner, at the close of the Thirteenth Stanza, which seemed to be the last, and Mr. Stanner was modestly expressing his regret he could do no better. A stentorian voice was heard outside the window-shutter repeating Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lo-rum Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lay. The Company was silent in a moment at this reinforcement, and only the Military tried not to look surprised. While all wondered who the Singer could be, someone entered the porch. The door opened and in came a young man about the size and weight of the Farnes Hercules in the uniform of a yeoman recovery. Tis young Squire Derriman, without waiting to address anybody, or, apparently, seeing who were gathered there, the colossal man waved his cap above his head and went on in tones that shook the window-panes. When husbands with their wives agree and maids won't wed from modesty, then little bony hill-pounds down and marches men in London-town. Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lo-rum Rolla come, ro-rum, to-lo-lay. It was a verse omitted by the gallant stanner out of respect to the ladies. The newcomer was red-haired in a floored complexion, and seemed full of conviction that his whim of entering must be their pleasure, which, for the moment, it was. No ceremony good men all, he said. I was passing by and my ear was caught by the singing. I like singing. Tis warming and cheering and shall not be put down. I should like to hear men said the miller, filling a glass and handing it to the yeoman. Come all the way from quarters, then. I hardly know thee and your soldiers clothes. You look more natural with a spud in your hand, sir. I shouldn't have known you at all if I hadn't heard that you were called out. More natural with a spud? Have a care, miller, said the young giant, the fire of his complexion increasing to scarlet. I don't mean anger, but a soldier's honour, you know. The military in the background laughed a little, and the yeoman then for the first time discovered that there were more regulars present than one. He looked momentarily disconcerted, but expanded again to full assurance. Right, right, Master Derriman, no offence, it was only my joke, said the genial miller. Everybody's a soldier nowadays. Drink a drop of this cordial and don't mind words. The young man drank without the least reluctance and said, yes, miller, I am called out. Tis ticklish time for a soldier's now. We hold our lives in our hands. What are those fellows grinning at behind the table? I say we do. Staying with your uncle at the farm for a day or two, Mr. Derriman? No, no, as I told you, six miles off, billeted at Castor Bridge, but I have to call and see the old, old gentleman? Gentleman, no, skinflint. He lives upon the sweepings of the Barton, and the speaker's regular white teeth showed themselves like snow in a Dutch cabbage. Well, well, the profession of arms makes a man proof against all that. I take things as I find them. Quite right, Mr. Derriman. Another drop? No, no, I'll take no more than is good for me. No man should. So don't tempt me. The young man then saw Anne, Anne by unconscious gravitation went towards her and the other women, flinging a remark to John Love Day in passing. Ah, Love Day, I heard you were come, in short, a comal purpose to see you, glad to see you enjoying yourself at home again. The trumpet major replied civilly, though not without grimness, for he seemed hardly to like Derriman's motion towards Anne. Widow Garland's daughter, yes, Tiz, surely, you remember me, I have been here before, Festus Derriman, Yeomanry Cavalry. Anne gave a little curtsy. I know your name is Festus, that's all. Yes, Tiz well known, especially latterly. He dropped his voice to confidence pitch. I suppose your friends here are disturbed by my coming in, as they don't seem to talk much. I don't mean to interrupt the party, but I often find that people are put out by my coming among them, especially when I've got my regimentals on. La, Anne, are they? Yes, Tiz the way I have. He furthered lowered his voice as if they had been old friends, though in reality he'd only seen her three or four times. And how did you come to be here? Dash, my wig, I don't like to see a nice young lady like you in this company. You should come to some of our Yeomanry sprees in Castor Bridge or Shotsford Forum. Oh, but the girls do come, though Yeomanry are respected men, men of good substantial families, many farming their own land, and every one among us rides his own charger, which is more than these cussed fellows do, he nodded towards the dergoons. Hush, hush, why, these are friends and neighbors of Miller Love Day, and he is a great friend of ours, our best friend, said Anne, with great emphasis, and reddening at the sense of injustice to their host. What are you thinking of talking like that? It is ungenerous in you. Ha, ha, I've affronted you, isn't that it? Fair angel, fair, what do you call it? Fair Vestal. Ah, well, would you was safe in my own house. But honor must be minded now, not courting. Rolla cum, tollo, low rum. Pardon me, my sweet. I likey. It may be a come down for me, own and land. But I do likey. Sir, please be quiet, said Anne, distressed. I will, I will. Well, corporate tellage, how's your head? He said, going towards the other end of the room, and leaving Anne to herself. The company had again recovered its liveliness, and it was a long time before the bouncing Rufus, who had joined them, could stay from their society, and good liquors, although he had had quite enough of the latter before he entered. The natives received him at his own valuation, and the soldiers of the camp who sat behind the table, smile behind their pipes at his remarks, with a pleasant twinkle of the eye, which approached the satirical, John Loveday not being the least conspicuous in this bearing. But he and his friends were too courteous on such an occasion as the present to challenge the young man's large remarks, and readily permitted him to set them right on the details of camping and other military routine, about which the troopers seemed willing to let persons hold any opinion whatsoever, provided that they themselves were not obliged to give attention to it, showing strangely enough that if there was one subject more than another which never interested their minds, it was the art of war. To them the art of enjoying good company and details of the miller's household, the swarming of his bees, the numbers of his chickens, and the fatness of his pigs were matters of infinitely greater concern. The present writer, to whom this party has been described times out of number by members of the Loveday family and other aged people now passed away, can never enter the old living room of Overcomb Mill without beholding this genial scene through the mists of the seventy or eighty beans between then and now. First and brightest to the eye are the dozen candles scattered about regardless of expense, and kept well snuffed by the miller, who walks round the room at intervals of five minutes, snuffers in hand, and nips each wick with great precision, and with something of an executioner's grim look upon his face as he closes the snuffers upon the neck of the candle. Next to the candlelight show the red and blue candles, nearly twenty of them in all besides the ponderous derriman, the head of the latter, and indeed the heads of all who are standing up being in dangerous proximity to the black beams of the ceiling. There is not one among them who would attach any meaning to Vittoria, or gather from the syllables Waterloo, the remotest idea of his own glory or death. Next appears the correct and innocent off. She looks at derriman with a half-easy smile as he clanks hither and thither, and hopes he will not single her out again to hold a private dialogue with, which however he does, irresistibly attracted by the white muslin figure. She must, of course, look a little gracious now and again, lest his mood should turn from sentimental to quarrelsome, no impossible contingency with a yeoman soldier as her quick life. Well, well, this idling won't do for me, folks, he said at last to Anne's relief. I should not ought to have come in by rights, but I heard you enjoying yourselves and thought it might be worthwhile to see what you were up to. I have several miles to go before bed time, and stretching his arms, lifting his chin and shaking his head to eradicate any unseemly the trumpet major dryly. You could soon have made him as crabbed as a bear. I didn't want to provoke the chap, it wasn't worthwhile. He came in friendly enough, said the gentle miller without looking up. I don't think he was over-much friendly, said John. Tis as well to be neighborly with folks. If they be not quite unbearable, his father was a man of kindness, of the seller, and the smeary effect of its numerous cobwebs upon best clothes. Some of the guests then spoke of fest airmen as not such a bad young man if you took him right and humored him. Others said that he was nobody's enemy but his own, near to over-cum than he did at present. This unappreciative person was the trumpet major. End of Chapter 5 Chapter 6 of the trumpet major This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The trumpet major at this time in the history of over-cum, one solitary newspaper occasionally found its way into the village. It was lent by the postmaster at Budsmouth, who in some mysterious way got it for nothing through his connection with the mail to Mr. Derriman at the Hall, by whom it was handed on to Mrs. Garland when it was not more than a fortnight long columns was not accorded to the widow Garland for nothing. It was by such ingenuous means that he paid her for her daughter's occasional service in reading aloud to him and making out his accounts, in which matters the farmer whose guineas were reported to touch five figures, some said more, was not expert. Mrs. Martha Garland as a respectable widow occupied a twilight rank between the former as letter-writer and reader and general translator from the printing tongue. It was not without satisfaction that she stood at her door of an evening newspaper in hand with three or four cottagers standing round and poured down their open throats any paragraph that she might choose to select from the stirring ones of the period. When she had done the hands it became subdivided into half-pages, quarter-pages and irregular triangles and ended its career as a paper cap, a flag-and-bong or a wrapper for his bread and cheese. Notwithstanding his compact with Mrs. Garland, all Mr. Derriman kept the paper so long and was so cheery of wasting his man's time on a merely intellectual exercise that unless the arrival of the soldiers led Mrs. Garland to dispatch her daughter for it the day after the party and away she went in her hat and police in a direction at right angles to that of the encampment on the hill. Walking across the fields for the distance of a mile or two she came out upon the high road by a wicket gate. On the other side the dry hard mud of the opening was marked with several horse-and-cow tracks that had been half obliterated by fifty-score sheep-tracks surcharged with the tracks of a man and a dog. Beyond this geological record appeared a carriage-road nearly grown over with grass which Anne followed. It descended by a gentle slope, dived under dark-rinded elm and chestnut trees and conducted a trail when it took a bend round a swamp of fresh water-cress and brook-lime that had once been a fish-pond. Here the gray weather-worn front of a building edged from behind the trees. It was Oxwell Hall once the seat of a family now extinct and, of late years, used as a farmhouse. Benjamin Derriman who owned the crumbling land during the growth of their only son there had been a partition of the Oxwell estate giving the farmer now a widower the opportunity of acquiring the building and a small portion of the land attached on exceptionally low terms. But two years after the purchase the boy died and Derriman's existence was paralyzed forthwith. It was said that since that event he had devised but this was not certainly known. The hall was as interesting as mansions in the state of declension usually are as the excellent county history showed. That popular work in folio contained an old plate dedicated to the last sign of the original owners from which drawing it appeared that in 1750 the date of the publication the windows were covered with little scratches that a lady and a lap dog stood on the lawn in a strenuously walking position and a substantial cloud and nine flying birds of no known species hung over the trees to the northeast. The rambling and neglected dwelling had all the romantic excellencies and practical drawbacks which such mildewed places share in common with caves, mountains, wildernesses, glens and other homes could have been raised on the inner plaster of the dewy walls at any height not exceeding three feet from the floor and mushrooms of the most refined and thin stemmed kinds grew up through the chinks in the larder paving. As for the outside, nature in the ample time that had been given her had so mingled her filings and effacements with the marks of human wear and tear upon the house that it was often hard to say in which of the two men the keenness was gone from the moldings of the doorways but whether worn out by the rubbing past of innumerable people's shoulders and the moving of their heavy furniture or by time in a grander and more abstract form did not appear. The iron stanchions inside the window panes were eaten away to the size of wires at the bottom where they settled into the stone that condensed mine altogether or become iridescent as a peacock's tail. In the middle of the porch was a vertical sundial whose no man swayed loosely about when the wind blew and casted shadow hither and thither as much as to say here's your fine model dial here's any time for any man I am an old dial and shiftiness is the best policy they would like to do to see the in the master's lodge reached by a spiral staircase across the archway was fixed a row of wooden hurdles one of which and opened and closed behind her. Their necessity was apparent as soon as she got inside. clicking the carved stone capitals that supported the vaulting, and went on to a second and open door, across which was another hurdle, to keep the livestock from absolute community with the inmates. There being no knocker, she knocked by means of a short stick which was laid against the post for that purpose, but, nobody attending, she entered the passage and tried an inner door. A slight noise was heard inside, the door opened about an inch, and a strip of decayed face, including the eye and some forehead wrinkles, appeared within the crevice. "'Please, I have come for the paper,' said Anne. "'Oh, is it you, dear Anne?' whined the inmate, opening the door a little further. "'I could hardly get to the door to open it, I am so weak.' The speaker was a wizened old gentleman, in a coat the color of his farmyard, breeches of the same hue unbuttoned at the knee, revealing a bit of leg above his stocking, and a dazzlingly white shirt-frill to compensate for this untightiness below. The edge of his skull round his eye sockets was visible through the skin, and he had a mouth whose corners made towards the back of his head on the slightest provocation. He walked with great apparent difficulty back into the room, Anne following him. "'Well, you can have the paper if you want it, but you never give me much time to see what's in it. Here's the paper.' He held it out to her, but before she could take it he drew it back again, saying, "'I have not had my share of the paper by a good deal, what with my weak sight and people coming so soon, foreign. I am a poor put-upon soul. But my duty of man will be left to me when the newspaper is gone.' And he sank into his chair with an air of exhaustion. Anne said that she did not wish to take the paper if he had not done with it, and that she was really later in the week than usual, owing to the soldiers. Soldiers, yes, wrought to the soldiers. And now hedges will be broke and hens' nests robbed and suckling pigs stole, and I don't know at all. Who's to pay for it, sure. I reckon that because the soldiers become you don't mean to be kind enough to read to me what I hadn't had time to read myself. She would read if he wished, she said, she was in no hurry, and sitting herself down she unfolded the paper. No faith is nothing to I. Defense of the country? You may read that, if you will. I hope there will be nobility in this parish or any wild work of that sort, for what would a poor old laminger like myself do with soldiers in his house and nothing to feed him with? Anne began reading and continued her task nearly ten minutes when she was interrupted by the appearance in the quadrangle slew without of a large figure in the uniform of a yeomanry cavalry. What do you see out there? said the farmer with a start, as she paused and slowly blushed. A soldier, one of the yeomanry, said Anne, not quite at a reese. Scrouch it all to my nephew, exclaimed the old man, his face turning to a phosphoric pallor, and his body twitching with innumerable alarms as he formed upon his face a gasping smile of joy with which to welcome the new coming relative. Read on, prithee, Miss Garland. Before she had read far the visitor straddled over the door-hurtle into the passage and entered the room. Well, nun, how do you feel? said the giant, shaking hands with the farmer in the manner of one violently ringing a hand-bell. Glad to see you. Bad and weakish, Festus, replied the other, his person responding passively to the rapid vibrations imparted. Oh, be tender, please! A little softer. There's a dear nephew. My arm is no more than a cobweb. Ah, poor soul! Yes, I am not much more than a skeleton, and can't bear rough usage. Sorry to hear that, but I'll bear your affliction in mind. Why, you are all in a tremble, Uncle Benjy. Tis because I am so gratified, said the old man. I always get all in a tremble when I'm taken by surprise by a beloved relation. Ah, that's it, said the yeoman, bringing his hand down on the back of his uncle's chair with a loud smack, at which Uncle Benjy nervously sprang three inches from his seat and dropped into it again. Ask your pardon for frightening, Yonkel. Tis how we do it in the army, and I forgot your nerves. You have scarcely expected to see me, I daresay, but here I am. I'm glad to see ye. You are not going to stay long, perhaps? Quite the contrary. I am going to stay ever so long. Oh, I see! I am so glad, dear Festus. Ever so long, did ye say? Yes, ever so long, said the young gentleman, sitting on the slope of the bureau and stretching out his legs as props. I am going to make this quite my own home whenever I am off duty, as long as we stay out. And after that, when the campaign is over in the autumn, I shall come here and live with you like your own son, and help you manage your land and your farm, you know, and make you a comfortable old man. Ah, how you do please me, said the farmer, with a horrified smile, grasping the arms of his chair to sustain himself. Yes, I've been meaning to come a long time, as I knew you'd like to have me, Uncle Benjy, and tis'n'd in my heart to refuse you. You always was kind that way. Yes, I always was. But I ought to tell you at once, not to disappoint you, that I shan't be here always, all day, that is, because of my military duties as a cavalryman. Oh, not always, that's a pity, exclaimed the farmer, with a cheerful eye. I knew you'd say so, and I shan't be able to sleep here at night sometimes for the same reason. Not sleep here, O Knights, said the old man, still more relieved. You ought to sleep here, you certainly ought, in short, you must. But you can't. Not while we are with the colors. But, directly, that's over, the very next day. I'll stay here all day and all night, too, to oblige you, since you ask me so very kindly. The thank thee, that will be very nice, said Uncle Benjy. Yes, I knew to a relief ye. Any kindly stroked his uncle's head, the old man expressing his enjoyment at the affectionate token, by a death's head grimace. I should have called to see you the other night when I passed through here, Festus continued. But it was so late that I couldn't come so far out of my way. You won't think it unkind. Not at all, if you couldn't. I shall never think it unkind if you really can't come, you know, Festi. There was a few minutes pause, and as the nephew said nothing, Uncle Benjy went on. I wish I had a little present for ye, but, as ill luck would have it, we have lost a deal of stock this year, and I've had to pay away so much. Poor old man, I know ye have. Shall I lend ye a seven-chilling piece, Uncle Benjy? Ha-ha! You must have your little joke. Well, I'll think of that. And so they expect Boney-part to choose this free part of the coast for his landing, eh? And that the yeomanry be to stand in front as the forlorn hope? Who says so? asked the floored son of Mars, losing a little redness. The newspaper man. Oh, there's nothing in that, said Festus bravely. The government thought it possible at one time, but they don't know. Festus turned himself as he talked, and now said abruptly, Ah, who's this? White is our little Anne. He had not noticed her till this moment, the young woman having at his entry kept her face over the newspaper, and then got away to the back part of the room. And are you and your mother always going to stay down there in the millhouse, watching the little fishes, Miss Anne? She said that it was uncertain, in a tone of truthful precision which the question was hardly worth, looking forcibly at him as she spoke. But she blushed fitfully in her arms and hands as much as in her face. Not that she was overpowered by the great boots, formidable spurs, and other fierce appliances of this person, as he imagined, simply she had not been prepared to meet him there. I hope you will, I am sure, for my own good, he said, letting his eyes linger on the round of her cheek. Anne became a little more dignified, and her look showed reserve. But the yeoman on perceiving this went on talking to her in so civil a way that he irresistibly amused her, though she tried to conceal all feeling. At a brighter remark of his than usual her mouth moved, her upper lip playing uncertainly over her white teeth. It would stay still. No, it would withdraw a little way in a smile. Then it would flutter down again, and so it wavered like a butterfly in a tender desire to be pleased and smiling, and yet to be also sedated and composed. To show him that she did not want compliments, and yet that she was not so cold as to wish to repress any genuine feeling he might be anxious to utter. Shall you want any more reading, Mr. Derriman, she said, interrupting the younger man in his remarks? If not, I'll go homeward. Don't let me hinder you longer, said Festus. I'm often a minute or two when your man has cleaned my boots. You don't hinder us, nephew. She must have the paper, tis the day for her to have them. She might read a little more as I've had so little profit out of them hither, too. Well, why don't you speak? Well ye, or won't ye, my dear? Not to to, she said. Ho-ho! Damn it, I must go, then, I suppose, said Festus, laughing, and unable to get a further glance from her, he left the room and clanked into the backyard where he saw a man. Holding up his hand, he cried, Anthony Cripplestraw. Cripplestraw came up in a trot, moved a lock of his hair and replaced it and said, Yes, Master Derriman. He was old Mr. Derriman's odd hand in the yard and garden, and like his employer had no great pretensions to manly beauty owing to a limpness of backbone and a specialty of mouth which opened on one side only, giving him a triangular smile. Well, Cripplestraw, how is it today? said Festus, with socially superior heartiness. Midland, consider and Master Derriman, and how's yourself? Farish? Well, now, see and clean these military boots of mine. I'll cock my foot up onto this bench. This pigsty of my uncles is not fit for a soldier to come into. Yes, Mr. Derriman, I will. No, tis not fit, Master Derriman. What stock has Uncle lost this year, Cripplestraw? Well, let's see, sir. I can call to mind that we've lost three chickens, a Tom pigeon, and a weakly suckling pig, one of a fair of ten. I can't think of no more, Master Derriman. Not a large quantity of cattle, the old rascal. No, tis not a large quantity. Old, what did you say, sir? Oh, nothing. He's within there. Festus flung his forehead in the direction of a right line towards the inner apartment. He's a regular snitch one. He-he-fie-fie, Master Derriman, said Cripplestraw, shaking his head in delighted censure. Gentle folks shouldn't talk so. And an officer, Mr. Derriman. Tis the duty of all cavalry gentlemen to bear in mind that their blood is a no-thing in the country, and not to speak illot. He's close-fisted. Well, Master, he is. I own he is a little. Tis the adder of some old venerable gentleman to be so. Will Hopil treat you well in your fortune, sir? Hope he will. Do people talk about me here, Cripplestraw? asked the yeoman, as the other continued busy with his boots. Well, yes, sir, they do often on, you know. They says you be as fine a piece of cavalry flesh and bones as ever groat on fallow ground. In short, all owns you be a fine fellow, sir. I wish I wasn't no more afraid of the French than you be, but, being in the locals, Master Derriman, I assure ye, I dream of having to defend my country every night. And I don't like the dream at all. You should take it careless, Cripplestraw, as I do, and would soon come natural to you not to mind at all. Well, a fine fellow is not everything you know. Oh, no. There's as good as I in the army, and even better. And they say that when you fall this summer you'll die like a man. When I fall? Yes, sure, Master Derriman, poor solo thee. I shan't forget ye as ye lie mouldering in your soldier's grave. Hey, said the warrior uneasly, what makes them think I'm going to fall? Well, sir, by all accounts the omenry will be put in front. Front? That's what my uncle has been saying. Yes, and by all accounts just true. And, laterally, they'll be mowed down like grass, and you among them, poor young gallant officer. Look here, Cripplestraw, this is a regular foolish report. How can ye omenry be put in front? Nobody's put in front. We ye omenry have nothing to do with Bonaparte's landing. We shall be away in a safe place, guarding the possessions and jewels. Now can ye see, Cripplestraw, any way at all that the ye omenry can be put in front? Do ye really think they can? Well, master, I'm afraid I do, said the cheering Cripplestraw, and I know a great warrior like you is only too glad of the chance. Twill be a great thing for ye, death and glory. In short, I hope from my heart you will, and I say so very often to folk, in fact I pray at night for it. O, cuss you, ye needn't pray about it. No, master Derriman, I won't. Of course my sword will do its duty, that's enough, and now be off with ye. Best is gloomily return to his uncle's room, and found that Anne was just leaving. He was inclined to follow her at once, but as she gave him no opportunity for doing this, he went to the window, and remained tapping his fingers against the shutter while she crossed the yard. Well, Nephy, you're not gone yet, said the farmer, looking dubiously at Festus from under one eyelid. You see how I am, not by any means better, you see, so I can't entertain ye as well as I would. You can't, nunc, you can't. I don't think you are worse, if I do dash my wig. But you'll have plenty of opportunity to make me welcome when you are better. If you are not so brisk inwardly as you was, why not try a change of air? This is a dull, damp hole. Tis Festus, and I am thinking of moving. Ah, where too, said Festus, with surprise and interest. Up into the garret in the north corner, there is no fireplace in the room, but I shan't want that, poor soul of me. Tis not moving far. Tis not, but I have not a soul belonging to me within ten mile, and you know very well that I couldn't afford to go to lodgings that I had to pay for. I know it, I know it, Uncle Benji. Well, don't be disturbed. I'll come and manage for you as soon as ever this bony alarm is over. But when a man's country calls he must obey if he is a man. A splendid spirit, said Uncle Benji, with much admiration on the surface of his countenance. I never had it. How could it have got into the boy? From my mother's side, perhaps. Perhaps so. Well, take care of yourself, Nephi, said the farmer, waving his hand impressively. Take care. In these warlike times your spirit may carry ye into the arms of the enemy, and you are the last of the family. You should think of this and not let your bravery carry ye away. Don't be disturbed, Uncle. I'll control myself, said Festus. Betrayed into self-complacency against his will. At least I'll do what I can. But nature will out sometimes. Well, I'm off. He began humming bright in camp and promising to come again very soon, retired with assurance, each yard of his retreat adding private joyousness to his uncle's form. When the bulky young man had disappeared through the porter's lodge, Uncle Benji showed preter natural activity for one in his invalid state, jumping up quickly without a stick, at the same time opening and shutting his mouth quite silently, like a thirsty frog, which was his way of expressing mirth. He ran upstairs as quick as an old squirrel, and went to a dormer window which commanded a view of the grounds beyond the gate, and the footpath that stretched across them to the village. Yes, yes, he said, in a suppressed scream, dancing up and down, he's after her. She've hidden. For there appeared upon the path the figure of Anne Garland, and hastening on at some little distance behind her the swaggering shape of Festus. She became conscious of his approach and moved more quickly. He moved more quickly still and overtook her. She turned as if an answer to a call from him, and he walked on besider till they were out of sight. The old man then played upon an imaginary fiddle for about a half a minute, and, suddenly discontinuing the signs of pleasure, went downstairs again. CHAPTER VII. HOW THEY TALKED IN THE PASTURES. You often come this way, said Festus to Anne, rather before he had overtaken her. I come for the newspaper and other things, she said, perplexed by a doubt whether he were there by accident or design. They moved on in silence, Festus beating the grass with the switch in a masterful way. Did you speak, Miss Anne? He asked. No, said Anne. Ten thousand pardons. I thought she did. Now don't let me drive you out of the path. I can walk among the high grass and the guilty cups. They will not yellow my stockings as they will yours. Well, what do you think of a lot of soldiers coming to the neighborhood in this way? I think it is very lively and a great change, she said with Demir's seriousness. Perhaps you don't like us warriors as a body. Anne smiled without replying. Why, you are laughing, said the yeoman, looking searchingly at her and blushing like a little fire. What do you see to laugh at? Did I laugh, said Anne, a little scared at a sudden mortification. Why, yes you did. Why, yes you know you did, you young sneer, he said, like a cross-baby. You are laughing at me, that's who you are laughing at. I should like to know what you would do without such as me if the French were to drop in upon ye any night. Would you help to beat them off, she said. Can you ask such a question? What are we for? But you don't think anything of soldiers. Oh, yes, she liked soldiers, she said. Especially when they come home from the wars covered with glory. Though when she thought what doings had won them that glory, she did not like them quite so well. The gallant and appeased yeoman said he supposed her to mean chopping off heads, blowing out brains, and that kind of business. Anne thought it quite right that a tender-hearted thing like her should feel a little horrified. But, as for him, he should not mind another Blenheim this summer as the army had fought a hundred years ago, or whenever it was, dash it wig if he should mind it at all. Hello, now you are laughing again. Yes, I saw you, and the caloric Festus turned his blue eyes and flushed face upon her as though he would read her thoughts. Anne strove valiantly to look calmly back, but her eyes could not face his and they fell. You did laugh, he repeated. It was only a tiny little one, she murmured. Ah, I knew you did, thundered he. What was it you laughed at? I only thought that you were merely in the yeomanry, she murmured slyly. And what of that? And the yeomanry only seemed farmers that have lost their senses. Yes, yes, I knew you meant some jeeringo that sword, Mistress Anne. But I supposed is the way of women, and I take no notice. I'll confess that some of us are no great things, but I know how to draw a sword, don't I? Say I don't, just to provoke me. I am sure you do, said Anne sweetly. If a Frenchman came up to you, Mr. Derriman, would you take him on the hip or on the thigh? Now you're flattering, he said, his white teeth uncovering themselves in a smile. Well, of course I should draw my sword. No, I mean my sword would already be drawn. And I should put spurs to my horse, Charger, as we call it in the army, and I should write up to him and say, no, I shouldn't say anything, of course. Men never waste words in battle. I should take him with the third guard, low point, then coming back to the second guard. But that would be taking care of yourself, not hitting at him. How can you say that, he cried, the beams upon his face turning to a lured cloud in a moment. How can you understand military terms who've never had a sword in your life? I shouldn't take him with a sword at all. He went on with eager sulkiness. I should take him with my pistol. I should pull off my right glove and throw back my goatskin. Then I should open my priming pan, prime and cast about, no, I shouldn't, that's wrong. I should draw my right pistol, and as soon as loaded, seize the weapon by the butt. Then at the word, cock your pistol, I should... Then there is plenty of time to give words of command in the heat of battle, said Anne innocently. No, said the yeoman, his face again in flames. Why, of course I'm only telling you what would be the word of command if, there now, you la... I didn't, upon my word I didn't. No, I don't think you did, it was my mistake. Well, then I come smartly to present, looking well along the barrel and fire. Of course I know well enough how to engage the enemy. But I expect my old uncle has been setting you against me. He has not said a word, replied Anne, though I have heard of you, of course. What have you heard? Nothing good, I dare say, makes my blood boil within me. Oh, nothing bad, she said, assuringly. Just a word now and then. Come now, tell me. There's a deer. I don't like to be crossed. It shall be a sacred secret between us. Come now." Anne was embarrassed, and her smile was uncomfortable. I shall not tell you, she said at last. There it is again, said the yeoman, throwing himself into a despair. I shall soon begin to believe that my name is not worth six pence about here. I tell you, to us nothing against you, repeated Anne. That means it might have been for me, said Festus, in a mollified tone. Well, though, to speak the truth, I have a good many faults. Some people will praise me, I suppose. To us praise? It was. Well I am not much at farming, and I am not much in company, and I am not much at figures, but perhaps I must own, since it is forced upon me, that I can show as fine a soldier's figure on the esplanade as any man of the cavalry. You can, said Anne, for though her flesh crept in mortal terror of his harassability, she could not resist the fearful pleasure of leading him on. You look very well, and some say you are—what? Well, they say I am good-looking. I don't make myself, so, tis no praise. Hello, what are you looking across there for? Only at a bird I saw fly out of that tree, said Anne. What, only at a bird, do you say? He heaved out a voice of thunder. I see your shoulders a-shaken young madame. Now, don't you provoke me with that laughing? By God it won't do. Then go away, said Anne, changing from mirthfulness to irritation by his rough manner. I don't want your company, you great bragging thing. You are so touchy, there's no bearing with you. Go away. No, no, Anne, I am wrong to speak to you so. I give you free liberty to say what you will to me. Say I am not a bit of a soldier or anything. Abuse me, do now, there's a deer. I'm scum, I'm froth, I'm dirt before the besom—yes. I have nothing to say, sir. Stay where you are till I am out of this field. Well, there's such command in your looks that I hadn't heart to go against you. You will come this way to-morrow at the same time. Now don't be uncivil. She was too generous not to forgive him, but the short little lip murmured that she did not think it at all likely she should come that way to-morrow. Then Sunday, he said. Not Sunday, said she. Then, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday surely he went on experimentally. She answered that she should probably not see him on either day, and, cutting short the argument, went through the wicket into the other field. Festus paused looking after her, and when he could no longer see her slight figure he swept away his deliberations, began singing, and turned off in the other direction.