arise, he, though a family man, would be useless:  that he always vacated the premises while those incidental scenes were being enacted at home; and that for him and George Stokes to be left alone with the young woman, why they would be of no more service to her than a couple of babies newborn themselves.  He, for his part, he assured Evan, should take to his heels, and relinquish waggon, and horses, and all; while George probably would stand and gape; and the end of it would be, they would all be had up for murder.  He diverged from the alarming prospect, by a renewal of the foregoing alternative to the gentleman who had constituted himself the young woman’s protector.  If he parted company with them, they would immediately part company with the young woman, whose condition was evident.

‘Why, couldn’t you tall that?’ said the waggoner, as Evan, tingling at the ears, remained silent.

‘I know nothing of such things,’ he answered, hastily, like one hurt.

I have to repeat the statement, that he was a youth, and a modest one.  He felt unaccountably, unreasonably, but horridly, ashamed.  The thought of his actual position swamped the sickening disgust at tailordom.  Worse, then, might happen to us in this extraordinary world!  There was something more abhorrent than sitting with one’s legs crossed, publicly stitching, and scoffed at!  He called vehemently to the waggoner to whip the horses, and hurry ahead into Fallowfield; but that worthy, whatever might be his dire alarms, had a regular pace, that was conscious of no spur:  the reply of ‘All right!’ satisfied him at least; and Evan’s chaste sighs for the appearance of an assistant petticoat round a turn of the road, were offered up duly, to the measure of the waggoner’s steps.

Suddenly the waggoner came to a halt, and said ’Blest if that Gearge bain’t a snorin’ on his pins!’

Evan lingered by him with some curiosity, while the waggoner thumped his thigh to, ‘Yes he be! no he bain’t!’ several times, in eager hesitation.

‘It’s a fellow calling from the downs,’ said Evan.

‘Ay, so!’ responded the waggoner.  ’Dang’d if I didn’t think ’twere that Gearge of our’n.  Hark awhile.’

At a repetition of the call, the waggoner stopped his team.  After a few minutes, a man appeared panting on the bank above them, down which he ran precipitately, knocked against Evan, apologized with the little breath that remained to him, and then held his hand as to entreat a hearing.  Evan thought him half-mad; the waggoner was about to imagine him the victim of a midnight assault.  He undeceived them by requesting, in rather flowery terms, conveyance on the road and rest for his limbs.  It being explained to him that the waggon was already occupied, he comforted himself aloud with the reflection that it was something to be on the road again for one who had been belated, lost, and wandering over the downs for the last six hours.