Sylvia turned her face round from the light, and shut her eyes.  Her cousin came close up to her on tip-toe, and looked anxiously at what he could see of her averted face; then he passed his hand so slightly over her hair that he could scarcely be said to touch it, and murmured—­

’Poor lassie! it’s a pity she came to-day, for it’s a long walk in this heat!’

But Sylvia started to her feet, almost pushing him along.  Her quickened senses heard an approaching step through the courtyard before any of the others were aware of the sound.  In a minute afterwards, the glass-door at one corner of the parlour was opened from the outside, and Mr. John stood looking in with some surprise at the group collected in his usually empty parlour.

‘It’s my cousin,’ said Philip, reddening a little; ‘she came wi’ her friend in to market, and to make purchases; and she’s got a turn wi’ seeing the press-gang go past carrying some of the crew of the whaler to the Randyvowse.

‘Ay, ay,’ said Mr. John, quickly passing on into the shop on tip-toe, as if he were afraid he were intruding in his own premises, and beckoning Philip to follow him there.  ’Out of strife cometh strife.  I guessed something of the sort was up from what I heard on t’ bridge as I came across fra’ brother Jeremiah’s.’  Here he softly shut the door between the parlour and the shop.  ’It beareth hard on th’ expectant women and childer; nor is it to be wondered at that they, being unconverted, rage together (poor creatures!) like the very heathen.  Philip,’ he said, coming nearer to his ’head young man,’ ’keep Nicholas and Henry at work in the ware-room upstairs until this riot be over, for it would grieve me if they were misled into violence.’

Philip hesitated.

’Speak out, man!  Always ease an uneasy heart, and never let it get hidebound.’

’I had thought to convoy my cousin and the other young woman home, for the town is like to be rough, and it’s getting dark.’

‘And thou shalt, my lad,’ said the good old man; ’and I myself will try and restrain the natural inclinations of Nicholas and Henry.’

But when he went to find the shop-boys with a gentle homily on his lips, those to whom it should have been addressed were absent.  In consequence of the riotous state of things, all the other shops in the market-place had put their shutters up; and Nicholas and Henry, in the absence of their superiors, had followed the example of their neighbours, and, as business was over, they had hardly waited to put the goods away, but had hurried off to help their townsmen in any struggle that might ensue.

There was no remedy for it, but Mr. John looked rather discomfited.  The state of the counters, and of the disarranged goods, was such also as would have irritated any man as orderly but less sweet-tempered.  All he said on the subject was:  ’The old Adam! the old Adam!’ but he shook his head long after he had finished speaking.