excellent spring-bed on his mother’s fat ribs; on Alick, the shepherd, in his new smock-frock, taking an uneasy siesta, half-sitting, half-standing on the granary steps.  Alick was of opinion that church, like other luxuries, was not to be indulged in often by a foreman who had the weather and the ewes on his mind.  “Church!  Nay—­I’n gotten summat else to think on,” was an answer which he often uttered in a tone of bitter significance that silenced further question.  I feel sure Alick meant no irreverence; indeed, I know that his mind was not of a speculative, negative cast, and he would on no account have missed going to church on Christmas Day, Easter Sunday, and “Whissuntide.”  But he had a general impression that public worship and religious ceremonies, like other non-productive employments, were intended for people who had leisure.

“There’s Father a-standing at the yard-gate,” said Martin Poyser.  “I reckon he wants to watch us down the field.  It’s wonderful what sight he has, and him turned seventy-five.”

“Ah, I often think it’s wi’ th’ old folks as it is wi’ the babbies,” said Mrs. Poyser; “they’re satisfied wi’ looking, no matter what they’re looking at.  It’s God A’mighty’s way o’ quietening ’em, I reckon, afore they go to sleep.”

Old Martin opened the gate as he saw the family procession approaching, and held it wide open, leaning on his stick—­pleased to do this bit of work; for, like all old men whose life has been spent in labour, he liked to feel that he was still useful—­that there was a better crop of onions in the garden because he was by at the sowing—­and that the cows would be milked the better if he stayed at home on a Sunday afternoon to look on.  He always went to church on Sacrament Sundays, but not very regularly at other times; on wet Sundays, or whenever he had a touch of rheumatism, he used to read the three first chapters of Genesis instead.

“They’ll ha’ putten Thias Bede i’ the ground afore ye get to the churchyard,” he said, as his son came up.  “It ‘ud ha’ been better luck if they’d ha’ buried him i’ the forenoon when the rain was fallin’; there’s no likelihoods of a drop now; an’ the moon lies like a boat there, dost see?  That’s a sure sign o’ fair weather—­there’s a many as is false but that’s sure.”

“Aye, aye,” said the son, “I’m in hopes it’ll hold up now.”

“Mind what the parson says, mind what the parson says, my lads,” said Grandfather to the black-eyed youngsters in knee-breeches, conscious of a marble or two in their pockets which they looked forward to handling, a little, secretly, during the sermon.

“Dood-bye, Dandad,” said Totty.  “Me doin’ to church.  Me dot my neklace on.  Dive me a peppermint.”

Grandad, shaking with laughter at this “deep little wench,” slowly transferred his stick to his left hand, which held the gate open, and slowly thrust his finger into the waistcoat pocket on which Totty had fixed her eyes with a confident look of expectation.