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+Project Gutenberg's White Lilac; or the Queen of the May, by Amy Walton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: White Lilac; or the Queen of the May
+
+Author: Amy Walton
+
+Release Date: April 27, 2007 [EBook #21228]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHITE LILAC ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
+
+
+
+
+
+White Lilac, by Amy Walton
+________________________________________________________________
+Mrs White had had several children before the birth of this one, but
+they had all died.  This makes her quite determined to make sure that
+this one survives.  She was telling a visitor that she thought of
+calling the baby Annie, in honour of the visitor, but she had just been
+saying how much she loved white lilacs, and her husband had brought a
+branch of it over from a nearby village.  So the visitor said, call her
+Lilac White, as there were already too many Annie Whites in the village.
+Unfortunately the father dies shortly after, and the mother has to bring
+the child up on her own.
+
+Now she is twelve, and a pretty child.  A visiting artist asks if he may
+put her in one of his pictures.  Lilac goes off with her cousin Agnetta,
+who believes she needs a new hair-do.  Needless to say, the result is
+not attractive to the artist, who now refuses to put her in the picture.
+
+Other characters in the story are Uncle Joshua, who is a good and
+well-loved man, and Peter, probably in his late teens, who is a farm
+worker, well-intentioned but clumsy.  A big event in the village is May
+Day, and there is rivalry among the girls about which of them shall be
+Queen of the May.  It is Lilac.  Yet that very day her mother is taken
+ill and dies.  She is taken to their home by a farmer and his wife, and
+taught the dairymaid arts such as butter and cheese making.  In those
+days a girl such as Lilac would hope to be taken into domestic service
+and trained up to such high levels as house-keeper or cook.  Lilac has
+some opportunities--will she or won't she take them up?  A lovely book
+that takes us back to long-gone days in the pastoral England of the
+1850s.  NH
+________________________________________________________________
+
+WHITE LILAC, BY AMY WALTON
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ONE.
+
+A BUNCH OF LILAC.
+
+  "What's in a name?"--_Shakespeare_.
+
+Mrs James White stood at her cottage door casting anxious glances up at
+the sky, and down the hill towards the village.  If it were fine the
+rector's wife had promised to come and see the baby, "and certainly,"
+thought Mrs White, shading her eyes with her hand, "you might call it
+fine--for April."  There were sharp showers now and then, to be sure,
+but the sun shone between whiles, and sudden rays darted through her
+little window strong enough to light up the whole room.  Their searching
+glances disclosed nothing she was ashamed of, for they showed that the
+kitchen was neat and well ordered, with bits of good substantial
+furniture in it, such as a long-bodied clock, table, and dresser of dark
+oak.  These polished surfaces smiled back again cheerfully as the light
+touched them, and the row of pewter plates on the high mantelshelf
+glistened so brightly that they were as good as so many little mirrors.
+But beside these useful objects the sunlight found out two other things
+in the room, at which it pointed its bright finger with special
+interest.  One of these was a large bunch of pure white lilac which
+stood on the window sill in a brown mug, and the other was a wicker
+cradle in which lay something very much covered up in blankets.  After a
+last lingering look down the hill, where no one was in sight, Mrs White
+shut her door and settled herself to work, with the lilac at her elbow,
+and the cradle at her foot.  She rocked this gently while she sewed, and
+turned her head now and then, when her needle wanted threading, to smell
+the delicate fragrance of the flowers.  Her face was grave, with a
+patient and rather sad expression, as though her memories were not all
+happy ones; but by degrees, as she sat there working and rocking, some
+pleasant thought brought a smile to her lips and softened her eyes.
+This became so absorbing that presently she did not see a figure pass
+the window, and when a knock at the door followed, she sprang up
+startled to open it for her expected visitor.
+
+"I'd most given you up, ma'am," she said as the lady entered, "but I'm
+very glad to see you."
+
+It was not want of cordiality but want of breath which caused a beaming
+smile to be the only reply to this welcome.  The hill was steep, the day
+was mild, and Mrs Leigh was rather stout.  She at once dropped with a
+sigh of relief, but still smiling, into a chair, and cast a glance full
+of interest at the cradle, which Mrs White understood as well as words.
+Bending over it she peeped cautiously in amongst the folds of flannel.
+
+"She's so fast, it's a sin to take her up, ma'am," she murmured, "but I
+_would_ like you to see her."
+
+Mrs Leigh had now recovered her power of speech.  "Don't disturb her
+for the world," she said, "I'm not going away yet.  I shall be glad to
+rest a little.  She'll wake presently, I dare say.  What is it," she
+continued, looking round the room, "that smells so delicious?  Oh, what
+lovely lilac!" as her eye rested on the flowers in the window.
+
+Mrs White had taken up her sewing again.
+
+"I always liked the laylocks myself, ma'am," she said, "partic'ler the
+white ones.  It were a common bush in the part I lived as a gal, but
+there's not much hereabouts."
+
+"Where did you get it?" asked Mrs Leigh, leaning forward to smell the
+pure-white blossoms; "I thought there was only the blue in the village."
+
+"Why, no more there is," said Mrs White with a half-ashamed smile; "but
+Jem, he knows I'm a bit silly over them, and he got 'em at Cuddingham
+t'other day.  You see, the day I said I'd marry him he gave me a bunch
+of white laylocks--and that's ten years ago.  Sitting still so much more
+than I'm used lately, with the baby, puts all sorts of foolishness into
+my head, and when you knocked just now it gave me quite a start, for the
+smell of the laylocks took me right back to the days when we were
+sweetheartin'."
+
+"How _is_ Jem?" asked Mrs Leigh, glancing at a gun which stood in the
+chimney corner.
+
+"He's _well_, ma'am, thank you, but out early and home late.  There's
+bin poaching in the woods lately, and the keepers have a lot of trouble
+with 'em."
+
+"None of _our_ people, I _hope_?" said the rector's wife anxiously.
+
+"Oh dear, no, ma'am!  A gipsy lot--a cruel wild set, to be sure, from
+what Jem says, and fight desperate."
+
+There was a stir amongst the blankets in the cradle just then, and
+presently a little cry.  The baby was _awake_.  Very soon she was in
+Mrs Leigh's arms, who examined the tiny face with great interest, while
+the mother stood by, silent, but eager for the first expression of
+admiration.
+
+"What a beautifully fair child!" exclaimed Mrs Leigh.
+
+"Everyone says that as sees her," said Mrs White with quiet triumph.
+"She features my mother's family--they all had such wonderful white
+skins.  But," anxiously, "you don't think she looks weakly, do you,
+ma'am?"
+
+"Oh, no," answered Mrs Leigh in rather a doubtful tone.  She stood up
+and weighed the child in her arms, moving nearer the window.  "She's a
+little thing, but I dare say she's not the less strong for that."
+
+"It makes me naturally a bit fearsome over her," said Mrs White; "for,
+as you know, ma'am, I've buried three children since we've bin here.
+Ne'er a one of 'em all left me.  It seems when I look at this little un
+as how I _must_ keep her.  I don't seem as if I _could_ let her go too."
+
+"Oh, she'll grow up and be a comfort to you, I don't doubt," said Mrs
+Leigh cheerfully.  "Fair-complexioned children are very often
+wonderfully healthy and strong.  But really," she continued, looking
+closely at the baby's face, "I never saw such a skin in my life.  Why,
+she's as white as milk, or snow, or a lily, or--" She paused for a
+comparison, and suddenly added, as her eye fell on the flowers, "or that
+bunch of lilac."
+
+"You're right, ma'am," agreed Mrs White with a smile of intense
+gratification.
+
+"And if I were you," continued Mrs Leigh, her good-natured face beaming
+all over with a happy idea, "I should call her `Lilac'.  That would be a
+beautiful name for her.  Lilac White.  Nothing could be better; it seems
+made for her."
+
+Mrs White's expression changed to one of grave doubt.
+
+"It do _seem_ as how it would fit her," she said; "but that's not a
+Christian name, is it, ma'am?"
+
+"Well, it would make it one if you had her christened so, you see."
+
+"I was thinking of making so bold as to call her `Annie', and to ask you
+to stand for her, ma'am."
+
+"And so I will, with pleasure.  But don't call her Annie; we've got so
+many Annies in the parish already it's quite confusing--and so many
+Whites too.  We should have to say `Annie White on the hill' every time
+we spoke of her.  I'm always mixing them up as it is.  _Don't_ call her
+Annie, Mrs White, Lilac's far better.  Ask your husband what he thinks
+of it."
+
+"Oh!  Jem, he'll think as I do, ma'am," said Mrs White at once; "it
+isn't _Jem_."
+
+"Who is it, then?  If you both like the name it can't matter to anyone
+else."
+
+"Well, ma'am," said Mrs White hesitatingly, as she took her child from
+Mrs Leigh, and rocked it gently in her arms, "they'll all say down
+below in the village, as how it's a fancy sort of a name, and maybe when
+she grows up they'll laugh at her for it.  I shouldn't like to feel as
+how I'd given her a name to be made game of."
+
+But Mrs Leigh was much too pleased with her fancy to give it up, and
+she smilingly overcame this objection and all others.  It was a pretty,
+simple, and modest-sounding name, she said, with nothing in it that
+could be made laughable.  It was short to say, and above all it had the
+advantage of being uncommon; as it was, so many mothers had desired the
+honour of naming their daughters after the rector's wife, that the
+number of "Annies" was overwhelming, but there certainly would not be
+two "Lilac Whites" in the village.  In short, as Mrs White told Jem
+that evening, Mrs Leigh was "that set" on the name that she had to give
+in to her.  And so it was settled; and wonderfully soon afterwards it
+was rumoured in the village that Mrs James White on the hill meant to
+call her baby "Lilac."
+
+This could not matter to anyone else, Mrs Leigh had said, but she was
+mistaken.  Every mother in the parish had her opinion to offer, for
+there were not so many things happening, that even the very smallest
+could be passed over without a proper amount of discussion when
+neighbours met.  On the whole they were not favourable opinions.  It was
+felt that Mrs White, who had always held herself high and been severe
+on the follies of her friends, had now in her turn laid herself open to
+remark by choosing an outlandish and fanciful name for her child.
+Lilies, Roses, and even Violets were not unknown in Danecross, but who
+had ever heard of Lilac?
+
+Mrs Greenways said so, and she had a right to speak, not only because
+she lived at Orchards Farm, which was the biggest in the parish, but
+because her husband was Mrs White's brother.  She said it at all times
+and in all places, but chiefly at "Dimbleby's", for if you dropped in
+there late in the afternoon you were pretty sure to find acquaintances,
+eager to hear and tell news; and this was specially the case on
+Saturday, which was shopping day.
+
+Dimbleby's was quite a large shop, and a very important one, for there
+was no other in the village; it was rather dark, partly because the roof
+was low-pitched, and partly because of the wonderful number and variety
+of articles crammed into it, so that it would have puzzled anyone to
+find out what Dimbleby did not sell.  The air was also a little thick to
+breathe, for there floated in it a strange mixture, made up of
+unbleached calico, corduroy, smockfrocks, boots, and bacon.  All these
+articles and many others were to be seen piled up on shelves or
+counters, or dangling from the low beams overhead; and, lately, there
+had been added to the stock a number of small clocks, stowed away out of
+sight.  Their hasty ceaseless little voices sounded in curious contrast
+to the slowness of things in general at Dimbleby's: "Tick-tack,
+tick-tack,--Time flies, time flies", they seemed to be saying over and
+over again.  Without effect, for at Dimbleby's time never flew; he
+plodded along on dull and heavy feet, and if he had wings at all he
+dragged them on the ground.  You had only to look at the face of the
+master of the shop to see that speed was impossible to him, and that he
+was justly known as the slowest man in the parish both in speech and
+action.  This was hardly considered a failing, however, for it had its
+advantages in shopping; if he was slow himself, he was quite willing
+that others should be so too, and to stand in unmoved calm while Mrs
+Jones fingered a material to test its quality, or Mrs Wilson made up
+her mind between a spot and a sprig.  It was therefore a splendid place
+for a bit of talk, for he was so long in serving, and his customers were
+so long in choosing, that there was an agreeable absence of pressure,
+and time to drink a cup of gossip down to its last drop of interest.
+
+"I don't understand myself what Mary White would be at," said Mrs
+Greenways.
+
+She stood waiting in the shop while Dimbleby thoughtfully weighed out
+some sugar for her; a stout woman with a round good-natured face, framed
+in a purple-velvet bonnet and nodding flowers; her long mantle matched
+the bonnet in stylishness, and was richly trimmed with imitation fur,
+but the large strong basket on her arm, already partly full of parcels,
+was quite out of keeping with this splendid attire.  The two women who
+stood near, listening with eager respect to her remarks, were of very
+different appearance; their poor thin shawls were put on without any
+regard for fashion, and their straight cotton dresses were short enough
+to show their clumsy boots, splashed with mud from the miry country
+lanes.  The edge of Mrs Greenways' gown was also draggled and dirty,
+for she had not found it easy to hold it up and carry a large basket at
+the same time.
+
+"I thought," she went on, "as how Mary White was all for plain names,
+and homely ways, and such-like."
+
+"She _do say_ so," said the woman nearest to her, cautiously.
+
+"Then, as I said to Greenways this morning, `It's not a consistent act
+for your sister to name her child like that.  Accordin' to her you ought
+to have names as simple and common as may be.'  Why, think of what she
+said when I named my last, which is just a year ago.  `And what do you
+think of callin' her?' says she.  `Why,' says I, `I think of giving her
+the name of Agnetta.'  `Dear me!' says she; `whyever do you give your
+girls such fine names?  There's your two eldest, Isabella and Augusta;
+I'd call this one Betsy, or Jane, or Sarah, or something easy to say,
+and suitable.'"
+
+"_Did_ she, now?" said both the listeners at once.
+
+"And it's not only that," continued Mrs Greenways with a growing sound
+of injury in her voice, "but she's always on at me when she gets a
+chance about the way I bring my girls up.  `You'd a deal better teach
+her to make good butter,' says she, when I told her that Bella was
+learning the piano.  And when I showed her that screen Gusta worked--
+lilies on blue satting, a re'lly elegant thing--she just turned her head
+and says, `I'd rather, if she were a gal of mine, see her knit her own
+stockings.'  Those were her words, Mrs Wishing."
+
+"Ah, well, it's easy to talk," replied Mrs Wishing soothingly, "we'll
+be able to see how she'll bring up a daughter of her own now."
+
+"I'm not saying," pursued Mrs Greenways, turning a watchful eye on Mr
+Dimbleby's movements, "that Mary White haven't a perfect right to name
+her child as she chooses.  I'm too fair for that, I _hope_.  What I do
+say is, that now she's picked up a fancy sort of name like Lilac, she
+hasn't got any call to be down on other people.  And if me and Greenways
+likes to see our girls genteel and give 'em a bit of finishing
+eddication, and set 'em off with a few accomplishments, it's our own
+affair and not Mary White's.  And though I say it as shouldn't, you
+won't find two more elegant gals than Gusta and Bella, choose where you
+may."
+
+During the last part of her speech Mrs Greenways had been poking and
+squeezing her parcel of sugar into its appointed corner of her basket;
+as she finished she settled it on her arm, clutched at her gown with the
+other hand, and prepared to start.
+
+"And now, as I'm in a hurry, I'll say good night, Mrs Pinhorn and Mrs
+Wishing, and good night to you, Mr Dimbleby."
+
+She rolled herself and her burden through the narrow door of the shop,
+and for a moment no one spoke, while all the little clocks ticked away
+more busily than ever.
+
+"She's got enough to carry," said Mrs Pinhorn, breaking silence at
+last, with a sideway nod at her neighbour.
+
+"She have _so_," agreed Mrs Wishing mildly; "and I wonder, that I do,
+to see her carrying that heavy basket on foot--she as used to come in
+her spring cart."
+
+Mrs Pinhorn pressed her lips together before answering, then she said
+with meaning: "They're short of hands just now at Orchards Farm, and
+maybe short of horses too."
+
+"You don't say so!" said Mrs Wishing, drawing nearer.
+
+"My Ben works there, as you know, and he says money's scarce there, very
+scarce indeed.  One of the men got turned off only t'other day."
+
+"Lor', now, to think of that!" exclaimed Mrs Wishing in an awed manner.
+"An' her in that bonnet an' all them artificials!"
+
+"There's a deal," continued Mrs Pinhorn, "in what Mrs White says about
+them two Greenways gals with their fine-lady ways.  It 'ud a been better
+to bring 'em up handy in the house so as to help their mother.  As it
+is, they're too finnicking to be a bit of use.  You wouldn't see either
+of _them_ with a basket on their arm, they'd think it lowering
+themselves.  And I dare say the youngest 'll grow up just like 'em."
+
+"There's a deal in what Mrs Greenways's just been saying too," remarked
+the woman called Mrs Wishing in a hesitating voice, "for Mrs James
+White _is_ a very strict woman and holds herself high, and `Lilac' is a
+fanciful kind of a name; but _I_ dunno."  She broke off as if feeling
+incapable of dealing with the question.
+
+"I can't wonder myself," resumed Mrs Pinhorn, "at Mrs Greenways being
+a bit touchy.  You heard, I s'pose, what Mrs White up and said to her
+once?  You didn't?  Well, she said, `You can't make a silk purse out of
+a sow's ear, and you'll never make them girls ladies, try all you will,'
+says she.  `Useless things you'll make 'em, fit for neither one station
+or t'other.'"
+
+"That there's plain speaking!" said Mrs Wishing admiringly.
+
+Mr Dimbleby had not uttered a word during this conversation, and was to
+all appearance entirely occupied in weighing out, tying up parcels, and
+receiving orders.  In reality, however, he had not lost a word of it,
+and had been getting ready to speak for some time past.  Neither of the
+women, who were well acquainted with him, was at all surprised when he
+suddenly remarked: "It were Mrs Leigh herself as had to do with the
+name of Mrs James White's baby."
+
+"Re'lly, now?" said Mrs Wishing doubtfully.
+
+"An' it were Mrs Leigh herself as I heard it from," continued Dimbleby
+ponderously, without noticing the interruption.
+
+"Well, that makes a difference, don't it now?" said Mrs Pinhorn.  "Why
+ever didn't you name that afore, Mr Dimbleby?"
+
+"And," added Dimbleby, grinding on to the end of his speech regardless
+of hindrance, like a machine that has been wound up; "and Mrs Leigh
+herself is goin' to stand for the baby."
+
+"Lor'!  I do wish Mrs Greenways could a heard that," said Mrs Pinhorn;
+"that'll set Mrs White up more than ever."
+
+"It will so," said Mrs Wishing; "she allers did keep herself _to_
+herself did Mrs White.  Not but what she's a decent woman and a kind.
+Seems as how, if Mrs Leigh wished to name the child `Lilac', she
+couldn't do no other than fall in with it.  But _I_ dunno."
+
+"And how does the name strike you, Mr Snell?" said Mrs Pinhorn,
+turning to a newcomer.
+
+He was an oldish man, short and broad-shouldered, with a large head and
+serious grey eyes.  Not only his leather apron, but the ends of his
+stumpy fingers, which were discoloured and brown, showed that he was a
+cobbler by trade.  When Mrs Pinhorn spoke to him, he fingered his cheek
+thoughtfully, took off his hat, and passed his hand over his high bald
+forehead.
+
+"What name may you be alludin' to, ma'am?" he enquired very politely.
+
+"The name `Lilac' as Mrs James White's goin' to call her child."
+
+"Lilac--eh!  Lilac White.  White Lilac," repeated the cobbler musingly.
+"Well, ma'am, 'tis a pleasant bush and a homely; I can't wish the maid
+no better than to grow up like her name."
+
+"Why, you wouldn't for sure wish her to grow up homely, would you now,
+Mr Snell?" said Mrs Wishing with a feeble laugh.
+
+"I _would_, ma'am," replied Mr Snell, turning rather a severe eye upon
+the questioner, "I _would_.  For why?  Because to be homely is to make
+the common things of home sweet and pleasant.  She can't do no better
+than that."
+
+Mrs Wishing shrank silenced into the background, like one who has been
+reproved, and the cobbler advanced to the counter to exchange greetings
+with Mr Dimbleby, and buy tobacco.  The women's voices, the sharp
+ticking of the clocks, and the deeper tones of the men kept up a steady
+concert for some time undisturbed.  But suddenly the door was thrown
+violently back on its hinges with a bang, and a tall man in labourer's
+clothes rushed into their midst.  Everyone looked up startled, and on
+Mrs Wishing's face there was fear as well as surprise when she
+recognised the newcomer.
+
+"Why, Dan'l, my man," she exclaimed, "what is it?"
+
+Daniel was out of breath with running.  He rubbed his forehead with a
+red pocket handkerchief, looked round in a dazed manner at the assembled
+group, and at length said hoarsely: "Mrs Greenways bin here?"
+
+"Ah, just gone!" said both the women at once.
+
+"There's trouble up yonder--on the hill," said Daniel, pointing with his
+thumb over his shoulder, and speaking in a strange, broken voice.
+
+"Mary White's baby!" exclaimed Mrs Pinhorn.
+
+"Fits!" added Mrs Wishing; "they all went off that way."
+
+"Hang the baby," muttered Daniel.  He made his way past the women, who
+had pressed up close to him, to where the cobbler and Dimbleby stood.
+
+"I've fetched the doctor," he said, "and she wants the Greenways to know
+it; I thought maybe she'd be here."
+
+"What is it?  Who's ill?" asked the cobbler.
+
+"Tain't anyone that's ill," answered Daniel; "he's stone dead.  They
+shot him right through the heart."
+
+"Who?  Who?" cried all the voices together.
+
+"I found him," continued Daniel, "up in the woods; partly covered up
+with leaves he was.  Smiling peaceful and stone dead.  He was always a
+brave feller and done his dooty, did James White on the hill.  But he
+won't never do it no more."
+
+"Poachers!" exclaimed Dimbleby in a horror-struck voice.
+
+"Poachers it was, sure enough," said Daniel; "an' he's stone dead, James
+White is.  They shot him right through the heart.  Seems a pity such a
+brave chap should die like that."
+
+"An' him such a good husband!" said Mrs Wishing.  "An' the baby an' all
+as we was just talking on," said Mrs Pinhorn; "well, it's a fatherless
+child now, anyway."
+
+"The family ought to allow the widder a pension," said Mr Dimbleby,
+"seeing as James White died in their service, so to speak."
+
+"They couldn't do no less," agreed the cobbler.
+
+The idea of fetching Mrs Greenways seemed to have left Daniel's mind
+for the present: he had now taken a chair, and was engaged in answering
+the questions with which he was plied on all sides, and in trying to fix
+the exact hour when he had found poor James White in the woods.  "As it
+might be here, and me standing as it might be there," he said,
+illustrating his words with the different parcels on the counter before
+him.  It was not until all this was thoroughly understood, and every
+imaginable expression of pity and surprise had been uttered, that Mrs
+Pinhorn remembered that the "Greenways ought to know.  And I don't see
+why," she added, seizing her basket with sudden energy, "I shouldn't
+take her up myself; I'm goin' that way, and she's a slow traveller."
+
+"An' then Dan'l can go straight up home with me," said Mrs Wishing,
+"and we can drop in as we pass an' see Mrs White, poor soul.  She
+hadn't ought to be alone."
+
+Before nightfall everyone knew the sad tidings.  James White had been
+shot by poachers, and Daniel Wishing had found him lying dead in the
+woods.
+
+As the days went on, the excitement which stirred the whole village
+increased rather than lessened, for not even the oldest inhabitant could
+remember such a tragical event.  Apart from the sadness of it, and the
+desolate condition of the widow, poor Jem's many virtues made it
+impressive and lamentable.  Everyone had something to say in his praise,
+no one remembered anything but good about him; he was a brave chap, and
+one of the right sort, said the men, when they talked of it in the
+public-house; he was a good husband, said the women, steady and sober,
+fond of his wife, a pattern to others.  They shook their heads and
+sighed mournfully; it was strange as well as pitiful that Jem White
+should a been took.  "There might a been _some_ as we could mention as
+wouldn't a been so much missed."
+
+Then came the funeral; the bunch of white lilac, still fresh, which he
+had brought from Cuddingham, was put on Jem's newly-made grave, and his
+widow, passing silently through the people gathered in the churchyard,
+toiled patiently back to her lonely home.
+
+They watched the solitary figure as it showed black against the steep
+chalky road in the distance.
+
+"Yon's an afflicted woman," said one, "for all she carries herself so
+high under it."
+
+"She's the only widder among all the Whites hereabouts," remarked Mrs
+Pinhorn.  "We needn't call her `Mrs White on the hill' no longer, poor
+soul."
+
+"It's a mercy she's got the child," said another neighbour, "if the Lord
+spares it to her."
+
+"The christening's to be on Sunday," added a third.  "I do wonder if
+she'll call it that outlandish name _now_."
+
+There was not much time to wonder, for Sunday soon came, and the Widow
+White, as she was to be called henceforth, was at the church, stern,
+sad, and calm, with her child in her arms.  It was an April morning,
+breezy and soft; the uncertain sunshine darted hither and thither, now
+touching the newly turned earth of Jem's grave, and now peering through
+the church window to rest on the tiny face of his little daughter in the
+rector's arms at the font.  All the village had come to see, for this
+christening was felt to be one of more than common interest, and while
+the service went on there was not one inattentive ear.
+
+Foremost stood Mrs Greenways, her white handkerchief displayed for
+immediate use, and the expression in her face struggling between real
+compassion and an eager desire to lose nothing that was passing;
+presently she craned her neck forward a little, for an important point
+was reached--
+
+"Name this child," said the rector.
+
+There was such deep silence in the church that the lowest whisper would
+have been audible, and Mrs Leigh's voice was heard distinctly in the
+farthest corner, when she answered "Lilac."
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+"Not that it matters," said Mrs Greenways on her way home afterwards,
+"what they call the poor little thing--Lilac White, or White Lilac, or
+what you will, for she'll never rear it, never.  It'll follow its father
+before we're any of us much older.  You mark my words, Greenways: I'm
+not the woman to discourage Mary White by naming it to her now she's so
+deep in trouble, but you mark my words, she'll _never_ rear that child."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO.
+
+THE COUSINS.
+
+  "For the apparel oft proclaims the man."--Shakespeare.
+
+But Mrs Greenways was wrong.  Twelve more springs came and went, cold
+winds blew round the cottage on the hill, winter snow covered it, summer
+sun blazed down on its unsheltered roof, but the small blossom within
+grew and flourished.  A weak tender-looking little plant at first, but
+gathering strength with the years until it became hardy and bold, fit to
+face rough weather as well as to smile in the sunshine.
+
+It was twelve years since James White's death, twelve years since he had
+brought the bunch of lilac from Cuddingham which had given his little
+daughter her name--that name which had once sounded so strangely in Mrs
+White's ears.  It had come to mean so much to her now, so many memories
+of the past, so much sweetness in the present, that she would not have
+changed it for the world, and indeed no one questioned its fitness, for
+as time went on it seemed to belong naturally to the child; it was even
+made more expressive by putting the surname first, so that she was often
+called "White Lilac."
+
+For the distinguishing character of her face was its whiteness--"A
+wonderful white skin", as her mother had said, which did not tan, or
+freckle, or flush with heat, and which shone out in startling contrast
+amongst the red and brown cheeks of her school companions.  This small
+white face was set upon a slender neck, and a delicately-formed but
+upright little figure, which looked all the straighter and more like the
+stalk of a flower, because it was never adorned with any flounces or
+furbelows.  Lilac was considered in the village to be very old-fashioned
+in her dress; she wore cotton frocks, plain in the skirt with gathers
+all round the waist, long pinafores or aprons, and sunbonnets.  This
+attire was always spotless and freshly clean, but garments of such a
+shape and cut were lamentably wanting in fashion to the general eye, and
+were the subject of constant ridicule.  Not in the hearing of the widow,
+for most people were a good deal in awe of her, but Lilac herself heard
+quite enough about her clothes to be conscious of them and to feel
+ashamed of looking "different."  And this was specially the case at
+school, for there she met Agnetta Greenways every day, and Agnetta was
+the object of her highest admiration; to be like her in some way was the
+deep and secret longing in her mind.  It was, she knew well, a useless
+ambition, but she could not help desiring it, Agnetta was such a
+beautiful object to look upon, with her red cheeks and the heavy fringe
+of black hair which rested in a lump on her forehead.  On Sundays, when
+she wore her blue dress richly trimmed with plush, a long feather in her
+hat, and a silver bangle on her arm, Lilac could hardly keep her intense
+admiration silent; it was a pain not to speak of it, and yet she knew
+that nothing would have displeased her mother so much, who was never
+willing to hear the Greenways praised.  So she only gazed wistfully at
+her cousin's square gaily-dressed figure, and felt herself a poor
+washed-out insignificant child in comparison.
+
+This was very much Agnetta's own view of the case; but nevertheless
+there were occasions when she was glad of this insignificant creature's
+assistance, for she was slow and stupid at her lessons, books were grief
+and pain to her, and Lilac, who was intelligent and fond of learning,
+was always ready to help and explain.  This service, given most
+willingly, was received by Agnetta as one to whom it was due, and indeed
+the position she held among her schoolfellows made most of them eager to
+call her friend.  She lived at Orchards Farm, which was the biggest in
+the parish; her two elder sisters had been to a finishing school, and
+one of them was now in a millinery establishment in London, where she
+wore a silk dress every day.  This was sufficient to excuse airs of
+superiority in anyone.  It was natural, therefore, to repay Lilac's
+devotion by condescending patronage, and to look down on her from a
+great height; nevertheless it was extremely agreeable to Agnetta to be
+worshipped, and this made her seek her cousin's companionship, and
+invite her often to Orchards Farm.  There she could display her smart
+frocks, dwell on the extent of her father's possessions, on her sister
+Bella's stylishness, on the last fashion Gusta had sent from London,
+while Lilac, meek and admiring, stood by with wonder in her eyes.
+Orchards Farm was the most beautiful place her imagination could
+picture, and to live there must be, she thought, perfect happiness.
+There was a largeness about it, with its blossoming fruit trees, its
+broad green meadows, its barns and stacks, its flocks of sheep and herds
+of cattle; even the shiny-leaved magnolia which covered part of the
+house seemed to Lilac to speak of peace and plenty.  It was all so
+different from her home; the bare white cottage on the hillside where no
+trees grew, where all was so narrow and cold, and where life seemed to
+be made up of scrubbing, sweeping, and washing.  She looked longingly
+down from this sometimes to the valley where the farm stood.
+
+But other eyes, and Mrs White's in particular, saw a very different
+state of things when they looked at Orchards Farm.  She knew that under
+this smiling outside face lay hidden care and anxiety; for her brother,
+Farmer Greenways, was in debt and short of money.  Folks shook their
+heads when it was mentioned, and said: "What could you expect?"  The old
+people remembered the prosperous days at the farm, when the dairy had
+been properly worked, and the butter was the best you could get anywhere
+round.  There was the pasture land still, and a good lot of cows, but
+since the Greenways had come there the supply of butter was poor, and
+sometimes the whole quantity sent to market was so carelessly made that
+it was sour.  Whose fault was it?  Mrs Greenways would have said that
+Molly, the one overworked maid servant, was to blame; but other people
+thought differently, and Mrs White was as usual outspoken in her
+opinions to her sister-in-law: "It 'ull never be any different as long
+as you don't look after the dairy yourself, or teach Bella to do it.
+What does Molly care how the butter turns out?"
+
+But Bella tossed her head at the idea of working, as she expressed it,
+"like a common servant", or indeed at working at all.  She considered
+that her business in life was to be genteel, and to be properly genteel
+was to do nothing useful.  So she studied the fashion books which Gusta
+sent from London, made up wonderful costumes for herself, curled her
+hair in the last style, and read the stories about dukes and earls and
+countesses which came out in the _Family Herald_.
+
+The smart bonnets and dresses which Mrs Greenways and her daughters
+wore on Sundays in spite of hard times and poor crops and debt were the
+wonder of the whole congregation, and in Mrs White's case the wonder
+was mixed with scorn.  "Peter's the only one among 'em as is good for
+anything," she sometimes said, "an' he's naught but a puzzle-headed sort
+of a chap."  Peter was the farmer's only son, a loutish youth of
+fifteen, steady and plodding as his plough horses and almost as silent.
+
+It was April again, bright and breezy, and all the cherry trees at the
+farm were so white with bloom that standing under them you could
+scarcely see the sky.  The grass in the orchard was freshly green and
+sprinkled with daisies, amongst which families of fluffy yellow
+ducklings trod awkwardly about on their little splay feet, while the
+careful mother hens picked out the best morsels of food for them.  This
+food was flung out of a basin by Agnetta Greenways, who stood there
+squarely erect uttering a monotonous "Chuck, chuck, chuck," at
+intervals.  Agnetta did not care for the poultry, or indeed for any of
+the creatures on the farm; they were to her only troublesome things that
+wanted looking after, and she would have liked not to have had anything
+to do with them.  Just now, however, there was a week's holiday at the
+school, and she was obliged to use her leisure in helping her mother,
+much against her will.  Agnetta had a stolid face with a great deal of
+colour in her cheeks; her hair was black, but at this hour it was so
+tightly done up in curl papers that the colour could hardly be seen.
+She wore an old red merino dress which had once been a smart one, but
+was now degraded to what she called "dirty work", and was covered with
+patches and stains.  Her hands and wrists were very large, and looked
+capable of hard work, as indeed did the whole person of Agnetta from top
+to toe.
+
+"Chuck, chuck, chuck," she repeated as she threw out the last spoonful;
+then, raising her eyes, she became aware of a little figure in the
+distance, running towards her across the field at the bottom of the
+orchard.
+
+"Lor'!" she exclaimed aloud, "if here isn't Lilac White!"
+
+It was a slight little figure clothed in a cotton frock which had once
+been blue in colour, but had been washed so very often that it now
+approached a shade of green; over it was a long straight pinafore
+gathered round the neck with a string, and below it appeared blue
+worsted stockings, and thick, laced boots.  Her black hair was brushed
+back and plaited in one long tail tied at the end with black ribbon, and
+in her hand she carried a big sunbonnet, swinging it round and round in
+the air as she ran.  As she came nearer the orchard gate, it was easy to
+see that she had some news to tell, for her small features worked with
+excitement, and her grey eyes were bright with eagerness.
+
+Agnetta advanced slowly to meet her with the empty basin in her hand,
+and unlatched the gate.
+
+"Whatever's the matter?" she asked.
+
+Lilac could not answer just at first, for she had been running a long
+way, and her breath came in short gasps.  She came to a standstill under
+the trees, and Agnetta stared gravely at her with her mouth wide open.
+The two girls formed a strong contrast to each other.  Lilac's white
+face and the faded colour of her dress matched the blossoms and leaves
+of the cherry trees in their delicacy, while about the red-cheeked
+Agnetta there was something firm and positive, which suggested the fruit
+which would come later.
+
+"I came--" gasped Lilac at last, "I ran--I thought I must tell you--"
+
+"Well," said Agnetta, still staring at her in an unmoved manner, "you'd
+better fetch your breath, and then you'll be able to tell me.  Come and
+sit down."
+
+There was a bench under one of the trees near where she had been feeding
+the ducks.  The two girls sat down, and presently Lilac was able to say:
+"Oh, Agnetta, the artist gentleman wants to put me in a picture!"
+
+"Whatever do you mean, Lilac White?" was Agnetta's only reply.  Her
+slightly disapproving voice calmed Lilac's excitement a little.
+
+"This is how it was," she continued more quietly.  "You know he's
+lodging at the `Three Bells?' and he comes an' sits at the bottom of our
+hill an' paints all day."
+
+"Of course I know," said Agnetta.  "It's a poor sort of an object he's
+copyin', too--Old Joe's tumble-down cottage.  I peeped over his shoulder
+t'other day--'taint much like."
+
+"Well, I pass him every day comin' from school, and he always looks up
+at me eager without sayin' nothing.  But this morning he says, `Little
+gal,' says he, `I want to put you into my picture.'"
+
+"Lor'!" put in Agnetta, "whatever can he want to paint _you_ for?"
+
+"So I didn't say nothing," continued Lilac, "because he looked so hard
+at me that I was skeert-like.  So then he says very impatient, `Don't
+you understand?  I want you to come here in that frock and that bonnet
+in your hand, and let me paint you, copy you, take your portrait.  You
+run and ask Mother.'"
+
+"I never did!" exclaimed Agnetta, moved at last.  "Whatever can he want
+to do it for?  An' that frock, an' that silly bonnet an' all!  He must
+be a crazy gentleman, I should say."  She gave a short laugh, partly of
+vexation.
+
+"But that ain't all," continued Lilac; "just as I was turning to go he
+calls after me, `What's yer name?'  And when I told him he shouts out,
+`_What_!' with his eyes hanging out ever so far."
+
+"Well, I dare say he thought it was a silly-sounding sort of a name,"
+observed Agnetta.
+
+"He said it over and over to hisself, and laughed right out--`Lilac
+White!  White Lilac!' says he.  `What a subjeck!  What a name!
+Splendid!'  An' then he says to me quieter, `You're a very nice little
+girl indeed, and if Mother will let you come I'll give you sixpence for
+every hour you stand.'  So then I went an' asked Mother, and she said
+yes, an' then I ran all the way here to tell you."
+
+Lilac looked round as she finished her wonderful story.  Agnetta's eyes
+were travelling slowly over her cousin's whole person, from her face
+down to the thick, laced boots on her feet, and back again.  "I can't
+mek out," she said at length, "whatever it is that he wants to paint you
+for, and dressed like that!  Why, there ain't a mossel of colour about
+you!  Now, if you had my Sunday blue!"
+
+"Oh, Agnetta!" exclaimed Lilac at the mention of such impossible
+elegance.
+
+"And," pursued Agnetta, "a few artificials in yer hair, like the ladies
+in our _Book of Beauty_, that 'ud brighten you up a bit.  Bella's got
+some red roses with dewdrops on 'em, an' a caterpillar just like life.
+She'd lend you 'em p'r'aps, an' I don't know but what I'd let you have
+my silver locket just for once."
+
+"I'm afraid he wouldn't like that," said Lilac dejectedly, "because he
+said quite earnest, `_Mind_ you bring the bonnet'."
+
+She saw herself for a moment in the splendid attire Agnetta had
+described, and gave a little sigh of longing.
+
+"I must go back," she said, getting up suddenly, "Mother'll want me.
+There's lots to do at home."
+
+"I'll go with you a piece," said Agnetta; "we'll go through the farmyard
+way so as I can leave the basin."
+
+This was a longer way home for Lilac than across the fields, but she
+never thought of disputing Agnetta's decision, and the cousins left the
+orchard by another gate which led into the garden.  It was not a very
+tidy garden, and although some care had been bestowed on the vegetables,
+the flowers were left to come up where they liked and how they liked,
+and the grass plot near the house was rank and weedy.  Nevertheless it
+presented a gay and flourishing appearance with its masses of polyanthus
+in full bloom, its tulips, and Turk's head lilies, and lilac bushes.
+There was one particular bed close to the gate which had a neater
+appearance than the rest, and where the flowers grew in a well-ordered
+manner as though accustomed to personal attention.  The edges of the
+turf were trimly clipped, and there was not a weed to be seen.  It had a
+mixed border of forget-me-not and London pride.
+
+"How pretty your flowers grow!" said Lilac, stopping to look at it with
+admiration.
+
+"Oh, that's Peter's bed," said Agnetta carelessly, snapping off some
+blossoms.  "He's allays mucking at it in his spare time--not that he's
+got much, there's so much to do on the farm."
+
+The house was now in front of them, and a little to the left the
+various, coloured roofs of the farm buildings, some tiled with
+weather-beaten bricks, some thatched, some tarred, and the bright yellow
+straw ricks standing here and there.  Between these buildings and the
+house was a narrow lane, generally ankle-deep in mud, which led into the
+highroad.
+
+Lilac was very fond of the farmyard and all the creatures in it.  She
+stopped at the gate and looked over at a company of small black pigs
+routing about in the straw.
+
+"Oh, Agnetta!" she exclaimed, "you've got some toiny pigs; what peart
+little uns they are!"
+
+"I can't abide pigs," said Agnetta with a toss of her curl-papered head;
+"no more can't Bella, we neither of us can't.  Nasty, vulgar,
+low-smelling things."
+
+Lilac felt that hers must be a vulgar taste as Agnetta said so, but
+still she _did_ like the little pigs, and would have been glad to linger
+near them.  It was often puzzling to her that Agnetta called so many
+things common and vulgar, but she always ended by thinking that it was
+because she was so superior.
+
+"Here, Peter!" exclaimed Agnetta suddenly.  A boy in leather leggings
+and a smock appeared at the entrance of the barn, and came tramping
+across the straw towards them at her call.  "Just take this into the
+kitchen," said his sister in commanding tones.  "Now," turning to Lilac,
+"we can go t'other way across the fields.  The lane's all in a muck."
+
+Peter slouched away with the basin in his hand.  He was a heavy-looking
+youth, and so shy that he seldom raised his eyes from the ground.
+
+"No one 'ud think," said Agnetta as the girls entered the meadow again,
+"as Peter was Bella's and Gusta's and my brother.  He's so dreadful
+vulgar-lookin' dressed like that.  He might be a common ploughboy, and
+his manners is awful."
+
+"Are they?" said Lilac.
+
+"Pa won't hear a word against him," continued Agnetta, "cause he's so
+useful with the farm work.  He says he'd rather see Peter drive a
+straight furrow than dress himself smart.  But Bella and me we're
+ashamed to be seen with him, we can't neither of us abide commoners."
+
+Common! there was the word again which seemed to mean so many things and
+yet was so difficult to understand.  Common things were evidently
+vulgar.  The pigs were common, Peter was common, perhaps Lilac herself
+was common in Agnetta's eyes.  "And yet," she reflected, lifting her
+gaze from the yellow carpet at her feet to the flowering orchards, "the
+cherry blossoms and the buttercups are common too; would Agnetta call
+them vulgar?"
+
+She had not long to think about this, for her cousin soon introduced
+another and a very interesting subject.
+
+"Who's goin' to be Queen this year, I wonder?" she said; "there'll be a
+sight of flowers if the weather keeps all on so fine."
+
+"It'll be you, Agnetta, for sure," answered Lilac; "I know lots who mean
+to choose you this time."
+
+"I dessay," said Agnetta with an air of lofty indifference.
+
+"Don't you want to be?" asked Lilac.
+
+The careless tone surprised her, for to be chosen Queen of the May was
+not only an honour, but a position of importance and splendour.  It
+meant to march at the head of a long procession of children, in a white
+dress, to be crowned with flowers in the midst of gaiety and rejoicing,
+to lead the dance round the maypole, and to be first throughout a day of
+revelry and feasting.  To Lilac it was the most beautiful of ceremonies
+to see the Queen crowned; to join in it was a delight, but to be chosen
+Queen herself would be a height of bliss she could hardly imagine.  It
+was impossible therefore, to think her cousin really indifferent, and
+indeed this was very far from the case, for Agnetta had set her heart on
+being Queen, and felt tolerably sure that she should get the greatest
+number of votes this year.
+
+"I don't know as I care much," she answered; "let's sit down here a
+bit."
+
+They sat down one each side of a stile, with their faces turned towards
+each other, and Agnetta again fixed her direct gaze critically on her
+cousin's figure.  Lilac twirled her sunbonnet round somewhat confusedly
+under these searching glances.
+
+"It's a pity you wear your hair scrattled right off your face like
+that," said Agnetta at last; "it makes you look for all the world like
+Daisy's white calf."
+
+"Does it?" said Lilac meekly; "Mother likes it done so."
+
+"I know something as would improve you wonderful, and give you a bit of
+style--something as would make the picture look a deal better."
+
+"Oh, what, Agnetta?"
+
+"Well, it's just as simple as can be.  It's only to take a pair of
+scissors and cut yer hair like mine in front so as it comes down over
+yer face a bit.  It 'ud alter you ever so.  You'd be surprised."
+
+Lilac started to her feet, struck with the immensity of the idea.  A
+fringe!  It was a form of elegance not unknown amongst the
+school-children, but one which she had never thought of as possible for
+herself.
+
+There was Agnetta's stolid rosy face close to her, as unmoved and
+unexcited as if she had said nothing unusual.
+
+"Oh, Agnetta, _could_ I?" gasped Lilac.
+
+"Whyever not?" said her cousin calmly.
+
+Lilac sat down again.  "I dursn't," she said.  "I couldn't ever bear to
+look Mother in the face."
+
+"Has she ever told you not?"
+
+"N-no," answered Lilac hesitatingly; "leastways she only said once that
+the girls made frights of themselves with their fringes."
+
+"Frights indeed!" said Agnetta scornfully; "anyhow," she added, "it 'ull
+grow again if she don't like it."  So it would.  That reflection made
+the deed seem a less daring one, and Lilac's face at once showed signs
+of yielding, which Agnetta was not slow to observe.  Warming with her
+subject, she proceeded to paint the improvement which would follow in
+glowing colours, and in this she was urged by two motives--one, an
+honest desire to smarten Lilac up a little, and the other, to vex and
+thwart her aunt, Mrs White; to pay her out, as she expressed it, for
+sundry uncomplimentary remarks on herself and Bella.
+
+"And supposing," was Lilac's next remark, "as how I _was_ to make up my
+mind, I couldn't never do it for myself.  I should be scared."
+
+This difficulty the energetic Agnetta was quite ready to meet.  _She_
+would do it.  Lilac had only to run down to the farm early next morning,
+and, after she was made fashionable, she could go straight on to the
+artist.  "And won't he just be surprised!" she added with a chuckle.  "I
+don't expect he'll hardly know you."
+
+"You're _quite_ sure it'll make me look better?" said Lilac wistfully.
+She had the utmost faith in her cousin, but the step seemed to her such
+a terribly large one.
+
+"Ain't I?" was Agnetta's scornful reply.  "Why, Gusta says all the
+ladies in London wears their hair like that now."
+
+After this last convincing proof, for Gusta's was a name of great
+authority, Lilac resisted no longer, and soon discovered, by the
+striking of the church clock, that it was getting very late.  She said
+good-bye to Agnetta, therefore, and, leaving her to make her way back at
+her leisure, ran quickly on through the meadows all streaked and
+sprinkled with the spring flowers.  After these came the dusty high-road
+for a little while, and then she reached the foot of the steep hill
+which led up to her home.  The artist gentleman was there as usual, a
+pipe in his mouth, and a palette on his thumb, painting busily: as she
+hurriedly dropped a curtsy in passing, Lilac's heart beat quite fast.
+
+"Me in a picture with a fringe!" she said to herself; "how I do hope as
+Mother won't mind!"
+
+That afternoon, when she sat quietly down to her sewing, this great idea
+weighed heavily upon her.  It would be the very first step she had ever
+taken without her mother's approval, and away from the influence of
+Agnetta's decided opinion it seemed doubly alarming--a desperate and yet
+an attractive deed.
+
+Now and then for a moment she thought it would be better to tell her
+mother, but when she looked up at the grave, rather sad face, bent
+closely over some needlework, she lacked courage to begin.  It seemed
+far removed from such trifles as fringes and fashions; and though, as
+Lilac knew well, it could have at times a smile full of love upon it,
+just now its expression was thoughtful, and even stern.
+
+She kept silence, therefore, and stitched away with a mind as busy as
+her fingers, until it was time to boil the kettle and get the tea ready.
+This was just done when Mrs Wishing, who lived still farther up the
+hill, dropped in on her way home from the village.
+
+She was an uncertain, wavering little woman, with no will of her own,
+and a heavy burden in the shape of a husband, who, during the last few
+years, had taken to fits of drinking.  The widow White acknowledged that
+she had a good deal to bear from Dan'l, and when times were very bad,
+often supplied her with food and firing from her own small store.  But
+she did not do so without protest, for in her opinion the fault was not
+entirely on Dan'l's side.  "Maybe," she said, "if he found a clean
+hearth and a tidy bit o' supper waitin' at home, he'd stay there
+oftener.  An' if he worked reg'lar, and didn't drink his wages, you'd
+want for nothin', and be able to put by with only just the two of you to
+keep.  But I can't see you starve."
+
+Mrs Wishing fluttered in at the door, and, as she thought probable, was
+asked to have a dish of tea.  Lilac bustled round the kitchen and set
+everything neatly on the table, while her mother, glancing at her now
+and then, stood at the window sewing with active fingers.
+
+"Well, you're always busy, Mrs White," said the guest plaintively as
+she untied her bonnet strings.  "I will say as you're a hard worker
+yourself, whatever you say about other folks."
+
+"An' I hope as when the time comes as I can't work that the Lord 'ull
+see fit to take me," said Mrs White shortly.
+
+"Dear, dear, you've got no call to say that," said Mrs Wishing, "you as
+have got Lilac to look to in your old age.  Now, if it was me and Dan'l,
+with neither chick nor child--" She shook her head mournfully.
+
+Mrs White gave her one sharp glance which meant "and a good thing too",
+but she did not say the words aloud; there was something so helpless and
+incapable about Mrs Wishing, that it was both difficult and useless to
+be severe with her, for the most cutting speeches could not rouse her
+from the mild despair into which she had sunk years ago.  "I dessay
+you're right, but _I_ dunno," was her only reply to all reproaches and
+exhortations, and finding this, Mrs White had almost ceased them,
+except when they were wrung from her by some unusual example of bad
+management.
+
+"An' so handy as she is," continued Mrs Wishing, her wandering gaze
+caught for a moment by Lilac's active little figure, "an' that's all
+your up-bringing, Mrs White, as I was saying just now to Mrs
+Greenways."
+
+Mrs White, who was now pouring out the tea, looked quickly up at the
+mention of Mrs Greenways.  She would not ask, but her very soul longed
+to know what had been said.
+
+"She was talkin' about Lilac as I was in at Dimbleby's getting a bunch
+of candles," continued Mrs Wishing, "sayin' how her picture was going
+to be took; an' says she, `It's a poor sort of picture as she'll make,
+with a face as white as her pinafore.  Now, if it was Agnetta,' says
+she, `as has a fine nateral bloom, I could understand the gentleman
+wantin' to paint _her_.'"
+
+"I s'pose the gentleman knows best himself what he wants to paint," said
+Mrs White.
+
+"Lor', of course he do," Mrs Wishing hastened to reply; "and, as I said
+to Mrs Greenways, `Red cheeks or white cheeks don't make much differ to
+a gal in life.  It's the upbringing as matters.'"
+
+Mrs White looked hardly so pleased with this sentiment as her visitor
+had hoped.  She was perfectly aware that it had been invented on the
+spot, and that Mrs Wishing would not have dared to utter it to Mrs
+Greenways.  Moreover, the comparison between Lilac's paleness and
+Agnetta's fine bloom touched her keenly, for in this remark she
+recognised her sister-in-law's tongue.
+
+The rivalry between the two mothers was an understood thing, and though
+it had never reached open warfare, it was kept alive by the kindness of
+neighbours, who never forgot to repeat disparaging speeches.  Mrs
+White's opinions of the genteel uselessness of Bella and Gusta were
+freely quoted to Mrs Greenways, and she in her turn was always ready
+with a thrust at Lilac which might be carried to Mrs White.
+
+When the widow had first heard of the artist's proposal, her intense
+gratification was at once mixed with the thought, "What'll Mrs
+Greenways think o' that?"
+
+But she did not express this triumph aloud.  Even Lilac had no idea that
+her mother's heart was overflowing with pleasure and pride because it
+was _her_ child, _her_ Lilac, whom the artist wished to paint.  So now,
+though she bit her lip with vexation at Mrs Wishing's speech, she took
+it with outward calmness, and only replied, with a glance at her
+daughter:
+
+"Lilac never was one to think much about her looks, and I hope she never
+will be."
+
+Both the look and the words seemed to Lilac to have special meaning,
+almost as though her mother knew what she intended to do to-morrow; it
+seemed indeed to be written in large letters everywhere, and all that
+was said had something to do with it.  This made her feel so guilty,
+that she began to be sure it would be very wrong to have a fringe.
+Should she give it up?  It was a relief when Mrs Wishing, leaving the
+subject of the picture for one of nearer interest, proceeded to dwell on
+Dan'l and his failings, so that Lilac was not referred to again.  This
+well-worn topic lasted for the rest of the visit, for Dan'l had been
+worse than usual.  He had "got the neck of the bottle", as Mrs Wishing
+expressed it, and had been in a hopeless state during the last week.
+Her sad monotonous voice went grinding on over the old story, while
+Lilac, washing up the tea things, carried on her own little fears, and
+hopes, and wishes in her own mind.  No one watching her would have
+guessed what those wishes were: she looked so trim and neat, and handled
+the china as deftly as though she had no other thought than to do her
+work well.  And yet the inside did not quite match this proper outside,
+for her whole soul was occupied with a beautiful vision--herself with a
+fringe like Agnetta!  It proved so engrossing that she hardly noticed
+Mrs Wishing's departure, and when her mother spoke she looked up
+startled.
+
+"Yon's a poor creetur as never could stand alone and never will," she
+said.  "It was the same when she was a gal--always hangin' on to
+someone, always wantin' someone else to do for her, and think for her.
+Well! empty sacks won't never stand upright, and it's no good tryin' to
+make 'em."
+
+Lilac made no reply, and Mrs White, seizing the opportunity of
+impressing a useful lesson, continued:
+
+"Lor'! it seems only the other day as Hepzibah was married to Daniel
+Wishing.  A pretty gal she was, with clinging, coaxing ways, like the
+suckles in the hedge, and everyone she come near was ready to give her a
+helping hand.  And at the wedding they all said, `There, now, she's got
+the right man, Hepzibah has.  A strong, steady feller, and a good
+workman an' all, and one as'll look after her an' treat her kind.'  But
+I mind what I said to Mrs Pinhorn on that very day: `I hope it may be
+so,' I says, `but it takes an angel, and not a man, to bear with a woman
+as weak an' shiftless as Hepzibah, and not lose his temper.'  And now
+look at 'em!  There's Dan'l taken to drink, and when he's out of himself
+he'll lift his hand to her, and they're both of 'em miserable.  It does
+a deal o' harm for a woman to be weak like that.  She can't stand alone,
+and she just pulls a man down along with her."
+
+The troubles of the Wishings were very familiar to Lilac's ears, and,
+though she took her knitting and sat down on her little stool close to
+her mother, she did not listen much to what she was saying.
+
+Mrs White, quite ignorant that her words of wisdom were wasted,
+continued admonishingly:
+
+"So as you grow up, Lilac, and get to a woman, that's what you've got to
+learn--to trust to yourself; you won't always have a mother to look to.
+And what you've got to do now is, to learn to do your work jest as well
+as you can, and then afterwards you'll be able to stand firm on yer own
+two feet, and not go leaning up against other folk, or be beholden to
+nobody.  That's a good thing, that is.  There's a saying, `Heaven helps
+them as helps themselves'.  If that poor Hepzibah had helped herself
+when she was a gal, she wouldn't be such a daundering creetur now, and
+Dan'l, he wouldn't be a curse instead of a blessin'."
+
+When Lilac went up to her tiny room in the roof that night, her head
+felt too full of confusing thoughts to make it possible to go to bed at
+once.  She knelt on a box that stood in the window, fastened back the
+lattice, and, leaning on the sill, looked out into the night.  The
+greyness of evening was falling over everything, but it was not nearly
+dark yet, so that she could see the windings of the chalky road which
+led down to the valley, and the church tower, and even one of the gable
+windows in Orchards Farm, where a light was twinkling.  Generally this
+last object was a most interesting one to her, but to-night she did not
+notice outside things much, for her mind was too busy with its own
+concerns.  She had, for the first time in her life, something quite new
+and strange to think of, something of her own which her mother did not
+know; and though this may seem a very small matter to people whose lives
+are full of events, to Lilac it was of immense importance, for until now
+her days had been as even and unvaried as those of any daisy that grows
+in a field.  But to-morrow, two new things were to happen--she was to
+have her hair cut, and to have her picture painted.  "A poor sort of
+picture," Mrs Greenways had said it would be, and, no doubt, Lilac
+agreed in her own mind Agnetta would make a far finer one--Agnetta, who
+had red cheeks, and a fringe already, and could dress herself so much
+smarter.  Would a fringe really improve her?  Agnetta said so.  And
+yet--her mother--was it worth while to risk vexing her?  But it would
+grow.  Yes, but in the picture it would never grow.  The more she
+thought, the more difficult it was to see her way clear; as the evening
+grew darker and more shadowy, so her reflections became dimmer and more
+confused; at last they were suddenly stopped altogether, for a bat which
+had come forth on its evening travels flapped straight against her face
+under the eaves.  Thoroughly roused, Lilac drew in her head, shut her
+window, and was very soon fast asleep in bed.
+
+Night is said to bring counsel, and perhaps it did so in some way,
+although she slept too soundly to dream, for punctually at eleven
+o'clock the next morning she was at the meeting-place appointed by
+Agnetta at the farm.
+
+This was a loft over the cows' stables, the only place when, at that
+hour, they could be sure of no interruption.
+
+"The proper place 'ud be my bedroom," Agnetta had said, "where there's a
+mirror an' all; but it's Bella's too, you see, an' just now she's making
+a new bonnet, and she's forever there trying it on.  But I'll bring the
+scissors and do it in a jiffy."
+
+And here was Agnetta armed with the scissors, and a certain authority of
+manner she always used with her cousin.
+
+"Tek off yer bonnet and undo yer plaits," she said, opening and shutting
+the bright scissors with a snap, as though she longed to begin.
+
+Lilac stood with her back against a truss of hay, rather shrinking away,
+for now that the moment had really come she felt frightened, and all her
+doubts returned.  She had the air of a pale little victim before her
+executioner.
+
+"Come," said Agnetta, with another snap.
+
+"Oh, Agnetta, do you really think they'll like it?" faltered Lilac.
+
+"What I really think is that you're a ninny," said the determined
+Agnetta; "an' I'm not agoin' to wait here while you shilly-shally.  Is
+it to be off or on?"
+
+"Oh off, I suppose," said Lilac.
+
+With trembling fingers she took off her bonnet, and unfastened her hair
+from its plait.  It fell like a dark silky veil over her shoulders.
+
+"Lor'!" said Agnetta, "you have got a lot of it."
+
+She stood for a second staring at her victim open-mouthed with the
+scissors upraised in one hand, then advanced, and grasping a handful of
+the soft hair drew it down over Lilac's face.
+
+"Oh, Agnetta," cried an imploring voice behind the screen thus formed,
+"you'll _be_ careful!  You won't tek off too much."
+
+"Come nearer the light," said Agnetta.
+
+Still holding the hair, she drew her cousin towards the wide open doors
+of the loft.  "Now," she said, "I can see what I'm at, an' I shan't be a
+minute."
+
+The steel scissors struck coldly against Lilac's forehead.  It was too
+late to resist now.  She held her breath.  Grind, grind, snip! they went
+in Agnetta's remorseless fingers, and some soft waving lengths of hair
+fell on the ground.  It certainly did not take long; after a few more
+short clips and snips Agnetta had finished, and there stood Lilac
+fashionably shorn, with the poor discarded locks lying at her feet.
+
+It was curious to see how much Agnetta's handiwork had altered her
+cousin's face.  Lilac's forehead was prettily shaped, and though she had
+worn her hair "scrattled" off it, there were little waving rings and
+bits which were too short to be "scrattled", and these had softened its
+outline.  But now the pure white forehead was covered by a lump of hair
+which came straight across the middle of it, and the small features
+below looked insignificant.  The expression of intelligent modesty which
+had made Lilac look different from other girls had gone; she was just an
+ordinary pale-faced little person with a fringe.
+
+"There!" exclaimed Agnetta triumphantly as she drew a small hand-glass
+from her pocket; "now you'll see as how I was right.  You won't hardly
+know yerself."
+
+Lilac took it, longing yet fearing to see herself.  From the surface of
+the glass a stranger seemed to return her glance--someone she had never
+seen before, with quite a different look in her eyes.  Certainly she was
+altered.  Was it for the better?  She did not know, and before she could
+tell she must get more used to this new Lilac White.  At present she had
+more fear than admiration for her.
+
+"Clump! clump!" came the sound of heavy feet up the loft ladder.  Lilac
+let the glass fall at her side, and turned a terrified gaze on Agnetta.
+
+"Oh, what's that?" she cried.  "Let me hide--don't let anyone see me!"
+
+Agnetta burst into a loud laugh.
+
+"Well, you _are_ a ninny, Lilac White.  Are you goin' to hide from
+everyone now you've got a fringe?  You as are goin' to have your picture
+took.  An' after all," she added, as a face and shoulders appeared at
+the top of the ladder.  "It's only Peter."
+
+Peter's rough head and blunt, uncouth features were framed by the square
+opening in the floor of the loft.  There they remained motionless, for
+the sight of Agnetta and Lilac where he had been prepared to find only
+hay and straw brought him to a standstill.  His face and the tips of his
+large ears got very red as he saw Lilac's confusion, and he went a step
+lower down the ladder, but his eyes were still above the level of the
+floor.
+
+"Well," said Agnetta, still giggling, "we'll hear what Peter thinks of
+it.  Don't she look a deal better with her hair cut so, Peter?"
+
+Peter's grey-green eyes, not unkindly in expression, fixed themselves on
+his cousin's face.  In her turn Lilac gazed back at them,
+half-frightened, yet beseeching mutely for a favourable opinion; it was
+like looking into a second mirror.  She waited anxiously for his answer.
+It came at last, slowly, from Peter's invisible mouth.
+
+"No," he said, "I liked it best as it wur afore."  As he spoke the head
+disappeared, and they heard him go clumping down the ladder again.  The
+words fell heavily on Lilac's ears.  "Best as it wur afore."  Perhaps
+everyone would think so too.  She looked dismally first at the locks of
+hair on the ground and then at Agnetta's unconcerned face.
+
+"Well, you've no call to mind what _he_ says anyhow," said the latter
+cheerfully.  "He don't know what's what."
+
+"I most wish," said Lilac, as she turned to leave the loft, "that I
+hadn't done it."
+
+As she spoke, the distant sound of the church clock was heard.  There
+was only just time to get to the foot of the hill, and she said a
+hurried good-bye to Agnetta, tying on her bonnet as she ran across the
+fields.  She generally hated the sun-bonnet, but to-day for the first
+time she found a comfort in its deep brim, which sheltered this new
+Lilac White a little from the world.  She almost hoped that the artist
+would change his mind and let her keep it on, instead of holding it in
+her hand.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE.
+
+"UNCLE JOSHUA."
+
+  "Let each be what he is, so will he be good enough for man himself,
+  and God."--_Lavater_.
+
+Whilst all this was going on at the farm, Mrs White had been busy as
+usual in the cottage on the hill--her mind full of Lilac, and her hands
+full of the Rectory washing.  It was an important business, for it was
+all she and her child had to depend on beside a small pension allowed
+her by Jem's late employers; but quite apart from this she took a pride
+in her work for its own sake.  She felt responsible not only for the
+unyielding stiffness of the Rector's round collars, but also for the
+appearance of the choristers' surplices; and any failure in colour or
+approach to limpness was a real pain to her, and made it difficult to
+fix her attention on the service.  This happened very seldom, however;
+and when it did, was owing to an unfortunate drying day or other
+accident, and never to want of exertion on her own part.
+
+There was nothing to complain of in the weather this morning--a bright
+sun and a nice bit of wind, and not too much of it.  Mrs White wrung
+out the surplices in a very cheerful spirit, and her grave face had a
+smile on it now and then, for she was thinking of Lilac.  Lilac
+sweetened all her life now, much in the same way that the bunch of
+flowers from which she took her name had sweetened the small room with
+its fragrance twelve years ago.  As she grew up her mother's love grew
+too, stronger year by year; for when she looked at her she remembered
+all the happiness that her life had known--when she spoke her name, it
+brought back a thousand pleasant memories and kept them fresh in her
+mind.  And she looked forward too, for Lilac's sake, and saw in years to
+come her proudest hope fulfilled--her child grown to be a
+self-respecting useful woman, who could work for herself and need be
+beholden to no one.  She had no higher ambition for her; but this she
+had set her heart on, she should not become lazy, vain, helpless, like
+her cousins the Greenways.  That was the pitfall from which she would
+strain every muscle to hold Lilac back.  There were moments when she
+trembled for the bad influence of example at Orchards Farm.  She knew
+Lilac's yielding affectionate nature and her great admiration for her
+cousins, and kept a watchful eye for the first unsatisfactory signs.
+But there were none.  No one could accuse Lilac of untidy ways, or want
+of thoroughness in dusting, sweeping, and all branches of household
+work, and even Mrs White could find no fault.  "After all," she said to
+herself, "it's natural in young things to like to be together, and
+there's nothing worse nor foolishness in Agnetta and Bella."  So she
+allowed the visits to go on, and contented herself by many a word in
+season and many a pointed practical lesson.  The Greenways were seldom
+mentioned, but they were, nevertheless, very often in the minds of both
+mother and daughter.
+
+This morning she was thinking of a much more pleasant subject.  "How was
+the artist gentleman getting along with Lilac's picture?  He must be
+well at it now," she thought, looking up at the loud-voiced American
+clock, "an' her looking as peart and pretty as a daisy.  White-faced
+indeed!  I'd rather she were white-faced than have great red cheeks like
+a peony bloom.  What will he do with the picture afterwards?"  Joshua
+Snell, through reading the papers so much, knew most things, and he had
+said that it would p'r'aps be hung up with a lot of others in a place in
+London called an exhibition, where you could pay money and go to see
+'em.  "If he's right," concluded Mrs White, wringing out the last
+surplice, "I do really think as how I must give Lilac a jaunt up to
+London, an' we'll go and see it.  The last holiday as ever I had was
+fifteen years back, an' that was when Jem and me, we went--Why, I do
+believe," she said aloud, "here she is back a'ready!"
+
+There was a sound of running feet, which she had heard too often to
+mistake, then the click of the latch, and then Lilac herself rushed
+through the front room.
+
+"Mother, Mother," she cried, "he won't paint me!"
+
+Mrs White turned sharply round.  Lilac was standing just inside the
+entrance to the back kitchen, with her bonnet on, and her hands clasped
+over her face.  To keep her bonnet on a moment after she was in the
+house struck her mother at once as something strange and unusual, and
+she stared at her for an instant in silence, with her bands held up
+dripping and pink from the water.
+
+"Whatever ails you, child?" she said at length.  "What made him change
+his mind?"
+
+"He said as how I was the wrong one," murmured Lilac under her closed
+hands.
+
+"The _wrong_ one!" repeated her mother.  "Why, how could he go to say
+such a thing?  You told him you was Lilac White, I s'pose.  There's
+ne'er another in the village."
+
+"He didn't seem as if he knew me," said Lilac.  "He looked at me very
+sharp, and said as how it was no good to paint me now."
+
+"Why ever not?  You're just the same as you was."
+
+"I ain't," said Lilac desperately, taking away her hands from her face
+and letting them fan at her side.  "I ain't the same.  I've cut my
+hair!"
+
+It was over now.  She stood before her mother a disgraced and miserable
+Lilac.  The black fringe of hair across her forehead, the bonnet pushed
+back, the small white face quivering nervously.
+
+But though she knew it would displease her mother, she had very little
+idea that she had done the thing of all others most hateful to her.  A
+fringe was to Mrs White a sort of distinguishing mark of the Greenways
+family, and of others like it.  Not only was it ugly and unsuitable in
+itself, but it was an outward sign of all manner of unworthy qualities
+within.  Girls who wore fringes were in her eyes stamped with three
+certain faults: untidiness, vanity, and love of dressing beyond their
+station.  Beginning with these, who could tell to what other evils a
+fringe might lead?  And now, her own child, her Lilac whom she had been
+so proud of, and thought so different from others, stood before her with
+this abomination on her brow.  Bitterest of all, it was the influence of
+the Greenways that had triumphed, and not her own.  All her care and
+toil had ended in this.  It had all been in vain.  If Lilac "took
+pattern" by her cousins in one way she would in another--"a straw can
+tell which way the wind blows."  She would grow up like Bella and
+Agnetta.
+
+Swiftly all this rushed into Mrs White's mind, as she stood looking
+with surprise and horror at Lilac's altered face.  Finding her voice as
+she arrived at the last conclusion, she asked coldly:
+
+"What made yer do it?"
+
+Lilac locked her hands tightly together and made no answer.  She would
+not say anything about Agnetta, who had meant kindly in what she had
+done.
+
+"I know," continued her mother, "without you sayin' a word.  It was one
+of them Greenways.  But I did think as how you'd enough sense and
+sperrit of yer own to stand out agin' their foolishness--let alone
+anything else.  It's plain to me now that you don't care for yer mother
+or what she says.  You'll fly right in her face to please any of them at
+Orchards Farm."
+
+Still Lilac did not speak, and her silence made Mrs White more and more
+angry.
+
+"An' what do you think you've got by it?" she continued scornfully.  "Do
+those silly things think it makes 'em look like ladies to cut their hair
+so and dress themselves up fine?  Then you can tell 'em this from me:
+Vulgar they are, and vulgar they'll be all their lives long, and nothing
+they can do to their outsides will change 'em.  But they might a left
+you alone, Lilac, for you're but a child; only I did think as you'd a
+had more sense."
+
+Lilac was crying now.  This scolding on the top of much excitement and
+disappointment was more than she could bear, but still she felt she must
+defend the Greenways from blame.
+
+"It was my fault," she sobbed.  "I thought as how it would look nicer."
+
+"The many and many times," pursued Mrs White, drying her hands
+vigorously on a rough towel, "as I've tried to make you understand
+what's respectable and right and fitting!  And it's all been no good.
+Well, I've done.  Go to your Greenways and let them teach you, and much
+profit may you get.  I've done with you--you don't look like my child no
+longer."
+
+She turned her back and began to bustle about with the linen, not
+looking towards Lilac again.  In reality her eyes were full of tears and
+she would have given worlds to cry heartily with the child, for to use
+those hard words to her was like bruising her own flesh.  But she was
+too mortified and angry to show it, and Lilac, after casting some
+wistful glances at the active figure, turned and went slowly out of the
+room with drooping head.
+
+Pulling her bonnet forward so that her forehead and the dreadful fringe
+were quite hidden, she wandered down the hill, hardly knowing or caring
+where she went.  All the world was against her.  No one would ever look
+pleasantly at her again, if even her mother frowned and turned away.
+One by one she recalled what they had all said.  First, Peter: "I liked
+it best as it wur afore."  Then the artist--he had been quite angry.
+"You stupid little girl," he had said, "you've made yourself quite
+commonplace.  You're no use whatever.  Run away."  And now Mother--that
+was worst of all: "You don't look like my child."  Lilac's tears fell
+fast when she remembered that.  How very hard they all were upon her!
+She strayed listlessly onwards, and presently came to a sudden
+standstill, for she found that she was getting near the bottom of the
+hill, where the artist was no doubt still sitting.  That would never do.
+At her right hand there branched off a wide grass-grown lane, one of
+the ancient roads of the Romans which could still be traced along the
+valley.  It was seldom used now, for it led nowhere in particular; but
+here and there at long distances there were some small cottages in it,
+and in one of these lived the cobbler, Joshua Snell.
+
+Now, Uncle Joshua, as she called him, though he was no relation to her,
+was a great friend of Lilac's, and the thought of him darted into her
+forlorn little mind like a ray of comfort.  He would perhaps look kindly
+at her in spite of her fringe.  There was no one else to do it except
+Agnetta, and to reach her the artist must be passed, which was
+impossible.  Lilac could not remember that Joshua had ever been cross to
+her, even in the days when she had played with his bits of leather and
+mislaid his tools--those old days when she was a tiny child, and Mother
+had left her with him "to mind" when she went out to work.  And besides
+being kind he was wise, and would surely find some way to help her in
+her present distress.  Perhaps even he would speak to Mother, who
+thought a deal of what he said, and that would make her less angry.  A
+little cheered by these reflections Lilac turned down the lane,
+quickened her pace, and made straight for the cobbler's cottage.
+
+It was a very small abode, with such a deep thatch and such tiny windows
+that it looked all roof.  At right angles there jutted out from it an
+extra room, or rather shed, and in this it was possible, by peering
+closely through a dingy pane of glass, to make out the dim figure of
+Joshua bending over his work.  This dark little hole, in which there was
+just space enough for Joshua, his boots and tools and leather, had no
+door from without, but could only be approached through the kitchen.  As
+he sat at work he could see the fire and the clock without getting up,
+which was very convenient, and he was proud of his work-shed, though in
+the winter it was both chilly and dark.  Joshua lived quite alone.  He
+had come to Danecross twenty years ago from the north, bringing with him
+a wife, a collection of old books, and a clarionet.  The wife, whose
+black bonnet still hung behind the kitchen door, had now been dead ten
+years, and he had only the books and the clarionet to bear him company.
+But these companions kept him from being dull and lonely, and gave him
+besides a position of some importance in the village.  For by dint of
+reading his books many times over, and pondering on them as he sat and
+cobbled, he had gained a store of wisdom, or what passed for such, and a
+great many long words with which he was fond of impressing the
+neighbours.  He was also considered a fine reader, and quite a musical
+genius; for although he now only played the clarionet in private, there
+had been a time, he told them, when he had performed in a gallery as one
+of the church choir.
+
+It was now about four o'clock in the afternoon, and he sat earnestly
+intent on making a good job of a pair of boots which had been brought to
+him to sole.  He was also anxious to make the most of the bright spring
+sunshine, a stray beam of which had found its way in at his little
+window and helped him greatly by its cheerful presence.  All at once a
+shadow flitted across it, and glancing up he saw a well-known figure run
+hurriedly in at the cottage door.  "It's White Lilac," he said to
+himself with a smile but without ceasing his work, for Lilac was a
+frequent visitor, and he could not afford to waste his time in welcoming
+his guests.  He did not even look round, therefore, but listened for her
+greeting white his hammer kept up a steady tack, tack, tack.  It did not
+come.  Joshua stopped his work, raised his head, and listened more
+intently.  The kitchen was as perfectly silent as though it were empty.
+"I cert'nly did see her," said he, almost doubting his eyesight; "maybe
+she's playing off a game."  He got up and looked cautiously round the
+entrance, quite expecting Lilac to jump out from some hiding-place with
+a laugh; but a very different sight met his eyes.  Lilac had thrown
+herself into a large chair which stood on the hearth, her head was bent,
+her face buried in her hands, and she was crying bitterly.
+
+"My word!" exclaimed Joshua, suddenly arrested on the threshold.
+
+He rubbed his hands in great perplexity on his leather apron.  It was
+quite a new thing to see Lilac in tears, and they fell so fast that she
+could neither control herself nor tell him the cause of her distress.
+In vain he tried to coax and comfort her: she would not even raise her
+head nor look at him.  Joshua looked round the room as if for counsel
+and advice in this difficulty, and fixed his eyes thoughtfully on the
+tall clock for some moments; then he winked at it, and said softly, as
+though speaking in confidence: "Best let her have her cry out; then
+she'll tell me."
+
+"See here," he continued, turning to Lilac and using his ordinary voice.
+"You've come to get Uncle's tea ready for him, I know, and make him
+some toast; that's what you've come for.  An' I've got a job as I must
+finish afore tea-time, 'cause the owner's coming for 'em.  So I'll go
+and set to and do it, and you'll get the tea ready like a handy maid as
+you are, and then we'll have it together, snug and cosy."
+
+When he had settled himself to his work again, and the sound of his
+hammer mingled with the ticking of the tall clock as though they were
+running a race, Lilac raised her head and rubbed her wet eyes.  There
+was something very soothing and peaceful in Uncle Joshua's cottage, and
+his kind voice seemed to carry comfort with it.  She had a strong hope
+that he would help her in some way, though she could not tell how, for
+he had never failed to find a remedy for all the little troubles she had
+brought to him from her earliest years.  Her faith in him, therefore,
+was entire, and even if he had proposed to make her hair long again at
+once, she would have believed it possible, because he knew so much.
+
+Gradually, as she remembered this, she ceased crying altogether, and
+began to move about the room to prepare the tea, a business to which she
+was well used, for she had always considered it an honour to get Uncle
+Joshua's tea and make toast for him.  The kettle already hung on its
+chain over the fire, and gave out a gentle simmering sound; by the time
+the toast was ready the water would boil.  Lilac got the bread from the
+corner cupboard and cut some stout slices.  Uncle liked his toast thick.
+Then she knelt on the hearth, and shielding her face with one hand
+chose out the fiercest red hollows of the fire.  It was an anxious
+process, needing the greatest attention; for Lilac prided herself on her
+toast, and it was a matter of deep importance that it should be a fine
+even brown all over--neither burnt, nor smoked, nor the least blackened.
+While she was making it she was happy again, and quite unconscious of
+the fringe, for the first time since she had felt Agnetta's cold
+scissors on her brow.
+
+It was soon quite ready on a plate on the hearth, so that it might keep
+hot.  Uncle Joshua was ready also, for he came in just then from his
+shed, carrying his completed job in his hand: a pair of huge hobnailed
+boots, which he placed gently on the ground as though they were brittle
+and must be handled with care.
+
+"Them's Peter Greenways' boots," he said, looking at them with some
+triumph, "and a good piece of work they be!"
+
+It was a great relief to Lilac that neither then nor during the meal did
+Uncle Joshua look at her with surprise, or appear to notice that there
+was anything different about her.  Everything went on just as usual,
+just as it had so often done before.  She sat on one side of the table
+and poured out the tea, and Uncle Joshua in his high-backed elbow chair
+on the other, with his red-and-white handkerchief over his knees, his
+spectacles pushed up on his forehead, and a well-buttered slice of toast
+in his hand.  He never talked much during his meals; partly because he
+was used to having them alone, and partly because he liked to enjoy one
+thing at a time thoroughly.  He was fond of talking and he was fond of
+eating, and he would not spoil both by trying to do them together.  So
+to-night, as usual, he drank endless cups of tea in almost perfect
+silence, and at last Lilac began to wish he would stop, for although she
+feared she yet longed for his opinion.  She felt more able to face it
+now that she had eaten something, for without knowing it she had been
+hungry as well as miserable, and had quite forgotten that she had had no
+dinner.  She watched Uncle Joshua nervously.  Would he ask for more tea.
+No.  He wiped his mouth with the red handkerchief, looked straight at
+Lilac, and suddenly spoke:
+
+"And how's the picture going forrard then?"
+
+After this question it was easy to tell the whole story, from its
+beginning to its unlucky end.  During its progress the cobbler listened
+with the deepest attention, gave now a nod, and now a shake of the head
+or a muttered "Humph!" and when it was finished he fingered his cheek
+thoughtfully, and said:
+
+"And so he wouldn't paint you--eh? and Mother was angry?"
+
+"She's dreadful angry," sighed Lilac.
+
+"Did you think it 'ud please her, now?" asked Uncle Joshua.
+
+"N-no," answered Lilac hesitatingly; "but I never thought as how she'd
+make so much fuss.  And after all no one don't like it.  Do you think as
+how it looks _very_ bad, Uncle?"
+
+The cobbler put his spectacles carefully straight and studied Lilac's
+face with earnest attention.  "What I consider is this here," he said as
+he finished his examination and leant back in his chair.  "It makes you
+look like lots of other little gells, that's what it does.  Not so much
+like White Lilac as you used to.  I liked it best as it wur afore."
+
+"Peter, he said that too," said Lilac.  "No one likes it except
+Agnetta."
+
+"Ah!  And what made Agnetta and all of 'em cut their hair that way?"
+asked Uncle Joshua.
+
+"Because Gusta Greenways told Bella as how all the ladies in London did
+it," answered Lilac simply.
+
+"That's where it is," said Uncle Joshua.  "My little maid, there's
+things as is fitting and there's things as isn't fitting.  Perhaps it's
+fitting for London ladies to wear their hair so.  Very well, then let
+them do it.  But why should you and Agnetta and the rest copy 'em?
+You're not ladies.  You're country girls with honest work to do, and
+proud you ought to be of it.  As proud every bit as the grandest lady as
+ever was, who never put her hand to a useful thing in her life.  I'm not
+saying you're better than her.  She's got her own place, an' her own
+lessons to learn, an' she's got to do the best she can with her life.
+But you're different, because your life's different, an' you'll never
+look like her whatever you put on your outside.  If a thing isn't fit
+for what it's intended, it'll never look well.  Now, here's Peter's
+boots--I call 'em handsome."
+
+He lifted one of them as he spoke and put it on the table, where it
+seemed to take up a great deal of room.  Lilac looked at it with a
+puzzled air; she saw nothing handsome in it.  It was enormously thick
+and deeply wrinkled across the toes, which were turned upwards as though
+with many and many a weary tramp.
+
+"I call 'em handsome," pursued Joshua.  "Because for why?  Because
+they're fit for ploughin' in the stiffest soil.  Because they'll keep
+out wet and never give in the seams.  They're fit for what they're meant
+to do.  But now you just fancy," he went on, raising one finger, "as how
+I'd made 'em of shiny leather, and put paper soles to 'em, and pointed
+tips to the toes.  How'd they look in a ploughed field or a muddy lane?
+Or s'pose Peter he went and capered about in these 'ere on a velvet
+carpet an' tried to dance.  How'd he look?"
+
+The idea of the loutish Peter capering anywhere, least of all on a
+velvet carpet, made Lilac smile in spite of Uncle Joshua's great
+gravity.
+
+"Why, he'd look silly," he continued; "as silly as a country girl, who's
+got to scrub an' wash an' make the butter, dressed out in silks an'
+fandangoes.  She ought to be too proud of being what she is, to try and
+look like what she isn't.  Give me down that big brown book yonder an'
+I'll read you something fine about that."
+
+Lilac reached the book from the shelf with the greatest reverence; it
+was the only one amongst Joshua's collection that she often begged to
+look at, because it was full of curious pictures.  It was Lavater's
+Physiognomy; having found the passage he wanted, Joshua read it very
+slowly aloud:
+
+"In the mansion of God there are to his glory vessels of wood, of
+silver, and of gold.  All are serviceable, all profitable, all capable
+of divine uses, all the instruments of God: but the wood continues wood,
+the silver silver, the gold gold.  Though the golden should remain
+unused, still they are gold.  The wooden may be made more serviceable
+than the golden, but they continue wood.  Let each be what he is, so
+will he be sufficiently good, for man himself, and God.  The violin
+cannot have the sound of the flute, nor the trumpet of the drum."
+
+He had just finished the last line, and still held one knotty brown
+finger raised to mark the important words, when there was a low knock at
+the door, and immediately afterwards it opened a little way and a head
+appeared, covered by a rusty-black wideawake.  It was the second time
+that day that Lilac had seen it, for it was Peter Greenways' head.  In a
+moment all the events of the unlucky morning came back to her, and his
+gruffly unfavourable opinion.  Why had he come?  This awkward Peter was
+always turning up when he was not wanted, and thrusting that large
+uncouth head in at unexpected places.  She turned her back towards the
+door in much vexation, and Peter himself remained stationary, with his
+eyes fixed where he had first directed them--on his own boot, which
+still stood on the table by Joshua's elbow.  His first intention had
+evidently been to come in, but suddenly seized with shyness he was now
+unable to move.
+
+"Why, Peter, lad," said the cobbler, "come in then; the boots is ready
+for you."
+
+Thus invited Peter slowly opened the door a very little wider and
+squeezed himself into the room.  He was indeed a very awkward-looking
+youth, and though he was broad-shouldered and strongly made, he was so
+badly put together that he did not seem to join properly anywhere, and
+moved with effort as though he were walking in a heavy clay soil.
+Everything about Peter, and even the colour of his clothes, made you
+think of a ploughed field, and he generally kept his eyes fastened on
+the ground as though following the course of a furrow.  This was a pity,
+for his eyes were the only good features in his broad red face, and had
+the kindly faithful expression seen in those of some dogs.
+
+As he stood there, ill at ease, with his enormous hands opening and
+shutting nervously, Lilac thought of Agnetta's speech: "Peter's so
+common."  If to be common was to look like Peter, it was a thing to be
+avoided, and she was dismayed to hear Uncle Joshua say:
+
+"Well, now, if you're not just in time to go home with Lilac here,
+seein' as how we've done our tea, and her mother'll be looking for her."
+
+"Oh, Uncle, I'd rather not," said Lilac hastily.  Then she added, "I
+want you to play me a tune before I go."
+
+Joshua was always open to a compliment about his playing.
+
+"Ah!" he said, "you want a tune, do you?  Well, and p'r'aps Peter he'd
+like to hear it too."
+
+As he spoke he gave the boots to Peter, who was now engaged in dragging
+up a leather purse from some great depth beneath his gaberdine.  This
+effort, and the necessity of replying, flushed his face to a deeper red
+than ever, but he managed to say huskily as he counted some coin into
+Joshua's hand:
+
+"No, thank you, Mr Snell.  Can't stop tonight."
+
+Nevertheless it was some moments before he could go away: he stood
+clasping his boots and staring at Joshua.
+
+"The money's all right, my lad," said the latter.
+
+"Well," said Peter, "I must be goin'."  But he did not move.
+
+"Well, good night, Peter," said Joshua, encouragingly.
+
+"Good night, Mr Snell."
+
+"Good night, Peter," said Lilac at length, nodding to him, and this
+seemed to rouse him, for with sudden energy he hurled himself towards
+the door and disappeared.
+
+"Yon's an honest lad and a fine worker," remarked the cobbler, "but he
+do seem a bit tongue-tied now and then."
+
+And now, after the tune was played, there was no longer any excuse to
+put off going home.  For the first time in her life Lilac dreaded it,
+for instead of a smile of welcome she had only a frown of displeasure to
+expect from her mother.  It was such a new thing that she shrank from it
+with fear, and found it almost as difficult to say goodbye as Peter had
+done.  If only Uncle Joshua would go with her!  Her face looked so
+wistful that he guessed her unspoken desire.
+
+"Now I shouldn't wonder," he said, carefully thrusting the clarionet
+into its green baize bag, "as how you'd like me to go up yonder with
+you.  And it do so happen as how I've got a job to take back to Dan'l
+Wishing, so I shall pass yours without goin' out of my way."
+
+Accordingly, the door of the cottage being locked, the pair set out
+together a few moments later, Lilac walking very soberly by the
+cobbler's side, with one hand in his.  Joshua's hand was rough with
+work, so that it felt like holding the bough of a gnarled elm tree, but
+it was so full of kindness that there was great comfort and support in
+it.
+
+How would Mother receive them?  Lilac hardly dared to look up when they
+got near the gate and saw her standing there, and hardly dared to
+believe her own ears when she heard her speak.  For what she said was:
+
+"Run in, child, and get yer tea.  I've put it by."
+
+She stayed a long time at the gate talking to Uncle Joshua, and Lilac,
+watching them through the window, felt little doubt that they were
+talking of her.  When her mother came in, and was quite kind and gentle,
+and behaved just as usual, she felt still more sure that it was Uncle
+Joshua's wonderful wisdom that had done it all.  But if she could have
+heard the conversation she would have been surprised, for they dwelt
+entirely on the cobbler's rheumatics and the chances of rain, and said
+no word of either Lilac or her fringe.  Mrs White had had time to
+repent of her harsh words, and when the hours went by, and Lilac did not
+come back, she had pictured her receiving comfort and encouragement from
+the Greenways--the very people she wished her to avoid.  Now she had
+driven her to them.  "I could bite my tongue out for talking so
+foolish," she said to herself as she ran out to the gate, over and over
+again.  When at last she saw the two well-known figures approaching, she
+could only just restrain herself from rushing out to meet Lilac and
+covering her with kisses.  The relief was almost too great to bear.
+
+In her own home, therefore, Lilac heard nothing further on the unlucky
+subject.  But this was not by any means the case in the village, where
+nothing was too small to be important.  The fact of the Widow White's
+Lilac wearing a fringe was quite enough to talk of, and more than enough
+to stare at, for it was something new.  Unfortunately everyone knew
+Lilac, and Lilac knew everyone, so there was no escape.  Her
+acquaintances would draw up in front of her and gaze steadily for an
+instant, after which the same remarks always came:
+
+"My! you have altered yerself.  I shouldn't never have known you, I do
+declare!  And so you didn't have yer picter done after all?"
+
+Lilac wished she could hide somewhere until her hair had grown long
+again.  And worst of all, when Mrs Leigh next saw her in school, she
+looked quite startled and said:
+
+"I'm so sorry you've cut your hair, Lilac; it looked much nicer before."
+
+It was the same thing over and over again, no one approved the change
+but Agnetta, and Lilac's faith in her cousin was by this time a little
+bit shaken.  She should not be so ready, she thought, the next time to
+believe that Agnetta must know best.  One drop of comfort in all this
+was that the artist gentleman no longer sat painting at the bottom of
+the hill.  He had packed up all his canvases and brushes and gone off to
+the station, so that Lilac saw him no more.  She was very glad of this,
+for she felt that it would have been almost impossible to pass him every
+day and to see his keen disapproving glance fixed upon her.  Slowly the
+picture that was to have been painted was forgotten, and Lilac White's
+fringe became a thing of custom.  There were more important matters near
+at hand; May Day was approaching, an event of interest and excitement to
+both young and old.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR.
+
+WHO WILL BE QUEEN?
+
+  "When daisies pied and violets blue
+  And lady-smocks all silver-white
+  And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue
+  Do paint the meadows with delight."--_Shakespeare_.
+
+On the top of the ridge of hills which rose behind Mrs White's cottage
+there was a great beech wood, which could be reached in two ways.  One
+was by following a rough stony road which got gradually steeper and was
+terribly hard for both man and beast, and the other was to take a chalky
+track which led straight across the rounded shoulder of the downs.
+
+This last was considerably shorter, and by active people was always
+preferred to the road, although in summer it was glaring and unshaded.
+But the scramble was soon over, and in the deep quiet shelter of the
+woods it was cool on the hottest day, for the trees held their leaves so
+thickly over your head that it was better than any roof.  The sun could
+not get through to scorch or dazzle, but it lit up the flickering sprays
+on the low boughs, so that looking through them you saw a silvery
+shimmering dance always going on.  In the valley there had not perhaps
+been a breath of air, but up here a little ruffling breeze had its home,
+and was ready to fan you gently and hospitably directly you arrived.
+
+Under your feet a red-and-brown carpet of last year's leaves was spread,
+stirred now and then with sudden mysterious rustlings as the small wild
+creatures darted away at the sound of your step.  These and the birds
+shared the woods in almost complete solitude, disturbed now and again by
+the woodcutters, or boys from the village.  But there was one day in the
+year when this quiet kingdom was strangely invaded, when its inhabitants
+fled to their most retired corners and peeped out with terrified eyes
+upon a very altered scene--and this was the first of May.  Then
+everything was changed for a little while.  Instead of the notes of the
+birds there were human voices calling to each other, laughing, singing,
+shouting, and the music of a band; instead of great silent spaces, there
+were many brightly-coloured figures which ran and danced.  In the midst,
+where a clearing had been made and the oldest trees stood solemnly
+round, there appeared the slim form of a maypole decked with gay
+ribbons; near it a throne covered with hawthorn boughs, on which,
+dressed in white with garland and sceptre, was seated the Queen of the
+May.  There with great ceremony she was crowned by her court, and
+afterwards led the dance round the maypole.  Songs and feasting followed
+until the sun went down, and then the gay company marched away to the
+sounds of "God save the Queen."  Quietness reigned in the woods again,
+and once more the wild creatures which lived there could roam and fly at
+their pleasure until next May Day.
+
+Now this holiday, which was fast approaching again, was not only looked
+forward to with interest and excitement by the children, but was an
+event of importance to everyone in the village.  The very oldest made
+shift somehow to get up to the woods and join in the rejoicing, and the
+most careworn and sorrowful managed to struggle out of their gloom for
+that one day, and to leave behind the dulness of their daily toil.
+Many, coming from distant parts of the parish, met for the only time
+throughout the year in the woods on May Day, and found the keenest
+pleasure in comparing the growth of their children, and talking of their
+neighbours' affairs.  It was a source of pride and satisfaction, too, to
+fathers as well as mothers, to point out some child in the procession so
+bedecked with flowers that the real Johnnie was hardly visible, and say
+with a grin of delight:
+
+"Why, it's our Johnnie, I do declare!  Shouldn't never a known him."  As
+the time came round again, therefore, it was more or less in everyone's
+mind in some way.  For one thing: Would it be fine?  That affected
+everyone's comfort, for a cold wet May Day could be nothing but a
+miserable failure.  Mr Dimbleby at the shop had his own anxieties, for
+it was his business to provide tea, bread and butter, and cake for the
+whole assembly, and to get it all up to the top of the hill--no small
+matter.  To do this it was necessary to keep his mind steadily fixed on
+May Day for a whole week beforehand, and not to allow it to relax for an
+instant.  The drum-and-fife band, who felt themselves the pride and
+ornament of the occasion, had to practise new tunes and polish up "God
+save the Queen" to a great pitch of perfection, and the children thought
+themselves busier than anyone.  Not only had they to wonder who would be
+Queen, but they must meet in the Vicarage garden and learn how to dance
+round the maypole, singing at the same time.  Not only must they present
+themselves at all sorts of odd hours to have some wonderful costume
+"tried on" by Miss Ellen and Miss Alice, but above all they had to
+gather the flowers for the wreaths and garlands.  Sometimes, if the
+season were cold and backward, it was difficult to get enough; but this
+year, as Lilac had noticed with delight, it had been so bright and mild
+that the meadows were thick with blossoms and there was no fear of any
+scarcity.  She was always amongst the children chosen "to gather"; and
+there was more in this office than might at first appear, for there were
+good gatherers and bad gatherers.  It might be done carelessly and in a
+half-hearted manner, or with full attention and earnest effort, and
+these results were evident when each child brought her own collection to
+the school room on May morning.  The contents of the baskets were very
+different, for some showed plainly that as little trouble as possible
+had been taken.  These flowers were picked anyhow, with short stalks or
+long stalks, in bud or too fully blown, faded or fresh, just as they
+happened to grow and could be most easily got.  Others, again, you could
+see at the first glance, had been gathered with care and thought, the
+finest specimens chosen just at the right stage of blossoming, and tied
+in neat bunches with the stalks all of one length.  You might be sure
+that the flowers in these baskets were quite as good at the bottom as
+those on the top.  Now, Lilac White was a gatherer on whom you might
+depend, and the ladies at the Rectory who made the wreaths, and dressed
+the Queen, and arranged the festivities, considered her their best
+support in the matter of flowers.  For, by reason of having had her eye
+upon them for weeks beforehand, she knew every spring where the finest
+grew, whether they were early or late, and whether they would be ready
+for the great occasion.  When they had to be gathered she spared no
+trouble, but would get up at any hour so that they might be picked
+before the sun scorched them, walk any distance or climb the steepest
+hills to get the very finest possible.  She was always appealed to when
+any question arose about the flowers.  "We must ask Lilac White whether
+the king-cups are out," Miss Ellen would say; and Lilac was always able
+to tell.  She filled, therefore, a very pleasant and important post at
+these times, and took great pride in it; but her Cousin Agnetta looked
+at this part of the affair differently.  To her there was neither
+pleasure nor profit in "mucking" about in the damp fields, as she said,
+getting her feet wet, and spoiling her frock in stooping about after the
+flowers.  She wished Mrs Leigh would let them wear artificials, which
+were quite as pretty to look at, and did not fade or get messy, and were
+no bother at all.  You could wear 'em time after time.  Agnetta felt
+quite sure she should be Queen this year, and although she did not like
+the trouble beforehand she looked forward to the event itself very much
+indeed.  There were many agreeable things about it: the white dress, the
+crown, the crowd of people looking on, and the fact of being first
+amongst her companions.  It was a little vexing that Lilac was quicker
+to learn the steps of the dance Miss Ellen was teaching them, and could
+sing the May-Day song better than she could.  Agnetta always sang out of
+tune, and tumbled over her own feet in the dance; but she consoled
+herself by remembering how well she should look as Queen dressed all in
+white, with her red cheeks and frizzy black hair.  Meanwhile the Queen
+was not yet chosen, but would be voted for in the school a week
+beforehand.
+
+Who would be chosen?  It was a question which occupied a good many minds
+just then, and amongst them one which was not supposed to trouble itself
+about such matters, or to have anything to do with merry-making.  This
+was Peter Greenways' mind.  He was so dull and silent, and worked so
+very hard all the year, that it was an ever fresh surprise to see him
+appear with the rest on May Day, and came natural to say, "What, you
+here, Peter!" although he had never missed a single occasion.  He
+expressed no pleasure, and showed no outward sign of enjoyment; but he
+always went, to the great vexation of his sisters, who were heartily
+ashamed of him.  His face was red, his figure was loutish--it was
+impossible to smarten him up or make him look like other folks; he
+continued, in spite of all their efforts, to be just plain
+Peter--"dreadful vulgar" in his appearance.  And the worst of it was,
+that you could not overlook him in the crowd.  This might have been the
+case if he had been allowed to wear his ordinary working-clothes, but
+Peter in his "best" was an object which seemed to stand out from all
+others, and to be present wherever the eye turned.
+
+On the day which was to decide the important question, Peter had been
+ploughing in a part of his father's land called the High Field.  All the
+rest lay level on the plain round about the farm, but this one field was
+on the shoulder of the downs, so that from it you looked far over the
+distant valley, with its little clusters of villages dotted here and
+there.  Immediately below was the grey church of Danecross, the rectory,
+the school-house, and a group of cottages all nestling sociably
+together; farther on, Orchards Farm peeped out from amongst the trees,
+which were still white with blossom, and above all this came the cold
+serious outline of the chalk hills, broken here and there by the beech
+woods.  Peter never felt so happy as when he was looking at this from
+the High Field, with his dinner in his pocket and the prospect of a long
+day's work before him.  It was so far away from all that disturbed and
+worried; no one to scold, no one to call him clumsy, no one to look
+angrily at him, no sounds of dispute.  Only the voice of the wind, which
+blew so freshly up here and seemed to cheer him on, and the song of the
+larks high above his head, and for companions his good beasts with no
+reproof in their patient eyes, but only obedience and kindness.  Peter
+was master in the High Field.  No one could do a better day's work or
+drive a straighter furrow, and he was proud of it, and proud of his
+team--three iron-greys, with white manes and tails, called "Pleasant",
+"Old Pleasant", and "Young Pleasant."  Yet though he did his ploughing
+well, it by no means occupied all his mind.  As he trudged backwards and
+forwards with bent head, and hands grasping the handles, with now and
+then a shout to his horses, and now and then a pause for rest, his
+thoughts were free as the wind, flying about to an sorts of subjects.
+For this silent Peter had always something to wonder about.  He never
+asked questions now as he had done at school: he had been laughed at so
+much then, that he knew well enough by this time that he only wondered
+so much because he was more stupid than other folks; it must be so, for
+the most common things which he saw every day, and which wise people
+took as a matter of course, were enough to puzzle him and fill his mind
+with wonder.  The stars, the flowers, the sunset, the sound of the wind,
+the very pebbles turned up by the ploughshare, gave him strange feelings
+which he did not understand and which he carefully hid.  They would have
+been explained, he knew, if he had expressed them, by the sentence,
+"Peter's not all there"; and he was sometimes quite inclined to think
+that this was really the case.  To-day his thoughts had been fixed on
+the approaching holiday, and on all the delights of the past one.  It
+was to him a most beautiful and even solemn occasion, and he could
+recall the very smallest detail of it from year to year: even the
+uncertain squeaks and flourishes of the drum and fife band were
+something to be remembered with pleasure.  As his eye rested on the
+school-house, a small red dot in the distance, he wondered if they had
+settled on the Queen yet, and whether Agnetta would be chosen.  "She'll
+be rarely vexed if she ain't," he thought seriously.  So the day went
+by, and after five o'clock had sounded from the church tower Peter and
+his beasts left off work and went leisurely down the hill towards home;
+two of the Pleasants in front with their harness clanking and flapping
+loosely about them, and their master following, seated sideways on the
+back of the third.  Peter had done a long day's work and was hungry, but
+he did not go into the house till he had seen his horses attended to by
+Ben Pinhorn, who was in the yard when they arrived.  Even after this he
+was further delayed, for as he was crossing the lane which separated the
+farm buildings from the house an ugly cat ran to meet him, rubbed
+against his legs, and mewed.
+
+"Jump, then, Tib," said Peter encouragingly; and Tib jumped, arriving
+with outspread claws on the front of his waistcoat and thence to his
+shoulder.  Thus accompanied he went to the kitchen window and tapped
+softly, which signal brought Molly the servant girl with a saucer of
+skim milk.
+
+"There's your supper, Tib," said Peter as he set it on the ground, and
+stood looking heavily down at the cat till she had lapped up the last
+drop.  And in this there was reason; for Sober the sheepdog, lying near,
+had his eye on the saucer, and only waited for Tib to be undefended to
+advance and finish the milk himself.
+
+Being now quite ready for his own refreshment Peter made his way through
+the back kitchen into the general living-room of the family, which also,
+much to Bella's disgust, had the appearance of a kitchen.  It was large
+and comfortable, with three windows in it, looking across the garden to
+the orchard, but, alas! it had a great fireplace and oven, where cooking
+often went on, and an odious high settle sticking out from one corner of
+the chimney.  This was enough to deprive it of all gentility, without
+mentioning the long deal table at which in former times the farmer had
+been used to dine with his servants.  They were banished now to the back
+kitchen, but this was the only reform Bella and Gusta had been able to
+make.  Nothing would induce their father to sit in the parlour, where
+there was a complete set of velvet-covered chairs, a sofa, a piano, a
+photograph-book, and a great number of anti-macassars and mats.  All
+these elegances were not enough to make him give up his warm corner in
+the settle, where he could stretch out his legs at his ease and smoke
+his pipe.  Mrs Greenways herself, though she was proud of her parlour,
+secretly preferred the kitchen, as being more handy and comfortable, so
+that except on great occasions the parlour was left in chilly
+loneliness.  When Peter entered there were only his mother and Bella in
+the room.  The latter stood at the table with a puzzled frown on her
+brow, and a large pair of scissors in her hand; before her were spread
+paper patterns, fashion-books, and some pieces of black velveteen, which
+she was eyeing doubtfully, and, placing in different ways so that it
+might be cut to the best advantage.  Bella was considered a fine young
+woman.  She had a large frame like all the Greenways, and nature had
+given her a waist in proportion to it.  She had, however, fought against
+nature and conquered, for her figure now resembled an hour-glass--very
+wide at the top, and suddenly very small in the middle.  Like Agnetta
+she had a great deal of colour, frizzy black hair, and a good-natured
+expression, but her face was just now clouded by some evident vexation.
+
+"Lor', Bella," said her mother, turning round from the hearth, "put away
+them fal-lals--do.  Here's Peter wanting his tea, and your father'll be
+along from market directly."  Bella did not answer, partly because her
+mouth was full of pins, and Mrs Greenways continued: "You might hurry
+and get the tea laid just for once.  I'm clean tired out."
+
+"Where's Molly?" muttered Bella indistinctly.
+
+"Molly indeed!" exclaimed her mother impatiently.  "It's Molly here and
+Molly there.  One 'ud think she had a hundred legs and arms for all you
+think she can do.  Molly's scrubbing out the dairy, which she ought to a
+done this morning."
+
+"It won't run to it after all!" exclaimed Bella, dashing her scissors
+down on the table; "not by a good quarter of a yard."
+
+"An' you've been and wasted pretty nigh all the afternoon over it," said
+Mrs Greenways.  "I do wish Gusta wouldn't send you them patterns, that
+I do."
+
+"I've cut up the skirt of my velveteen trying to fashion it," said
+Bella, looking mournfully at the plate in Myra's Journal, "so now I'm
+ever so much worse off than I was afore.  Lor', Peter!" she added, as
+her eye fell on her brother, "do go and take off that horrid gaberdine
+and them boots.  You look for all the world like Ben Pinhorn, there
+ain't a pin to choose between you."
+
+"You oughtn't to speak so sharp," said her mother, as Peter slouched out
+of the room.  "I know what it is to feel spent like that after a day's
+work.  You just come in and fling down where you are and as you are,
+boots or no boots."
+
+As she spoke the rattle of wheels was heard outside, and then the click
+of a gate.
+
+"There now!" she exclaimed, starting up; "there _is_ yer father.  Back
+already, and a fine taking he'll be in to see all this muss about and no
+tea ready.  He's short enough always when he's bin to market, without
+anything extry to vex him."  She swept Bella's scraps, patterns, and
+books unceremoniously into a heap, and directly afterwards the tramp of
+heavy feet sounded in the passage, and the farmer entered.  His first
+glance as he threw himself on the settle was at the table, where Bella
+was hurriedly clearing away her confused mass of working materials.
+
+"Be off with all that rubbish and let's have tea," he said crossly.
+"Why can't it be ready when I come in?"
+
+"You're a bit earlier than usual, Richard," said his wife; "but you'll
+have it in no time now.  The kettle's on the boil."
+
+She made anxious signs to Bella to quicken her movements, for she saw
+that the farmer was in a bad humour.  Things had not gone well at
+market.
+
+"And what did you see at Lenham?" she asked, as she began to put the
+cups and saucers on the table.
+
+"Nawthing," answered Mr Greenways, staring at the fire.
+
+"What did you hear then?" persisted his wife.
+
+"Nawthing," was the answer again.
+
+Mother and daughter exchanged meaning looks.  The farmer jerked his head
+impatiently round.
+
+"What I want to see is summat to eat, and what I want to hear is no more
+questions till I've got it.  So there!"
+
+He thrust out his legs, pushed his hands deep down in his pockets, and
+with his chin sunk on his breast sat there a picture of moody
+discontent.
+
+After a good deal of clatter and bustle, and calls for Molly, the tea
+was ready at last--a substantial meal, but somewhat untidily served--and
+Peter, having changed the offensive gaberdine for a shiny black cloth
+coat, having joined them, the party sat down.  It was a very silent one,
+for no one dared to address another remark to the farmer until he had
+satisfied his appetite, which took some time.  At last, however, as he
+handed his cup to his wife to be refilled, he asked:
+
+"Who made the butter this week?"
+
+"Why, Molly, as always makes it," answered Mrs Greenways.  "Wasn't it
+good.  I thought it looked beautiful."
+
+"Well, all I know is," said the farmer moodily, "that Benson told me
+to-day that if this lot was like the last he wouldn't take no more."
+
+"Lor', Richard, you don't really mean it!" said Mrs Greenways, setting
+down the teapot with a thump.  "Whatever shall we do if Benson won't
+take the butter?"
+
+"You can't expect him to take it if it ain't good," answered the farmer.
+"I don't blame him; he's got to sell it again."
+
+"It's that there good-for-nothing Molly," said Mrs Greenways.  "I'm
+always after her about the dairy, yet if my head's turned a minute
+she'll forget to scald her pans, and that gives the butter a sour
+taste."
+
+"All I know is, it's a hard thing, that with good pasture and good cows,
+and three women indoors, the butter can't be made so as it's fit to
+sell," said Mr Greenways, hitting the table with his fist.
+
+"What's the use of Bella and Agnetta, I should like to know?"
+
+Bella tossed her head and smiled.  "Lor', Pa, how you talk!" she said
+mincingly.
+
+"They've never been taught nothing of such things," said Mrs Greenways;
+"and besides, Agnetta's got her schooling yet awhile."
+
+"Fancy me," said Bella with a giggle, "making the butter with my sleeves
+tucked up like Molly.  I hope I'm above that sort of thing.  I didn't go
+to Lenham finishing school to _learn_ that."
+
+"I can't find out what it was you did learn there," growled her father,
+"except to look down on everything useful.  I'll not have Agnetta sent
+there, I know.  Not if I had the money, I wouldn't.  It's bad enough to
+have bad seasons and poor crops to do with out-of-doors, without having
+a set of dressed-up lazy hussies in the house, who mar more than they
+make.  Where to turn for money I don't know, and there's going on for
+three years' rent owing to Mr Leigh."
+
+He got up as he spoke and left the room, followed by Peter.  Bella
+continued her tea placidly.  Father was always cross on market days, and
+it did not impress her in the least to be called lazy; she was far more
+interested in the fate of her velveteen dress than in the quality of the
+butter.  But this was not the case with Mrs Greenways.  To hear that
+Benson had threatened not to take the butter was a real as well as a new
+trouble, and alarmed her greatly.  The rent owing and the failing crops
+were such a very old story that she had ceased to heed it much, but what
+would happen if the butter was not sold?  The dairy was one of their
+largest sources of profit, and, as the farmer had said, the pasture was
+good and the cows were good.  There was no fault out-of-doors.  Whose
+fault was it?  Molly's without doubt.  "But then," reflected Mrs
+Greenways, "she have got a sight to do, and you can't hurry butter; you
+must have care and time."  She sighed as she glanced at Bella's strong
+capable form.  Perhaps it would have been better after all, as Mrs
+White had so often said, to bring up her girls to understand household
+matters, instead of being stylishly idle.  "I did it for their good,"
+thought poor Mrs Greenways; "and anyhow, it's too late to alter 'em
+now.  They'd no more take to it than ducks to flying."  She was startled
+out of these reflections by the sudden entrance of Agnetta, who burst
+into the room with a hot excited face, and flung her bag of books into a
+corner.
+
+"Well," said Bella, looking calmly at her, "I s'pose you're to be Queen,
+ain't you?"
+
+"No!" exclaimed Agnetta angrily, "I ain't Queen; and it's a shame, so it
+is."
+
+"Why, whoever is it, then?" asked Bella, open-mouthed.
+
+"They've been and chosen Lilac White; sneaking little thing!" said
+Agnetta.
+
+"Well, now, surely, I am surprised," said her mother.  "I made sure
+they'd choose you, Agnetta; being the oldest, and the best lookin', and
+all.  I do call it hard."
+
+"It's too bad," continued Agnetta, thus encouraged; "after I've been
+such a friend to her, and helped her cut her hair.  It's ungrateful.
+She might have told me."
+
+"Why, I don't suppose she knew it, did she?" said Bella.
+
+"She went all on pretending she wanted me Queen," said Agnetta, "as
+innocent as you please.  And she must a known there were a lot meant to
+vote for her.  I call it mean."
+
+"Never you mind, Agnetta," said her mother soothingly; "come and get yer
+tea, and here's a pot of strawberry jam as you're fond of.  She'll never
+make half such a good Queen as you, and I dessay you'll look every bit
+as fine now, when you're dressed."
+
+"I don't want no strawberry jam," said Agnetta sullenly, kicking at the
+leg of the table.
+
+"Mercy me!" said poor Mrs Greenways with a sigh, "everything do seem to
+go crossways today."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE.
+
+MAY DAY.
+
+  "But I must gather knots of flowers, and buds and garlands gay,
+  For I'm to be Queen of the May, mother, I'm to be Queen of the May!"
+  --_Tennyson_.
+
+Agnetta had been quite wrong in saying that Lilac had any idea of being
+Queen.  At the school that afternoon, when amidst breathless silence the
+Mistress had counted up the votes and said: "Lilac White is chosen
+Queen", it had been such a surprise to her that she had stood as though
+in a dream.  Her companions nudged her on either side.  "It's you that's
+Queen," they whispered; and at length she awoke to the wonderful fact
+that it was not Agnetta or anyone else who had the most votes, but she
+herself, Lilac White.  She was Queen!  Looking round, still half-puzzled
+to believe such a wonderful thing, she saw a great many pleased faces,
+and heard Mrs Leigh say: "I think you have chosen very well, and I am
+glad Lilac will be Queen this year."  It was, then, really true.  "How
+pleased Mother'll be!" was her first thought; but her second was not so
+pleasant, for her eye fell on Agnetta.  It was the only sullen face
+there; disappointment and vexation were written upon it, and there was
+no answering glance of sympathy from the downcast eyes.  Lilac was an
+impulsive child, and affection for her friend made her forget everything
+else for the moment.  She left her place, went up to Mrs Leigh, who was
+talking to the schoolmistress, and held one arm out straight in front of
+her.
+
+"Well, Lilac," said Mrs Leigh kindly, "what is it?"
+
+"Please, ma'am," said Lilac, dropping a curtsy, "if they don't mind, I'd
+rather Agnetta Greenways was Queen."
+
+"Oh, that's quite out of the question," said Mrs Leigh decidedly; "when
+the Queen's been once chosen it can't be altered.  Why, I should have
+thought you would have been pleased."
+
+Lilac hung her head, and went back to her place rather abashed.  She was
+pleased, and she did not like Mrs Leigh to think she did not care.  Her
+whole heart was full of delight at receiving such an honour, but at the
+same time it was hard for Agnetta, who had so set her mind on being
+Queen.  If only she could be Queen too!  That being impossible, Lilac
+had done her best in offering to give it up, and it was disappointing to
+find that her friend, far from being grateful, was cross and sulky with
+her and quite out of temper.  When the other children crowded round
+Lilac with pleased faces Agnetta held back, and had not one kind word to
+say, but refusing an advances flung herself away from her companions and
+rushed home full of wrath.  Lilac looked after her wistfully; it hurt
+her to think that Agnetta could behave so.  "After all," she said to
+herself, "I couldn't help them choosing me, and I did offer to give it
+up."
+
+Everyone else was glad that she was Queen, and ready with a smile and a
+nod when they met her.  If Agnetta had only been pleased too Lilac's
+happiness would have been perfect, but that was just the one thing
+wanting.  However, even with this drawback there was a great deal of
+pleasure to look forward to, and when she went to the Rectory to have
+the white dress fitted on she was almost as excited as though it was
+really a royal robe.
+
+"It's a pity about the fringe, Lilac," said Miss Ellen as she pinned and
+arranged the long train; "it's not nearly so becoming."  Then seeing the
+excited face suddenly downcast she added: "Never mind; I dare say the
+crown will partly hide it."
+
+Her arrangements finished, she called her sister, and they both surveyed
+Lilac gravely, who, a little abashed by such business-like observation,
+stood before them shyly in her straight white gown, with the train
+fastened on her shoulders.
+
+"I think she'll do very nicely," said Miss Alice, "when she gets the
+flowers on.  They make all the difference.  What will she wear?"
+
+Miss Ellen's opinion was decided on that point.  "It ought to be white
+lilac, and plenty of it," she said, "nothing would suit the Queen so
+well."  Then came a difficulty: there was none nearer than Cuddingham.
+Could it be got in time?
+
+Lilac was doubtful, for Cuddingham was a long way off, but she promised
+to do her best, and Miss Ellen's last words to her were:
+
+"Bring moon daisies if you can't get it, but remember I should like
+white lilac much the best."
+
+Lilac herself thought the moon daisies would be prettier, with their
+bright yellow middles; but Miss Ellen's word was law, and as she had set
+her heart on white lilac, some way of going to Cuddingham must be found
+since it was too far to walk.  There were only two days now to the great
+event, and during them Lilac did her best to make her wants known
+everywhere.  In vain, however.  No one was going to or coming from that
+place; always the same disappointing answers:
+
+"Cuddingham!  No, thank goodness; I was there last week.  I don't want
+to see that hill again yet a while."  Or, "Well now, if I'd known
+yesterday I might a suited you."  And so on.
+
+Lilac began to despair.  She thought of Orchards Farm, but she had not
+courage to ask any favour there while Agnetta was so vexed with her.
+Even Uncle Joshua, who had always helped her at need, had nothing to
+suggest now, and did not even seem to think it of much importance.  He
+dropped in to see Mrs White on the evening before May Day, and with her
+usual faith in him Lilac at once began to place her difficulty before
+him.  But for once he was not ready to listen, and she was obliged to
+wait impatiently while he carried on a long conversation with her
+mother.  They had a great deal to talk of, and it was most uninteresting
+to Lilac, for it was all about things of the past in which she had had
+no share.  She might have liked it at another time, but just now she was
+full of the present, and she became more and more impatient as Uncle
+Joshua went on.  He had to call back the first celebration of May Day
+which he "minded", and the smallest event connected with it; and when he
+had done Mrs White took up the tale, dwelling specially on Jem's
+musical talent, and how he had been the very soul of the drum-and-fife
+band.
+
+"They're all at sixes and sevens now, to my thinking," she said.  "Jem,
+he kep' 'em together and made 'em do their best."
+
+"Aye, that's where it is," said the cobbler with an approving nod;
+"that's what we've all on us got to do."
+
+His eye rested as he spoke on Lilac's eager face, and seizing the
+opportunity of a pause she rushed in with what she had so much on her
+mind:
+
+"Oh, Uncle Joshua! to-morrow's the day, and I can't get no white lilac
+for Miss Ellen to make my garland with.  What shall I do?"
+
+But Joshua was in a moralising mood, and though Lilac's question gave
+him another subject to discourse on, he was more bent on hearing himself
+talk than in getting over her difficulty.  He raised one finger and
+began to speak slowly, and when Mrs White saw that, she paused with the
+kettle in her hand and stood quite still to listen.  Joshua was going to
+say something "good."
+
+"It don't matter a bit," he said, "what you make your garland of.
+Flowers is all perishin' things and they'll be dead next day, and wear
+what you will, they won't make you into a real Queen.  But there's
+things as will always make folks bow down when they see 'em, May Day or
+no May Day, and them's the things you ought to seek for, early and late
+till you find 'em.  You take a lot of pains to get flowers to deck your
+outsides, but you don't care much for the plants I'm thinking of; you
+leave 'em to chance, and so sometimes they're choked out by the weeds.
+An' yet they're worth takin' trouble for, and if you once get 'em to
+take root and grow they're fit to crown the finest Queen as ever was;
+and they won't die either, but the more you use 'em the fresher and
+sweeter they'll be.  There's Love now; you can't understand anyone, not
+the smallest child, without that.  There's Truth; you can't do anything
+with folks unless they trust you.  There's Obedience; you can't rule
+till you know how to serve.  There's three plants for you, and there's a
+whole lot more, but that's enough for you to bear in mind, and I must be
+going along."
+
+Joshua departed much satisfied with his eloquence, leaving Mrs White
+equally impressed.
+
+"Lor'!" she exclaimed, "there's a gifted man.  It's every bit as good as
+being in church to hear him.  And I hope, Lilac, as how you'll lay it to
+heart and mind it when you get to be a woman."
+
+But Lilac did not feel in the least inclined to lay it to heart.  She
+was vexed with Uncle Joshua, who had not been the least help in her
+perplexity; for once he had failed her, and she was glad he had gone
+away so that she could think over a plan for to-morrow.  It was of no
+use evidently to reckon on white lilac any longer, the only thing to be
+done now was to get up very early the next morning and pick the best
+moon daisies she could find for Miss Ellen.  This determination was so
+strong within her when she fell asleep, that she woke with a sudden
+start next morning as the daylight was just creeping through her
+lattice.  Had she overslept herself?  No, it was beautifully early, it
+must be an hour at least before her usual time.  She dressed herself
+quickly and quietly, so as not to disturb her mother in the next room,
+and then pushing open her tiny window gave an anxious look at the
+weather.  Would it be fine?  At present a thin misty grey veil was
+spread over everything, but she could see the village below, which
+looked fast, fast asleep, with no smoke from its chimneys and nothing
+stirring.  There was such a stillness everywhere that it seemed wrong to
+make a noise, as though you were in church.  And the birds felt it too,
+for they twittered in a subdued manner, keeping back their full burst of
+song to greet someone who would come presently.  Lilac knew who that
+was.  She knew as well as the birds that very soon the sun would thrust
+away the misty veil and show his beaming face to the valley.  It would
+be fine.  It was May Day, and she was Queen!
+
+She drew a deep breath of delight, went downstairs on tiptoe, found a
+basket and a knife, tied on her bonnet, and unlatched the door; but
+there she stopped short, checked on the threshold by a sight so
+surprising that for a moment she could not move.  For at her feet, on
+the doorstep, lying there purely white as though it had fallen from the
+clouds, was a great mass of white lilac.  There were branches and
+branches of it, so that the air was filled with its gentle delicate
+scent, and it was so fresh that all its leaves were moist with dew.
+Someone had been up earlier even than herself.  The question was--who?
+
+Uncle Joshua of course; he had not failed after all, though how even
+such a very clever man could have got to Cuddingham and back since last
+night was more than Lilac could tell.  That did not matter.  There it
+was, and what a fine lot of it!  "He must have brought away nigh a whole
+bush," she said to herself.  "Miss Ellen will be rare and pleased,
+surely."  She gathered up the sweet-smelling boughs at last, and put
+them into one of her mother's washing-baskets.  There was no need to
+pick moon daisies now, and as she swept and dusted the room and lit the
+fire she gave many looks of admiration at her treasure, and many
+grateful thoughts to Uncle Joshua.  Mrs White also had no doubt that he
+had managed it somehow; and she was so moved by the fact of his
+kindness, and by Lilac being Queen, and by a hundred past memories, that
+her usual composure left her, and she threw her apron over her head and
+had a good cry.
+
+"There!" she said when it was over, "I can't think what makes me so
+silly.  But Jem he would a been proud to have seen you--he always liked
+the laylocks."
+
+But now came the question as to how it was to be carried down the hill
+to the school room.  Lilac could not lift the great basket, and it was
+at last found best to pile up the branches in her long white pinafore,
+which she held by the two corners.  When all was ready she looked
+seriously across the fragrant burden, which reached up to her chin, and
+said:
+
+"You'll be sure and be up there in time, won't you, Mother, or you won't
+see me crowned?"
+
+"No fear," said Mrs White as she held the gate open.  "Mind and walk
+steady or you'll drop some, and you can't pick it up if you do."
+
+Lilac nodded.  She was almost too excited to speak.  If it felt like
+this to be Queen of the May, she wondered what it must be like to be a
+real Queen!
+
+It was a glorious morning.  The mist had gone, the sun had come, and all
+the birds were singing their best tunes to welcome him.  To Lilac they
+sounded more than usually gay, as though they were telling each other
+all sorts of pleasant things.  "The sun is here--it is May Day--Lilac is
+Queen."  All the trees too, as they bent in the breeze, seemed to talk
+together with busy murmurs and whisperings: they tossed their heads and
+threw up their hands as if in surprise at some news, and then bowed low
+and gracefully before her, for what they had heard was--"Lilac White is
+Queen!"
+
+Her heart danced so to listen to them that it was quite difficult to
+keep her feet to a measured step, but when she reached the turn of the
+hill something made her feel that she must look back.  She turned slowly
+round.  There was Mother waving her hand at the gate.  When they next
+met it would be up in the woods, and Lilac would wear crown and garland.
+She could not wave her hand or even nod in return, but she made a sort
+of little curtsy and went on her way.
+
+At the bottom of the hill she met Mrs Wishing, who, bent nearly double
+by a heavy bundle, was crawling up from the village.
+
+"Well, you look happy anyhow, Lilac White," she said mournfully.  "And
+you haven't forgotten to bring enough flowers with you either."
+
+"I can't stop," said Lilac, "I've got to go and put these on Father
+first.  It's so far for Mother to come."
+
+She gave a movement of her chin towards the primrose wreath which Mrs
+White had added at the last moment to the heap of flowers.
+
+"Ah! well," sighed Mrs Wishing, "in the midst of life we are in death.
+I haven't much heart for junketing myself, but I shall be up yonder this
+afternoon if I'm spared."
+
+Lilac passed quickly on, nodding and smiling in return to the greetings
+which met her.  At the door of the shop stood Mr Dimbleby, his face
+heavier than usual with importance, and a little farther on she saw her
+Uncle Greenways' wagon and team waiting in charge of Ben, who leant
+lazily against one of the horses.  Mr Greenways always lent a wagon on
+May Day so that the very old people and small children might drive up
+the worst part of the hill.  Certainly it was there in plenty of time,
+for it would not be wanted till the afternoon; but it is always well not
+to be hurried on such occasions, and many of the people had to walk from
+outlying hamlets.
+
+Lilac laid her primroses on her father's grave, and turned back towards
+the school-house just as the clock struck twelve.  There were now many
+other little figures hurrying in the same direction with businesslike
+step, and all carrying flowers.  Primroses, daisies, buttercups,
+cowslips, and honeysuckle were to be seen, but there was nothing half so
+beautiful as the heap of white lilac.  Agnetta saw it as she passed into
+the school room, and gave an astonished stare and a sniff of
+displeasure: she had only brought a basket of small daisies, and had
+taken no trouble about them, so that her offering was not noticed or
+praised at all.  Then Lilac advanced, and dropping her little curtsy
+stood silently in front of Miss Ellen and Miss Alice holding out her
+pinafore to its widest extent.  There were exclamations of admiration
+and surprise from everyone, and Agnetta stamped her foot with vexation
+to hear them.
+
+"It's _exquisite_!" said Miss Ellen at last.  "Where did you get such a
+beautiful lot of it?"
+
+"Please, ma'am, I don't know," said Lilac.  "I found it on the
+doorstep."
+
+Agnetta's wrath grew higher every moment.  No one paid her any
+attention, and here was her insignificant cousin Lilac the centre of
+everyone's interest.  She overheard a whisper of Miss Alice's: "She'll
+make far the loveliest Queen we've ever had."
+
+What could it be they admired in Lilac?  Agnetta stood with a pout on
+her lips, idle, while all round the busy work and chatter went on.
+
+"Now, Agnetta," said Miss Ellen, bustling up to her, "there's plenty to
+do.  Get me some twine and some wire, and if you're very careful you may
+help me with the Queen's sceptre."
+
+It was a hateful office, but there was no help for it, and Agnetta had
+to humble herself in the Queen's service for the rest of the morning.
+To kneel on the floor, pick off small sprays from the bunches of lilac,
+and hand them up to Miss Ellen as she wove them into garland and
+sceptre.  While she did it her heart was hot within her, and she felt
+that she hated her cousin.  The work went on quickly but very silently
+inside the schoolroom.  There was no time to talk, for the masses of
+flowers which covered table, benches, and floor had all to be changed
+into wreaths and garlands before one o'clock, for the Queen and her
+court.  Outside it was not so quiet.  An eager group had gathered there
+long ago, composed of the drum-and-fife band, which broke out now and
+then into fragments of tunes, the boy with the maypole on his shoulder,
+and bearers of sundry bright flags and banners.  To these the time
+seemed endless, and they did their best to shorten it by jokes and
+laughter; it was only the close neighbourhood of the schoolmaster which
+prevented the boldest from climbing up to the high window and hanging on
+by his hands to see how matters were going on within.  But at last the
+latch clicked, the door opened wide: there stood the smiling little
+white Queen with her gaily dressed court crowding at her back.  There
+was a murmur of admiration, and the band, gazing open-mouthed, almost
+forgot to strike up "God save the Queen."  For there was something
+different about this Queen to any they had seen before.  She was so
+delicately white, so like a flower herself, that looking out from the
+blossoms which surrounded her she might have been the spirit of a lilac
+bush suddenly made visible.  The white lilac covered her dress in
+delicate sprays, it bordered the edge of her long train, it twined up
+the tall sceptre in her hand, it was woven into the crown which was
+carried after her.  At present the Queen's head was bare, for she would
+not be crowned till she reached her throne in the woods.
+
+Then the procession began its march, band playing, banners fluttering
+bravely in the wind, through the village first, so that all those who
+could not get up the hill might come to their doors and windows to
+admire.  Then leaving the highroad it came to the steep ascent, and here
+the wind blowing more freshly almost caught away the Queen's train from
+the grasp of her two little pages.  The band, in spite of gallant
+struggles, became short of breath, so that the music was wild and
+uncertain; and the smaller courtiers straggled behind unable to keep up
+with the rest.
+
+It made its way, however, notwithstanding these difficulties, and from
+the top of the hill where crowds of people had now gathered it was
+watched by eager and interested eyes.  First it looked in the distance
+like a struggling piece of patchwork on the hillside, then it took shape
+and they could make out the maypole and the flags, then, nearer still,
+the sounds of the three tunes which the band played over and over again
+were wafted to their ears, and at last the small white figure of the
+Queen herself could plainly be distinguished from the rest.  It did not
+take long after this to reach level ground, and as the procession moved
+along with recovered breath and dignity to the music of "God save the
+Queen", it was followed by admiring remarks from all sides:
+
+"See my Johnnie!  Him in the pink cap.  Bless his 'art, how fine he
+looks!"  Or "There's Polly Ann with the wreath of daisies!"
+
+"Well now," said Mrs Pinhorn, "I will say Lilac looks as peart and neat
+as a little bit of waxworks."
+
+"She wants colour, to my thinking," said Mrs Greenways, to whom this
+was addressed.
+
+The Greenways stood a little aloof from the general crowd, dressed with
+great elegance.  Bella rather looked down on the whole affair.  "It's so
+mixed," she said; "but we have to go, because Papa don't wish to offend
+Mr Leigh."
+
+"I call that a real pretty sight," said Joshua Snell, turning to his
+neighbour, who happened to be Peter Greenways.  "They've dressed her up
+very fitting in all them lilac blooms.  But wherever did they get such a
+sight of 'em?"
+
+Peter had been forced into a shiny black suit of clothes, a stiff
+collar, and a bright blue necktie, that he might not disgrace the
+stylish appearance of his mother and sisters.  In this attire he felt
+even less at his ease than usual, and his arms hung before him as
+helplessly as those of a stuffed figure.  Perhaps it was owing to this
+state of discomfort that he made no other answer to Joshua's remark than
+a nervous grin.
+
+"I don't see the Widder White anywheres," continued Joshua, looking
+round; "but there's such a throng one can't tell who's who."
+
+Lilac, too, had been looking in vain for her mother amongst the groups
+of people she had passed through, and as she took her seat on the
+hawthorn-covered throne she gazed wistfully to right and left.  No,
+Mother was not there.  Plenty of well-known faces, but not the one she
+wanted most to see.
+
+"She _promised_ to be in time," she said to herself, "and now she'll
+miss the crowning."  It was a dreadful pity, for Lilac could only be
+Queen once in her life, and it seemed to take away the best part of the
+pleasure for Mother not to be there.  She had been looking forward to it
+for so long.  What could have kept her away?  The Queen's eyes filled
+with tears of disappointment, and through them the form of Peter
+Greenways seemed to loom unnaturally large, his face redder than ever
+above his blue neckcloth, his mouth and eyes wide open.  Lilac checked
+her tears and remembered her exalted position.  She must not cry now;
+but directly the crowning and the dance were over she resolved to search
+for her mother, and if she were not there to go home and see what had
+prevented her coming.
+
+This determination enabled her to bear her honours with becoming
+dignity, and to put aside her private anxiety for the time like other
+royal personages.  She danced round the maypole with her court, and led
+the May-Day song as gaily as if her pleasure had been quite perfect.
+But it was not; for all the while she was wondering what could possibly
+have become of her mother.
+
+At last, her public duties over, the Queen found herself at liberty.
+The crowd had dispersed now, and was broken up into little knots of
+people chatting together and waiting for the next excitement--tea-time.
+
+Through these Lilac passed with always the same question: "Have you seen
+Mother?"  Sometimes in the distance she fancied she saw a shawl of a
+pattern she knew well, but having pursued it, it turned out to belong to
+someone quite different.  She had just made up her mind to go home, when
+one of her companions ran up to her with an excited face:
+
+"Come along," she cried; "they're just agoin' to start the races."
+
+Lilac hesitated.  "I can't," she said; "I've got to go and look after
+Mother."
+
+"Well, it'll be on your way," said the other; "and you needn't stop no
+longer nor you like.  Come along."
+
+She seized Lilac's arm and they ran on together to the flat piece of
+ground on the edge of the wood, where the races were to take place.  The
+steep side of the down descended abruptly from this, and Lilac knew that
+by taking that way, which was quite an easy one to her active feet, she
+could very quickly reach home.  So she stayed to look first at one race
+and then at another, and they all proved so amusing that the more she
+saw the more she wanted to see, though she still said to herself: "I'll
+go after this one."  She was laughing at the struggling efforts of the
+boys in a sack race, when suddenly, amidst the noise of cheers and
+shouting which surrounded her, she heard her own name spoken in an
+urgent entreating voice: "Lilac--Lilac White!"
+
+"Who is it wants me!" she said, starting up and trying to force her way
+through the crowd.  "I'm here; what is it?"  The people stood back to
+let her pass.
+
+"It's Mrs Leigh wants you," said a woman.  "She's standing back
+yonder."
+
+It was strange to see Mrs Leigh's beaming face look so grave and
+troubled, and it gave Lilac a sense of fear when she reached her.
+
+"Is Mother here, ma'am?" was her first question.  "Does she want me,
+please?"
+
+Mrs Leigh did not answer quite at once, then she said very seriously:
+
+"Your mother is at home, Lilac.  You must go with me at once.  She is
+ill."
+
+Self-reproach darted through Lilac's heart.  Why had she put off going
+home?  But she must do the best she could now, and she said at once:
+
+"Hadn't I best send someone for the doctor first, ma'am?"
+
+"He is there," answered Mrs Leigh.  "He was sent for some time ago;
+Daniel Wishing went."
+
+The next thing was to get back to Mother as quickly as possible, and
+Lilac turned without hesitation to the way she had meant to take--
+straight down the side of the hill.  But Mrs Leigh stopped aghast.
+
+"You're not going down there, surely?" she said.
+
+"It's as nigh again as going round, ma'am," said Lilac eagerly; "and
+it's not to say difficult if you do it sideways."
+
+Mrs Leigh still hesitated.  It was very steep; the smooth turf was
+slippery.  There was not even a shrub or anything to cling to, and a
+slip would certainly end in an awkward tumble.  At another time she
+would have turned from it with horror, but she looked at Lilac's
+upturned anxious face and was touched with pity.
+
+"After all," she said, grasping her umbrella courageously, "if you can
+help me a little, perhaps it won't be so bad as it looks."
+
+So they started, hand in hand, Lilac a little in front carefully leading
+the way; but she was soon sorry that they had not gone round by the
+road.  This was a short distance for herself, but it proved a long one
+now that she had Mrs Leigh with her.  A slip, a stop, a slide, another
+stop--it was a very slow progress indeed.  As they went jerking along
+the flowers fell off Lilac's dress one by one and left a white track
+behind her.  She had taken off her crown and held it in her hand; its
+blossoms were drooping already, and its leaves folded up and limp.  How
+short a time it was since they had been fresh and fair, and she had
+marched up the hill so bravely, full of delight.  Now, poor little
+discrowned Queen, she was leaving her kingdom of mirth and laughter
+behind her with every step, and coming nearer to the shadowy valley
+where sadness waited.  After many a sigh and gasp Mrs Leigh and her
+guide reached the bottom in safety.  They were on comparatively level
+ground now, with gently sloping fields in front of them and the sharp
+shoulder of the hill rising at their back.  There, within a stone's
+throw stood the Wishings' cottage, and a little farther on Lilac's own
+home.  How quiet, how very still it all looked!  Now and then there
+floated in the calm air a shout or a sudden burst of laughter from the
+distant merry-makers, but here, below, it was all utterly silent.  The
+two little white cottages had no light in their windows, no smoke from
+their chimneys, no sign of life anywhere.
+
+"Mother's let the fire out," said Lilac.
+
+Mrs Leigh came to a sudden standstill.  "Lilac," she said, "my poor
+child--"
+
+Lilac looked up frightened and bewildered.  Mrs Leigh's eyes were full
+of tears, and she could hardly speak.  She took Lilac's hand in hers and
+held it tightly.  "My poor child," she repeated.
+
+"Oh, please, ma'am," cried Lilac, "let's be quick and go to Mother.
+What ails her?"
+
+"Nothing ails her," said Mrs Leigh solemnly; "nothing will ever ail her
+any more.  You must be brave for her sake, and remember that she loves
+you still; but you will not hear her speak again on earth."
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+The revels on the hill broke up sooner than usual that night, and those
+who had to pass the cottage on their way home trod softly and hushed
+their children's laughter.  For ill news travels fast, and before
+nightfall there was no one who did not know that the Widow White was
+dead.
+
+And thus Lilac's May-Day reign held in its short space the greatest
+happiness and the greatest sorrow of her life.  Joy and smiles and
+freshly-blooming flowers in the morning; sadness and tears and a
+withered crown at night.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX.
+
+ALONE.
+
+  "The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a wounded spirit
+  who can bear?"--_Proverbs_.
+
+A few days after this Lilac sat on her little stool in her accustomed
+corner, listening in a dreamy way to the muffled voices of Mrs Pinhorn
+and Mrs Wishing.  They spoke low, not because they did not wish her to
+hear, but because, having just come from her mother's funeral, they felt
+it befitted the occasion.  As they talked they stitched busily at some
+"black" which they were helping her to make, only pausing now and then
+to glance round at her as though she were some strange animal, shake
+their heads, and sigh heavily.  Lilac had not cried much since her
+mother's death, and was supposed by the neighbours to be taking it
+wonderful easy-like.  For the twentieth time Mrs Wishing was entering
+slowly and fully into every detail connected with it--of all the doctor
+had said of its having been caused by heart disease, of all she had said
+herself, of all Mr Leigh had said; and if she paused a moment Mrs
+Pinhorn at once asked another question.  For it was Mrs Wishing, who,
+running in as usual to borrow something, had found Mrs White on May
+morning sitting peacefully in her chair, quite dead.
+
+"And it do strike so mournful," she repeated, "to think of the child
+junketing up on the hill, and May Queen an' all, an' that poor soul an
+alone."
+
+"It's a thing one doesn't rightly understand, that is," said Mrs
+Pinhorn, "why both Lilac's parents should have been took so sudden."
+She gave a sharp glance round the room--"I suppose," she added, "the
+Greenways'll have the sticks.  There's a goodish few, and well kep'.
+Mary White was always one for storing her things."
+
+"I never heard of no other kin," said Mrs Wishing.
+
+"Lilac's lucky to get a home like Orchards Farm.  But there!  Some is
+born lucky."
+
+The conversation continued in the same strain until Mrs Wishing
+discovered that she must go home and get Dan'l's supper ready.
+
+"An' it's time I was starting too," added Mrs Pinhorn.  "I've got a
+goodish bit to walk."
+
+They both looked hesitatingly at Lilac.
+
+"You'll come alonger me and sleep, won't you, dearie?" said Mrs Wishing
+coaxingly.  "It's lonesome for you here."
+
+But Lilac shook her head.  "I'd rather bide here, thank you," was all
+she said; and after trying many forms of persuasion the two women left
+her unwillingly and took their way.
+
+Lilac stood at the open door and watched them out of sight, but she was
+not thinking of them at all, though she still seemed to hear Mrs
+Wishing's words: "It's lonesome for you here."  Her head felt strange
+and dizzy, almost as though she had been stunned, and it was stranger
+still to find that she could not cry although Mother was dead.  She knew
+it very well, everyone had talked of it to her.  Mr Leigh had spoken
+very kind, and Mrs Leigh had given her a black frock, and all the
+neighbours at the church that morning had groaned and cried and pitied
+her; but Lilac herself had hardly shed a tear, though she felt it was
+expected of her, and saw that people were surprised to see her so quiet.
+She tried every now and then to get it into her head, and to understand
+it, but she could not.  It seemed to be someone else that folks spoke
+of, and not Mother.  As she stood by the open door, each thing her eye
+rested on seemed to have something to do with her and to promise her
+return.  There was the hill she had toiled up so often: surely she would
+come again with a tired footstep, but always a smile for Lilac.  There
+was the little garden and the sweet-peas she had sown, just showing
+green above the earth: would she never see them bloom?  There on the
+window sill were her knitting-pins and a half-finished stocking: was it
+possible that Lilac would never hear them click again in her busy
+fingers?  There, most familiar object of all, was the clothes line.
+Lilac could almost fancy she saw her mother's straight active figure, as
+she had done scores of times, stretching up her arms to fasten the
+clothes with wooden pegs, her skirt tucked up, her arms bare, her
+sunbonnet tilted over her eyes.  No--it was quite impossible to feel
+that she would really never come back; it seemed much more likely that
+by and by she would walk in at the door and sit down by the window in
+her high-backed Windsor chair, and take up the unfinished knitting.  As
+Lilac was thinking thus, a figure did really appear at the top of the
+hill, a short square figure with a gaily trimmed hat on its head--her
+cousin Agnetta.
+
+For the first time in all her life Agnetta was feeling not superior to
+Lilac as usual, but shy of her.  She did not know what to say to her nor
+even whether she should be welcome, for she was conscious of having been
+very ill-tempered lately.  Now that Lilac was in trouble, cast down from
+her high position as Queen, she no longer felt angry with her, and would
+even have liked to make herself pleasant--if she could.  As she came
+near, however, and stood staring at her cousin, she felt that somehow
+there was a great difference in her, something which she could not
+understand.  There was a look in Lilac's small white face which made it
+impossible to speak to her in the old patronising tone; it was as though
+she had been somewhere and seen something to which Agnetta was a
+stranger, and which could never be explained to her.  It made her
+uncomfortable, and almost afraid to say anything; and yet, she
+remembered, Lilac was very low down in the world now--there was less
+reason than ever to stand in awe of her.  She was only poor little Lilac
+White, with nothing in the world she could call her own, an orphan, and
+dependent for a home on Agnetta's father.  So after these reflections
+she took courage and spoke: "Mamma said I was to tell you that she'll be
+up to-morrow morning to look at the furniture, and you must be ready in
+the afternoon to come down alonger Ben when he brings the cart."
+
+Lilac nodded, and the two girls stood silently on the doorstep for a
+moment; then Agnetta spoke again:
+
+"I s'pose you're glad you're coming to live at the farm, ain't ye?"
+
+"No," answered Lilac, "I don't know as I be.  I'd rather bide here."
+
+Agnetta had recovered her courage with her voice.  She stepped uninvited
+past Lilac into the room and cast a curious look round.
+
+"Lor'!" she said, "don't it look mournful!  I should think you'd be glad
+to get away."
+
+Lilac did not answer.
+
+"What's this?" asked Agnetta, pouncing on the needlework which the two
+women had left on the table.
+
+"It's a frock for me," said Lilac.  "Mrs Leigh give it to me."
+
+Agnetta held the skirt out at arm's length and looked at it critically.
+
+"Well!" she exclaimed with some scorn in her voice, "I should a thought
+you'd a had it made different now."
+
+"Different?" said Lilac enquiringly.
+
+"Why, there's no reason you shouldn't have it cut more stylish, is
+there, now there's no one to mind?"
+
+No one to mind!  Lilac looked at her cousin with dazed eyes for a
+moment, as if she hardly understood--then she took the stuff out of her
+hand.
+
+"I'll never have 'em made different," she cried with a sudden flash in
+her eyes; "I never, never will."  And then to Agnetta's great surprise
+she suddenly burst into tears.
+
+Agnetta stood staring at her, puzzled.  She was sorry, only what had
+made Lilac cry just now when she had been quite calm hitherto?
+
+"Don't take on so," she ventured to say presently; "and you'll spoil
+your black.  It'll stain dreadful."
+
+But Lilac took no more notice than if she had not been there, and soon,
+feeling that she could do nothing, Agnetta left her and took her way
+home.  She had accomplished something by her visit, though she did not
+know it, for she had made Lilac feel now that it really was true.
+Mother would not come back.  She was alone in the world.  There was no
+one, as Agnetta had said, "to mind."
+
+She began to understand it now, and the clearer it was the harder it was
+to bear.  So she bowed her head on the table, amongst the black stuff in
+spite of Agnetta's caution, and cried on.  And presently another thing,
+which she had not realised till now, stood out plainly before her.  She
+was to go away to-morrow and live at Orchards Farm.  Orchards Farm,
+which she had always fancied the most beautiful place in the world, and
+beside which her own home had seemed poor and small!  Now all that had
+changed, and the more she thought of it the more she felt that she did
+not want to leave the cottage.  It had suddenly become dear and
+precious; for all the things in it, even the meanest and smallest,
+seemed full of her mother's voice and presence.  Orchards Farm was a
+strange country now, with nothing in it that her mother had loved or
+that loved her, and to go there would be like going still farther from
+her.  Raising her eyes she looked round at the familiar room, at her
+mother's chair, at her own little stool, at the plants in the window.
+They all seemed to say: "Don't go, Lilac.  It is better to stay here."
+Must she go?  Then suddenly she caught sight of the lilac crown lying
+dusty and withered in a corner.  It reminded her of a friend.  "I'll ask
+Uncle Joshua," she said to herself; "I'll go early to-morrow morning and
+ask him.  _He'll_ know."
+
+Joshua had a very decided opinion on the question placed before him next
+day: Could Lilac live alone at the cottage and take in the washing as
+her mother used to do?
+
+"I can reach the line quite easy if I stand on a stool," she said
+anxiously; "and Mrs Wishing, she'd help me wring."
+
+"Bless you, my maid," he said, "you're not old enough to make a living,
+or strong enough, or wise enough yet.  The proper place for you is your
+Uncle Greenways' house, till such time as you come to be older."
+
+"Mother, she always said, `Don't be beholden to no one.  Stand on your
+own feet.'  That's what she said ever so often," faltered Lilac.
+
+The cobbler smiled as he looked at the slight little figure.  "Well, you
+must wait a bit.  If Mother could speak to you now, she'd say as I do.
+And you won't be no farther from her at the farm; wherever and whenever
+you think of her and mind what she said, and how she liked you to act,
+that's her voice talking to you still.  You listen and do as she bids,
+and that'll make her happier and you too."
+
+Joshua set to work again with feverish haste as he finished.  He did not
+like parting with Lilac, and it was difficult to say goodbye.  She
+lingered, looking wistfully at him.
+
+"You'll come and see me down yonder, won't you, Uncle Joshua?"
+
+"Why, surely, surely," replied Joshua hastily; "and you'll come and see
+me.  It ain't so far after all.  Bless me!" he added with a testy glance
+at the dusty pane in front of him, "what ails the window this morning?
+It don't give no light whatever."
+
+In a moment Lilac had fetched a duster and rubbed the little window
+bright and clear.  It was a small office she had often performed for the
+cobbler.
+
+"It wasn't, not to say very dirty," she said; "but you'll have to do it
+yourself next time, Uncle Joshua."
+
+When she got back to the cottage, she felt a little comforted by the
+cobbler's words, although he had not fallen in with her plan.  What
+could she do at once, she wondered, that would please her mother?  She
+looked round the room.  It had a forlorn appearance.  The doorstep,
+trodden by so many feet lately, was muddy, there was dust on the
+furniture, and the floor had not been swept for days.  Mother certainly
+would not like that, and Lilac felt she could not leave it so another
+minute.  With new energy she seized broom, brushes, and pail and went to
+work, going carefully into all the corners, and doing everything just as
+she had been taught.  Very soon it all looked like itself again, bright
+and orderly, and with a sigh of satisfaction she went upstairs to put
+herself "straight" before her aunt came.
+
+When there another idea struck her, for the moment she looked at the
+glass she remembered how Mother had hated the fringe.  Surely she could
+brush it back now that her hair had grown longer.  No, brush as hard as
+she would it fell obstinately over her forehead again.  But Lilac was
+not to be conquered.  She scraped it back once more, and tied a piece of
+ribbon firmly round her head; then she nodded triumphantly at herself in
+the glass.  It was ugly, but anyhow it was neat.
+
+She had just finished this arrangement when a noise in the room below
+warned her of Mrs Greenways' approach, and running downstairs she found
+her seated breathless in the high-backed chair.  One foot was stretched
+out appealingly in front of her, and she was so fatigued that at first
+she could only nod speechlessly at Lilac.
+
+"I'm fairly spent," she said at last, "with that terr'ble hill.  I can't
+wonder myself that your poor mother was taken so sudden with her heart,
+though she was always a spare figure."
+
+Lilac said nothing; the old feeling came back to her that it was someone
+else and not Mother who was spoken of.
+
+Mrs Greenways looked thoughtfully round the room; her eye rested on
+each piece of furniture in turn.  "They're good solid things, and well
+kept," she said.  "I will say for Mary White as she knew how to keep her
+things.  We can do with a good many of 'em at the farm," she went on
+after a pause; "but I don't want to be cluttered up with furniture, and
+the rest we must sell as it stands."
+
+Lilac's heart sank.  She could not bear to think of any of Mother's
+things being sold, but she was too much in awe of her aunt to say
+anything.
+
+"So I've come up this morning," pursued Mrs Greenways, producing an old
+envelope and a stumpy pencil; "just to jot down what I want to keep.
+And when I've done here, and fetched my breath a little, I'll go
+upstairs and have a look round."
+
+Mrs Greenways made her list, and then with a businesslike air tied
+pieces of tape on all the things she had chosen.  Lilac saw with dismay
+that her own little stool and the high-backed chair were left out.  It
+was almost like leaving two old friends behind.
+
+"Have you packed your clothes?" asked Mrs Greenways.
+
+"No, Aunt, not yet," said Lilac.
+
+"Well, I shall have to send Ben up with the cart this afternoon for your
+box, so you may as well come alonger him.  And mind this, Lilac.  Don't
+you go bringin' any litter and rubbish with you.  Jest your clothes and
+no more, and your Bible and Prayer Book.  And now I'll go upstairs."
+
+Mrs Greenways went upstairs, followed meekly by Lilac.  She watched
+passively while her aunt punched all the mattresses, placed a searching
+finger beneath every sheet and blanket, sat down in the chairs, and
+finally examined every article of Mrs White's wardrobe.  "'Tain't any
+of it much good to me," she said, holding up a cotton gown to the light.
+"They're all cut so antiquated, and she was never anything of a figure.
+You may as well keep 'em, Lilac, and they'll come in for you later."
+
+It made Lilac's heart ache sorely to see her mother's clothes in Mrs
+Greenways' hands turned about and talked over.  There was one gown in
+particular, with a blue spot.  Mrs White had worn it on that last May
+morning when she had stood at the gate, and it seemed almost a part of
+her.  When her aunt dropped it carelessly on the ground after her last
+remark, Lilac picked it up and held it closely to her.
+
+"And her Sunday bonnet now," continued Mrs Greenways discontentedly.
+"All the ribbons is fresh and it's a good straw, but I don't suppose I
+shall look anything but a scarecrow in it."
+
+She perched it on her head as she spoke, and turned about before the
+glass.
+
+"'Tain't so bad," she murmured, with a glance at Lilac for approval.
+There was no answer; for to her great surprise Mrs Greenways found that
+her niece had hidden her face in the blue cotton gown she held to her
+breast, and was sobbing quietly.
+
+Mrs Greenways was a kind-hearted woman in spite of her coarse nature.
+She could not exactly see what had made Lilac cry just now, but she went
+up to her and spoke soothingly.
+
+"There, there," she said, "it's natural to take on, but you'll be better
+soon, when you get down to the farm alonger Agnetta.  You must think of
+all you've got to be thankful for.  And now I should relish a cup o'
+tea, for I started away early; so we'll go down and you'll get it for
+me, I dessay.  I brought a little in my pocket in case you should be out
+of it.  I shouldn't wonder if Bella was able to give this a bit of
+style,"--taking off the bonnet.  "She's wonderful clever with her
+fingers."
+
+Mrs Greenways drank her tea, made Lilac take some and eat some bread
+and butter, which she wished to refuse but dared not.
+
+"Now you feel better, don't you?" she said good-naturedly.  "And before
+I start off home, Lilac, I've got a word to say, and that is that I hope
+you're proper and thankful for all your uncle's going to do for you."
+
+"Yes, Aunt," said Lilac.
+
+"If it wasn't for him, you know, there'd only be the house for you to go
+to.  Just think o' that!  What a disgrace it 'ud be!  It's a great
+expense to have an extry mouth to feed and a growing girl to clothe in
+these bad times, but we must put up with it."
+
+"I can work, Aunt," said Lilac.  "I can do lots of things."
+
+"Well, I hope you'll do what you can," replied Mrs Greenways.
+"Because, as you haven't a penny of your own, you ought to do summat in
+return for your uncle's charity.  That's only fair and right, isn't it?"
+
+Her mother's words came into Lilac's mind: "Don't be beholden to no
+one."
+
+"I don't mind work, Aunt," she repeated more boldly.  "I'd rather work.
+Mother, she always taught me to."
+
+"Well, that's a good thing," said Mrs Greenways.  "Because, now you're
+left so desolate, you've got nothing to look to but your own hands and
+feet.  But as to being any help--you're small and young, you see, and
+you can't be anything but a burden to us for years to come."
+
+A burden!  That was a new idea to Lilac.
+
+"And so," finished Mrs Greenways, rising, "I hope as how you'll be a
+good gal, and grateful, and always remember that if it wasn't for us
+you'd be on the parish, instead of at Orchards Farm."
+
+She made her way out of the door, and stopped at the garden gate to call
+back over her shoulder:
+
+"Mind and bring no rubbish along with you.  Nothing but clothes."
+
+Lilac's tears dropped fast into the painted deal box as she packed her
+small stock of clothes.  But she felt that she must not wait to cry; she
+must be ready by the time Ben came, and her aunt's visit had been so
+long that it was already late.  When she had finished she went
+downstairs to take a last look round.  There stood all the well-known
+pieces of furniture, dumb, yet full of speech; they had seen and heard
+so much that was dear to her, that it seemed cruel to leave them to
+strangers.  Above all she looked wistfully at a small twisted cactus in
+a pot standing on the window ledge.  Mrs White had been fond of it, and
+had given it much care and attention.  Might she venture to take it with
+her?  How pleased Mother had been, she remembered, when the cactus had
+once rewarded her by producing two bright-red blossoms.  That was long
+ago, and it had never done anything so brilliant again.  Content with
+its one effort it had since remained unadorned, yet as it stood there,
+with its fat green leaves and little bunches of prickles, it had the air
+of saying to itself, "I have done it once, and if I liked I could do it
+a second time."  Even now as she bent tenderly over it Lilac thought she
+could make out the faint beginning of a bud.
+
+"I do wish I could take it," she said to herself.  "If it was only in
+bloom maybe they'd like it."
+
+But the cactus was very far from blooming, and perhaps had no intention
+of doing so; in its present condition it would certainly be considered
+"rubbish" at Orchards Farm.
+
+Lilac turned from it with a sigh, and glancing through the window was
+startled to see that the cart with Ben sitting in it was already at the
+gate.  Ben looked as though he might have been waiting there for some
+hours, and was content to wait for any length of time.  She ran out in
+alarm.
+
+"Oh, Ben!" she cried, "I never heard you.  Have you been here long?"
+
+"Not I," said Ben; "on'y just come.  Missus she give orders as how I was
+to fetch down some cheers alonger you, so as to lighten the next load a
+bit."
+
+By the time he had slowly stacked the chairs together, and disposed them
+round Lilac's box in the cart, which cost him much painful thought,
+there was not much room left.
+
+"Now then, missie," he said at length, "that's the lot, ain't it?"
+
+"Where am I to sit, Ben?" asked Lilac doubtfully.  Ben took off his hat
+to scratch his head.  He had a perfectly round, foolish face, with short
+dust-coloured whiskers.
+
+"That's so," he said.  "I clean forgot you was to go too."
+
+A corner was at last found amongst the chairs, and Ben having hoisted
+himself on to the shaft they started slowly on their way.  Lilac kept
+her eyes fixed on the cottage until a turn of the road hid it from her
+sight.  It was just there she had turned to look at Mother on May Day.
+What a long, long time ago, and what a different Lilac she felt now!
+Grave and old, with all manner of cares and troubles waiting for her,
+and no one to mind if she were glad or sorry.  No one to want her much
+or to be pleased at her coming.  A burden instead of a blessing.  She
+clung to the hope that Agnetta at least would not think her so, but
+would welcome her to her new home and be kind to her; but she was the
+only one of whom she thought without shrinking.  Her aunt and uncle,
+Bella and Peter, above all the last, were people to be afraid of.
+
+"Here's the young master," said Ben, suddenly turning his face round to
+look at her.  "He be coming up to fetch the rest of the sticks."
+
+Lilac peeped out through the various legs of chairs which surrounded
+her; towards her, crawling slowly up the hill, came a wagon drawn by
+three iron-grey horses, and by their side a broad-shouldered, lumbering
+figure.  It was her Cousin Peter.  Of course it was Peter, she thought
+impatiently, turning her head away.  No one else would walk up the hill
+instead of riding in the empty wagon.  The descent now becoming easier
+Ben whipped up his horse, and they soon jolted past Peter and his team.
+
+"There's been a sight o' deaths lately in the village," he resumed
+cheerfully, having once broken the silence.  "I dunno as I can ever call
+to mind so many.  The bell's forever agoin'.  It's downright mournful."
+
+He was kindly disposed towards Lilac, and having hit upon this lucky
+means of entertaining her he dwelt on it for the rest of the way,
+fortunately requiring no answering remarks.  It seemed long before they
+reached the farm, and Lilac was cramped and tired in her uneasy position
+when they had at last driven in at the yard gate.  There was no one to
+be seen; but presently Molly, the servant girl, having spied the arrival
+from the back kitchen, came and stood at the door.  When she discovered
+Lilac almost hidden by the chairs, she hastened out and held up a broad
+red hand to help her down from the cart.
+
+"You've brought yer house on yer back like a hoddy-dod," she said with a
+grin.
+
+Lilac clambered down with difficulty, and stood by the side of the cart
+uncertain where to go.  A forlorn little figure in her straight black
+frock, clasping her mother's large old cotton umbrella.  She wished she
+could see Agnetta, but she did not appear.  Soon her aunt and Bella came
+into the yard, but their attention was immediately fixed on the chairs,
+which Ben had now unloaded and placed in a long row by Lilac's side.
+
+"Where were they to go?" asked Molly.
+
+In the living-room, Mrs Greenways thought, where they were short of
+chairs.
+
+"In the bedrooms," said Bella contemptuously.  "Common-looking things
+like them."
+
+"We could do with 'em in the kitchen," added Molly.
+
+The dispute continued for some time, but in the end Bella carried the
+day, and Mrs Greenways found time to notice the newcomer.
+
+"Well, here you are, Lilac," she said.  "Come along in, and Agnetta
+shall show where you've got to sleep."
+
+Agnetta led the way up the steep stairs to the top of the house.  She
+had rather a condescending manner as she threw open the door of a small
+attic in the roof.
+
+"This is it," she said; "and Mamma says you've got to keep it clean
+yerself."
+
+"I'd rather," said Lilac hastily.  "I've always been used to."
+
+She looked round the room.  It was very like her old one at the cottage,
+and its sloping ceiling and bare white walls seemed familiar and
+homelike; it was a comfort, too, to see that its tiny window looked
+towards the hills.  As she observed all this she took off her bonnet,
+and was immediately startled by a loud laugh from Agnetta.
+
+"Well!" she exclaimed, "You have made a pretty guy of yourself."
+
+Lilac put her hand quickly up to her head.
+
+"Oh, I forgot--my hair," she said.
+
+"Whatever made you do it?" asked Agnetta, planting herself full in front
+of her cousin and staring at her.
+
+"It's neater," said Lilac, avoiding the hard gaze.  "I shall wear it so
+till it gets longer.  I'm not agoin' to have a fringe no more."
+
+"Well!" repeated Agnetta, lost in astonishment; then she added:
+
+"You do look comical!  Just like a general servant.  If I was you I'd
+wear a cap!"
+
+With this parting thrust she clattered downstairs giggling.  So this was
+Lilac's welcome.  She went to the window, leant her arms on the broad
+sill, and looked forlornly up at the hill.  There was not a single
+person who wanted her here, or who had taken the trouble to say a kind
+word.  How could she bear to live here always?
+
+"Li-lack!" shrieked a voice up the stairs, "you're to come to tea."
+
+Through the meal that followed Lilac sat shyly silent, feeling that
+every morsel choked her, and listening to the clatter of voices and
+teacups round her but hardly hearing any words.  The farmer had noticed
+her presence by a nod, and then resumed his newspaper.  He meant to do
+his duty by Mary's girl until she was old enough to go to service, but
+no one could expect him to be glad of her arrival.  Another useless
+member of the family to support, where there were already too many.
+Peter was not there at first, but when the meal was nearly over Lilac
+heard the wagon roll heavily into the yard, and soon afterwards its
+master came almost as heavily into the room and took his place at the
+table.  When there he eat largely and silently, taking huge draughts of
+tea out of a great mug.  This was one of his many vulgarities, which
+Bella deplored but could not alter, for he required so much tea that a
+cup was a ridiculous and useless thing to him, and had to be filled so
+often that it gave a great deal of trouble--in this therefore he was
+allowed to have his way.
+
+When Lilac got into her attic that night she found that her deal box had
+been carried up and placed in one corner, and as she began to undress in
+the half-light she caught sight of something else which certainly had
+not been there before.  Something standing in the window twisted and
+prickly, but to her most pleasant to look upon.  Could it really be the
+cactus?  She went up to it, half afraid to find that she was mistaken.
+No, it was not fancy, the cactus was there, and Lilac was so pleased to
+see its ugly friendly face that tears came into her eyes.  She had found
+a little bit of kindness at last at Orchards Farm, and it no longer felt
+quite so cold and strange.  Peter no doubt had brought the plant down
+from the cottage, but who had told him to do it?  Her aunt, or Agnetta,
+or perhaps after all it was Uncle Joshua as usual.
+
+Whoever it was Lilac felt very grateful, and went to sleep comforted
+with the thought that there was something in the room which had lived
+her old life and known her mother's care, though it was only a cactus
+plant.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN.
+
+ORCHARDS FARM.
+
+  "For a crowd is not company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures,
+  and talk but a tinkling cymbal where there is no love."--_Bacon_.
+
+"I like this one best," said Lilac.
+
+She was looking in at the shed where Ben was milking the cows at
+Orchards Farm.
+
+Inside it was dusky and cool.  There was a sweet smell of hay and new
+milk, and it was very quiet, the silence only disturbed when an
+impatient cow stamped her foot or swished her tail at the flies, and was
+reproved by Ben's deep-toned, "Woa then, stand still."  But outside it
+was very different, for the afternoon sun was still hot and dazzling,
+and all the farmyard creatures were conversing cheerfully together in
+many keys and voices.  A tall white cock had perched himself tiptoe on a
+gate, crowing in a shrilly triumphant manner, the ducks were quacking in
+a sociable chorus, and Chummy, the great black sow, lying stretched on
+her side in the sun, kept up an undertone of deeply comfortable grunts.
+
+Lilac leant against the doorpost, now looking in at Ben and his cows,
+and now at the sunshiny strawyard.  She felt tired and languid, as she
+very often did at the end of the day, although the work at Orchards Farm
+was no harder than she had always been used to at home.  There, however,
+it had been done in peace and quietness, here all was hurry and
+confusion.  It was a new and distracting thing to live in the midst of
+wrangling disputes, to be called here, shouted after there, to do bits
+of everyone's business, and to be scolded for leaving undone what she
+had never been told to do.  Altogether a heavy change from her old
+peaceful life, and she could not settle her mind to it with any comfort.
+"'Tain't the work, it's the worry I mind," she said once to Agnetta;
+but Agnetta only stared and laughed.  There was no consolation at all to
+be found in her, and all Lilac's hopes concerning her were disappointed
+as time went on.  She was the same and Orchards Farm was the same as
+they had been in the old days when Lilac had worshipped them from a
+distance; but somehow, seen quite near this glory vanished, and though
+the stylish Sunday frocks and bangles remained, they were worth nothing
+compared to a little sympathy and kindness.  Alas! these were not to be
+had.  Lilac must stand on her own feet now, as her mother had told her:
+everyone was too full of their own troubles and interests and enjoyments
+to have any thought for her.  What could she need beyond a roof over her
+head, food to eat, and clothes to wear?  Mrs Greenways and all the
+neighbours thought her a lucky child, and told her so very often; but
+Lilac did not feel lucky, she felt sad and very lonely.  After one or
+two attempts to talk to Agnetta, she resolved, however, to keep her
+troubles to herself, for Agnetta did not "understand."  Who was there
+now to understand?  None in the wide world but Uncle Joshua, and from
+him she felt as far distant as though he were in another country.  She
+became in this way, as time went on, more silent, graver, and more what
+her cousins called "old-fashioned"; and though at heart she was far more
+childlike than they, she went about her work with serious application
+like one of twice her years.  Mrs Greenways did not disapprove of this,
+and though she lost no occasion of impressing upon Lilac her smallness
+and uselessness, she soon began to find her valuable in the house: it
+was a new thing to have someone there who was steady and thorough in her
+work, and might be depended on to do it without constant reproof.  She
+was satisfied, too, that Lilac had quite got over her grief, and did not
+seem to miss her mother so much as might have been expected.  It would
+be troublesome to see the child fret and pine, and as no sign of this
+appeared she concluded it was not there.  Mrs Greenways was accustomed
+to the sort of sorrow which shows itself in violent tears and
+complaints, and she would have been surprised if she could have known
+how Lilac's lonely little heart ached sometimes for the sound of her
+mother's voice or the sight of her face; how at night, when she was shut
+safely into her attic, she would stretch out her arms towards the
+cottage on the hill, and long vainly for the days to come back which she
+had not loved half well enough while they were passing.  But no one knew
+this, and amidst the turmoil and bustle of the day no one guessed how
+lonely she was or thought of her much in any way.  She was only little
+Lilac White, an orphan who had been fortunate enough to get a good home.
+So she lived her own life, solitary, although surrounded by people; and
+while she worked her mind was full of her mother's memory--sometimes she
+even seemed to hear her words again, and to see her smile of pleasure
+when she had done anything particularly well.  She was careful,
+therefore, not to relax her efforts in the least, and though she got no
+praise for the thoroughness of her work, it was a little bit of comfort
+at the end of the day to think that she had "pleased Mother."
+
+It began soon to be a pleasure, too, when work was finished, to go out
+amongst the creatures in the farmyard.  Here she forgot her troubles and
+her loneliness for a little while, and made many satisfactory
+friendships in which there were no disappointments.  True, there was
+plenty of noise and bustle here as well as indoors, and family quarrels
+were not wanting amongst the poultry; but unlike the sharp speeches of
+Bella and Agnetta they left no bad feeling behind, and were soon settled
+by a few pecks and flaps.  Lilac was sure of a welcome when she appeared
+at the gate to distribute the small offerings she had collected for her
+various friends during the day; bits of bread, sugar, or crusts--nothing
+came amiss, and even the great lazy Chummy would waddle slowly across to
+her from the other end of the yard.  By degrees Lilac began to look
+forward to the end of the day, when she should meet these friends, and
+found great comfort in the thought that they expected her and looked out
+for her coming.  Especially she liked to be present at milking-time, and
+as often as she possibly could she stole out of the house at this hour
+to spend a few quiet moments with Ben and his cows.
+
+On this particular afternoon she saw that there was one among them she
+had not noticed before--a little cream-coloured Alderney, with slender
+black legs and dark eyes.
+
+"I like that one best of all," she said, pointing to it.
+
+Ben's voice sounded hollow as he answered, and seemed to come out of the
+middle of the cow, for his head was pressed firmly against her side.
+
+"Ah, she's a sort of a little fancy coo, she is," he said; "she belongs
+to the young master.  He thinks a lot of her.  `We'll call this one
+None-so-pretty,' says he, when he brung her home."
+
+"Why does it belong to him," asked Lilac, "more than the other cows?"
+
+"Well, it were like this 'ere," said Ben, who was fond of company and
+always willing to talk.  "This is how it wur.  None-so-pretty she caught
+cold when she'd bin here a couple of weeks, and the master he sent for
+coo-doctor.  And coo-doctor come and says: `She's in a pretty plight,'
+says he; `information of the lungs she's got, and you'll never get her
+through it.  A little dillicut scrap of a animal like that,' he says;
+'she ain't not to say fit for this part of the country!  An' so he goes
+away, and the coo gets worse, so as it's a misery to see her."
+
+Ben stopped so long in his story to quiet None-so-pretty, who wanted to
+kick over the pail, that Lilac had to put another question.
+
+"How did she get well?"
+
+"It wur along of the young master," answered Ben, "as sat up with her a
+week o' nights, and poured her drink down her throat, and poletissed her
+chest, and cockered her up like as if she'd bin a human Christian.  And
+he brung her through.  Like a skilliton she wur at fust, but she picked
+up after a bit and got saucy again.  An' ever sin that she'll foller him
+and rub her head agin' him, and come to his whistle like a dog.  An' so
+the old master, he says: `The little cow's yer own now, Peter, to do as
+you like with,' he says; `no one else'd a had the patience to bring her
+through.  An' if you'll take my advice you'll sell her, for she'll never
+be much good to us.'"
+
+"But Peter wouldn't sell her, I suppose?" asked Lilac eagerly.
+
+"No fear," replied Ben's muffled voice; "he's martal fond of
+None-so-pretty."
+
+Lilac looked with great interest at the little cow.  An odd pair of
+friends--she and Peter--and as unlike as they could possibly be, for
+None-so-pretty was as graceful and slender in her proportions as he was
+clumsy and awkward-limbed.  It was a good thing that there was someone
+to admire and like Peter, even if it were only a cow; for Lilac had not
+been a month at the farm without beginning to feel a little pity for
+him.  He was uncouth and stupid, to be sure, but it was hard, she
+thought, that he should be so incessantly worried and jeered at.  From
+the moment he entered the house to the moment he left it, there was
+something wrong in what he said or did.  If he sat down on the settle
+and wearily stretched out his long legs, someone was sure to tumble over
+them: "Peter, how stupid you are!"  If he opened his mouth to speak he
+said something laughable, and if to eat, there was something vulgar in
+his manners which called down a sharp reproof from Bella, who considered
+herself a model of refinement and good taste.  He took all this in
+unmoved silence, and seldom said a word except to talk to his father on
+farming matters; but Lilac, looking on from her quiet corner, often felt
+sorry for him, as she would have done to see any large, patient animal
+ill-treated and unable to complain.
+
+"Anyhow," she said to herself as she stood with her eyes fixed on
+None-so-pretty after Ben had done his story, "if he is common he's
+kind."
+
+Her reflections were disturbed by Ben's voice making another remark,
+which came from the side of a large red cow named Cherry:
+
+"There's not a better lot of coos, nor richer milk than what they give,
+this side Lenham."  Lilac made no answer.
+
+"An' if so be as the dairy wur properly worked they'd most pay the rent
+of this 'ere farm, with the poultry thrown in."
+
+Lilac glanced at the various feathered families outside; they were
+supposed to be Bella's charge, she knew, but she generally gave them
+over to Agnetta, who looked after them when she was inclined, and often
+forgot to search for the eggs altogether.
+
+"They wants care," continued Ben, "as well as most things.  I don't name
+no names, but the young broods had ought to be better looked after in
+the spring.  And they're worth it.  There's ducks now--chancy things is
+early ducks, but they pay well.  Git 'em hatched out early.  Feed 'em
+often.  Keep 'em warm and dry at fust.  Let 'em go into the water at the
+right time.  Kill 'em and send 'em up to Lunnon, and there you are--a
+good profit.  Why, you'll git 15 shillings the couple for ducklings in
+March!  That's not a price to sneeze at, that isn't.  I name no names,"
+he repeated mysteriously, "but them as don't choose to take the pains
+can't expect the profit."
+
+At supper that night Lilac remembered this conversation with Ben, and
+examined Peter's countenance curiously as he sat opposite to her with
+his whole being apparently engrossed by the meal.  She could not,
+however, discover any kind or pleasant expression upon it.  If it were
+there at all, it was unable to struggle through the thick dull mask
+spread over it.  Bella meanwhile had news to tell.  She had heard at
+Dimbleby's that afternoon that there was to be a grand fete in Lenham
+next week.  Fireworks and a balloon, and perhaps dancing and a band.
+Charlotte Smith said it would be splendid, and she was going to have a
+new hat on purpose.
+
+"Well, I haven't got no money to throw away on new hats and suchlike,"
+said Mrs Greenways, "but I s'pose you and Agnetta'll want to go too."
+
+"How'll we get over there?" asked Bella, looking fixedly at Peter, who
+did not raise his eyes from his plate.  Mrs Greenways turned her glance
+in the same direction, and said presently:
+
+"Well, perhaps Peter he could drive you over in the spring cart."
+
+"Hay harvest," muttered Peter, deep down in his mug; "couldn't spare
+time."
+
+"Oh, bother," said Bella.  "Then we must do with Ben."
+
+"Couldn't spare him neither," was Peter's answer.  "Heavy crop.  Want
+all the hands we can get."
+
+Bella pouted and Agnetta looked on the edge of tears.  Mrs Greenways,
+anxious to settle matters comfortably, made another suggestion.
+
+"Well, you must just drive yourselves then, Bella.  The white horse is
+quiet.  I've drove him often."
+
+"Couldn't spare the horse neither," said Peter, "nor yet the cart," and
+having finished both his meal and the subject he got up and went out of
+the room.
+
+The farmer, roused by the sound of the dispute from a nap in the window
+seat, now enquired what was going on, and was told of the difficulty.
+
+"What's to prevent 'em walking?" he asked; "it's only five miles.  If
+they're too proud to walk they'd better stop at home," and then he too
+left the room.
+
+"You don't catch _me_ walking!" exclaimed Bella; "if I can't drive I
+shan't go at all.  Getting all hot and dusty, and Charlotte Smith
+driving past us on the road with her head held up ever so high."
+
+"No more shan't I," said Agnetta, with a toss of her head.
+
+"Well, there, we'll see if we can't manage somehow," said Mrs Greenways
+coaxingly.  "If the weather's good for the hay harvest your father'll be
+in a good temper, and we'll see what we can do.  Lilac!" she added,
+turning sharply to her niece, "Molly's left out some bits of washing in
+the orchard, jest you run and fetch 'em in."
+
+Lilac picked up her sunbonnet and went out, glancing at Agnetta to see
+if she were coming too, but she did not move.  It was a cool, still
+evening after a very hot day, and all the flowers in the garden were
+holding up their drooping heads again, and giving out their sweetest
+scent as if in thankfulness for the change.  There were a great many in
+bloom now, for it was June, more than a whole month since that happy,
+miserable day when Lilac had been Queen, and as she passed Peter's own
+little bit of ground she stopped to look admiringly at them.  They
+seemed to grow here better than in other places--with a willing
+luxuriance as though in return for the affection and care which was
+evidently spent on them.  Pansies, columbines, white-fringed pinks, and
+sweet-peas all mixed up together, and yet keeping a certain order and
+not allowed to intrude upon each other.  Lilac passed on through a
+little gate which led into the kitchen garden, and as she did so became
+aware that the owner of the flowers was quite near.  She paused and
+considered within herself as to whether she should speak to him.  He was
+sitting on the stump of a cherry tree, which had been cut down to a
+convenient height from the ground; on this was placed a square piece of
+turf, so that it formed a cushion, and was evidently a customary seat.
+Near him was a row of beehives, under a slanting thatch, and their busy
+inhabitants, returning in numbers from their day's labour, hummed and
+buzzed around him, much to the annoyance of Sober, the old sheep dog,
+who lay stretched at his feet.  Tib, the ugly cat, had taken up a
+discreet position at a little distance from the hives, and sat very wide
+awake, with the only eye she possessed on the alert for any stray game
+that might pass that way.
+
+Neither Peter nor his companions saw Lilac; they all appeared absorbed
+in their own reflections, and the former had fixed his gaze vacantly on
+the copse beyond the orchard.  A little while ago she would have passed
+quickly on without a moment's hesitation, but now she felt a sort of
+sympathy with Peter.  She was lonely, and he was lonely; besides, he had
+been kind to None-so-pretty.  So presently she made a little rustle,
+which roused Sober from his slumbers.  He raised his head, and finding
+that it was a friend wagged his bushy tail and resumed his former
+position; but this roused Peter too, and he slowly turned his eyes upon
+Lilac and stared silently.  Knowing that it would be useless to wait for
+him to speak, she said timidly:
+
+"How pretty your pinks grow!"
+
+Peter got up from his seat and looked seriously over the railing at the
+pinks.
+
+"They're well enough," he said; "but the slugs and snails torment 'em
+so."
+
+"I think they're as pretty as can be," said Lilac; "and that sweet you
+can smell 'em ever so far.  We had some up yonder," she added, with a
+nod towards the hills, "but they never had such blooms as yours."
+
+"Maybe you'd like a posy," said Peter, suddenly blurting out the words
+with a great effort.
+
+Receiving a delighted answer in the affirmative he fumbled for some time
+in his pocket, and having at last produced a large clasp knife bent over
+his flower bed.
+
+The conversation having got on so far, Lilac felt encouraged to continue
+it, and looked round her for a subject.
+
+"This is a nice, pretty corner to sit in," she said; "but don't the bees
+terrify you?"
+
+Peter straightened himself up with the flowers he had cut in one hand,
+and stared in surprise.
+
+"The bees!" he repeated.
+
+He strode up to the hives, took up a handful of bees and let them crawl
+about him, which they did without any sign of anger.
+
+"Why ever don't they sting yer?" asked Lilac, shrinking away.
+
+"They know I like 'em," answered Peter, returning to his flowers.  "They
+know a lot, bees do."
+
+"I s'pose they're used to see you sitting here?" said Lilac.
+
+Peter nodded.  "They're rare good comp'ny too," he said, "when you can
+follow their carryings on, and know what they're up to."
+
+Lilac watched him thoughtfully as his large hand moved carefully amongst
+the flowers, cutting the best blossoms and adding them to the nosegay,
+which now began to take the shape of a large fan.
+
+While he had been talking of the bees his face had lost its dullness; he
+had not looked stupid at all, and scarcely ugly.  She would try and make
+him speak again.
+
+"The blossoms is over now," she remarked, looking at the trees in the
+orchard; "but there's been a rare sight of 'em this year."
+
+"There has so," answered Peter.  "It'll be a fine season for the fruit
+if so be as we get sun to ripen it.  The birds is the worst," he went
+on.  "I've seen them old jaypies come out of the woods yonder as thick
+as thieves into the orchard.  I don't seem to care about shootin' 'em,
+and scarecrows is no good."
+
+What a long sentence for Peter!
+
+"Do they now?" said Lilac sympathisingly.  "An' I s'pose," stroking Tib
+on the head, "they don't mind Tib neither?"
+
+"Not they," said Peter, with something approaching a chuckle.  "They're
+altogether too many for _her_."
+
+"She's not a _pretty_ cat," said Lilac doubtfully.
+
+"Well, n-no," said Peter, turning round to look at Tib with some regret
+in his tone.  "She ain't not to say exactly pretty, but she's a rare one
+for rats.  Ain't ye, Tib?"
+
+As if in reply Tib rose, fixed her front claws in the ground, and
+stretched her long lean body.  She was not pretty, the most favourable
+judge could not have called her so.  Her coat was harsh and wiry, her
+head small and mean, with ears torn and scarred in many battles.  Her
+one eye, fiercely green, seemed to glare in an unnaturally piercing
+manner, but this was only because she was always on the lookout for her
+enemies--the rats.  To complete her forlorn appearance she had only half
+a tail, and it was from this loss that her friendship with Peter dated,
+for he had rescued her from a trap.
+
+He seemed now to feel that her character needed defence, for he went on
+after a pause:
+
+"She'll sit an' watch for 'em to come out of the ricks by the hour,
+without ever tasting food.  Better nor any tarrier she is at it."
+
+"Ben says the rats is awful bad," said Lilac.  "They're that bold
+they'll steal the eggs, and scare off the hens when they're setting."
+
+"They do that," replied Peter, shaking his head.  "The poultry wants
+seeing to badly; but Bella she don't seem to take to it, nor yet
+Agnetta, and our hands is full outside."
+
+"I like the chickens and ducks and things," said Lilac.  "I wish Aunt'd
+let me take 'em in hand."
+
+Peter reared himself up from his bent position, and holding the big
+nosegay in one hand looked gravely down at his cousin.
+
+It was a good long distance from his height to Lilac, and she seemed
+wonderfully small and slender and delicately coloured as she stood there
+in her straight black frock and long pinafore.  She had taken off her
+sun bonnet, so that her little white face with all the hair fastened
+back from it was plainly to be seen.  It struck Peter as strange that
+such a small creature should talk of taking any more work "in hand"
+besides what she had to do already.
+
+"You hadn't ought to do hard work," he said at length; "you haven't got
+the strength."
+
+"I don't mind the work," said Lilac, drawing up her little figure.  "I'm
+stronger nor what I look.  'Taint the work as I mind--" She stopped, and
+her eyes filled suddenly with tears.
+
+Peter saw them with the greatest alarm.  Somehow with his usual
+stupidity he had made his cousin cry.  All he could do now was to take
+himself away as quickly as possible.  He went up to Sober and touched
+him gently with his foot.
+
+"Come along, old chap," he said.  "We've got to look after the lambs
+yonder."
+
+Without another word or a glance at Lilac he rolled away through the
+orchard with the dog at his heels, his great shoulders plunging along
+through the trees, and Lilac's gay bunch of flowers swinging in one
+hand.  He had quite forgotten to give it to her.
+
+She looked after him in surprise, with the tears still in her eyes.
+Then a smile came.
+
+"He's a funny one surely," she said to herself.  "Why ever did he make
+off like that?"
+
+There was no one to answer except Tib, who had jumped up into a tree and
+looked down at her with the most complete indifference.
+
+"Anyway, he means to be kind," concluded Lilac, "and it's a shame to
+flout him as they do, so it is."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT.
+
+ONLY A CHILD!
+
+  "Who is the honest man?
+  He who doth still and strongly good pursue,
+  To God, his neighbour and himself most true,
+  Whom neither force nor fawning can
+  Unpin or wrench from giving all his due."
+  _G.  Herbert_.
+
+Joshua Snell had by no means forgotten his little friend Lilac.  There
+were indeed many occasions in his solitary life when he missed her a
+great deal, and felt that his days were duller.  For on her way to and
+from school she had been used to pay him frequent visits, if only for a
+few moments at a time, dust his room, clean the murky little window, and
+bring him a bunch of flowers or a dish of gossip.
+
+In this way she was a link between him and the small world of Danecross
+down below; and in spite of his literary pursuits Joshua by no means
+despised news of his neighbour's affairs, though he often received it
+with a look of indifference.  Besides this, her visits gave him an
+opportunity for talking, which was a great pleasure to him, and one in
+which he was seldom able to indulge, except on Saturdays when he
+travelled down to the bar of the "Three Bells" for an hour's
+conversation.  He was also fond of Lilac for her own sake, and anxious
+to know if she were comfortable and happy in her new home.
+
+He soon began, therefore, to look out eagerly for her as he sat at work;
+but no little figure appeared, and he said to himself, "I shall see her
+o' Sunday at church."  But this expectation was also disappointed, and
+he learned from Bella Greenways that Lilac and Agnetta were to go in the
+evenings, it was more convenient.  Joshua could not do that; it had been
+his settled habit for years to stay at home on Sunday evening, and it
+was impossible to alter it.  So it came to pass that a whole month went
+by and he had not seen her once.  Then he said to himself, "If so be as
+they won't let her come to me, I reckon I must go and see her."  And he
+locked up his cottage one evening and set out for the farm.  Joshua was
+a welcome guest everywhere, in spite of his poverty and lowly station;
+even at the Greenways', who held their heads so high, and did not "mix",
+as Bella called it, with the "poor people."  This was partly because of
+his learning, which in itself gave him a position apart, and also
+because he had a certain dignity of character which comes of
+self-respect and simplicity wherever they are found.  Mrs Greenways was
+indeed a little afraid of him, and as anxious to make the best of
+herself in his presence as she was in that of her rector and landlord,
+Mr Leigh.
+
+"Why, you're quite a stranger, Mr Snell," she said when he appeared on
+this occasion.  "Now sit down, do, and rest yourself, and have a glass
+of something or a cup of tea."
+
+Joshua being comfortably settled with a mug of cider at his elbow she
+continued:
+
+"Greenways is over at Lenham, and Peter's out on the farm somewheres,
+but I expect they'll be in soon."
+
+The cobbler waited for some mention of Lilac, but as none came he
+proceeded to make polite enquiries about other matters, such as the
+crops and the live stock, and the chances of good weather for the hay.
+He would not ask for her yet, he thought, because it might look as
+though he had no other reason for coming.
+
+"And how did you do with your ducks this season, Mrs Greenways, ma'am?"
+he said.
+
+"Why, badly," replied Mrs Greenways in a mortified tone; "I never knew
+such onlucky broods.  A cow got into the orchard and trampled down one.
+Fifteen as likely ducklings as you'd wish to see.  And the rats scared
+off a hen just as she'd hatched out; and we lost a whole lot more with
+the cramp."
+
+"H'm, h'm, h'm," said the cobbler sympathisingly, "that was bad, that
+was.  And you ought to do well with your poultry in a fine place like
+this too."
+
+"Well, we don't," said Mrs Greenways, rather shortly; "and that's all
+about it."
+
+"They want a lot of care, poultry does," said Joshua reflectively; "a
+lot of care.  I know a little what belongs to the work of a farm.  Years
+afore I came to these parts I used to live on one."
+
+"Then p'r'aps you know what a heart-breaking, back-breaking, wearing-out
+life it is," burst out poor Mrs Greenways.  "All plague an' no profit,
+that's what it is.  It's drive, drive, drive, morning, noon, and night,
+and all to be done over again the next day.  You're never through with
+it."
+
+"Ah!  I dessay," said Joshua soothingly; "but there's your daughters
+now.  They take summat off your hands, I s'pose?  And that reminds me.
+There's little White Lilac, as we used to call her,--you find her a
+handy sort of lass, don't you?"
+
+"She's well enough in her way," said Mrs Greenways.  "I don't never
+regret giving her a home, and I know my duty to Greenways' niece; but as
+for use--she's a child, Mr Snell, and a weakly little thing too, as
+looks hardly fit to hold a broom."
+
+"Well, well, well," said Joshua, "every little helps, and I expect
+you'll find her more use than you think for.  Even a child is known by
+its doings, as Solomon says."
+
+Mrs Greenways interposed hastily, for she feared the beginning of what
+she called Joshua's "preachments."
+
+"You'd like to have seen her, maybe; but she's gone with Agnetta to the
+Vicarage to take some eggs.  Mrs Leigh likes to see the gals now and
+then."
+
+Joshua made his visit as long as he could in the hope of Lilac's return,
+but she did not appear, and at last he could wait no longer.
+
+"Well, I'll go and have a look round for Peter," he said; "and p'r'aps
+you'll send Lilac up one day to see me.  She was always a favourite of
+mine, was Lilac White.  And I'd a deal of respect for her poor mother
+too.  Any day as suits your convenience."
+
+"Oh, she can come any day as for that, Mr Snell," replied Mrs
+Greenways with a little toss of her head.  "It doesn't make no differ in
+a house whether a child like that goes or stays.  She's plenty of time
+on her hands."
+
+"That's settled then, ma'am," said Joshua, "and I shall be looking to
+see her soon."
+
+He made his farewell, leaving Mrs Greenways not a little annoyed that
+no mention had been made of Agnetta in this invitation.
+
+"Not that she'd go," she said to herself, "but he might a asked her as
+well as that little bit of a Lilac."
+
+It was quite a long time before she found it possible to allow Lilac to
+make this visit, for although she was small and useless and made no
+differ in the house, there were a wonderful number of things for her to
+do.  Lilac's work increased; other people beside Mrs Greenways
+discovered the advantage of her willing hands, and were glad to put some
+of their own business into them.
+
+Thus the care of the poultry, which had been shuffled off Bella's
+shoulders on to Agnetta, now descended from her to Lilac, the number of
+eggs brought in much increasing in consequence.  Lilac liked this part
+of her daily task; she was proud to discover the retired corners and
+lurking-places of the hens, and fill her basket with the brown and pink
+eggs.  Day by day she took more interest in her feathered family, and
+began to find distinguishing marks of character or appearance in each,
+she even made plans to defeat the inroads of the rats by coaxing her
+charges to lay their eggs in the barn, where they were more secure.
+"Hens is sillier than most things," said Ben, when she confided her
+difficulties to him; "what they've done once they'll do allers, it's no
+good fightin' with 'em."  He consented, however, to nail some boards
+over the worst holes in the barn, and by degrees, after infinite
+patience, Lilac succeeded in making some of the hens desert their old
+haunts and use their new abode.  All this was encouraging.  And about
+this time a new interest indoors arose which made her life at Orchards
+Farm less lonely, and was indeed an event of some importance to her.  It
+happened in this way.  Ever since her arrival she had watched the
+proceedings of Molly in the dairy with great attention.  She had asked
+questions about the butter-making until Molly was tired of answering,
+and had often begged to be allowed to help.  This was never refused,
+although Molly opened her eyes wide at the length of time she took to
+clean and rinse and scour, and by degrees she was trusted with a good
+deal of the work.  The day came when she implored to be allowed to do it
+all--just for once.  Molly hesitated; she had as usual a hundred other
+things to do and would be thankful for the help, but was such a bit of a
+thing to be trusted?  On the whole, from her experience of Lilac she
+concluded that she was.
+
+"You won't let on to the missus as how you did it?" she said.  And this
+being faithfully promised, Lilac was left in quiet possession of the
+dairy.  She felt almost as excited about that batch of butter as if her
+life depended on it.  Suppose it should fail?  "But there!" she said to
+herself, "I won't think of that; I will make it do," and she set to work
+courageously.  And now her habits of care and neatness and thoroughness
+formed in past years came to her service, as well as her close
+observation of Molly.  Nothing was hurried in the process, every small
+detail earnestly attended to, and at last trembling with excitement and
+triumph she saw the result of her labours.  The butter was a complete
+success.  As she stood in the cool dark dairy with the firm golden pats
+before her, each bearing the sharply-cut impression of the stamp, Lilac
+clasped her hands with delight.  She had not known such a proud moment
+in all her life, except on the day when she had been Queen.  And this
+was a different sort of pride, for it was joy in her own handiwork--
+something she herself had done with no one to help her.  "Oh," she said
+to herself, "if Mother could but see that, how rare an' pleased she'd
+be!"  Maybe she did, but how silent it was without her voice to say
+"Well done", and how blank without her face to smile on her child's
+success.
+
+There was no one to sympathise but Molly, who came in presently with
+loud exclamations of surprise.
+
+"So you've got through?  Lor'-a-mussy, what a handy little thing it is!
+And you won't ever let on to missus or any of 'em?"
+
+Lilac never did "let on."  She kept Molly's secret faithfully, and saw
+her butter packed up and driven off to Lenham without saying a word.
+And from this time forward the making up of the butter, and sometimes
+the whole process, was left in her hands.  It was not easy work, for all
+the things she had to use were too large and heavy for her small hands,
+and she had to stand on a stool to turn the handle of the big churn.
+But she liked it, and what she lacked in strength she made up in zeal;
+it was far more interesting than scrubbing floors and scouring
+saucepans.  Molly, too, was much satisfied with this new arrangement,
+for the dairy had always brought her more scolding from her mistress
+than any part of her work, and all now went on much more smoothly.
+Lilac wondered sometimes that her aunt never seemed to notice how much
+she was in the dairy, or called her away to do other things; she always
+spoke as if it were Molly alone who made the butter.  In truth Mrs
+Greenways knew all about it, and was very content to let matters go on
+as they were; but something within her, that old jealousy of Lilac and
+her mother, made it impossible for her to praise her niece for her
+services.  She could not do it without deepening the contrast between
+her own daughters and Lilac, which she felt, but would not acknowledge
+even to herself.  So Lilac got no praise and no thanks for what she did,
+and though she found satisfaction in turning out the butter well for its
+own sake, this was not quite enough.  A very small word or look would
+have contented her.  Once when her uncle said: "The butter's good this
+week," she thought her aunt must speak, and glanced eagerly at her, but
+Mrs Greenways turned her head another way and no words come.  Lilac
+felt hurt and disappointed.
+
+It was a busier time than usual at the farm just now, though there was
+always plenty for everyone to do.  It was hay harvest and there were
+extra hands at work, extra cooking to do, and many journeys to be made
+to and from the hayfield.  Lilac was on the run from morning till night,
+and even Bella and Agnetta were obliged to bestir themselves a little.
+In the big field beyond the orchard where the grass had stood so tall
+and waved its flowery heads so proudly, it was now lying low on the
+ground in the bright hot sun.  The sky was cloudless, and the farmer's
+brow had cleared a little too, for he had a splendid crop and every
+chance of getting it in well.
+
+"To-morrow's Lenham fete," said Agnetta to Lilac one evening.
+
+"It's a pity but what you can go," answered Lilac.
+
+"We are going," said Agnetta triumphantly, "spite of Peter and Father
+being so contrary; and we ain't a-going to walk there neither!"
+
+"How are you goin' to get there, then?" asked Lilac.
+
+"Mr Buckle, he's goin' to drive us over in his gig," said Agnetta.  "My
+I shan't we cut a dash?  Bella, she's goin' to wear her black silk done
+up.  We've washed it with beer and it rustles beautiful just like a new
+one.  And she's got a hat turned up on one side and trimmed with
+Gobelin."
+
+"What's that?" asked Lilac, very much interested.
+
+"It's the new blue, silly," answered Agnetta disdainfully.  Then she
+added: "My new parasol's got lace all round it, ever so deep.  I expect
+we shall be about the most stylish girls there.  Won't Charlotte Smith
+stare!"
+
+"I s'pose it's summat like a fair, isn't it?" asked Lilac.
+
+"Lor', no!" exclaimed Agnetta; "not a bit.  Not near so vulgar.  There's
+a balloon, and a promnarde, and fireworks in the evening."
+
+All these things sounded mysteriously splendid to Lilac's unaccustomed
+ears.  She did not know what any of them meant, but they seemed all the
+more attractive.
+
+"You've got to be so sober and old-fashioned like," continued Agnetta,
+"that I s'pose you wouldn't care to go even if you could, would you?
+You'd rather stop at home and work."
+
+"I'd like to go," answered Lilac; "but Molly couldn't never get through
+with the work to-morrow if we was all to go.  There's a whole lot to
+do."
+
+"Oh, of course you couldn't go," said Agnetta loftily.  "Bella and me's
+different.  We're on a different footing."
+
+Agnetta had heard her mother use this expression, and though she would
+have been puzzled to explain it, it gave her an agreeable sense of
+superiority to her cousin.
+
+In spite of soberness and gravity, Lilac felt not a little envious the
+next day when Mr Buckle drove up in his high gig to fetch her cousins
+to the fete.  She could hear the exclamations of surprise and admiration
+which fell from Mrs Greenways as they appeared ready to start.
+
+"Well," she said with uplifted hands, "you do know how to give your
+things a bit of style.  That I _will_ say."
+
+Bella had spent days of toil in preparing for this occasion, and the
+result was now so perfect in her eyes that it was well worth the labour.
+The silk skirt crackled and rustled and glistened with every movement;
+the new hat was perched on her head with all its ribbons and flowers
+nodding.  She was now engaged in painfully forcing on a pair of
+lemon-coloured gloves, but suddenly there was the sound of a crack, and
+her smile changed to a look of dismay.
+
+"There!" she exclaimed, "if it hasn't gone, right across the thumb."
+
+"Lor', what a pity," said her mother.  "Well, you can't stop to mend it;
+you must keep one hand closed, and it'll never show."
+
+Agnetta now appeared.  She was dressed in the Sunday blue, with Bella's
+silver locket round her neck and a bangle on her wrist.  But the glory
+of her attire was the new parasol; it was so large and was trimmed with
+such a wealth of cotton lace, that the eye was at once attracted to it,
+and in fact when she bore it aloft her short square figure walking along
+beneath it became quite a secondary object.
+
+Lilac watched the departure from the dairy window, which, overgrown with
+creepers, made a dark frame for the brightly-coloured picture.  There
+was Mr Buckle, a young farmer of the neighbourhood, in a light-grey
+suit with a blue satin tie and a rose in his buttonhole.  There was
+Bella, her face covered with self-satisfied smiles, mounting to his
+side.  There was Agnetta carrying the new parasol high in the air with
+all its lace fluttering.  How gay and happy they all looked!  Mrs
+Greenways stood nodding at the window.  She had meant to go out to the
+gate, but Bella had checked her.  "Lor', Ma," she said, "don't you come
+out with that great apron on--you're a perfect guy."
+
+When the start was really made, and her cousins were whirled off to the
+unknown delights of Lenham, leaving only a cloud of dust behind them,
+Lilac breathed a little sigh.  The sun was so bright, the breeze blew so
+softly, the sky was so blue--it was the very day for a holiday.  She
+would have liked to go too, instead of having a hard day's work before
+her.
+
+"Where's Lilac?" called out Mrs Greenways in her high-pitched worried
+voice.  "What on earth's got that child?  Here's everything to do and no
+one to do it.  Ah! there you are," as Lilac ran out from the dairy.
+"Now, you haven't got no time to moon about to-day.  You must stir
+yourself and help all you can."
+
+"Bees is swarmin'!" said Ben, thrusting his head in at the kitchen door,
+and immediately disappearing again.
+
+"Bother the bees!" exclaimed Mrs Greenways crossly.  But on Molly the
+news had a different effect.  It was counted lucky to be present at the
+housing of a new swarm.  She at once left her occupation, seized a
+saucepan and an iron spoon, and regardless of her mistress rushed out
+into the garden, making a hideous clatter as she went.  "There now, look
+at that!" said Mrs Greenways with a heated face.  "She's off for
+goodness knows how long, and a batch of loaves burning in the oven, and
+your uncle wanting his tea sent down into the field.  Why ever should
+they want to go swarmin' now in that contrairy way?"
+
+She opened the oven door and took out the bread as she spoke.
+
+"Now, don't you go running off, Lilac," she continued.  "There's enough
+of 'em out there to settle all the bees as ever was.  You get your
+uncle's tea and take it out, and Peter's too.  They won't neither of 'em
+be in till supper.  Hurry now."
+
+The last words were added simply from habit, for she had soon discovered
+that it was impossible to hurry Lilac.  What she did was well and
+thoroughly done, but not even the example which surrounded her at
+Orchards Farm could make her in a bustle.  The whole habit of her life
+was too strong within her to be altered.  Mrs Greenways glanced at her
+a little impatiently as she steadily made the tea, poured it into a tin
+can, and cut thick hunches of bread and butter.  "I could a done it
+myself in, half the time," she thought; but she was obliged to confess
+that Lilac's preparations if slow were always sure, and that she never
+forgot anything.
+
+Lilac tilted her sunbonnet well forward and set out, walking slowly so
+as not to spill the tea.  How blazing the sun was, though it was now
+nearly four o'clock.  In the distance she could see the end of her
+journey, the big bare field beyond the orchard full of busy figures.  As
+she passed the kitchen garden, Molly, rushing back from her encounter
+with the bees, almost ran against her.
+
+"There was two on 'em," she cried, her good-natured face shining with
+triumph and the heat of her exertions; "and we've housed 'em both
+beautiful.  Lor'! ain't it hot?"
+
+She stood with her iron weapons hanging down on each side, quite ready
+for a chat to delay her return to the house.  Molly was always
+cheerfully ready to undertake any work that was not strictly her own.
+Lilac felt sorry, as they went on their several ways, to think of the
+scolding that was waiting for her; but it was wasted pity, for Molly's
+shoulders were broad, and a scolding more or less made no manner of
+difference to them.
+
+There were all sorts and sizes of people at work in the hayfield as
+Lilac passed through it.  Machines had not yet come into use at
+Danecross, so that the services of men, women, and children were much in
+request at this busy time.  The farmer, remembering the motto, was
+determined to make his hay while the sun shone, and had collected hands
+from all parts of the neighbourhood.  Lilac knew most of them, and
+passed along exchanging greetings, to where her uncle sat on his grey
+cob at the end of the field.  He was talking to Peter, who stood by him
+with a wooden pitchfork in his hand.
+
+Lilac thought that her uncle's face looked unusually good-tempered as
+she handed up his meal to him.  He sat there eating and drinking, and
+continued his conversation with his son.
+
+"Well, and what d'ye think of Buckle's offer for the colt?"
+
+"Pity we can't sell him," answered Peter.
+
+"_Can't_ sell him!" repeated the farmer; "I'm not so sure about that.
+Maybe he'd go sound now.  He doesn't show no signs of lameness."
+
+"Wouldn't last a month on the roads," said Peter.
+
+The farmer's face clouded a little.  "Well," he said hesitatingly,
+"that's Buckle's business.  He can look him over, and if he don't see
+nothing wrong--"
+
+"We hadn't ought to sell him," said Peter in exactly the same voice.
+"He's not fit for the roads.  Take him off soft ground and he'd go queer
+in a week."
+
+"He might or he mightn't," said the farmer impatiently; "all I know is I
+want the cash.  It'd just pay that bill of Jones's, as is always
+bothering for his money.  I declare I hate going into Lenham for fear of
+meeting that chap."
+
+Peter had begun to toss the hay near him with his pitchfork.  He did not
+look at his father or change his expression, but he said again:
+
+"Knowing what we do, we hadn't ought to sell him."
+
+The farmer struck his stirrup-iron so hard with his stick that even the
+steady grey pony was startled.
+
+"I wish," he said with an oath, "that you'd never found it out then.
+I'd like to be square and straight about the horse as well as anyone.
+I've always liked best to be straight, but I'm too hard up to be so
+particular as that comes to.  It's easy enough," he added moodily, "for
+a man to be honest with his pockets full of money."
+
+"I could get the same price for None-so-pretty," said Peter after a long
+pause.  "Mrs Grey wants her--over at Cuddingham.  Took a fancy to her a
+month ago."
+
+"I'll not have her sold," said the farmer quickly.  "What's the good of
+selling her?  She's useful to us, and the colt isn't."
+
+"She ain't not exactly so _useful_ to us as the other cows," said Peter.
+"She's more of a fancy."
+
+"Well, she's yours," answered the farmer sullenly.  "You can do as you
+like with her of course; but I'm not going to be off my bargain with
+Buckle whatever you do."
+
+He shook his reins and jogged slowly away to another part of the field,
+while Peter fell steadily to work again with his pitchfork.  Lilac was
+packing the things that had been used into her basket, and glanced at
+him now and then with her thoughts full of what she had just heard.  Her
+opinion of Peter had changed very much lately.  She had found, since her
+first conversation with him, that in many things he was not stupid but
+wise.  He knew for instance a great deal about all the animals on the
+farm, their ways and habits, and how to treat them when they were ill.
+There were some matters to be sure in which he was laughably simple, and
+might be deceived by a child, but there were others on which everyone
+valued his opinion.  His father certainly deferred to him in anything
+connected with the live stock, and when Peter had discovered a grave
+defect in the colt he did not dream of disputing it.  So Lilac's feeling
+of pity began to change into something like respect, and she was sure
+too that Peter was anxious to show her kindness, though the expression
+of it was difficult to him.  Since the day when he had gone away from
+her so suddenly, frightened by her tears, they had had several talks
+together, although the speech was mostly on Lilac's side.  She shrank
+from him no longer, and sometimes when the real Peter came up from the
+depths where he lay hidden, and showed a glimpse of himself through the
+dull mask, she thought him scarcely ugly.
+
+Would he sell None-so-pretty?  She knew what it would cost him, for
+since Ben's history she had observed the close affection between them.
+There were not so many people fond of Peter that he could afford to lose
+even the love of a cow--and yet he would rather do it than let the colt
+be sold!
+
+As she turned this over in her mind Lilac lingered over her
+preparations, and when Peter came near her tossing the hay to right and
+left with his strong arms, she looked up at him and said:
+
+"I'm sorry about None-so-pretty."
+
+Peter stopped a moment, took off his straw hat and rubbed his hot red
+face with his handkerchief.
+
+"Thank yer," he answered; "so am I."
+
+"Is it _certain sure_ you'll sell her?" asked Lilac.
+
+Peter nodded.  "She'll have a good home yonder," he said; "a rare fuss
+they'll make with her."
+
+"She'll miss you though," said Lilac, shaking her head.
+
+"Well," answered Peter, "I shouldn't wonder if she did look out for me a
+bit just at first.  I've always been foolish over her since she was
+ill."
+
+"But if Uncle sells the colt I s'pose you won't sell her, will you?"
+continued Lilac.
+
+"He _won't_ sell him," was Peter's decided answer, as he turned to his
+work again.
+
+Now, nothing could have been more determined than Mr Greenways' manner
+as he rode away, but yet when Lilac heard Peter speak so firmly she felt
+he must be right.  The colt would not be sold and None-so-pretty would
+have to go in his place.  She returned to the farm more than ever
+impressed by Peter's power.  Quiet, dull Peter who seemed hardly able to
+put two sentences together, and had never an answer ready for his
+sisters' sharp speeches.
+
+That evening when Bella and Agnetta returned from Lenham, Lilac was at
+the gate.  She had been watching for them eagerly, for she was anxious
+to hear all about the grand things they had seen, and hoped they would
+be inclined to talk about it.  As they were saying goodbye to Mr Buckle
+with a great many smiles and giggles, the farmer came out.
+
+"Stop a bit, Buckle," he said, "I want a word with you about the colt.
+I've changed my mind since the morning."
+
+Lilac heard no more as she followed her cousins into the house; but
+there was no need.  Peter had been right.
+
+During supper nothing was spoken of but the fete--the balloon, the band,
+the fireworks, and the dresses, Charlotte Smith's in particular.  Lilac
+was intensely interested, and it was trying after the meal was over to
+have to help Molly in taking away the dishes, and lose so much of the
+conversation.  This business over she drew near Agnetta and made an
+attempt to learn more, but in vain.  Agnetta was in her loftiest mood,
+and though she was full of private jokes with Bella, she turned away
+coldly from her cousin.  They had evidently some subject of the deepest
+importance to talk of which needed constant whispers, titters from
+Bella, and even playful slaps now and then.  Lilac could hear nothing
+but "He says--She says," and then a burst of laughter, and "go along
+with yer nonsense."  It was dull to be left out of it all, and she
+wished more than ever that she had gone to the fete too.
+
+"Lilac," said her aunt, "just run and fetch your uncle's slippers."
+
+She was already on her way when the farmer took his pipe out of his
+mouth and looked round.  He had been moody and cross all supper-time,
+and now he glanced angrily at his two daughters as they sat whispering
+in the corner.
+
+"It's someone else's turn to run, it seems to me," he said; "Lilac's
+been at it all day.  You go, Agnetta."  And as Agnetta left the room
+with an injured shrug, he continued:
+
+"Seems too as if Lilac had all the work and none of the fun.  You'd like
+an outing as well as any of 'em--wouldn't you, my maid?"
+
+Lilac did not know what to make of such unexpected kindness.  As a rule
+her uncle seemed hardly to know that she was in the house.  She did not
+answer, for she was very much afraid of him, but she looked appealingly
+at her aunt.
+
+"I'm sure, Greenways," said the latter in an offended tone, "you needn't
+talk as if the child was put upon.  And your own niece, and an orphan
+besides.  I know my duty better.  And as for holidays and fetes and
+such, 'tisn't nateral to suppose as how Lilac would want to go to 'em
+after the judgment as happened to her directly after the last one.
+Leastways, not yet awhile.  There'd be something ondacent in it, to my
+thinking."
+
+"Well, there! it doesn't need so much talking," replied the farmer.
+"I'm not wanting her to go to fetes.  But there's Mr Snell--he was
+asking for her yesterday when I met him.  Let her go tomorrow and spend
+the day with him."
+
+"If there is a busier day than another, it's Thursday," said Mrs
+Greenways fretfully.
+
+"Why, as to that, she's only a child, and makes no differ in the house,
+as you always say," remarked the farmer; "anyhow, I mean her to go
+to-morrow, and that's all about it."
+
+Lilac went to bed that night with a heart full of gratitude for her
+uncle's kindness, and delight at the promised visit; but her last
+thought before she slept was: "I'm sorry as how None-so-pretty has got
+to be sold."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE.
+
+COMMON THINGS.
+
+  "...Find out men's wants and will
+  And meet them there, all earthly joys grow less
+  To the one joy of doing kindnesses."
+  _George Herbert_.
+
+Lilac could hardly believe her own good fortune when nothing happened
+the next morning to prevent her visit, not even a cross word nor a
+complaint from her aunt, who seemed to have forgotten her objections of
+last night and to be quite pleased that she should go.  Mrs Greenways
+put a small basket into her hand before she started, into which she had
+packed a chicken, a pot of honey, and a pat of fresh butter.
+
+"There," she said, "that's a little something from Orchards Farm, tell
+him.  The chick's our own rearing, and the honey's from Peter's bees,
+and the butter's fresh this morning."
+
+She nodded and smiled good-naturedly; Joshua should see there was no
+stint at the farm.  "Be back afore dusk," she called after Lilac as she
+watched her from the gate.
+
+So there was nothing to spoil the holiday or to damp Lilac's enjoyment
+in any way, and she felt almost as merry as she used to be before she
+came to live in the valley, and had begun to have cares and troubles.
+For one whole day she was going to be White Lilac again, with no
+anxieties about the butter; she would hear no peevish voices or
+wrangling disputes, she would have kindness and smiles and sunshine all
+round her, and the blue sky above.  In this happy mood everything along
+the well-known road had new beauties, and when she turned up the hill
+and felt the keener air blow against her face, it was like the greeting
+of an old friend.  The very flowers in the tall overgrown hedges were
+different to those which grew in the valley, and much sweeter; she
+pulled sprays of them as she went along until she had a large straggling
+bunch to carry as well as her basket, and so at last entered Joshua's
+cottage with both hands full.
+
+"Now, Uncle Joshua," she said, when the first greetings over he had
+settled to his work again, "I've come to dinner with you, and I've
+brought it along with me, and until it's ready you're not to look once
+into the kitchen.  You couldn't never guess what it is, so you needn't
+try; and you mustn't smell it more nor you can help while it's cooking."
+
+It was a proud moment for Lilac when, the fowl being roasted to a turn,
+the table nicely laid, and the bunch of flowers put exactly in the
+middle, she led the cobbler up to the feast.  Even if Joshua had smelt
+the fowl he concealed it very well, and his whole face expressed the
+utmost astonishment, while Lilac watched him in an ecstasy of delight.
+
+"My word!" he exclaimed, "its fit for a king.  I feel," looking down at
+his clothes, "as if I ought to have on my Sunday best."
+
+Lilac was almost too excited to eat anything herself, and presently,
+when she saw Joshua pause after his first mouthful, she enquired
+anxiously:
+
+"Isn't it good, Uncle?"
+
+"Fact is," he answered, "it's _too_ good.  I don't really feel as how I
+ought to eat such dillicate food.  Not being ill, or weak, or anyway
+picksome in my appetite."
+
+"I made sure you'd say that," said Lilac triumphantly; "and I just made
+up my mind I'd cook it without telling what it was.  You've got to eat
+it now, Uncle Joshua.  You couldn't never be so ungrateful as to let it
+spoil."
+
+"There's Mrs Wishing now," said Joshua, stilt hesitating, "a sickly
+ailing body as 'ud relish a morsel like this."
+
+It was not until Lilac had set his mind at rest by promising to take
+some of the fowl to Mrs Wishing before she returned, that he was able
+to abandon himself to thorough enjoyment.  Lilac knew then by his
+silence that her little feast was heartily appreciated, and she would
+not disturb him by a word, although there were many things she wanted to
+say.  But at last Joshua had finished.
+
+"A fatter fowl nor a finer, nor a better cooked one couldn't be," he
+said, as he laid down his knife and fork.  "Not a bit o' dryness in the
+bird: juicy all through and as sweet as a nut."
+
+Ready now for a little conversation, he puffed thoughtfully at his pipe
+while Lilac stood near washing the dishes and plates.
+
+"It's thirty years ago," he said, speaking in a jerky voice so as not to
+interfere with the comfort of his pipe, "since I had a fowl for dinner--
+and I mind very well when it was.  It was my wedding-day.  Away up in
+the north it was, and parson gave the feast."
+
+"Was that when you used to play the clar'net in church, Uncle?" asked
+Lilac.
+
+Joshua nodded.
+
+"We was a clar'net and a fiddle and a bass viol," he said reflectively.
+"Never kept time--the bass viol didn't.  Couldn't never get it into his
+head.  He wasn't never any shakes of a player--and he was a good feller
+too."
+
+"Did they play at your wedding?" asked Lilac.
+
+"They did that," he answered; "in church and likewise after the
+ceremony.  Lor'! to hear how the bass viol did tag behind in
+_Rockingham_.  I can hear him now.  'Twas like two solos being played,
+as one might say.  No unity at all.  I never hear that tune now but what
+it carries me back to my wedding-day and the bass viol; and the taste of
+that fowl's done the same thing.  It's a most pecooliar thing, is the
+memory."
+
+Lilac liked to hear Joshua talk about old days, but she was eager too to
+tell her own news.  There was so much that he did not know: all about
+hay-harvest, and her butter-making, about Lenham fete, and her cousins,
+and, finally, all about None-so-pretty and Peter.  "I do think," she
+added, "as how I like him best of any of 'em, for all they say he's so
+common."
+
+"Common or uncommon, they'd do badly without him," muttered Joshua.
+"He's the very prop and pillar of the place, is Peter; if a wall's
+strong enough to hold the roof up, you don't ask if it's made of marble
+or stone."
+
+"Are common things bad things?" asked Lilac suddenly.
+
+Joshua took his pipe out of his mouth and looked at her in some
+surprise.
+
+"Common things--eh?" he repeated.
+
+"Yes, Uncle," said Lilac hesitatingly, and trying to think of how to
+make it clear.  But she could only add:
+
+"They call the pigs common too."
+
+"Well, as to pigs," said Joshua, "I wish they was commoner still.  I
+don't despise a bit of bacon myself.  I call that a good thing anyhow.
+When one comes to look at it," he continued after a few puffs at his
+pipe, "the best things of all is common.  The things as is under our
+feet and nigh to our hand and easy to be got.  There's the flowers now--
+the common ones which grow so low as any child can pick 'em in the
+fields, daisies and such.  There's the blue sky as we can all see, poor
+as well as rich.  There's rain and sunshine and air and a heap else as
+belongs to all alike, and which we couldn't do without.  The common
+things is the best things, don't you make any mistake about that.
+There's your own name now--Lilac.  It's a common bush lilac is; it grows
+every bit as well in a little bit of garden nigh the road as in a grand
+park, and it hasn't no rare colours to take the eye.  And yet on a
+sunshiny day after rain the folks passing'll say, `Whatever is it as
+smells so beautiful?'  Why it's just the common lilac bush.  You ought
+to be like that in a manner of speaking--not to try and act clever and
+smart so as to make folks stare, but to be good-tempered and peaceful
+and loving, so as they say when you leave 'em, `What made the place so
+pleasant?  Why, it was Lilac White.  She ain't anything out of the
+common, but we miss her now she's gone--'"
+
+The frequent mention of her name reminded Lilac of something she wanted
+to say, and she broke in suddenly:
+
+"Why, I've never thought to thank you, Uncle, for all that bloom you got
+me on May Day.  What a long way back it do seem!"
+
+Joshua looked perplexed.
+
+"What's the child talking on?" he said.  "I didn't get no flowers."
+
+"Whoever in all the world could it a been then?" said Lilac slowly.
+"You're sure you haven't forgotten, Uncle Joshua?"
+
+"Sartain sure!"
+
+"You didn't ask no one to get it?"
+
+"Never mentioned a word to a livin' bein'."  Lilac stared thoughtfully
+at the cobbler, who had now gone back to his little shed and was hard at
+work.
+
+"P'r'aps, then," she said, "'twarn't you neither who sent Mother's
+cactus down to the farm?"
+
+"Similarly," replied he, "it certainly was _not_; so you've got more
+friends than you reckoned for, you see."
+
+Lilac stood in the doorway, her bonnet dangling in one hand, her eyes
+fixed absently on Joshua's brown fingers.
+
+"I made sure," she said, "as how it was you.  I couldn't think as there
+was anybody else to mind."
+
+It was getting late.  Without looking at the clock she knew that her
+holiday would soon be over, because through Joshua's little window there
+came a bright sun beam which was never there till after five.  She tied
+on her bonnet, prepared a choice morsel of chicken for Mrs Wishing, and
+set out on her further journey after a short farewell to the cobbler.
+Joshua never liked saying goodbye, and did it so gruffly that it might
+have sounded sulky to the ear of a stranger, but Lilac knew better.  She
+had a "goodish step" before her, as she called it to herself, and if she
+were to get back to the farm before dusk she must make haste.  So she
+hurried on, and soon in the distance appeared the two little white
+cottages side by side, perched on the edge of the steep down.  The one
+in which she had lived with her mother was empty, and as she got close
+to it and stopped to look over the paling into the small strip of
+garden, she felt sorry to see how forlorn and deserted it looked.  It
+had always been so trim and neat, and its white hearthstone and open
+door had invited the passer-by to enter.  Now the window shutters were
+fastened, the door was locked, the straggling flowers and vegetables
+were mixed up with tall weeds and nettles--it was all lifeless and cold.
+It was a pity.  Mother would not have liked to see it.  Lilac pushed
+her hand through the palings and managed to pick some sweet-peas which
+were trailing themselves helplessly about for want of support, then she
+went on to the next gate.  Poor Mrs Wishing was very lonely now that
+her only neighbour was gone; very few people passed over that way or
+came up so far from Danecross.  Sometimes when Dan'l had a job on in the
+woods he was away for days and she saw no one at all, unless she was
+able to get to the cobbler's cottage, and that was seldom.  Lilac
+knocked gently at the half-open door, and hearing no answer went in.
+
+Mrs Wishing was there, sitting asleep in a chair by the hearth with her
+head hanging uncomfortably on one side; her dress was untidy, her hair
+rough, and her face white and pinched.  Lilac cast one glance at her and
+then looked round the room.  There were some white ashes on the hearth,
+a kettle hanging over them by its chain, and at Mrs Wishing's elbow
+stood an earthenware teapot, from which came a faint sickly smell; and
+when Lilac saw that she nodded to herself, for she knew what it meant.
+The next moment the sleeper opened her large grey eyes and gazed
+vacantly at her visitor.
+
+"It's me," said Lilac.  "It's Lilac White."
+
+Mrs Wishing still gazed without speaking; there was an unearthly
+flickering light in her eyes.  At last she muttered indistinctly:
+
+"You're just like her."
+
+Not in the least alarmed or surprised at this condition, Lilac glanced
+at the teapot and said reproachfully:
+
+"You've been drinking poppy tea, and you promised Mother you wouldn't do
+it no more."
+
+Mrs Wishing struggled feebly against the drowsiness which overpowered
+her, and murmured apologetically:
+
+"I didn't go to do it, but it seemed as if I couldn't bear the pain."
+
+Lilac set down her basket, and opened the door of a cupboard near the
+chimney corner.
+
+"Where's your kindlin's?" she asked.  "I'll make you a cup of real tea,
+and that'll waken you up a bit.  And Uncle Joshua's sent you a morsel of
+chicken."
+
+"Ha'n't got no kindlin's and no tea," murmured Mrs Wishing.  "Give me a
+drink o' water from the jug yonder."
+
+No tea!  That was an unheard-of thing.  As Lilac brought the water she
+said indignantly:
+
+"Where's Mr Wishing then?  He hadn't ought to go and leave you like
+this without a bit or a drop in the house."
+
+Mrs Wishing seemed a little refreshed by the water and was able to
+speak more distinctly.  She sat up in her chair and made a few listless
+attempts to fasten up her hair and put herself to rights.
+
+"'Tain't Dan'l's fault this time," she said; "he's up in the woods
+felling trees for a week.  They're sleeping out till the job's done.  He
+did leave me money, and I meant to go down to the shop.  But then I took
+bad and I couldn't crawl so far, and nobody didn't pass."
+
+"And hadn't you got nothing in the house?" asked Lilac.
+
+"Only a crust a' bread, and I didn't seem to fancy it.  I craved so for
+a cup a' tea.  And I had some dried poppy heads by me.  So I held out as
+long as I could, and nobody didn't come.  And this morning I used my
+kindlin's and made the tea.  And when I drank it I fell into a blessed
+sleep, and I saw lots of angels, and their harps was sounding beautiful
+in my head all the time.  When I was a gal there was a hymn--it was
+about angels and golden crownds and harps, but I can't put it rightly
+together now.  So then I woke and there was you, and I thought you was a
+sperrit.  Seems a pity to wake up from a dream like that.  But _I_
+dunno."
+
+She let her head fall wearily back as she finished.  Lilac was not in
+the least interested by the vision.  She was accustomed to hear of Mrs
+Wishing's angels and harps, and her mind was now entirely occupied by
+earthly matters.
+
+"What you want is summat to eat and drink," she said, "and I shall just
+have to run back to Uncle Joshua's for some bread and tea.  But first
+I'll get a few sticks and make you a blaze to keep you comp'ny."
+
+Mrs Wishing's eyes rested an her like those of a child who is being
+comforted and taken care of, as having collected a few sticks she knelt
+on the hearth and fanned them into a blaze with her pinafore.
+
+"You couldn't bide a little?" she said doubtfully, as Lilac turned
+towards the door.
+
+"I'll be back in no time," said Lilac, "and then you shall have a nice
+supper, and you mustn't take no more of this," pointing to the teapot.
+"You know you promised Mother."
+
+"I didn't _go to_," repeated Mrs Wishing submissively; "but it seemed
+as if I couldn't bear the gnawing in my inside."
+
+It did not take long for Lilac, filled with compassion for her old
+friend, to run back to the cobbler's cottage; but there she was delayed
+a little, for Joshua had questions to ask, although he was ready and
+eager to fill her basket with food.  The return was slower, for it was
+all uphill and her burden made a difference to her speed, so that it was
+long past sunset when she reached Mrs Wishing for the second time.
+Then, after coaxing her to eat and drink, Lilac had to help her upstairs
+and put her to bed like a child, and finally to sit by her side and talk
+soothingly to her until she dropped into a deep sleep.  Her duties over,
+and everything put ready to.  Mrs Wishing's hand for the next morning,
+she now had time to notice that it was quite dusk, and that the first
+stars were twinkling in the sky.  With a sudden start she remembered her
+aunt's words: "Be back afore dusk," and clasped her hands in dismay.  It
+was no use to hurry now, for however quickly she went the farm would
+certainly be closed for the night before she reached it.  Should she
+stay where she was till the morning?  No, it would be better to take the
+chance of finding someone up to let her in.  Mrs Wishing would be all
+right now that Joshua knew about her; "and anyway, I'm glad I came,"
+said Lilac to herself, "even if Aunt does scold a bit."
+
+With this thought to console her, she stepped out into the cool summer
+night, and began her homeward journey.  It was not very dark, for it was
+midsummer--near Saint Barnabas Day, when there is scarcely any night at
+all--
+
+  "Barnaby Bright
+  All day and no night!"
+
+Lilac had often heard her mother say that rhyme, and she remembered it
+now.  It was all very, very still, so that all manner of sounds too low
+to have been noticed amongst the noises of the day were now plainly to
+be heard.  A soft wind went whispering and sighing to itself in the
+trees overhead, carrying with it the sweetness of the hayfields and the
+honeysuckle in the hedges, owls hooted mysteriously, and the frogs
+croaked in some distant pond.  Creatures never seen in the daytime were
+now awake and busy.  As Lilac ran along, the bats whirred close past her
+face, and she saw in the grass by the wayside the steady little light of
+the glow-worms.  It was certainly very late; there was hardly a glimmer
+of hope that anyone would be up at the farm.  It was equally certain
+that, if there were, a scolding waited for Lilac.  Either way it was
+bad, she thought.  She wanted to go to bed, for she was very tired, but
+she did not want to be scolded to-night; she could bear that better in
+the morning.  When she reached the house, therefore, and found it all
+silent and dark, with no light in any window and no sound of any
+movement, she hardly knew whether to be glad or sorry.  But presently,
+as she stood there forlornly, with only the sky overhead full of stars
+blinking their cold bright eyes at her, she began to long to creep in
+somewhere and rest.  Her limbs ached, her head felt heavy, and her hard
+little bed seemed a luxury well worth the expense of a scolding.  Should
+she venture to knock at the door?  She had almost determined on this
+bold step, when quite suddenly a happy idea came to her.  There would
+perhaps be some door open in the outbuildings, either in the loft or the
+barn or the stables, where she could get in and find shelter for the
+night.  It was worth trying at any rate.  With renewed hope she ran
+across the strawyard and tried the great iron ring in the stable door.
+It was not locked.  Here were shelter and rest at last, and no one to
+scold!
+
+She crept in, and was just closing the heavy door when towards her,
+across the rickyard, came the figure of a man.  His head was bent so
+that she could not see his face, but she thought from his lumbering walk
+that it must be Peter, and in a moment it flashed across her mind that
+he had just got back from Cuddingham.  While she stood hesitating just
+within the door the man came quite close, and before she could call out
+the key rattled in the lock and heavy footsteps tramped away again.
+Then it was Peter.  But surely he must have seen her, and if so why had
+he locked her in?  Anyhow here she was for the night, and the next thing
+to do was to find a bed.  She groped her way past the stalls of the
+three Pleasants, whose dwelling she had invaded, to the upright ladder
+which led to the loft.  The horses were all lying down after their hard
+day's work, and only one of them turned his great head with a rattle of
+his halter, to see who this small intruder could be.  Lilac clambered up
+the ladder and was soon in the dark fragrant-smelling loft above, where
+the trusses of hay and straw were mysteriously grouped under the low
+thick beams.  There was no lack of a soft warm nest here, and the close
+neighbourhood of the Pleasants made it feel secure and friendly; nothing
+could possibly be better.  She took off her shoes, curled herself up
+cosily in the hay, and shut her weary eyes.  Presently she opened them
+drowsily again, and then discovered that her lodging was shared by a
+companion, for on the rafters just above her head, her single eye
+gleaming in the darkness, sat Peter's cat Tib.  Lilac called to her, but
+she took no notice and did not move, having her own affairs to conduct
+at that time of night.  Lilac watched her dreamily for a little while,
+and then her thoughts wandered on to Peter and became more and more
+confused.  He got mixed up with Joshua, and the cactus and
+None-so-pretty and heaps of white flowers.  "The common things are the
+best things," she seemed to hear over and over again.  Then quite
+suddenly she was in Mrs Wishing's cottage, and the loft was filled with
+the heavy sickly smell of poppy tea: it was so strong that it made her
+feel giddy and her eyelids seemed pressed down by a firm hand.  After
+that she remembered nothing more that night.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN.
+
+THE CREDIT OF THE FARM.
+
+  "Many littles make a mickle."--_Scotch Proverb_.
+
+She was awakened the next morning by trampling noises in the stable
+below, and starting up could not at first make out where she was.  The
+sun was shining through a rift in the loft door, Tib was gone, cocks
+were crowing outside, all the world was up and busy.  She could hear
+Ben's gruff voice and the clanking of chains and harness, and soon he
+and the three horses had left the stable and gone out to their day's
+work.  It must be late, therefore, and she must lose no time in
+presenting herself at the house.  Perhaps it might be possible, she
+thought, to get up to her attic without seeing anyone, and tidy herself
+a bit first; she should then have more courage to face her aunt, for at
+present with her rough hair and pieces of hay and straw clinging to her
+clothes, she felt like some little stray wanderer.  She approached the
+house cautiously and peeped in at the back door before entering, to see
+who was in the kitchen.  Bella was there talking to Molly, whose broad
+red face was thrust eagerly forward as though she were listening to
+something interesting.  They were indeed so deeply engaged that Lilac
+felt sure they would not notice her, and she took courage and went in.
+
+"It's a mercy she wasn't killed," Molly was saying.  "She's no light
+weight to fall, isn't the missus."
+
+"It's completely upset me," said Bella in a faint voice, with one hand
+on her heart.  "I tremble all over still."
+
+"And to think," said Molly, "as it was only yesterday I said to myself,
+`I'll darn that carpet before I'm an hour older'."
+
+"Well, it's a pity you didn't," said Bella sharply; "just like your
+careless ways."
+
+Molly shook her head.
+
+"'Twasn't to _be_," she said.  "'Twasn't for nothing that I spilt the
+salt twice, and dreamt of water."
+
+"The doctor says it's a bad sprain," continued Bella; "and it's likely
+she'll be laid up for a month.  Perfect rest's the only thing."
+
+"_I_ had a cousin," said Molly triumphantly, "what had a similar
+accident.  A heavy woman she was, like the missus in build.  Information
+set in with _her_ and she died almost immediate."
+
+Lilac did not wait to hear more; she made her escape safely to her
+attic, and soon afterwards found Agnetta and learnt from her the history
+of the accident.  Mrs Greenways had had a bad fall; she had caught her
+foot in a hole in the carpet and twisted her ankle, and the doctor said
+it was a wonder she had not broken any bones.  Everyone in the house had
+so much to say, and was so excited about this misfortune, that Lilac's
+little adventure was passed over without notice, and the scolding she
+had dreaded did not come at all.  Poor Mrs Greenways had other things
+to think of as she lay groaning on the sofa, partly with pain and partly
+at the prospect before her.  To be laid up a month!  It was easy for the
+doctor to talk, but what would become of things?  Who would look after
+Molly?  Who would see to the dairy?  It would all go to rack and ruin,
+and she must lie here idle and look on.  Her husband stood by trying to
+give comfort, but every word he said only seemed to make matters worse.
+
+"Why, there's Bella now," he suggested; "she ought to be able to take
+your place for a bit."
+
+"And that just shows how much you know about the indoors work,
+Greenways," said his wife fretfully; "to talk of Bella!  Why, I'd as
+soon trust the dairy to Peter's cat as Bella--partikler now she's got
+that young Buckle in her head.  She don't know cream from buttermilk."
+
+"Why, then, you must just leave the butter to Molly as usual, and let
+the girls see after the rest," said Mr Greenways soothingly.
+
+"Oh, it's no use talking like that," said his wife impatiently; "it's
+only aggravating to hear you.  I suppose you think things are done in
+the house without heads or hands either.  Girls indeed!  There's
+Agnetta, knows no more nor a baby, and only that little bit of a Lilac
+as can put her hand to anything."
+
+Finding his efforts useless, Mr Greenways shrugged his shoulders and
+went out, leaving his wife alone with her perplexities.
+
+The more she thought them over the worse they seemed.  To whom could she
+trust whilst she was helpless?  Who would see that the butter was ready
+and fit for market?  Not Bella, not Agnetta, and certainly not Molly.
+Really and truly there was only that little bit of a Lilac, as she
+called her, to depend on--she would do her work just as well whether she
+were overlooked or not, Mrs Greenways felt sure.  It was no use to shut
+her eyes to it any longer, Lilac White was not a burden but a support,
+not useless but valuable, only a child, but more dependable than many
+people of twice her years.  It was bitter to poor Mrs Greenways to
+acknowledge this, even to herself, for the old jealousy was still strong
+within her.
+
+"I s'pose," she said with a groan, "there was something in Mary White's
+upbringing after all.  I'm not agoin' to own up to it, though, afore
+other folks."
+
+When a little later Lilac was told that her aunt wanted her, she thought
+that the scolding had come at last, and went prepared to bear it as well
+as she could.  It was, however, for a surprisingly different purpose.
+
+"Look here, Lilac," said Mrs Greenways carelessly, "you've been a good
+deal in the dairy lately, and you ought to have picked up a lot about
+it."
+
+"I can make the butter all myself, Aunt," replied Lilac, "without Molly
+touching it."
+
+"Well, I hope you're thankful for such a chance of learning," said Mrs
+Greenways; "not but what you're a good child enough, I've nothing to say
+against you.  But what I want to say is this: Molly can't do everything
+while I'm laid by, and I think I shall take her from the dairy-work
+altogether, and let you do it."
+
+Lilac's eyes shone with delight.  Her aunt spoke as though she were
+bestowing a favour, and she felt it indeed to be such.
+
+"Oh! thank you, Aunt," she cried.  "I'm quite sure as how I can do it,
+and I like it ever so much."
+
+"With Agnetta to help you I dessay you'll get through with it," said
+Mrs Greenways graciously, and so the matter was settled.  Lilac was
+dairymaid!  No longer a little household drudge, called hither and
+thither to do everyone's work, but an important person with a business
+and position of her own.  What an honour it was!  There was only one
+drawback--there was no mother to rejoice with her, or to understand how
+glad she felt about it.  Lilac was obliged to keep her exultation to
+herself.  She would have liked to tell Peter of her advancement, but
+just now he was at work on some distant part of the farm, and she saw
+him very seldom, for her new office kept her more within doors than
+usual.  The good-natured Molly was, however, delighted with the change,
+and full of wonder at Lilac's cleverness.
+
+"It's really wonderful," she said; "and what beats me is that it allus
+turns out the same."
+
+With this praise Lilac had to be content, and she busied herself
+earnestly in her own little corner with increasing pride in her work.
+Sometimes, it is true, she looked enviously at Agnetta, who seemed to
+have nothing to do but enjoy herself after her own fashion.  Since
+Lenham fete Bella and she had had some confidential joke together, which
+they carried on by meaning nods and winks and mysterious references to
+"Charlie."  They were also more than ever engaged in altering their
+dresses and trimming their hats, and although Lilac was kept completely
+outside all this, she soon began to connect it with the visits of young
+Mr Buckle.  She thought it a little unkind of Agnetta not to let her
+into the secret, and it was dull work to hear so much laughter going on
+without ever joining in it; but very soon she knew what it all meant.
+
+"Heard the news?" cried Agnetta, rushing into the dairy, then, without
+waiting for an answer, "Bella's goin' to get married.  Guess who to?"
+
+"Young Mr Buckle," said Lilac without a moment's hesitation.
+
+"As soon as ever Ma's about again the wedding's to be," said Agnetta
+exultingly.  "I'm to be bridesmaid, and p'r'aps Charlotte Smith as
+well."  Lilac, who had stopped her scrubbing to listen, now went on with
+it, and Agnetta looked down at her kneeling figure with some contempt.
+
+"What a lot of trouble you take over it!" she said.  "Molly used to do
+it in half the time."
+
+"If I ain't careful," answered Lilac, "the butter'd get a taste."
+
+"I'll help you a bit," said her cousin condescendingly.  "I'll rinse
+these pans for you."
+
+Lilac was glad to have Agnetta's company, for she wanted to hear all
+about Bella's wedding; but Agnetta's help she was not so anxious for,
+because she usually had to do the work all over again.  Agnetta's idea
+of excellence was to get through her work quickly, to make it look well
+outside, to polish the part that showed and leave the rest undone.
+Speed and show had always been the things desired in the household at
+Orchards Farm--not what _was_ good but what _looked_ good, and could be
+had at small expense and labour.  Beneath the smart clothing which Mrs
+Greenways and her daughters displayed on Sundays, strange discoveries
+might have been made.  Rents fastened up with pins, stains hidden by
+stylish scarves and mantles, stockings unmended, boots trodden down or
+in holes.  A feather in the hat, a bangle on the arm, and a bunched-up
+dress made up for these deficiencies.  "If it don't show it don't
+matter," Bella was accustomed to say.  Agnetta paused to rest after
+about two minutes.
+
+"Bella won't have nothing of this sort to do after she's married," she
+said.  "Charlie says she needn't stir a finger, not unless she likes.
+She'll be able to sit with her hands before her just like a lady."
+
+"I shouldn't care about being a lady if that's what I had to do," said
+Lilac.  "I should think it would be dull.  I'd rather see after the
+farm, if I was Bella."
+
+"You don't mean to tell me you _like work_?" said Agnetta, staring.
+"You wouldn't do it, not if you weren't obliged?  'Tain't natural."
+
+"I like some," said Lilac.  "I like the dairy work and I like feeding
+the poultry.  And I want to learn to milk, if Ben'll teach me.  And in
+the spring I mean to try and get ever such a lot of early ducks."
+
+"Well, I hate all that," said Agnetta.  "Now, if I could choose I
+wouldn't live on a farm at all.  I'd have lots of servants, and silk
+gownds and gold bracelets and broaches, and satting furniture, and a
+carridge to drive in every day.  An' I'd lie in bed ever so late in the
+mornings and always do what I liked."
+
+Time went on and Mrs Greenway's ankle got better, so that although
+still lame she was able to hobble about with a stick, and find out
+Molly's shortcomings much as usual.  During her illness she had relied a
+good deal on Lilac and softened in her manner towards her, but now the
+old feeling of jealousy came back, and she found it impossible to praise
+her for the excellence of the dairy-work.  "I can't somehow bring my
+tongue to it," she said to herself; "and the better she behaves the less
+I can do it."  One day the farmer came back from Lenham in a good
+humour.
+
+"Benson asked if we'd got a new dairymaid," he said to his wife; "the
+butter's always good now.  Which of 'em does it?"
+
+"Oh," said Mrs Greenways carelessly, "the girls manage it between 'em,
+and I look it over afore it goes."
+
+Lilac heard it, for she had come into the room unnoticed, and for a
+second she stood still, uncertain whether to speak, fixing a reproachful
+gaze on her aunt.  What a shame it was!  Was this her reward for all her
+patience and hard work?  Never a word of praise, never even the credit
+of what she did!  On her lips were some eager angry words, but she did
+not utter them.  She turned and ran upstairs to her own little attic.
+Her heart was full; she could see no reason for this injustice: it was
+very, very hard.  What would they do, she went on to think, if she left
+the butter to Bella and Agnetta to manage between them?  What would her
+aunt say then?
+
+Trembling with indignation she sat down on her bed and buried her face
+in her hands.  At first she was too angry to cry, but soon she felt so
+lonely, with such a great longing for a word of comfort and kindness,
+that the tears came fast.  After that she felt a little better, rubbed
+her eyes on her pinafore, and looked up at the small window through
+which there streamed some bright rays of the afternoon sun.  What was it
+that lighted the room with such a glory?  Not the sunshine alone.  It
+rested on something in the window, which stood out in gorgeous splendour
+from the white bareness of its surroundings--the cactus had bloomed!
+Yes, the cactus had really burst into two blossoms, of such size and
+brilliancy that with the sunlight upon them they were positively
+dazzling to behold.  Lilac sat and blinked her red eyes at them in
+admiration and wonder.  She had watched the two buds with tender
+interest, and feared they would never unfold themselves.  Now they had
+done it, and how beautiful they were!  How Mother would have liked them!
+
+Her next thought was, as she went closer to examine them, that she must
+tell Peter.  She remembered now, that, occupied with her own affairs and
+interests, she had never thanked him for two kind things he had done.
+She was quite sure that he had got the flowers for her on May Day, and
+had brought the cactus down from the cottage, yet she had said nothing.
+How ungrateful she had been!  She knew now how hard it was not to be
+thanked for one's services.  Did Peter mind?  He must be pretty well
+used to it, for certainly no one ever thanked him for anything, and as
+for praise that was out of the question.  If, as Uncle Joshua had said,
+he was the prop of the house, it was taken for granted, and no one
+thought of saying, "Well done, Peter!"
+
+Yet he never complained.  He went patiently on in his dull way, keeping
+his pains and troubles to himself.  How seldom his face was brightened
+by pleasure, and yet Lilac remembered when he had been talking to her
+about his animals or farming matters, that she had seen it change
+wonderfully.  Some inner feeling had beamed out from it, and for a few
+minutes Peter was a different creature.  It was a pity that he did not
+always look like that; no one at such times could call him stupid or
+ugly.  "Anyway," concluded Lilac, "he's been kind, and I'll thank him as
+soon as ever I can."
+
+Her sympathy for Peter made her own trouble seem less, and she went
+downstairs cheerfully with her mind bent on managing a little talk with
+him as soon as possible.  Supper-time would not do, because Bella and
+Agnetta were there, and afterwards Peter was so sleepy.  It must be
+to-morrow.  As it happened things turned out fortunately for Lilac, and
+required no effort on her part, for Mrs Greenways discovered the next
+day that someone must do some shopping in Lenham.  There were things
+wanted that Dimbleby did not keep, and the choice of which could not be
+trusted to a man.
+
+"I wonder," she said, "if I could make shift to get into the cart--but
+if I did I couldn't never get in and out at the shops."
+
+She looked appealingly at her elder daughter.
+
+"The cart's _going_ in with the butter," she added.
+
+But Bella was not inclined to take the hint.
+
+"You don't catch me driving into Lenham with the cart full of butter and
+eggs and such," she said.  "Whatever'd Charlie say?  Why shouldn't Lilac
+go?  She's sharp enough."
+
+There seemed no reason against this, and it was accordingly settled that
+Lilac should be entrusted with Mrs Greenways' commissions.  As she
+received them, her mind was so full of the dazzling prospect of driving
+into Lenham with the butter that it was almost impossible to bring it to
+bear on anything else.  It would be like going into the world.  Only
+once in her whole life had she been there before, and that was when her
+mother had taken her long ago.  She was quite a little child then, but
+she remembered the look of it still, and what a grand place she had
+thought it, with its broad market square and shops and so many people
+about.
+
+When her aunt had finished her list, which was a very long one, Bella
+was ready with her wants, which were even more puzzling.
+
+"I want this ribbon matched," she said, "and I want a bonnet shape.  It
+mustn't be too high in the crown nor yet too broad in the brim, and it
+mustn't be like the one Charlotte Smith's got now.  If you can't match
+the ribbon exactly you must get me another shade.  A kind of a sap
+green, I think--but it must be something uncommon.  And you might ask at
+Jones's what's being worn in hats now--feathers or artificials.  Oh, and
+I want some cream lace, not more than sixpence a yard, a good striking
+pattern, and as deep as you can get for the money."  Agnetta having
+added to this two ounces of coconut rock and a threepenny bottle of
+scent, Lilac was allowed to get ready for her expedition.  The cart was
+waiting in the yard with the baskets packed in at the back, and Ben was
+buckling the last strap of the harness.  She expected that he was going
+with her, and it was quite a pleasant surprise when Peter came out of
+the house with a whip in his hand and took the reins.  Nothing could
+have happened more fortunately, she thought to herself as they drove out
+of the gate, for now there would be no difficulty at all in saying what
+she had on her mind.  This and the excitement of the journey itself put
+her in excellent spirits, so that though some people might have called
+the road to Lenham dull and flat, it was full of charms to Lilac.  It
+was indeed more lively than usual, for it was market day, and as they
+jogged along at an easy pace they were constantly greeted by
+acquaintances all bent in the same direction.  Some of these were on
+foot and others in all kinds of vehicles, from a wagon to a donkey cart.
+Mr Buckle presently dashed by them in a smart gig, and called out,
+"How's yourself, Peter?" as he passed; and farther on they overtook Mrs
+Pinhorn actively striding along in her well-known checked shawl.
+
+Peter answered all greetings in the same manner--a wag of the head
+towards the right shoulder--but Lilac felt so proud and pleased to be
+going to Lenham with her own butter that she sat up very straight, and
+smiled and nodded heartily to those she knew.  It seemed a wonderfully
+short journey, and she saw the spire of Lenham church in the distance
+before she had said one word to Peter, or he had broken silence except
+to speak to his horse.  This did not disturb her, for she was used to
+his ways now, and she made up her mind that she would put off any
+attempt at conversation until their return.  And here they were at
+Lenham, rattling over the round stones with which the marketplace was
+paved.  It was full of stalls, crowded together so closely that there
+was scarcely room for all the people passing up and down between them.
+They struggled along, jostling each other, pushing their way with great
+baskets on their arms, and making a confusion of noises.  Scolding,
+laughter, shouting filled the air, mixed up with the clatter of
+crockery, cracking of whips, and the shrill cries of the market women.
+Such a turmoil Lilac had never heard, and it was almost a relief when
+Peter turned a little away from it and drew up at the door of Benson's
+shop, where the butter was to be left.  It was a large and important
+shop, and though the entrance was down a narrow street it had two great
+windows facing the market square, and there was a constant stream of
+people bustling in and out.  Lilac's heart beat fast with excitement.
+If she had known that the butter was to be displayed in such a grand
+beautiful place as this, and seen by so many folks, she would hardly
+have dared to undertake it.  Sudden fear seized her that it might not be
+so good as usual this time: there was perhaps some fault in the
+making-up, some failure in the colour, although she had thought it
+looked all right when she packed up at the farm.  She followed Peter
+into the shop with quite a tremor, and was glad when she saw Mr Benson
+could not attend to them just yet, for he and his boy were both deeply
+engaged in attending to customers.  Lilac had plenty of time to look
+round her.  Her eye immediately fell on some rolls of butter on the
+counter, and she lifted a corner of the cloth which covered her own and
+gave an anxious peep at it, then nudged Peter and looked up at him for
+sympathy.
+
+"It's a better colour nor that yonder," she whispered.
+
+Peter stood stolidly unconscious of her excitement, but he turned his
+quiet eyes upon the eager face lifted to his, and nodded kindly.  Mr
+Benson caught sight of him and bustled up.
+
+"Morning, Peter," he said briskly.  "How's your mother?"
+
+"Middling, thank you," said Peter, and without any further words he
+pointed at the basket on the counter.
+
+"Butter--eh?" said the grocer.  "Well, I hope it's as good as the last."
+He unpacked the basket and proceeded to weigh the butter, talking all
+the time.
+
+"It's an odd thing to me how your butter varies.  Now, the last month
+it's been as good again as it used to be.  Of course in the winter there
+will be a difference because of the feed, I can understand that; but I
+can't see why it shouldn't be always the same in the summer.  I don't
+mind telling you," he continued, leaning forward and speaking in a
+confidential tone, "that I'd made up my mind at one time to give it up.
+People won't buy inferior butter, and I don't blame 'em."
+
+"It's good this time, anyhow," said Peter.
+
+"It's prime," said Mr Benson.  "Is it the cows now, that you've got
+new, or is it the dairymaid?"
+
+"The cows isn't new, nor yet the dairymaid," said Peter.
+
+"Well, whichever it is," said the grocer, "the credit of the farm's
+coming back.  Orchards Farm always had a name for its dairy in the old
+days.  I remember my father talking of it when I was a boy."
+
+Mrs Pinhorn, who had been standing near during this conversation, now
+struck sharply in:
+
+"They _do_ say there was a brownie at the farm in those days, but when
+it got into other hands he was angered and quitted."
+
+"That's a curious superstition, ma'am," said the grocer politely.
+
+"There's folks in Danecross who give credit to it still," continued Mrs
+Pinhorn.  "Old Grannie Dunch'll tell you ever so many tales about the
+brownie and his goings-on."
+
+"Well, if we didn't live, so to say, within the pale of civilisation,"
+said the grocer, sticking his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets, "we might
+think you'd got him back again at the farm.  What do you say to that,
+Peter?"
+
+Everyone knew that Peter believed in all sorts of crazy things, and when
+Mr Benson put this jocular question to him several people turned to see
+how he took it.
+
+Lilac looked eagerly up at him also, for she had a faint hope that he
+might somehow know that she was dairymaid, and would tell them so.  That
+would be a triumph indeed.  At any rate he would stop all this silly
+talk about the brownie.  She had heard Grannie Dunch's stories scores of
+times, and they were very interesting, but as to believing them--Lilac
+felt far above such folly, and held them all in equal contempt, whether
+they were of charms, ghosts, brownies, or other spirits.  It was
+therefore with dismay that she saw Peter's face get redder and redder
+under the general gaze, and heard him instead of speaking up only
+mutter, "I don't know nothing about it."
+
+Moved by indignation at such foolishness, and at the mocking expression
+an Mr Benson's round face, she ventured to give Peter's sleeve a sharp
+pull.  No more words came, he only shuffled his feet uneasily and showed
+an evident desire to get out of the shop.
+
+"Well, well," said the grocer, turning his attention to some money he
+was counting out of a drawer, "never you mind, Peter.  If you've got him
+you'd better keep him, for he knows how to make good butter at any
+rate."
+
+Everyone laughed, as they always did at Mr Benson's speeches, and in
+the midst of it Peter gathered up his money and left the shop with
+Lilac.  She felt so ruffled and vexed by what had passed, that she could
+hardly attend to his directions as he pointed out the different shops
+she had to go to.  They were an ironmonger's, a linendraper's, and a
+china shop, and in the last he told her she must wait until he came to
+fetch her with the cart in about an hour's time.  Lilac stood for a
+moment looking after him as he drove away to put up his horse at the
+inn.  She was angry with Mr Benson, angry with the people who had
+laughed, and angry with Peter.  No wonder folks thought him half-silly
+when he looked like that.  And yet he knew twice as much as all of 'em
+put together.  Only that morning when Sober had cut his foot badly with
+broken glass, it was Peter with his clumsy-looking gentle fingers who
+had known how to stop the bleeding and bind up the wound in the best
+way.  But in spite of all this he could stand like a gaby and let folks
+make a laughing-stock of him?  It was so provoking to remember how silly
+he had looked, that it was only by a determined effort that Lilac could
+get it out of her head, and bend her attention on Bella's ribbons and
+her aunt's pots and pans.  When she had once began her shopping,
+however, she found it took all her thoughts, and it was not till she was
+seated in the china shop, her business finished, and her parcels
+disposed round her, that the scene came back to her again.  Could it be
+possible that Peter put any faith in such nonsensical tales?
+
+Grannie Dunch believed them; but then she was very ignorant, over ninety
+years old, and had never been to school.  When Grannie Dunch was young
+perhaps folks did believe such things, and she had never been taught
+better; there were excuses for her.  On one point Lilac was determined.
+Peter's mind should be cleared up as to who made the butter.  What had
+Mr Benson said about it?  "The credit of the farm's coming back."  She
+repeated the words to herself in a whisper.  What a grand thing if she,
+Lilac White, had helped to bring back the credit of the farm!
+
+At this point in her reflections the white horse appeared at the door,
+and Lilac and all her belongings were lifted up into the cart.  Very
+soon they were out of the noisy stony streets of Lenham, and on the
+quiet country road again.  She took a side glance at her companion.  He
+looked undisturbed, with his eyes fixed placidly on the horse's ears,
+and had evidently nothing more on his mind than to sit quietly there
+until they reached home.  It made Lilac feel quite cross, and she gave
+him a sharp little nudge with her elbow to make him attend to what she
+had to say.
+
+"Why ever did you let 'em go on so silly about the brownie?" she said.
+"You looked for all the world as if you believed in it."
+
+Peter flicked his horse thoughtfully.
+
+"There's a many cur'ous things in the world," he said; "cur'ouser than
+that."
+
+"There ain't no such things as brownies, though," said Lilac, with
+decision; "nor yet ghosts, nor yet witches, nor yet any of them things
+as Grannie Dunch tells about."
+
+Peter was silent.
+
+"_Is_ there?" she repeated with another nudge of the elbow.
+
+"I don't says as there is," he answered slowly.
+
+"Of course not!" exclaimed Lilac triumphantly.
+
+"And I don't say as there isn't," finished Peter in exactly the same
+voice.
+
+This unexpected conclusion quite took Lilac's breath away.  She stared
+speechlessly at her cousin, and he presently went on in a reflective
+tone with his eyes still fixed on the horse's ears:
+
+"It's been a wonderful lucky year, there's no denying.  Hay turned out
+well, corn's going to be good.  More eggs, more milk, better butter,
+bees swarmed early."
+
+"But," put in Lilac, "Aunt sprained her ankle, and the colt went lame,
+and you had to sell None-so-pretty.  That wasn't lucky.  Why didn't the
+brownie hinder that?"
+
+Peter shook his head.
+
+"I don't say as there _is_ a brownie at the farm," he said.
+
+"But you think he helps make the butter," said Lilac scornfully.
+
+Peter turned his eyes upon his companion; her face was hidden from him
+by her sunbonnet, but her slender form and the sound of her voice seemed
+both to quiver with indignation and contempt.
+
+"Well, then, who _does_?" he asked.
+
+But Lilac only held her head up higher and kept a dignified silence; she
+was thoroughly put out with Peter, and if he was so silly it really was
+no use to talk to him.
+
+Conscious that he was in disgrace, Peter fidgeted uneasily with his
+reins, whipped his horse, and cast some almost frightened glances over
+his shoulder at the silent little figure beside him, then he coughed
+several times, and finally, with an effort which seemed to make his face
+broader and redder every minute, began to speak:
+
+"I'd sooner plough a field than talk any day, but but I'll tell you
+something if I can put it together.  Words is so hard to frame, so as to
+say what you mean.  Maybe you'll only think me stupider after I'm done,
+but this is how it was--"
+
+He stopped short, and Lilac said gently and encouragingly, "How was it,
+Peter?"
+
+"I've had a sort of a queer feeling lately that there's something
+different at the farm.  Something that runs through everything, as you
+might say.  The beasts do their work as well again, and the sun shines
+brighter, and the flowers bloom prettier, and there's a kind of a
+pleasantness about the place.  I can't set it down to anything, any more
+than I know why the sky's blue, but it's there all the same.  So I
+thought over it a deal, and one day I was up in the High field, and all
+of a sudden it rapped into my head what Grannie Dunch says about the
+brownie as used to work at the farm.  `Maybe,' I says to myself, `he's
+come back.'  So I didn't say nothing, but I took notice, and things went
+on getting better, and I got to feel there was someone there helping on
+the work--but I wasn't not to say _certain_ sure it was the brownie,
+till one night--"
+
+"When?" said Lilac eagerly as Peter paused.
+
+"It was last Saint Barnaby's, and I'd been up to Cuddingham with
+None-so-pretty.  It was late when I got back, and I remembered I hadn't
+locked the stable door, and I went across the yard to do it--"
+
+"Well?" said Lilac with breathless interest.
+
+"So as I went, it was most as light as day, and I saw as plain as could
+be something flit in at the stable door.  'Twasn't so big as a man, nor
+so small as a boy, and its head was white.  So then I thought, `Surely
+'tis the brownie, for night's his working time,' and I'd half a mind to
+take a peep and see him at it.  But they say if you look him in the face
+he'll quit, so I just locked the door and left him there.  When Benson
+talked that way about the credit of the farm, I knew who we'd got to
+thank.  Howsomever," added Peter seriously, "you mustn't thank him, nor
+yet pay him, else he'll spite you instead of working for you."
+
+As he finished his story he turned to his cousin a face beaming with the
+most childlike faith; but it suddenly clouded with disappointment, for
+Lilac, no longer gravely attentive, was laughing heartily.
+
+"I thought maybe you'd laugh at me," he said, turning his head away
+ashamed.
+
+Lilac checked her laughter.  "Here's a riddle," she said.  "The brownie
+you locked into the stable that night always makes the butter.  He isn't
+never thanked nor yet paid, but you've looked him in the face scores of
+times."
+
+Peter gazed blankly at her.
+
+"You're doing of it now!" she cried with a chuckle of delight; "you're
+looking at the brownie now!  Why, you great goose, it's me as has made
+the butter this ever so long, and it was me as was in the stable on
+Saint Barnaby's!"
+
+It was only by very slow degrees that Peter could turn his mind from the
+brownie, on whom it had been fixed for weeks past, to take in this new
+and astonishing idea.  Even when Lilac had told her story many times,
+and explained every detail of how she had learnt to be dairymaid, he
+broke out again:
+
+"But how _could_ you do it?  You didn't know before you came, and
+there's Bella and Agnetta was born on the farm, and doesn't know now.
+Wonderful quick you must be, surely.  And so little as you are--and
+quiet," he went on, staring at his cousin.  "You don't make no more
+clatter nor fuss than a field-mouse."
+
+"'Tisn't only noisy big things as is useful," said Lilac with some
+pride.
+
+"It's harder to believe than the brownie," went on Peter, shaking his
+head; "a deal more cur'ous.  I thought I had got hold of him, but I
+don't seem to understand this at all."
+
+He fell into deep thought, shaking his head at intervals, and it was not
+until the farm was in sight that he broke silence again.
+
+"The smallest person in the farm," he said slowly, "has brought back the
+credit of the farm.  It's downright amazing.  I'm not agoin' to say
+`thank you,' though," he added with a smile as they drove in at the
+gate.
+
+A sudden thought flashed into Lilac's mind.  "Oh, Peter," she cried,
+"the flowers was lovely on May Day, and the cactus is blooming
+beautiful!  Was it the brownie as sent 'em, do you think?"
+
+Peter made no reply to this, and his face was hidden, for he was
+plunging down to collect the parcels in the back of the cart.  Lilac
+laughed as she ran into the house.  What a funny one he was surely, and
+what a fine day's holiday she had been having!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN.
+
+THE CONCERT.
+
+  "But I will wear my own brown gown
+  And never look too fine."
+
+Months came and went.  August turned his beaming yellow face on the
+waving cornfields, and passed on leaving them shorn and bare.  Then came
+September bending under his weight of apples and pears, and after him
+October, who took away the green mantle the woods had worn all the
+summer, and gave them one of scarlet and gold.  He spread on the ground,
+too, a gorgeous carpet of crimson leaves, which covered the hillside
+with splendour so that it glowed in the distance like fire.  Here and
+there the naked branches of the trees began to show sharply against the
+sky--soon it would be winter.  Already it was so cold, that although it
+was earlier than usual Miss Ellen said they must begin to think of
+warming the church, and to do this they must have some money, and
+therefore the yearly village concert must be arranged.
+
+"It was the new curate as come to me about it," said the cobbler to Mr
+Dimbleby one evening.  "`You must give us a solo on the clar'net, Mr
+Snell,' says he."
+
+"He's a civil-spoken young feller enough," remarked Mr Dimbleby, "but
+he's too much of a boy to please me.  The last was the man for my
+money."
+
+"Time'll mend that," said Joshua.  "And what I like about him is that he
+don't bear no sort of malice when he's worsted in argeyment.  We'd been
+differing over a passage of Scripture t'other day, and when he got up to
+go, `Ah, Mr Snell,' says he, `you've a deal to learn.'  `And so have
+you, young man,' says I.  Bless you, he took it as pleasant as could be,
+and I've liked him ever since."
+
+He turned to Bella Greenways, who had just entered.
+
+"And what's _your_ place in the programme, Miss Greenways?"
+
+Bella always avoided speaking to the cobbler if she could, for while she
+despised him as a "low" person, she feared his opinion, and knew that he
+disapproved of her.  She now put on her most mincing air as she replied:
+
+"Agnetta and me's to play a duet, the `Edinburgh Quadrilles,' and Mr
+Buckle accompanies on the drum and triangle."
+
+"Why, you'd better fall in too with the clar'net, Mr Snell," suggested
+Mr Dimbleby.  "That'd make a fine thing of it with four instruments."
+
+Joshua shook his head solemnly.
+
+"Mine's a solo," he said.  "A sacred one: `Sound the loud timbrel o'er
+Egypt's dark sea.'  That'll give a variety."
+
+"Mr Buckle's going to recite a beautiful thing," put in Bella: "`The
+Dream of Eugene Aram'.  He's been practising it ever so long.  He's
+going to do it with action."
+
+"I don't know as I can make much of that reciting," said Joshua
+doubtfully.  "Now a good tune, or a song, or a bit of reading, I can
+take hold of and carry along, but it's poor sport to see a man twist
+hisself, and make mouths, and point about at nothing at all.  I remember
+the first time the curate did it.  He stares straight at me for a
+second, and then he shakes his fist and shouts out suddenly: `Wretch!'
+or `Villain!' or summat of that sort.  I was so taken aback I nearly got
+up and went out.  Downright uncomfortable I was."
+
+"It's all the fashion now.  But of course," said Bella disdainfully, "it
+isn't everybody as is used to it.  I'm sure it's beautiful to hear
+Charlie!  It makes your blood run cold.  There's a part where he has to
+speak it in a sort of a hissing whisper.  He's afraid the back seats
+won't hear."
+
+"And a good thing for 'em," muttered Joshua.  "It's bad enough to see a
+man make a fool of hisself without having to hear him as well."
+
+"But after all," continued Bella, without noticing this remark, "it's
+only the gentry as matter much, and they'll be in the two front rows.
+Mrs Leigh's going to bring some friends."
+
+"And what's Lilac White going to do?" said Joshua, turning round with
+sudden sharpness.  "She used to sing the prettiest of 'em all at
+school."
+
+"Oh, I dare say she'll sing in the part songs with the other children,"
+said Bella carelessly.  "They haven't asked her for a solo."
+
+But although this was the case Lilac felt quite as interested and
+pleased as though she were to be the chief performer at the concert.
+When the programme was discussed at the farm, which was very often, she
+listened eagerly, and was delighted to find that Mrs Leigh wished her
+to sing in two glees which she had learnt at school.  The concert would
+be unusually good this year, everyone said, and each performer felt as
+anxious about his or her part as if its success depended on that alone.
+Mr Buckle, next to his own recitation, relied a good deal on the
+introduction of a friend of his from Lenham, who had promised to perform
+on the banjo and sing a comic song--if possible.
+
+"If you can get Busby," he repeated over and over again, "it'll be the
+making of the thing, and so I told Mrs Leigh."
+
+"What did she say?" enquired Bella.
+
+"Well, she wanted to know what he would sing.  But, as I said to her,
+you can't treat Busby as you would the people about here.  He moves in
+higher circles and he wouldn't stand it.  You can't tie him down to a
+particular song, he must sing what he feels inclined to.  After all, I
+don't suppose he'll come.  He's so sought after."
+
+"Well, it is awkward," said Bella, "not being certain--because of the
+programme."
+
+"Oh, they must just put down, _Song, Mr Busby_, and leave a blank.
+It's often done."
+
+Each time Mr Buckle dropped in at the farm just now he brought fresh
+news relating to Mr Busby.
+
+He could, or could not come to the concert, so that an exciting state of
+uncertainty was kept up.  As the day grew nearer the news changed.
+Busby would certainly _come_, but he had a dreadful cold so that it was
+hardly probable he would be able to sing.  Lilac heard it all with the
+greatest sympathy.  The house seemed full of the concert from morning
+till night.  As she went about her work the strains of the "Edinburgh
+Quadrilles" sounded perpetually from the piano in the parlour.
+Sometimes it was Agnetta alone, slowly pounding away at the bass, and
+often coming down with great force and determination on the wrong
+chords; sometimes Bella and Agnetta at the same time, the treble dashing
+along brilliantly, and the bass lumbering heavily in the distance but
+contriving to catch it up at the end by missing a few bars; sometimes
+Mr Buckle arriving with his drum and triangle there was a grand
+performance of all three, when Lilac and Molly, taking furtive peeps at
+them through the half-open door, were struck with the sincerest
+admiration and awe.  It was indeed wonderful as well as deafening to
+hear the noise that could be got out of those three instruments; they
+seemed to be engaged in a sort of battle in which first one was
+triumphant and then another.
+
+"It's a _little_ loud for this room," observed Mr Buckle complacently,
+"but it'll sound very well at the concert."  Bella felt sure that it
+would be far the best thing in the programme, not only because the
+execution was spirited and brilliant but on account of the stylish
+appearance of the performers.  Mr Buckle had been persuaded to wear his
+volunteer uniform on the occasion, in which, with his drum slung from
+his shoulders and the triangle fastened to a chair, so that he could
+kick it with one foot, he made a very imposing effect.
+
+Agnetta and Bella had coaxed their mother into giving them new dresses
+of a bright blue colour called "electric", which, being made up by
+themselves in the last fashion, were calculated to attract all eyes.
+
+These preparations, whilst they excited and interested Lilac, also made
+her a little envious.  She began to wish she had something pretty to put
+on in honour of the concert, and even to have a faint hope that her aunt
+might give her a new dress too.  But this did not seem even to occur to
+Mrs Greenways, and Lilac soon gave up all thoughts of it with a sigh.
+Her Sunday frock was very shabby, but after all just to stand up amongst
+the other children it would not show much.  She took it out of her box
+and looked at it: perhaps there was something she could do to smarten it
+up a little.  It certainly hung in a limp flattened manner across the
+bed, and was even beginning to turn a rusty colour; nothing would make
+it look any different.  Would one of her cottons be better, Lilac
+wondered anxiously.  But none of the children would wear cottons, she
+knew--they all put on their Sunday best for the concert.  The black
+frock must do.  She could put a clean frill in the neck, and brush her
+hair very neatly, but that was all.  There was no one she remembered to
+take much notice what she wore, so it did not matter.
+
+The evening came.  Everyone had practised their parts and brought them
+to a high pitch of perfection; and except Mr Busby, whose appearance
+was still uncertain, everyone was prepared to fill their places in the
+programme.
+
+"You won't find two better-looking girls than that," said Mrs Greenways
+to her husband, looking proudly at her two daughters.  "That blue does
+set 'em off, to be sure!"
+
+"La!" said Bella with a giggle, "I feel that nervous I know I shall
+break down.  I'm all of a twitter."
+
+"Well, it's no matter how you _play_ as long as you look well," said
+Mrs Greenways; "with Charlie making all that noise on the drum, you
+only hear the piano now and again.  But where's Lilac!" she added.
+"It's more than time we started."
+
+Lilac had been ready long ago, and waiting for her cousins, but just
+before they came downstairs she had caught sight of Peter looking into
+the room from the garden, and making mysterious signs to her to come
+out.  When she appeared he held towards her a bunch of small red and
+white chrysanthemums.  "Here's a posy for you," he said.  "Stick it in
+your front.  They're a bit frost-bitten, but they're better than
+nothing."
+
+Lilac took the flowers joyfully; after all she was not to be quite
+unadorned at the concert.
+
+"You ain't got a new frock," he continued, looking at her seriously when
+she had fastened them in her dress.  "You look nice, though."
+
+"Ain't you coming?" asked Lilac.  She felt that she should miss Peter's
+friendly face when she sang, and that she should like him to hear her.
+
+"Presently," he said.  "Got summat to see to first."
+
+When the party reached the school-house it was already late.  The
+Greenways were always late on such occasions.  The room was full, and
+Mr Martin, the curate, who had the arrangement of it all, was bustling
+about with a programme in his hand, finding seats for the audience,
+greeting acquaintances, and rushing into the inner room at intervals to
+see if the performers had arrived.
+
+"All here?" he said.  "Then we'd better begin.  Drum and fife band!"
+
+The band, grinning with embarrassment and pleasure, stumbled up the
+rickety steps on to the platform.  The sounds of their instruments and
+then the clapping and stamping of the audience were plainly heard in the
+green room, which had only a curtain across the doorway.
+
+"Lor'!" said Bella, pulling it a little on one side and peeping through
+at the audience, "there _is_ a lot of people!  Packed just as close as
+herrings.  There's a whole row from the Rectory.  How I do palpitate, to
+be sure!  I wish Charlie was here!"
+
+Mr Buckle soon arrived with vexation on his brow.  No sign of Busby!
+He was down twice in the programme, and there was hardly a chance he
+would turn up.  It was too bad of Busby to throw them over like that.
+He might at least have _come_.
+
+"Well, if he wasn't going to sing I don't see the good of that," said
+Bella; "but it _is_ a pity."
+
+"It just spoils the whole thing," said Mr Buckle, and the other
+performers agreed.  But to Lilac nothing could spoil the concert.  It
+was all beautiful and glorious, and she thought each thing grander than
+the last.  Uncle Joshua's solo almost brought tears to her eyes, partly
+of affection and pride and partly because he extracted such lovely and
+stirring sounds from the clar'net.  It made her think of her mother and
+the cottage, and of so many dear old things of the past, that she felt
+sorrowful and happy at once.  Next she was filled with awe by Mr
+Buckle's recitation, which, however, fell rather flat on the rest of the
+assembly; and then came the "Edinburgh Quadrilles", in which the
+performers surpassed themselves in banging and clattering.  Lilac was
+quite carried away by enthusiasm.  She stood as close to the curtain as
+she could, clapping with all her might.  The programme was now nearly
+half over, and Mr Busby's first blank had been filled up by someone
+else.  Mr Martin came hurriedly in.
+
+"Who'll sing or play something?" he said.  "We must fill up this second
+place or the programme will be too short."
+
+His glance fell upon Lilac.
+
+"Why, you're the little girl who was Queen?  You can sing, I know.
+That'll do capitally--come along."
+
+Lilac shrank back timidly.  It was an honour to be singled out in that
+way, but it was also most alarming.  She looked appealingly at her
+cousin Bella, who at once came forward.
+
+"I don't think she knows any songs alone, sir," she said; "but I'll play
+something if you like."
+
+"Oh, thank you, Miss Greenways," said Mr Martin hastily, "we've had so
+much playing I think they'd like a song.  I expect she knows some little
+thing--don't you?" to Lilac.
+
+Lilac hesitated.  There stood Mr Martin in front of her, eager and
+urgent, with outstretched hand as though he would hurry her at once to
+the platform; there was Bella fixing a mortified and angry gaze upon
+her; and, in the background, the other performers with surprise and
+disapproval on their faces.  She felt that she _could_ not do it, and
+yet it was almost as impossible to disoblige Mr Martin, the habit of
+obedience, especially to a clergyman, was so strong within her.
+Suddenly there sounded close to her ear a gruff and friendly voice:
+
+"Give 'em the `Last Rose of Summer', Lilac.  You can sing that very
+pretty."  It came from Uncle Joshua.
+
+"The very thing!" exclaimed Mr Martin.  "Couldn't possibly be better,
+and I'll play it for you.  Come along!"
+
+Without more words Lilac found herself hurried out of the room, up the
+steps, and on to the platform, with Mr Martin seated at the piano.
+Breathless and frightened she stood for a second half uncertain whether
+to turn and run away.  There were so many faces looking up at her from
+below, and she felt so small and unprotected standing there alone in
+front of them.  Her heart beat fast, her lips were as though fastened
+together, how could she possibly sing?  Suddenly in the midst of that
+dim mass of heads she caught sight of something that encouraged her.  It
+was Peter's round red face with mouth and eyes open to their widest
+extent, and it stood out from all the rest, just as it had done on May
+Day.  Then it had vexed her to see it, now it was such a comfort that it
+filled her with courage.  Instead of running away she straightened
+herself up, folded her hands neatly in front of her, and took a long
+breath.  When Mr Martin looked round at her she was able to begin, and
+though her voice trembled a little it was sweet and clear, and could be
+heard quite to the end of the room.  Very soon she forgot her rears
+altogether, and felt as much at her ease as though she were singing in
+Uncle Joshua's cottage as she had done so often.  The audience kept the
+most perfect silence, and gazed at her attentively throughout.  It was a
+very simple little figure in its straight black frock, its red and white
+nosegay, and thick, laced boots, and it looked all the more so after the
+ribbons and finery of those which had come before it; yet there was a
+certain dignity about its very simplicity, and the earnest expression in
+the small face showed that Lilac was not thinking of herself, but was
+only anxious to sing her song as well as she could.  She finished it,
+and dropped the straight little curtsy she had been taught at school.
+"After all it had not been so bad," she thought with relief, as she
+turned to go away in the midst of an outburst of claps and stamps from
+the audience.  But she was not allowed to go far, for it soon became
+evident that they wanted her to sing again; nothing in the whole
+programme had created so much excitement as this one little simple song.
+They applauded not only in the usual manner but even by shouts and
+whistling, and through it all was to be heard the steady thump, thump,
+thump of a stick on the floor from the middle of the room where Peter
+sat.  Lilac looked round half-frightened at Mr Martin as the noise rose
+higher and higher, and made her way quickly to the steps which led from
+the platform.
+
+"They won't leave off till you sing again," he said, following her,
+"though we settled not to have any encores.  You'd better sing the last
+verse."
+
+So it turned out that Lilac's song was the most successful performance
+of the evening; it was impossible to conceal the fact that it had won
+more applause than anything, not even excepting the "Edinburgh
+Quadrilles."  This was felt to be most unjust, for she had taken no
+trouble in preparing it, and was not even properly dressed to receive
+such an honour.
+
+"I must own," said Mrs Greenways in a mortified tone, "that I did feel
+disgraced to see Lilac standing up there in that old black frock.  I
+can't think what took hold of the folks to make so much fuss with her.
+But there!  'Tain't the best as gets the most praise."
+
+"I declare," added Bella bitterly, "it's a thankless task to get up
+anything for the people here.  They're so ignorant they don't know
+what's what.  To think of passing over Charley's recitation and encoring
+a silly old song like Lilac's.  It's a good thing Mr Busby _didn't_
+come, I think--he wouldn't 'a been appreciated."
+
+"'Twasn't only the poor people though," said Agnetta.  "I saw those
+friends of Mrs Leigh's clapping like anything."
+
+"Ah, well," said Mrs Greenways, "Lilac's parents were greatly respected
+in the parish, and that's the reason of it.  She hasn't got no cause to
+be set up as if it was her singing that pleased 'em."  Lilac had indeed
+very little opportunity of being "set up."  After the first glow of
+pleasure in her success had faded, she began to find more reason to be
+cast down.  Her aunt and cousins were so jealous of the applause she had
+gained that they lost no occasion of putting her in what they called her
+proper place, of showing her that she was insignificant, a mere nobody;
+useless they could not now consider her, but she had to pay dearly for
+her short triumph at the concert.  The air just now seemed full of sharp
+speeches and bitterness, and very often after a day of unkind buffets
+she cried herself to sleep, longing for someone to take her part, and
+sore at the injustice of it all.
+
+"'Tain't as if I'd wanted to sing," she said to herself.  "They made me,
+and now they flout me for it."
+
+But her unexpected appearance in public had another and most surprising
+result.
+
+About a week after the concert, when the excitement was lessening and
+the preparations for Bella's wedding were beginning to take its place,
+Mrs Greenways was sent for to the Rectory--Mrs Leigh wished to speak
+to her.
+
+"I shouldn't wonder," she said to her husband before she started, "if it
+was to ask what Bella'd like for a present.  What'd you say?"
+
+"I shouldn't wonder if it was nothing of the kind," replied Mr
+Greenways.  "More likely about the rent."
+
+But Mrs Greenways held to her first opinion.  It would not be about the
+rent, for Mrs Leigh never mentioned it to her.
+
+No.  It was about the present; and very fitting too, when she called to
+mind how long her husband had been Mr Leigh's tenant.  To be sure he
+had generally owed some rent, but the Greenways had always held their
+heads high and been respected in spite of their debts.
+
+On her way to the Rectory, therefore, she carefully considered what
+would be best to choose for Bella and Charlie.  Should it be something
+ornamental--a gilt clock, or a mirror with a plush frame for the
+drawing-room?  They would both like that, but she knew Mrs Leigh would
+prefer their asking for something useful; perhaps a set of tea-things
+would be as good as anything.
+
+These reflections made the distance short, yet an hour later, when, her
+interview over, Mrs Greenways reappeared at the farm, her face was
+lengthened and her footstep heavy with fatigue.  What could have
+happened?  Something decidedly annoying, for she snapped even at her
+darling Agnetta when she asked questions.
+
+"Don't bother," she said, "let's have tea.  I'm tired out."
+
+During the meal her daughters cast curious glances at her and at each
+other, for it was a most unusual thing for their mother to bear her
+troubles quietly.  As a rule the more vexed she was the more talkative
+she became.  It must therefore be something out of the common, they
+concluded; and before long it appeared that it was the presence of Lilac
+that kept Mrs Greenways silent.  She threw angry looks at her, full of
+discontent, and presently, unable to control herself longer, said
+sharply:
+
+"When you've finished, Lilac, I want you to run to Dimbleby's for me.  I
+forgot the starch.  If you hurry you'll be there and back afore dusk."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWELVE.
+
+LILAC'S CHOICE.
+
+  "A stone that is fit for the wall will not be left in the way."--_Old
+  Proverb_.
+
+As the door closed on Lilac, the news burst forth from Mrs Greenways in
+such a torrent that it was difficult at first to follow, but at length
+she managed to make clear to her astonished hearers all that had passed
+between herself and Mrs Leigh.  It was this: A lady staying at the
+Rectory had seen Lilac at the concert, and asked whom she was.
+Whereupon, hearing her history and her present occupation at Orchards
+Farm, she made the following suggestion.  She wanted a second dairymaid,
+and was greatly pleased with Lilac's appearance and neat dress.  Would
+Mrs Leigh find out whether her friends would like her to take such a
+situation?  She would give her good wages, and raise them if she found
+her satisfactory.  "It's a great opportunity for a child like Lilac,"
+Mrs Leigh had said to Mrs Greenways; "but I really think from what I
+hear of her that she is quite fit to take such a place."
+
+"Well, as to that," said Mr Greenways slowly when his wife paused for
+breath, "I suppose she is.  If she can manage the dairy alone here, she
+can do it with someone over her there."
+
+"Now I wonder who _could_ 'a told Mrs Leigh that Lilac made our
+butter," said Mrs Greenways; "somehow or other that child gets round
+everyone with her quiet ways."
+
+"Most likely that interfering old Joshua Snell," said Bella, "or Peter
+maybe, or Ben.  They all think no end of Lilac."
+
+"Well, I don't see myself what they find in her," said Mrs Greenways;
+"though she's a good child enough and useful in her way.  I should miss
+her now I expect; though, of course," with a glance at her husband, "she
+wouldn't leave us, not so long as we wanted her."
+
+"That's for _her_ to say," said the farmer.  "I'm not going to take a
+chance like that out of her mouth.  She's a good little gal and a credit
+to her mother, and it's only fair and right she should choose for
+herself.  Go or stay, I won't have a word said to her.  'Tain't every
+child of her age as has an offer like that, and she's deserved it."
+
+"And who taught her all she knows?" said Mrs Greenways wrathfully.
+"Who gave her a home when she wanted one, and fed and kep' her?  And now
+as she's just beginning to be a bit of use, she's to take herself off at
+the first chance!  I haven't common patience with you, Greenways, when
+you talk like that.  It's all very well for you; and I s'pose you're
+ready to pay for a dairymaid in her place.  But I know this: If Lilac's
+got a drop of gratitude in her, and a bit of proper feeling, she'll
+think first of what she owes to her only relations living."
+
+"Well, you ought to 'a told her how useful she was if you wanted her to
+know it," said Mr Greenways.  "You've always gone on the other tack and
+told her she was no good at all.  I shouldn't blame her if she wanted to
+try if she could please other folks better."
+
+There was so much truth in this, that in spite of Mrs Greenways' anger
+it sank deeply into her mind.  Why had she not made more of Lilac?  What
+should she do, if the child, with the consent of her uncle and
+encouraged by Mrs Leigh, were to choose to leave the farm?  It was not
+unlikely, for although she had not been actively unkind to Lilac she had
+never tried to make her happy at the farm; her jealousy had prevented
+that.  And then, the money--that would be a great temptation; and the
+offer of it seemed to raise Lilac's value enormously.  In short, now
+that someone else wanted her, and was willing to pay for her services,
+she became twice as important in Mrs Greenways' eyes.  One by one the
+various duties rose before her which Lilac fulfilled, and which would be
+left undone if she went away.  She sat silent for a few minutes in moody
+thought.
+
+"I didn't say nothing certain to Mrs Leigh," she remarked at length,
+"but I did mention as how we'd never had any thought of Lilac taking
+service, no more nor Agnetta or Bella."
+
+"Lor', Ma!" said Bella, "the ideer!"
+
+"All the same," said the farmer, "when we first took Lilac we said we'd
+keep her till she was old enough for a place.  The child's made herself
+of use, and you don't want to part with her.  That's the long and the
+short of it.  But I stand by what I say.  She shall settle it as she
+likes.  She shall go to Mrs Leigh and hear about it, and then no one
+shan't say a word to her, for or against.  When's she got to decide?"
+
+"In a week," answered his wife.  "But you're doing wrong, Greenways, you
+hadn't ought to put it on the child's shoulders; it's us as ought to
+decide for her, us as are in the place of her father and mother.  She's
+too young to know what's for her good."
+
+"I stand by what I say," repeated the farmer, and he slapped the table
+with his hand.  Mrs Greenways knew then that it was useless to oppose
+him further, and the conversation came to an end.
+
+Now, when the matter was made known to Lilac, it seemed more like a
+dream than anything real.  She had become so used to remain in the
+background, and go quietly on at her business without notice, that she
+could not at first believe in the great position offered to her.  She
+was considered worth so much money a year!  It was wonderful.
+
+After she had seen Mrs Leigh, and heard that it really was true and no
+dream, another feeling began to take the place of wonder, and that was
+perplexity.  The choice, they told her, was to remain in her own hands,
+and no one would interfere with it.  What would be best?  To go or stay?
+It was very difficult, almost impossible, to decide.  Never in her
+short life had she yet been obliged to choose in any matter; there had
+always been a necessity which she had obeyed: "Do this," "Go there."
+The habit of obedience was strong within her, but it was very hard to be
+suddenly called to act for herself.  And the worst of it was that no one
+would help her; even Mrs Leigh only said: "I shan't persuade you one
+way or the other, Lilac, I shall leave it to you and your relations to
+consider."  Uncle Joshua had no counsel either.  "You must put one
+against the other and decide for yourself, my maid," he said; "there'll
+be ups and downs wherever you go."  She studied her aunt's face
+wistfully, and found no help there.  Mrs Greenways kept complete and
+gloomy silence on the question.
+
+Thrown back upon herself, Lilac's perplexity grew with each day.  If she
+went to sleep with her mind a little settled to one side of the matter,
+she woke up next morning to see many more advantages on the other.  To
+leave Orchards Farm, and the village, and all the faces she had known
+since she could remember anything, and go to strangers!  That would be
+dreadful.  But then, there was the money to be thought of, and perhaps
+she might find the strangers kinder than her own relations.  "It's like
+weighing out the butter," she said to herself; "first one side up and
+then t'other."  If only someone would say you _must_ go, or you _must_
+stay.
+
+During this week of uncertainty many things at the farm looked
+pleasanter than they had ever done before, and she was surprised at the
+interest everyone in the village took in her new prospects.  They all
+had something to say about them, and though this did not help her
+decision but rather hindered it, she was pleased to find that they cared
+so much for her.
+
+"And so you're goin' away," said poor Mrs Wishing, fluttering into the
+farm one day and finding Lilac alone.  "Seems as if I was to lose the
+on'y friend I've got.  But I dunno.  There was your poor mother, she was
+took, and now I shan't see you no more.  'Tain't as I see you often, but
+I know you might drop in anywhen and there's comfort in that.  Lor'!  I
+shouldn't be standing here now if you hadn't come in that night--I was
+pretty nigh gone home that time.  Might a been better p'r'aps for me and
+Dan'l too if I had.  But you meant it kind."
+
+"Maybe I shan't go away after all," said Lilac soothingly.
+
+"You're one of the lucky ones," continued Mrs Wishing.  "I allers said
+that.  Fust you get taken into a beautiful home like this, and then you
+get a place as a gal twice your age would jump at.  Some gets all the
+ups and some gets all the downs.  But _I_ dunno!"
+
+She went on her way with a weary hitch of the basket on her arm, and a
+pull at her thin shawl.  Then Bella's voice sounded beseechingly on the
+stairs:
+
+"Oh, _do_ come here a minute, Lilac."
+
+Bella was generally to be found in her bedroom just now, stitching away
+at various elegancies of costume.  She turned to her cousin as she
+entered, and said with a puzzled frown:
+
+"I'm in ever such a fix with this skirt.  I can't drape it like the
+picture do what I will, it hangs anyhow.  And Agnetta can't manage it
+either."
+
+Agnetta stood by, her face heated with fruitless labour, and her mouth
+full of pins.
+
+Lilac examined the skirt gravely.
+
+"You haven't got enough stuff in it," she said.  "You'll have to do it
+up some other way."
+
+"Pin it up somehow, then, and see what you can do," said Bella.  "I'm
+sick and tired of it."
+
+Lilac was not quite without experience in such things, for she had often
+helped her cousins with their dressmaking, and she now succeeded after a
+few trials in looping up the skirt to Bella's satisfaction.
+
+"_That's_ off my mind, thank goodness!" she exclaimed.  "You're a
+neat-fingered little thing; I don't know what we shall do without you."
+
+It was a small piece of praise, but coming from Bella it sounded great.
+
+Lilac's affairs, her probable departure from the farm and how she would
+be much missed there, were much talked of in the village just now.  The
+news even reached Lenham, carried by the active legs and eager tongue of
+Mrs Pinhorn, who, with many significant nods, as of one who could tell
+more if she chose, gave Mr Benson to understand that he might shortly
+find a difference in the butter.  It was not for _her_ to speak, with
+Ben working at the farm since a boy, but--So even the great and
+important Mr Benson was prepared to be interested in Lilac's choice.
+
+She often wondered, as day after day went by so quickly and left her
+still undecided, what her mother would have advised her to do.  But
+then, if her mother had been alive, all this would not have happened.
+She tried nevertheless to imagine what she would have said about it, and
+to remember past words which might be of help to her now.  "Stand on
+your own feet and don't be beholden to anyone."  Certainly by taking
+this situation she would follow that advice, and child though she was,
+she knew it might be the beginning of greater things.  If she filled
+this place well she might in time get another, and be worth even more
+money.  But then, could she leave the farm? the home which had sheltered
+her when she had been left alone in the world.  Who would take her
+place?  No one could deny now that she would leave a blank which must be
+filled up.  She could hardly bear to think of a stranger standing in her
+accustomed spot in the dairy, handling the butter, looking out of the
+little ivy-grown window, taking charge of the poultry.  "They'll feed
+'em different, maybe," she thought; "and they won't get half the eggs, I
+know they won't."  How hard it would be, too, to leave the faces she had
+known from childhood, all so familiar, and some of them so dear: not
+human faces alone, but all sorts of kind and friendly ones, belonging to
+the dumb animals, as she called them.  She would miss the beasts sorely,
+and they would miss her: the cows she was learning to milk, the great
+horses who jingled their medals and bowed their heads so gently as she
+stood on tiptoe to feed them, the clever old donkey who could unfasten
+any gate and let all the animals out of a field: the pigs, even the
+sheep, who were silliest of all, knew her well and showed pleasure at
+her coming.  She looked with affection, too, at the bare little attic,
+out of whose window she had gazed so often with eyes full of tears at
+the white walls of her old home on the hillside.  How hard it had been
+to leave it, and now it made her almost as sad to think of going away
+from the farm.
+
+But then--there was the money, and although Mrs Leigh said nothing in
+favour of her going to this new place, Lilac had a feeling that she
+really wished it, and would be disappointed if she gave it up.  Everyone
+said it was such a chance!
+
+It was not altogether a fancy on Lilac's part that everyone at the farm
+looked at her kindly just now, for the idea of losing her made them
+suddenly conscious that she would be very much missed.  Mrs Greenways
+watched her with anxiety, and there was a new softness in her way of
+speaking; her old friends, Molly and Ben, were eager in showing their
+goodwill, and Agnetta, in spite of the approaching excitement of Bella's
+wedding, found time to enquire many times during the day if Lilac "had
+made up her mind."
+
+"Of course you meant to go from the first," she said at length.  "Well,
+I don't blame you, but you might 'a said so to an old friend like me."
+
+The only person at the farm who was sincerely indifferent to Lilac's
+choice was Bella.
+
+"It won't make any matter to me whether you're here or there," she said
+candidly; "but there's no doubt it'll make a difference to Ma.  There's
+some as would call it demeaning to go out to service, but I don't look
+at it like that.  Of course if it was me or Agnetta it wouldn't be
+thought of; but I agree with Pa that it's right you should choose for
+yourself."
+
+So no one helped Lilac, and the days passed and the last one came, while
+she was still as far as ever from deciding.  Escaping from the chatter
+and noises inside the house she went out towards evening into the garden
+for a little peace and quietness.  She wanted to be alone and think it
+over for the last time; after that she would go to Mrs Leigh and tell
+her what she meant to do, and then all the worry would be over.  She
+strolled absently along, with the same tiresome question in her mind,
+through the untidy bushy garden, past Peter's flower bed, gay with
+chrysanthemums and Michaelmas daisies, until she came to the row of
+beehives, silent, deserted-looking dwellings now with only one or two
+languid inhabitants to be seen crawling torpidly about the entrances.
+Lilac sat down on the cherry-tree stump opposite them, and, for a moment
+leaving the old subject, her mind went back to the spring evening when
+Peter had cut the bunch of flowers for her, and let the bees crawl over
+his fingers.  She smiled to herself as she remembered how suddenly he
+had gone away without giving her the nosegay at all.  Poor Peter! she
+understood him better now.  As she thought this there was a click of the
+gate leading into the field, she turned her head, and there was Peter
+himself coming towards her with his dog Sober at his heels.
+
+During this past week Peter as well as Lilac had been turning things
+over a great deal in his mind.  Not that he was troubled by uncertainty,
+for he felt sure from the first that she would go away from the farm.
+And it was best she should.  From outward ill-treatment he could have
+defended her: he was strong in the arm, but with his tongue he was
+weaker than a child.  Many a time he had sat in silence when hard or
+unkind speeches had been cast at her, but none the less he had felt it
+sorely.  After the concert, when she had sung as pretty as a bird, how
+they had flouted her.  It was a hard thing surely, and it was best she
+should go away to folks as would value her better.  But he felt also
+that he must tell her he was sorry.  That was a trial and a difficulty.
+How should he frame it?  Though he could talk more easily to Lilac than
+anyone else in the world, speech was still terribly hard, and when he
+suddenly came upon her this evening his first instinct was to turn and
+go back.  Sober, however, pricked his ears and ran forward when he saw a
+friend, and this example encouraged Peter.
+
+"As like as not," he said to himself, "I shall say summat quite
+different the minute I begin, but I'll have a try at it;" so he went on.
+
+There was a touch of frost in the air, and the few remaining leaves, so
+few that you could count them, were falling every minute or so gently
+from the trees.  A scarlet one from the cherry tree overhead had dropped
+into Lilac's lap, and lay there, a bright red spot on her white
+pinafore.  As Peter's eye fell on it it occurred to him to say gruffly:
+"The leaves is nearly all gone."
+
+"Pretty nigh," said Lilac, looking up into the bare branches of the
+cherry tree.  "We'll soon have winter now."
+
+There was silence.  Peter took off his hat and rubbed his forehead with
+his coat sleeve.
+
+"There's lots will be sorry when you go," he burst out suddenly.  "The
+beasts'll miss you above a bit."
+
+Lilac did not answer.  She saw that he wanted to say something more, and
+knew that it was best not to confuse his mind by remarks.
+
+"Not but what," he went on, "you're in the right.  Why should you work
+for nothing here and get no thanks?  You're worth your wages, and there
+you'll get 'em.  There's justice in that.  Only--the farm'll be
+different."
+
+"There's only the dairy," said Lilac.  "Someone else'll have to do that
+if I go.  And I should miss the beasts too."
+
+She put her hand on Sober's rough head as he sat by her.
+
+"It's a queer thing," said Peter after another pause, "what a lot I get
+in my head sometimes and yet I can't speak it out.  You remember about
+the brownie, and me saying the farm was pleasanter and that?  Well, what
+I want to say now is, that when you're gone all that'll be gone--mostly.
+It'll be like winter after summer.  Anyone as could use language could
+say a deal about that, but I can't.  I don't want you to stay, but I've
+had it in my mind to tell you that I shall miss you as well as the
+beasts--above a bit.  That's all."
+
+Sober now seemed to think he must add something to his master's speech,
+for he raised one paw, placed it on Lilac's knee, and gazed with a sort
+of solemn entreaty into her face.  She knew at once what he wanted, for
+though he could not "use language" any more than Peter, he was quite
+able to make his meaning clear.  In the course of many years' faithful
+attention to business he had become rheumatic, and this paw, in
+particular was swollen and stiff at the joint.  Lilac had found that it
+gave him ease to rub it, and Sober had got into the habit of calling her
+attention to it in this way at all times and seasons.  Now as she took
+it in her hand and looked into his wise affectionate eyes, it suddenly
+struck her that here were two people who would really miss her, and want
+her if she were far away.  No one would rub Sober's paw, no one would
+take much notice of her other dumb friend, Peter.  She could not leave
+them.  She placed the dog's foot gently on the ground and stood up.
+
+"I'm not going away," she said, "I'm going to bide.  And I shall go
+straight in and tell Aunt, and then it'll be settled."
+
+Indoors, meanwhile, the same subject had been discussed between
+different people.  In the living room, where tea was ready on the table,
+Mrs Greenways and her two daughters waited the coming of the farmer,
+Agnetta eyeing a pot of her favourite strawberry jam rather impatiently,
+and Bella, tired with her stitching, leaning languidly back in her chair
+with folded arms.
+
+"Lilac ain't said nothing to either of you, I s'pose?" began Mrs
+Greenways.
+
+"I know she means to go, though," said Agnetta.
+
+"Well, I must look about for a girl for the dairy, I s'pose," said Mrs
+Greenways sadly.  "I won't give it to Molly again.  And a nice set they
+are, giggling flighty things with nothing but their ribbons and their
+sweethearts in their heads."
+
+"Lor'!  Ma, don't fret," said Bella consolingly; "you got along without
+Lilac before, and you'll get along without her again."
+
+"I shan't ever replace her," continued her mother in the same dejected
+voice; "she doesn't care for ribbons, and she's not old enough for
+sweethearts.  I do think it's not acting right of Mrs Leigh to go and
+entice her away."
+
+"If here isn't Mr Snell coming in alonger Pa," said Agnetta, craning
+her neck to see out of the window.  "He's sure to stay to tea."  She
+immediately drew her chair up to the table and helped herself largely to
+jam.
+
+"And of all evenings in the week I wish he hadn't chosen this," said
+Mrs Greenways.  "Poking and meddling in other folks' concerns.  Now
+mind this, girls,--don't you let on as if I wanted to keep Lilac, or was
+sorry she's going.  Do you hear?"
+
+It did not at first appear, however, that this warning was necessary,
+for Joshua said no word of Lilac or her affairs; he seemed fully
+occupied in drinking a great deal of tea and discussing the events of
+the neighbourhood with the farmer, and it was not till the end of his
+meal that he looked round the table enquiringly, and asked the dreaded
+question.
+
+"And what's Lilac settled to do about going?"
+
+"You know as much about that as we do, Mr Snell," replied Mrs
+Greenways loftily.
+
+"There's no doubt," continued the cobbler, fixing his eye upon her, "as
+how Mrs Leigh's friend is going to get a prize in Lilac White.  She's
+only a child, as you once said, ma'am, but I know what her upbringing
+was: `As the twig is bent, the tree's inclined'.  There's the making of
+a thorough good servant in her.  Well worth her wages she'll be."
+
+"She's been worth more to us already than ever I knew of, or counted on,
+till lately," put in the farmer.  "Just now, I met Benson, and says he:
+`You're losing your dairymaid by what I hear, and I can but wish you as
+good a one.'"
+
+"That's not so easy," said Joshua, shaking his head.  "Good workers
+don't grow on every bush.  It's a pity, too, just when your butter was
+getting back its name."
+
+"I'd half a mind," said the farmer, "to offer the child wages to stop,
+but then I thought it wouldn't be acting fair.  She ought to have the
+chance of bettering herself in a place like that.  If she goes she's
+bound to rise, and if she stays she won't, for I can't afford to give
+her much."
+
+"And what's your opinion, ma'am?" asked Joshua politely of Mrs
+Greenways.
+
+"Oh, it isn't worth hearing, Mr Snell," she replied with a bitter
+laugh; "its too old-fashioned for these days.  I should 'a thought Lilac
+owed summat to us, but my husband don't seem to take no count of that at
+all.  Not that it matters to me."
+
+As she spoke, with the colour rising in her face and a voice very near
+tears, the door opened and Lilac came quickly in.  The conversation
+stopped suddenly, all eyes were fixed on her; perhaps never since she
+had been Queen had her presence caused so much attention: even Agnetta
+paused in her repast, and looked curiously round to see what she would
+do or say.
+
+Without giving a glance at anyone else in the room, Lilac walked
+straight up to where Mrs Greenways sat at the head of the table:
+
+"Aunt," she said rather breathlessly, "I've come to say as I've made up
+my mind."
+
+Mrs Greenways straightened herself to receive the blow.  She knew what
+was coming, and it was hard to be humiliated in the presence of the
+cobbler, yet she would put a brave face upon it.  With a great effort
+she managed to say carelessly:
+
+"It don't matter just now, Lilac.  Sit down and get your tea."
+
+But Mr Greenways quite spoilt the effect of this speech.
+
+"No, no," he called out.  "Let her speak.  Let's hear what she's got to
+say.  Here's Mr Snell'd like to hear it too.  Speak out, Lilac."
+
+Thus encouraged, Lilac turned a little towards her uncle and Joshua.
+
+"I've made up my mind as I'd rather bide here, please," she said.
+
+The teapot fell from Mrs Greenways' hands with such a crash on the tray
+that all the cups rattled, the air of indifference which she had
+struggled to keep up vanished, her whole face softened, and as she
+looked at the modest little figure standing at her side tears of relief
+came into her eyes.  Uncle Joshua and her old feelings of jealousy and
+pride were forgotten for the moment as she laid her broad hand kindly on
+the child's shoulder:
+
+"You're a good gal, Lilac, and you shan't repent your choice," she said;
+"take my word, you shan't."
+
+"And that's your own will, is it, Lilac?" said her uncle.  "And you've
+thought it well over, and you won't want to be altering it again?"
+
+"No, Uncle," said Lilac.  "I'm quite sure now."  Her aunt's kind manner
+made her feel more firmly settled than before.
+
+"It's a harassing thing is a choice," said Mr Greenways.  "I know what
+it is myself with the roots and seeds.  Well, I won't deny that I'm glad
+you're going to stop, but I hope you've done the best for yourself, my
+maid."
+
+"Lor', Greenways, don't worry the child," interrupted his wife, who had
+recovered her usual manner.  "She knows her own mind, and I'm glad she's
+shown so much sense.  You sit down and get your tea, Lilac, and let's be
+comfortable and no more about it."
+
+Lilac slipped into the empty place between the cobbler and Agnetta,
+rather abashed at so much notice.  Agnetta pushed the pot of jam towards
+her.
+
+"I'm glad you're going to stop," she said.  "Have some jam."
+
+Joshua had not spoken since Lilac's entrance, but Mrs Greenways, eyeing
+him nervously, felt sure he was preparing to "preachify."  She went on
+talking very fast and loud in the hope of checking this eloquence, but
+in vain; Joshua, after a few short coughs, stood upright and looked
+round the table.
+
+"Friends," he said, "I knew Lilac's mother well, and I call to mind this
+evening what she often said to me: `I want my child to grow up
+self-respecting and independent.  I want to teach her to stand alone and
+not to be a burden on anyone.'  And then, poor soul, she died sudden,
+and the child was left on your hands.  And she couldn't but be a burden
+at first, seeing how young she was and how little she knew.  And now
+look at it!  How it's all changed.  'Tain't long ago, and she isn't much
+bigger to speak of, and yet she's got to be something as you value and
+don't want to part with.  She's made her own place, and she stands firm
+in it on her own feet, and no one would fill it as well.  It's wonderful
+that is, how small things may help big ones.  Look at it!" said Joshua,
+spreading out the palms of his hands.  "You take a little weak child
+into your house and think she's of no count at all, either to help or to
+hinder; she's so small and the place is so big you hardly know she's
+there.  And then one day you wake up to find that she's gone quietly on
+doing her best, and learning to do better, until she's come to be one of
+the most useful people on the farm.  Because for why?  It's her mother's
+toil and trouble finding their fruit; we oughtn't to forget that.  When
+folks are dead and gone it's hard on 'em not to call to mind what we owe
+'em.  They sowed and we reap.  Lilac's come to be what she is because
+her mother was what she was, and I expect Mary White's proud and pleased
+enough to see how her child's valued this day.  And so I wish the farm
+luck, and all of you luck, and we'll all be glad to think as we're not
+going to lose our little bit of White Lilac as is growing up amongst
+us."
+
+Lilac's eyes had been fixed shyly on her plate.  It was like being Queen
+a second time to have everyone looking at her and talking of her.  As
+Joshua finished there was a sound at the door of gruff assent, and she
+looked round.  It came from Peter, who stood there with all his features
+stretched into a wide smile of pleasure.
+
+"They're all glad I'm going to bide," she said to herself, "and so am
+I."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's White Lilac; or the Queen of the May, by Amy Walton
+
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