leap to meet the coming Perseus, as Martha’s heart went out to this prince, come, if come indeed he were, to break the chains that bound her to the cruel rock of barren life. Her heart overflowed with gratitude, and humbly she thanked her God that His handmaiden had found favour in this great Lord’s sight. She did not ask for the fervent worship of an ardent wooer’s love. She only asked to be allowed to love, and to be loved a little—oh! just a little, in return—as the parched ground thirsts for the grateful shower, so thirsted the heart of the patient Martha for a good man’s love.

 

CHAPTER V.

 

HAPPY'S the wooing that’s not long a-doing, and Jabez Tinker, his mind resolved, was not the man to let the grass grow under his feet. Martha was not the one to insist on all the formularies of a protracted siege; she surrendered the citadel of her heart at the first blast of trumpet. She only insisted that the wedding should be a quiet one. As this jumped entirely with her lover’s notions she had her own way, though Ephraim protested.

“We don’t kill a pig every day, and blow th’ expense. If aw pay th’ piper surely I ought to chuse th’ tune.”

But he was not suffered to choose the tune, though none questioned that he paid the piper, and paid him handsomely. Exactly how many thousands of pounds made over his humble counter went to swell Mr. Tinker’s balance at the Bank no one but he and his son-in-law and the bankers knew, and is no concern of ours.

Jabez took his bride to London for the honeymoon. The wool-sales were on at the time, so that the manufacturer was able to combine business with pleasure, and to avoid that exclusive devotion to his wife which even more ardent husbands are said to have found somewhat irksome. But he took care that Martha should see some of the sights of London—the Houses of Parliament, the Abbey, St. Paul’s, and the Tower. Theatres were, of course, not to be thought of, but on one never-to-be-forgotten Saturday, the two went up the river to Hampton Court. Then for the first time Martha realized that the world is very beautiful and often amid the bleak hills and stone walls and hideous mills of her mountain home, her thoughts would dwell upon the green fields and rich hedges and rustling, swaying, leafy branches and deep flowing waters of the fair valley of the Thames. The portraits at Hampton Court shocked her, and she hurried through the rooms with crimson face.

But her heart was very light 

 Prev. P 36/194 next