head with an infinity of wisdom, tempered by deeply-rooted mistrust of the British climate and the British Government. 

 “I don’t ’xpect nothing, Mr. Jellyband,” he said. “Pore folks like us is of no account up there in Lunnon, I knows that, and it’s not often as I do complain. But when it comes to sich wet weather in September, and all me fruit a-rottin’ and a-dyin’ like the ’Guptian mother’s first-born, and doin’ no more good than they did, pore dears, save to a lot of Jews, pedlars and sich, with their oranges and sich like foreign ungodly fruit, which nobody’d buy if English apples and pears was nicely swelled. As the Scriptures say—” 

 “That’s quite right, Mr. ’Empseed,” retorted Jellyband, “and as I says, what can you ’xpect? There’s all them Frenchy devils over the Channel yonder a-murderin’ their king and nobility, and Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox and Mr. Burke a-fightin’ and a-wranglin’ between them, if we Englishmen should ’low them to go on in their ungodly way. ‘Let ’em murder!’ says Mr. Pitt. ‘Stop ’em!’ says Mr. Burke.” 

 “And let ’em murder, says I, and be demmed to ’em,” said Mr. Hempseed, emphatically, for he had but little liking for his friend Jellyband’s political arguments, wherein he always got out of his depth, and had but little chance for displaying those pearls of wisdom which had earned for him so high a reputation in the neighbourhood and so many free tankards of ale at “The Fisherman’s Rest.” 

 “Let ’em murder,” he repeated again, “but don’t let’s ’ave sich rain in September, for that is agin the law and the Scriptures which says—” 

 “Lud! Mr. ’Arry, ’ow you made me jump!” 

 It was unfortunate for Sally and her flirtation that this remark of hers should have occurred at the precise moment when Mr. Hempseed was collecting his breath, in order to deliver himself of one of those Scriptural utterances which had made him famous, for it brought down upon her pretty head the full flood of her father’s wrath. 

 “Now then, Sally, me girl, now then!” he said, trying to force a frown upon his good-humoured face, “stop that fooling with them young jackanapes and get on with the work.” 

 “The work’s gettin’ on all ri’, father.” 

 But Mr. Jellyband was peremptory. He had other views for his buxom daughter, his only child, who would in God’s good time become the owner of “The Fisherman’s Rest,” than to see her married to one of these young fellows who earned but a 

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