IN A HAMPSHIRE VILLAGE 163 



My usual good luck attended me in this place, for 

 seldom have I stayed with people I liked better. The 

 wife was intelligent enough to let me live just as I liked 

 without any fuss, so that I couid get up at four o'clock 

 in the morning when they were still sleeping to make 

 tea for myself in the kitchen before going out, and 

 come in when I liked and have what I liked in the way 

 of food. The man, too, was a perfect host ; his good 

 qualities and cleverness in his work had raised him to 

 a better position than that of most working-men. He 

 was actually earning about three pounds a week, but 

 prosperity had not spoiled him ; he might have been 

 making no more than fifteen or eighteen shillings like 

 others of his class, in the village. His manner was 

 singularly engaging, and he was quiet and gentle in the 

 house. One might have thought that he had been 

 subdued by his wife — that she was the ruling spirit ; 

 but it was not so : when they were together, and when 

 they sat at table, where I sometimes sat with them, she 

 tuned herself to him and talked with a gentle cheerful- 

 ness, watching his face and hanging on his words. 

 Their manner was so unlike that of most persons in 

 their state of life that it was a puzzle to me, and I might 

 have guessed the secret of it from a peculiar pathos in 

 his voice and the inward-gazing dreamy expression in 

 his eyes which haunted me ; but I guessed nothing, 

 and only learnt it just before quitting the village. 



Then there was the boy, who in the house was just 

 as still, gentle, and low-voiced as his father ; a boy who 

 disliked his books and crawled reluctantly to school 



