Io FIELD AND HEDGEROW, 
him to lose his self-respect and liberty. He would 
rather risk his life in the snowdrift. Nature, earth, and 
the gods did not help him; sun and stars, where were 
they? He knocked at the doors of the farms and 
found good in man only—not in Law or Order, but- in 
individual man alone. 
The bitter north wind drives even the wild fieldfare 
to the berries in the garden hedge; so it drives stray 
human creatures to the door. A third came—an old 
gipsy woman—still stout and hearty, with green fresh 
brooms to sell. We bought some brooms—one of them 
was left on the kitchen floor, and the tame rabbit nibbled 
it; it proved to be heather. The true broom is as green 
and succulent in appearance in January as June. She 
would see the ‘missis.” ‘Bless you, my good lady, it be 
weather, bean’t it? I hopes you'll never know what it be 
to want, my good lady. Ah, well, you looks good- 
tempered if you don’t want to buy nothing. Do you 
see if you can’t find me an old body, now, for my girl— 
now do’ee try; she’s confined in a tent on the common 
—nothing but one of our tents, my good lady—that’s 
true—and she’s doing jest about well’ (with briskness 
and an air of triumph), ‘that she is! She’s got twins, 
you see, my lady, but she’s all right, and as well as can 
be. She wants to get up; and she says to me, “ Mother, 
co’ee try and get me a body; ’tis hard to lie here abed 
and be well enough to get up, and be obliged to stay 
here because I’ve got nothing but a bedgown.” For you 
see, my good lady, we managed pretty well with the 
first baby; but the second bothered us, and we cut up 
all the bits of things we could find, and there she ain’t 
got nothing to put on. Do’ee see if ’ee can’t find her an 
old body.’ The common is an open piece of furze and 
heath at the verge of the forest ; and here, in a tent just 
