"Now," said Snac, "I never thought as Lord Barfield 'ud be so mean as to do things in that half-an'-half manner. I should ha' fancied, if Lord Barfield had took it into his head to set up an extra gentleman in livery, he'd ha' done it thorough."

Joseph's countenance fell, and he surveyed his own arms and legs with an air of criticism. Then he took hold of the gold-laced flaps of the crimson waistcoat and laughed with a swift and intense approval.

"Ain't this been done thorough?" he demanded.

"As far as it goes, Joseph," replied the jocular Snac, "it's n.o.ble, to be sure." Joseph became critical again, but again at the sight of the gold-laced waistcoat his doubts vanished. "But surely, surely, Joseph, he should ha' gi'en you a pair o' them high collars as he wears, and a cravat, to go along with a get out like that."

"He might ha' done that, to be sure," said Joseph, tentatively.

"Might ha' done it!" cried Snac, with a voice of honest scorn. "Ah!

and would ha' done it if he'd been half a man, let alone a peer of the realm. For that's what he is, Joseph--a peer of the realm."

"So he is," said the poor Joseph, who was rapidly sliding into the trap which was set for him. "You would have expected a peer of the realm to do it thorough, wouldn't you?"

"Look here, Joseph," continued Snac, opening his trap wide, "you go and tell him. 'My lord,' says you--a-speakin' like a man, Joseph, and a-lookin' his lordship i' the face as a man in a suit of clothes like them has got a right to do--'my lord,' you says, 'you're as mean as you're high,' says you. 'What for?' says he. 'Why,' says you, 'for settin' a man out i' this half-an'-half mode for the folks to laugh at.

Give me a collar and a cravat this minute, you says,' or else be ashamed o' thyself. Be ayther a man or a mouse.' That's the way to talk to 'em, Joseph."

"Think so?" asked Joseph, with an air half martial and half doubtful.

"To be sure," cried Snac; and with one exception everybody in the little crowd echoed "To be sure!"

"I'll goo an' do it," said Joseph, thus fortified, "this instant minute."

"Wait a bit Joseph," said Reuben Gold, "I'm going that way. We'll go a little of the road together."

"Now, Mr. Gold," cried Snac, in a whisper, recognizing Reuben's voice before he turned, "don't you go an' spoil sport."

"Snac, my lad," responded Reuben, smiling, "it's poor sport."

"He'd go an' tell him," said Snac, with a delighted grin. "You can mek him say annythin'."

"That's why it's such poor sport," said Reuben. "It's too easy. It's sport to stand up for a bout with the sticks when the other man's a bit better than you are, but it's no fun to beat a baby."

"I like it better," Snac replied, with candor, "when th' odds is on t'other side. I like to be a bit better than t'other chap."

"You like to win? That's natural. But you like to deserve a bit of praise for winning; eh?"

Reuben walked away with the rescued Joseph at his side. Joseph was as yet unconscious of his rescue, and was fully bent upon his message to the earl.

"Theer's no denyin' that chap nothin," said Snac, looking after Reuben's retiring figure. "He's got that form an' smilin' manner as'll tek no such thing as a no. An' lettin' that alone," he continued, again relapsing into candor, "he could punch my head if he wanted to, though I'm a match for ere another man i' the parish--and he'd do it too, at anny given minute, for all so mild as he is."

"He's the spit of what his uncle was," said the aged rustic. "When he was a lad he was the best cudgel-player, the best man of his hands, and the prettiest man of his feet from here to Castle Barfield."

"He's fell off of late 'ears, then," said Snac.

"Ah!" quavered the old fellow, "it's time as is too many for the best on us, Mr. Eld. Who'd think as I'd iver stood again all comers for miles and miles around for the ten-score yards? I did though!"

"Didst?" cried Snac. "Then tek a shillin' and get a drop o' good stuff wi' it, an' warm up that old gizzard o' thine wi' thinkin' o' thy younger days."

And away he swaggered, carrying his shilling's worth with him in the commendations of the rustic circle. He was a young man who liked to be well thought of, and to that end did most of his benefactions in the open air.

In the mean time Reuben had disappeared with Joseph, and was already engaged in spoiling the village sport. Joseph was so resolved upon the collars and the cravat, and his imagination was so fired by the prospect of those splendid additions to his toilet, that Reuben was compelled to promise them from his own stores. Joseph became at once amenable to reason, and promised to overlook his lordship's meanness.

"Are you going to do anything for his lordship to-day, Joseph?" his protector asked him.

"No," said Joseph. "He's gi'en me a holiday. I tode him as 'twarn't natural to think as a man 'ud want to go to work i' togs like thesen.

The fust day's wear, and all!"

"Well, if you _should_ care to earn a shilling--"

"I couldn't undertek a grimy job," said Joseph. "Not to-day. A message now."

"A message? Could you take the message in a wheelbarrow, Joseph?"

"A barrer?" Joseph surveyed his arms and legs, and then took a grip of the laced waistcoat with both hands.

"A message in a wheelbarrow for a shilling, and a pair of collars and a black satin cravat to come I home in, Joseph."

"Gaffer," said Joseph, "it's a bargain."

Reuben's message was Ezra Gold's musical library, and the volumes having been carefully built up in a roomy wheelbarrow, Joseph set out with them at a leisurely pace towards his patron's home. Reuben on first entering his uncle's house had laid the green baize bag upon the table. When the books were all arranged, and Joseph had started away with them, Reuben re-entered.

"I've brought the old lady back again, uncle," he said.

"You've eased her down, I hope, lad," said the old man, untying the bag and drawing forth the violin. "That's right. As for bringing her back again, you remember what used to be the sayin' when you was a child, 'Give a thing and take a thing, that's the devil's plaything.' I meant thee to keep her, lad. It's a sin an' a shame as such a voice should be silent."

"Uncle," said Reuben, stammering somewhat, "I scarcely like to take her.

It seems like--like trespa.s.sing on your goodness."

"I won't demean th' old lady," returned Ezra. "Her comes o' the right breed to have all the virtues of her kind. Her's a Stradivarius, Reuben, and my grandfather gi'en fifty guineas for her in the year seventeen hundred an' sixty-one. A king might mek a present of her to a king. And that's why in the natural selfishness of a man's heart I kep' her all these 'ears hangin' dumb and idle on the wall here. I take some shame to myself as I acted so, for you might ha' had her half a dozen years ago, and ha' done her no less than as much justice as I could iver ha' done her myself at the best days of my life. Her's yourn, my lad, and I only mek one bargain. If you should marry and have children of your own, and one of 'em should be a player, he can have her, but if not, I ask you to will her to somebody as'll know her value, and handle her as her deserves."

Reuben was embarra.s.sed by the gift.

"To tell the truth, uncle," he said, "I should take her the more readily if I'd coveted her less."

"Bring her out into the gardin, lad," returned his uncle. "Let's hear the 'Last Rose' again."

Reuben followed the old man's lead. His uncle's house-keeper carried chairs to the gra.s.s-plot, and there the old man and the young one sat down together in the summer air, and Reuben, drawing a little pitch-pipe from his pocket, sounded its note, adjusted the violin, and played. Ezra set his elbows upon his knees and chin in his hands, and sat to listen.

"Lend her to me, lad," he said, when his nephew laid the instrument across his knees. "I don't know--I wonder--Let's see if there is any of the old skill left." His face was gray and his hands shook as he held them out. "Theer's almost a fear upon me," he said, as he took the fiddle and tucked it beneath his chin. "No, no, I dar' not. I doubt the poor thing 'ud shriek at me."

"Nonsense, uncle," answered Reuben, with a swift and subtle movement of the fingers of the left hand, such as only a violin-player could accomplish. "I doubt if there is such a thing as forgetting when once you have played. Try."

"No," said the old man, handing back the fiddle. "I dar' not. I haven't the courage for it. It's a poor folly, maybe, for a man o' my years to talk o' breakin' his heart over a toy like that, and yet, if the tone wasn't to come after all! That 'nd be a bitter pill, Reuben. No, no.

It's a thousand to one the power's left me, but theer's just a chance it hasn't. I feel it theer." The gaunt left-hand fingers made just such a strenuous swift and subtle motion as Reuben's had made a minute earlier.

"And yet it mightn't be." Reuben reached out the violin towards him, but he recoiled from it and arose. "No, no. I dar'n't fail," he said, with a gray smile. "I darn't risk it. Take her away, lad. No, lend her here. A man as hasn't pluck enow in his inwards for a thing o' that kind--Lend her here!"

He seized the instrument, tucked it once more beneath his chin, and with closed eyes laid the bow upon the strings. His left foot, stretched firmly out in advance of the right, beat noiselessly upon the turf, as if it marked the movement of a prelude inaudible except to him. Then the bow gripped the strings, and sounded one soft, long-drawn, melancholy note. A little movement of the brows, a scarcely discernible nod of the head marked his approval of the tone, and after marking anew the cadence of that airy prelude he began to play. For a minute or more his resolve and excitement carried him along, but suddenly a note sounded false and he stopped.