"She'll do!" After about twenty minutes of
silence thus employed, he got up, saying:

"Well, Hester, I'm going. When shall I
come back again?"

"Please thysel', and thou'lt please me," said
Hester, in a tone that she tried to make light
and indifferent; but he saw that her colour came
and went, and that she trembled while she
moved about. In another moment Hester was
soundly kissed; but when she looked round to
scold the middle-aged farmer, he appeared so
entirely composed that she hesitated. He said:

"I have pleased mysel', and thee too, I
hope. Is it a month's wage, and a month's
warning? To-day is the eighth. July eighth
is our wedding-day. I have no time to spend
a-wooing before then, and wedding must na
take long. Two days is enough to throw away
at our time o' life."

It was like a dream; but Hester resolved
not to think more about it till her work was
done. And when all was cleaned up for the
evening, she went and gave her mistress warning,
telling her all the history of her life in a
very few words. That day month she was
married from Mrs. Thompson's house.

The issue of the marriage was one boy, Benjamin.
A few years after his birth, Hester's
brother died at Leeds, leaving ten or twelve
children. Hester sorrowed bitterly over this
loss; and Nathan showed her much quiet
sympathy, although he could not but remember that
Jack Rose had added insult to the bitterness of
his youth. He helped his wife to make ready to
go by the waggon to Leeds. He made light of
the household difficulties which came thronging
into her mind after all was fixed for her departure.
He filled her purse, that she might have
wherewithal to alleviate the immediate wants
of her brother's family. And as she was
leaving, he ran after the waggon. "Stop, stop!"
he cried. "Hetty, if thou wilt — if it wunnot be
too much for thee—bring back one of Jack's
wenches for company, like. We've enough and
to spare; and a lass will make the house
winsome, as a man may say."

The waggon moved on, while Hester had such
a silent swelling of gratitude in her heart, as
was both thanks to her husband, and thanksgiving
to God.

And that was the way that little Bessy Rose
came to be an inmate of the Nab's-end farm.

Virtue met with its own reward in this
instance, and in a clear and tangible shape, too,
which need not delude people in general into
thinking that such is the usual nature of virtue's
rewards. Bessy grew up a bright, affectionate,
active girl; a daily comfort to her uncle and
aunt. She was so much a darling in the household
that they even thought her worthy of their
only son Benjamin, who was perfection in their
eyes. It is not often the case that two plain,
homely people have a child of uncommon beauty;
but it is sometimes, and Benjamin Huntroyd
was one of these exceptional cases. The hard-
working, labour and care-marked farmer, and
the mother, who could never have been more
than tolerably comely in her best days, produced
a son who might have been an earl's son for
grace and beauty. Even the hunting squires of
the neighbourhood reined up their horses to
admire him, as he opened the gates for them.
He had no shyness, he was so accustomed to
admiration from strangers, and adoration from
his parents from his earliest years. As for
Bessy Rose, he ruled imperiously over her heart
from the time she first set eyes on him. And
as she grew older, she grew on in loving,
persuading herself that what her uncle and
aunt loved so dearly it was her duty to love
dearest of all. At every unconscious symptom
of the young girl's love for her cousin,
his parents smiled and winked: all was going
on as they wished, no need to go far afield for
Benjamin's wife. The household could go on
as it was now; Nathan and Hester sinking into
the rest of years, and relinquishing care and authority
to those dear ones, who, in process of time,
might bring other dear ones to share their love.

But Benjamin took it all very coolly. He had
been sent to a day-school in the neighbouring
town—a grammar-school, in the high state of
neglect in which the majority of such schools
were thirty years ago. Neither his father nor
his mother knew much of learning.  All that
they knew (and that directed their choice of a
school) was, that they could not, by any
possibility, part with their darling to a boarding-
school; that some schooling he must have, and
that Squire Pollard's son went to Highminster
Grammar School. Squire Pollard's son, and many
another son destined to make his parents' hearts
ache, went to this school. If it had not been so
utterly bad a place of education, the simple
farmer and his wife might have found it out
sooner. But not only did the pupils there learn
vice, they also learnt deceit. Benjamin was
naturally too clever to remain a dunce, or else, if he had
chosen so to be, there was nothing in Highminster
Grammar School to hinder his being a dunce of
the first water. But to all appearance he grew
clever and gentlemanlike. His father and
mother were even proud of his airs and graces
when he came home for the holidays ; taking
them for proofs of his refinement, although the
practical effect of such refinement was to make
him express his contempt for his parents' homely
ways and simple ignorance. By the time he was
eighteen—an articled clerk in an attorney's office
at Highminster, for he had quite declined becoming
a "mere clod-hopper," that is to say a hard-working,
honest farmer like his father—Bessy Rose
was the only person who was dissatisfied with
him. The little girl of fourteen instinctively
felt there was something wrong about him.
Alas! two years more, and the girl of sixteen
worshipped his very shadow, and would not
see that aught could be wrong with one so soft-
spoken, so handsome, so kind as Cousin
Benjamin. For Benjamin had found out that the
way to cajole his parents out of money for every
indulgence he fancied, was to pretend to forward
their innocent scheme, and make love to his
pretty cousin Bessy Rose. He cared just