should they have been solicitous in the matter?  They had their leases, and there was no adequate reason for supposing that one Caldigate would be more pleasant in his dealing with them than another.  And yet it was evident to him now that this birth of a real heir at the squire’s house, with a fair prospect that the acres would descend in a right line, was regarded by them all with almost superstitious satisfaction.  The bells were rung as though the church-towers were going to be pulled down, and there was not a farmer or a farmer’s wife who did not come to the door of Folking to ask how the young mother and the baby were doing.

‘This is as it should be, squoire,’ said Ralph Holt, who was going about in his Sunday clothes, as though it was a day much too sacred for muck and work.  He had caught hold of Caldigate in the stable yard, and was now walking with him down towards the ferry.

‘Yes;—­she’s doing very well, they tell me,’ said the newly-made father.

’In course she’ll do well.  Why not?  A healthy lass like she, if I may make so free?  There ain’t nothing like having them strong and young, with no town-bred airs about ’em.  I never doubted as she wouldn’t do well.  I can tell from their very walk what sort of mothers they’ll be.’  Mr. Holt had long been known as the most judicious breeder of stock in that neighbourhood.  ‘But it ain’t only that, squoire.’

‘The young’un will do well too, I hope.’

’In course he will.  Why not?  The foals take after their dams for a time, pretty much always.  But what I mean is;—­we be all glad you’ve come back from them out-o’-the-way parts.’

‘I had to go there, Holt.’

’Well;—­we don’t know much about that, sir, and I don’t mean nothing about that.’

’To tell the truth, my friend, I should not have done very well here unless I had been able to top-dress the English acres with a little Australian gold.’

’Like enough, squoire; like enough.  But I wasn’t making bold to say nothing about that.  For a young gentleman to go out a while and then to come back was all very well.  Most of ’em does it.  But when there was a talk as you wern’t to come back, and that Master George was to take the place;—­why then it did seem as things was very wrong.’

‘Master George might have been quite as good as I.’

’It wasn’t the proper thing, squoire.  It wasn’t straight.  If you hadn’t never a’ been, sir, or if the Lord Almighty had taken you as he did the others, God bless ’em, nobody wouldn’t have had a right to say nothing.  But as you was to the fore it wouldn’t have been straight, and no one wouldn’t have thought it straight.’  Instigated by this John Caldigate looked a good deal into the matter that day, and began to feel that, having been born Squire of Folking, he had, perhaps, no right to deal with himself otherwise.  Then various thoughts passed through his mind as to other dealings which had taken place.  How great