Martha came and lighted a fire under Mrs. Tadman’s direction.  That lady was inclined to look somewhat uneasily upon the operation; for the grate had been used constantly throughout a long winter, and the chimney had not been swept since last spring, whereby Mrs. Tadman was conscious of a great accumulation of soot about the massive old brickwork and ponderous beams that spanned the wide chimney.  She had sent for the Malsham sweep some weeks ago; but that necessary individual had not been able to come on the particular day she wished, and the matter had been since then neglected.  She remembered this now with a guilty feeling, more especially as Stephen had demanded a blazing fire, with flaring pine-logs piled half-way up the chimney.  He came back to the parlour presently, arrayed in an old suit of clothes which he kept for such occasions—­an old green coat with basket buttons, and a pair of plaid trousers of an exploded shape and pattern—­and looking more like a pinched and pallid scarecrow than a well-to-do farmer.  Mrs. Tadman had only carried out his commands in a modified degree, and he immediately ordered the servant to put a couple of logs on the fire, and then drew the table close up to the hearth, and sat down to his tea with some appearance of satisfaction.  He had had rather a good day at market, he condescended to tell his wife during the progress of the meal; prices were rising, his old hay was selling at a rate which promised well for the new crops, turnips were in brisk demand, mangold enquired for—­altogether Mr. Whitelaw confessed himself very well satisfied with the aspect of affairs.

After tea he spent his evening luxuriantly, sitting close to the fire, with his slippered feet upon the fender, and drinking hot rum-and-water as a preventive of impending, or cure of incipient, cold.  The rum-and-water being a novelty, something out of the usual order of his drink, appeared to have an enlivening effect upon him.  He talked more than usual, and even proposed a game at cribbage with Mrs. Tadman; a condescension which moved that matron to tears, reminding her, she said, of old times, when they had been so comfortable together, before he had taken to spend his evenings at the Grange.

“Not that I mean any unkindness to you, Ellen,” the doleful Tadman added apologetically, “for you’ve been a good friend to me, and if there’s one merit I can lay claim to, it’s a grateful heart; but of course, when a man marries, he never is the same to his relations as when he was single.  It isn’t in human nature that he should be.”

Here Mrs. Tadman’s amiable kinsman requested her to hold her jaw, and to bring the board if she was going to play, or to say as much if she wasn’t.  Urged by this gentle reminder, Mrs. Tadman immediately produced a somewhat dingy-looking pack of cards and a queer little old-fashioned cribbage-board.