Her father went his way down a long winding hill beyond his own grounds, along a country road lined with magnificent oaks, through a village where his practised eye noted several bad cottages with disapproval, till presently he slackened his horse’s pace, as he passed an ill-looking farm about half a mile beyond the village.

‘Not a decent gate in the whole place!’ he said to himself with disgust.  ’And the farm buildings only fit for a bonfire.  High time indeed that we made Mannering sit up!’

He paused also to look over the neighbouring hedge at some fields literally choked with weeds.

’And as for Gregson—­lazy, drunken fellow!  Why didn’t he set some village women on?  Just see what they’ve done on my place!  Hullo, here he is!  Now I’m in for it!’ For he saw a slouching man coming rapidly towards him from the farmyard, with the evident intention of waylaying him.  The man’s shabby, untidy dress and blotched complexion did not escape Sir Henry’s quick eye.  ’Seems to have been making a night of it,’ was his inward comment.

‘Good-day, Sir Henry,’ said the farmer, laying a hand on Chicksands’ bridle, ’I wanted a word with you, sir.  I give you fair warning, you and your Committee, you’ll not turn me out without a fight!  I was never given no proper notice—­and there are plenty as ’ll stand by me.’

The voice was thick and angry, and the hand shook.  Sir Henry drew his horse away, and the man’s hold dropped.

‘Of course you had every notice,’ said Sir Henry drily.

‘I hadn’t,’ the man persisted.  ’If the letters as they talk of were sent, I never saw ’em.  And when the Committee came I was out—­on business.  Can’t a man be out on his lawful business, Sir Henry, instead of dancin’ attendance on men as know no better than he?  The way this Government is doing things—­you might as well live under the Czar of Russia as in this country.  It’s no country this for free men now, Sir Henry.’

’The Czar of Russia has come to grief, my man, for the same reason that you have,’ said Sir Henry, gathering up the reins, ’for shirking his duty.  All very well before the war, but now we can’t afford this kind of thing.’

‘And so you’ve told the Squire to turn me out?’ said the man fiercely, his hands on his sides.

‘You’ve had no notice from Mr. Mannering yet?’

‘Not a word.’

‘But you’ve heard from the Inspection Committee?’

The man nodded.

‘But it’s not they as can turn me out, if the Squire don’t agree.’

There was a note of surly defiance in his voice.

‘I don’t know about that,’ said Sir Henry, whose horse was getting restive.  ’My advice to you, Gregson, is to take it quietly, pull yourself together, and get some other work.  There’s plenty going nowadays.’

’Thank you for nothing, Sir Henry.  I’ve got plenty to advise me—­people as I set more store by.  I’ve got a wife and children, sir, and I shan’t give in without a fuss—­you may be sure of that.  Good-day to you.’