The grey figure kept Phoebe in sight, but followed a path of his own choosing.  When she entered the woods he drew a little nearer, and thus followed, passing from shadow to shadow, scarce fifty yards behind.

Meanwhile the main procession approached the scene of its labours.  Martin Grimbal, attracted by the prospect of reading this page from an old Devonian superstition, was of the company.  He walked with Billy Blee and Gaffer Lezzard; and these high priests, well pleased at their junior’s attitude towards the ceremony, opened their hearts to him upon it.

“’T is an ancient rite, auld as cider—­maybe auld as Scripture, to, for anything I’ve heard to the contrary,” said Mr. Lezzard.

“Ay, so ‘t is,” declared Billy Blee, “an’ a custom to little observed nowadays.  But us might have better blooth in springtime an’ braaver apples come autumn if the trees was christened more regular.  You doan’t see no gert stock of sizable apples best o’ years now—­li’l scrubbly auld things most times.”

“An’ the cider from ’em—­poor roapy muck, awnly fit to make ’e thirst for better drink,” criticised Gaffer Lezzard.

“’Tis this way:  theer’s gert virtue in cider put to apple-tree roots on this particular night, accordin’ to the planets and such hidden things.  Why so, I can’t tell ’e, any more ’n anybody could tell ’e why the moon sails higher up the sky in winter than her do in summer; but so ’t is.  An’ facts be facts.  Why, theer’s the auld ‘Sam’s Crab’ tree in this very orchard we’m walkin’ to.  I knawed that tree three year ago to give a hogshead an’ a half as near as damn it.  That wan tree, mind, with no more than a few baskets of ‘Redstreaks’ added.”

“An’ a shy bearer most times, tu,” added Mr. Lezzard.

“Just so; then come next year, by some mischance, me being indoors, if they didn’t forget to christen un!  An’, burnish it all! theer wasn’t fruit enough on the tree to fill your pockets!”

“Whether ’t is the firing into the branches, or the cider to the roots does gude, be a matter of doubt,” continued Mr. Lezzard; but the other authority would not admit this.

“They ’m like the halves of a flail, depend on it:  wan no use wi’out t’other.  Then theer’s the singing of the auld song:  who’s gwaine to say that’s the least part of it?”

“’T is the three pious acts thrawn together in wan gude deed,” summed up Mr. Lezzard; “an’ if they’d awnly let apples get ripe ’fore they break ‘em, an’ go back to the straw for straining, ’stead of these tom-fule, new-fangled hair-cloths, us might get tidy cider still.”

By this time the gate of the orchard was reached; Gaffer Lezzard, Billy, and the other patriarch, Mr. Chapple,—­a very fat old man,—­loaded their weapons, and the perspiring cider-carriers set down their loads.

“Now, you bwoys, give awver runnin’ ’bout like rabbits,” cried out Mr. Chapple.  “You ‘m here to sing while us pours cider an’ shoots in the trees; an’ not a drop you’ll have if you doan’t give tongue proper, so I tell ’e.”