This marriage was solemnized between us.”

[Illustration:  Facsimile of the Signatures in the Register.]

“In the presence of THOMAS HUTCHINSON. 
JOANNA HUTCHINSON. 
JOHN HUTCHINSON.”

The same day Wordsworth with his wife and sister drove to Thirsk and two days afterwards reached Grasmere, where they soon settled down to an uneventful life at Dove Cottage.  Dorothy Wordsworth could not “describe what she felt,” but we are told that she accepted her sister-in-law without a trace of jealousy.

There is still preserved in Pickering one of the parchments on which were enrolled the names of all those who were liable for service in the militia.  It is headed

“Militia Enrollment 1807-8”

and begins:—­

“An enrollment of the names of the several persons who have been chosen by ballot to serve in the Militia for five years for the west part of the sub-division of Pickering Lyth in the North Riding of the County of York and also of the several substitutes who have been produced and approved to serve for the like term and for such further term as the Militia shall remain embodied, if within the space of five years His Majesty shall order the Militia to be drawn out and embodied and are enrolled in the place of such principals whose names are set opposite thereto in pursuance of an act of the 47th of King George III., Cap. 71, entitled an act for the speedily completing the Militia of Great Britain and increasing the same under certain delimitations and restrictions (14th Aug. 1807).”

The thirty-six men were taken as follows:—­

 8 from Middleton.
 5 " Kirby Misperton.
16 " Pickering.
 1 " Ellerburne.
 1 " Levisham.
 3 " Sinnington.
 1 " Thornton.

Jonathan Goodall, a farmer of Middleton, induced Geo. Thompson of Pickering, a farmer’s servant, 30 years old, to stand for him, paying him L42.

Wm. Newton, a farmer of Middleton, had to pay Geo. Allen, a linen draper of Richmond, L47, 5s. as substitute.

The smallest amount paid was L20, and the largest sum was L47, 5s.

Substitutes seem to have been hard to find in the neighbourhood of Pickering, and those few whose names appear had to be heavily paid.  George Barnfather, a farm servant of Kirby Misperton agreed to serve as a substitute on payment of L42, and a cartwright of Goathland agreed for the same sum, while men from Manchester or Leeds were ready to accept half that amount.

The extreme reluctance to serve of a certain Ben Wilson, a sweep of Middleton, is shown in a story told of him by a very old inhabitant of Pickering whose memory is in no way impaired by her years.  She tells us that this Wilson on hearing of his ill-luck seized a carving-knife and going to the churchyard put his right hand on a gate-post and fiercely cut off the two fingers required for firing a rifle.  He avoided active service in this way and often showed his mutilated hand to the countryfolk who may or may not have admired the deed.