In the meantime Miss Anne did not forget to visit the cabin, and cheer, as well as she could, the trouble of poor Martha, whose good and proud housewifery had kept Fern’s Hollow cleaner and tidier than any of the cottages at Botfield.  It was no easy matter to rouse Martha to take any interest in the miserable cabin where the household furniture had been hastily heaped in the night before; but when her heart warmed to the work, in which Miss Anne was taking an active part, she began to feel something like pleasure in making the new home like the old one, as far as the interior went.  Out of doors, no improvement could be made until soil could be carried up the barren and steep bank, to make a little plot of garden ground.  But within, the work went on so heartily that, when Stephen returned from the pit, half an hour earlier than usual,—­for he had no long walk of two miles now,—­he found his grandfather settled in the chimney corner, apparently unconscious of any removal, while both Martha and little Nan seemed in some measure reconciled to their change of dwelling.  Moreover, Miss Anne was waiting to greet him kindly.

‘Stephen,’ she said, ’Martha has found the three notes in your grandfather’s pocket all safe.  You had better take them with you to the clergyman at Danesford, and do what he advises you with them.  And now you are come to live at Botfield, you can manage to go to church every Sunday; even little Nan can go; and there is a night-school at Longville, where you can learn to write as well as read.  It will not be all loss, my boy.’

The opportunity for going to Danesford was not long in coming, for Black Thompson and Cole, who were the chief colliers in the pit, chose to take a ‘play-day’ with the rest of their comrades; and the boys and girls employed at the works were obliged to play also, though it involved the forfeiture of their day’s wages—­always a serious loss to Stephen.  This time, however, he heard the news gladly; and, carefully securing the three notes by pinning them inside his pocket, he set out for his ten miles walk across the tableland to the other side of the mountains, where Danesford lay.  His nearest way led straight by Fern’s Hollow, and he saw that already upon the old site the foundation was laid for a new house containing three rooms.  In everything else the aspect of the place remained unchanged; there still hung the creaking wicket, where little Nan had been wont to look for his coming home, until she could run with outstretched arms to meet him.  The beehives stood yet beneath the hedge, and the bees were flying to and fro, seeking out the few flowers of the autumn upon the hillside.  The fern upon the uplands, just behind the hollow, was beginning to die, and its rich red-brown hue showed that it was ready to be cut and carried away for fodder; but a squatter from some other hill-hut had trespassed upon Stephen’s old domain.  Except this one man, the whole tableland was deserted; and so silent