We forbear to recount his return, and how many times he walked up and down the close to view his scattered bark, and to estimate the damage that had been done to him.  At length that hour came which usually suspends all passions by the more imperious power of appetite—­the hour of dinner:  an hour of which it was never needful to remind Mr. Hill by watch, clock, or dial; for he was blessed with a punctual appetite, and powerful as punctual:  so powerful, indeed, that it often excited the spleen of his more genteel or less hungry wife.  “Bless my stars!  Mr. Hill,” she would oftentimes say, “I am really downright ashamed to see you eat so much; and when company is to dine with us, I do wish you would take a snack by way of a damper before dinner, that you may not look so prodigious famishing and ungenteel.”

Upon this hint, Mr. Hill commenced a practice, to which he ever afterwards religiously adhered, of going, whether there was to be company or no company, into the kitchen regularly every day, half an hour before dinner, to take a slice from the roast or the boiled before it went up to table.  As he was this day, according to his custom, in the kitchen, taking his snack by way of a damper, he heard the housemaid and the cook talking about some wonderful fortune-teller, whom the housemaid had been consulting.  This fortune-teller was no less a personage than the successor to Bampfylde Moore Carew, king of the gipsies, whose life and adventures are probably in many, too many, of our readers’ hands.  Bampfylde, the second king of the gipsies, assumed this title, in hopes of becoming as famous, or as infamous, as his predecessor:  he was now holding his court in a wood near the town of Hereford, and numbers of servant-maids and ’prentices went to consult him—­nay, it was whispered that he was resorted to, secretly, by some whose education might have taught them better sense.

Numberless were the instances which our verger heard in his kitchen of the supernatural skill of this cunning man; and whilst Mr. Hill ate his snack with his wonted gravity, he revolved great designs in his secret soul.  Mrs. Hill was surprised, several times during dinner, to see her consort put down his knife and fork, and meditate.  “Gracious me, Mr. Hill! what can have happened to you this day?  What can you be thinking of, Mr. Hill, that can make you forget what you have upon your plate?”

“Mrs. Hill,” replied the thoughtful verger, “our grandmother Eve had too much curiosity; and we all know it did not lead to good.  What I am thinking of will be known to you in due time, but not now, Mrs. Hill; therefore, pray, no questions, or teasing, or pumping.  What I think, I think; what I say, I say; what I know, I know; and that is enough for you to know at present:  only this, Phoebe, you did very well not to put on the Limerick gloves, child.  What I know, I know.  Things will turn out just as I said from the first.  What I say, I say; and what I think, I think; and this is enough for you to know at present.”