[Extract]

“Martha Dence and I have had words, and what do you think it was about?  I happened to let out my opinion of Mr. Raby.  Mother, it was like setting a match to a barrel of gunpowder.  She turned as red as fire, and said, ‘Who be you that speaks against Raby to Dence?’

“I tried to pacify her, but it was no use.  ‘Don’t speak to me,’ said she.  ‘I thought better of you.  You and I are out.’  I bowed before the storm, and, to give her time to cool, I obeyed your wishes, and walked to Cairnhope old church.  What a curious place!  But I could not get in; and, on my return, I found Mr. Raby keeps the key.  Now, you can’t do a thing here, or say a word, but what it is known all over the village.  So Martha Dence meets me at the door, and says, very stiffly, she thought I might have told her I wanted to see the old church.  I pulled a long, penitent face, and said, ’Yes; but unfortunately, I was out of her good books, and had orders not to speak to her.’  ‘Nay,’ says she, ’life is too short for long quarrels.  You are a stranger, and knew no better.’  Then she told me to wait five minutes while she put on her bonnet, as she calls it.  Well, I waited the five and-forty minutes, and she put on her bonnet, and so many other smart things, that we couldn’t possibly walk straight up to the old church.  We had to go round by the butcher’s shop, and order half a pound of suet; no less.  ’And bring it yourself, this evening,’ said I, ‘or it might get lost on the road.’  Says the butcher, ’Well, sir, that is the first piece of friendly advice any good Christian has bestowed—­’ But I heard no more, owing to Martha chasing me out of the shop.

“To reach the old church we had to pass the old ruffian’s door.  Martha went in; I sauntered on, and she soon came after me, with the key in her hand.  ‘But,’ said she, ’he told me if my name hadn’t been Dence he wouldn’t trust me with it, though I went on my bended knees.’

“We opened the church-door, and I spent an hour inside, examining and copying inscriptions for you.  But, when I came to take up a loose brass, to try and decipher it, Martha came screaming at me, ’Oh, put it down! put it down!  I pledged my word to Squire you should not touch them brasses.’  What could I do, mother?  The poor girl was in an agony.  This old ruffian has, somehow, bewitched her, and her father too, into a sort of superstitious devotion that I can’t help respecting, unreasonable as it is.  So I dropped the brass, and took to reflecting.  And I give you my thoughts.

“What a pity and a shame that a building of this size should lie idle!  If it was mine I would carefully remove all the monuments, and the dead bones, et cetera, to the new church, and turn this old building into a factory, or a set of granaries, or something useful.  It is as great a sin to waste bricks and mortar as it is bread,” etc.

“My dear Harry,—­Your dear sprightly letters delight me, and reconcile me to the separation; for I see that your health is improving every day, by your gayety; and this makes me happy, though I can not quite be gay.