Just after this I went home for a week’s holiday.  Everything was prospering there; my father’s new partnership gave evident satisfaction to both parties.  There was no display of increased wealth in our modest household; but my mother had a few extra comforts provided for her by her husband.  I made acquaintance with Mr and Mrs Ellison, and first saw pretty Margaret Ellison, who is now my wife.  When I returned to Eltham, I found that a step was decided upon, which had been in contemplation for some time; that Holdsworth and I should remove our quarters to Hornby; our daily presence, and as much of our time as possible, being required for the completion of the line at that end.

Of course this led to greater facility of intercourse with the Hope Farm people.  We could easily walk out there after our day’s work was done, and spend a balmy evening hour or two, and yet return before the summer’s twilight had quite faded away.  Many a time, indeed, we would fain have stayed longer—­the open air, the fresh and pleasant country, made so agreeable a contrast to the close, hot town lodgings which I shared with Mr Holdsworth; but early hours, both at eve and morn, were an imperative necessity with the minister, and he made no scruple at turning either or both of us out of the house directly after evening prayer, or ‘exercise’, as he called it.  The remembrance of many a happy day, and of several little scenes, comes back upon me as I think of that summer.  They rise like pictures to my memory, and in this way I can date their succession; for I know that corn harvest must have come after hay-making, apple-gathering after corn-harvest.

The removal to Hornby took up some time, during which we had neither of us any leisure to go out to the Hope Farm.  Mr Holdsworth had been out there once during my absence at home.  One sultry evening, when work was done, he proposed our walking out and paying the Holmans a visit.  It so happened that I had omitted to write my usual weekly letter home in our press of business, and I wished to finish that before going out.  Then he said that he would go, and that I could follow him if I liked.  This I did in about an hour; the weather was so oppressive, I remember, that I took off my coat as I walked, and hung it over my arm.  All the doors and windows at the farm were open when I arrived there, and every tiny leaf on the trees was still.  The silence of the place was profound; at first I thought that it was entirely deserted; but just as I drew near the door I heard a weak sweet voice begin to sing; it was cousin Holman, all by herself in the house-place, piping up a hymn, as she knitted away in the clouded light.  She gave me a kindly welcome, and poured out all the small domestic news of the fortnight past upon me, and, in return, I told her about my own people and my visit at home.

‘Where were the rest?’ at length I asked.