Master Gammon and Mrs. Sumfit were punctual in their return near the dinnerhour; and the business of releasing the dumplings and potatoes, and spreading out the cold meat and lettuces, restrained for some period the narrative of proceedings at the funeral.  Chief among the incidents was, that Mrs. Sumfit had really seen, and only wanted, by corroboration of Master Gammon, to be sure she had positively seen, Anthony Hackbut on the skirts of the funeral procession.  Master Gammon, however, was no supporter of conjecture.  What he had thought he had thought; but that was neither here nor there.  He would swear to nothing that he had not touched;—­eyes deceived;—­he was never a guesser.  He left Mrs. Sumfit to pledge herself in perturbation of spirit to an oath that her eyes had seen Anthony Hackbut; and more, which was, that after the close of the funeral service, the young squire had caught sight of Anthony crouching in a corner of the churchyard, and had sent a man to him, and they had disappeared together.  Mrs. Sumfit was heartily laughed at and rallied both by Robert and the farmer.  “Tony at a funeral! and train expenses!” the farmer interjected.  “D’ye think, mother, Tony’d come to Wrexby churchyard ’fore he come Queen Anne’s Farm?  And where’s he now, mayhap?”

Mrs. Sumfit appealed in despair to Master Gammon, with entreaties, and a ready dumpling.

“There, Mas’ Gammon; and why you sh’d play at ‘do believe’ and at ’don’t believe,’ after that awesome scene, the solem’est of life’s, when you did declare to me, sayin’, it was a stride for boots out o’ London this morning.  Your words, Mas’ Gammon! and ’boots’-=it’s true, if by that alone!  For, ‘boots,’ I says to myself—­he thinks by ‘boots,’ there being a cord’er in his family on the mother’s side; which you yourself told to me, as you did, Mas’ Gammon, and now holds back, you did, like a bad horse.”

“Hey! does Gammon jib?” said the farmer, with the ghost of old laughter twinkling in his eyes.

“He told me this tale,” Mrs. Sumfit continued, daring her irresponsive enemy to contradict her, with a threatening gaze.  “He told me this tale, he did; and my belief’s, his game ’s, he gets me into a corner—­there to be laughed at!  Mas’ Gammon, if you’re not a sly old man, you said, you did, he was drownded; your mother’s brother’s wife’s brother; and he had a brother, and what he was to you—­that brother—­” Mrs. Sumfit smote her hands—­“Oh, my goodness, my poor head! but you shan’t slip away, Mas’ Gammon; no, try you ever so much.  Drownded he was, and eight days in the sea, which you told me over a warm mug of ale by the fire years back.  And I do believe them dumplings makes ye obstinate; for worse you get, and that fond of ’em, I sh’ll soon not have enough in our biggest pot.  Yes, you said he was eight days in the sea, and as for face, you said, poor thing! he was like a rag of towel dipped in starch, was your own words, and all his likeness wiped out; and Joe, the other brother,