“In the Rufford Gazette.  There is a Rufford Gazette, and Rufford isn’t much more than a village.  If he would publish his accounts half-yearly in the Rufford Gazette, honestly showing how much he had lost by his system, how much capital had been misapplied, and how much labour wasted, he might serve as an example, like the pictures of ‘The Idle Apprentice.’  I don’t see that he can do any other good,—­unless it be to the estimable gentleman who is allowed to occupy the pretty house.  I don’t think you’d see anything like that model farm in our country, Sir.”

“Your views, Mr. Gotobed, are utilitarian rather than picturesque.”

“Oh!—­if you say that it is done for the picturesque, that is another thing.  Lord Rufford is a wealthy lord, and can afford to be picturesque.  A green sward I should have thought handsomer, as well as less expensive, than a ploughed field, but that is a matter of taste.  Only why call a pretty toy a model farm?  You might mislead the British rustics.”

They had by this time passed through a couple of fields which formed part of the model farm, and had come to a stile leading into a large meadow.  “This I take it,” said the Senator looking about him, “is beyond the limits of my Lord’s plaything.”

“This is Shugborough,” said Sir George, “and there is John Runce, the occupier, on his pony.  He at any rate is a model farmer.”  As he spoke Mr. Runce slowly trotted up to them touching his hat, and Mr. Gotobed recognized the man who had declined to sit next to him at the hunting breakfast.  Runce also thought that he knew the gentleman.  “Do you hunt to-morrow, Mr. Runce?” asked Sir George.

“Well, Sir George, no; I think not.  I b’lieve I must go to Rufford and hear that fellow Scrobby get it hot and heavy.”

“We seem all to be going that way.  You think he’ll be convicted, Sir.”

“If there’s a juryman left in the country worth his salt, he’ll be convicted,” said Mr. Runce, almost enraged at the doubt.  “But that other fellow; he’s to get off.  That’s what kills me, Sir George.”

“You’re alluding to Mr. Goarly, Sir,” said the Senator.

“That’s about it, certainly,” said Runce, still looking very suspiciously at his companion.

“I almost think he is the bigger rogue of the two,” said the Senator.

“Well,” said Runce; “well!  I don’t know as he ain’t.  Six of one and half a dozen of the other!  That’s about it” But he was evidently pacified by the opinion.

“Goarly is certainly a rascal all round,” continued the Senator.  Runce looked at him to make sure whether he was the man who had uttered such fearful blasphemies at the breakfast-table.  “I think we had a little discussion about this before, Mr. Runce.”

“I am very glad to see you have changed your principles, Sir.”

“Not a bit of it.  I am too old to change my principles, Mr. Runce.  And much as I admire this country I don’t think it’s the place in which I should be induced to do so.”  Runce looked at him again with a scowl on his face and with a falling mouth.  “Mr. Goarly is certainly a blackguard.”