THREE:"By St. Nicholas!" said the smith, as he stooped to remove the pressure, while the tears started to his eyes, "this is too bad. 'Tis enough to make a heathen sick to see a christian man served in this manner. Here, father John, (assisting him to rise) take my jerkin, and wrap this about you (snatching a cloak from the shoulders of one of the men). And now, good father, tell me who did this?"Reuben struck his horse with the whip, and the[Pg 185] animal sprang forward. A man who had been trying to climb into the gig, fell off, and was nearly trampled on. Reuben flogged his way through the pack, a shower of missiles hurtling round him, while his ears burned with the abuse which had once been his badge of pride, but now in the hour of defeat smote him with a sick sense of impotence and degradation. "Ben the Gorilla! Ben the Gorilla!"
THREE:
THREE:
TWO:This would have been bad enough in any year, but in times when he bore the burden of his yet profitless milk-round it was only a little short of catastrophe. Making every allowance for a first year, that milk-round had[Pg 265] disappointed him. He found private custom hard to win, and even the ceasing of French dairy supplies, owing to the Franco-Prussian war, did not bring him the relief he had hoped. One or two small farms on the borders of Rye catered in dairy stuff for its inhabitants, and he found them hard to outbid or outwit. Also, owing to the scarcity of grass feed, it was a bad milk year, and poor supplies were put down by consumers to the new milkman, and in more than one case custom was withdrawn."Madam," said Sudbury, with some heat, "his grace has so determined; and, moreover, contrary to the advice of his noble cousins and councillors, he will go down the river and parley with the villeins!"
TWO:Alice had let Reuben in. She looked a little tired, but otherwise quite cheerful, and she welcomed him simply and naturally.