"Ah." said Matthew Moon, 'she'll wish her cake
dough if so be she's over intimate with that man."
"She's not over intimate with him." said Gabriel,
indignantly.
"She would know better." said Coggan. "Our
mis'ess has too much sense under they knots of black
hair to do such a mad thing."
"You see, he's not a coarse, ignorant man, for he
was well brought up." said Matthew, dubiously. "'Twas
only wildness that made him a soldier, and maids rather
like your man of sin."
"Now, Cain Ball." said Gabriel restlessly, "can you
swear in the most awful form that the woman you saw
was Miss Everdene?"
"Cain Ball, you be no longer a babe and suckling,"
said Joseph in the sepulchral tone the circumstances
demanded, "and you know what taking an oath is.
'Tis a horrible testament mind ye, which you say and
seal with your blood-stone, and the prophet Matthew
tells us that on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind
him to powder. Now, before all the work-folk here
assembled, can you swear to your words as the shep-
herd asks ye?"
"Please no, Mister Oak!" said Cainy, looking from
one to the other with great uneasiness at the spiritual
magnitude of the position.
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