“That were a thousand pities,” she laughed, “the sun has not yet been up more than some poor hour or two and the world is not yet nicely warmed; you might have a chill, and that were much to be deplored; besides, a silken suit is rarely needed where work has to be done. Back to thy nest, Sir ’Prentice! Back to thy nest, and I’ll send old Margery to tuck thee snugly up!” And the young girl, laughing like a brook in springtime, went on and left me there discomfited.
Nevertheless, I went down and took the plain but wholesome breakfast that they offered me, and afterward whiled away an hour or so upon the bench in wondering silently what all this meant, where it was drifting to, how it would end, whether it were, indeed, ending or beginning. And then came round the girl again, and, railing me on my melancholy, took me out to see the herds and fields, and was all the time so sweetly insolent, after her nature, and yet so velvet soft, that I was fairly glamoured by her.
This maid, with the quick woman tongue, that was so pointed, and could at need hurt so much, and the blue, speaking eyes that were as tender and straightforward as her speech was full of covert thorns, led me out into the orchards. First she took me to where the milk was stored, a roomy open shed, smelling of cool cleanliness, with white benches down the sides and red-flagged floor, and great open pans of crimson ware full of frothy milk. Outside the low straw eaves the swallows were chattering, while the emerald meadows, through the farther doorway, glistened and gleamed in the bright spring sunshine. Here we discovered two country girls at work making curds and cheese and butter; ruddy, buxom damsels with strong round arms bare to the shoulder, with rattling clogs upon their feet, white gowns tucked up, and kerchiefs on their heads. These curtsied as we entered, and rattled the pans about, and sent the strong streams of warm new milk gushing from pail to pan. And then presently, when I had watched a time their busy labor, nothing would suit Mistress Faulkener but I should try! That saucy, laughing girl would have it so! and, glancing at the delighted milkmaids, dragged me to a churn, there bidding me roll a sleeve to the elbow, and take the long handle thus, and thus, and “put my strength into it,” and show I could do something to earn a luncheon. And I, ever strong and willing, did her bidding, and rolled back my silk and lawn, and bared the thews that had made me dreadful and victorious in a thousand combats, and seized that white straight rod. But, Hoth! ’twas not my trade, I had more strength than art, and the first stroke that I made upon the curdling stuff within the white fluid leaped in a glittering fountain to the roof above and drenched the screaming maidens; the second stroke from my stalwart shoulders started two iron hoops binding the strong ash ribs of that churn and made it swirl upon the tiles, while at the third mighty fall the rammer was shivered to the grasp, and the milk escaped and went in twenty meandering rivulets across the floor! At this uprose those fair confederates and drove me forth with boisterous anger, saying I had wasted more value in good milk than most likely all my life so far had earned.
While they put right my amiss I sat upon a mossy wall and wiped dry my hose and doublet. Nor was there long to sit before out came my comely hostess with forgiveness in her smiling eyes. “Did I now see,” she queried, “how presumptuous it was to meddle with such things as were beyond one’s capacity?”
To which I answered that I truly saw. “And did I crave forgiveness—would I make amends?” And to that I said she had but to try me in some venture where my rough, unruly strength might tell, and she should see. So peace was made between us, and on we went again to note how the crimson buds were setting on the sunny, red garden walls; to explore her sloping orchards, and count the frolic lambs that clustered round the distant folds.
It was her kingdom, and here her knowledge bettered mine. This she soon found out; and when I showed at fault in the stratagems of husbandry, or tripped in politics of herds or flocks, she would glance at me through her half-shut lids, and demurely ask:
“Are you of good learning, friend?”
And to that I answered that “I had so much as might be picked up in a reasonably long life—not scholarly or well polished, but sufficient and readily accessible.”
“I am glad of it,” she said; “then you can tell the difference between a codling and a pippin?”
“Nay, I fear I cannot.”