I remembered what the old woman had told me—that she had two boys in the sea; and I knew therefore what he meant. He regarded his drowned boys as still tossed about in the weary wet cold ocean, and would have gladly laid them to rest in the warm dry churchyard.
He wiped a tear from the corner of his eye with the back of his hand, and saying, "Well, I must be off to my gardening," left me with his wife. I saw then that, humorist as the old man might be, his humour, like that of all true humorists, lay close about the wells of weeping.
"The old man seems a little out of sorts," I said to his wife.
"Well, sir," she answered, with her usual gentleness, a gentleness which obedient suffering had perfected, "this be the day he buried our Nancy, this day two years; and to-day Agnes be come home from her work poorly; and the two things together they've upset him a bit."
"I met Agnes coming this way. Where is she?"
"I believe she be in the churchyard, sir. I've been to the doctor about her."
"I hope it's nothing serious."
"I hope not, sir; but you see—four on 'em, sir!"
"Well, she's in God's hands, you know."
"That she be, sir."