The young workman hesitated for a moment, and then half turned away his head, but the vicar ran forward as the maiden in distress cried sharply—
“Oh Daisy, Daisy, what shall I do?”
“Let me help you out,” said the vicar, smiling. “Why, it is soft here,” he cried, as he went in over his knees, but got one foot on a tuft of dry heath and dragged out the other, to plant it upon a patch of grass. “Don’t be alarmed. There, both hands on my shoulder. That’s right. Hold tight, I’ve got you. Why you were sinking fast, and planting yourself as a new kind of marsh flower—and—there, don’t shrink away, or we shall be both planted—to blossom side by side. It is soft—that’s better—now lean all your weight on me, my dear—not that you’re heavy—now I have you—steady it is—that’s better.”
As he kept up this running fire of disconnected words, he contrived to drag the girl out of the soft bog, placing his arm well round her waist, and then carried her in his arms, stepping cautiously from tussock to tussock till he placed her blushing and trembling beside her companion, who had retreated to the firm ground.
“Oh, thank you. I am so much obliged,” stammered the girl, as her long lashes were lowered over her pretty hazel eyes, which shrank from the honest admiring gaze directed upon them.
And truly there was something to admire in the pretty, innocent, girlish face with its creamy complexion, and wavy dark brown hair, several little tresses of which had been blown loose by the breeze on the hill-side.
She was very plainly dressed, and wore a simple coarse straw hat, but there was an air of refinement about her which, before she opened her lips, told the new vicar that he was in the presence of one who had been born in a sphere of some culture.
Not so her companion, who, though as well favoured by nature, was cast in quite another mould. Plump, peachy, and rounded of outline, she was a thorough specimen of the better class English cottage girl, spoiled by her parents, and imbued with a knowledge that she was the pretty girl of the place.
“I am so much obliged—it was so good of you,” stammered the heroine of the bog.
“Not at all, my dear; don’t mention it,” said the vicar, in a quiet way that helped to put the discomfited maiden at her ease. “I see: gathering bog-flowers and went too far. For shame,” he continued, loudly. “You, a county young lady, and not to know it was dangerous to go where the cotton rushes grow. You wanted some, eh? Yes, and left the basket out there—half full.”