"Not but what," continued the sexton, "it is not excusable now for me. For my work is very sad and awesome indeed."
The sexton had never before been so impressed with the conversational advantage of his lugubrious occupation, and he determined to make up for lost opportunities.
"I believe you, sexton," said Peter Smith,
"Some of them as I've buried was all young and blooming, and others were ever so old, nearly as old as Canthrop yonder."
"Don't talk like that," said the patriarch, hoarsely. "Ye make me afeard."
"I wonder what it is to-night," said a labourer in the corner who had hitherto drunk in silence, "that makes you all talk as if you couldn't say what you meant."
"Perhaps a man is being hanged," said the sexton.
"Poor fellow!" said Nancy.
"I feel queer to-night," drawled old Canthrop. "But I don't know why that is. What is it makes it so?"
"The moon, old man, the moon."