But Horatia exclaimed, 'He wasn't a bit; he was very nice, and has taken two delicate men with families back into the mills.—I must see these mills, Mr Clay,' said Horatia.
'So you shall to-morrow, if you like, and then you'll see them two fettlers doing their work, as if they'd all day to fettle one machine,' replied Mr Clay.
'What's a fettler, and what is to fettle a machine?' inquired Horatia with interest. 'I think I've heard that word before.'
'Clean it up, and if they don't do it sharp while the machine is going there's an accident, and they get caught in the works, and that's what'll likely happen to them two, and you'll feel sorry then you had them back,' he replied.
It was late when they had finished dinner, and the mill-owner said 'Good-night' when his wife and the girls left the dining-room.
'Oh my dear, God bless you!' cried Mrs Clay when they were in the drawing-room, as she took Horatia's hand in hers.
'I didn't do anything; I just amused myself,' said Horatia, laughing. 'But I expected to see quite different men. They looked quite quiet and respectable.'
'What did you expect them to look like?' demanded Sarah. 'They were respectable mill-hands, as my father was years ago.'
'But I expected to see wild, fierce men, like those in the French Revolution, demanding their rights, and brandishing sticks and things.'
'Oh my dear! we ain't come to that, an', please God, we never shall,' protested Mrs Clay with a shudder.