“Eh, Simon, mon, owd Jotty wur woiser nor thee. Theere’s a neame fur a lad to stand by! It’s as good as a leeapin’-pow’[13] that it is, t’ help him ower th’ brucks[14] an’ rucks[15] o’ th’ warld.”
Simon sat lost in thought. At length he raised his head, and remarked soberly—
“Parson Brookes moight ha’ bin a prophet; th’ choilt’s mother did bear him wi’ sorrow. The neame fits th’ lad as if it had bin meade fur him.”
“Then aw hope he’s a prophet o’ eawt, feyther, an’ o’ th’ rest’ll come true in toime,” briskly interjected Bess; adding—“Coom, tay’s ready;” further appending for the information of their visitors—“Madam Clough sent the tay an’ sugar, an’ th’ big curran’-loaf, when hoo heeard as feyther had axed for a holiday fur the kirsenin’; an’ Mester Clough’s sen some yale ale, an’ a thumpin’ piece o’ beef.”
“Ay, lass; an, as we’n a’ready a foine kirsenin’ feast, we’n no change parson’s seven-shillin’ piece, but lay it oop fur th’ lad hissen.”
But the christening feast did not proceed without sundry noisy demonstrations from Master Jabez. If, as Simon had once hinted, he was an angel in the house, he flapped his wings and blew his trumpet pretty noisily at times.
“Eh, lass, aw wish Tum wur here neaw, to enjoy hisself wi’ us. Aw wonder what he’d say to see yo’ nursin’ a babby so bonnily?”
Simon was munching a huge piece of currant-cake as he uttered this, after a meditative pause. A look of pain passed over Bessy’s face. She rarely mentioned the absent Tom, though he was seldom out of her thoughts.
“Yea, an’ aw wish he wur here!” she echoed with a sigh, the fountain of which was deep in her own breast. “Aw wonder where he is neaw.”
“Feightin’, mebbe!” suggested her father.