There was no hypocrisy in her. If there had been the least tinge of unreality, her husband would have fastened on it, and her power over him would have been at an end. But her trances and fits and visions were real, and he regarded her as a person of superior spiritual powers, almost inspired, gifted with supernatural clearness of vision.

'Master John,' said Genefer, 'you've a-told me sure enough why there be all that havage (disturbance) in the old house, fit to worry a saint of God out of life, what with the smeech (smell) of paint, and the hammerings, and the sawings, and the plasterings. You've a-told me, right enough, that there be a new mistress coming, and I be not that footy to go against it. The Lord said, "It is not good for man to be alone," and that settles the matter; but I want to know what she be like.'

'Oh, dear Jenny, she is everything that she ought to be. You may take my word for that.'

'Ah! all fowl be good fowl till you come to pluck 'em. There be maidens and maidens, and you must not take 'em by what they purfess, but by what they be. When the Lord were by the Sea of Tiberias, He seed a poor man coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, and He axed, What be thy name? Then he answered, Legion, which means six thousand. But the Lord knowed better than that, and He sed, sed He; "Come out of him thou one unclean spirit, and go into the swine." Ah! if you listen to what they sez of themselves, they be Legion—six thousand. Loramussy! with their airs and their graces, and their good looks, and their fortune, and their learning, and their pianny-playing, and their flower-painting, and this and that—they'd make you believe they was possessed with a legion of graces, but when you come to get hold and look close, there be naught there but one mean and selfish spirit, bad enough to make a pig mazed.'

'My dear Jenny, I hope and trust your future mistress will please you, but you don't expect that I should put the choosing into your hands.'

'I don't that 'xactly, Master John. No, I don't go so far as that. But you might have done worse. There be none but a woman as can see into a woman. It be just the same as with the Freemasons. They knows one another wherever they be, and in the midst of a crowd; but you as bain't in the secret have no idea how. It be just the same with women. Us knows one another fast enough, and what is hid from you men be clear to we. There were a battle against Ephraim, and the men of Gilead took the passages of Jordan, and when the Ephraimites were a-flying, then said the Gileadites to 'em, "Say Shibboleth!" and they said Sibboleth, for they could not frame to pronounce it right. So they took them and slew them there. I tell you, Master John, there don't at no time meet two women wi'out one putting the Shibboleth to the other and finding out whether her belongs to Ephraim or Gilead. I'd like to know of the missis as be coming what her be like, but I know very well it be no good my axing of you. You've not took her down to the passages of Jordan and tried her there.'

'Ask me what I can tell you, and I will satisfy you to the best of my power.'

'Master John, it be a false beginning papering the porch room with white and gold. The bare whitewash were good enough for your mother and your grandmother, and it would be good enough for your wife, I reckon, if her were of the proper sort. And if her be not, let her take herself off from Welltown. Will you tell me this, Master John; be she a Cornish woman?'

'No, Jenny, I do not think she is.'

'Be she strong and hearty, wi' brave red rosy cheeks and a pair of strong arms?'