'Take some dumpling, Elijah?'

'I won't eat till my Glory comes.'

'Lord preserve you!' exclaimed Mrs. De Witt, slapping his back. 'Go on and eat. You don't understand girls, as you do calves, that is a fact. Why, a girl on her marriage-day is shamefaced, and does not like to be seen. In high society they hide their heads in their wails all day. That is what the wails are for. I was like that. You may look at me, but it is true as that every oyster wears a beard. When I was married to Moses I was that kittle, coy young bird I would have dived and hid among the barnacles on the keel of the wessel, had I been able to keep under water like a duck.'

'Where is she?'

'How do I know? Never fear; she is somewhere—gone out to get a little fresh air. It was hot and stank in that hold of an old church. What with the live corpses above in the pews and the dead ones below deck, it gave me a headache, and you may be sure Mehalah was overcome. I saw she did not look well. The pleasure, I suppose, has been too much for her. A wery little tipple of that topples some folks over.'

'You think so?'

'I am sure of it. Have I not been a bride myself? I know about those sort of things by actual experience. I've gone through the operation myself. It is wery like being had up before the magistrate and convicted for life.'

Elijah was partly satisfied, and he began to eat; but his eyes turned restlessly at intervals to the door.

'Don't you put yourself out,' murmured Mrs. De Witt as she leaned over his shoulder and emptied his glass of spirits. 'Girls are much like scallops. If you want to have them tender and melting in your month, you must treat them with caution and patience. You take the scallops and put them first in lukewarm water, working up into a gentle simmer, and at last, but not under two hours, you toast them, and pepper and butter them, and then they are scalding and delicious. But if you go too fast to work with them, they turn to leather, and will draw the teeth out of your gums if you bite into them. Girls must be treated just similarly, or you spoil them. You wouldn't think it, looking at me, but my Moses, with all his faults, knew how to deal with me, and he got me that soft and yielding that he could squeeze me through his fingers like Mersea mud. True as gospel. Fill your glass, Elijah; it don't look hospitable to allow it to stand empty.'

When the lady in her red coat entered, holding triumphantly above her head a leg of boiled mutton, there was a general burst of delight.