At this point we were alarmed by the cries of my family, and I perceived my youngest daughter in the midst of a rapid stream, and struggling with the torrent; she must have certainly perished had not my companion instantly plunged in to her relief. Her gratitude may be more readily imagined than described; she thanked her deliverer more with looks than words. Soon afterwards Mr. Burchell took leave of us, and we pursued our journey to the place of our retreat.
II.--The Squire
At a small distance from our habitation was a seat overshaded by a hedge of hawthorn and honeysuckle. Here, when the weather was fine, and our labour soon finished, we usually sat together to enjoy an extensive landscape in the calm of the evening. On an afternoon about the beginning of autumn, when I had drawn out my family to the seat, dogs and horsemen swept past us with great swiftness. After them a young gentleman, of a more genteel appearance than the rest, came forward, and, instead of pursuing the chase, stopped short, and approached us with a careless, superior air. He let us know that his name was Thornhill, and that he was the owner of the estate that lay around us. As his address, though confident, was easy, we soon became more familiar; and the whole family seemed earnest to please him.
As soon as he was gone, my wife gave the opinion that it was a most fortunate hit, and hoped again to see the day in which we might hold up our heads with the best of them.
"For my part," cried Olivia, "I don't like him, he is so extremely impudent and familiar." I interpreted this speech by contrary, and found that Olivia secretly admired him.
"To confess the truth," said I, "he has not prepossessed me in his favour. I had heard that he was particularly remarkable for faithlessness to the fair sex."
A few days afterwards we entertained our young landlord at dinner, and it may be easily supposed what provisions were exhausted to make an appearance. As he directed his looks and conversation to Olivia, it was no longer doubted but that she was the object that induced him to be our visitor; and my wife exulted in her daughter's victory as if it were her own.
On one evening Mr. Thornhill came with two young ladies, richly dressed, whom he introduced as women of very great distinction and fashion from town. The two ladies threw my girls quite into the shade, for they would talk of nothing but high life and high-lived company. 'Tis true, they once or twice mortified us sensibly by slipping out an oath; their finery, however, threw a veil over any grossness in their conversation.
I now began to find that all my long and painful lectures upon temperance, simplicity, and contentment were entirely disregarded. The distinctions lately paid us by our betters awakened that pride which I had laid asleep, but not removed. When the two ladies of quality showed a willingness to take our girls to town with them as companions, my wife was overjoyed at our good fortune. But Mr. Burchell, who had at first been a welcome guest at our house, but had become less welcome since we had been favoured with the company of persons of superior station, dissuaded her with great ardour, and so angered her that she ended by asking him to stay away.
Returning home one day, I found my wife and girls all in tears, Mr. Thornhill having been there to inform them that their journey to town was entirely over. The two ladies, having heard reports of us from some malicious person, were that day set out for London. We were not long in finding who it was that had been so base as to asperse the character of a family so harmless as ours. One of our boys found a letter-case which we knew to belong to Mr. Burchell. Within it was a sealed note, superscribed, "The copy of a letter to be sent to the two ladies at Thornhill Castle." At the joint solicitation of the family, I opened it, and read as follows: