‘I,’ says the Quarterly,
So savage and Tartarly;
‘’Twas one of my feats.’
Who shot the arrow?
‘The poet-priest Milman
(So ready to kill man),
Or Southey or Barrow.’
‘THE WASTREL.’
The black-faced sheep were scattering about the moss when David Moir stopped to shut the loaning gate. It was getting dark and the lonely fells rolled back, blurred and shadowy, to the east. In the foreground, peat-hags showed gashes of oily black among the ling, but some were filled with leaden water, ruffled by the bitter wind. Beneath him, in a hollow, his small, white farmstead stood amidst a few bare ash trees, and a dim gleam to the west indicated the sea. Moir was gaunt and a trifle bent by age and toil, though his eyes were keen. Sheep dealers called him a hard man, but took his word about the flocks he sold. As a matter of fact, he lived with stern frugality because his upland farm was poor and his younger son’s folly had cost him dear.