About noon he was trudging along in the turnpike road when he was met by a farmer driving in a trap, who pulled up to speak to him and asked him if he could say how far it was to Winterbourne Bishop. Joseph replied that it was about fourteen miles—he had left Bishop that morning.
Then the farmer asked him if he knew a man there named Caleb Bawcombe, and if he had a place as shepherd there, as he was now on his way to look for him and to try and persuade him to go back to Dorset, where he had been his head-shepherd for the space of a year.
Joseph said that Caleb had a place as head-shepherd on a farm at Bishop, that he was satisfied with it, and was, moreover, one that preferred to bide in his native place.
The farmer was disappointed, and the other added, "Maybe you've heard Caleb speak of his elder brother Joseph—I be he."
"What!" exclaimed the farmer. "You're Caleb's brother! Where be going then?—to a new place?"
"I've got no place; I be going to look for a place in Dorsetsheer."
"'Tis strange to hear you say that," exclaimed the farmer. He was going, he said, to see Caleb, and if he would not or could not go back to Dorset himself to ask him to recommend some man of the village to him; for he was tired of the ways of the shepherds of his own part of the country, and his heart was set on getting a man from Caleb's village, where shepherds understood sheep and knew their work. "Now look here, shepherd," he continued, "if you'll engage yourself to me for a year I'll go no farther, but take you right back with me in the trap."
The shepherd was very glad to accept the offer; he devoutly believed that in making it the farmer was but acting in accordance with the will of a Power that was mindful of man and kept watch on him, even on His poor servant Joseph, who had left his home and people to be a stranger in a strange land.
So well did servant and master agree that Joseph never had occasion to look for another place; when his master died an old man, his son succeeded him as tenant of the farm, and he continued with the son until he was past work. Before his first year was out, his younger sister, Hannah, came to live with him and keep house, and eventually they both got married, Joseph to a young woman of the place, and Hannah to a small working farmer whose farm was about a mile from the village. Children were born to both, and in time grew up, Joseph's sons following their father's vocation, while Hannah's were brought up to work on the farm. And some of them, too, got married in time and had children of their own.
These are the main incidents in the lives of Joseph and Hannah, related to me at different times by their brother; he had followed their fortunes from a distance, sometimes getting a message, or hearing of them incidentally, but he did not see them. Joseph never returned to his native village, and the visits of Hannah to her old home had been few and had long ceased. But he cherished a deep enduring affection for both; he was always anxiously waiting and hoping for tidings of them, for Joseph was now a feeble old man living with one of his sons, and Hannah, long a widow, was in declining health, but still kept the farm, assisted by one of her sons and two unmarried daughters. Though he had not heard for a long time it never occurred to him to write, nor did they ever write to him.