Everybody turned out to look for the child; they examined moors and crofts for a good distance round till after daybreak without seeing sight or sign of it; but, when it was near sunrise, Betty spied the cat coming towards her, then it went back mewling into a brake of furze. She followed it and came to a plot of mossy grass, surrounded by thickets and ferns, where she saw, amongst heath and wortleberry plants, a bundle of old-fashioned chintz; she opened it and there was her child, sleeping like a nut. It was wrapped in several gay old gowns, with mint, balm, and all sorts of sweet herbs and flowers that are found on moors or in gardens; but otherwise it was as naked as when born, yet clean and sweet as a rose.
All the old folks said it was carried there by small-people, who intended to bear it away to the hills or carns; but it took them so long to clean it first that daylight surprised them ere they had done it to their mind; so they left it there meaning to fetch it the next night.
The fright, however, that Betty had undergone, did her good and the child too, for she passed less time in courseying, and took more care of her babe for fear it might be stolen again. She made lots of frocks for it out of the old chintz; and it throve so well after the small folks' cleansing that he made as stout a man as his dad, who was usually called Jan the Maunster (monster) from his bulky form.
[How a Morvah Man Bought Clothes for his Wife.] [4]
"Contented toil, and hospitable care,
And kind connubial tenderness are there."
Goldsmith.
