Of a summer's eve, when the day's work among the hot hay was done, Iden would often go out and sit under the russet apple till the dew had filled the grass like a green sea. When the tide of the dew had risen he would take off his heavy boots and stockings, and so walk about in the cool shadows of eve, paddling in the wet grass. He liked the refreshing coolness and the touch of the sward. It was not for washing, because he was scrupulously clean under the ragged old coat; it was because he liked the grass. There was nothing very terrible in it; men, and women, too, take off their shoes and stockings, and wade about on the sands at the sea, and no one thinks that it is anything but natural, reasonable, and pleasant. But, then, you see, _everybody_ does it at the seaside, and Iden alone waded in the dew, and that was his crime--that he alone did it. The storm and rage of Mrs. Iden whenever she knew he was paddling in the grass was awful. She would come shuffling out--she had a way of rubbing her shoes along the ground when irritated with her hands under her apron, which she twisted about--and pelt him with scorn. "There, put your boots on--do, and hide your nasty feet!" (Iden had a particularly white skin, and feet as white as a lady's.) "Disgusting! Nobody ever does it but you, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself! Anything more disgusting I never heard of. Nobody else but you would ever think of such a thing; makes me feel queer to see you." Shuffling about, and muttering to herself, "Nobody else"--that was the sin and guilt of it--by-and-by Mrs. Iden would circle round to where he had left his boots, and, suddenly seizing them, would fling them in the ditch. And I verily believe, in the depth of her indignation, if she had not been afraid to touch firearms, she would have brought out the gun, and had a shot at him. After a time Iden left his old post at the russet apple, and went up the meadow to the horse-chestnut trees that he himself had planted, and there, in peace and quietness and soft cool shadow, waded about in the dew, without any one to grumble at him. How crookedly things are managed in this world! It is the modern fashion to laugh at the East, and despise the Turks and all their ways, making Grand Viziers of barbers, and setting waiters in high places, with the utmost contempt for anything reasonable--all so incongruous and chance-ruled. In truth, all things in our very midst go on in the Turkish manner; crooked men are set in straight places, and straight people in crooked places, just the same as if we had all been dropped promiscuously out of a bag and shook down together on the earth to work out our lives, quite irrespective of our abilities and natures. Such an utter jumble!