Gazing upon the crookedness about him, he saw it straightened: looking upon the rough places, he saw them made plain. He saw the desolation banished, the wilderness made glad. He saw the woods ordered, the broken roads mended, the bridges rebuilt, streams back in their beds, vistas unshuttered, avenues cleared.... He saw himself striving, one of a little company sworn to redeem the stolen property. Man had won it by the sweat of his brow--his seal was on it yet--that great receiver Nature must give it up. It was not the repair of an estate that they would compass; it was the restoration of the kingdom of man. Marking the light in his employee's eyes, Colonel Winchester could have flung up his cap. Opening his heart, he spoke with a rough eloquence of the great days the place had seen, of lords and ladies who had slept at the house, of coaches that had rumbled over that broken bridge, of a troop ambushed at the bend of the avenue, of a duel fought upon that sometime sward.... "The world 'd think me mad. In the clubs I used to belong to they'd remember that I was always a bit of a crank. To the Press I should be a curio worth three lines and a photograph of the 'Brigadier Breaks Stones' order. But there's a zest to the job you won't find in Pall Mall. There's an encouragement to go ahead that you seldom strike in this world. There's a gratitude the old place'll hand you that no reporter could ever understand...." It was true. As the short days went tearing by, the spirit of the place entered into Anthony's soul. He laboured thirstily, yet not so much laboured as laid his labour as a thank-offering at his goddess's feet. He counted himself happy, plumed himself on his selection for the office, thanked God nightly. But that he needed the pay, he would not have touched it. As it was, a third of it went into his tool-bag. The appalling magnitude of the task never worried him--nor, for the matter of that, his fellow-workers. Master and men went toiling from dawn to dusk under a spell, busy, tireless as gnomes, faithful as knights to their trust. Their zeal was quick with the devotion to a cause that went out with coat-armour. Rough weather might chill one iron, but another was plucked from the fire ere the first was cold. There never was seen such energy. Place and purpose together held them in thrall. Had encouragement been needed, the death of every day showed some material gain. Foot by foot the kingdom was being restored. Whether the goddess of the estate had charmed Patch also, it is not for me to say. He was certainly a happy fellow. Life had apparently developed into one long, glorious ramble, which nothing but nightfall could curtail. To his delight, too, Anthony and the other men showed an unexpected and eventful interest in stones and boughs and ditches and drains, and sometimes they even dragged trees along the ground for him to bark at. It is to be hoped that he also expressed his gratitude of nights......