Bryda lay in a state of feverish exhaustion on her bed for many weeks, tended with loving care by Betty, who did her best to divert her mind from sad thoughts. Betty said very little about the time when the Squire lay in the parlour below, and Bryda was too languid to ask many questions. In the farm things seemed to have taken a turn for the better. Peter Palmer, having been assured that he was delivered from debt, seemed to take a new lease of life. The wheat harvest promised to be plentiful, the berry crop had been good, and old Silas reported well of the sheep, the last flock driven to Bristol market having fetched a fair price from the dealers; and as to the poultry, Dorothy Burrow declared that, now Goody Renton was dead, the later broods were all healthy, and that it was her evil eye which had done to death so many in previous summers. Mr Barrett was still in occasional attendance on the Squire, and never failed to stop at Bishop's Farm when he passed, either going or coming. He was always cheery and hopeful, and in advance of the general practitioner of those days in many ways. He brought Bryda books and newspapers; but when she asked news of Thomas Chatterton he would put off a direct answer. Another question, often on her lips, about the Squire he parried; and when she asked, 'Is there any way of getting Jack Henderson back--of letting him know?' Mr Barrett would shake his head. 'I am afraid not; but don't vex yourself, my dear. He may be making his fortune, and come back one day a rich man.' 'Ah! but he will always have that face before him, lying dead, as he thought. Even now I can't forget it.' 'Oh! come, come! the Squire is better. He was able to set his hand to a document to-day, and Nurse says he is not so wandering in his sleep. He'll do in time.' And while these glowing August days of 1770 went on, and the golden corn ripened, and the trees in the orchard were laden with rosy fruit, while the hills wore their imperial robes of purple and gold, and partridges, all unconscious of their coming fate, rose in covies from the stubble, London streets were hot and dusty, and there, up and down, paced the boy poet, nearing the tragic end of all his bright dreams and all his proud aspirations. The pathetic story need not be told in detail here. From the moment when he left Mr Lambert's house, and went to try his fortune in the great city of London, he drifted away from his Bristol friends and Bristol ties. Mr Barrett and his staunch friend Mr George Catcott had letters from him, and it is plain that he applied to Mr Barrett for a certificate to go out as a ship's surgeon. But this request he could not honestly grant. Letters to his mother and sister are also preserved, which are pathetic, indeed, as they are evidently written with the one desire of keeping them in ignorance of his real condition.