“He is a disgrace, sir,--though I say it that should not,--a disgrace and scandal to the name of man! I have come here, sir, I assure you, to see if the Squire will bind him over to keep the peace towards me; for only last night,--and it is his regular work now he is married, and master of the farm,--only last night he came down from Barwick as drunk as a lord, and he insisted on having a posset immediately. The fire was out, sir,”--Mrs. Palethorpe here wept afresh,--“and Dorothy was gone to bed.” Mrs. Palethorpe could not (for human nature will fail and sink sometimes) get any further. Though Colin and Jane had much ado to forbear laughing at this account of her grievances, the former yet requested her to be comforted; and assured her that he had no doubt Mr. Lupton would very soon take such steps with Mr. Palethorpe as should effectually prevent him from resorting to personal violence for the future. “As, I suppose,” he continued, “this black eye is an evidence of some of his handiwork?” “It is, sir!” exclaimed Mrs. Samuel, with passionate firmness. “I simply told him as gently as I could how circumstances stood, when he made no more to do than strike me two or three blows--he repeated them--in the face, and made me this figure, that I am ashamed of anybody seeing me!” And then she covered her face with her handkerchief. Without farther parley, Colin now bade Mrs. Palethorpe follow him, and led her into the presence of the Squire. That gentleman, for the first time since the death of his wife, was observed to smile when made acquainted with the poor woman's story. In the course of making out her case, she informed Mr. Lupton how, upon her visit with Palethorpe to London, she had somehow consented in a foolish moment to be married to him, immediately on their return; that, accordingly, that event had taken place at Barwick Church; how tipsy he got the first day of their wedding; how scandalously he had neglected everything since, except his drinking; and how abominably he had treated her almost from that very day up to the present moment.