"Cripps, I assure you I was astonished. Of course you knew Cinnaminta--well, I don't want to be interrupted. No one could say any harm of her; and a lovelier girl was never seen. The landlord had heard some bygone gossip about Cinnaminta and myself. I did admire her. I am not ashamed to say that I greatly admired her. And so did every young fellow here, who had got a bit of pluck in him. I will not go into that question; but you know what Cinnaminta was." Cripps nodded, with a thick mixture of feelings. His poetical self had been smitten more with Cinnaminta than he cared to tell; and his practical self was getting into a terrible hubbub about his horse. "To be sure, your Worship," was all he said. "Very well, now you understand me. To hear of Cinnaminta being in that camp at Nettlebed made me so determined that I laid hold of the landlord by the collar without thinking. He begged me not to ride off with him, or his business would be ruined; and feeling that he weighed about eighteen stone, I left him on his threshold. "I could not bear to ask him now another word of anything. Knowing looks, and winks, and reeking jokes so irritate me, when I know that a woman is pure and good. You remember how we all lost Cinnaminta. Three or four score of undergraduates, reckless of parental will, had offered her matrimony; and three or four newly-elected fellows were asking whether they would vacate, if they happened to jump the broomstick." "All that were too fine to last," muttered Cripps, most sensibly. "But her ought to a' had a sound man on the road--a man with a horse well seasoned, and a substantial cart--her ought." "Oh, then, Cripps, you were smitten too! A nice connection for light parcels! Well, never mind. The whole thing is over. We all are sadder and wiser men; but we like to know who the chief sufferer is--what man has won the beauty. And with this in my mind, I rode up the hill, and resolved to go through with my seeking. "When I got to the end of 'the fair-mile,' the night came down in earnest. You know my young horse 'Cantelupe,' freckled like a melon. He knows me as well as my old dog; and a child can ride him. But in the dark he gets often nervous, and jumps across the road, if he sees what he does not consider sociable. So that one must watch his ears, whatever the weather may be. And now the weather was as bad as man or horse could be out in.