Barnaby returned to live with his mother on the farm established there, and Grip was his cherished companion throughout the rest of his life. John Willet retired into a small cottage in the village, where the fire-place was widened and enlarged for him, and where a boiler was hung up for his edification, and, furthermore, in the little garden outside the front door a fictitious Maypole was planted; so that he was quite at home directly. To this new abode came his old friends and cronies of the old chimney-corner of the Maypole to chum over the things that once were. No doubt they talked of the old days in the old inn, and occasionally turned in to its enticing haven and challenged anyone to find its equal by asking, as was asked before, "What carpet like its crunching sand, what merry music as its crackling logs, what perfume like its kitchen's dainty breath, what weather genial as its hearty warmth?" And we are sure that they all endorsed its historian's benediction--"Blessings on the old house, how sturdily it stood." We have attempted to bring to mind the atmosphere of the Maypole as it was in the days of the story of _Barnaby Rudge_, and to recall the characters and incidents associated with it. The pilgrim to this notable Dickens shrine to-day, remembering these things, will find that time has dealt kindly with the old inn. It is changed, of course, in many ways, but it is still the old Maypole, with its bar, its Chester room, its stables, its cellars running under the adjoining cottages, and its ivy still clinging to the old worn bricks at the back. Its windows are still diamond-paned, and its floors are still uneven and sunken in places; its heavy beams run across the ceiling. One can even hear the sparrows chirp and see the other birds disport themselves in their revels. The building has many gables, and its stories overhang and bulge over the pathway as if the old house was nodding in its sleep just as the novelist described it. And, in the churchyard opposite, the scene of Barnaby and his mother sitting upon a tombstone and eating their frugal meal can easily be visualized. Still set in a rural and beautiful district of England's verdant lanes, long may the Maypole survive! It is interesting to note that in 1899 "The Charles Dickens Lodge" was consecrated in the Maypole, and still holds its meetings there. The Lodge is held in what was undoubtedly the "best bedroom" of the inn, and the banquet follows in the Chester Room. CHAPTER VI BARNABY RUDGE (_continued_) AND THE OLD CURIOSITY SHOP THE BOOT--THE BLACK LION--THE CROOKED BILLET--THE RED LION, BEVIS MARKS--GRAY'S INN COFFEE-HOUSE--AND OTHERS