No one grudged now, nor mixed ill-feeling in the emulation with which neighbouring agriculturists watched the fields of Allenders. Something of fear and solemn awe startled the very labourers in these fields when Martha passed them, assiduous and diligent in all the work she set herself to do. They were not afraid of _her_--she did not impress them with more than the respect which they gave willingly as her right; but there was something solemn in a representative of the dead--a person living, as it seemed, but to carry out the thoughts and wishes of another who had passed away. The stir and thrill of renewed and increased industry came again upon Maidlin Cross. It was true they had no model cottages yet, but the land lay marked out on the other side of the cross, where Harry’s new houses were to be; and Armstrong thought Miss Allenders had answered him almost fiercely, when he proposed to plough this land, and enclose it in a neighbouring field. No--it was Harry’s will those houses should be built, and built they must be, when justice and right permitted; and it soon came to be known in Maidlin, where Harry in his careless good-humour had promised anything without bestowing it, that it needed but a hint of this to Martha to secure the favour. And the works went on steadily and prosperously, and with a wise boldness Martha drew upon Mr. Buchanan’s thousand pounds. Armstrong, no longer driven to the sad alternative of doing nothing, or acting on his own responsibility, became emboldened, and was no longer afraid to be now and then responsible; and Allender Mains became a great farm-steading, and began to send off droves to Stirling market, and Falkirk tryste, and was managed as the cautious Armstrong never could have managed it, had all this gainful risk and expenditure been incurred for himself. And on the Sabbath days when they leave the church--Agnes in her widow’s weeds leaning on Martha’s arm, and Rose leading the children--they turn aside to a little space railed off from the wall, where moulders the mossed gravestone of the old Laird of Allenders, and where the gowans and forget-me-nots grow sweetly under the spring sunshine upon Harry’s breast. His name is on a tablet of white marble on the wall--his name and age--nothing more. They go there silently--almost as it seems involuntarily--towards their grave, and stand in silence by the railing, visiting the dead, but saying nothing to each other; and after a little while, as silently as they came, the family go away. Nor do they ever allude to this visit, though the custom is never broken through--it is something sacred, a family solemnity, a thing to be done in silence.