"None save a blind bat should have asked that," saith Aunt _Joyce_. "But thou hast worn blinkers, _Dulcie_, ever sith I knew thee. Eh, lack-a-daisy! but that is fifty year gone, or not far thence." "Three lacking," quoth my Lady _Stafford_. "I'll tell you what, we be growing old women!" saith Aunt _Joyce. "Ned_ and _Edith_, ye ungracious loons, what do ye a-laughing?" "I cry you mercy, _Aunt_, I could not help it," said I, when I might speak: "you said it as though you had discovered the same but that instant minute." "Well, I had," saith she. "And so shall you, afore you come to sixty years: or if not, woe betide you." "Dear heart, _Aunt_, there is a long road betwixt sixteen and sixty!" cried I, yet laughing. "There is, _Edith_," right grave, Aunt _Joyce_ makes answer. "A long stretch of road: and may-be steep hills, child, and heavy moss, and swollen rivers to ford, and snowstorms to breast on the wild moors. Ah, how little ye young things know! I reckon most folk should count my life an easy one, beside other: but I would not live it again, an' I might choose. Wouldst thou, _Dulcie_?" "Oh dear, no!" cries my Lady _Stafford_. "And thou, _Grissel_?" Mistress _Martin_ shook her head. "And thou, _Lettice_?" _Mother_ hesitated a little. "Some part, I might," she saith. "Ay, some part: we could all pick out that," returns Aunt _Joyce_. "What sayest thou, _Bess_?" "What, to turn back, and begin all o'er again?" quoth Cousin _Bess_. "Nay, Mistress _Joyce_, I'm none such a dizard as that. I reckon _Ned_ shall tell you, when a sailor is coming round the corner in sight of home, 'tis not often he shall desire to sail forth back again." "Why, we reckon that as ill as may be," saith _Ned_, "not to be able to make your port, and forced to put to sea again." "And when the sea hath been stormy," saith Aunt _Joyce_, "and the port is your own home, and you can see the light gleaming through the windows?" "Why, it were well-nigh enough to make an old salt cry," saith _Ned_. "Ay," saith Aunt _Joyce_. "Nay--I would not live it again. Yet my life hath not been an hard one--only a little lonely and trying. _Dulcie_, here, hath known far sorer sorrows than I. Yet I shall be glad to get home, and lay by my travelling-gear." "But thou hast had sorrow, dear _Joyce_," saith my Lady _Stafford_ gently. "Did any woman ever reach fifty without it?" Aunt _Joyce_ makes answer. "Ay, I have had my sorrows, like other women--and one sorer than ever any knew. May-be, _Dulcie_, if the roads were smoother and the rivers shallower to ford, we should not be so glad when we gat safe home." "`And so He leadeth them unto the haven where they would be,'" softly saith Mistress _Martin_.