Well, this Mary Jane was a very fine woman—rather on the big side for a girl of twenty-two; but the small men always look for a large, helpful pattern of maiden, an’ Nicholas was as much in love with her as he could be with any mortal she, despite her humble circumstances. Her liked him too, up to a certain point; but ’twas the sort of fondness a maiden naturally gets for any young man who be very well-to-do, an’ have a fine house an’ land an’ a prosperous business. ’Tis hard to make up your mind about such a man, specially if he’m a trifle undersized an’ underhung, an’ not generally well liked by the neighbours. But, for all that, Mary Jane Arscott kept his beautiful farm in her eye an’ seed her way pretty clear, if it hadn’t been for a young youth by the name of Benjamin Pearn. But for him no doubt she’d have said “yes” long ago—perhaps afore Nicholas had had time to get out his proposal of marriage, for she comed of very pauper stock, an’ had never known comfort in her life. But this here Ben Pearn chanced to have just what t’other man lacked—a comely countenance an’ a fine, manly frame to him. A blue-eyed, sandy-headed man—hard as nails an’ fairly prosperous for a chap only turned four or five-an’-twenty. He was a shepherd in springtime; an’ looked after the common lands; an’ he was verger of the church; an’ he kept bees; an’ he’d lend a hand at thatching or painting of sign-boards, or harvesting, or any mortal thing. But his father had been a famous poacher, though of course I ban’t bringing that up against the man. Yet, with all his cleverness, he was a fool when he failed in love, as a many afore him. ’Twas love for Mary Jane found out the soft spot in him, an’ showed that he was a thought weak in his head, for all his business, and could do an underhand deed, like anybody else in the same fix. For when we’m struck on a maid, if us can’t see how to fight fair in it, us all fights foul without a blush. Which shows love ban’t a Bible vartue, but just a savage strain in the blood, if you come to think of it. Besides, you can’t forget his father was a poacher. Between these two men, Ben an’ Nicholas, it rested, an’ Mary Jane took her time to make up her mind. She was in love with Benjamin’s self an’ Yelland’s farm. That’s how it stood. She didn’t want to miss the farm, an’ she didn’t want to miss Benjamin; but her couldn’t have both; an’ her found it a bit difficult to make up her mind, though Lord He knows her faither an’ mother done their best to make it up for her. They had an eye on the gert chimney-corners to Cator Court, no doubt. Then things happened that helped Mary Jane to decide.