The preacher saw the crowd had no ears for him now, and so, with a last little despairing shake of the arm, he closed his book and jumped off his plank. The round-about gave a last shriek of enthusiasm and then dropped exhausted, with the happy sense that it had added to the gaiety of the nations and had brought many coppers into the pockets of its master. The crowd surged towards the little red beadle with the drum, and Maradick and Tony surged with it. It was beyond question a very lively crowd, and it threatened to be livelier with every beat of the drum. The sound was intoxicating beyond a doubt, and when you had already paid a visit to the “Red Lion” and enjoyed a merry glass with your best friend, of course you entered into the spirit of things more heartily than ever. And then, too, this dance round the town was the moment of the year. It was the one occasion on which no questions were asked and no surprise ever shown. Decorum and propriety, both excellent things, were for once flung aside; for unless they were discarded the spirit of the dance was not enjoyed. It was deeply symbolic; a glorious quarter of an hour into which you might fling all the inaction of the year—disappointment, revenge, jealousy, hate went, like soiled and useless rags, into the seething pot, and were danced away for ever. You expressed, too, all your joy and gratitude for a delightful year and a most merry fair, and you drank in, as it were wine, encouragement and hope for the year to come. There had been bad seasons and disappointing friends, and the sad knowledge that you weren’t as strong as you had once been; but into the pot with it all! Dance it away into limbo! and, on the back of that merry drum, sits a spirit that will put new heart into you and will send your toes twinkling down the street. And then, best of all, it was a Dance of Hearts. It was the great moment at which certainty came to you, and, as you followed that drum down the curving street, you knew that the most wonderful thing in the world had come to you, and that you would never be quite the same person again; perhaps she had danced with you down the street, perhaps she had watched you and listened to the drum and known that there was no question any more. I do not know how many marriages in Treliss that drum had been answerable for, but it knew its business.