"Bettesworth started work again yesterday. He planted some shallots, and even while I watched him smoothing the earth over them, he raked out two which, failing to see, he trod upon and left on the ground." And that was Bettesworth's last day's work. He never again after that day put hand to tool, and probably some suspicion that the end had at length come to the usefulness of his life prompted me the next morning to make that entry in my book. On that day he had professed to be fairly well, and so he seemed. He mentioned, however, when I asked if Kid Norris had yet been to see him, that the kindness of the Norrises had "fell away very much. Very much, it have. I en't _told_ nobody, but...." He talked of giving up his cottage and accepting an offer to lodge with George Bryant. This young labourer, who has been spoken of before, was now and to the end a stanch friend and admirer of Bettesworth. With him Bettesworth fancied he would be comfortable, and I thought so too, and encouraged him in the project, for the old man's illness had shown that it was not right for him to live alone. But the proposal came too late. On the following morning (the 8th: a Tuesday) no Bettesworth appeared; but about nine o'clock a messenger, who was on the way to fetch a doctor, called to say that Bettesworth was very ill; and then I remembered that on the previous afternoon he had spoken of having been shivering all through his dinner-hour. It was a wet day: the influenza had barely left me, and I dared not go out to visit Bettesworth. Towards evening, as there had been no news of him, a member of my family started out across the valley to make inquiries, and had not long been gone, when one of his neighbours arrived here. It was Mrs. Eggar--"Kate," as he called her: the same good helpful woman who had volunteered to do his washing when his wife was ill, and had despatched the messenger for a doctor this morning. On this evening she had stepped into the gap again. Her errand was to urge that Bettesworth should be sent off at once to the infirmary, and to persuade me to write to the relieving officer asking him to take the necessary action. Her daughter, she said, would carry my letter to him in the morning, and would bring back any message or instructions he might send.