One morning, when Nathan went into his shop, he began to make the smithy fire, but had scarcely applied the match when a loud explosion followed, his face was scorched by the blinding flame, and his eyes were filled with fine, sharp particles of dust from the smithy hearth. Groping in darkness and pain, he found his way to the slake-trough and plunged his head into the water. The sense of relief was brief, and Natty, still unable to see, was compelled to feel his way indoors, and present his scorched locks, blackened face, and fiery eyes, to his distressed and startled daughter. In a case like this, however, Lucy showed her remarkable tact and skill--characteristics which made her presence and assistance invaluable by every sick-bed in Nestleton. Calm, firm, and skilful, she applied oil and flour and cotton wool to the burns, and then dispatched her little maid to Farmer Houston’s. In a few moments a messenger had ridden off post-haste to Kesterton to fetch Dr. Jephson, the most noted medico in all the country-side. Lucy’s resources, meanwhile, were tested to the utmost, for her father was suffering the severest pain, especially in the eyes. At length the doctor arrived, made careful examination of his injuries, and cheered them and Mrs. Houston and Judith Olliver, who had come to render what help they could, with the gratifying announcement that his eyesight was uninjured, and that no permanent harm was done. A few days of bandaging and darkness, of embrocation and patience, would put him to rights, the doctor said, especially with such a nurse as Lucy by his side. It was a narrow escape, however, and the wonder was that he had not been blinded for life. “Thank God,” said Blithe Natty, who was blind Natty too for a season, “thank God for sparing us that sorrow. Things are never so bad but they might be worse!” and even in his pain Blithe Natty could joke about Guy Fawkes and the gunpowder plot, for we may depend upon it he was not called Blithe Natty for nought. Tenderly, lovingly, patiently, Lucy nursed her father night and day. Tenderly, lovingly, patiently, Nathan bore his pain and enforced blindness for her sake, and went so far as to say, though it must be taken _cum grano salis_, that it would be worth while for Guy Fawkes to come again, that he might have another course of nursing and syllabubs from the same gentle hands. When Nathan appeared again in public, with his scars not yet healed, and a large green shade over both eyes, he was met with universal congratulations on his escape, and universal anathemas on the dastardly villains who had done the shameful deed.