‘Trifles?’ repeated Mrs. Seaton in a deep voice, throwing up her eyes. But she would not venture an argument with Dr. Baker. He had all the cheery self-confidence of the old established local doctor, who knows himself to be a power, and neither Mrs. Seaton nor her restless, intriguing little husband had ever yet succeeded in putting him down. ‘You must see these two old characters,’ said Dr. Baker to Elsmere across the table. ‘They are relics of Westmoreland which will soon have disappeared. Old John, who is going on for seventy, is as tough an old dalesman as ever you saw. He doesn’t measure his cups, but he would scorn to be floored by them. I don’t believe he does drink much, but if he does there is probably no amount of whiskey that he couldn’t carry. Jim, the other brother, is about five years older. He is a kind of softie--all alive on one side of his brain, and a noodle on the other. A single glass of rum and water puts him under the table. And as he never can refuse this glass, and as the temptation generally seizes him when they are on their rounds, he is always getting John into disgrace. John swears at him and slangs him. No use. Jim sits still, looks--well, nohow. I never saw an old creature with a more singular gift of denuding his face of all expression. John vow’s he shall go to the “house;” he has no legal share in the business; the house and the horse and cart are John’s. Next day you see them on the cart again just as usual. In reality neither brother can do without the other. And three days after, the play begins again.’ ‘An improving spectacle for the valley,’ said Mrs. Seaton dryly. ‘Oh, my dear madam,’ said the doctor, shrugging his shoulders, ‘we can’t all be so virtuous. If old Jim is a drunkard, he has got a heart of his own somewhere, and can nurse a dying niece like a woman. Miss Leyburn can tell us something about that.’ And he turned round to his neighbor with a complete change of expression, and a voice that had a new note in it of affectionate respect. Catherine colored as if she did not like being addressed on the subject, and just nodded a little with gentle affirmative eyes. ‘A strange case.’ said Dr. Baker again looking at Elsmere. It is a family that is original and old-world even in its ways of dying. I have been a doctor in these parts for five-and-twenty years. I have seen what you may call old Westmoreland die out--costume, dialect, superstitions. At least, as to dialect, the people have become bilingual. I sometimes think they talk it to each other as much as ever, but some of them won’t talk it to you and me at all. And as to superstitions, the only ghost story I know that still has some hold on popular belief is the one which attaches to this mountain here, High Fell, at the end of this valley.’