"’Tis queer, I’ve often thowt," he said; "we all knaw what mak o’ soil grows under foot here—yet out on ’t come th’ sweetest herbs i’ Marshcotes. An’ that’s a true pictur o’ life, as I’ve fund it through three-score year an’ ten." "What’s tha knaw about life?" snapped Nanny. "Death is more i’ thy way, an’ tha’ll be a wise man, Witherlee, sooin as tha comes to join th’ ghosties.—Not but what there’s sense for once i’ what tha says. Sweetness grows i’ muck, an’ ye can’t get beyond that; an’ if onybody thinks to say it isn’t so, let ’em look at Shameless Wayne, an’ set him beside what he war afore th’ feud broke out." "Ay, he’s better for th’ fighting," put in Witherlee, with something of his wonted zest. "Fighting? I reckon nowt on ’t. All moil, an’ mess, an’ litter—gaping wounds that drip on to th’ floors just when ye’ve bee’s-waxed ’em—women crying their een out, an’ lossing so mich time, ower them ’at’s goan—’tis mucky soil, I tell thee, Luke. An’ yet, begow, it hes bred summat into Shameless Wayne that he niver hed afore." "They say him an’ th’ Lean Man is hunting one t’ other fro’ morn to neet, but allus seem to tak different roads. What’s come to th’ Lean Man, Nanny? He war daunted a while back, an’ now he’s keen as ony lad again!" "Tha doesn’t knaw Barguest’s ways as I knaw ’em, lad. Th’ Dog, when he’s haunted a man nigh out of his senses, hods off for a bit, for sport, like, an’ maks him ’at he’s marked think th’ sickness is all owered wi’—an’ then, when he’s thinking o’ summat else entirely, up th’ Brown Beast leaps, snarling fit to mak his blood run cold.—Ay, it’s true th’ Lean Man is hunting this day, for I met him riding into Marshcotes not a half-hour sin’, wi’ his een on both sides o’ th’ road at once, an’ his hand set tight on his sword-heft." "Did he say owt to thee, Nanny? He’s noan just friendly to thee, an’——" "He said nowt to me," broke in Nanny, "but I said a deal to him. I asked if Barguest’s hide war as rough, an’ his teeth as sharp, as when he fought th’ owd feud for th’ Waynes. An’ he seemed fit to strike me first of all; an’ then he sickened; an’ at after that he rode forrard, saying nowt nawther one way nor t’ other. Well, he minds how his father died, an’ his father’s father; an’ he’ll be crazy again by fall o’ neet, if I knaw owt. It’s th’ Dog-days, an’ all, an’ th’ month when dogs run mad is Barguest’s holiday, I’ve noticed." "Tha mud weel say it’s th’ Dog-days," said Witherlee, pointing to the moor above. "We shall hev sich a storm as nawther thee nor me hev seen th’ like on, Nanny, sin’ we war wedded." From the moor-edge an angry haze was beating up against the wind, and the sun, a round ball that seemed dropping from the steel-blue of the sky above it, was cruel with the earth. Everywhere peatland and tillage-soil—the very graveyard earth—opened parched mouths and cried for drink. But still the sun shone, and only the slow-moving haze told of the rain to come.