"Do you know, darling, Dalling told me this morning"--Dalling was the Tressadys' principal agent--"that he thought it would be a good thing if we could make friends with some of the people here? The Union are not--or _were_ not--quite so strong in this valley as they are in some other parts. That's why that fellow Burrows--confound him!--has come to live here of late. It might be possible to make some of the more intelligent fellows hear reason. My uncles have always managed the thing with a very high hand--very natural!--the men _are_ a set of rough, ungrateful brutes, who talk impossible stuff, and never remember anything that's done for them--but after all, if one has to make a living out of them, one may as well learn how to drive them, and what they want to be at. Suppose you come and show yourself in the village this afternoon?" Letty looked extremely doubtful. "I really don't get on very well with poor people, George. It's very dreadful, I know, but there!--I'm not Lady Maxwell--and I can't help it. Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's different--they always curtsy and are very respectful--but Mrs. Matthews says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude to you if they don't like you." George laughed. "Go and call upon them in that dress and see! I'll eat my hat if anybody's rude. Beside, I shall be there to protect you. We won't go, of course, to any of the strong Union people. But there are two or three--an old nurse of mine I really used to be rather fond of--and a fireman that's a good sort--and one or two others. I believe it would amuse you." Letty was quite certain that it would not amuse her at all. However, she assented unwillingly, and they went in to lunch. * * * * * So in the afternoon the husband and wife sallied forth. Letty felt that she was being taken through an ordeal, and that George was rather foolish to wish it. However, she did her best to be cheerful, and to please George she still wore the pretty Paris frock of the morning, though it seemed to her absurd to be trailing it through a village street with only colliers and their wives to look at it. "What ill luck," said George, suddenly, as they descended their own hill, "that that fellow Burrows should have settled down here, in one's very pocket, like this!" "Yes, you had enough of him at Malford, didn't you?" said Letty. "I don't yet understand how he comes to be here."