In 1906 Frederic William Maitland landed on the island too ill to reach the house that Mrs. Maitland had gone out earlier to prepare for him. He was taken to an hotel in the city of Las Palmas, and there, on December the 19th, he died. In the spring of 1907 Mrs. Maitland returned to England. In 1909 she added on to a small farm house at Brookthorpe, and there she went to live. She was thus able to renew many friendships, and in some slight degree take up the life that had been so dear to her. It was during these last eleven years at Brookthorpe that she wrote all her plays dealing with country people; the first for a class of village children to whom she taught singing, the later ones in response to a growing demand not only from other Gloucestershire villages, but from village clubs and institutes scattered over a large part of England. She saw several of her plays acted by the Oakridge and the Sapperton players, and these performances and letters from other performers gave her great pleasure. In 1913 she married Sir Francis Darwin. Their life at Brookthorpe was varied by months spent at his house in Cambridge. It was there that she died on March 5th, 1920. During her last years she had much illness to contend with. Unable to play her violin, she turned to the spinet. She practised for hours, wrote plays, and attended to her house when many would have lain in their beds. Her religion became of increasingly great comfort and interest to her, and it was in that light that she came, more and more, to look at all things. In the minds of many who knew her in those years rose up the words: I have fought a good fight. E. M. THE LOVERS’ TASKS CHARACTERS FARMER DANIEL, ELIZABETH, _his wife_. MILLIE, _her daughter_. ANNET, _his niece_. MAY, _Annet’s sister_, _aged ten_. GILES, _their brother_. ANDREW, _a rich young farmer_. GEORGE _and_ JOHN, _servants to Giles_. AN OLD MAN. ACT I.—Scene 1. _The parlour at Camel Farm_. _Time_: _An afternoon in May_. ELIZABETH _is sewing by the table with_ ANNET. _At the open doorway_ MAY _is polishing a bright mug_. ELIZABETH. [_Looking up_.] There’s Uncle, back from the Fair. MAY. [_Looking out of the door_.] O Uncle’s got some rare big packets in his arms, he has. ELIZABETH. Put down that mug afore you damage it, May; and, Annet, do you go and help your uncle in. MAY. [_Setting down the mug_.] O let me go along of her too—[ANNET _rises and goes to the door followed by_ MAY, _who has dropped her polishing leather upon the ground_. ELIZABETH. [_Picking it up and speaking to herself in exasperation_.] If ever there was a careless little wench, ’tis she. I never did hold with the bringing up of other folks children and if I’d had my way, ’tis to the poor-house they’d have went, instead of coming here where I’ve enough to do with my own.