"I thank you, captain," said the stout parson. "I will become no slave, but since his Majesty has written so much about the Indian weed it has begotten an itching in my sinful soul to know what it is like." "I see," said Gil, smiling. "Well, that is Indian weed from Virginia. Shred it up fine with your knife, press it into the pipe, and then hold to it a light, and draw the smoke through thy lips, swallow it if thou canst, and then drive it forth through thy nostrils." "Hold there!" said the parson, with his eyes twinkling. "I've watched it all, my good lad. I've seen Master Wat Kilby smoking away like one of friend Cobbe's furnace-chimneys, and I've seen Master Cobbe himself lie back in his chair and fume and dream, and I would fain have tried myself, for how can I condemn the sin with a good conscience if I do not know how evil it may be?" "True, sir," said Gil, laughing; "and we all have our weak points." "Even to playing fast and loose with ladies' hearts, Captain Gil," said the parson, with a peculiar look. Gil's eyes flashed as he turned sharply round and faced his companion, who was about to lay one of his fat hands upon his arm; but the young man felt so irritable and unfit to listen to the other's words that he drew back, ran up the bank, and plunged at once into the forest, crashing through the undergrowth until he struck a faint track, and then winding in and out through the dark arcades for a good hour till he reached a deep ravine, down whose bottom he made his way, along the border of a little stream which trickled over the huge masses of sandstone from pool to pool, each of which held its half-score of trout ready to dart beneath the overhanging stones and under the roots of trees, to their little havens of refuge, till the interrupter of their solitude had passed. After an hour's walking he came to a spot where the stream widened out a little, and he gave a nod of satisfaction as, fifty yards in front, he saw the tall gaunt form of Wat Kilby wading in the pools, and stooping down from time to time beneath the overhanging stony banks to thrust in his hand, and more than once retire it with a glistening speckled trout, which he thrust into a satchel hanging beneath his arm. The old fellow straightened his back and nodded, as the captain came up to seat himself upon a stone. "Well, skipper," said Wat, counting the trout through the canvas of his wallet. "Well," said the other. "I am afraid some folk have found out the store." "Not they," growled the old fellow. "How could they?" "I went up awhile ago, and saw half-a-dozen of the men with a lady whom they had found sitting on a stone in the narrows." "Yes, I know," said Wat. "You know?" "Yes; I saw Mother Goodhugh take her up there with her eyes shut, and leave her on the stone." "You saw her?" "To be sure," growled the old fellow; "and I watched her till the lads come and took her, and you ran up." "And you didn't interfere?"