Master Streatfield was an elderly man, fat and easygoing, to whom talking seemed rather a trouble than otherwise, though he was very good-natured. His wife was a merry, lively, active woman, who had been handed over to him by her father like a piece of Flanders cambric, but who never seemed to regret her position, managed men and maids, farm and guests, kept perfect order without seeming to do so, and made great friends with Perronel, never guessing that she had been one of the strolling company, who, nine or ten years before, had been refused admission to the Antelope, then crowded with my Lord of Oxford’s followers. At first, it was enough for the prentices to spend most of their time in lying about on the grass under the trees. Giles, who was in the best condition, exerted himself so far as to try to learn chess from Aldonza, who seemed to be a proficient in the game, and even defeated the good-natured burly parson who came every evening to the Antelope, to imbibe slowly a tankard of ale, and hear any news there stirring. She and Giles were content to spend hours over her instructions in chess on that pleasant balcony in the shade of the house. Though really only a year older than Dennet Headley, she looked much more, and was so in all her ways. It never occurred to her to run childishly wild with delight in the garden and orchard as did Dennet, who, with little five-years-old Will Streatfield for her guide and playfellow, rushed about hither and thither, making acquaintance with hens and chickens, geese and goslings, seeing cows and goats milked, watching butter churned, bringing all manner of animal and vegetable curiosities to Stephen to be named and explained, and enjoying his delight in them, a delight which after the first few days became more and more vigorous. By and by there was punting and fishing on the river, strawberry gathering in the park, explorations of the forest, expeditions of all sorts and kinds, Jasper being soon likewise well enough to share in them. The boys and girls were in a kind of fairy land under Perronel’s kind wing, the wandering habits of whose girlhood made the freedom of the country far more congenial to her than it would have been to any regular Londoner.