With a severe scowl, he snatched the cowslips from the frightened child, and threw them away, and then made a gripe at his little hat; but, the boy drawing back with a blubbering cry, the zealous and tall curate, who had a little over-reached himself, slipped and fell prone upon the grass. This, however, was the lightest part of his misfortune; for it so chanced that his face came in full contact with a new-made rain-puddle, and he arose with his eyes half blinded, and his face covered and besmeared with mud. With the tears yet rolling down his red cheeks, the little fellow, as he saw himself avenged in a measure so contenting, and a manner so ridiculous, ran out of his reach, literally shrieking with laughter; and a hearty roar from old Peter at once completed his mortification, and determined his retreat. This soon became a maddened flight: for a sleeping dog roused by the noise of the laughter pursued him with angry barkings, from which, as he had no staff, and the grassy close could furnish no stone, there was no escape till the wearied animal paused and turned. The whole of this scene was so very swiftly enacted, that Noble had no opportunity to say or do any thing in the matter; and charity itself could not suppress a smile at a punishment so well suited to the morosity which had led to it. Neither was he at all sorry to be relieved upon this festal day from the intrusive visit of a sour, ill-instructed fanatic, whose opinions he could not value, and for whose character he felt no respect. He looked, therefore, with unmixed satisfaction at the laughing urchin, as he gathered up his scattered wealth, and departed. Now merrily rang out the lively bells of Cheddar Tower; and already was every street a green alley, freshened by thick boughs, and made fragrant by small branches of white thorn neatly interwoven. The house of the chief franklin, Mr. Blount, was more especially honoured. Before his door was planted the largest and fairest branch of May that could be found in a circuit of five good miles, and his hospitable porch was made a rich bower of shrubs and flowers. Beneath the tall trees in front of it was a little crowd of youths and maidens, in holyday trim, wearing garlands, with green rushes and strewing herbs in their arms, or aprons: full they were of smiles and glee; and, out on the road, all the village was assembled, save the infirm old and the cradled young; though, of these last, not a few were borne in their mothers’ arms, or lifted up with honest pride in those of their brown fathers, whose burning toils a field were, for this joyous day, forgotten.