In Jan’s thoughts there was not much room for the war and its vicissitudes. There would have been no room in them at all for Judith Combe if she had not enjoyed the proverbial privilege of living near the rose, which entailed the more dubious one of hearing the rose extolled without intermission during those Sunday walks which at an earlier period had been so largely taciturn. But Judith was a long-suffering little soul, and it was only after much hesitation that she ventured to ask: ‘Bain’t ’ee gettin’ tu fond of her, Jan?’ Jan reddened all over his face and neck. ‘Tu fond o’ Miss Mildred! What be dramin’ about then? Do ’ee think a dog can get tu fond o’ the sun? You’m talkin’ proper nonsense, Judy.’ Nevertheless, Judith’s words came to him as a shock and a revelation, over which he pondered for hours afterwards. At first he was ashamed of his audacity and felt as if he had been guilty of some unpardonable outrage; but by degrees he arrived at a different view of the matter. What if he did love a human goddess? When all was said, he could not help it. The veriest cur, according to his own homely metaphor, may bask in the sun, and she could not be displeased by what would certainly never be revealed to her. It was his secret, which he was surely free to cherish, without the least shadow of hope, much as certain sixteenth-century poets cherished a passion for Queen Elizabeth, or said they did. But the fact of being without shadow of hope—as of course he was—did not preclude indulgence in ecstatic visions. His mobile imagination enabled him to see himself earning literary renown (like the peasant Robert Burns, perhaps), rising by virtue of the same to a position of admitted equality with the highest in the land and stripping the laurels from his brow to lay them at Mildred’s feet. Such things could not come to pass, and he knew that they could not; yet he liked to picture them and might plead that his fancies were as harmless as his love.