Seated at his table in the window of the “Duke,” Lancaster could see the farmers come jogging into Sandwath, rounding the dangerous corner with a loose rein, and, as often as not, a head turned in the opposite direction. There were few dreary faces among them, for the late year had been a good one, with heavy crops and the right sort of weather, and no disease to play havoc with stock. He watched them disappear into the stable-yard, and from thence drift across to the Bank, presently to drift back to the “Duke” for their receipts. It was the last of the three January rent-audits, Bluecaster, Witham and Sandwath; the last, the smallest, and far the most enjoyable. The others, where the numbers ran in each case to over a hundred, were too big, too busy, too long; but to-day there were only the marsh-men and some from nearer home, including Wild Duck, counting barely forty, all told. Here, everybody knew his neighbour, and the tenants were mostly of long holding, so that the half-yearly meeting was more like a gathering of a clan than a business convocation. He knew precisely the time-worn joke that would herald most of them, together with the equally hoary grievance; just as he knew the ancient answer that would spring to his lips of its own accord. He was not bored, even if he had ceased to be much amused. The years had not changed the audit into a mere mechanical necessity, nor stolen one whit of its humanity. These people were part of himself by now, with their shrewdness and simpleness, ignorance and intuition, pungent wit, callous exteriors and sentimental hearts. He had the key to every one of them, knew how far each was to be trusted, how far advice would carry, how much sympathy would be wise. The breaking-up of an old man hurt him, as did the downfall of a young one; just as octogenarian vigour or steady success was a matter of almost personal pride. Scarcely any life on the land but touched his own somewhere, definitely or unconsciously working its own effect. The last three months had passed quickly, and more happily than any since his father’s death. It seemed as if, with the settling of the marsh problem, the worry of years had come to a head and ceased; as if, in playing the rôle of Fate, he had acquired something of Fate’s serenity. The old, grinding anxiety had vanished, leaving in its place a steady, uplifting consciousness of righteous power.