“Ah--strong-minded, without a doubt,” admitted Mr Beer. “Wish my Jane was. Wish I was too. ’Tis a very good gift on Dartymoor; but we’m soft in heart as well as body. We live by yielding. I couldn’t bide in a place by that name. It’s owing to the poetry in me. ’Twill out. I must be rhyming. So sure as there comes a Bank Holiday, or the first snow, or an extra good run with hounds, then verses flow out of me, like feathers off a goose.” The lovers drank a pint of beer between them turn and turn about; but Minnie’s share was trifling. Then they walked off to Hangman’s Hut, where it stood alone in a dimple of the hillside half a mile from the high road. The cottage looked east and was approached by a rough track over the moor. High ground shielded it from the prevalent riot of the west wind; and nearly two miles distant, in the midst of a chaos of broken land and hillocks of _débris_, a great waterwheel stood out from the waste and a chimney rose above Vitifer Mine. Minnie gravely examined the cottage and directed Daniel where to take measurements. The place was in good repair, and had only been vacant two months. It was not the last tenant who had destroyed himself, but an unhappy water-bailiff many years previously. “The golden plover nearly always come this way when they first arrive in winter. Many’s the pretty bird I’ll shoot ’e, Min.” She nodded. Her thoughts were on the kitchen range at the time. “You’ll often see hounds in full cry--’tis a noble sight.” But Minnie was examining the larder. She spent an hour in the cottage, and no experienced housewife could have shown more judgment and care. Then, much to Daniel’s satisfaction, his sweetheart decided for Hangman’s Hut. “But I wish you could get it for five shillings a week, instead of six, Dan.” “No, no, I can’t beat Beer down. He’m too good a neighbour, an’ ’twould never do to begin with a difference of opinion. Six ban’t too much. An’ I’m to get twenty shillings wages after Christmas. You always forget that. There’ll be tons of money.” Mrs Beer greeted them on their return to the Warren Inn. She was a plain, careworn soul who let her poultry get upon her nerves and take the place of children as a source of anxiety. In her sleep she often cried out about laying hens and foxes; but everybody knew her for the best creature on Dartmoor. The women talked together and the men drank. Then Daniel prepared to start, and soon he and Minnie were jogging home under the dusk of night. Dartmoor stretched vast and formless round about them, and Minnie discussed second-hand furniture. She held that carpets were a luxury not to be named; but Daniel insisted upon one in the parlour.