This sort of language was too frequently repeated, and the witch Matty Drew's prophecy too often alluded to, by old Deborah, in those days when her tongue still talked triumphantly, although her limbs were incapable of motion, not to produce a deep and lasting impression upon her hearers. One half of the village was in a constant state of alarm, after Ralph had returned, a man, from the “up-along” counties, to which he had departed, a boy, in order to learn some improved mode of cultivating land, lest the two cousins should meet and quarrel in their cups. If they were seen in the village, passing a few moments in friendly chat, a scout immediately acquainted the parties most interested with the circumstance; and, in a short time, one of them was drawn off, by a fictitious story, of lambs tumbling into ditches, cows getting their legs entangled in hurdles, or children fallen into fits. Ralph and Harry both loved the pastimes of their native place; they could wrestle, and play at back-sword, in very laudable style; but Ralph was the better wrestler, and Harry surpassed in the use of the single-stick. Devon being noted for its wrestlers, and Somerset for its single-stick players, the cousins were attracted in different directions, to enjoy that pastime in which each excelled; so that, up to the fortieth year of their lives,--and they were, as it will be remembered, precisely of the same age,--they had never, much to the satisfaction of their friends, met in the ring as rivals. Especial care had always been taken that they did not join the same convivial parties; they often attempted to make merry together, for Ralph and Harry really felt an affection for each other's society, but the women invariably out-manoeuvred them, and the two cousins were greater strangers to each other, than either of them was to any man else in the village, of his own age and station.