THE ancient village of Holmfirth on the river Holme was, in former days, of considerably more pretension than it is to-day, when the neighbouring town of Huddersfield dwarfs the surrounding communities. Holmfirth stands near the head of the valley of the Holme, and at one time was looked up to as a petty capital by the straggling hamlets that intervened between the river's head and the spot where, some nine miles below, its tortuous course joins the river Colne at King's mill in Huddersfield, whence the united currents sweep in broader stream to blend with the Calder at Cooper Bridge, and so onwards to the capacious bosom of the Humber. Best known and best accustomed of all the shops in Holmfirth was that of Ephraim Thorpe, sometimes; known as Eph o' Natt's o' th' Thong, but more as "Split," from a tradition current in the village that he would split a pea rather than be guilty of giving over-weight or measure. The shop was low and dark, it's floor of blackened stone seldom scrubbed. The two counters were not cleanly, their surface much worn by the friction of heavy vessels and the testing of doubtful coins. But what article of household provision you failed to get at "Split's" you might despair of purchasing anywhere nearer than Huddersfield itself. A candle rack ran round three sides of the shop, just above the counters, and the sickly odour of tallow pervaded all the spot, dominating even the smell of treacle and "shilling-oil" as the oil used for lamps was called. Flitches of bacon hung from the rafters; bags of flour and of oatmeal with open necks were propped up in corners. Bars of soap, piles of soft-stone and white stone, tins of tea and coffee, pats of butter, skins of lard, papers of blacking and black-lead, pots and pans, and brushes hard and soft, eggs and herrings, peas and beans and Indian corn for poultry, gridirons and porringers, thimbles and shoelaces, clogs and pocket-handkerchiefs--all these and sundry others were the articles of commerce retailed at fifty per cent, profit to a grateful public by Mr. Ephraim Thorpe. That public consisted for the most part of those employed in the neighbouring mills, and few were the families of the humbler sort entirely out of Ephraim's debt. He was always willing to trust a man that he knew to be fairly sober and in fair work, and to his regular customers at the crisis of a funeral or a wedding, lend a guinea or so at the easy interest of sixpence in the pound per week; so long as the interest was paid regularly he never pressed for the principal. But woe betide any housewife who took her ready money to a rival tradesman, or ventured to go shopping at the flaunting stores of Huddersfield. The Court of Requests and the "Bum" were words of terrible portent, and Ephraim knew every trick of the law. He knew, too, the wages of every working family in the district how much they ought to spend when they bought in for the week, and how far it was safe to trust when work was