On the opposite side of the hearth sat Mr. Black, the village Schoolmaster, a little lean man well past his meridian, his hair sparse and thin, and sparse and thin all his form and frame. He is clean shaven, but his lips are firm and his eye bright and keen. Though he has the lean and hungry look of the born conspirator, never did such a look so belie a man; for a gentler being never breathed than William Black, nor one more secure in the affection and esteem of high and low for many miles around. He was not a that country man and how or by what fate, driven by what adversity or sore mischance, he had drifted to that wild neighbourhood none presumed to know. He kept a day school for boys and girls, whose parents paid fourpence a child per week when they could afford it, and less when they couldn't--generally less. Then on alternate week-nights he kept a night-school where strapping and ambitious youths from loom or farm or bench, whose education had been neglected in their tender youth sought painfully to learn to read and write and sum. These were known to pay as much as twopence a lesson. Mr. Black--even in those irreverent days and parts, where few even of the better sort escape a nick-name, he was always called _Mr_. Black,--was a bachelor, and his modest household and Mr. Black himself were ruled by a spinster sister, shrill of voice, caustic of speech, with profound contempt for her brother's softness, but unceasing and untiring in the care of the household gods, and happiest in those "spring cleanings" that were not confined to spring. But to-night Mr. Black has fled before his sister's voice and twirling mop, and a look of seraphic content rests upon his face as he meditatively puffs his long churchwarden and sniffs the fragrant odour of the mulled ale that simmers in the copper vessel, shaped like a candle-snuffer, or, as Mr. Black reflected, like a highly burnished dunce's cap, and which the plump hand of Mrs. Schofield had thrust nigh to its rim in the very heart of the ruddy fire. The schoolmaster's thin legs, clad in stout stockings of native wool, knit by Miss Black's deft fingers, were crossed before the blaze and the grateful warmth falls upon them, the while the clogging snow slowly melts from his stout boots. "Redfearn o' Fairbanks is late to-night," he said at length, after a silence broken only by the click of Mrs. Schofield's steel knitting needles. "Aye, it's market day in Huddersfilt, yo' know, Mr. Black, an' th' roads 'll be bad to-neet. But Fairbanks 'll win through if th' mare dunnot fall an' break his neck." "Th' mare's nooan foaled 'at 'll break Tom o' Fairbank's neck," said Moll o' Stuart's, grimly. "It's spun hemp that bides for him, if there's a God i' heaven." "Whisht yo' now, Moll, an' quit speakin' o' your betters, leastwise if you canna speak respectful." "Betters! Respectful! Quo' she," retorted Molly with a defiant snort, pulling hard at her filthy cuddy.