When Lady-day came round, Steadfast found to his delight and surprise a little figure dancing out to meet him from Mrs. Lightfoot's. "There, Master Stead. Are not you glad to see me, or be you too dumbfounded to get out a word, like good old Jenny?" stroking the donkey's cars. "Posies of primroses! How sweet they be! You must spare me one." "As many as you will, sweetheart. They be all for you, whether given or sold. And you've got a holiday for Lady-day." "Have a care! I got my ears boxed for such a Popish word. 'Tis but quarter day, you know, being that, hang, draw, and quarter is more to the present folks' mind than ladies or saints. I have changed my service, you must know, as poor Dick used to sing:-- "Have a new master, be a new man." "You have not heard from your own folk," cried Stead, this being what he most dreaded. "Nay. But I can away no more with Dame Sloggett, and Cross-patch Rachel, white seam and salmon, and plain collars. So I bade her farewell at the end of the year, and I've got a new mistress." Stead stood with open mouth. To change service at the end of a year was barely creditable in those days, and to do so without consultation with home was unkind and alarming. "There now, don't be crooked about it. I had not time to come out and tell you and Patience, the old crones kept me so close, stitching at shirts for a captain that is to sail next week, and I knew you would be coming in." "Where is it?" was all Stead uttered. "What think you of Master Henshaw's, the great merchant, and an honest well-wisher to King and Church to boot?" "Master Henshaw, the West Indian merchant? His is a good, well-ordered household, and he holds with the old ways." "Yes. He was out that Whitsun morning we wot of," said Emlyn. "I wist well you would be pleased." "But I thought his good lady was dead," said Steadfast. "So she is. She that came out to the gully, but there's a new Mistress Henshaw, a sweet young lady, of a loyal house, the Ayliffes of Calfield. And I am to be her own woman." "Own woman," said Mrs. Lightfoot, for they were by this time among the loaves in her stall. "Merchants' wives did not use to have women of their own in my time." For this was the title of a lady's maid, and rules as to household appointments were strictly observed before the rebellion. "Mistress Henshaw is gentlewoman born," returned Emlyn, with a toss of her head. "She ought to have all that is becoming her station in return for being wedded to an old hunks like that! And 'tis very well she should have one like _me_ who has seen what becomes good blood! So commend me to Patience and Rusha, and tell Ben maybe I shall have an orange to send him one of these days. And cheer up, Stead. I shall get five crowns and two gowns a year, and many a fee besides when there is company, so we may build the house the sooner, and I shall not be mewed up, and shall see the more of thee. 'Tis all for you. So never look so gloomy on it, old Sobersides."