'Excuse me, Jack, if I give you my opinion. I think you are going to work in the wrong way. A man's success in life depends on his seeing where to put his foot, and then and there putting it down. If you want to cross the Axe mud you must step on the stones, otherwise you go up to your waist. Now, Jack, there's a fine field open to you as the son of Captain Job. But you will not enter it. I've seen an ox――just the same; the farmer wanted to drive him into a pasture rich with buttercups, but, bless your soul! he would bounce into a milliner's shop instead.' Jack took up his hat again, and went forth. He was weary of Olver Dench and his persistence in urging him to pursue his father's business. Full of discouragement that made his heart sad, he wandered about till the day closed in, and then, for lack of anything else to do, he resolved to go to Bindon, not to take any part in the festivities, but from a distance to observe them. The weather was favourable, the air mild, although the season was mid-winter. Bindon, as already intimated, had a front court closed by a wall. With this wall the house formed a quadrangle. The porch and hall windows faced the entrance, looking into a turfed enclosure, whilst a chapel occupied one wing, and the other was given up to barns. The chapel, never consecrated, had been erected for divine service in 1425, when the mansion was the residence of a squire with retainers; but when Bindon declined to be a farmhouse, the building ceased to be associated with worship and was given over to secular purposes. As the lonely lad approached, he saw the twinkle of lights, and heard the hum of happy voices. He would not draw near, lest he should be recognised, and this led to an awkward situation. He hung about within hearing of the music and voices. Bindon has never been surrounded by a park, but it has pleasant, sloping grounds, well studded with trees and broken with rock. It was something to Jack to be near his fellows, and to know that if he was sad others were happy. As the darkness deepened, the risk of being recognised became less, and he drew nearer. The barn had been cleared, lanterns had been suspended from the rafters, and as these shed but a feeble light, they had been supplemented by hoops stuck with candles, pendent from the tie beams. On a barrel at one end sat a fiddler, the clerk in Axmouth church, and near him a solemn man, the tailor, who worked the bass viol. Another, Hopkins, the shoemaker, warbled on the clarionet. In the days gone by, at the beginning of the century, every country church had its village orchestra. At that time the detestable harmonium and the strident American organ, the phylloxera of sacred music, had not invaded and exterminated village concerted music.