The stonecutter struggled to gather his wandering wits together. In his confusion the only friendly shape he could visualize was the form of Mr. Valley, and he promptly made all the use he could of that.

“The Reverend here,” he said, “can bear witness to I, in the face of all thee’s bloody millponds and hay-wagons. The Reverend here do know what they words, ‘Torp, Moniment-Maker, Blacksod,’ do signify. The Reverend here did see, for his own self, thik girt stone what I did put up over first young man.” He now removed his bewildered little pig’s-eyes from Mr. Valley and fixed them upon Wolf. “And here be second young man who can bear witness to I; and, darn it, thee’d best do as I do say, Mr. Redfern Number Two, for thee’s been clipping and cuddling our Gerda, ’sknow, and I be only to tell Missus on ’ee, and fat be in fire.”