the tumult.
John stood his ground. Once a torch was flung at him—he stooped and picked it up. I thought he was going to hurl it back again, but he did not; he only threw it down, and stamped it out safely with his foot. This simple action had a wonderful effect on the crowd.
The big fellow advanced to the gate and called John by his name.
"Is that you, Jacob Baines? I am sorry to see you here."
"Be ye, sir."
"What do you want?"
"Nought wi' thee. We wants Abel Fletcher. Where is 'um?"
"I shall certainly not tell you."
As John said this again the noise arose, and again Jacob Baines seemed to have power to quiet the rest.
John Halifax never stirred. Evidently he was pretty well known. I caught many a stray sentence, such as "Don't hurt the lad."—"He were kind to my lad, he were."—"No, he be a real gentleman."—"No, he comed here as poor as us," and the like. At length one voice, sharp and shrill, was heard above the rest.
"I zay, young man, didst ever know what it was to be pretty nigh vamished?"
"Ay, many a time."
The answer, so brief, so unexpected, struck a great hush into the throng. Then the same voice cried—
"Speak up, man! we won't hurt 'ee! You be one o' we!"
"No, I am not one of you. I'd be ashamed to come in the night and burn my master's house down."
I expected an outbreak, but none came. They listened, as it were by compulsion, to the clear, manly voice that had not in it one shade of fear.
"What do you do it for?" John continued. "All because he would not sell you, or give you, his wheat. Even so—it was HIS wheat, not yours. May not a man do what he likes with his own?"
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