and we are soon stamping our feet on the hard, smooth road in front of
the Saltersgate Inn. The door opens straight into a large stone-flagged
room. Everything is redolent of coaching days, for the cheery glow of
the fire shows a spotlessly clean floor, old high-backed settles, a gun
hooked to one of the beams overhead, quaint chairs and oak stools, and a
fox's mask and brush. A gamekeeper is warming himself at the fire, for
the evening is chilly, and the firelight falls on his box-cloth gaiters
and heavy boots, as we begin to talk of the loneliness and the dangers
of the moors, and of the snowstorms in winter, that almost bury the low
cottages and blot out all but the boldest landmarks. Soon we are
discussing the superstitions which still survive among the simple
country-folk, and the dark and lonely wilds we have just left make this
a subject of great fascination.

Although we have heard it before, we hear over again with intense
interest the story of the witch who brought constant ill-luck to a
family in these parts. Their pigs were never free from some form of
illness, their cows died, their horses lamed themselves, and even the
milk was so far under the spell that on churning-days the butter refused
to come unless helped by a crooked sixpence. One day, when as usual they
had been churning in vain, instead of resorting to the sixpence, the
farmer secreted himself in an outbuilding, and, gun in hand, watched the
garden from a small opening. As it was growing dusk he saw a hare coming
cautiously through the hedge. He fired instantly, the hare rolled over,
dead, and almost as quickly the butter came. That same night they heard
that the old woman, whom they had long suspected of bewitching them, had
suddenly died at the same time as the hare, and henceforward the farmer
and his family prospered.

In the light of morning the isolation of the inn is more apparent than