That we have dealt too scantily with her tragic experiences may be
suspected; but the sequel will serve to show how these circumstances
demand no greater elaboration than has been accorded to them.




CHAPTER VII

LIBATION TO POMONA


A WINTER moon threw black shadows from stock and stone, tree and cot in
the valley of the Teign. Heavy snow had fallen, and moor-men, coming
down from the highlands, declared it to lie three feet deep in the
drifts. Now fine, sharp weather had succeeded the storm, and hard frost
held both hill and vale.

On Old Christmas Eve a party numbering some five-and-twenty persons
assembled in the farmyard of Monks Barton, and Billy Blee, as master of
the pending ceremonies, made them welcome. Some among them were aged,
others youthful; indeed the company consisted mostly of old men and
boys, a circumstance very easily understood when the nature of their
enterprise is considered. The ancients were about to celebrate a
venerable rite and sacrifice to a superstition, active in their boyhood,
moribund at the date with which we are concerned, and to-day probably
dead altogether. The sweet poet[2] of Dean Prior mentions this quaint,
old-time custom of "christening" or "wassailing" the fruit-trees among
Christmas-Eve ceremonies; and doubtless when he dwelt in Devon the use