"'Twould be a great inconvenience, as you say, Billy, if, for the
sake of argument, the men of Hampshire wanted to curse the men of
Surrey."

"They couldn't do it"--Billy shook his head--"for the sake of
argument or any other sake; and therefore I say, though not one to
dictate to the Lord, that if a river can't be managed hereabouts--
and, these two not being Devon and Cornwall, a whole river might be
overdoing things--there ought to be some little matter of a
trout-stream, or at the least a notice-board."

"The fellow's right," said my father. "Man would tire too soon of
his natural vices; so we invent new ones for him by making laws and
boundaries."

"Surely and virtues too," suggested my uncle, as we rode forward
again. "You will not deny that patriotism is a virtue?"

"Not I," said my father; "nor that it is the finest invention of
all."

I remember the Hog's Back and the breeze blowing there because on the
highest rise we came on a gibbet and rode around it to windward on
the broad turfy margin of the road; and also because the sight put my
father in mind of a story which he narrated on the way down to
Guildford.


THE STORY OF OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY.