from the barns. The yard was in stillness, a little mist floating
against the walls, and the pervading greyness of the morning seemed to
be lit up by the huge blotches of yellow lichen that covered the slated
roofs of barns and dwelling--the roofs were all new, having only for a
year or two superseded the old roofs of osier thatch, but that queer
golden rust had almost hidden their substance, covering them as it
covered everything that was left exposed to the salt-thick marsh air.

Joanna stood in the middle of the yard looking keenly round her like a
cat, then like a cat she pounced. The interior of the latest built barn
was dimly lit by a couple of windows under the roof--the light was just
enough to show inside the doorway five motionless figures, seated about
on the root-pile and the root-slicing machine. They were Joanna's five
farm-men, apparently wrapped in a trance, from which her voice
unpleasantly awoke them.

"Here, you--what d'you think you're doing?"

The five figures stiffened with perceptible indignation, but they did
not rise from their sitting posture as their mistress advanced--or
rather swooped--into their midst. Joanna did not expect this. She paid a
man fifteen shillings a week for his labour and made no impossible
demands of his prejudices and private habits.

"I've been up an hour," she said, looking round on them, "and here I
find all of you sitting like a lot of sacks."

"It's two hours since I've bin out o' my warm bed," said old Stuppeny
reproachfully.