R. A. STREATFEILD.




CHAPTER I


When I was a small boy at the beginning of the century I remember an old
man who wore knee-breeches and worsted stockings, and who used to hobble
about the street of our village with the help of a stick. He must have
been getting on for eighty in the year 1807, earlier than which date I
suppose I can hardly remember him, for I was born in 1802. A few white
locks hung about his ears, his shoulders were bent and his knees feeble,
but he was still hale, and was much respected in our little world of
Paleham. His name was Pontifex.

His wife was said to be his master; I have been told she brought him a
little money, but it cannot have been much. She was a tall,
square-shouldered person (I have heard my father call her a Gothic woman)
who had insisted on being married to Mr Pontifex when he was young and
too good-natured to say nay to any woman who wooed him. The pair had
lived not unhappily together, for Mr Pontifex's temper was easy and he
soon learned to bow before his wife's more stormy moods.

Mr Pontifex was a carpenter by trade; he was also at one time parish
clerk; when I remember him, however, he had so far risen in life as to be
no longer compelled to work with his own hands. In his earlier days he
had taught himself to draw. I do not say he drew well, but it was