plateau at the top of the down.

Anne threw down her work, and letting her eyes remain on the nearing
masses of cavalry, the worsteds getting entangled as they would,
said, 'Mother, mother; come here! Here's such a fine sight! What
does it mean? What can they be going to do up there?'

The mother thus invoked ran upstairs and came forward to the window.
She was a woman of sanguine mouth and eye, unheroic manner, and
pleasant general appearance; a little more tarnished as to surface,
but not much worse in contour than the girl herself.

Widow Garland's thoughts were those of the period. 'Can it be the
French,' she said, arranging herself for the extremest form of
consternation. 'Can that arch-enemy of mankind have landed at
last?' It should be stated that at this time there were two
arch-enemies of mankind--Satan as usual, and Buonaparte, who had
sprung up and eclipsed his elder rival altogether. Mrs. Garland
alluded, of course, to the junior gentleman.

'It cannot be he,' said Anne. 'Ah! there's Simon Burden, the man
who watches at the beacon. He'll know!'

She waved her hand to an aged form of the same colour as the road,
who had just appeared beyond the mill-pond, and who, though active,
was bowed to that degree which almost reproaches a feeling observer
for standing upright. The arrival of the soldiery had drawn him out
from his drop of drink at the 'Duke of York' as it had attracted
Anne. At her call he crossed the mill-bridge, and came towards the
window.