trace of them having disappeared more utterly than their bones. Their
bones, indeed, did not disappear, and were a source of much trouble to
the sexton, for in digging a new grave they came up to the surface in
quantities, and had to be shovelled in and covered up again, so that the
bodily remains of successive generations were jumbled together, and
Puritan and Georgian Thaxtons were mixed promiscuously with their
descendants. Nevertheless, Eastthorpe had really had a history. It had
known victory and defeat, love, hatred, intrigue, hope, despair, and all
the passions, just as Elizabeth, King Charles, Cromwell, and Queen Anne
knew them, but they were not recorded.

It was a bright, hot, August Saturday, as we have said, and it was market
day. Furthermore, it was half-past two in the afternoon, and the guests
at Mr. Furze's had just finished their dinner. Mr. Furze was the largest
ironmonger in Eastthorpe, and sold not only ironmongery, but ploughs and
all kinds of agricultural implements. At the back of the shop was a
small foundry where all the foundry work for miles round Eastthorpe was
done. It was Mr. Furze's practice always to keep a kind of open house on
Saturday, and on this particular day, at half-past two, Mr. Bellamy, Mr.
Chandler, Mr. Gosford, and Mr. Furze were drinking their
whiskey-and-water and smoking their pipes in Mr. Furze's parlour. The
first three were well-to-do farmers, and with them the whiskey-and-water
was not a pretence. Mr. Furze was a tradesman, and of a different build.
Strong tobacco and whiskey at that hour and in that heat were rather too
much for him, and he played with his pipe and drank very slowly. The
conversation had subsided for a while under the influence of the beef,
Yorkshire pudding, beer, and spirits, when Mr. Bellamy observed--

"Old Bartlett's widow still a-livin' up at the Croft?"