"But you can't go over the bridge, there's a gate on it; master keeps
the key himself. You are in the private grounds now. Dear, dear! the
squire would be so angry if he knew. You must go back; and they'll see
you from the house! Dear me! dear, dear! What shall I do? Can't you
leap back again?"

Moved by these piteous exclamations, and not wishing to subject the poor
old lady to the wrath of a master evidently an unfeeling tyrant, I
resolved to pluck up courage and releap the dangerous abyss.

"Oh, yes, never fear," said I, therefore. "What's been done once ought
to be done twice, if needful. Just get out of my way, will you?"

And I receded several paces over a ground much too rough to favor my run
for a spring. But my heart knocked against my ribs. I felt that
impulse can do wonders where preparation fails.

"You had best be quick, then," said the old woman.

Horrid old woman! I began to esteem her less. I set my teeth, and was
about to rush on, when a voice close beside me said,--

"Stay, young man; I will let you through the gate."

I turned round sharply, and saw close by my side, in great wonder that I
had not seen him before, a man, whose homely (but not working) dress
seemed to intimate his station as that of the head-gardener, of whom my
guide had spoken. He was seated on a stone under a chestnut-tree, with
an ugly cur at his feet, who snarled at me as I turned.