THREE:About an hour after nightfall the next evening, the galleyman prepared to depart from Holgrave's cottage: repeatedly did he urge his host to accept his offer, and with his wife and the little babe remove for ever from a spot where his proud spirit had suffered such wrong; but Holgrave steadily refused; and the galleyman, having forced Margaret to accept two pieces of gold, went forth from the roof that had sheltered him. Holgrave's dwelling, as the reader already knows, stood upon an eminence apart from the congregated dwellings that were styled the village. The only object Wells could discover as he looked around, was the glimmering of the lights in the adjoining habitations. He remained stationary for an instant, while he looked across in the direction of Hartwell's house, and then, smiling an imaginary farewell to the pretty Lucy, with a quick step and a light heart, he walked away in the opposite direction.She was no longer merely dissatisfied. In her heart she passionately rebelled. She hated herself, and her condition, for now she hated Reuben. The vague hostility she had felt towards him during Fanny's short[Pg 100] life had given place to a definite hatred. She looked upon Reuben as the murderer of her child, and she hated him. During the first days of her grief he had been so kind to her that she had grown dependent on him and hatred was delayed, but now dependence and dazed gratitude had passed away, and in their place was a sick, heavy loathing for the man whose neglect and indifference she believed had killed her child. She could not endure the thought of giving him another. Sometimes she thought she would like to kill herself, but she was too weak a soul for anything desperate.
THREE:The signs of strong excitement became every day more general and more evident, especially in the counties of Kent, Essex, Hertford, and Norfolk. The furbishing of weapons; the whetting and sharpening of hand-bills, wood-knives, and other offensive implements of husbandry; and the general relaxation, and in many places total suspension of labour, were like the heavings and the tremblings which betokened an approaching shock. Indeed, in many places partial risings had already commenced; but these had originated rather with the free than the bond: rather in resisting the obnoxious tax than in asserting a right to freedom; and the more timid and least influential of the gentry, unable to control the popular movement, had already shut themselves up in their mansions or castles, leaving to the government the task of stemming the storm. Even Richard and his council became alarmed; and after issuing a few proclamations, and a commission of trail baron to try the rioters, awaited the event, trusting to the want of organization among the people for a successful termination of the outbreak.
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