"It is false, knave!" said De Boteler, who had listened with impatience to the persuasive address of his lady"it is false! We are positively informed that you aided and abetted the flight of this bondman, and that you alone can give tidings of him.""You needn't tell me that.""My liege," said Newton, as the horseman neared the royal train, "that man is Wat Tyler."
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It was about a fortnight after this court day that the fortunate yeoman one morning led his mother, Edith Holgrave, to the cottage he had built on the land that was now his own."What! the audacious monk who intruded upon us at Kennington?"The Repeal of the Corn Laws did not have such a bad effect on Odiam as Reuben had feared. The harvests in '46 and '47 were unusually good, and a general revival of prosperity throughout the country atoned for the low price of grain. It was not to be expected, however, that he would forgive at once the party which had betrayed agricultural interests. He transferred his political allegiance to Disraeli, whose feudalistic attitude won his entire respect. It was a great trial to him that he could not read the newspapers, for nowadays he did not care to have Naomi read to him. She used to sometimes, but her utter lack of interest and understanding was no longer atoned for by a voice love-modulated or a soft hand stroking his. He resolved that none of his children should share his disabilities, and already the infant Albert toddled daily to a little house in the village where two vague-looking sisters taught the rising generation mysteries hidden from their parents. Reuben could spell out one or two words, and could write "Reuben Backfield" in big printing letters at the bottom of any document he had to sign, but he had no time to educate himself further.Early the next spring Reuben had a stroke of luck, for he was able to sell the remainder of his lease of the Landgate shop to a greengrocer. With the proceeds he bought half a dozen more cows, and grounded his dairy business more firmly. In spite of his increased herd he still had several acres of superfluous pasture, and pocketing his pride, advertised "keep" for stock, which resulted in his pocketing also some much-needed cash. His most immediate ambition was to pay off the mortgage he had raised a year ago, and restore to Odiam its honourable freedom."As long as there's men and women in the world, the men 'ull be top and the women bottom."Somehow out there was a wider life, a life which took no reck of sickness or horror or self-reproach. The wind which stung his face and roughed his hair, the sun which tanned his nape as he bent to his work, the smell of the earth after rain, the mists that brewed in the hollows at dusk, and at dawn slunk like spirits up to the clouds ... they were all part of something too great to take count of human painso much greater than he that in it he could forget his trouble, and find ease and hope and purposeeven though he was fighting it.
