‘Mr. Mears’!’ she exclaimed.

‘No: ourn be Passon Fordy.’

It turned out that this place was not in Earlscombe at all, but in Hillside, a different parish; and the boy, Amos, further communicated that there was old Passon Fordy, and Passon Frank, and Madam, what was Mr. Frank’s lady.  Yes, he could read, he could; he went to Sunday School, and was in Miss Ellen’s class; he had been to school worky days, only father was dead, and Farmer Hartop gave him a job.

It was plain that Hillside was under a very different rule from Earlscombe; and Emily was delighted to have discovered that the sweet cottage bonnet’s owner was called Ellen, which just then was the pet Christian name of romance, in honour of the Lady of the Lake.

In the midst of her raptures, however, just as we were about to turn in at our own gate into the. . . Read More