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She swept up the kitchen, got her milk-strainer and pans ready upon the buttery shelf, and began to set the table. By the time this was half done, in came Sam Larkens with two great pails of milk, and Johnny Low followed with another.
But tell me first, my kind lassy, for I see you are a kind lassy, tell me, has not this house had a change of fortune, and fallen to decay of late? for the inn at Bannow was pictured to me as a bra' neat place. Biddy. Ah! that was, may-be, the time the Larkens had it? Mr. H. The Larkens! that was the very name: it warms my heart to hear the sound of it. Biddy.
"Have they been killed!" was her first astonished exclamation, to which Sam responded with another burst. "Be quiet, Sam Larkens!" said Mr. Van Brunt. "Yes, Miss Ellen, they've been killed, sure enough." "Are these the same pigs I used to see you feeding with corn, Mr. Van Brunt?"
There they were all her old friends Streaky and Dolly, and Jane and Sukey, and Betty Flynn sleek and contented; winter and summer were all the same to them. And Mr. Van Brunt was very glad to see her there again, and Sam Larkens and Johnny Low looked as if they were too, and Ellen told them with great truth she was very glad indeed to be there; and then she went in to supper with Mr.
Van Brunt was there always at night, and about the place as much as possible during the day; when obliged to be absent, he stationed Sam Larkens to guard the house, also to bring wood and water, and do whatever he was bid. All the help, however, that was given from abroad could not make Ellen's life an easy one; Mr. Van Brunt's wishes that Miss Fortune would get up again began to come very often.
Larkens, or Larkins, or Larkme, or Larkus Sir J.H. is not able to read which or what; but he is happy to observe, at all events, that, end how he may, the gentleman begins with a "lark!" which Sir J.H. always does, when he can. Not being able to discover his terminal syllable, he will take the liberty of styling him by his sprightly beginning, and calling him shortly "Lark."
"Come down here? to be sure you may! You may always come straight where I am, without asking any questions." Ellen went down. But before she reached the lowest step she stopped with almost a start, and stood fixed with such a horrified face, that neither Mr. Van Brunt nor Sam Larkens, who was there, could help laughing.
"Churning! Been long at it?" "A good while," said Ellen, with a sigh. "Coming?" "I don't know when." Mr. Van Brunt stepped to the door, and shouted for Sam Larkens. He was ordered to take the churn and bring the butter; and Ellen, very glad of a rest, went out to amuse herself with feeding the chickens, and then up stairs to see what Nancy was doing. "Butter come?" said Nancy.
Van Brunt on having made himself one of the richest landholders "in town," by the junction of another fat farm to his own; some pitying him for having got more than his match within doors, and "guessing he'd missed his reckoning for once." "If he has, then," said Sam Larkens, who heard some of these condoling remarks, "it's the first time in his life, I can tell you.
"What's the use of troubling yourself about other people's notions?" said Mr. Van Brunt. "If folks want to take the road, let them have it. That's my way. I am satisfied, provided they don't run me over." " 'Tain't my way, then, I'd have you to know," said Miss Fortune; "I despise it! And 'tain't your way, neither, Van Brunt; what did you give Tom Larkens a cowhiding for?"
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