again before this time o' day. If I hed a wife now, Eleanor could tell her all her troubles, and she'd give her advice a man niver thinks about."
"But, then, t' wife thou is after, Jonathan, is varry little older than thy daughter; but she's a good lass. It's Sarah Benson, isn't it?"
"Ay, it's Sarah. Dost thou think she'll hev me, Ben?"
"I niver asked her. Ask her thysen. I'm nobbut a bachelor ta knows, and therefore varry ignorant about such inscrutable creatures as women. But nobody could be the worse o' Sarah Benson, and they happen might be the better. Only I'll tell thee one thing: Aske and his wife will be mad as iver was if thou does a thing like that. Thou art a mill-owner now, and a land-owner, too, and Sarah, poor lass, is nobbut a hand."
"I was a hand mysen once, Ben, and ta knows I loved her mother before Sarah was born."
"Varry good; but Squire Aske and Mistress Aske were niver hands; and they know nowt at all about Sarah Benson or her mother. And thou may make up thy mind to one thing, that is, that Sarah Benson isn't t' right kind of
