Now, when we got into the village street at Darrington, we found that the folks there had been very busy since early morning, and had prepared us such a welcome as showed that they wished us well. For there was a great arch of green stuff across the high-road at the inn, and another at the entrance to the churchyard, and the church porch was gay with flowers. Here there was a great concourse of people gathered together, and we were saluted with right hearty cheers as we left our horses and walked into the church, where Parson Drumbleforth waited, book in hand, to receive us in the presence of a congregation which filled every corner. So Ben and I took up our places, and our friends stood round us, and presently appeared Jack and Tom leading the brides, and the Vicar began the solemn service that was to make us one for life. And when he came to that part where it is necessary that someone should give the woman to the man, I stayed him and beckoned Jacob Trusty to come forward, and it was Jacob’s hand that put my wife’s in mine. So the service went on, and presently the last words were said, and we went out into the sunlight with the bells clashing and clanging joyously from the old tower above.
Now, we had no sooner emerged from the porch with our wives than we were surrounded by the crowd and greeted with such warmth as deeply touched us. Then Ben and I threw away all our small money for the children to scramble for, and sent more to the ringers in the belfry, so that they might refresh themselves and ring their merriest. And all this done, we mounted our horses and reformed our procession to return home, but now our wives rode at the head with us, and Parson Drumbleforth, very fine in his best cap and cassock and silver-buckled shoes, rode at our side on his white mare. So we returned to Dale’s Field and were greeted with much affection by those who had remained behind, and I lifted Rose from my horse and took her across the threshold for the first time as mistress of my house.
Then followed the wedding-feast, whereat almost every friend we had was present, and the tables were crowded. Whether Ben or I felt most proud I know not, but he did often say in after-years that I looked as if I had conquered a city and won a rich treasure—as indeed I had. As for him, he plucked up his courage wonderfully now that the ordeal was over, and laughed and joked with everyone, and made a speech that caused everybody to laugh exceedingly. We had plenty of speechmaking indeed, for the Vicar had some grave remarks to make, and Jack some humorous ones, and old Jacob, whom I had caused to sit near me in an honoured place, addressed a few words to us, and there were toasts proposed and spoken to until everybody’s health had been drunk. But there was one toast drunk in solemn silence and received with sad feelings by all of us, and that was to the memory of my dear father and mother and of Philip Lisle.
When the feast was over nothing would content Jack but a dance, and very soon he had sent for the fiddler and was arranging matters for country dances on the lawn before the house. So all the young folks danced and the old ones sat round the garden and watched them, and whenever the fiddler stopped playing we heard the joyous jangle of the bells ringing out across the fields. So the afternoon wore away to evening, and at last the shadows fell across garden and meadow, and our guests prepared to depart. And first of all Ben saddled his horse and made ready the pillion, and brought forth his wife, between whom and Rose there was much embracing, and they, too, rode away, with half a dozen cavaliers to escort them to Master Ben’s house at Pontefract. Then followed the others, in twos and threes and fours, their laughter ringing out happily along the highway. And last of all went Jack and his father, with many a wish for our happiness, and many a pressure of our hands, and we stood at the garden-gate, listening to the dying away of their horses’ feet in the distance, and to the last merry peal of the bells in the church tower.
The last sound died away, the bells ceased with a final note of triumph; the twilight deepened, and the moon rose above the dark woods. We stood for a moment and looked across the familiar fields; then, hand in hand, we went into our house and closed the door and left the land sleeping in the moonlight.
And now if I had my own way I would add nothing more to this history, because in all such matters that I have read there was no more written after the marriage of the folks most concerned. But my daughter Dorothy, who knows more of these things than I, insists that
