Then he curled himself in a hollow full of
dry leaves, and went to sleep.
When he woke, it was in the edge of the evening. Long shadows pointed
like lances among the trees. A horse was cropping the grass in a
clearing, and some one beyond the thicket was reading aloud. For an
instant he thought himself dreaming of the old cottage at
Austerfield--but the voice was young and lightsome.
"Where a man can live at all, there can he live nobly."
The reader stopped and laughed out. A lively snarling came from a burrow
not far away, where two badgers were quarrelling conscientiously.
"Just like folks ye be, a-hectorin' and a-fussin'. What's the great
question to settle now--predestination or infant baptism?--Why, where
under the canopy did you come from, you pint o' cider?"
"I be a-travelin'," Will said stoutly.
"Runaway 'prentice, I should guess. I was one myself at fifteen."
"I'm 'leven, goin' on twelve," said the boy, standing as straight as he
could.
"Any folks?"
"I lived with granddad until he died, four year back."
"And so you're wayfarin', be you? What can you do to get your bread?"
The urchin dug a bare toe into the sod. "I can work," he said
half-defiantly. "Granddad always said I should be put to school some
day, but my uncle won't have that.
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