Page:Hannah More (1887 Charlotte Mary Yonge British).djvu/95

Rh monks at Glastonbury. They had to change the subject. As Hannah wrote: "Miss Wilberforce would have been shocked could she have seen the petty tyrants whose insolence we stroked and tamed, the ugly children we fondled, the pointers and spaniels we caressed, the cider we commended, and the wine we swallowed." This put the farmer in good humour, and he was further mollified on finding that no subscription was asked, assuring these strange visitors that it was a pity that they should take the trouble, since the Cheddar people were extremely well off, there being a large legacy to be given in time of distress, though to be sure they had not received any for the last seven-and-thirty years, it having been thrown into Chancery on a dispute of the two churchwardens; but now he believed it might soon be settled, as he was appointed a trustee!

Feeling that they had gained some ground, the two ladies returned to their inn at Cross, and drove to Cheddar before eight the next morning to begin their canvass. They made about eleven or twelve calls, generally being offered brandy and water, and finding the most intelligent persons of opinion that it might be well to have the children shut up in school, as there was a deal of robbery of orchards. They gave a fearful account of the poor (as is the wont of the farmer), but even among themselves, Martha says, "there is as much knowledge of Christ as in the wilds of Africa."