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“Sure you’m a very kind-fashioned bwoy, Jan Aggett.”

“You’d best to call me just ‘Jan,’ like other folks.”

“So I will; an’ you’d best to call me ‘Sally.’”

“Burned if I doan’t then! An’ us’ll be friends.”

From that time forward the lonely children became close companions; and when years passed and Sarah ripened to maidenhood, while John brought forth a straw-coloured moustache and thick beard that matched his sandy locks, the pair of them were already regarded by their own generation as surely bound for marriage in due season.

There came an afternoon when the girl had reached the age of eighteen and John was just arrived at man’s estate. They worked together during harvest time, and the thatcher, standing on a stack ladder, watched the girl where she was gleaning and likened her pink sunbonnet to some bright flower nodding over the gold stubbles. Presently she came to him with a bundle of good corn under her arm.

“’Tis long in the straw this year,” she said. “You must thresh it for me when you can and hand me the straw for plaiting. I can sell all the hats an’ bonnets tu, as I’m like to weave. An’ parson do allus give me half a crown each year for a new straw hat.”