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CXVIII

t was late in the evening when Philip arrived at Ferne. It
Iwas Mrs. Athelny’s native village, and she had been ac-
customed from her childhood to pick in the hop-field to
which with her husband and her children she still went ev-
ery year. Like many Kentish folk her family had gone out
regularly, glad to earn a little money, but especially regard-
ing the annual outing, looked forward to for months, as
the best of holidays. The work was not hard, it was done in
common, in the open air, and for the children it was a long,
delightful picnic; here the young men met the maidens; in
the long evenings when work was over they wandered about
the lanes, making love; and the hopping season was gen-
erally followed by weddings. They went out in carts with
bedding, pots and pans, chairs and tables; and Ferne while
the hopping lasted was deserted. They were very exclusive
and would have resented the intrusion of foreigners, as
they called the people who came from London; they looked
down upon them and feared them too; they were a rough
lot, and the respectable country folk did not want to mix
with them. In the old days the hoppers slept in barns, but
ten years ago a row of huts had been erected at the side of a
meadow; and the Athelnys, like many others, had the same
hut every year.
Athelny met Philip at the station in a cart he had bor-