Back O' the Moon

THE first thing that the new parson noticed, as he rode up the narrow, precipitous street late in the October afternoon, was that the muffled knock-knocking that proceeded from the houses ceased as he ascended; and the next was that he had never in his life seen so many mongrel dogs as prowled and sniffed at his heels. He had left his grey galloway in Horwick Town, three miles back; he now saw the reason why they had laughed, and advised him that he might as well sell it there and then. Wadsworth Shelf had been steep; Wadsworth Street was precipitous; and at the head of the street rose Wadsworth Scout, dark and mountainous. The Scout was thinly wooded here and there with birch and mountain-ash. It overshadowed the village beneath it; and as the parson reached the small square at its foot he saw, over an irregular row of roofs, the squat belfry of the little church that was now his charge. A ramshackle inn, with a long horse-trough in front of it, occupied the lower side of the square.