Her face was rather short, and swarthy as
a gipsy's; observant and sullen too; and she did not move, only eyed us
negligently from under her dark lashes as we drew near. Altogether a not
unpicturesque figure, with a dusky, red petticoat of drugget, and tattered
jacket of bottle-green stuff, with short sleeves, which showed her brown
arms from the elbow.
'That's Pegtop's daughter,' said Milly.
'Who is Pegtop?' I asked.
'He's the miller--see, yonder it is,' and she pointed to a very pretty
feature in the landscape, a windmill, crowning the summit of a hillock
which rose suddenly above the level of the treetops, like an island in the
centre of the valley.
'The mill not going to-day, Beauty?' bawled Milly.
'No--a, Beauty; it baint,' replied the girl, loweringly, and without
stirring.
'And what's gone with the stile?' demanded Milly, aghast. 'It's tore away
from the paling!'
'Well, so it be,' replied the wood nymph in the red petticoat, showing her
fine teeth with a lazy grin.
'Who's a bin and done all that?' demanded Milly.
'Not you nor me, lass,' said the girl.
''Twas old Pegtop, your father, did it,' cried Milly, in rising wrath.
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