At first, indeed, they had no woman-servant at all.

But this created such horror that Parson Dale ventured a hint upon the matter, which Riccabocca took in very good part; and an old woman was forthwith engaged after some bargaining--at three shillings a week--to wash and scrub as much as she liked during the daytime.

She always returned to her own cottage to sleep.

The man-servant, who was styled in the neighbourhood "Jackeymo," did all else for his master,--smoothed his room, dusted his papers, prepared his coffee, cooked his dinner, brushed his clothes, and cleaned his pipes, of which Riccabocca had a large collection.

But however close a man's character, it generally creeps out in driblets; and on many little occasions the Italian had shown acts of kindness, and, on some more rare occasions, even of generosity, which had served to silence his calumniators, and by degrees he had established a very fair reputation,--suspected, it is true, of being a little inclined to the Black Art, and of a strange inclination to starve Jackeymo and himself, in other respects harmless enough.
Signor Riccabocca had become very intimate, as we have seen, at the Parsonage.