Ford.'

'If you mean old Hobden the hedger, he's only seventy-two. He told me so
himself,' said Dan. 'He's a intimate friend of ours.'

'You're quite right,' Puck replied. 'I meant old Hobden's ninth
great-grandfather. He was a free man and burned charcoal hereabouts.
I've known the family, father and son, so long that I get confused
sometimes. Hob of the Dene was my Hobden's name, and he lived at the
Forge cottage. Of course, I pricked up my ears when I heard Weland
mentioned, and I scuttled through the woods to the Ford just beyond Bog
Wood yonder.' He jerked his head westward, where the valley narrows
between wooded hills and steep hop-fields.

'Why, that's Willingford Bridge,' said Una. 'We go there for walks
often. There's a kingfisher there.'

'It was Weland's Ford then, dear. A road led down to it from the Beacon
on the top of the hill--a shocking bad road it was--and all the hillside
was thick, thick oak-forest, with deer in it. There was no trace of
Weland, but presently I saw a fat old farmer riding down from the Beacon
under the greenwood tree. His horse had cast a shoe in the clay, and
when he came to the Ford he dismounted, took a penny out of his purse,
laid it on a stone, tied the old horse to an oak, and called out:
"Smith, Smith, here is work for you!" Then he sat down and went to
sleep. You can imagine how _I_ felt when I saw a white-bearded, bent old
blacksmith in a leather apron creep out from behind the oak and begin to
shoe the horse. It was Weland himself. I was so astonished that I jumped
out and said: "What on Human Earth are you doing here, Weland?"'