You have been into the
church?'
'I am going there now,' the child replied.
'There's an old well there,' said the sexton, 'right underneath the
belfry; a deep, dark, echoing well. Forty year ago, you had only
to let down the bucket till the first knot in the rope was free of
the windlass, and you heard it splashing in the cold dull water.
By little and little the water fell away, so that in ten year after
that, a second knot was made, and you must unwind so much rope, or
the bucket swung tight and empty at the end. In ten years' time,
the water fell again, and a third knot was made. In ten years
more, the well dried up; and now, if you lower the bucket till your
arms are tired, and let out nearly all the cord, you'll hear it, of
a sudden, clanking and rattling on the ground below; with a sound
of being so deep and so far down, that your heart leaps into your
mouth, and you start away as if you were falling in.'
'A dreadful place to come on in the dark!' exclaimed the child, who
had followed the old man's looks and words until she seemed to
stand upon its brink.
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