For the stocks itself Leonard had no affection, it is true; but he had no sympathy with its aggressors, and he could well conceive that the squire would be very much hurt at the revolutionary event of the night.

"So," thought poor Leonard in his simple heart,--"so, if I can serve his honour, by keeping off mischievous boys, or letting him know who did the thing, I'm sure it would be a proud day for Mother." Then he began to consider that, however ungraciously Mr.Stirn had bestowed on him the appointment, still it was a compliment to him,--showed trust and confidence in him, picked him out from his contemporaries as the sober, moral, pattern boy; and Lenny had a great deal of pride in him, especially in matters of repute and character.
All these things considered, I say, Leonard Fairfield reclined on his lurking-place, if not with positive delight and intoxicating rapture, at least with tolerable content and some complacency.
Mr.Stirn might have been gone a quarter of an hour, when a boy came through a little gate in the park, just opposite to Lenny's retreat in the hedge, and, as if fatigued with walking, or oppressed by the heat of the day, paused on the green for a moment or so, and then advanced under the shade of the great tree which overhung the stocks.
Lenny pricked up his ears, and peeped out jealously.
He had never seen the boy before: it was a strange face to him.
Leonard Fairfield was not fond of strangers; moreover, he had a vague belief that strangers were at the bottom of that desecration of the stocks.

The boy, then, was a stranger; but what was his rank?
Was he of that grade in society in which the natural offences are or are not consonant to, or harmonious with, outrages upon stocks?
On that Lenny Fairfield did not feel quite assured.

According to all the experience of the villager, the boy was not dressed like a young gentleman.

Leonard's notions of such aristocratic costume were naturally fashioned upon the model of Frank Hazeldean.