Once, inhaling the smell of the wood fire, he even laughed aloud--a strange laugh, and at its close uncannily like a sob.

Tilda, watching him quietly, observed that he trembled too--trembled all over--from time to time.

She observed, too, that this happened when he looked up from the fire and the kettle; but also that in looking up he never once looked back, that his eyes always wandered along the still waterway and to the horizon ahead.
This puzzled her completely.
Breakfast followed, and was delightful, though not unaccompanied by terrors.

A barge hove in sight, wending downwards from Bursfield, and the children hid.

It passed them, and after ten minutes came a couple from the same direction, with two horses hauling at the first, and the second (which Sam called a butty-boat) towed astern.