Thicker than flies around the milk-pail, rumours came flitting
daily; and even the night--that fair time of thinking--was busy with
buzzing multitude.
"Long time have I lived, and a sight have I seed," said Zebedee Tugwell
to his wife, "of things as I couldn't make no head nor tail of; but
nothing to my knowledge ever coom nigh the sort of way our folk has
taken to go on. Parson Twemlow told us, when the war began again, that
the Lord could turn us all into Frenchmen, if we sinned against Him
more than He could bear. I were fool enough to laugh about it then,
not intaking how it could be on this side of Kingdom Come, where no
distinction is of persons. But now, there it is--a thing the Almighty
hath in hand; and who shall say Him nay, when He layeth His hand to it?"
"I reckon, 'a hath begun with you too, Zeb," Mrs. Tugwell would answer,
undesirably. "To be always going on so about trash trifles, as a woman
hath a right to fly up at, but no man! Surely Dan hath a right to his
politics and his parables, as much as any lame old chap that sitteth on
a bench. He works hard all day, and he airns his money; and any man hath
a right to wag his tongue of night-time, when his arms and his legs have
been wagging all day."
"Depends upon how he wags 'un." The glance of old Tugwell was stern, as
he spoke, and his eyebrows knitted over it. "If for a yarn, to plaise
children or maidens, or a bit of argyment about his business, or talk
about his neighbours, or aught that consarns him--why, lads must be
fools, and I can smoke my pipe and think that at his age I was like him.
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