It was just feeding time; that was why Joe came up at this moment; and in addition to all these circumstances, there came faintly booming through the trees the ding of the old church bell, reminding Mr. Bumpkin that he must “goo and smarten oop a bit” for church. He already had on his purple cord trousers, and, as Joe termed it, his hell-fire waistcoat with the flames coming out of it in all directions; but he had to put on his drab “cooat” and white smock-frock, and then walk half a mile before service commenced. He always liked to be there before the Squire, and see him and his daughters, Miss Judith and Miss Mary, come in.
So he had to leave the question of the “walley” of the pig and attend to the more important interests of his immortal soul. But now as he was going comes the point to which the reader’s special attention is directed. He had got about six yards from the stye, or it may have been a little more, when Snooks cried out:
To which Mr. Bumpkin replied, without so much as turning his head—
Now this expression, according to Chitty on Contracts, would mean, “Have you, indeed? Mr. Snooks.” But the extreme cunning of Josiah converted it into “’Ave un,” which, by the same learned authority would signify, “Very well, Mr. Snooks, you can have him.”
The simplicity and enjoyments of a country life depicted.
A quiet day was Sunday on Southwood Farm. Joe used to slumber in the meadows among the buttercups, or in the loft, or near the kitchen-fire, as the season and weather invited. That is to say, until such time as, coming out of Sunday School (for to Sunday School he sometimes went) he saw one of the fairest creatures he had ever read about either in the Bible or elsewhere! It was a very strange thing she should be so different from everybody else: not even the clergyman’s daughters—no, nor the Squire’s daughters, for the matter of that—looked half so nice as pretty Polly Sweetlove, the housemaid at the Vicar’s.
“Now look at that,” said Joe, as he went along the lane on that Sunday when he first beheld this divine creature. “I’m danged if she beant about the smartest lookin o’ any on ’em. Miss Mary beant nothing to her: it’s a dandelion to a toolup.”
So ever since that time Joe had slept less frequently in the hay-loft on a Sunday afternoon; and, be it said to his credit, had attended his church with greater punctuality. The vicar took great notice of the lad’s religious tendencies, and had him to his night-school at the vicarage, in consequence; and certainly no vicar ever knew a boy more regular in his attendance. He was there waiting to go in ever so long before the school began, and was always the very last to leave the premises.