'Ah, well,' said Worm musingly, 'some would have looked for no
less than a Sir. There's a sight of difference in people.'
'And in pigs likewise,' observed John Smith, looking at the halved
carcass of his own.
Robert Lickpan, the pig-killer, here seemed called upon to enter
the lists of conversation.
'Yes, they've got their particular naters good-now,' he remarked
initially. 'Many's the rum-tempered pig I've knowed.'
'I don't doubt it, Master Lickpan,' answered Martin, in a tone
expressing that his convictions, no less than good manners,
demanded the reply.
'Yes,' continued the pig-killer, as one accustomed to be heard.
'One that I knowed was deaf and dumb, and we couldn't make out
what was the matter wi' the pig. 'A would eat well enough when 'a
seed the trough, but when his back was turned, you might a-rattled
the bucket all day, the poor soul never heard ye. Ye could play
tricks upon en behind his back, and a' wouldn't find it out no
quicker than poor deaf Grammer Cates. But a' fatted well, and I
never seed a pig open better when a' was killed, and 'a was very
tender eating, very; as pretty a bit of mate as ever you see; you
could suck that mate through a quill.
'And another I knowed,' resumed the killer, after quietly letting
a pint of ale run down his throat of its own accord, and setting
down the cup with mathematical exactness upon the spot from which
he had raised it--'another went out of his mind.
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