“Can’t you just, though; look at the price; down ter nothing, as you might say. Get it for the asking.”
“But I didn’t get cherries for the asking; I had to pay eightpence a pound for some I bought at Chatham.”
“Oh! I dessay. Wish I c’d git a penny a pound. But that’s jist like them ’ere starv’em, rob’em, and cheat’em folks. Wouldn’t give ’ee so much’s the parings o’ their finger-nails if they c’d help it.”
“Then why don’t you make preserves of some of your fruit?”
“Preserves? what’s that, mister?”
“Why, jam, you know. Besides, surely you eat some of your own fruit, don’t you?”
“Fruit’s to sell, not to heat!”
“Well, then, if you can’t sell it, don’t preserve it, and won’t eat any of it, what do you do with it?”
“Give it ter the pigs, in coorse!”
“Yes, but why not eat some of it yourself?”