‘Why, then, you may hear it now,’ says he, ‘an’ see it also, if you’ll gi’ me a pot an’ a couple o’ quarts o’ soft water.’
‘You can have it an’ welcome,’ says they.
So they put down the pot an’ the water, an’ my father went over an’ tuk a chair hard by the pleasant fire for himself, an’ put down his two limestones to boil, an’ kept stirrin’ them round like stir-about.
Very good—well, by-an’-by, when the wather began to boil—‘’Tis thickening finely,’ says my father; ‘now if it had a grain o’ salt at all, ’twould be a great improvement to it.’
‘Raich down the salt-box, Nell,’ says the man o’ the house to his wife. So she did.
‘Oh, that’s the very thing, just,’ says my father, shaking some of it into the pot. So he stirred it again a while, looking as sober as a minister. By-an’-by he takes the spoon he had stirring it an’ tastes it.
‘It is very good now,’ says he, ‘altho’ it wants something yet.’
‘What is it?’ says they.
‘Oyeh, wisha nothin’,’ says he; ‘maybe ’t is only fancy o’ me.’
‘If it’s anything we can give you,’ says they, ‘you’re welcome to it.’