"Then," she began, knitting her brows, for really this at its best was bad taste, and bad taste, she had always been taught, was the very worst—oh, but how nice it was, a little bit of it, after the swamps of good taste one waded about in in cathedral cities! She knitted her brows, aghast at her thoughts. "Then what," she asked, "do you fill your life up with?"
"Manure," said the German gentleman.
The ladies leapt in their places.
"Ma—" began Ingeborg; then stopped.
"I am engaged in endeavouring to teach the peasants of my parish how best to farm their poor pieces of land."
"Oh, really," said Ingeborg, politely.
"I do it by example. They do not attend to words. I have bought a few acres and experiment before their eyes. Our soil is the worst in Germany. It is inconceivably thankless. And the peasants resemble it."
"Oh, really," said Ingeborg.
"The result of the combination is poverty."
"So then, I suppose," said Ingeborg, with memories of the Bishop's methods, "you preach patience."