“She gets on beautiful, sir,” was the answer. “She's thrivin' wonderful.”
“Oh!” exclaimed the Signor, lighting up, and evidently intensely delighted. “I am so glad. I come avays to see 'er. Tell me,” he continued, becoming suddenly serious, “'ave she 'ad 'er bart?” [The Signor almost sings his sentences. He went up the scale to the verb “'ad,” and took a turn down again three notes to the noun “bart,” which, by the way, was his way of pronouncing “bath.”]
“Every day, sir,” replied the maid, cheerfully, “and her skin looks as white as a young infant's.”
Again the Signor was in ecstasies.
“Come!” he cried, “let us go an' see 'er.”
A good deal of the Signor's conversation resembles easy lessons in one syllable for beginners. His “let us go and see 'er,” was delivered with a slight halt between each word, like a child in a state of doubt over a column in a spelling book.
They went into the house, and out, by the back way.
Madame Regniati soon discovered the worst. When the Signor had gone, she called at the house herself, and found that the Signor rented a lodging of the farmer, and, kept a pig.
Though forced to give up the country, he could not deny himself this agricultural pleasure. His first pig had won a prize, and the farmer showed Mrs. Regniati the account of the Cattle Show in a local paper, with Mr. Regniati exhibiting under the name of “Tomkins,” and then, in the fulness of his heart, he brought out a silver medal, tied to a blue riband and preserved in a case of morocco leather, on which was inscribed that this represented the second prize for pigs awarded by the Judges to Mr. Regniati, as “Tomkins,” for the sow Selina, and then followed date, place, and other particulars.
After this discovery there was an arrangement. Mr. Regniati was allowed a small farm-house in the country, on condition of his not wasting money upon it, and only taking to it as a recreation, while the greater portion of his time he would be, henceforth, in honour bound to dedicate to his Art.