"Ar, zo I do ear say," said the old man, chuckling over some profound thought. "And Mas'r Willum e do zay thaät too, though e be tother side." He wagged his head twice with the wise subtlety of age. "Ar now, which way be I going to voät? Ar? Thaät's what many on us ud like t' know!"
The Canvasser began to despair. He kept his weary smile upon his face, rose from his chair, and said: "Well, I must be going now, madam."
"That ye must," said the old lady cheerfully.
"Don't you let un go wi'out gi'ing un some of that wa-ine," said the host, as he leaned forward in his chair and stirred the down fire with an old charred stick.
The woman looked at the Canvasser suspiciously and poured him out some parsnip wine, which he drank with the best grace in the world. As he lifted the glass he said, with an assumed cheerfulness: "Well! here's to Mr. Richards!"
"Ar!" said the old man.
The old woman took the glass, wiped it carefully without washing it, put it back into the cupboard with the bottle, and turned round to continue her occupation of fixing the stranger with her eye.
"Well, I must be gone," he said for the second time, and in as breezy a tone as he could command.
"Ar, zo you zay!" was all the reply he obtained, and he left that citizen of many years still smiling with his bony aged jaws at the down fire, and muttering again to himself that great truth about material wealth which had haunted him throughout the brief conversation.