When I had viewed these wonders he led me to a glorified pasture lot and presented me to the occupant—a smallish cow of, a prevalent henna tone. Except that she had rather slender legs and a permanent wave between the horns she seemed to my uninitiated eyes much the same as any other cow of the Jersey persuasion. I realized, however, that she must be very high-church. My friend, I knew, would harbor no nonconformist cows in his place, and besides, she distinctly had the high-church manner, a thing which is indefinable in terms of speech but unmistakably to be recognized wherever found. Otherwise, though, I could observe nothing about her calculated to excite the casual passer-by. But my friend was all enthusiasm.
“Now,” he said proudly, “what do you think of that for a perfect specimen?”
“Well,” I said, “anybody could tell that she's had a lot of refining influences coming into her life. She's no doubt cultured and ladylike to a degree; and she has the fashionable complexion of the hour and she's all marcelled up and everything, but excepting for these adornments has she any special accomplishments that are calculated to give her class?”
“Class!” he repeated. “Class, did you say? Say, listen! That cow has all the class there is. She's less than two years old and she cost me a cool fifteen hundred cash—and cheap at the figure, at that.”
“Fifteen hundred,” I murmured dazedly. “What does she give?”
“Why, she gives milk, of course,” he explained. “What else would she be giving?”
“Well,” I said, “I should think that at that price she should at least give music lessons. Perhaps she does plain sewing?”
“Say,” he demanded, “what do you expect for fifteen hundred dollars? Fifteen hundred is a perfectly ridiculous price to pay for a cow with a pedigree such as this cow has. She's registered back I don't know how far. It's the regal breeding you pay for when you get an animal like this—not the animal herself.”
But I refused to be swept off my feet. Before this I had associated with royalty. I once met a lineal descendant of William the Conqueror; he told me so himself. Being a descendant was apparently the only profession he had, and I judged this cow was in much the same line of business. “Well,” I replied, “all I can say is that I wouldn't care if her ancestors came over on the Mayflower—if she belonged to me she'd have to show me something in the line of special endeavor. She'd have to have talents or we'd part company pretty pronto, I'm telling you.”
“It is evident you do not understand anything about blooded stock,” he said. “The grandmother of this cow was insured for fifteen thousand dollars, and her great-grandfather, King Bulbul, was worth a fortune. The owner was offered fifty thousand for him—and refused it.”