But Mrs Crumpler was not discouraged: “They mid be shart, sir, but they be terr’ble strong,” she returned; “feel o’ them.”
The farmer laughed again, but this time more good-naturedly.
“If you was to give me a trial, sir, I think you’d be satisfied,” pleaded Mrs Crumpler.
“Oh, you can try as much as you like,” returned the master, twitching the rein from her hand, and eyeing her with a smile that was not unkindly. “I don’t suppose you’ll make much hand of it, but you’re welcome to try.”
“Thank ’ee, sir,” she responded, fervently. “What be I to do then, please, sir?”
“Why, we’ll try what your arms are made of, since you’re so proud of ’em. You’ll find a pitchfork in that shed yonder. Be sprack and get it, and follow the rest o’ the folks up along.”
He chuckled as he watched her cross the yard and dive into the shed, reappearing in a twinkling with a pitchfork as tall as herself. Having seen her shoulder this and hasten away with it, he put his horse to a trot, and presently forgot all about Mrs Crumpler in attending to more weighty matters.
The little woman’s appearance in the field was greeted with a shout of laughter; but, nothing daunted, she made her way to the nearest waggon.
“I be come to lend a hand,” she declared; “I be come to take Jarge’s place.”
The announcement was treated as a good joke; old Joe Weatherby grinned down at her from the waggon, while Bill Frost paused with an immense bundle of hay poised on his fork.