“Oh, ’ot!” said Sarah, with scorn. “It makes me tired to hear every one growlin’ about the ’eat, and sayin’ there was never such a drought.”
“But you said yourself it was hot yesterday,” protested the bewildered Tom.
“Well, I did; an’ it was ’ot. But I don’t go growlin’ all the time. Summers ain’t nothing to what they was: I tell you, in my young days ’eat was ’eat, an’ drought was drought, an’ no mistake. Just you think what summers was twenty years ago—oh, well, of course you can’t”—as her hearers shouted with laughter—“but any’ow, you can take my word for it we knew what temp’rashur was! Soarin’ well above the ’undred for a fortnight on end. An’ droughts lasted years. Nowadays, every one thinks they’re killed if they get a few days’ ’eat, an’ a bit of a drought like this makes ’em think the world’s comin’ to an end.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that, Sarah. But it’s bad enough.”
“Aw, bad!” sniffed Sarah. “Them old droughts was bad, if you like, when the ground was as bare as Collins Street, an’ all the sheep got boiled down for tallow. An’ there wasn’t the grumblin’ then that there is now.”
“Gammon!” said Tom unexpectedly. “Don’t tell me people didn’t growl, Sarah. Why, anyone on the land will growl even in a good season, let alone a bad one. Did you ever know a man on the land who was satisfied with the weather?”
“Well, no, I don’t suppose I did,” admitted Sarah, gazing with some amazement at her opponent. “Farmers an’ sich especially: you can’t please ’em with weather, not if you made it to order. But what I do say is, that it’s no good grumblin’ an’ grousin’, even if there is a bit of a drought. Keep smilin’, an’ it’ll rain some day.” With which philosophy Sarah collected her temporarily scattered forces and withdrew.
“She didn’t say that, at all, of course,” remarked Tom. “At least, I don’t think she did, but Sarah’s so eloquent, when she gets going, that I’m really not sure. I’d love to take her last bit of advice home to Father and give it to him when he was being really excited about the drought. ‘Keep smilin’, an’ it’ll rain some day!’ But I’d wish to be well out of his reach when I delivered it.”
“You’d think Sarah was such a Tartar, just to listen to her, wouldn’t you?” laughed Jean, pouring out tea. “And she’s really so mild she’d eat out of your hand. She’s been teaching us the proper way to turn out rooms, and polish floors, and to keep the silver, in the hope of making us what she calls ‘house-proud.’ She says no woman is any good unless she’s house-proud.”
“Whatever’s that?” asked the bewildered masculine hearer.