"Why do you cut the tails off the cattle?" I asked Sorley, as he proceeded to wash the wound on the brindled cow.
"Just to keep them short," he said, stealing a furtive glance at me as he spoke. I did not ask any further questions, but I could see that he was telling an untruth. At once I guessed that the farm was boycotted, and that the peasantry were showing their disapproval of some action of Sorley's by cutting the tails off his cattle. I wished that moment that I had gotten another master who was on a more friendly footing with his neighbours.
When we returned to the house the old woman was sitting still by the fire mumbling away to herself at the one thing over and over again.
"Old Mary Sorley won't be hounded out of her house and home if all the cattle in me byre was without tails," she said in rambling tones, which now and again rose to a shriek almost. "What would an old woman like me be carin' for the band of them? Am I not as good as the tenant that was here before me, him with his talk of rack-rint and Home Rule? Old Mary Sorley is goin' to stay here till she leaves the house in a coffin."
The man and I sat down at a pot of porridge and ate our suppers.
"Don't take any heed of me mother," he said to me. "It's only dramin' and dotin' that she is."
Early next morning I was sent out to the further end of the moor, there to gather up some sheep and take them back to the farmyard. I met three men on the way, three rough-looking, angry sort of men. One of them caught hold of me by the neck and threw me into a bog-hole. I was nearly drowned in the slush. When I tried to drag myself out, the other two threw sods on top of me. The moment I pulled myself clear I ran off as hard as I could.
"This will teach ye not to work for a boycotted bastard," one of them called after me, but none of them made any attempt to follow. I ran as hard as I could until I got to the house. When I arrived there I informed Sorley of all that had taken place, and said that I was going to stop no longer in his service.
"I had work enough lookin' for a cub," he said; "and I'm no goin' to let ye run away now."