"Ay, and I can sow a breadth with here and there a fellow in any——"
"Pshaw!—don't you watch the corn while it is growing, weed it, and attend to it till it is ripe? and do not you, with the sweat of your own brow, and the help of those you hire with your own purse, reap the corn, and gather it into the stack-yard?—and don't you, afterwards, pay many a shilling in wages for Roger Brown, and Tim Wilson, and others, to thrash your corn for you?—and don't you consider the corn yours when you are taking it to market?—and don't you think you have a right to receive the money for which you sell it?"
"Ay, and I would fain be knowing, Dick, who besides has so good a right to it as I have," replied the farmer, starting to his feet with warmth, and not apprehending the drift of Dick's queries.
"Then the corn which these poor hares have eaten during the summer," said Dick, pointing to the dead animals which lay on the floor, "was your corn, and not the 'squire's, for you pay him his rent, don't you, Kiah?"
"Zounds, ay! to the very day," instantly and proudly replied the farmer.
"And yet you durst not kill a hare, and be seen in doing it," said Dick, not permitting a moment's pause to take place.
"Me kill a hare!" exclaimed Kiah, scratching his head, and colouring very deeply; "Lord! you know, Dick, I've no licence; and, besides, the 'squire always reckons the hares his own, you know."
"Does he?" said Dick, with a peculiar sneer, "then he's a fool for so doing.—Why, Farmer Dobson, don't you remember how, last latter-end, three persons came from Lincoln, and went shooting like wild devils over the whole estate, murdering and bagging all they could see? And it's more than likely you'll have a greater number of the Lincoln Minster Jackdaws, as the 'squire called 'em, this month than you had last November; and will the 'squire be such a fool as to call the hares his own then, when the black thieves are packing off with them, think you?"
"Dang it! thou talks very odd, Dick!" said the farmer, sitting down very quietly, fixing his eyes on the floor, and scratching his head harder than before; "thou talks very odd, but what thou say'st is as true as the gospel, for all that."