“‘How shouldst thou?’ said the old man, taking off his cocked hat. ‘Put me the sky into my hat, Edward.’
“‘Ay, truly,’ said the lad, ‘that would be a feat.’
“‘Then fetch me all the water of the pond there in this tumbler,’ offering the pert youth a tumbler on a little hand-tray, in which he had been taking water to some one.
“‘Well, it just wouldn’t go in,’ said the youth, laughing.
“‘How should it?’ said the old Friend. ‘The sky is there, and the water is there, and the love of God to his creatures is everywhere, but they can none of them get into thy little measures, nor into thy little head, because these are too little for them. The things are there, but the capacity to receive them is wanting in them, and in thee, young man.’”
“That was a very fine answer,” said Ann. “I like that very much.”
“This William Theobald is the coachman of that odd man, Mr. George Barthe, who went about saying such odd things to the young people,” said George; “and he gave us some curious anecdotes of him, for he attends him to many great houses. At a great house in Derbyshire, he says, Mr. Barthe was fastening a lady’s teeth with gold wire, and as he snipped continually pieces of the wire off, the lady said, ‘Oh! let a cloth be spread on the carpet, or the gold will be lost.’
“‘No,’ said the dentist, ‘it won’t be lost, any of it.’
“‘But it must be lost,’ insisted the lady.
“‘No,’ added Mr. Barthe, gravely, ‘I assure thee none of it will be lost. It will all be found in the bill.’