.

"Get out!" saith he. "I never want no women folk."

'Tis not oft we have fairer greeting of _Jack_.

"Nay, truly, _Jack_," saith _Milly_ right demurely. "They be a rare bad
handful,--nigh as ill as men folk. What thou lackest is eggs and
cordial water, the which women can carry as well as jackasses."

She held forth her basket as she spake.

"Humph!" grunts old _Jack_. "I'd liever have the jackasses."

"I am assured thou wouldst," quoth _Milly_. "Each loveth best his own
kind."

Old _Jack_ was fingering of the eggs.

"They be all hens' eggs!"

"So they be," saith _Milly_. "I dare guess, thou shouldst have loved
goose eggs better."

"Ducks'," answereth old _Jack_.

"The ducks be gone a-swimming," saith she.

I now drew forth my bottle of cordial water, the which the old man took
off me with never a thank you, and after smelling thereto, set of the
ground at his side.

"What art reading, _Jack_?" saith _Milly_.

"What _Paul's_ got to say again' th' law," quoth he. "'Tis a rare ill
thing th' law, Mistress _Milisent_. And so be magistrates, and
catchpolls [constables] and all the lawyer folk. Rascals, Mistress
_Milisent_,--all rascals, every man Jack of 'em. Do but read _Paul_,
and you shall see so much."

"Saith the Apostle so?" quoth _Milly_, and gave me a look which nigh
o'erset me.

"He saith `the law is not given unto a righteous man,' so how can they
be aught but ill folk that be alway a-poking in it? Tell me that,
Mistress. If `birds of a feather will flock together,' then a chap
that's shaking hands every day wi' th' law mun be an ill un, and no
mistake."

"Go to, _Jack_: it signifies not that," _Milly_ makes answer. "Saint
_Paul_ meant that the law of God was given for the sake of ill men, not
good men. The laws of _England_ be other matter."

"Get out wi' ye!" saith _Jack_. "Do ye think I wis not what _Paul_
means as well as a woman? It says th' law, and it means th' law. And
if he'd signified as you say, he'd have said as th' law wasn't given
again' a righteous man, not to him. You gi'e o'er comin' a-rumpagin'
like yon."

For me, I scarce knew which way to look, to let me from laughing. But
_Milly_ goes on, sad as any judge.

"Well, but if lawyers be thus bad, _Jack_--though my sister's husband is
a lawyer, mind thou--"

"He's a rascal, then!" breaks in _Jack_. "They're all rascals, every
wastrel [an unprincipled, good-for-nothing fellow] of 'em."

"But what f