ere as a regular upright and
down-straight man. Every farmer and every corn-dealer and cattle-dealer
congratulated him in his homely way on his success. They looked at his
samples and acknowledged they were very bright and weighty. "I never
liked that Snooks feller," was the general cry, and at the farmers'
ordinary, which was held every market day at the "Plough," every one who
knew Bumpkin shook hands and wished him well, and after dinner, before
they broke up, Farmer Gosling proposed his health, and said how proud he
"were that his old neighbour had in the beautiful words o' the National
Anthem, 'confounded their politicks': and he hoped that the backbone o'
old England, which were the farmers, wornt gwine to be broked jist yet
awhile. Farmin might be bad, but yet wi little cheaper rents and a good
deal cheaper rates and taxes, there'd be good farmin and good farmers in
England yit."

Now this speech, I saw in my dream, brought down the house. Everyone
said it was more to the point than the half-mile speeches which took up
so much of the newspapers to the exclusion of murders, burglaries and
divorces. And in truth, now I come to look at it in my waking moments, I
respectfully commend it to our legislators, or what is better, to their
constituencies, as embodying on this subject both the principles of true
conservatism and true liberalism: and I don't see what the most exacting
of politicians can require more than that.

Mr. Bumpkin made a suitable reply--that is to say, "he wur mighty proud
o' their neighbourliness--he wur a plaain man, as had made his own way in
the world, or leastwise tried to do un by ard work and uprightedness and
downstraightedness; tried to be straight forrerd, and nobody as he knowed
of could ax un for a shillin'. But," he added: "I be praisin oop myself,
neighbours, I be afeard, and I doant wish to do thic, only to put I
straaight afore thee. I beant dead yit, and I hope we shall all be
friends and neighbours, and meet many moore times at this ornary
together."

And so, delighted with one another, after a glass or two, and a song or
two, the party broke up, all going to their several farms. Mr. Bumpkin
was particularly well pleased, for he had sold twenty quarters of wheat
at forty-nine shillings a quarter; which, as times went, was a very
considerable increase, showing the excellent quality of the samples.

Sooner or later, however, it must be told, that when Bumpkin reached his