millet-seed,
And makes intangible savings.

As Mr. Casaubon's carriage was passing out of the gateway, it arrested
the entrance of a pony phaeton driven by a lady with a servant seated
behind. It was doubtful whether the recognition had been mutual, for
Mr. Casaubon was looking absently before him; but the lady was
quick-eyed, and threw a nod and a "How do you do?" in the nick of time.
In spite of her shabby bonnet and very old Indian shawl, it was plain
that the lodge-keeper regarded her as an important personage, from the
low curtsy which was dropped on the entrance of the small phaeton.

"Well, Mrs. Fitchett, how are your fowls laying now?" said the
high-colored, dark-eyed lady, with the clearest chiselled utterance.

"Pretty well for laying, madam, but they've ta'en to eating their eggs:
I've no peace o' mind with 'em at all."

"Oh, the cannibals! Better sell them cheap at once. What will you
sell them a couple? One can't eat fowls of a bad character at a high
price."

"Well, madam, half-a-crown: I couldn't let 'em go, not under."

"Half-a-crown, these times! Come now--for the Rector's chicken-broth
on a Sunday. He has consumed all ours that I can spare. You are half
paid with the sermon, Mrs. Fitchett, remember that. Take a pair of
tumbler-pigeons for them--little beauties. You must come and see them.
You have no tumblers among your pigeons."

"Well, madam, Master Fitchett shall go and see 'em after work. He's
very hot on new sorts; to oblige you."

"Oblige me! It will be the best bargain he ever made. A pair of
church pigeons for a couple of wicked Spanish fowls that eat their own
eggs! Don't you and Fitchett boast too much, that is all!"

The phaeton was driven onwards with the last words, leaving Mrs.
Fitchett laughing and shaking her head slowly, with an interjectional
"Sure_ly_, sure_ly_!"--from which it might be inferred that she would
have found the country-side somewhat duller if the Rector's lady had
been less free-spoken and less of a skinflint. Indeed, both the
farmers and laborers in the parishes of Freshitt and Tipton would have
felt a sad lack of conversation but for the stories about what Mrs.
Cadwallader said and did: a lady of immeasurably high birth, descended,
as it were, from unknown earls, dim as the crowd of heroic shades--who
pleaded poverty, pared down prices, and cut jokes in the most
companionable manner, though with a turn of tongue that let you know
who she