f a bet were depending on the first man who winked; while the
beer-drinkers, chiefly men in fustian jackets and smock-frocks, kept
their eyelids down and rubbed their hands across their mouths, as if
their draughts of beer were a funereal duty attended with embarrassing
sadness. At last Mr. Snell, the landlord, a man of a neutral
disposition, accustomed to stand aloof from human differences as those
of beings who were all alike in need of liquor, broke silence, by
saying in a doubtful tone to his cousin the butcher--

"Some folks 'ud say that was a fine beast you druv in yesterday, Bob?"

The butcher, a jolly, smiling, red-haired man, was not disposed to
answer rashly. He gave a few puffs before he spat and replied, "And
they wouldn't be fur wrong, John."

After this feeble delusive thaw, the silence set in as severely as
before.

"Was it a red Durham?" said the farrier, taking up the thread of
discourse after the lapse of a few minutes.

The farrier looked at the landlord, and the landlord looked at the
butcher, as the person who must take the responsibility of answering.

"Red it was," said the butcher, in his good-humoured husky treble--"and
a Durham it was."

"Then you needn't tell _me_ who you bought it of," said the farrier,
looking round with some triumph; "I know who it is has got the red
Durhams o' this country-side. And she'd a white star on her brow, I'll
bet a penny?" The farrier leaned forward with his hands on his knees
as he put this question, and his eyes twinkled knowingly.

"Well; yes--she might," said the butcher, slowly, considering that he
was giving a decided affirmative. "I don't say contrairy."

"I knew that very well," said the farrier, throwing himself backward
again, and speaking defiantly; "if _I_ don't know Mr. Lammeter's cows,
I should like to know who does--that's all. And as for the cow you've
bought, bargain or no bargain, I've been at the drenching of
her--contradick me who will."

The farrier looked fierce, and the mild butcher's conversational spirit
was roused a little.

"I'm not for contradicking no man," he said; "I'm for peace and
quietness. Some are for cutting long ribs--I'm for cutting 'em short
myself; but _I_ don't quarrel with 'em. All I say is, it's a lovely
carkiss--and anybody as was reasonable, it 'ud bring tears into their
eyes to look at it."

"Well, it's the cow as I drenched, whatever it is," pursued the
farrier, angrily; "and it was Mr. Lammet