hough, of
course, not with so much learning, or so much to the purpose,
because--why? They are in the House of Commons, and we in a public room
of an inn at Horncastle. The goodness of the ale, do ye see, never
depending on what it is made of, oh, no! but on the fashion and
appearance of the jug in which it is served up. After being turned out
of the firm, I got my living in two or three honest ways, which I shall
not trouble you with describing. I did not like any of them, however, as
they did not exactly suit my humour; at last I found one which did. One
Saturday forenoon, I chanced to be in the cattle-market of a place about
eighty miles from here; there I won the favour of an old gentleman who
sold dickeys. He had a very shabby squad of animals, without soul or
spirit; nobody would buy them, till I leaped upon their hinder ends, and
by merely wriggling in a particular manner, made them caper and bound so
to people's liking, that in a few hours every one of them was sold at
very sufficient prices. The old gentleman was so pleased with my skill,
that he took me home with him, and in a very little time into
partnership. It's a good thing to have a gift, but yet better to have
two. I might have got a very decent livelihood by throwing stones, but I
much question whether I should ever have attained to the position in
society which I now occupy, but for my knowledge of animals. I lived
very comfortably with the old gentleman till he died, which he did about
a fortnight after he had laid his old lady in the ground. Having no
children, he left me what should remain after he had been buried
decently, and the remainder was six dickeys and thirty shillings in
silver. I remained in the dickey trade ten years, during which time I
saved a hundred pounds. I then embarked in the horse line. One day,
being in the . . . market on a Saturday, I saw Mary Fulcher with a halter
round her neck, led about by a man, who offered to sell her for eighteen-
pence. I took out the money forthwith and bought her; the man was her
husband, a basket-maker, with whom she had lived several years without
having any children; he was a drunken, quarrelsome fellow, and having had
a dispute with her the day before, he determined to get rid of her by
putting a halter round her neck and leading her to the cattle-market, as
if she were a mare, which he had, it seems, a right to do; all women
being considered mares by old English law, and, indeed,