"For Heaven's sake, pop thy hands under the pump, Deb! Upon my soul,

if the London folk only knowed of thee and thy slovenly ways, they'd

swaller their milk and butter more mincing than they do a'ready; and

that's saying a good deal." The milking progressed, till towards the end Tess and Clare, in

common with the rest, could hear the heavy breakfast table dragged

out from the wall in the kitchen by Mrs Crick, this being the

invariable preliminary to each meal; the same horrible scrape

accompanying its return journey when the table had been cleared.

XXI

There was a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast. The

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churn revolved as usual, but the butter would not come. Whenever

this happened the dairy was paralyzed. Squish, squash echoed the

milk in the great cylinder, but never arose the sound they waited

for. Dairyman Crick and his wife, the milkmaids Tess, Marian, Retty

Priddle, Izz Huett, and the married ones from the cottages; also

Mr Clare, Jonathan Kail, old Deborah, and the rest, stood gazing

hopelessly at the churn; and the boy who kept the horse going outside

put on moon-like eyes to show his sense of the situation. Even the

melancholy horse himself seemed to look in at the window in inquiring

despair at each walk round.

"'Tis years since I went to Conjuror Trendle's son in Egdon--years!"

said the dairyman bitterly. "And he was nothing to what his father

had been. I have said fifty times, if I have said once, that I DON'T

believe in en; though 'a do cast folks' waters very true. But I

shall have to go to 'n if he's alive. O yes, I shall have to go to

'n, if this sort of thing continnys!"

Even Mr Clare began to feel tragical at the dairyman's desperation. "Conjuror Fall, t'other side of Casterbridge, that they used to call

'Wide-O', was a very good man when I was a boy," said Jonathan Kail.

"But he's rotten as touchwood by now."

"My grandfather used to go to Conjuror Mynterne, out at Owlscombe,

and a clever man a' were, so I've heard grandf'er say," continued Mr

Crick. "But there's no such genuine folk about nowadays!"

Mrs Crick's mind kept nearer to the matter in hand.

"Perhaps somebody in the house is in love," she said tentatively.

"I've heard tell in my younger days that that will cause it. Why,

Crick--that maid we had years ago, do ye mind, and how the butter

didn't come then--" "Ah yes, yes!--but that isn't the rights o't. It had nothing to do

with the love-making. I can mind all about it--'twas the damage to

the churn." He turned to Clare.




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