Making Even 151 



TUMMUS (quite extinguished] : ' Thou's countin' 

 rent twice, muster ! ' (They argue the point at length.} 



GILES (with magnanimity, having floored his man) : 

 ' That makes you owe me half-a-sovran, Tummus 

 counting the pig. So if you give I that, we can make 

 even.' 



TUMMUS (angry and fallen, but powerless} : ' Nay 

 muster, but I be wonderful short of brass, I be ; and 

 the missis when I tell her, her'll say " Go set," and 

 " Here's a man for you, I'll be taken abed with the 

 ninth next week, and the wastrel has drunk six 

 months' wages in a night ! " For her'll think I'n made 

 this p.' 



GILES (heartily) : ' Why, dang me if I see thee 

 beaten, Tummus ; thou's worked well for me, lad, and 

 I'll stand to thee. Thou owes me for the pigling, 

 that's ten shill'n, and we'll let the rent stand over till 

 next reck'nin', that's two pounds. Now if I gin thee 

 thirty shill'n' and thou owes me the rent. And that 

 makes even, dount it ? ' (Scene closes.} 



. In this way, Tummus, with a debt of two pounds 

 and cash in hand to the amount of one pound ten, 

 would start upon another six months' term ; at the 

 end whereof he was pretty sure to be much in the 

 same predicament. It may be deemed that the prac- 

 tice is obsolete, but it is not so. Old customs die 

 very hard, and many forces tend to keep this one in 

 being. Few can penetrate the mysteries of the cot- 

 tage economics, or so much as guess at the contriving 



