BIRDS' NESTS. 157 



think would then be more comfortable and 

 healthy than it can be at present." 



" Well, Sir, and so he would ; but he says, 

 and I say too, that that's the landlord's busi- 

 ness, and he won't do it unless he is paid for 

 his time." 



" I can't see that it is the landlord's busi- 

 ness. He made the house comfortable before 

 you came into it, and it is the business of the 

 tenant to keep it so. But even if the landlord 

 were the person who ought to do it, it seems 

 to me that it would be better to work three or 

 four hours for him without being paid, rather 

 than paddle about in the mud half the year 

 round, and run the risk of getting fever and 

 rheumatism into the house." 



" Yes, Sir, and if we were to do that, he 

 would be expecting us next to buy thorns and 

 mend the gaps in the garden-hedge, that his 

 cattle made." 



" If Mr. Long's cattle broke through your 

 fence, he certainly ought to make it good again; 



