THE COMMON WILD DUCK 197 



the marsh "when things was a bit damp," in reality 

 wet howling weather, when the rain drove over the 

 bare grass stretches in sheets of water, blotting out 

 for a time all objects, far and near. The floors 

 were brick floors from one end to the other, not 

 "ground for the floor," as the song has it, but the 

 whole of the dwelling was on the ground floor. 

 Some rough furniture, just enough for the bare 

 necessaries of life, was there, and bare white-washed 

 walls, with the coyman's wife's dresser, where all her 

 crockery was displayed with evident pride. Some 

 heads of bulrushes, the giant reed mace, with some 

 reed tassels, crossed each other on the top part, 

 where her idolized "chaney" was placed out of 

 harm's way. How some of her fragile egg-shell 

 porcelain, that she would say her mother had given 

 her, had been kept from harm, was a mystery. 

 Tea, before things were altered as they are now, 

 was a little bit expensive, and a pound of the best 

 " gunpowder tea " as a present was considered some- 

 thing handsome. Not that I ever heard of the 

 marsh-folks buying this. You would hear them ask 

 for lots of things when, at rare intervals, they did 

 come in to a neighbouring town to do some shop- 

 ping. This was one of their greatest treats, for 

 then they heard how the little edge of the solid 

 earth just outside of them, with its houses and people, 

 was progressing. 



Laudanum would be sure to be asked for. That 

 drug or medicine did not walk about the marshes 

 at night, as, unless some folks were grossly mis- 



