COUNTRY PLACES. 183 . 
was recovering they would take a fancy to it and buy it 
at their own valuation, for of course the humble labourer 
was obliged to regard such a wish as a command. The 
workhouse system puts the labourer completely under 
the thumb of the clergyman and the doctor. It was in 
this way that many good old pieces of work gradually 
found their destination in great London collections. 
Once now and then, however, the eager collector would 
come across some one independent, and mcct with a 
sharp refusal to part with the old china bowl. The wife 
of a small farmer naively remarked about the tithes, 
‘You know it is such a lot to pay, and we never go there 
to church ; you know it is too far to walk.’ It was not 
the doctrine to which she objected—it was the paying 
for nothing ; paying and never having anything. The 
farmers, staunch upholders of Church and State, are 
always grumbling because the clergy are constantly 
begging. One man took a deep oath that if the clergy- 
man ever came to his house without asking for money 
he would cut a deep notch with his knife in the oaken 
doorpost. Ten years went by, still more years, and still 
no notch was cut. Odd things happen in odd places. 
There is a story of an old mansion where a powerful 
modern stove was put in an ancient hearth under a 
~ mantelpiece supported by carved oak figures of knights. 
The unwonted heat roasted the toes of these martyrs 
till their feet fell off. Another story relates how in our 
grandfathers’ days a great man invited his friends to 
dinner, promising them a new dish that had never before 
been set upon the table. The fillet came in on the 
shoulders of several men, and, when the cover was re- 
moved, lo an actress in a state of nature! One farmer 
lent his friend his dogcart. Yime went on, and the dog- 
cart was not returned; a year went by, still no cart. 
