"Weary, weary,--ay, as a tom-fool at a holiday feast," said the
hunchback to his companion. "Spade and axe have I lifted these twenty
years, and what the better am I o' the labour? A groat's worth of wit is
worth a pound o' sweat,' as my dame says. I'll turn pedlar some o' these
days, and lie, and cheat, and sell."
"Ay, Gregory," interrupted the other, "thee'd sell thy own paws, if so
be they'd fetch a groat i' the market; but then, I warrant, the dame at
the hall would lack her henchman at the churn."
"Tut! I care for nought living but my worthless carcase," replied the
hunchback, surveying his own person. "Why should I? there's nought
living that cares for me. Sure as fate, if a' waur dead beside, we'd ha'
curran' baws i' the pot every day. What a murrain is it to this hungry
maw whether Ned Talbot, or Joe Tempest, or any other knave o' the pack,
tumbles into his berth, or is put to bed wi' the shovel, a day sooner or
later. He maun budge some time. Faugh! how I hate your whining--your
cat-a-whisker'd faces, purring and mewling, while parson Pudsay says
grace over the cold carrion; he cares not if it waur hash'd and stew'd
i' purgatory, so that he gets the shrift-money.
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