’I reckon that be a long way off, t’other side o’ Prince’s Town and the prisons, surely. Be there savages in them parts?’ ’Savages! certainly not.’ ’There be here. I be one. I be a Cobbledick, and the Cobbledicks be all savages. But vaither and I be better nor the rest out Nymet. They be savages and no mistake.’ ’I have no doubt of it.’ ’I say, young lady, is that man as they carried on the gate to West Wyke your vaither?’ ’He is my father.’ ’Did he bang you about much? Did he whack you often wi’ a bunch of vuzz? Not but you’d mind over much wi’ all them pack o’ clothes to your back.’ ’Certainly not.’ ’Did you have to rock him to sleep o’ nights in a barril?’ ’No.’ ’Mebbe you niver had much dodging out of the way of the stones he throwed at your head.’ ’Of course not.’ ’My old vaither doth all these to me. He whacks me wi’ brimmles and vuzz, and he throws turves and stones at me, and I has to rock mun every night or he wouldn’t sleep a wink. Of all the proper blaggards in the world there ain’t an ekal to vaither. But I reckon vaithers is vaithers all the world over. They be all like oaksticks, some crookeder nor others, but none straight. You don’t mind over much what has happened to yours?’ The young lady only imperfectly understood the girl, owing to the rudeness of her speech and her strong provincial brogue. ’There be my old vaither rolled out of his barril right across the high road, and I don’t know if he’ve a broke his neck or no; and I don’t kear hover much, no more nor you does because your vaither ha’ gone and done the same.’ ’What do you mean, girl?’ ’I mean what I sez. I know what broke necks mean. I ha’ broke the necks o’ rabbits scores and scores o’ times. Him’s just the same, ivery bit and croome.’ The young lady shuddered. She did not cry, but her breath caught in her throat. ’Mon Dieu! Ce n’est pas vrai! Comme cette fille me fait peur!’ ’What be that jabber about? You oughtn’t to mind.’ ’For the love of God, girl, do not frighten me. It is wicked—it is cruel. It is not true.’ ’Not true!’ echoed Joyce; ’I knows it be. I knows a broke neck in a man as in a rabbit.’ ’Be quiet. If you want money, _en voilà_, take and leave me tranquil.’ Joyce struck her hand aside.