"Oh, there's all mak's o' tales about him," said Mary. "He's been th' talk o' th' countryside this twenty year an' more, to my knowledge. Some sayn one thing, an' some another. I did hear he'd been a parson an' had his frock ta'en off him for some prank or other. But it's all 'he says an' shoo says,' an' I ma' no count o' them sort o' tales. There's wimmen i' this parish as is nivver so happy as when they're callin' fro' door to door an' rakin' up all th' tittle-tattle they can gather an' ladlin' it out as they go, wi' more to it. An' all th' time th' breakfust pots is on th' table, th' asses on th' hearth, th' dust on th' furniture, th' beds just as they were ligged in, th' slops i' th' pots, an' th' dinner for th' poor fools 'at's teed to 'em takkin' its luck on th' hob or i' th' oven. Aw thank God aw'm noan o' that mak'!" "No, that you're not," quoth Jim right heartily. "But come, Abel, lad, let's be starting for th' Wakes or we'st miss th' rush cart. We'st be back bi ten o'clock, mother, an' aw should like some browies for my supper." "There's nowt like browies to go to bed on when yo'n a skin full o' ale," Jim confided to me as we crossed the mill yard and made for the plank that crossed Diggle Brook and led on to the way to Woolroad and Dobcross, and so to Saddleworth. "And how's that?" I asked, more to humour Jim's loquacity than because I thought myself likely to need the specific. "Why, yo' see," expounded Jim, "th' haver bread's nourishin' o' itself and gives th' ale summat to work on, but it's th' fat as does it. It swims your stoma' an' prevents th' ale mountin' to your yead. Tha can't goa far wrong if tha sticks to ale n' Owdham browies, an' don't yo' forget it, an' yo'll have summat to thank Jim th' Tuner for as long as yo' live, if he is a fooil." "I can't see, Jim, why you should seem to make a point of getting more drink than usual at Christmas time and the Wakes," I ventured, somewhat timidly, for this was a soreish point with my friend, who for three hundred and sixty-three days of the year was as temperate a man as ever walked on two legs, barring, of course, the members of that new-fangled sect, the teetotallers, that has sprung up since Jim and I were young men. Jim pondered deeply before he vouchsafed a reply.