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 our pigs before we was up, killed ’em in our very ears, an’ sent ’em up to town afore our very eyes, an’ that at the rate o’ ten to three. Larry he laughed fit to split his sides when he saw it all, an’ father, though he was a bit vexed—an’ I don’t wonder—he couldn’t help but laugh too. . . . Mother she didn’t. Anybody say anythin’ to the natives about it? No, how could they? But I can tell you one thing though—Taipo didn’t trouble the pa much after that.

“Well, well! the pa itself is gone now, an’ there’s the cheese-factory in its place; an’ you’ve church every week, an’ a public hall an’ library, an’ a couple o’ stores; an’ a steamer a-callin’ every other day for to bring you mails from Town, an’ the mornin’ paper, an’ baker’s bread, my word! an’ to carry you off for to see your grannies any time you’ve a mind. Civilisation on tap, as you may say. But I’m not a-goin’ to give in to it, for all that, as you’ve a-got all the meat while we had all the shell. There’s many a worse thing to be had in this world than light hearts, an’ good nature, an’ neighbourliness; besides, we’ve all of us grown up tough an’ hearty, an’ done our day’s work in the world.

“But yet I’m not a-goin’ to say as we had all the best of it either. The want o’ too much jam on your bread don’t make everythin’ else sweet, so far as I can see; an’ ours was a rough life, an’ a narrow. It’s good to think as the children can be taught. It’s good to think as the men needn’t now to drop asleep all wore out, or to stay awake fit for nothin’ but liquor, after the tough day’s work o’ sawin’ or burnin’; an’ to know that the women can have their washin’ machines an’ their sewin’ machines,