Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 17.djvu/215

Rh refused his bond; only the sharpers and the scriveners, the lawyers and their clerks, pelted sir Roger as he went along. The squirters were at it with their kennel-water, for they were mad for the loss of their bubble, and that they could not get him to mortgage the manor of Bullock's Hatch. Sir Roger shook his ears, and nuzzled along, well satisfied within himself, that he was doing a charitable work, in rescuing an honest man from the claws of harpies and bloodsuckers. Mrs. Bull did all that an affectionate wife, and a good housewife, could do; yet the boundaries of virtues are indivisible lines; it is impossible to march up close to the frontiers of frugality, without entering the territories of parsimony. Your good housewives are apt to look into the minutest things; therefore some blamed Mrs. Bull for new heel-piecing of her shoes, grudging a quarter of a pound of soap and sand to scour the rooms ; but especially, that she would not allow her maids and apprentices the benefit of John Bunyan, the London Apprentice, or the Seven Champions in the black letter. . XVII.