Page:History of John Cheap the chapman (5).pdf/14

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14
THE HISTORY OF

Yes, ſaid he, what are you going to do with it? Indeed ſaid I, I am going to knock out all my teeth with it, for I can get no bread to buy in all the country, for all the ſtores and ſtacks you have in it; what, ſaid he, were you in the miniſter's? I know not, ſaid I, does he keep an ale house? O na, ſaid he, he preaches every Sunday; and what does he preach, ſaid I? is it to harden your hearts? haud well together? have no charity? hate ſtrangers? hunger the poor? eat and drink all yourſelves? better burſt your bellies than give it to beggars, or let good meat ſpoil: If your miniſter be as naughty as his people, I'm poſitive he'll drive a louſe to London for the hide and tallow. Here I bought the weaver's dinner for two pence and then ſet out again, keeping my courſe weſtward. It being now night I came to a farmer's houſe ſouth from Dalkeith; the goodman being very civil, and deſirous of news, I related the whole paſſages of the two days and nights by paſt, whereat he was greatly diverted, and ſaid, I was the firſt he hard of, that ever that man gave quarters to before, though he was an elder of the pariſh. So the goodman and I fell ſo thick, that he ordered me to be laid on a ſhake-down bed beyond the fire, where I lay more ſnug than among the ſwine. Now there was three women lying in a bed in the ſame apartment, and they not minding that I was there, firſt one of them roſe and let her water go in below the chimney grate, where I had a perfect view of her bonny-thing, as the coal fire burnt so clearly all the night; then another roſe and did she ſame; laſt of all got up the old matron, as ſhe appear'd to be, like a ſecond-handed goodwife, or a whirl'd o'er maiden, ſix times overturned, and as ſhe let her dam go, ſhe alſo with full force, when done, let a fart like a blaſt of a trumpet, which made the duſt on the hearth ſtone to fly up like duſt about her buttocks, whereat I was forced to laugh out, which made her to run for it, but to ſmother