Now, though I knew a great deal of milk, having learned to like it the very day I was born, yet I was utterly ignorant of how to choose a cow, and at that time had no friend to advise with. But I suspected that no one who had a first-rate animal would voluntarily part with it, and so expected to be cheated. I hinted as much to my wife, whereupon she begged that the choice might be left to her; to which I partially consented, thinking that if we should be imposed on, I should feel better if the imposition could be made chargeable somewhere else than to my own ignorance. Besides, I knew that she could hardly be worse cheated than myself.
One morning a very respectable-looking old man drove a cow up to the door, and called us out to look at her. My wife was pleased with her looks the moment she set eyes on her, while the children were delighted with the calf, some two weeks old. I did not like her movements--she seemed restless and ill-tempered; but the old man said that was always the way with cows at their first calving. Still, I should not have bought her. But somehow my wife seemed bewitched in her favor, and was determined to have her. This the old man could not fail to notice, and was loud in extolling her good qualities, declaring that she would give twenty quarts of milk a day. After some further parley, he inadvertently admitted that she had never been milked. My wife did not notice this striking discrepancy of a cow giving twenty quarts daily, when as yet no one had ever milked her; but the lie was too bouncing a one to escape my notice. As I saw my wife had set her heart upon the cow, I said nothing, and finally bought cow and calf for thirty dollars, though quite certain they could have been had for five dollars less, if my wife had not so plainly shown to the old sinner that she was determined to have them. I do not think she will ever be up to me in making a bargain. But as it had been agreed that she should choose a cow, so she was permitted to have her own way.
At the end of the week the calf was sold for three dollars--a low price; but then my wife wanted the milk, and she and Kate were anxious to begin the milking. I am sure I was quite willing they should have all they could get. When they did begin, there was a great time. Now, most women profess to understand precisely how a cow should be milked, and yet comparatively few know any thing about it. They remind me of the Irish girls who are hunting places. These are all first-rate cooks, if you take their word for it, and yet not one in a hundred knows any thing of even the first principles of cooking.