"That's all right," said Peter, "but I have always thought when the right Abraham comes, Sarah dances. Good! What will you give your boy?"
Peter scratched his head. "It depend! what sort of year this is. The dowry runs into money, and if I have a bad year, there will be no money, and one does not know how it will go, for the snow came in autumn on the seed when the fields were wet."
"Just the same with me," said Paid. "We will let it stand over till the autumn, and if we can both produce the same amount we will let the organ blow, as the verger says, and if fortune is kind the ox will calve as well as the cow."
"Very well! And so the matter remains: the boy and the girl must wait till the corn is in the ear."
Then they began to drink; but the younger ones had pushed away the straw and sat in a circle to "hunt the slipper." Paul and Peter sat for a while looking on at the game; at last Paul felt exhilarated by drinking, and felt strongly tempted to start a more lively conversation. He knew very well how to do so.
"Well, Peter," he resumed, "are you coming to the city this winter?"
Peter showed his teeth like an ill-tempered dog, looked at Paul to see if he meant it seriously, and said:
"Still as prejudiced against the town as ten years ago? What! Can you not bear to look at it through seven palings?"
"I wouldn't have it as a gift, if you threw it at me! I don't need it at all, but it can't live without me."
"So I say! I have meat and hay, beer and bread, fuel and timber, house and clothing; what do I want with you then? I build my house, I plough my field, I cut my wood; my old woman spins my yarn, weaves my coat, bakes my bread, and brews my beer. What do you do? You tax my crop; you impose tolls on my wood; you empty my granary. You settle down on a stone as bald as the palm of my hand; you neither sow nor plough, but you reap and gather into barns; you eat my bread and drink my beer; you burn my wood and spin my wool; you sit there like a lazy monk and take tithe, and what do you give me for it?"
"Listen! Listen!" stammered Paul. "Don't you get my salt?"
"Your salt! You make no salt; and if you had not grabbed at it, so that we needed you as a middleman, you could not grind us down. And your sugar? I do not need your sugar, I have my bees!"