"What's the matter wi' ye?" said Bess the matron, taking up the bundle
and examining it. "Ye'n sweltered yoursen, I reckon, running that fool's
race. An' here, they'n gi'en you lots o' good grogram and flannel, as
should ha' been gi'en by good rights to them as had the sense to keep
away from such foolery. Ye might spare me a bit o' this grogram to make
clothes for the lad--ye war ne'er ill-natured, Bess; I ne'er said that
on ye."
"Ye may take it all, for what I care," said Bess the maiden, with a
pettish movement, beginning to wipe away her tears and recover herself.
"Well, I could do wi't, if so be ye want to get rid on't," said the
disinterested cousin, walking quickly away with the bundle, lest Chad's
Bess should change her mind.
But that bonny-cheeked lass was blessed with an elasticity of spirits
that secured her from any rankling grief; and by the time the grand
climax of the donkey-race came on, her disappointment was entirely lost
in the delightful excitement of attempting to stimulate the last donkey
by hisses, while the boys applied the argument of sticks. But the
strength of the donkey mind lies in adopting a course inversely as the
arguments urged, which, well considered, requires as great a mental
force as the direct sequence; and the present donkey proved the
first-rate order of his intelligence by coming to a dead standstill
just when the blows were thickest.
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