Then there were
young farmers and old farmers with smock-frocks, brown great-coats, drab
great-coats, red worsted comforters, leather-leggings, wonderful shaped
hats, hunting-whips, and rough sticks, standing about in groups, or
talking noisily together on the tavern steps, or paying and receiving
huge amounts of greasy wealth, with the assistance of such bulky
pocket-books that when they were in their pockets it was apoplexy to
get them out, and when they were out it was spasms to get them in again.
Also there were farmers' wives in beaver bonnets and red cloaks, riding
shaggy horses purged of all earthly passions, who went soberly into all
manner of places without desiring to know why, and who, if required,
would have stood stock still in a china shop, with a complete
dinner-service at each hoof. Also a great many dogs, who were strongly
interested in the state of the market and the bargains of their masters;
and a great confusion of tongues, both brute and human.
Mr Pinch regarded everything exposed for sale with great delight, and
was particularly struck by the itinerant cutlery, which he considered
of the very keenest kind, insomuch that he purchased a pocket knife with
seven blades in it, and not a cut (as he afterwards found out) among
them.
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