'Good morning, madam, and sirs, and the company. Could you give me a
little red wine?' Not a head moved.
True I was very dirty and tired, and they may have thought me a
beggar, to whom, like good sensible Christians who had no nonsense
about them, they would rather have given a handsome kick than a cup of
cold water. However, I think it was not only my poverty but a native
churlishness which bound their bovine souls in that valley.
I sat down at a very clean table. I notice that those whom the Devil
has made his own are always spick and span, just as firemen who have
to go into great furnaces have to keep all their gear highly polished.
I sat down at it, and said again, still gently -
'It is, indeed, a fine country this of yours. Could you give me a
little red wine?'
Then the ox-faced man who had his back turned to me, and was the worst
of the lot, said sulkily, not to me, but to the woman -
'He wants wine.'
The woman as sulkily said to me, not looking me in the eyes -
'How much will you pay?'
I said, 'Bring the wine. Set it here. See me drink it. Charge me your
due.'
I found that this brutal way of speaking was just what was needed for
the kine and cattle of this pen.
