But While They Laughed The
Contractor Pushed Ahead In Yankee Style, Using Any And Every Expedient,
And Making Money While They Sighed Over The Slow Plough.
They must have
everything perfect, else they could do nothing; he could do much with
very imperfect materials.
He would make a cucumber frame out of a church
window, or a church window out of a cucumber frame. One of the residents
on the new building estate found his cupboard doors numbered on the
panels two, six, eight, in gilt figures inside, and in fact they were
made of pew doors which the contractor had got out of some old church he
had ransacked and turned topsy-turvy to the order of the vicar. He would
have run up a new Salt Lake City cheap, or built a new Rome at five per
cent. in a few days.
Meantime, at the little village, various incidents occurred; the sternly
virtuous cottagers, for one thing, had collected from their scattered
homes and held a 'Horn Fair.' Some erring barmaid at the inn, accused of
too lavish a use of smiles, too much kindness - most likely a jealous tale
only - aroused their righteous ire. With shawm and timbrel and ram's-horn
trumpet - - i.e. - with cow's horns, poker and tongs, and tea-trays - the
indignant and high-toned population collected night after night by the
tavern, and made such fearful uproar that the poor girl, really quite
innocent, had to leave her situation. Nothing could be more charitable,
more truly righteous, after the model of the Man who would not even so
much as - say - a harsh word to the woman taken in adultery.
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