He's a terror to work at
plowin', cradlin', and bindin', but he ain't no good at chores. I bet
yeh he'll leave Mandy to do the milkin', ten cows, and some's awful
bad."
"And who's Mandy?" enquired Cameron.
"Mandy! She's my sister. She's an awful quick milker. She can beat Dad,
or Perkins, or any of 'em, but ten cows is a lot, and then there's the
pigs and the calves to feed, and the wood, too. I bet Perkins won't cut
a stick. He's good enough in the field," continued Tim, with an obvious
desire to do Perkins full justice, "but he ain't no good around the
house. He says he ain't hired to do women's chores, and Ma she won't ask
'im. She says if he don't do what he sees to be done she'd see 'im far
enough before she'd ask 'im." And so Timothy went on with a monologue
replete with information, his high thin voice rising clear above the
roar and rattle of the lumber wagon as it rumbled and jolted over the
rutty gravel road. Those who knew the boy would have been amazed at his
loquacity, but something in Cameron had won his confidence and opened
his heart. Hence his monologue, in which the qualities, good and bad, of
the members of the family, of their own hired man and of other hired
men were fully discussed. The standard of excellence for work in the
neighbourhood, however, appeared to be Perkins, whose abilities Tim
appeared greatly to admire, but for whose person he appeared to have
little regard.
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