No attempt will be made to set down the dialect, which may be found galore in the works of a very celebrated English novelist. In fact, more than one writer of distinction has had his shy at the Muddleshire accent and vocabulary.
"My lord, we live in cottages on your lordship's estate, and we work for the farmers that are tenants of your farms. Now, these cottages are two or three hundred years old, built of timber and brick and plaster, with thatched roofs."
"And very picturesque they are," interpolated Lord Stranleigh.
Well, sir, my lord, we never heard that that was wrong with them too, but goodness knows they're bad enough. They leak, and the floor is ten inches, and sometimes more, below the level of the ground. Mr. Wilson, he won't spend a penny on repairs, and the farmers, they won't. Times is too bad, they says, and the cottages belong to Lord Stranleigh. He ought to mend them, they says, and Mr. Wilson"
"Ah, what does Wilson say?"
"Mr. Wilson, he says as it's neither the farmer's business nor Lord Stranleigh's business; that we ought to mend them ourselves."
"They're past mending," growled another voice. "Ought to be torn down, every blasted one of them. They've been no good this last forty years."
"So the dispute seems to be: Who is the re-
