But all the while I
saw no women, though I sometimes heard a bustle in that part of
the house from which the spring came.
At length Rice himself came in, for it was now dark, with an
ox-whip in his hand, breathing hard, and he too soon settled down
into his seat not far from me, as if, now that his day's work was
done, he had no farther to travel, but only to digest his supper
at his leisure. When I asked him if he could give me a bed, he
said there was one ready, in such a tone as implied that I ought
to have known it, and the less said about that the better. So
far so good. And yet he continued to look at me as if he would
fain have me say something further like a traveller. I remarked,
that it was a wild and rugged country he inhabited, and worth
coming many miles to see. "Not so very rough neither," said he,
and appealed to his men to bear witness to the breadth and
smoothness of his fields, which consisted in all of one small
interval, and to the size of his crops; "and if we have some
hills," added he, "there's no better pasturage anywhere.
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