at the farm. On his way he notes many things. He sees (you'll excuse
me, Farmer, but I can't help it) that you're all behind the world, and
the land is yielding less than half of what it ought. Have you ever
seen a book by Lord Dundonald on the connection between Agriculture and
Chemistry? No? I thought not. Do you know of any manure better than
the ore-weed you gather down at the Cove? Or the plan of malting grain
to feed your cattle on through the winter? Or the respective merits of
oxen and horses as beasts of draught? But these matters, though the
life and soul of modern husbandry, are as nothing to this lump in my
hand. What do you call the field we're now standing in?"

"Parc Dew."

"Exactly--the 'black field,' or the 'field of black soil': the very name
should have told you. But you lay it down in grass, and but for the
chance of this spud and a lucky thistle, I might have walked over it a
score of times without guessing its secret. Man alive, it's red gold I
have here--red, wicked, damnable, delicious gold--the root of all evil
and of most joys."

"If you lie, you lie enticingly, young man."

"By gold, I mean stuff that shall make gold for you. There is ore here,
but what ore exactly I can't tell till I've streamed it: lead, I fancy,
with a trace of silver--wealth for you, certainly; and in what quantity
you shall find out--"

At this juncture a voice was heard calling over the hedge, at the bottom
of the field. It came from Young Zeb, the upper part of whose person,
as he stood up in his cart, was just visible between two tamarisk