"Well, at fust, the old man would only buy one of these little
eight-horse rubby-dubbys that go strugglin' up 'ills with a death-rattle
in its throat, and all the people in buggies passin' it.
O' course that didn't suit Henery. He used to get that spiked
when a car passed him, he'd nearly go mad. And one day he nearly
got the sack for dodgin' about up a steep 'ill in front of one o' them
big twenty-four Darracqs, full of 'owlin' toffs, and not lettin' 'em
get a chance to go past till they got to the top. But at last he persuaded
old John Bull to let him go to England and buy a car for him.
He was to do a year in the shops, and pick up all the wrinkles,
and get a car for the old man. Bit better than wood and water joeying,
wasn't it?"

Our progress here was barred by our rounding a corner right on to a flock
of sheep, that at once packed together into a solid mass in front of us,
blocking the whole road from fence to fence.

"Silly cows o' things, ain't they?" said Alfred, putting on his
emergency brake, and skidding up till the car came softly to rest against
the cushion-like mass -- a much quicker stop than any horse-drawn vehicle
could have made. A few sheep were crushed somewhat, but it is well known
that a sheep is practically indestructible by violence.
Whatever Alfred's faults were, he certainly could drive.

"Well," he went on, lighting a cigarette, unheeding the growls
of the drovers, who were trying to get the sheep to pass the car,
"well, as I was sayin', Henery went to England, and he got a car.
Do you know wot he got?"