steadiness with whom the hostler behooved to be careful. First he
carefully removed the dirt down to a kind of Plimsoll load-line
midway his neck; then he frothed the soap-suds into his red
rectangular ears, which stood out like speaking trumpets; there he
let it remain. Soap is for putting on the face, grease on the
hair. It is folly then to wash either off. Besides being wasteful.
His flaxen hair stood out in wet strands and clammy tags and
tails. All the while Saunders kept muttering to himself:

"An' says I to her: 'Meg Kissock, ye're a bonny woman,' says I.
'My certie, but ye hae e'en like spunkies [will-o'-the-wisps] or
maybes," said Saunders in a meditative tone. "I had better say
'like whurlies in a sky-licht.' It micht be considered mair lovin'
like!"

"Then she'll up an' say: 'Saunders, ye mak' me fair ashamed to
listen to ye. Be mensefu' [polite], can ye no?'"

This pleased Saunders so much that he slapped his thigh so that
the pony started and clattered to the other side of his stall.

"Then I'll up an' tak' her roun' the waist, an' I'll look at her
like this--" (here Saunders practised the effect of his
fascinations in the glass, a panorama which was to some extent
marred by the necessary opening of his mouth to enable the razor
he was using to excavate the bristles out of the professional
creases in his lower jaw. Saunders pulled down his mouth to
express extra grief when a five-foot grave had been ordered. His
seven-foot manifestations of respect for the deceased were a sight
to see. He held the opinion that anybody that had no more 'conceit