'We buy them.'

'From Stovey, I suppose.'

'Yes; from Mr Stovey. It goes against the rent.'

'And it ought to go against the grain too living in the country and
paying for milk! I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll give you a cow. It
shall be a little present from me to you.' He said nothing of the more
important present which this would entail upon him in the matter of the
grass for the cow; but she understood the nature of the arrangement,
and was anxious to prevent it.

'Oh, Mr Belton, I think we'd better not attempt that,' she said.

'But we will attempt it. I've pledged myself to do nothing to oppose
your father; but I've made no such promise as to you. We'll have a cow
before I'm many days older. What a pretty place this is! I do like
these rocks so much, and it is such a comfort to be off the flat.'

'It is pretty.'

'Very pretty. You've no conception what an ugly place Plaistow is. The
land isn't actual fen now, but it was once. And it's quite flat. And
there is a great dike, twenty feet wide, oozing through it just oozing,
you know; and lots of little dikes, at right angles with the big one.
And the fields are all square. And there are no hedges and hardly a
tree to be seen in the place.