'For where we ain't quite successful we're cunning,' he said; 'and we not being able to get rid of William the Conqueror, because he's got a will of his own and he won't budge, why, we takes and makes him one of ourselves; and no disgrace in that, I should hope! He paid us a compliment, don't you see, Master Harry?
he wanted to be an Englishman.

"Can you this ?" says we, sparrin' up to him.
"Pretty middlin'," says he, "and does it well." "Well then," says we, "then you're one of us, and we'll beat the world"; and did so.' John Thresher had a laborious mind; it cost him beads on his forehead to mount to these heights of meditation.

He told me once that he thought one's country was like one's wife: you were born in the first, and married to the second, and had to learn all about them afterwards, ay, and make the best of them.

He recommended me to mix, strain, and throw away the sediment, for that was the trick o' brewery.

Every puzzle that beset him in life resolved to this cheerful precept, the value of which, he said, was shown by clear brown ale, the drink of the land.