Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 4, 2025
'A man's property was molested, they will say. 'What property? will be asked. 'The Can with the Diamond Notch, they will answer; 'the man of substance conspired with the thief to make away with it. These are the words that will be spoken in the streets." Festus Clasby set great store on his name, the name he had got painted for the eye of the country over his door.
When he brought forth his great account book and entered up their purchases with a carpenter's pencil having first moistened the tip of it with his flexible lips they had strongly, deep down in their souls, the conviction that they were then and for all time debtors to Festus Clasby. Which, indeed and in truth, they were.
As to security, if Festus Clasby's customers had not a great deal of money they had grass which grew every year, and the beasts which Festus Clasby fattened and sold at the fairs had sometimes to eat his debtors out of his book.
Festus Clasby would have looked the part in any notorious position in life; his shoulders would have carried with dignity the golden chain of office of the mayoralty of a considerable city; he would have looked a perfect chairman of a jury at a Coroner's inquest; as the Head of a pious Guild in a church he might almost be confused with the figures of the stained glass windows; marching at the head of a brass band he would symbolise the conquering hero; as an undertaker he would have reconciled one to death.
And at one of its wayward curves was the shop, the shop of Festus Clasby, a foreign growth upon the landscape, its one long window crowded with sombre merchandise, its air that of established, cob-web respectability. Inside the shop was Festus Clasby himself, like some great masterpiece in its ancient frame.
But to stand in the devotional lights in front of his counter, wedged in between divisions and subdivisions of his boxes and barrels, and to scent the good scents which exhaled from his shelves, and to get served by Festus Clasby in person, was to feel that you had been indeed served.
"This man," she said airily, "has no interest for me. Whatever took place between the two of you in regard to my brother's can I will have nothing to say to." "Then if you won't," said Festus Clasby, "I will have nothing to do with you. If he had no right to the can you can put the police on to him; that's what police are for." "And upon you," the woman added. "The police are also for that."
Festus Clasby paid the money, a bright shilling and two threepenny bits, into her hand, wondering vaguely, but virtuously, as he did so, what hardy little dark mountainy man he would later charge up the can to at the double price.
You received, and the receiver is as bad as the rogue. So the law has it. The shadow of the law is great." Festus Clasby came down from his cart, his face troubled. "I am not used to this," he said. "You are a handsome man, a man thought well of. You have great provisions upon your cart. This man has nothing but the unwashed shirt which hangs on his slack back.
If his bullocks were not able to do even this, then Festus Clasby talked to the small farmer about a mortgage on the land, so that now and again small farmers became herds for Festus Clasby. In this way was he able to maintain his position with his back to the hills and his toes in the valley, striding his territory like a Colossus.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking