LOTH

You must show me a little forbearance. You see, I'm a city man; and it isn't possible for me to know things about farming very exactly.

BEIPST

City folks! Eksh! All of 'em I ever saw thought they knew it all--better'n country folks.

LOTH

That isn't the case with me.--Can you explain to me, for instance, what kind of an implement this is? I have seen one like it before, to be sure, but the name--

BEIPST

That thing that ye're sittin' on? Why, they calls that a cultivator.

LOTH

To be sure--a cultivator. Is it used here?

BEIPST

Naw; more's the pity. He lets everything go to h.e.l.l ... all the land ...

lets it go, the farmer does. A poor man would like to have a bit o'

land--you can't have grain growin' in your beard, you know. But no! He'd rather let it go to the devil! Nothin' grows excep' weeds an' thistles.

LOTH

Well, but you can get those out with the cultivator, too. I know that the Icarians had them, too, in order to weed thoroughly the land that had been cleared.

BEIPST

Where's them I-ca ... what d'you, call 'em?

LOTH

The Icarians? In America.

BEIPST

They've got things like that there, too?

LOTH

Certainly.

BEIPST

What kind of people is them I-I-ca...?

LOTH

The Icarians? They are not a special people at all, but men of all nations who have united for a common purpose. They own a considerable tract of land in America which they cultivate together. They share both the work and the profits equally. None of them is poor and there are no poor people among them.

BEIPST

[_Whose expression had become a little more friendly, a.s.sumes, during LOTH'S last speech, his former hostile and suspicious look. Without taking further notice of LOTH he has, during the last few moments, given his exclusive attention to his work._] Beast of a scythe!

[_LOTH, still seated, first observes the old man with a quiet smile and then looks out into the awakening morning._

_Through the gateway are visible far stretches of clover field and meadow. Between them meanders a brook whose course is marked by alders and willows. A single mountain peak towers on the horizon. All about, larks have begun their song, and their uninterrupted trilling floats, now from near, now from far, into the farm yard._

LOTH

[_Getting up._] One ought to take a walk. The morning is magnificent.

[_The clatter of wooden shoes is heard. Some one is rapidly coming down the stairs that lead from the stable loft. It is GUSTE._

GUSTE

[_A rather stout maid-servant. Her neck is bare, as are her arms and legs below the knee. Her naked feet are stuck in wooden shoes. She carries a burning lantern._] Good morning father Beipst!

[_BEIPST growls._]

GUSTE

[_Shading her eyes with her hand looks after LOTH through the gate._]

What kind of a feller is that?

BEIPST

[_Embittered._] He can make fools o' beggars ... He can lie like a parson ... Jus' let him tell you his stories. [_He gets up._] Get the wheelbarrows ready, girl!

GUSTE

[_Who has been washing her legs at the well gets through before disappearing into the cow stable._] Right away, father Beipst.

LOTH

[_Returns and gives BEIPST a tip._] There's something for you. A man can always use that.

BEIPST

[_Thawing at once, quite changed and with sincere companionableness._]

Yes, yes, you're right there, and I thank ye kindly.--I suppose you're the company of the son-in-law over there? [_Suddenly very voluble._] You know, if you want to go walkin' out there, you know, toward the hill, then you want to keep to the left, real close to the left, because to the right, there's clefts. My son, he used to say, the reason of it was, he used to say, was because they didn't board the place up right, the miners didn't. They gets too little pay, he used to say, and then folks does things just hit or miss, in the shafts you know.--You see? Over yonder?

Always to the left! There's holes on t'other side. It wasn't but only last year and a b.u.t.ter woman, just as she was, sudden, sunk down in the earth, I don't know how many fathoms down. n.o.body knew whereto. So I'm tellin' you--go to the left, to the left and you'll be safe.

[_A shot is heard. BEIPST starts up as though he had been struck and limps out a few paces into the open._

LOTH