From the nature of his equipage,
he is not given to grinding so perpetually as his heavily-burdened
brethren. He cannot of course grind, as they occasionally do, as he
travels along, so he pursues a different system of tactics. He walks
leisurely along the quiet ways, turning his eyes constantly to the
right and left, on the look-out for a promising opening. The sight of
a group of children at a parlour-window brings him into your front
garden, where he establishes his instrument with all the deliberation
of a proprietor of the premises. He is pretty sure to begin his
performance in the middle of a tune, with a hiccoughing kind of sound,
as though the pipes were gasping for breath. He puts a sudden period
to his questionable harmony the very instant he gets his penny, having
a notion, which is tolerably correct, that you pay him for his silence
and not for his sounds. In spite of his discordant gurglings and
squealings, he is welcomed by the nursery-maids and their infant
tribes of little sturdy rogues in petticoats, who flock eagerly round
him, and purchase the luxury of a half-penny grind, which they perform
_con amore_, seated on the top of his machine. If, when your front
garden is thus invaded, you insist upon his decamping without a fee,
he shews his estimate of the peace and quietness you desiderate by his
unwillingness to retire, which, however, he at length consents to do,
though not without a muttered remonstrance, delivered with the air of
an injured man.
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