"
Agamemnon recalled that Mr. Bromwick once wanted to hire Mr.
Peterkin's lot for his cow.
Mr. Peterkin started up.
"That is true; and of course Mr. Bromwick must have known there
was feed enough for one cow."
"And the reason you didn't let him have it," said Solomon John,
"was that Elizabeth Eliza was afraid of cows."
"I did not like the idea," said Elizabeth Eliza, "of their cow's
looking at me over the top of the fence, perhaps, when I should be
planting the sweet peas in the garden. I hope our cow would be a
quiet one. I should not like her jumping over the fence into the
flower-beds."
Mr. Peterkin declared that he should buy a cow of the quietest
kind.
"I should think something might be done about covering her
horns," said Mrs.
Peterkin; "that seems the most dangerous part. Perhaps they might
be padded with cotton."
Elizabeth Eliza said cows were built so large and clumsy, that if
they came at you they could not help knocking you over.
The little boys would prefer having the pasture a great way off.
Half the fun of having a cow would be going up on the hills after
her.
Agamemnon thought the feed was not so good on the hills.
"The cow would like it ever so much better," the little boys
declared, "on account of the variety. If she did not like the rocks
and the bushes, she could walk round and find the grassy places."
"I am not sure," said Elizabeth Eliza, "but it would be less
dangerous to keep the cow in the lot behind the house, because
she would not be coming and going, morning and night, in that
jerky way the Larkins' cows come home.
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