Contradict me, and I'll say ten.
Let me narrate exactly how it happened. I should
have proceeded to do so in my very first word, but
for this plain consideration -- if I am to tell a story
I must begin at the beginning; and how is it pos-
sible to begin at the beginning, without beginning
at the kettle?
It appeared as if there were a sort of match, or
trial of skill, you must understand, between the kettle
and the Cricket. And this is what led to it, and
how it came about.
Mrs. Peerybingle, going out into the raw twilight,
and clicking over the wet stones in a pair of pattens
that worked innumerable rough impressions of the
first proposition in Euclid all about the yard -- Mrs,
Peerybingle filled the kettle at the water-butt. Pres-
ently returning, less the pattens (and a good deal
less, for they were tall and Mrs. Peerybingle was
but short), she set the kettle on the fire. In doing
which she lost her temper, or mislaid it for an instant;
for, the water being uncomfortably cold, and in that
slippy, slushy, sleety sort of state wherein it seems
to penetrate through every kind of substance, pat-
ten rings included -- had laid hold of Mrs.
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