CHAPTER III. THE CASTING OFF OF MOREL—THE TAKING ON OF WILLIAM
During the next week Morel’s temper was almost unbearable. Like all miners, he was a great lover of medicines, which, strangely enough, he would often pay for himself.
“ You mun get me a drop o’ laxy vitral,” he said. “It’s a winder as we canna ha’e a sup i’ th’ ’ouse.”
So Mrs. Morel bought him elixir of vitriol, his favourite first medicine. And he made himself a jug of wormwood tea. He had hanging in the attic great bunches of dried herbs: wormwood, rue, horehound, elder-flowers, parsley-purt, marshmallow, hyssop, dandelion, and centuary. Usually there was a jug of one or other decoction standing on the hob, from which he drank largely.
“ Grand!” he said, smacking his lips after wormwood. “Grand!” And he exhorted the
