Calf-stealing.

Manawatu Standard, Volume 4, Issue 110, 17 April 1883, Page 3

Calf-stealing.

A few years ago, a butcher who had purchased a calf not far from Lewes, m Sussex, sat with it on a horse at a pub-lic-house door ; a shoemaker remarkable for his drollery, knowing that the butcher had, to pass through a wood, offered to : the landlord to carry off the calf, provided that be would treat him -withiißixpenny worth of grog-. The landlord agreed ; and the shoemaker setting off, dropped one new shoe m the 'path noar the middle of the wood, and another near a quarter of a mile from it. The butcher saw the first shoe, bnt did n t think it worth getting down fptv; however, when he discovered; : the second j he thought the pair would be ar«; acquisition , 'and accdrdiiigly "dig-: mounted, tied- his' hoi fie to 'the hedge, ■and walked back' to where he had seen; -the first Jshoe. : j The shoemaker m the .meantime unstrapped the calf, and;] carried it across the fields to the landlord, who put ' it m b'S barn. The butcher -missing bis calf went back to! iihe inn, and told his misfortune J at -the* same time observing ] that he- must! calf, cost what it would, -as' thefveal was ; bespoke. The landlord; told him he bad a calf m the barn, which he would sell him ; the butcher looked at it and asked the price. The' landlord replied; "Give me the same -as you.didfbr the calf you lost, as 'this I; thiukriis tall as large;" The butcher 'wouldiby no: means allow the calf to. be so good,! but agreed to give him within • six shillings of what the other cost, and accordingly put the calf a second time; on his 'horse. Crispin, elated with his success, undertook to steal the calf again for another sixpenny- worth ; which * being agreed on, he posted to s wood, ■•> and there hid himself ; When tjhe butcher ckme along, he I w bellowed so like a calf, that the butcher, .conceiving it to be the one he had lost, cried^pntinjoy, *< Ah >l are you there? jaare.l found yon. at last ?' ; and immediately dismounting, ran into the wqod.. Crispin taking advantage of the butcher's; absence, unstrapped the calf, and actually got back with it to the publican, before .the -butcher arrived to v tell. the mournful tale, and attribute the 1 whole to witchcraft.