"Well, I gives him a nudge of my helbow, to remind him not to tell him
it was a 'daumed lee,' as he did the other man.
"'What does moose mean, my man?'
"Would you believe it, Sir, he didn't like that word 'my man,'
partikelarly coming from a soldier, for they are so hignorant here
they affect to look down upon soldiers, and call 'em 'thirteen
pences.'
"'Mean,' said he, 'it means that,' a-pointin' to the carcass. 'Do you
want to buy it?'
"'Hem!' said Mac. 'Well now, my good fellow--'
"Oh, Sir, if you had a seen the countryman when he heard them words,
it would a been as good as a play. He eyed him all over, very
scornful, as if he was taking his measure and weight for throwing him
over the sled by his cape and his trousers, and then he put his hand
in his waistcoat pocket, and took out a large black fig of coarse
tobacco, and bit a piece out of it, as if it was an apple, and fell
too a chewing of it, as if to vent his wrath on it, but said nothing.
"'Well, my good fellow,' said Mac, 'when there are more than one, or
they are in the plural number, what do you call them?'
"'Mice,' said the fellow.
"'Mice!' said M'Clure, 'I must look into that; it's very odd. Still,
it can't be mooses either.'
"He didn't know what to make of it; he had been puzzled with mouse
before, and found he was wrong, so he thought it was possible 'mice'
might be the right word after all.
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