“A desolate-minded man, ye kna…”

But he was a lonely man, fond o’ goin’ out wi’ his family, and saying nowt to noan of ’em. When a man goes in a family way he keeps togither wi’ ’em and chats a bit wi’ ’em, but many’s a time I’ve seed him a takin’ his family out in a string, and niver geein’ the deariest bit of notice to ’em; standin’ by hissel’ and stoppin’ behind agapin’, wi’ his jaws workin’ the whoal time; but niver no cracking wi’ ’em, nor no pleasure in ’em—a desolate-minded man, ye kna. Queer thing that, mun, but it was his hobby, ye kna. It was potry as did it. We all have our hobbies—some for huntin’, some cardin’, some fishin’, some wrestlin’…But his hobby, ye mun kna, was potry. It was a queer thing, but it would like enough cause him to be desolate; and I’se often thowt that his brain was that fu’ of sic stuff, that he was forced to be always at it whether or no, wet or fair, mumbling to hissel’ along the roads.

—An unknown innkeeper, on William Wordsworth