Our guide surprised us by refraining from exploiting it for propaganda purposes. In fact, she seemed to take a genuine delight in all the gardens of Su-chou- a fact which may explain why we saw so many of them. Not once did she say so much as a word about the decadence of life under the emperors.

The teacher's voice inflects the pulse of nêhiyawêwin as he teaches us. He says a prayer in the first class. Nouns, we learn, have a gender. In French, nouns are male or female, but in Cree, nouns are living or non-living, animate or inanimate.

He had followed Larry faithfully for two days, getting yelled at and grieved over and yogied into a pretzel and fucked over by all sorts of weirdoes who seemed to find him a nice object to act on.

‘And the Punches,’ said William. ‘There’s cattle! A Suffolk Punch, when he’s a good un, is worth his weight in gold. Did you ever breed any Suffolk Punches yourself, sir?’