Siegfried is determined to make the errant farmers pay their bills.

Siegfried gives a friend's offspring some experience in the surgery. Calum initially resents this, but bucks up when he sees the young student.

James wears his shorts to a visit and is challenged to a race, while Jock, a once champion sheepdog, and delights in chasing cars from the farm.

Siegfried buys a television set, and James has to deal with a man who has cancer.

Siegfried once again gets James to play cricket in a charity match for the village against the county team. The tables are turned however when James is injured and Siegfried is pressed into service. Bob and Rachel Taylor are worried about their lame horse, Maggie. Siegfried operated on the animal, but she seems to going down hill. Siegfried is accompanied oh his rounds by young Colin Appleby, who has sick goldfish.

An old friend of James and Siegfried, an itinerant raveler called Roddy Travers, arrives in Darrowby. He appears to be stealing instruments from the practice but Siegfried and James are relieved to discover that Roddy's recently acquired lurcher dog, Murphy, is the culprit. However, the situation turns serious when an elderly local farmer accuses Murphy of sheep killing.

Siegfried insists on singing the praises of his new time- management system, a personal diary, much to the annoyance of James. James is particularly put out by Siegfried's successful demonstration to his bete-noir, the redoubtable Mr. Ripley. However, Siegfried's morning is spoiled when he has to deal with Humphrey, an exuberant Great Dane.

Siegfried is perplexed when the usually-caring Grandma Clarke snubs her neighbor, Franco Pedretti, who is the new shepherd on the estate where she is a tenant farmer. It soon becomes apparent that she blames Franco for the untimely death of her son in Italy during the war and the subsequent death of his wife in childbirth.