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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Romany Rye, by George Borrow
+(#2 in our series by George Borrow)
+
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+Title: The Romany Rye
+
+Author: George Borrow
+
+Release Date: February, 1996  [EBook #422]
+[This file was first posted on December 20, 1995]
+[Most recently updated: August 18, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE ROMANY RYE ***
+
+
+
+
+Transcribed from the 1907 J. M. Dent Edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
+
+
+
+
+THE ROMANY RYE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+
+The Making of the Linch-pin--The Sound Sleeper--Breakfast--The
+Postillion's Departure.
+
+
+I awoke at the first break of day, and, leaving the postillion fast
+asleep, stepped out of the tent.  The dingle was dank and dripping.
+I lighted a fire of coals, and got my forge in readiness.  I then
+ascended to the field, where the chaise was standing as we had left
+it on the previous evening.  After looking at the cloud-stone near
+it, now cold, and split into three pieces, I set about prying
+narrowly into the condition of the wheel and axletree--the latter
+had sustained no damage of any consequence, and the wheel, as far
+as I was able to judge, was sound, being only slightly injured in
+the box.  The only thing requisite to set the chaise in a
+travelling condition appeared to be a linch-pin, which I determined
+to make.  Going to the companion wheel, I took out the linch-pin,
+which I carried down with me to the dingle, to serve as a model.
+
+I found Belle by this time dressed, and seated near the forge:
+with a slight nod to her like that which a person gives who happens
+to see an acquaintance when his mind is occupied with important
+business, I forthwith set about my work.  Selecting a piece of iron
+which I thought would serve my purpose, I placed it in the fire,
+and plying the bellows in a furious manner, soon made it hot; then
+seizing it with the tongs, I laid it on my anvil, and began to beat
+it with my hammer, according to the rules of my art.  The dingle
+resounded with my strokes.  Belle sat still, and occasionally
+smiled, but suddenly started up, and retreated towards her
+encampment, on a spark which I purposely sent in her direction
+alighting on her knee.  I found the making of a linch-pin no easy
+matter; it was, however, less difficult than the fabrication of a
+pony-shoe; my work, indeed, was much facilitated by my having
+another pin to look at.  In about three-quarters of an hour I had
+succeeded tolerably well, and had produced a linch-pin which I
+thought would serve.  During all this time, notwithstanding the
+noise which I was making, the postillion never showed his face.
+His non-appearance at first alarmed me:  I was afraid he might be
+dead, but, on looking into the tent, I found him still buried in
+the soundest sleep.  "He must surely be descended from one of the
+seven sleepers," said I, as I turned away, and resumed my work.  My
+work finished, I took a little oil, leather, and sand, and polished
+the pin as well as I could; then, summoning Belle, we both went to
+the chaise, where, with her assistance, I put on the wheel.  The
+linch-pin which I had made fitted its place very well, and having
+replaced the other, I gazed at the chaise for some time with my
+heart full of that satisfaction which results from the
+consciousness of having achieved a great action; then, after
+looking at Belle in the hope of obtaining a compliment from her
+lips, which did not come, I returned to the dingle, without saying
+a word, followed by her.  Belle set about making preparations for
+breakfast; and I taking the kettle, went and filled it at the
+spring.  Having hung it over the fire, I went to the tent in which
+the postillion was still sleeping, and called upon him to arise.
+He awoke with a start, and stared around him at first with the
+utmost surprise, not unmixed, I could observe, with a certain
+degree of fear.  At last, looking in my face, he appeared to
+recollect himself.  "I had quite forgot," said he, as he got up,
+"where I was, and all that happened yesterday.  However, I remember
+now the whole affair, thunder-storm, thunder-bolt, frightened
+horses, and all your kindness.  Come, I must see after my coach and
+horses; I hope we shall be able to repair the damage."  "The damage
+is already quite repaired," said I, "as you will see, if you come
+to the field above."  "You don't say so," said the postillion,
+coming out of the tent; "well, I am mightily beholden to you.  Good
+morning, young gentle-woman," said he, addressing Belle, who,
+having finished her preparations, was seated near the fire.  "Good
+morning, young man," said Belle, "I suppose you would be glad of
+some breakfast; however, you must wait a little, the kettle does
+not boil."  "Come and look at your chaise," said I; "but tell me
+how it happened that the noise which I have been making did not
+awake you; for three-quarters of an hour at least I was hammering
+close at your ear."  "I heard you all the time," said the
+postillion, "but your hammering made me sleep all the sounder; I am
+used to hear hammering in my morning sleep.  There's a forge close
+by the room where I sleep when I'm at home, at my inn; for we have
+all kinds of conveniences at my inn--forge, carpenter's shop, and
+wheel-wright's,--so that when I heard you hammering I thought, no
+doubt, that it was the old noise, and that I was comfortable in my
+bed at my own inn."  We now ascended to the field, where I showed
+the postillion his chaise.  He looked at the pin attentively,
+rubbed his hands, and gave a loud laugh.  "Is it not well done?"
+said I.  "It will do till I get home," he replied.  "And that is
+all you have to say?" I demanded.  "And that's a good deal," said
+he, "considering who made it.  But don't be offended," he added, "I
+shall prize it all the more for its being made by a gentleman, and
+no blacksmith; and so will my governor, when I show it to him.  I
+shan't let it remain where it is, but will keep it, as a
+remembrance of you, as long as I live."  He then again rubbed his
+hands with great glee, and said, "I will now go and see after my
+horses, and then to breakfast, partner, if you please."  Suddenly,
+however, looking at his hands, he said, "Before sitting down to
+breakfast I am in the habit of washing my hands and face:  I
+suppose you could not furnish me with a little soap and water."
+"As much water as you please," said I, "but if you want soap, I
+must go and trouble the young gentle-woman for some."  "By no
+means," said the postillion, "water will do at a pinch."  "Follow
+me," said I, and leading him to the pond of the frogs and newts, I
+said, "this is my ewer; you are welcome to part of it--the water is
+so soft that it is scarcely necessary to add soap to it;" then
+lying down on the bank, I plunged my head into the water, then
+scrubbed my hands and face, and afterwards wiped them with some
+long grass which grew on the margin of the pond.  "Bravo," said the
+postillion, "I see you know how to make a shift:" he then followed
+my example, declared he never felt more refreshed in his life, and,
+giving a bound, said, "he would go and look after his horses."
+
+We then went to look after the horses, which we found not much the
+worse for having spent the night in the open air.  My companion
+again inserted their heads in the corn-bags, and, leaving the
+animals to discuss their corn, returned with me to the dingle,
+where we found the kettle boiling.  We sat down, and Belle made tea
+and did the honours of the meal.  The postillion was in high
+spirits, ate heartily, and, to Belle's evident satisfaction,
+declared that he had never drank better tea in his life, or indeed
+any half so good.  Breakfast over, he said that he must now go and
+harness his horses, as it was high time for him to return to his
+inn.  Belle gave him her hand and wished him farewell:  the
+postillion shook her hand warmly, and was advancing close up to
+her--for what purpose I cannot say--whereupon Belle, withdrawing
+her hand, drew herself up with an air which caused the postillion
+to retreat a step or two with an exceedingly sheepish look.
+Recovering himself, however, he made a low bow, and proceeded up
+the path.  I attended him, and helped to harness his horses and put
+them to the vehicle; he then shook me by the hand, and taking the
+reins and whip, mounted to his seat; ere he drove away he thus
+addressed me:  "If ever I forget your kindness and that of the
+young woman below, dash my buttons.  If ever either of you should
+enter my inn you may depend upon a warm welcome, the best that can
+be set before you, and no expense to either, for I will give both
+of you the best of characters to the governor, who is the very best
+fellow upon all the road.  As for your linch-pin, I trust it will
+serve till I get home, when I will take it out and keep it in
+remembrance of you all the days of my life:" then giving the horses
+a jerk with his reins, he cracked his whip and drove off.
+
+I returned to the dingle, Belle had removed the breakfast things,
+and was busy in her own encampment:  nothing occurred, worthy of
+being related, for two hours, at the end of which time Belle
+departed on a short expedition, and I again found myself alone in
+the dingle.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+
+The Man in Black--The Emperor of Germany--Nepotism--Donna Olympia--
+Omnipotence--Camillo Astalli--The Five Propositions.
+
+
+In the evening I received another visit from the man in black.  I
+had been taking a stroll in the neighbourhood, and was sitting in
+the dingle in rather a listless manner, scarcely knowing how to
+employ myself; his coming, therefore, was by no means disagreeable
+to me.  I produced the hollands and glass from my tent, where
+Isopel Berners had requested me to deposit them, and also some lump
+sugar, then taking the gotch I fetched water from the spring, and,
+sitting down, begged the man in black to help himself; he was not
+slow in complying with my desire, and prepared for himself a glass
+of hollands and water with a lump of sugar in it.  After he had
+taken two or three sips with evident satisfaction, I, remembering
+his chuckling exclamation of "Go to Rome for money," when he last
+left the dingle, took the liberty, after a little conversation, of
+reminding him of it, whereupon, with a he! he! he! he replied,
+"Your idea was not quite so original as I supposed.  After leaving
+you the other night, I remembered having read of an Emperor of
+Germany who conceived the idea of applying to Rome for money, and
+actually put it into practice.
+
+"Urban the Eighth then occupied the papal chair, of the family of
+the Barbarini, nicknamed the Mosche, or Flies, from the
+circumstance of bees being their armorial bearing.  The Emperor
+having exhausted all his money in endeavouring to defend the church
+against Gustavus Adolphus, the great King of Sweden, who was bent
+on its destruction, applied in his necessity to the Pope for a loan
+of money.  The Pope, however, and his relations, whose cellars were
+at that time full of the money of the church, which they had been
+plundering for years, refused to lend him a scudo; whereupon a
+pasquinade picture was stuck up at Rome, representing the church
+lying on a bed, gashed with dreadful wounds, and beset all over
+with flies, which were sucking her, whilst the Emperor of Germany
+was kneeling before her with a miserable face, requesting a little
+money towards carrying on the war against the heretics, to which
+the poor church was made to say:  'How can I assist you, O my
+champion, do you not see that the flies have sucked me to the very
+bones?'  Which story," said he, "shows that the idea of going to
+Rome for money was not quite so original as I imagined the other
+night, though utterly preposterous.
+
+"This affair," said he, "occurred in what were called the days of
+nepotism.  Certain popes, who wished to make themselves in some
+degree independent of the cardinals, surrounded themselves with
+their nephews and the rest of their family, who sucked the church
+and Christendom as much as they could, none doing so more
+effectually than the relations of Urban the Eighth, at whose death,
+according to the book called the 'Nipotismo di Roma,' there were in
+the Barbarini family two hundred and twenty-seven governments,
+abbeys and high dignities; and so much hard cash in their
+possession, that threescore and ten mules were scarcely sufficient
+to convey the plunder of one of them to Palestrina."  He added,
+however, that it was probable that Christendom fared better whilst
+the popes were thus independent, as it was less sucked, whereas
+before and after that period it was sucked by hundreds instead of
+tens, by the cardinals and all their relations, instead of by the
+pope and his nephews only.
+
+Then, after drinking rather copiously of his hollands, he said that
+it was certainly no bad idea of the popes to surround themselves
+with nephews, on whom they bestowed great church dignities, as by
+so doing they were tolerably safe from poison, whereas a pope, if
+abandoned to the cardinals, might at any time be made away with by
+them, provided they thought that he lived too long, or that he
+seemed disposed to do anything which they disliked; adding, that
+Ganganelli would never have been poisoned provided he had had
+nephews about him to take care of his life, and to see that nothing
+unholy was put into his food, or a bustling stirring brother's wife
+like Donna Olympia.  He then with a he! he! he! asked me if I had
+ever read the book called the "Nipotismo di Roma"; and on my
+replying in the negative, he told me that it was a very curious and
+entertaining book, which he occasionally looked at in an idle hour,
+and proceeded to relate to me anecdotes out of the "Nipotismo di
+Roma," about the successor of Urban, Innocent the Tenth, and Donna
+Olympia, showing how fond he was of her, and how she cooked his
+food, and kept the cardinals away from it, and how she and her
+creatures plundered Christendom, with the sanction of the Pope,
+until Christendom, becoming enraged, insisted that he should put
+her away, which he did for a time, putting a nephew--one Camillo
+Astalli--in her place, in which, however, he did not continue long;
+for the Pope, conceiving a pique against him, banished him from his
+sight, and recalled Donna Olympia, who took care of his food, and
+plundered Christendom until Pope Innocent died.
+
+I said that I only wondered that between pope and cardinals the
+whole system of Rome had not long fallen to the ground, and was
+told, in reply, that its not having fallen was the strongest proof
+of its vital power, and the absolute necessity for the existence of
+the system.  That the system, notwithstanding its occasional
+disorders, went on.  Popes and cardinals might prey upon its
+bowels, and sell its interests, but the system survived.  The
+cutting off of this or that member was not able to cause Rome any
+vital loss; for, as soon as she lost a member, the loss was
+supplied by her own inherent vitality; though her popes had been
+poisoned by cardinals, and her cardinals by popes; and though
+priests occasionally poisoned popes, cardinals, and each other,
+after all that had been, and might be, she had still, and would
+ever have, her priests, cardinals, and pope.
+
+Finding the man in black so communicative and reasonable, I
+determined to make the best of my opportunity, and learn from him
+all I could with respect to the papal system, and told him that he
+would particularly oblige me by telling me who the Pope of Rome
+was; and received for answer, that he was an old man elected by a
+majority of cardinals to the papal chair; who, immediately after
+his election, became omnipotent and equal to God on earth.  On my
+begging him not to talk such nonsense, and asking him how a person
+could be omnipotent who could not always preserve himself from
+poison, even when fenced round by nephews, or protected by a
+bustling woman, he, after taking a long sip of hollands and water,
+told me that I must not expect too much from omnipotence; for
+example, that as it would be unreasonable to expect that One above
+could annihilate the past--for instance, the Seven Years' War, or
+the French Revolution--though any one who believed in Him would
+acknowledge Him to be omnipotent, so would it be unreasonable for
+the faithful to expect that the Pope could always guard himself
+from poison.  Then, after looking at me for a moment stedfastly,
+and taking another sip, he told me that popes had frequently done
+impossibilities; for example, Innocent the Tenth had created a
+nephew; for, not liking particularly any of his real nephews, he
+had created the said Camillo Astalli his nephew; asking me, with a
+he! he!  "What but omnipotence could make a young man nephew to a
+person to whom he was not in the slightest degree related?"  On my
+observing that of course no one believed that the young fellow was
+really the Pope's nephew, though the Pope might have adopted him as
+such, the man in black replied, "that the reality of the nephewship
+of Camillo Astalli had hitherto never become a point of faith; let,
+however, the present pope, or any other pope, proclaim that it is
+necessary to believe in the reality of the nephewship of Camillo
+Astalli, and see whether the faithful would not believe in it.  Who
+can doubt that," he added, "seeing that they believe in the reality
+of the five propositions of Jansenius?  The Jesuits, wishing to
+ruin the Jansenists, induced a pope to declare that such and such
+damnable opinions, which they called five propositions, were to be
+found in a book written by Jansen, though, in reality, no such
+propositions were to be found there; whereupon the existence of
+these propositions became forthwith a point of faith to the
+faithful.  Do you then think," he demanded, "that there is one of
+the faithful who would not swallow, if called upon, the nephewship
+of Camillo Astalli as easily as the five propositions of
+Jansenius?"  "Surely, then," said I, "the faithful must be a pretty
+pack of simpletons!"  Whereupon the man in black exclaimed, "What!
+a Protestant, and an infringer of the rights of faith!  Here's a
+fellow, who would feel himself insulted if any one were to ask him
+how he could believe in the miraculous conception, calling people
+simpletons who swallow the five propositions of Jansenius, and are
+disposed, if called upon, to swallow the reality of the nephewship
+of Camillo Astalli."
+
+I was about to speak, when I was interrupted by the arrival of
+Belle.  After unharnessing her donkey, and adjusting her person a
+little, she came and sat down by us.  In the meantime I had helped
+my companion to some more hollands and water, and had plunged with
+him into yet deeper discourse.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+
+Necessity of Religion--The Great Indian One--Image-worship--
+Shakespeare--The Pat Answer--Krishna--Amen.
+
+
+Having told the man in black that I should like to know all the
+truth with regard to the Pope and his system, he assured me he
+should be delighted to give me all the information in his power;
+that he had come to the dingle, not so much for the sake of the
+good cheer which I was in the habit of giving him, as in the hope
+of inducing me to enlist under the banners of Rome, and to fight in
+her cause; and that he had no doubt that, by speaking out frankly
+to me, he ran the best chance of winning me over.
+
+He then proceeded to tell me that the experience of countless ages
+had proved the necessity of religion; the necessity, he would
+admit, was only for simpletons; but as nine-tenths of the dwellers
+upon this earth were simpletons, it would never do for sensible
+people to run counter to their folly, but, on the contrary, it was
+their wisest course to encourage them in it, always provided that,
+by so doing, sensible people would derive advantage; that the truly
+sensible people of this world were the priests, who, without caring
+a straw for religion for its own sake, made use of it as a cord by
+which to draw the simpletons after them; that there were many
+religions in this world, all of which had been turned to excellent
+account by the priesthood; but that the one the best adapted for
+the purposes of priestcraft was the popish, which, he said, was the
+oldest in the world and the best calculated to endure.  On my
+inquiring what he meant by saying the popish religion was the
+oldest in the world, whereas there could be no doubt that the Greek
+and Roman religion had existed long before it, to say nothing of
+the old Indian religion still in existence and vigour; he said,
+with a nod, after taking a sip at his glass, that, between me and
+him, the popish religion, that of Greece and Rome, and the old
+Indian system were, in reality, one and the same.
+
+"You told me that you intended to be frank," said I; "but, however
+frank you may be, I think you are rather wild."
+
+"We priests of Rome," said the man in black, "even those amongst us
+who do not go much abroad, know a great deal about church matters,
+of which you heretics have very little idea.  Those of our brethren
+of the Propaganda, on their return home from distant missions, not
+unfrequently tell us very strange things relating to our dear
+mother; for example, our first missionaries to the East were not
+slow in discovering and telling to their brethren that our religion
+and the great Indian one were identical, no more difference between
+them than between Ram and Rome.  Priests, convents, beads, prayers,
+processions, fastings, penances, all the same, not forgetting
+anchorites and vermin, he! he!  The pope they found under the title
+of the grand lama, a sucking child surrounded by an immense number
+of priests.  Our good brethren, some two hundred years ago, had a
+hearty laugh, which their successors have often re-echoed; they
+said that helpless suckling and its priests put them so much in
+mind of their own old man, surrounded by his cardinals, he! he!
+Old age is second childhood."
+
+"Did they find Christ?" said I.
+
+"They found him too," said the man in black, "that is, they saw his
+image; he is considered in India as a pure kind of being, and on
+that account, perhaps, is kept there rather in the background, even
+as he is here."
+
+"All this is very mysterious to me," said I.
+
+"Very likely," said the man in black; "but of this I am tolerably
+sure, and so are most of those of Rome, that modern Rome had its
+religion from ancient Rome, which had its religion from the East."
+
+"But how?" I demanded.
+
+"It was brought about, I believe, by the wanderings of nations,"
+said the man in black.  "A brother of the Propaganda, a very
+learned man, once told me--I do not mean Mezzofanti, who has not
+five ideas--this brother once told me that all we of the Old World,
+from Calcutta to Dublin, are of the same stock, and were originally
+of the same language, and--"
+
+"All of one religion," I put in.
+
+"All of one religion," said the man in black; "and now follow
+different modifications of the same religion."
+
+"We Christians are not image-worshippers," said I.
+
+"You heretics are not, you mean," said the man in black; "but you
+will be put down, just as you have always been, though others may
+rise up after you; the true religion is image-worship; people may
+strive against it, but they will only work themselves to an oil;
+how did it fare with that Greek Emperor, the Iconoclast, what was
+his name, Leon the Isaurian?  Did not his image-breaking cost him
+Italy, the fairest province of his empire, and did not ten fresh
+images start up at home for every one which he demolished?  Oh! you
+little know the craving which the soul sometimes feels after a good
+bodily image."
+
+"I have indeed no conception of it," said I; "I have an abhorrence
+of idolatry--the idea of bowing before a graven figure!"
+
+"The idea, indeed!" said Belle, who had now joined us.
+
+"Did you never bow before that of Shakespeare?" said the man in
+black, addressing himself to me, after a low bow to Belle.
+
+"I don't remember that I ever did," said I, "but even suppose I
+did?"
+
+"Suppose you did," said the man in black; "shame on you, Mr. Hater
+of Idolatry; why, the very supposition brings you to the ground;
+you must make figures of Shakespeare, must you? then why not of St.
+Antonio, or Ignacio, or of a greater personage still!  I know what
+you are going to say," he cried, interrupting me, as I was about to
+speak.  "You don't make his image in order to pay it divine
+honours, but only to look at it, and think of Shakespeare; but this
+looking at a thing in order to think of a person is the very basis
+of idolatry.  Shakespeare's works are not sufficient for you; no
+more are the Bible or the legend of Saint Anthony or Saint Ignacio
+for us, that is for those of us who believe in them; I tell you,
+Zingara, that no religion can exist long which rejects a good
+bodily image."
+
+"Do you think," said I, "that Shakespeare's works would not exist
+without his image?"
+
+"I believe," said the man in black, "that Shakespeare's image is
+looked at more than his works, and will be looked at, and perhaps
+adored, when they are forgotten.  I am surprised that they have not
+been forgotten long ago; I am no admirer of them."
+
+"But I can't imagine," said I, "how you will put aside the
+authority of Moses.  If Moses strove against image-worship, should
+not his doing so be conclusive as to the impropriety of the
+practice:  what higher authority can you have than that of Moses?"
+
+"The practice of the great majority of the human race," said the
+man in black, "and the recurrence to image-worship where image-
+worship has been abolished.  Do you know that Moses is considered
+by the church as no better than a heretic, and though, for
+particular reasons, it has been obliged to adopt his writings, the
+adoption was merely a sham one, as it never paid the slightest
+attention to them?  No, no, the church was never led by Moses, nor
+by one mightier than he, whose doctrine it has equally nullified--I
+allude to Krishna in his second avatar; the church, it is true,
+governs in his name, but not unfrequently gives him the lie, if he
+happens to have said anything which it dislikes.  Did you never
+hear the reply which Padre Paolo Segani made to the French
+Protestant Jean Anthoine Guerin, who had asked him whether it was
+easier for Christ to have been mistaken in his Gospel, than for the
+Pope to be mistaken in his decrees?"
+
+"I never heard their names before," said I.
+
+"The answer was pat," said the man in black, "though he who made it
+was confessedly the most ignorant fellow of the very ignorant order
+to which he belonged, the Augustine.  'Christ might err as a man,'
+said he, 'but the Pope can never err, being God.'  The whole story
+is related in the Nipotismo."
+
+"I wonder you should ever have troubled yourself with Christ at
+all," said I.
+
+"What was to be done?" said the man in black; "the power of that
+name suddenly came over Europe, like the power of a mighty wind; it
+was said to have come from Judea, and from Judea it probably came
+when it first began to agitate minds in these parts; but it seems
+to have been known in the remote East, more or less, for thousands
+of years previously.  It filled people's minds with madness; it was
+followed by books which were never much regarded, as they contained
+little of insanity; but the name! what fury that breathed into
+people! the books were about peace and gentleness, but the name was
+the most horrible of war-cries--those who wished to uphold old
+names at first strove to oppose it, but their efforts were feeble,
+and they had no good war-cry; what was Mars as a war-cry compared
+with the name of . . . ?  It was said that they persecuted
+terribly, but who said so?  The Christians.  The Christians could
+have given them a lesson in the art of persecution, and eventually
+did so.  None but Christians have ever been good persecutors; well,
+the old religion succumbed, Christianity prevailed, for the
+ferocious is sure to prevail over the gentle."
+
+"I thought," said I, "you stated a little time ago that the Popish
+religion and the ancient Roman are the same?"
+
+"In every point but that name, that Krishna and the fury and love
+of persecution which it inspired," said the man in black.  "A hot
+blast came from the East, sounding Krishna; it absolutely maddened
+people's minds, and the people would call themselves his children;
+we will not belong to Jupiter any longer, we will belong to
+Krishna, and they did belong to Krishna; that is in name, but in
+nothing else; for who ever cared for Krishna in the Christian
+world, or who ever regarded the words attributed to him, or put
+them in practice?"
+
+"Why, we Protestants regard his words, and endeavour to practise
+what they enjoin as much as possible."
+
+"But you reject his image," sad the man in black; "better reject
+his words than his image:  no religion can exist long which rejects
+a good bodily image.  Why, the very negro barbarians of High
+Barbary could give you a lesson on that point; they have their
+fetish images, to which they look for help in their afflictions;
+they have likewise a high priest, whom they call--"
+
+"Mumbo Jumbo," said I; "I know all about him already."
+
+"How came you to know anything about him?" said the man in black,
+with a look of some surprise.
+
+"Some of us poor Protestants tinkers," said I, "though we live in
+dingles, are also acquainted with a thing or two."
+
+"I really believe you are," said the man in black, staring at me;
+"but, in connection with this Mumbo Jumbo, I could relate to you a
+comical story about a fellow, an English servant, I once met at
+Rome."
+
+"It would be quite unnecessary," said I; "I would much sooner hear
+you talk about Krishna, his words and image."
+
+"Spoken like a true heretic," said the man in black; "one of the
+faithful would have placed his image before his words; for what are
+all the words in the world compared with a good bodily image!"
+
+"I believe you occasionally quote his words?" said I.
+
+"He! he!" said the man in black; "occasionally."
+
+"For example," said I, "upon this rock I will found my church."
+
+"He! he!" said the man in black; "you must really become one of
+us."
+
+"Yet you must have had some difficulty in getting the rock to
+Rome?"
+
+"None whatever," said the man in black; "faith can remove
+mountains, to say nothing of rocks--ho! ho!"
+
+"But I cannot imagine," said I, "what advantage you could derive
+from perverting those words of Scripture in which the Saviour talks
+about eating his body."
+
+"I do not know, indeed, why we troubled our heads about the matter
+at all," said the man in black; "but when you talk about perverting
+the meaning of the text, you speak ignorantly, Mr. Tinker; when he
+whom you call the Saviour gave his followers the sop, and bade them
+eat it, telling them it was his body, he delicately alluded to what
+it was incumbent upon them to do after his death, namely, to eat
+his body."
+
+"You do not mean to say that he intended they should actually eat
+his body?"
+
+"Then you suppose ignorantly," said the man in black; "eating the
+bodies of the dead was a heathenish custom, practised by the heirs
+and legatees of people who left property; and this custom is
+alluded to in the text."
+
+"But what has the New Testament to do with heathen customs," said
+I, "except to destroy them?"
+
+"More than you suppose," said the man in black.  "We priests of
+Rome, who have long lived at Rome, know much better what the New
+Testament is made of than the heretics and their theologians, not
+forgetting their Tinkers; though I confess some of the latter have
+occasionally surprised us--for example, Bunyan.  The New Testament
+is crowded with allusions to heathen customs, and with words
+connected with pagan sorcery.  Now, with respect to words, I would
+fain have you, who pretend to be a philologist, tell me the meaning
+of Amen."
+
+I made no answer.
+
+"We of Rome," said the man in black, "know two or three things of
+which the heretics are quite ignorant; for example, there are those
+amongst us--those, too, who do not pretend to be philologists--who
+know what Amen is, and, moreover, how we got it.  We got it from
+our ancestors, the priests of ancient Rome; and they got the word
+from their ancestors of the East, the priests of Buddh and Brahma."
+
+"And what is the meaning of the word?" I demanded.
+
+"Amen," said the man in black, "is a modification of the old Hindoo
+formula, Omani batsikhom, by the almost ceaseless repetition of
+which the Indians hope to be received finally to the rest or state
+of forgetfulness of Buddh or Brahma; a foolish practice you will
+say, but are you heretics much wiser, who are continually sticking
+Amen to the end of your prayers, little knowing when you do so,
+that you are consigning yourselves to the repose of Buddh!  Oh,
+what hearty laughs our missionaries have had when comparing the
+eternally-sounding Eastern gibberish of Omani batsikhom, Omani
+batsikhom, and the Ave Maria and Amen Jesus of our own idiotical
+devotees."
+
+"I have nothing to say about the Ave Marias and Amens of your
+superstitious devotees," said I; "I dare say that they use them
+nonsensically enough, but in putting Amen to the end of a prayer,
+we merely intend to express, 'So let it be.'"
+
+"It means nothing of the kind," said the man in black; "and the
+Hindoos might just as well put your national oath at the end of
+their prayers, as perhaps they will after a great many thousand
+years, when English is forgotten, and only a few words of it
+remembered by dim tradition without being understood.  How strange
+if, after the lapse of four thousand years, the Hindoos should damn
+themselves to the blindness so dear to their present masters, even
+as their masters at present consign themselves to the forgetfulness
+so dear to the Hindoos; but my glass has been empty for a
+considerable time; perhaps, Bellissima Biondina," said he,
+addressing Belle, "you will deign to replenish it?"
+
+"I shall do no such thing," said Belle, "you have drunk quite
+enough, and talked more than enough, and to tell you the truth I
+wish you would leave us alone."
+
+"Shame on you, Belle," said I; "consider the obligations of
+hospitality."
+
+"I am sick of that word," said Belle, "you are so frequently
+misusing it; were this place not Mumpers' Dingle, and consequently
+as free to the fellow as ourselves, I would lead him out of it."
+
+"Pray be quiet, Belle," said I.  "You had better help yourself,"
+said I, addressing myself to the man in black, "the lady is angry
+with you."
+
+"I am sorry for it," said the man in black; "if she is angry with
+me, I am not so with her, and shall be always proud to wait upon
+her; in the meantime, I will wait upon myself."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+
+The Proposal--The Scotch Novel--Latitude--Miracles--Pestilent
+Heretics--Old Fraser--Wonderful Texts--No Armenian.
+
+
+The man in black having helped himself to some more of his
+favourite beverage, and tasted it, I thus addressed him:  "The
+evening is getting rather advanced, and I can see that this lady,"
+pointing to Belle, "is anxious for her tea, which she prefers to
+take cosily and comfortably with me in the dingle:  the place, it
+is true, is as free to you as to ourselves, nevertheless, as we are
+located here by necessity, whilst you merely come as a visitor, I
+must take the liberty of telling you that we shall be glad to be
+alone, as soon as you have said what you have to say, and have
+finished the glass of refreshment at present in your hand.  I think
+you said some time ago that one of your motives for coming hither
+was to induce me to enlist under the banner of Rome.  I wish to
+know whether that was really the case?"
+
+"Decidedly so," said the man in black; "I come here principally in
+the hope of enlisting you in our regiment, in which I have no doubt
+you could do us excellent service."
+
+"Would you enlist my companion as well?" I demanded.
+
+"We should be only too proud to have her among us, whether she
+comes with you or alone," said the man in black, with a polite bow
+to Belle.
+
+"Before we give you an answer," I replied, "I would fain know more
+about you; perhaps you will declare your name?"
+
+"That I will never do," said the man in black; "no one in England
+knows it but myself, and I will not declare it, even in a dingle;
+as for the rest, Sono un Prete Cattolico Appostolico--that is all
+that many a one of us can say for himself, and it assuredly means a
+great deal."
+
+"We will now proceed to business," said I.  "You must be aware that
+we English are generally considered a self-interested people."
+
+"And with considerable justice," said the man in black, drinking.
+"Well, you are a person of acute perception, and I will presently
+make it evident to you that it would be to your interest to join
+with us.  You are at present, evidently, in very needy
+circumstances, and are lost, not only to yourself, but to the
+world; but should you enlist with us, I could find you an
+occupation not only agreeable, but one in which your talents would
+have free scope.  I would introduce you in the various grand houses
+here in England, to which I have myself admission, as a surprising
+young gentleman of infinite learning, who by dint of study has
+discovered that the Roman is the only true faith.  I tell you
+confidently that our popish females would make a saint, nay, a God
+of you; they are fools enough for anything.  There is one person in
+particular with whom I would wish to make you acquainted, in the
+hope that you would be able to help me to perform good service to
+the holy see.  He is a gouty old fellow, of some learning, residing
+in an old hall, near the great western seaport, and is one of the
+very few amongst the English Catholics possessing a grain of sense.
+I think you could help us to govern him, for he is not unfrequently
+disposed to be restive, asks us strange questions--occasionally
+threatens us with his crutch; and behaves so that we are often
+afraid that we shall lose him, or, rather, his property, which he
+has bequeathed to us, and which is enormous.  I am sure that you
+could help us to deal with him; sometimes with your humour,
+sometimes with your learning, and perhaps occasionally with your
+fists."
+
+"And in what manner would you provide for my companion?" said I.
+
+"We would place her at once," said the man in black, "in the house
+of two highly respectable Catholic ladies in this neighbourhood,
+where she would be treated with every care and consideration till
+her conversion should be accomplished in a regular manner; we would
+then remove her to a female monastic establishment, where, after
+undergoing a year's probation, during which time she would be
+instructed in every elegant accomplishment, she should take the
+veil.  Her advancement would speedily follow, for, with such a face
+and figure, she would make a capital lady abbess, especially in
+Italy, to which country she would probably be sent; ladies of her
+hair and complexion--to say nothing of her height--being a
+curiosity in the south.  With a little care and management she
+could soon obtain a vast reputation for sanctity; and who knows but
+after her death she might become a glorified saint--he! he!  Sister
+Maria Theresa, for that is the name I propose you should bear.
+Holy Mother Maria Theresa--glorified and celestial saint, I have
+the honour of drinking to your health," and the man in black drank.
+
+"Well, Belle," said I, "what have you to say to the gentleman's
+proposal?"
+
+"That if he goes on in this way I will break his glass against his
+mouth."
+
+"You have heard the lady's answer," said I.
+
+"I have," said the man in black, "and shall not press the matter.
+I can't help, however, repeating that she would make a capital lady
+abbess; she would keep the nuns in order, I warrant her; no easy
+matter!  Break the glass against my mouth--he! he!  How she would
+send the holy utensils flying at the nuns' heads occasionally, and
+just the person to wring the nose of Satan, should he venture to
+appear one night in her cell in the shape of a handsome black man.
+No offence, madam, no offence, pray retain your seat," said he,
+observing that Belle had started up; "I mean no offence.  Well, if
+you will not consent to be an abbess, perhaps you will consent to
+follow this young Zingaro, and to co-operate with him and us.  I am
+a priest, madam, and can join you both in an instant, connubio
+stabili, as I suppose the knot has not been tied already."
+
+"Hold your mumping gibberish," said Belle, "and leave the dingle
+this moment, for though 'tis free to every one, you have no right
+to insult me in it."
+
+"Pray be pacified," said I to Belle, getting up, and placing myself
+between her and the man in black, "he will presently leave, take my
+word for it--there, sit down again," said I, as I led her to her
+seat; then, resuming my own, I said to the man in black:  "I advise
+you to leave the dingle as soon as possible."
+
+"I should wish to have your answer to my proposal first," said he.
+
+"Well, then, here you shall have it:  I will not entertain your
+proposal; I detest your schemes:  they are both wicked and
+foolish."
+
+"Wicked," said the man in black, "have they not--he! he!--the
+furtherance of religion in view?"
+
+"A religion," said I, "in which you yourself do not believe, and
+which you contemn."
+
+"Whether I believe in it or not," said the man in black, "it is
+adapted for the generality of the human race; so I will forward it,
+and advise you to do the same.  It was nearly extirpated in these
+regions, but it is springing up again, owing to circumstances.
+Radicalism is a good friend to us; all the liberals laud up our
+system out of hatred to the Established Church, though our system
+is ten times less liberal than the Church of England.  Some of them
+have really come over to us.  I myself confess a baronet who
+presided over the first radical meeting ever held in England--he
+was an atheist when he came over to us, in the hope of mortifying
+his own church--but he is now--ho! ho!--a real Catholic devotee--
+quite afraid of my threats; I make him frequently scourge himself
+before me.  Well, Radicalism does us good service, especially
+amongst the lower classes, for Radicalism chiefly flourishes
+amongst them; for though a baronet or two may be found amongst the
+radicals, and perhaps as many lords--fellows who have been
+discarded by their own order for clownishness, or something they
+have done--it incontestably flourishes best among the lower orders.
+Then the love of what is foreign is a great friend to us; this love
+is chiefly confined to the middle and upper classes.  Some admire
+the French, and imitate them; others must needs be Spaniards, dress
+themselves up in a zamarra, stick a cigar in their mouth, and say,
+'Carajo.'  Others would pass for Germans; he! he! the idea of any
+one wishing to pass for a German! but what has done us more service
+than anything else in these regions--I mean amidst the middle
+classes--has been the novel, the Scotch novel.  The good folks,
+since they have read the novels, have become Jacobites; and,
+because all the Jacobs were Papists, the good folks must become
+Papists also, or, at least, papistically inclined.  The very Scotch
+Presbyterians, since they have read the novels, are become all but
+Papists; I speak advisedly, having lately been amongst them.
+There's a trumpery bit of a half papist sect, called the Scotch
+Episcopalian Church, which lay dormant and nearly forgotten for
+upwards of a hundred years, which has of late got wonderfully into
+fashion in Scotland, because, forsooth, some of the long-haired
+gentry of the novels were said to belong to it, such as Montrose
+and Dundee; and to this the Presbyterians are going over in
+throngs, traducing and vilifying their own forefathers, or denying
+them altogether, and calling themselves descendants of--ho! ho!
+ho!--Scottish Cavaliers!!!  I have heard them myself repeating
+snatches of Jacobite ditties about 'Bonnie Dundee,' and -
+
+
+"'Come, fill up my cup, and fill up my can,
+And saddle my horse, and call up my man.'
+
+
+There's stuff for you!  Not that I object to the first part of the
+ditty.  It is natural enough that a Scotchman should cry, 'Come,
+fill up my cup!' more especially if he's drinking at another
+person's expense--all Scotchmen being fond of liquor at free cost:
+but 'Saddle his horse!!!'--for what purpose, I would ask?  Where is
+the use of saddling a horse, unless you can ride him? and where was
+there ever a Scotchman who could ride?"
+
+"Of course you have not a drop of Scotch blood in your veins," said
+I, "otherwise you would never have uttered that last sentence."
+
+"Don't be too sure of that," said the man in black; "you know
+little of Popery if you imagine that it cannot extinguish love of
+country, even in a Scotchman.  A thorough-going Papist--and who
+more thorough-going than myself?--cares nothing for his country;
+and why should he? he belongs to a system, and not to a country."
+
+"One thing," said I, "connected with you, I cannot understand; you
+call yourself a thorough-going Papist, yet are continually saying
+the most pungent things against Popery, and turning to unbounded
+ridicule those who show any inclination to embrace it."
+
+"Rome is a very sensible old body," said the man in black, "and
+little cares what her children say, provided they do her bidding.
+She knows several things, and amongst others, that no servants work
+so hard and faithfully as those who curse their masters at every
+stroke they do.  She was not fool enough to be angry with the
+Miquelets of Alba, who renounced her, and called her 'puta' all the
+time they were cutting the throats of the Netherlanders.  Now, if
+she allowed her faithful soldiers the latitude of renouncing her,
+and calling her 'puta' in the market-place, think not she is so
+unreasonable as to object to her faithful priests occasionally
+calling her 'puta' in the dingle."
+
+"But," said I, "suppose some one were to tell the world some of the
+disorderly things which her priests say in the dingle?"
+
+"He would have the fate of Cassandra," said the man in black; "no
+one would believe him--yes, the priests would:  but they would make
+no sign of belief.  They believe in the Alcoran des Cordeliers--
+that is, those who have read it; but they make no sign."
+
+"A pretty system," said I, "which extinguishes love of country and
+of everything noble, and brings the minds of its ministers to a
+parity with those of devils, who delight in nothing but mischief."
+
+"The system," said the man in black, "is a grand one, with
+unbounded vitality.  Compare it with your Protestantism, and you
+will see the difference.  Popery is ever at work, whilst
+Protestantism is supine.  A pretty church, indeed, the Protestant!
+Why, it can't even work a miracle."
+
+"Can your church work miracles?" I demanded.
+
+"That was the very question," said the man in black, "which the
+ancient British clergy asked of Austin Monk, after they had been
+fools enough to acknowledge their own inability.  'We don't pretend
+to work miracles; do you?'  'Oh! dear me, yes,' said Austin; 'we
+find no difficulty in the matter.  We can raise the dead, we can
+make the blind see; and to convince you, I will give sight to the
+blind.  Here is this blind Saxon, whom you cannot cure, but on
+whose eyes I will manifest my power, in order to show the
+difference between the true and the false church;' and forthwith,
+with the assistance of a handkerchief and a little hot water, he
+opened the eyes of the barbarian.  So we manage matters!  A pretty
+church, that old British church, which could not work miracles--
+quite as helpless as the modern one.  The fools! was birdlime so
+scarce a thing amongst them?--and were the properties of warm water
+so unknown to them, that they could not close a pair of eyes and
+open them?"
+
+"It's a pity," said I, "that the British clergy at that interview
+with Austin, did not bring forward a blind Welshman, and ask the
+monk to operate upon him."
+
+"Clearly," said the man in black; "that's what they ought to have
+done; but they were fools without a single resource."  Here he took
+a sip at his glass.
+
+"But they did not believe in the miracle?" said I.
+
+"And what did their not believing avail them?" said the man in
+black.  "Austin remained master of the field, and they went away
+holding their heads down, and muttering to themselves.  What a fine
+subject for a painting would be Austin's opening the eyes of the
+Saxon barbarian, and the discomfiture of the British clergy!  I
+wonder it has not been painted!--he! he!"
+
+"I suppose your church still performs miracles occasionally!" said
+I.
+
+"It does," said the man in black.  "The Rev.--has lately been
+performing miracles in Ireland, destroying devils that had got
+possession of people; he has been eminently successful.  In two
+instances he not only destroyed the devils, but the lives of the
+people possessed--he! he!  Oh! there is so much energy in our
+system; we are always at work, whilst Protestantism is supine."
+
+"You must not imagine," said I, "that all Protestants are supine;
+some of them appear to be filled with unbounded zeal.  They deal,
+it is true, not in lying miracles, but they propagate God's Word.
+I remember only a few months ago, having occasion for a Bible,
+going to an establishment, the object of which was to send Bibles
+all over the world.  The supporters of that establishment could
+have no self-interested views; for I was supplied by them with a
+noble-sized Bible at a price so small as to preclude the idea that
+it could bring any profit to the vendors."
+
+The countenance of the man in black slightly fell.  "I know the
+people to whom you allude," said he; "indeed, unknown to them, I
+have frequently been to see them, and observed their ways.  I tell
+you frankly that there is not a set of people in this kingdom who
+have caused our church so much trouble and uneasiness.  I should
+rather say that they alone cause us any; for as for the rest, what
+with their drowsiness, their plethora, their folly and their
+vanity, they are doing us anything but mischief.  These fellows are
+a pestilent set of heretics, whom we would gladly see burnt; they
+are, with the most untiring perseverance, and in spite of divers
+minatory declarations of the holy father, scattering their books
+abroad through all Europe, and have caused many people in Catholic
+countries to think that hitherto their priesthood have endeavoured,
+as much as possible, to keep them blinded.  There is one fellow
+amongst them for whom we entertain a particular aversion; a big,
+burly parson, with the face of a lion, the voice of a buffalo, and
+a fist like a sledge-hammer.  The last time I was there, I observed
+that his eye was upon me, and I did not like the glance he gave me
+at all; I observed him clench his fist, and I took my departure as
+fast as I conveniently could.  Whether he suspected who I was, I
+know not; but I did not like his look at all, and do not intend to
+go again."
+
+"Well, then," said I, "you confess that you have redoubtable
+enemies to your plans in these regions, and that even amongst the
+ecclesiastics there are some widely different from those of the
+plethoric and Platitude schools?"
+
+"It is but too true," said the man in black; "and if the rest of
+your church were like them we should quickly bid adieu to all hope
+of converting these regions, but we are thankful to be able to say
+that such folks are not numerous; there are, moreover, causes at
+work quite sufficient to undermine even their zeal.  Their sons
+return at the vacations, from Oxford and Cambridge, puppies, full
+of the nonsense which they have imbibed from Platitude professors;
+and this nonsense they retail at home, where it fails not to make
+some impression, whilst the daughters scream--I beg their pardons--
+warble about Scotland's Montrose and Bonny Dundee, and all the
+Jacobs; so we have no doubt that their papas' zeal about the
+propagation of such a vulgar book as the Bible will in a very
+little time be terribly diminished.  Old Rome will win, so you had
+better join her."
+
+And the man in black drained the last drop in his glass.
+
+"Never," said I, "will I become the slave of Rome."
+
+"She will allow you latitude," said the man in black; "do but serve
+her, and she will allow you to call her 'puta' at a decent time and
+place, her popes occasionally call her 'puta.'  A pope has been
+known to start from his bed at midnight and rush out into the
+corridor, and call out 'puta' three times in a voice which pierced
+the Vatican; that pope was--"
+
+"Alexander the Sixth, I dare say," said I; "the greatest monster
+that ever existed, though the worthiest head which the pope system
+ever had--so his conscience was not always still.  I thought it had
+been seared with a brand of iron."
+
+"I did not allude to him, but to a much more modern pope," said the
+man in black; "it is true he brought the word, which is Spanish,
+from Spain, his native country, to Rome.  He was very fond of
+calling the church by that name, and other popes have taken it up.
+She will allow you to call her by it, if you belong to her."
+
+"I shall call her so," said I, "without belonging to her, or asking
+her permission."
+
+"She will allow you to treat her as such, if you belong to her,"
+said the man in black; "there is a chapel in Rome, where there is a
+wondrously fair statue--the son of a cardinal--I mean his nephew--
+once--Well, she did not cut off his head, but slightly boxed his
+cheek and bade him go."
+
+"I have read all about that in 'Keysler's Travels,'" said I; "do
+you tell her that I would not touch her with a pair of tongs,
+unless to seize her nose."
+
+"She is fond of lucre," said the man in black; "but does not grudge
+a faithful priest a little private perquisite," and he took out a
+very handsome gold repeater.
+
+"Are you not afraid," said I, "to flash that watch before the eyes
+of a poor tinker in a dingle?"
+
+"Not before the eyes of one like you," said the man in black.
+
+"It is getting late," said I; "I care not for perquisites."
+
+"So you will not join us?" said the man in black.
+
+"You have had my answer," said I.
+
+"If I belong to Rome," said the man in black, "why should not you?"
+
+"I may be a poor tinker," said I; "but I may never have undergone
+what you have.  You remember, perhaps, the fable of the fox who had
+lost his tail?"
+
+The man in black winced, but almost immediately recovering himself,
+he said, "Well, we can do without you, we are sure of winning."
+
+"It is not the part of wise people," said I, "to make sure of the
+battle before it is fought:  there's the landlord of the public-
+house, who made sure that his cocks would win, yet the cocks lost
+the main, and the landlord is little better than a bankrupt."
+
+"People very different from the landlord," said the man in black,
+"both in intellect and station, think we shall surely win; there
+are clever machinators among us who have no doubt of our success."
+
+"Well," said I, "I will set the landlord aside, and will adduce one
+who was in every point a very different person from the landlord,
+both in understanding and station; he was very fond of laying
+schemes, and, indeed, many of them turned out successful.  His last
+and darling one, however, miscarried, notwithstanding that by his
+calculations he had persuaded himself that there was no possibility
+of its failing--the person that I allude to was old Fraser--"
+
+"Who?" said the man in black, giving a start, and letting his glass
+fall.
+
+"Old Fraser, of Lovat," said I, "the prince of all conspirators and
+machinators; he made sure of placing the Pretender on the throne of
+these realms.  'I can bring into the field so many men,' said he;
+'my son-in-law Cluny, so many, and likewise my cousin, and my good
+friend;' then speaking of those on whom the government reckoned for
+support, he would say, 'So and so are lukewarm, this person is
+ruled by his wife, who is with us, the clergy are anything but
+hostile to us, and as for the soldiers and sailors, half are
+disaffected to King George, and the rest cowards.'  Yet when things
+came to a trial, this person whom he had calculated upon to join
+the Pretender did not stir from his home, another joined the
+hostile ranks, the presumed cowards turned out heroes, and those
+whom he thought heroes ran away like lusty fellows at Culloden; in
+a word, he found himself utterly mistaken, and in nothing more than
+in himself; he thought he was a hero, and proved himself nothing
+more than an old fox; he got up a hollow tree, didn't he, just like
+a fox?
+
+
+"'L'opere sue non furon leonine, ma di volpe.'"
+
+
+The man in black sat silent for a considerable time, and at length
+answered in rather a faltering voice, "I was not prepared for this;
+you have frequently surprised me by your knowledge of things which
+I should never have expected any person of your appearance to be
+acquainted with, but that you should be aware of my name is a
+circumstance utterly incomprehensible to me.  I had imagined that
+no person in England was acquainted with it; indeed, I don't see
+how any person should be, I have revealed it to no one, not being
+particularly proud of it.  Yes, I acknowledge that my name is
+Fraser, and that I am of the blood of that family or clan, of which
+the rector of our college once said, that he was firmly of opinion
+that every individual member was either rogue or fool.  I was born
+at Madrid, of pure, oime, Fraser blood.  My parents, at an early
+age, took me to -, where they shortly died, not, however, before
+they had placed me in the service of a cardinal, with whom I
+continued for some years, and who, when he had no further occasion
+for me, sent me to the college, in the left-hand cloister of which,
+as you enter, rest the bones of Sir John -; there, in studying
+logic and humane letters, I lost whatever of humanity I had
+retained when discarded by the cardinal.  Let me not, however,
+forget two points,--I am a Fraser, it is true, but not a Flannagan;
+I may bear the vilest name of Britain, but not of Ireland; I was
+bred up at the English house, and there is at--a house for the
+education of bogtrotters; I was not bred up at that; beneath the
+lowest gulf, there is one yet lower; whatever my blood may be, it
+is at least not Irish; whatever my education may have been, I was
+not bred at the Irish seminary--on those accounts I am thankful--
+yes, per dio!  I am thankful.  After some years at college--but why
+should I tell you my history? you know it already perfectly well,
+probably much better than myself.  I am now a missionary priest,
+labouring in heretic England, like Parsons and Garnet of old, save
+and except that, unlike them, I run no danger, for the times are
+changed.  As I told you before, I shall cleave to Rome--I must; no
+hay remedio, as they say at Madrid, and I will do my best to
+further her holy plans--he! he!--but I confess I begin to doubt of
+their being successful here--you put me out; old Fraser, of Lovat!
+I have heard my father talk of him; he had a gold-headed cane, with
+which he once knocked my grandfather down--he was an astute one,
+but, as you say, mistaken, particularly in himself.  I have read
+his life by Arbuthnot, it is in the library of our college.
+Farewell!  I shall come no more to this dingle--to come would be of
+no utility; I shall go and labour elsewhere, though--how you came
+to know my name, is a fact quite inexplicable--farewell! to you
+both."
+
+He then arose; and without further salutation departed from the
+dingle, in which I never saw him again.  "How, in the name of
+wonder, came you to know that man's name?" said Belle, after he had
+been gone some time.
+
+"I, Belle?  I knew nothing of the fellow's name, I assure you."
+
+"But you mentioned his name."
+
+"If I did, it was merely casually, by way of illustration.  I was
+saying how frequently cunning people were mistaken in their
+calculations, and I adduced the case of old Fraser, of Lovat, as
+one in point; I brought forward his name, because I was well
+acquainted with his history, from having compiled and inserted it
+in a wonderful work, which I edited some months ago, entitled
+'Newgate Lives and Trials,' but without the slightest idea that it
+was the name of him who was sitting with us; he, however, thought
+that I was aware of his name.  Belle! Belle! for a long time I
+doubted the truth of Scripture, owing to certain conceited
+individuals, but now I begin to believe firmly; what wonderful
+texts are in Scripture, Belle; 'The wicked trembleth where--where--
+'"
+
+"'They were afraid where no fear was; thou hast put them to
+confusion, because God hath despised them,'" said Belle; "I have
+frequently read it before the clergyman in the great house of Long
+Melford.  But if you did not know the man's name, why let him go
+away supposing that you did?"
+
+"Oh, if he was fool enough to make such a mistake, I was not going
+to undeceive him--no, no!  Let the enemies of old England make the
+most of all their blunders and mistakes, they will have no help
+from me; but enough of the fellow, Belle; let us now have tea, and
+after that--"
+
+"No Armenian," said Belle; "but I want to ask a question:  pray are
+all people of that man's name either rogues or fools?"
+
+"It is impossible for me to say, Belle, this person being the only
+one of the name I have ever personally known.  I suppose there are
+good and bad, clever and foolish, amongst them, as amongst all
+large bodies of people; however, after the tribe had been governed
+for upwards of thirty years, by such a person as old Fraser, it
+were no wonder if the greater part had become either rogues or
+fools:  he was a ruthless tyrant, Belle, over his own people, and
+by his cruelty and rapaciousness must either have stunned them into
+an apathy approaching to idiotcy, or made them artful knaves in
+their own defence.  The qualities of parents are generally
+transmitted to their descendants--the progeny of trained pointers
+are almost sure to point, even without being taught:  if,
+therefore, all Frasers are either rogues or fools, as this person
+seems to insinuate, it is little to be wondered at, their parents
+or grandparents having been in the training-school of old Fraser!
+But enough of the old tyrant and his slaves.  Belle, prepare tea
+this moment, or dread my anger.  I have not a gold-headed cane like
+old Fraser of Lovat, but I have, what some people would dread much
+more, an Armenian rune-stick."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+
+Fresh Arrivals--Pitching the Tent--Certificated Wife--High-flying
+Notions.
+
+
+On the following morning, as I was about to leave my tent, I heard
+the voice of Belle at the door, exclaiming, "Sleepest thou, or
+wakest thou?"  "I was never more awake in my life," said I, going
+out.  "What is the matter?"  "He of the horse-shoe," said she,
+"Jasper, of whom I have heard you talk, is above there on the field
+with all his people; I went out about a quarter of an hour ago to
+fill the kettle at the spring, and saw them arriving.  "It is
+well," said I; "have you any objection to asking him and his wife
+to breakfast?"  "You can do as you please," said she; "I have cups
+enough, and have no objection to their company."  "We are the first
+occupiers of the ground," said I, "and, being so, should consider
+ourselves in the light of hosts, and do our best to practise the
+duties of hospitality."  "How fond you are of using that word,"
+said Belle; "if you wish to invite the man and his wife, do so,
+without more ado; remember, however, that I have not cups enough,
+nor indeed tea enough, for the whole company."  Thereupon hurrying
+up the ascent, I presently found myself outside the dingle.  It was
+as usual a brilliant morning, the dewy blades of the rye-grass
+which covered the plain sparkled brightly in the beams of the sun,
+which had probably been about two hours above the horizon.  A
+rather numerous body of my ancient friends and allies occupied the
+ground in the vicinity of the mouth of the dingle.  About five
+yards on the right I perceived Mr. Petulengro busily employed in
+erecting his tent; he held in his hand an iron bar, sharp at the
+bottom, with a kind of arm projecting from the top for the purpose
+of supporting a kettle or cauldron over the fire, and which is
+called in the Romanian language "Kekauviskoe saster."  With the
+sharp end of this Mr. Petulengro was making holes in the earth, at
+about twenty inches distant from each other, into which he inserted
+certain long rods with a considerable bend towards the top, which
+constituted no less than the timber of the tent, and the supporters
+of the canvas.  Mrs. Petulengro, and a female with a crutch in her
+hand, whom I recognised as Mrs. Chikno, sat near him on the ground,
+whilst two or three children, from six to ten years old, who
+composed the young family of Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro, were playing
+about.
+
+"Here we are, brother," said Mr. Petulengro, as he drove the sharp
+end of the bar into the ground; "here we are, and plenty of us--
+Bute dosta Romany chals."
+
+"I am glad to see you all," said I; "and particularly you, madam,"
+said I, making a bow to Mrs. Petulengro; "and you also, madam,"
+taking off my hat to Mrs. Chikno.
+
+"Good-day to you, sir," said Mrs. Petulengro; "you look, as usual,
+charmingly, and speak so, too; you have not forgot your manners."
+
+"It is not all gold that glitters," said Mrs. Chikno.  "However,
+good-morrow to you, young rye."
+
+"I do not see Tawno," said I, looking around; "where is he?"
+
+"Where, indeed!" said Mrs. Chikno; "I don't know; he who
+countenances him in the roving line can best answer."
+
+"He will be here anon," said Mr. Petulengro; "he has merely ridden
+down a by-road to show a farmer a two-year-old colt; she heard me
+give him directions, but she can't be satisfied."
+
+"I can't indeed," said Mrs. Chikno.
+
+"And why not, sister?"
+
+"Because I place no confidence in your words, brother; as I said
+before, you countenances him."
+
+"Well," said I, "I know nothing of your private concerns; I am come
+on an errand.  Isopel Berners, down in the dell there, requests the
+pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro's company at breakfast.  She
+will be happy also to see you, madam," said I, addressing Mrs.
+Chikno.
+
+"Is that young female your wife, young man?" said Mrs. Chikno.
+
+"My wife?" said I.
+
+"Yes, young man; your wife, your lawful certificated wife?"
+
+"No," said I; "she is not my wife."
+
+"Then I will not visit with her," said Mrs. Chikno; "I countenance
+nothing in the roving line."
+
+"What do you mean by the roving line?" I demanded.
+
+"What do I mean by the roving line?  Why, by it I mean such conduct
+as is not tatcheno.  When ryes and rawnies live together in
+dingles, without being certificated, I call such behaviour being
+tolerably deep in the roving line, everything savouring of which I
+am determined not to sanctify.  I have suffered too much by my own
+certificated husband's outbreaks in that line to afford anything of
+the kind the slightest shadow of countenance."
+
+"It is hard that people may not live in dingles together without
+being suspected of doing wrong," said I.
+
+"So it is," said Mrs. Petulengro, interposing; "and, to tell you
+the truth, I am altogether surprised at the illiberality of my
+sister's remarks.  I have often heard say, that it is in good
+company--and I have kept good company in my time--that suspicion is
+king's evidence of a narrow and uncultivated mind; on which account
+I am suspicious of nobody, not even of my own husband, whom some
+people would think I have a right to be suspicious of, seeing that
+on his account I once refused a lord; but ask him whether I am
+suspicious of him, and whether I seek to keep him close tied to my
+apron-string; he will tell you nothing of the kind; but that, on
+the contrary, I always allows him an agreeable latitude, permitting
+him to go where he pleases, and to converse with any one to whose
+manner of speaking he may take a fancy.  But I have had the
+advantage of keeping good company, and therefore--"
+
+"Meklis," said Mrs. Chikno, "pray drop all that, sister; I believe
+I have kept as good company as yourself; and with respect to that
+offer with which you frequently fatigue those who keeps company
+with you, I believe, after all, it was something in the roving and
+uncertificated line."
+
+"In whatever line it was," said Mrs. Petulengro, "the offer was a
+good one.  The young duke--for he was not only a lord, but a duke
+too--offered to keep me a fine carriage, and to make me his second
+wife; for it is true that he had another who was old and stout,
+though mighty rich, and highly good-natured; so much so, indeed,
+that the young lord assured me that she would have no manner of
+objection to the arrangement; more especially if I would consent to
+live in the same house with her, being fond of young and cheerful
+society.  So you see--"
+
+"Yes, yes," said Mrs. Chikno, "I see, what I before thought, that
+it was altogether in the uncertificated line."
+
+"Meklis," said Mrs. Petulengro; "I use your own word, madam, which
+is Romany:  for my own part, I am not fond of using Romany words,
+unless I can hope to pass them off for French, which I cannot in
+the present company.  I heartily wish that there was no such
+language, and do my best to keep it away from my children, lest the
+frequent use of it should altogether confirm them in low and vulgar
+habits.  I have four children, madam, but--"
+
+"I suppose by talking of your four children you wish to check me
+for having none," said Mrs. Chikno, bursting into tears; "if I have
+no children, sister, it is no fault of mine, it is--but why do I
+call you sister?" said she, angrily; "you are no sister of mine,
+you are a grasni, a regular mare--a pretty sister, indeed, ashamed
+of your own language.  I remember well that by your high-flying
+notions you drove your own mother--"
+
+"We will drop it," said Mrs. Petulengro; "I do not wish to raise my
+voice, and to make myself ridiculous.  Young gentleman," said she,
+"pray present my compliments to Miss Isopel Berners, and inform her
+that I am very sorry that I cannot accept her polite invitation.  I
+am just arrived, and have some slight domestic matters to see to--
+amongst others, to wash my children's faces; but that in the course
+of the forenoon, when I have attended to what I have to do, and
+have dressed myself, I hope to do myself the honour of paying her a
+regular visit; you will tell her that, with my compliments.  With
+respect to my husband he can answer for himself, as I, not being of
+a jealous disposition, never interferes with his matters."
+
+"And tell Miss Berners," said Mr. Petulengro, "that I shall be
+happy to wait upon her in company with my wife as soon as we are
+regularly settled:  at present I have much on my hands, having not
+only to pitch my own tent, but this here jealous woman's, whose
+husband is absent on my business."
+
+Thereupon I returned to the dingle, and, without saying anything
+about Mrs. Chikno's observations, communicated to Isopel the
+messages of Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro; Isopel made no other reply
+than by replacing in her coffer two additional cups and saucers,
+which, in expectation of company, she had placed upon the board.
+The kettle was by this time boiling.  We sat down, and, as we
+breakfasted, I gave Isopel Berners another lesson in the Armenian
+language.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+
+The Promised Visit--Roman Fashion--Wizard and Witch--Catching at
+Words--The Two Females--Dressing of Hair--The New Roads--Belle's
+Altered Appearance--Herself Again.
+
+
+About mid-day Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro came to the dingle to pay the
+promised visit.  Belle, at the time of their arrival, was in her
+tent, but I was at the fire-place, engaged in hammering part of the
+outer-tire, or defence, which had come off from one of the wheels
+of my vehicle.  On perceiving them I forthwith went to receive
+them.  Mr. Petulengro was dressed in Roman fashion, with a somewhat
+smartly-cut sporting-coat, the buttons of which were half-crowns--
+and a waistcoat, scarlet and black, the buttons of which were
+spaded half-guineas; his breeches were of a stuff half velveteen,
+half corduroy, the cords exceedingly broad.  He had leggings of
+buff cloth, furred at the bottom; and upon his feet were highlows.
+Under his left arm was a long black whalebone riding-whip, with a
+red lash, and an immense silver knob.  Upon his head was a hat with
+a high peak, somewhat of the kind which the Spaniards call calane,
+so much in favour with the bravos of Seville and Madrid.  Now, when
+I have added that Mr. Petulengro had on a very fine white holland
+shirt, I think I have described his array.  Mrs. Petulengro--I beg
+pardon for not having spoken of her first--was also arrayed very
+much in the Roman fashion.  Her hair, which was exceedingly black
+and lustrous, fell in braids on either side of her head.  In her
+ears were rings, with long drops of gold.  Round her neck was a
+string of what seemed very much like very large pearls, somewhat
+tarnished, however, and apparently of considerable antiquity.
+"Here we are, brother," said Mr. Petulengro; "here we are, come to
+see you--wizard and witch, witch and wizard:-
+
+
+"'There's a chovahanee, and a chovahano,
+The nav se len is Petulengro.'"
+
+
+"Hold your tongue, sir," said Mrs. Petulengro; "you make me ashamed
+of you with your vulgar ditties.  We are come a visiting now, and
+everything low should be left behind."
+
+"True," said Mr. Petulengro; "why bring what's low to the dingle,
+which is low enough already?"
+
+"What, are you a catcher at words?" said I.  "I thought that
+catching at words had been confined to the pothouse farmers and
+village witty bodies."
+
+"All fools," said Mrs. Petulengro, "catch at words, and very
+naturally, as by so doing they hope to prevent the possibility of
+rational conversation.  Catching at words confined to pothouse
+farmers, and village witty bodies!  No, not to Jasper Petulengro.
+Listen for an hour or two to the discourse of a set they call
+newspaper editors, and if you don't go out and eat grass, as a dog
+does when he is sick, I am no female woman.  The young lord whose
+hand I refused when I took up with wise Jasper, once brought two of
+them to my mother's tan, when hankering after my company; they did
+nothing but carp at each other's words, and a pretty hand they made
+of it.  Ill-favoured dogs they were; and their attempts at what
+they called wit almost as unfortunate as their countenances."
+
+"Well," said I, "madam, we will drop all catchings and carpings for
+the present.  Pray take your seat on this stool, whilst I go and
+announce to Miss Isopel Berners your arrival."
+
+Thereupon I went to Belle's habitation, and informed her that Mr.
+and Mrs. Petulengro had paid us a visit of ceremony, and were
+awaiting her at the fire-place.  "Pray go and tell them that I am
+busy," said Belle, who was engaged with her needle.  "I do not feel
+disposed to take part in any such nonsense."  "I shall do no such
+thing," said I; "and I insist upon your coming forthwith, and
+showing proper courtesy to your visitors.  If you do not, their
+feelings will be hurt, and you are aware that I cannot bear that
+people's feelings should be outraged.  Come this moment, or--"  "Or
+what?" said Belle, half smiling.  "I was about to say something in
+Armenian," said I.  "Well," said Belle, laying down her work, "I
+will come."  "Stay," said I; "your hair is hanging about your ears,
+and your dress is in disorder; you had better stay a minute or two
+to prepare yourself to appear before your visitors, who have come
+in their very best attire."  "No," said Belle, "I will make no
+alteration in my appearance; you told me to come this moment, and
+you shall be obeyed."  So Belle and I advanced towards our guests.
+As we drew nigh Mr. Petulengro took off his hat, and made a
+profound obeisance to Belle, whilst Mrs. Petulengro rose from the
+stool, and made a profound curtsey.  Belle, who had flung her hair
+back over her shoulders, returned their salutations by bending her
+head, and after slightly glancing at Mr. Petulengro, fixed her
+large blue eyes full upon his wife.  Both these females were very
+handsome--but how unlike!  Belle fair, with blue eyes and flaxen
+hair; Mrs. Petulengro with olive complexion, eyes black, and hair
+dark--as dark as could be.  Belle, in demeanour calm and proud; the
+gypsy graceful, but full of movement and agitation.  And then how
+different were those two in stature!  The head of the Romany rawnie
+scarcely ascended to the breast of Isopel Berners.  I could see
+that Mrs. Petulengro gazed on Belle with unmixed admiration; so did
+her husband.  "Well," said the latter, "one thing I will say, which
+is, that there is only one on earth worthy to stand up in front of
+this she, and that is the beauty of the world, as far as man flesh
+is concerned, Tawno Chikno; what a pity he did not come down!"
+
+"Tawno Chikno," said Mrs. Petulengro, flaring up; "a pretty fellow
+he to stand up in front of this gentlewoman, a pity he didn't come,
+quotha? not at all, the fellow is a sneak, afraid of his wife.  He
+stand up against this rawnie! why, the look she has given me would
+knock the fellow down."
+
+"It is easier to knock him down with a look than with a fist," said
+Mr. Petulengro; "that is, if the look comes from a woman:  not that
+I am disposed to doubt that this female gentlewoman is able to
+knock him down either one way or the other.  I have heard of her
+often enough, and have seen her once or twice, though not so near
+as now.  Well, ma'am, my wife and I are come to pay our respects to
+you; we are both glad to find that you have left off keeping
+company with Flaming Bosville, and have taken up with my pal; he is
+not very handsome, but a better--"
+
+"I take up with your pal, as you call him! you had better mind what
+you say," said Isopel Berners, "I take up with nobody."
+
+"I merely mean taking up your quarters with him," said Mr.
+Petulengro; "and I was only about to say a better fellow-lodger you
+cannot have, or a more instructive, especially if you have a desire
+to be inoculated with tongues, as he calls them.  I wonder whether
+you and he have had any tongue-work already."
+
+"Have you and your wife anything particular to say? if you have
+nothing but this kind of conversation I must leave you, as I am
+going to make a journey this afternoon, and should be getting
+ready."
+
+"You must excuse my husband, madam," said Mrs. Petulengro, "he is
+not overburdened with understanding, and has said but one word of
+sense since he has been here, which was that we came to pay our
+respects to you.  We have dressed ourselves in our best Roman way,
+in order to do honour to you; perhaps you do not like it; if so, I
+am sorry.  I have no French clothes, madam; if I had any, madam, I
+would have come in them, in order to do you more honour."
+
+"I like to see you much better as you are," said Belle; "people
+should keep to their own fashions, and yours is very pretty."
+
+"I am glad you are pleased to think it so, madam; it has been
+admired in the great city; it created what they call a sensation;
+and some of the great ladies, the court ladies, imitated it, else I
+should not appear in it so often as I am accustomed; for I am not
+very fond of what is Roman, having an imagination that what is
+Roman is ungenteel; in fact, I once heard the wife of a rich
+citizen say that gypsies were vulgar creatures.  I should have
+taken her saying very much to heart, but for her improper
+pronunciation; she could not pronounce her words, madam, which we
+gypsies, as they call us, usually can, so I thought she was no very
+high purchase.  You are very beautiful, madam, though you are not
+dressed as I could wish to see you, and your hair is hanging down
+in sad confusion; allow me to assist you in arranging your hair,
+madam; I will dress it for you in our fashion; I would fain see how
+your hair would look in our poor gypsy fashion; pray allow me,
+madam?" and she took Belle by the hand.
+
+"I really can do no such thing," said Belle, withdrawing her hand;
+"I thank you for coming to see me, but--"
+
+"Do allow me to officiate upon your hair, madam," said Mrs.
+Petulengro.  "I should esteem your allowing me a great mark of
+condescension.  You are very beautiful, madam, and I think you
+doubly so, because you are so fair; I have a great esteem for
+persons with fair complexions and hair; I have a less regard for
+people with dark hair and complexions, madam."
+
+"Then why did you turn off the lord, and take up with me?" said Mr.
+Petulengro; "that same lord was fair enough all about him."
+
+"People do when they are young and silly what they sometimes repent
+of when they are of riper years and understandings.  I sometimes
+think that had I not been something of a simpleton, I might at this
+time be a great court lady.  Now, madam," said she, again taking
+Belle by the hand, "do oblige me by allowing me to plait your hair
+a little?"
+
+"I have really a good mind to be angry with you," said Belle,
+giving Mrs. Petulengro a peculiar glance.
+
+"Do allow her to arrange your hair," said I; "she means no harm,
+and wishes to do you honour; do oblige her and me too, for I should
+like to see how your hair would look dressed in her fashion."
+
+"You hear what the young rye says?" said Mrs. Petulengro.  "I am
+sure you will oblige the young rye, if not myself.  Many people
+would be willing to oblige the young rye, if he would but ask them;
+but he is not in the habit of asking favours.  He has a nose of his
+own, which he keeps tolerably exalted; he does not think small-beer
+of himself, madam; and all the time I have been with him, I never
+heard him ask a favour before; therefore, madam, I am sure you will
+oblige him.  My sister Ursula would be very willing to oblige him
+in many things, but he will not ask for anything, except for such a
+favour as a word, which is a poor favour after all.  I don't mean
+for her word; perhaps he will some day ask you for your word.  If
+so--"
+
+"Why, here you are, after railing at me for catching at words,
+catching at a word yourself," said Mr. Petulengro.
+
+"Hold your tongue, sir," said Mrs. Petulengro.  "Don't interrupt me
+in my discourse; if I caught at a word now, I am not in the habit
+of doing so.  I am no conceited body; no newspaper Neddy; no
+pothouse witty person.  I was about to say, madam, that if the
+young rye asks you at any time for your word, you will do as you
+deem convenient; but I am sure you will oblige him by allowing me
+to braid your hair."
+
+"I shall not do it to oblige him," said Belle; "the young rye, as
+you call him, is nothing to me."
+
+"Well, then, to oblige me," said Mrs. Petulengro; "do allow me to
+become your poor tire-woman."
+
+"It is great nonsense," said Belle, reddening; "however, as you
+came to see me, and ask the matter as a particular favour to
+yourself--"
+
+"Thank you, madam," said Mrs. Petulengro, leading Belle to the
+stool; "please to sit down here.  Thank you; your hair is very
+beautiful, madam," she continued, as she proceeded to braid Belle's
+hair; "so is your countenance.  Should you ever go to the great
+city, among the grand folks, you would make a sensation, madam.  I
+have made one myself, who am dark; the chi she is kauley, which
+last word signifies black, which I am not, though rather dark.
+There is no colour like white, madam; it's so lasting, so genteel.
+Gentility will carry the day, madam, even with the young rye.  He
+will ask words of the black lass, but beg the word of the fair."
+
+In the meantime Mr. Petulengro and myself entered into
+conversation.  "Any news stirring, Mr. Petulengro?" said I.  "Have
+you heard anything of the great religious movements?"
+
+"Plenty," said Mr. Petulengro; "all the religious people, more
+especially the Evangelicals--those that go about distributing
+tracts--are very angry about the fight between Gentleman Cooper and
+White-headed Bob, which they say ought not to have been permitted
+to take place; and then they are trying all they can to prevent the
+fight between the lion and the dogs, which they say is a disgrace
+to a Christian country.  Now I can't say that I have any quarrel
+with the religious party and the Evangelicals; they are always
+civil to me and mine, and frequently give us tracts, as they call
+them, which neither I nor mine can read; but I cannot say that I
+approve of any movements, religious or not, which have in aim to
+put down all life and manly sport in this here country."
+
+"Anything else?" said I.
+
+"People are becoming vastly sharp," said Mr. Petulengro; "and I am
+told that all the old-fashioned good-tempered constables are going
+to be set aside, and a paid body of men to be established, who are
+not to permit a tramper or vagabond on the roads of England;--and
+talking of roads, puts me in mind of a strange story I heard two
+nights ago, whilst drinking some beer at a public-house in company
+with my cousin Sylvester.  I had asked Tawno to go, but his wife
+would not let him.  Just opposite me, smoking their pipes, were a
+couple of men, something like engineers, and they were talking of a
+wonderful invention which was to make a wonderful alteration in
+England; inasmuch as it would set aside all the old roads, which in
+a little time would be ploughed up, and sowed with corn, and cause
+all England to be laid down with iron roads, on which people would
+go thundering along in vehicles, pushed forward by fire and smoke.
+Now, brother, when I heard this, I did not feel very comfortable;
+for I thought to myself, what a queer place such a road would be to
+pitch one's tent upon, and how impossible it would be for one's
+cattle to find a bite of grass upon it; and I thought likewise of
+the danger to which one's family would be exposed in being run over
+and severely scorched by these same flying fiery vehicles; so I
+made bold to say, that I hoped such an invention would never be
+countenanced, because it was likely to do a great deal of harm.
+Whereupon, one of the men, giving me a glance, said, without taking
+the pipe out of his mouth, that for his part, he sincerely hoped
+that it would take effect; and if it did no other good than
+stopping the rambles of gypsies, and other like scamps, it ought to
+be encouraged.  Well, brother, feeling myself insulted, I put my
+hand into my pocket, in order to pull out money, intending to
+challenge him to fight for a five-shilling stake, but merely found
+sixpence, having left all my other money at the tent; which
+sixpence was just sufficient to pay for the beer which Sylvester
+and myself were drinking, of whom I couldn't hope to borrow
+anything--'poor as Sylvester' being a by-word amongst us.  So, not
+being able to back myself, I held my peace, and let the Gorgio have
+it all his own way, who, after turning up his nose at me, went on
+discoursing about the said invention, saying what a fund of profit
+it would be to those who knew how to make use of it, and should
+have the laying down of the new roads, and the shoeing of England
+with iron.  And after he had said this, and much more of the same
+kind, which I cannot remember, he and his companion got up and
+walked away; and presently I and Sylvester got up and walked to our
+camp; and there I lay down in my tent by the side of my wife, where
+I had an ugly dream of having camped upon an iron road; my tent
+being overturned by a flying vehicle; my wife's leg injured; and
+all my affairs put into great confusion."
+
+"Now, madam," said Mrs. Petulengro, "I have braided your hair in
+our fashion:  you look very beautiful, madam; more beautiful, if
+possible, than before."  Belle now rose, and came forward with her
+tire-woman.  Mr. Petulengro was loud in his applause, but I said
+nothing, for I did not think Belle was improved in appearance by
+having submitted to the ministry of Mrs. Petulengro's hand.  Nature
+never intended Belle to appear as a gypsy; she had made her too
+proud and serious.  A more proper part for her was that of a
+heroine, a queenly heroine,--that of Theresa of Hungary, for
+example; or, better still, that of Brynhilda the Valkyrie, the
+beloved of Sigurd, the serpent-killer, who incurred the curse of
+Odin, because, in the tumult of spears, she sided with the young
+king, and doomed the old warrior to die, to whom Odin had promised
+victory.
+
+Belle looked at me for a moment in silence; then turning to Mrs.
+Petulengro, she said, "You have had your will with me; are you
+satisfied?"  "Quite so, madam," said Mrs. Petulengro, "and I hope
+you will be so too, as soon as you have looked in the glass."  "I
+have looked in one already," said Belle; "and the glass does not
+flatter."  "You mean the face of the young rye," said Mrs.
+Petulengro; "never mind him, madam; the young rye, though he knows
+a thing or two, is not a university, nor a person of universal
+wisdom.  I assure you, that you never looked so well before; and I
+hope that, from this moment, you will wear your hair in this way."
+"And who is to braid it in this way?" said Belle, smiling.  "I,
+madam," said Mrs. Petulengro; "I will braid it for you every
+morning, if you will but be persuaded to join us.  Do so, madam,
+and I think, if you did, the young rye would do so too."  "The
+young rye is nothing to me, nor I to him," said Belle; "we have
+stayed some time together; but our paths will soon be apart.  Now,
+farewell, for I am about to take a journey."  "And you will go out
+with your hair as I have braided it," said Mrs. Petulengro; "if you
+do, everybody will be in love with you."  "No," said Belle;
+"hitherto I have allowed you to do what you please, but henceforth
+I shall have my own way.  Come, come," said she, observing that the
+gypsy was about to speak, "we have had enough of nonsense; whenever
+I leave this hollow, it will be wearing my hair in my own fashion."
+"Come, wife," said Mr. Petulengro; "we will no longer intrude upon
+the rye and rawnie; there is such a thing as being troublesome."
+Thereupon Mr. Petulengro and his wife took their leave, with many
+salutations.  "Then you are going?" said I, when Belle and I were
+left alone.  "Yes," said Belle; "I am going on a journey; my
+affairs compel me."  "But you will return again?" said I.  "Yes,"
+said Belle, "I shall return once more."  "Once more," said I; "what
+do you mean by once more?  The Petulengros will soon be gone, and
+will you abandon me in this place?"  "You were alone here," said
+Belle, "before I came, and I suppose, found it agreeable, or you
+would not have stayed in it."  "Yes," said I, "that was before I
+knew you; but having lived with you here, I should be very loth to
+live here without you."  "Indeed," said Belle; "I did not know that
+I was of so much consequence to you.  Well, the day is wearing
+away--I must go and harness Traveller to the cart."  "I will do
+that," said I, "or anything else you may wish me.  Go and prepare
+yourself; I will see after Traveller and the cart."  Belle departed
+to her tent, and I set about performing the task I had undertaken.
+In about half-an-hour Belle again made her appearance--she was
+dressed neatly and plainly.  Her hair was no longer in the Roman
+fashion, in which Pakomovna had plaited it, but was secured by a
+comb; she held a bonnet in her hand.  "Is there anything else I can
+do for you?" I demanded.  "There are two or three bundles by my
+tent, which you can put into the cart," said Belle.  I put the
+bundles into the cart, and then led Traveller and the cart up the
+winding path to the mouth of the dingle, near which was Mr.
+Petulengro's encampment.  Belle followed.  At the top, I delivered
+the reins into her hands; we looked at each other stedfastly for
+some time.  Belle then departed, and I returned to the dingle,
+where, seating myself on my stone, I remained for upwards of an
+hour in thought.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+
+The Festival--The Gypsy Song--Piramus of Rome--The Scotchman--Gypsy
+Names.
+
+
+On the following day there was much feasting amongst the Romany
+chals of Mr. Petulengro's party.  Throughout the forenoon the
+Romany chies did scarcely anything but cook flesh, and the flesh
+which they cooked was swine's flesh.  About two o'clock, the chals
+dividing themselves into various parties, sat down and partook of
+the fare, which was partly roasted, partly sodden.  I dined that
+day with Mr. Petulengro and his wife and family, Ursula, Mr. and
+Mrs. Chikno, and Sylvester and his two children.  Sylvester, it
+will be as well to say, was a widower, and had consequently no one
+to cook his victuals for him, supposing he had any, which was not
+always the case, Sylvester's affairs being seldom in a prosperous
+state.  He was noted for his bad success in trafficking,
+notwithstanding the many hints which he received from Jasper, under
+whose protection he had placed himself, even as Tawno Chikno had
+done, who himself, as the reader has heard on a former occasion,
+was anything but a wealthy subject, though he was at all times
+better off than Sylvester, the Lazarus of the Romany tribe.
+
+All our party ate with a good appetite, except myself, who, feeling
+rather melancholy that day, had little desire to eat.  I did not,
+like the others, partake of the pork, but got my dinner entirely
+off the body of a squirrel which had been shot the day before by a
+chal of the name of Piramus, who, besides being a good shot, was
+celebrated for his skill in playing on the fiddle.  During the
+dinner a horn filled with ale passed frequently around; I drank of
+it more than once, and felt inspirited by the draughts.  The repast
+concluded, Sylvester and his children departed to their tent, and
+Mr. Petulengro, Tawno, and myself, getting up, went and lay down
+under a shady hedge, where Mr. Petulengro, lighting his pipe, began
+to smoke, and where Tawno presently fell asleep.  I was about to
+fall asleep also, when I heard the sound of music and song.
+Piramus was playing on the fiddle, whilst Mrs. Chikno, who had a
+voice of her own, was singing in tones sharp enough, but of great
+power, a gypsy song:-
+
+
+POISONING THE PORKER
+BY MRS. CHIKNO
+
+
+To mande shoon ye Romany chals
+Who besh in the pus about the yag,
+I'll pen how we drab the baulo,
+I'll pen how we drab the baulo.
+
+We jaws to the drab-engro ker,
+Trin horsworth there of drab we lels,
+And when to the swety back we wels
+We pens we'll drab the baulo,
+We'll have a drab at a baulo.
+
+And then we kairs the drab opre,
+And then we jaws to the farming ker,
+To mang a beti habben,
+A beti poggado habben.
+
+A rinkeno baulo there we dick,
+And then we pens in Romano jib;
+Wust lis odoi opre ye chick,
+And the baulo he will lel lis,
+The baulo he will lel lis.
+
+Coliko, coliko saulo we
+Apopli to the farming ker
+Will wel and mang him mullo,
+Will wel and mang his truppo.
+
+And so we kairs, and so we kairs;
+The baulo in the rarde mers;
+We mang him on the saulo,
+And rig to the tan the baulo.
+
+And then we toves the wendror well
+Till sore the wendror iuziou se,
+Till kekkeno drab's adrey lis,
+Till drab there's kek adrey lis.
+
+And then his truppo well we hatch,
+Kin levinor at the kitchema,
+And have a kosko habben,
+A kosko Romano habben.
+
+The boshom engro kils, he kils,
+The tawnie juva gils, she gils
+A puro Romano gillie,
+Now shoon the Romano gillie.
+
+
+Which song I had translated in the following manner, in my younger
+days, for a lady's album:
+
+
+Listen to me ye Romanlads, who are seated in the straw about the
+fire, and I will tell how we poison the porker, I will tell how we
+poison the porker.
+
+We go to the house of the poison-monger, where we buy three
+pennies' worth of bane, and when we return to our people we say, we
+will poison the porker; we will try and poison the porker.
+
+We then make up the poison, and then we take our way to the house
+of the farmer, as if to beg a bit of victuals, a little broken
+victuals.
+
+We see a jolly porker, and then we say in Roman language, "Fling
+the bane yonder amongst the dirt, and the porker soon will find it,
+the porker soon will find it."
+
+Early on the morrow, we will return to the farm-house, and beg the
+dead porker, the body of the dead porker.
+
+And so we do, even so we do; the porker dieth during the night; on
+the morrow we beg the porker, and carry to the tent the porker.
+
+And then we wash the inside well, till all the inside is perfectly
+clean, till there's no bane within it, not a poison grain within
+it.
+
+And then we roast the body well, send for ale to the alehouse, and
+have a merry banquet, a merry Roman banquet.
+
+The fellow with the fiddle plays, he plays; the little lassie
+sings, she sings an ancient Roman ditty; now hear the Roman ditty.
+
+
+SONG OF THE BROKEN CHASTITY
+BY URSULA
+
+
+Penn'd the Romany chi ke laki dye
+"Miry dearie dye mi shom cambri!"
+"And coin kerdo tute cambri,
+Miry dearie chi, miry Romany chi?"
+"O miry dye a boro rye,
+A bovalo rye, a gorgiko rye,
+Sos kistur pre a pellengo grye,
+'Twas yov sos kerdo man cambri."
+"Tu tawnie vassavie lubbeny,
+Tu chal from miry tan abri;
+Had a Romany cwal kair'd tute cambri,
+Then I had penn'd ke tute chie,
+But tu shan a vassavie lubbeny
+With gorgikie rat to be cambri."
+
+
+"There's some kernel in those songs, brother," said Mr. Petulengro,
+when the songs and music were over.
+
+"Yes," said I; "they are certainly very remarkable songs.  I say,
+Jasper, I hope you have not been drabbing baulor lately."
+
+"And suppose we have, brother, what then?"
+
+"Why, it is a very dangerous practice, to say nothing of the
+wickedness of it."
+
+"Necessity has no law, brother."
+
+"That is true," said I; "I have always said so, but you are not
+necessitous, and should not drab baulor."
+
+"And who told you we had been drabbing baulor?"
+
+"Why, you have had a banquet of pork, and after the banquet, Mrs.
+Chikno sang a song about drabbing baulor, so I naturally thought
+you might have lately been engaged in such a thing."
+
+"Brother, you occasionally utter a word or two of common sense.  It
+was natural for you to suppose, after seeing that dinner of pork,
+and hearing that song, that we had been drabbing baulor; I will now
+tell you that we have not been doing so.  What have you to say to
+that?"
+
+"That I am very glad of it."
+
+"Had you tasted that pork, brother, you would have found that it
+was sweet and tasty, which balluva that is drabbed can hardly be
+expected to be.  We have no reason to drab baulor at present, we
+have money and credit; but necessity has no law.  Our forefathers
+occasionally drabbed baulor; some of our people may still do such a
+thing, but only from compulsion."
+
+"I see," said I; "and at your merry meetings you sing songs upon
+the compulsatory deeds of your people, alias, their villainous
+actions; and, after all, what would the stirring poetry of any
+nation be, but for its compulsatory deeds?  Look at the poetry of
+Scotland, the heroic part, founded almost entirely on the
+villainous deeds of the Scotch nation; cow-stealing, for example,
+which is very little better than drabbing baulor; whilst the softer
+part is mostly about the slips of its females among the broom, so
+that no upholder of Scotch poetry could censure Ursula's song as
+indelicate, even if he understood it.  What do you think, Jasper?"
+
+"I think, brother, as I before said, that occasionally you utter a
+word of common sense; you were talking of the Scotch, brother; what
+do you think of a Scotchman finding fault with Romany!"
+
+"A Scotchman finding fault with Romany, Jasper!  Oh dear, but you
+joke, the thing could never be."
+
+"Yes, and at Piramus's fiddle; what do you think of a Scotchman
+turning up his nose at Piramus's fiddle?"
+
+"A Scotchman turning up his nose at Piramus's fiddle! nonsense,
+Jasper."
+
+"Do you know what I most dislike, brother?"
+
+"I do not, unless it be the constable, Jasper."
+
+"It is not the constable; it's a beggar on horseback, brother."
+
+"What do you mean by a beggar on horseback?"
+
+"Why, a scamp, brother, raised above his proper place, who takes
+every opportunity of giving himself fine airs.  About a week ago,
+my people and myself camped on a green by a plantation in the
+neighbourhood of a great house.  In the evening we were making
+merry, the girls were dancing, while Piramus was playing on the
+fiddle a tune of his own composing, to which he has given his own
+name, Piramus of Rome, and which is much celebrated amongst our
+people, and from which I have been told that one of the grand
+gorgio composers, who once heard it, has taken several hints.  So,
+as we were making merry, a great many grand people, lords and
+ladies, I believe, came from the great house, and looked on, as the
+girls danced to the tune of Piramus of Rome, and seemed much
+pleased; and when the girls had left off dancing, and Piramus
+playing, the ladies wanted to have their fortunes told; so I bade
+Mikailia Chikno, who can tell a fortune when she pleases better
+than any one else, tell them a fortune, and she, being in a good
+mind, told them a fortune which pleased them very much.  So, after
+they had heard their fortunes, one of them asked if any of our
+women could sing; and I told them several could, more particularly
+Leviathan--you know Leviathan, she is not here now, but some miles
+distant, she is our best singer, Ursula coming next.  So the lady
+said she should like to hear Leviathan sing, whereupon Leviathan
+sang the Gudlo pesham, and Piramus played the tune of the same
+name, which as you know, means the honeycomb, the song and the tune
+being well entitled to the name, being wonderfully sweet.  Well,
+everybody present seemed mighty well pleased with the song and
+music, with the exception of one person, a carroty-haired Scotch
+body; how he came there I don't know, but there he was; and, coming
+forward, he began in Scotch as broad as a barn-door to find fault
+with the music and the song, saying, that he had never heard viler
+stuff than either.  Well, brother, out of consideration for the
+civil gentry with whom the fellow had come, I held my peace for a
+long time, and in order to get the subject changed, I said to
+Mikailia in Romany, You have told the ladies their fortunes, now
+tell the gentlemen theirs, quick, quick,--pen lende dukkerin.
+Well, brother, the Scotchman, I suppose, thinking I was speaking
+ill of him, fell into a greater passion than before, and catching
+hold of the word dukkerin--'Dukkerin,' said he, 'what's dukkerin?'
+'Dukkerin,' said I, 'is fortune, a man or woman's destiny; don't
+you like the word?'  'Word! d'ye ca' that a word? a bonnie word,'
+said he.  'Perhaps, you'll tell us what it is in Scotch,' said I,
+'in order that we may improve our language by a Scotch word; a pal
+of mine has told me that we have taken a great many words from
+foreign lingos.'  'Why, then, if that be the case, fellow, I will
+tell you; it is e'en "spaeing,"' said he, very seriously.  'Well,
+then,' said I, 'I'll keep my own word, which is much the prettiest-
+-spaeing! spaeing! why, I should be ashamed to make use of the
+word, it sounds so much like a certain other word;' and then I made
+a face as if I were unwell.  'Perhaps it's Scotch also for that?'
+'What do ye mean by speaking in that guise to a gentleman?' said
+he; 'you insolent vagabond, without a name or a country.'  'There
+you are mistaken,' said I; 'my country is Egypt, but we 'Gyptians,
+like you Scotch, are rather fond of travelling; and as for name--my
+name is Jasper Petulengro, perhaps you have a better; what is it?'
+'Sandy Macraw.'  At that, brother, the gentlemen burst into a roar
+of laughter, and all the ladies tittered."
+
+"You were rather severe on the Scotchman, Jasper."
+
+"Not at all, brother, and suppose I were, he began first; I am the
+civilest man in the world, and never interfere with anybody, who
+lets me and mine alone.  He finds fault with Romany, forsooth! why,
+L-d A'mighty, what's Scotch?  He doesn't like our songs; what are
+his own?  I understand them as little as he mine; I have heard one
+or two of them, and pretty rubbish they seemed.  But the best of
+the joke is, the fellow's finding fault with Piramus's fiddle--a
+chap from the land of bagpipes finding fault with Piramus's fiddle!
+Why, I'll back that fiddle against all the bagpipes in Scotland,
+and Piramus against all the bagpipers; for though Piramus weighs
+but ten stone, he shall flog a Scotchman of twenty."
+
+"Scotchmen are never so fat as that," said I, "unless indeed, they
+have been a long time pensioners of England.  I say, Jasper, what
+remarkable names your people have!"
+
+"And what pretty names, brother; there's my own, for example,
+Jasper; then there's Ambrose and Sylvester; then there's Culvato,
+which signifies Claude; then there's Piramus--that's a nice name,
+brother."
+
+"Then there's your wife's name, Pakomovna; then there's Ursula and
+Morella."
+
+"Then, brother, there's Ercilla."
+
+"Ercilla! the name of the great poet of Spain, how wonderful; then
+Leviathan."
+
+"The name of a ship, brother; Leviathan was named after a ship, so
+don't make a wonder out of her.  But there's Sanpriel and Synfye."
+
+"Ay, and Clementina and Lavinia, Camillia and Lydia, Curlanda and
+Orlanda; wherever did they get those names?"
+
+"Where did my wife get her necklace, brother?"
+
+"She knows best, Jasper.  I hope--"
+
+"Come, no hoping!  She got it from her grandmother, who died at the
+age of a hundred and three, and sleeps in Coggeshall churchyard.
+She got it from her mother, who also died very old, and who could
+give no other account of it than that it had been in the family
+time out of mind."
+
+"Whence could they have got it?"
+
+"Why, perhaps where they got their names, brother.  A gentleman,
+who had travelled much, once told me that he had seen the sister of
+it about the neck of an Indian queen."
+
+"Some of your names, Jasper, appear to be church names; your own,
+for example, and Ambrose, and Sylvester; perhaps you got them from
+the Papists, in the times of Popery; but where did you get such a
+name as Piramus, a name of Grecian romance?  Then some of them
+appear to be Slavonian; for example, Mikailia and Pakomovna.  I
+don't know much of Slavonian; but--"
+
+"What is Slavonian, brother?"
+
+"The family name of certain nations, the principal of which is the
+Russian, and from which the word slave is originally derived.  You
+have heard of the Russians, Jasper?"
+
+"Yes, brother; and seen some.  I saw their crallis at the time of
+the peace; he was not a bad-looking man for a Russian."
+
+"By the bye, Jasper, I'm half inclined to think that crallis is a
+Slavish word.  I saw something like it in a lil called 'Voltaire's
+Life of Charles.'  How you should have come by such names and words
+is to me incomprehensible."
+
+"You seem posed, brother."
+
+"I really know very little about you, Jasper."
+
+"Very little indeed, brother.  We know very little about ourselves;
+and you know nothing, save what we have told you; and we have now
+and then told you things about us which are not exactly true,
+simply to make a fool of you, brother.  You will say that was
+wrong; perhaps it was.  Well, Sunday will be here in a day or two,
+when we will go to church, where possibly we shall hear a sermon on
+the disastrous consequences of lying."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+
+The Church--The Aristocratical Pew--Days of Yore--The Clergyman--
+"In What Would a Man be Profited?"
+
+
+When two days had passed, Sunday came; I breakfasted by myself in
+the solitary dingle; and then, having set things a little to
+rights, I ascended to Mr. Petulengro's encampment.  I could hear
+church-bells ringing around in the distance, appearing to say,
+"Come to church, come to church," as clearly as it was possible for
+church-bells to say.  I found Mr. Petulengro seated by the door of
+his tent, smoking his pipe, in rather an ungenteel undress.  "Well,
+Jasper," said I, "are you ready to go to church? for if you are, I
+am ready to accompany you."  "I am not ready, brother," said Mr.
+Petulengro, "nor is my wife; the church, too, to which we shall go
+is three miles off; so it is of no use to think of going there this
+morning, as the service would be three-quarters over before we got
+there; if, however, you are disposed to go in the afternoon, we are
+your people."  Thereupon I returned to my dingle, where I passed
+several hours in conning the Welsh Bible, which the preacher, Peter
+Williams, had given me.
+
+At last I gave over reading, took a slight refreshment, and was
+about to emerge from the dingle, when I heard the voice of Mr.
+Petulengro calling me.  I went up again to the encampment, where I
+found Mr. Petulengro, his wife, and Tawno Chikno, ready to proceed
+to church.  Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro were dressed in Roman fashion,
+though not in the full-blown manner in which they had paid their
+visit to Isopel and myself.  Tawno had on a clean white slop, with
+a nearly new black beaver, with very broad rims, and the nap
+exceedingly long.  As for myself, I was dressed in much the same
+manner as that in which I departed from London, having on, in
+honour of the day, a shirt perfectly clean, having washed one on
+purpose for the occasion, with my own hands, the day before, in the
+pond of tepid water in which the newts and defts were in the habit
+of taking their pleasure.  We proceeded for upwards of a mile, by
+footpaths through meadows and corn-fields; we crossed various
+stiles; at last, passing over one, we found ourselves in a road,
+wending along which for a considerable distance, we at last came in
+sight of a church, the bells of which had been tolling distinctly
+in our ears for some time; before, however, we reached the church-
+yard, the bells had ceased their melody.  It was surrounded by
+lofty beech-trees of brilliant green foliage.  We entered the gate,
+Mrs. Petulengro leading the way, and proceeded to a small door near
+the east end of the church.  As we advanced, the sound of singing
+within the church rose upon our ears.  Arrived at the small door,
+Mrs. Petulengro opened it and entered, followed by Tawno Chikno.  I
+myself went last of all, following Mr. Petulengro, who, before I
+entered, turned round, and, with a significant nod, advised me to
+take care how I behaved.  The part of the church which we had
+entered was the chancel; on one side stood a number of venerable
+old men--probably the neighbouring poor--and on the other a number
+of poor girls belonging to the village school, dressed in white
+gowns and straw bonnets, whom two elegant but simply dressed young
+women were superintending.  Every voice seemed to be united in
+singing a certain anthem, which, notwithstanding it was written
+neither by Tate nor Brady, contains some of the sublimest words
+which were ever put together, not the worst of which are those
+which burst on our ears as we entered:
+
+
+"Every eye shall now behold Him,
+Robed in dreadful majesty;
+Those who set at nought and sold Him,
+Pierced and nailed Him to the tree,
+Deeply wailing,
+Shall the true Messiah see."
+
+
+Still following Mrs. Petulengro, we proceeded down the chancel and
+along the aisle; notwithstanding the singing, I could distinctly
+hear as we passed many a voice whispering, "Here come the gypsies!
+here come the gypsies!"  I felt rather embarrassed, with a somewhat
+awkward doubt as to where we were to sit; none of the occupiers of
+the pews, who appeared to consist almost entirely of farmers, with
+their wives, sons, and daughters, opened a door to admit us.  Mrs.
+Petulengro, however, appeared to feel not the least embarrassment,
+but tripped along the aisle with the greatest nonchalance.  We
+passed under the pulpit, in which stood the clergyman in his white
+surplice, and reached the middle of the church, where we were
+confronted by the sexton dressed in long blue coat, and holding in
+his hand a wand.  This functionary motioned towards the lower end
+of the church, where were certain benches, partly occupied by poor
+people and boys.  Mrs. Petulengro, however, with a toss of her
+head, directed her course to a magnificent pew, which was
+unoccupied, which she opened and entered, followed closely by Tawno
+Chikno, Mr. Petulengro, and myself.  The sexton did not appear by
+any means to approve of the arrangement, and as I stood next the
+door, laid his finger on my arm, as if to intimate that myself and
+companions must quit our aristocratical location.  I said nothing,
+but directed my eyes to the clergyman, who uttered a short and
+expressive cough; the sexton looked at him for a moment, and then,
+bowing his head, closed the door--in a moment more the music
+ceased.  I took up a prayer-book, on which was engraved an earl's
+coronet.  The clergyman uttered, "I will arise, and go to my
+father."  England's sublime liturgy had commenced.
+
+Oh, what feelings came over me on finding myself again in an
+edifice devoted to the religion of my country!  I had not been in
+such a place I cannot tell for how long--certainly not for years;
+and now I had found my way there again, it appeared as if I had
+fallen asleep in the pew of the old church of pretty D---.  I had
+occasionally done so when a child, and had suddenly woke up.  Yes,
+surely I had been asleep and had woke up; but no! alas, no!  I had
+not been asleep--at least not in the old church--if I had been
+asleep I had been walking in my sleep, struggling, striving,
+learning, and unlearning in my sleep.  Years had rolled away whilst
+I had been asleep--ripe fruit had fallen, green fruit had come on
+whilst I had been asleep--how circumstances had altered, and above
+all myself, whilst I had been asleep.  No, I had not been asleep in
+the old church!  I was in a pew, it is true, but not the pew of
+black leather, in which I sometimes fell asleep in days of yore,
+but in a strange pew; and then my companions, they were no longer
+those of days of yore.  I was no longer with my respectable father
+and mother, and my dear brother, but with the gypsy cral and his
+wife, and the gigantic Tawno, the Antinous of the dusky people.
+And what was I myself?  No longer an innocent child, but a moody
+man, bearing in my face, as I knew well, the marks of my strivings
+and strugglings, of what I had learnt and unlearnt; nevertheless,
+the general aspect of things brought to my mind what I had felt and
+seen of yore.  There was difference enough, it is true, but still
+there was a similarity--at least I thought so--the church, the
+clergyman, and the clerk, differing in many respects from those of
+pretty D---, put me strangely in mind of them; and then the words!-
+-by the bye, was it not the magic of the words which brought the
+dear enchanting past so powerfully before the mind of Lavengro? for
+the words were the same sonorous words of high import which had
+first made an impression on his childish ear in the old church of
+pretty D---.
+
+The liturgy was now over, during the reading of which my companions
+behaved in a most unexceptionable manner, sitting down and rising
+up when other people sat down and rose, and holding in their hands
+prayer-books which they found in the pew, into which they stared
+intently, though I observed that, with the exception of Mrs.
+Petulengro, who knew how to read a little, they held the books by
+the top, and not the bottom, as is the usual way.  The clergyman
+now ascended the pulpit, arrayed in his black gown.  The
+congregation composed themselves to attention, as did also my
+companions, who fixed their eyes upon the clergyman with a certain
+strange immovable stare, which I believe to be peculiar to their
+race.  The clergyman gave out his text, and began to preach.  He
+was a tall, gentlemanly man, seemingly between fifty and sixty,
+with greyish hair; his features were very handsome, but with a
+somewhat melancholy cast:  the tones of his voice were rich and
+noble, but also with somewhat of melancholy in them.  The text
+which he gave out was the following one, "In what would a man be
+profited, provided he gained the whole world, and lost his own
+soul?"
+
+And on this text the clergyman preached long and well:  he did not
+read his sermon, but spoke it extempore; his doing so rather
+surprised and offended me at first; I was not used to such a style
+of preaching in a church devoted to the religion of my country.  I
+compared it within my mind with the style of preaching used by the
+high-church rector in the old church of pretty D---, and I thought
+to myself it was very different, and being very different I did not
+like it, and I thought to myself how scandalized the people of D---
+would have been had they heard it, and I figured to myself how
+indignant the high-church clerk would have been had any clergyman
+got up in the church of D--- and preached in such a manner.  Did it
+not savour strongly of dissent, methodism, and similar low stuff?
+Surely it did; why, the Methodist I had heard preach on the heath
+above the old city, preached in the same manner--at least he
+preached extempore; ay, and something like the present clergyman;
+for the Methodist spoke very zealously and with great feeling, and
+so did the present clergyman; so I, of course, felt rather offended
+with the clergyman for speaking with zeal and feeling.  However,
+long before the sermon was over I forgot the offence which I had
+taken, and listened to the sermon with much admiration, for the
+eloquence and powerful reasoning with which it abounded.
+
+Oh, how eloquent he was, when he talked of the inestimable value of
+a man's soul, which he said endured for ever, whilst his body, as
+every one knew, lasted at most for a very contemptible period of
+time; and how forcibly he reasoned on the folly of a man, who, for
+the sake of gaining the whole world--a thing, he said, which
+provided he gained he could only possess for a part of the time,
+during which his perishable body existed--should lose his soul,
+that is, cause that precious deathless portion of him to suffer
+indescribable misery time without end.
+
+There was one part of his sermon which struck me in a very
+particular manner:  he said, "That there were some people who
+gained something in return for their souls; if they did not get the
+whole world, they got a part of it--lands, wealth, honour, or
+renown; mere trifles, he allowed, in comparison with the value of a
+man's soul, which is destined either to enjoy delight, or suffer
+tribulation time without end; but which, in the eyes of the
+worldly, had a certain value, and which afforded a certain pleasure
+and satisfaction.  But there were also others who lost their souls,
+and got nothing for them--neither lands, wealth, renown, nor
+consideration, who were poor outcasts, and despised by everybody.
+My friends," he added, "if the man is a fool who barters his soul
+for the whole world, what a fool he must be who barters his soul
+for nothing."
+
+The eyes of the clergyman, as he uttered these words, wandered
+around the whole congregation; and when he had concluded them, the
+eyes of the whole congregation were turned upon my companions and
+myself.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+
+Return from Church--The Cuckoo and Gypsy--Spiritual Discourse.
+
+
+The service over, my companions and myself returned towards the
+encampment, by the way we came.  Some of the humble part of the
+congregation laughed and joked at us as we passed.  Mr. Petulengro
+and his wife, however, returned their laughs and jokes with
+interest.  As for Tawno and myself, we said nothing:  Tawno, like
+most handsome fellows, having very little to say for himself at any
+time; and myself, though not handsome, not being particularly
+skilful at repartee.  Some boys followed us for a considerable
+time, making all kinds of observations about gypsies; but as we
+walked at a great pace, we gradually left them behind, and at last
+lost sight of them.  Mrs. Petulengro and Tawno Chikno walked
+together, even as they had come; whilst Mr. Petulengro and myself
+followed at a little distance.
+
+"That was a very fine preacher we heard," said I to Mr. Petulengro,
+after we had crossed the stile into the fields.
+
+"Very fine indeed, brother," said Mr. Petulengro; "he is talked of,
+far and wide, for his sermons; folks say that there is scarcely
+another like him in the whole of England."
+
+"He looks rather melancholy, Jasper."
+
+"He lost his wife several years ago, who, they say, was one of the
+most beautiful women ever seen.  They say that it was grief for her
+loss that made him come out mighty strong as a preacher; for,
+though he was a clergyman, he was never heard of in the pulpit
+before he lost his wife; since then, the whole country has rung
+with the preaching of the clergyman of M--- as they call him.
+Those two nice young gentlewomen, whom you saw with the female
+childer, are his daughters."
+
+"You seem to know all about him, Jasper.  Did you ever hear him
+preach before?"
+
+"Never, brother; but he has frequently been to our tent, and his
+daughters too, and given us tracts; for he is one of the people
+they call Evangelicals, who give folks tracts which they cannot
+read."
+
+"You should learn to read, Jasper."
+
+"We have no time, brother."
+
+"Are you not frequently idle?"
+
+"Never, brother; when we are not engaged in our traffic, we are
+engaged in taking our relaxation:  so we have no time to learn."
+
+"You really should make an effort.  If you were disposed to learn
+to read, I would endeavour to assist you.  You would be all the
+better for knowing how to read."
+
+"In what way, brother?"
+
+"Why, you could read the Scriptures, and, by so doing, learn your
+duty towards your fellow-creatures."
+
+"We know that already, brother; the constables and justices have
+contrived to knock that tolerably into our heads."
+
+"Yet you frequently break the laws."
+
+"So, I believe, do now and then those who know how to read,
+brother."
+
+"Very true, Jasper; but you really ought to learn to read, as, by
+so doing, you might learn your duty towards yourselves:  and your
+chief duty is to take care of your own souls; did not the preacher
+say, 'In what is a man profited, provided he gain the whole
+world?'"
+
+"We have not much of the world, brother."
+
+"Very little indeed, Jasper.  Did you not observe how the eyes of
+the whole congregation were turned towards our pew, when the
+preacher said, 'There are some people who lose their souls, and get
+nothing in exchange; who are outcast, despised, and miserable?'
+Now was not what he said quite applicable to the gypsies?"
+
+"We are not miserable, brother."
+
+"Well, then, you ought to be, Jasper.  Have you an inch of ground
+of your own?  Are you of the least use?  Are you not spoken ill of
+by everybody?  What's a gypsy?"
+
+"What's the bird noising yonder, brother?"
+
+"The bird! oh, that's the cuckoo tolling; but what has the cuckoo
+to do with the matter?"
+
+"We'll see, brother; what's the cuckoo?"
+
+"What is it? you know as much about it as myself, Jasper."
+
+"Isn't it a kind of roguish, chaffing bird, brother?"
+
+"I believe it is, Jasper."
+
+"Nobody knows whence it comes, brother?"
+
+"I believe not, Jasper."
+
+"Very poor, brother, not a nest of its own?"
+
+"So they say, Jasper."
+
+"With every person's bad word, brother?"
+
+"Yes, Jasper, every person is mocking it."
+
+"Tolerably merry, brother?"
+
+"Yes, tolerably merry, Jasper."
+
+"Of no use at all, brother?"
+
+"None whatever, Jasper."
+
+"You would be glad to get rid of the cuckoos, brother?"
+
+"Why, not exactly, Jasper; the cuckoo is a pleasant, funny bird,
+and its presence and voice give a great charm to the green trees
+and fields; no, I can't say I wish exactly to get rid of the
+cuckoo."
+
+"Well, brother, what's a Romany chal?"
+
+"You must answer that question yourself, Jasper."
+
+"A roguish, chaffing fellow, a'n't he, brother?"
+
+"Ay, ay, Jasper."
+
+"Of no use at all, brother?"
+
+"Just so, Jasper; I see--"
+
+"Something very much like a cuckoo, brother?"
+
+"I see what you are after, Jasper."
+
+"You would like to get rid of us, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Why no, not exactly."
+
+"We are no ornament to the green lanes in spring and summer time,
+are we, brother? and the voices of our chies, with their cukkerin
+and dukkerin, don't help to make them pleasant?"
+
+"I see what you are at, Jasper."
+
+"You would wish to turn the cuckoos into barn-door fowls, wouldn't
+you?"
+
+"Can't say I should, Jasper, whatever some people might wish."
+
+"And the chals and chies into radical weavers and factory wenches,
+hey, brother?"
+
+"Can't say that I should, Jasper.  You are certainly a picturesque
+people, and in many respects an ornament both to town and country;
+painting and lil writing too are under great obligations to you.
+What pretty pictures are made out of your campings and groupings,
+and what pretty books have been written in which gypsies, or at
+least creatures intended to represent gypsies, have been the
+principal figures.  I think if we were without you, we should begin
+to miss you."
+
+"Just as you would the cuckoos, if they were all converted into
+barn-door fowls.  I tell you what, brother; frequently, as I have
+sat under a hedge in spring or summer time, and heard the cuckoo, I
+have thought that we chals and cuckoos are alike in many respects,
+but especially in character.  Everybody speaks ill of us both, and
+everybody is glad to see both of us again."
+
+"Yes, Jasper, but there is some difference between men and cuckoos;
+men have souls, Jasper!"
+
+"And why not cuckoos, brother?"
+
+"You should not talk so, Jasper; what you say is little short of
+blasphemy.  How should a bird have a soul?"
+
+"And how should a man?"
+
+"Oh, we know very well that a man has a soul."
+
+"How do you know it?"
+
+"We know very well."
+
+"Would you take your oath of it, brother--your bodily oath?"
+
+"Why, I think I might, Jasper!"
+
+"Did you ever see the soul, brother?"
+
+"No, I never saw it."
+
+"Then how could you swear to it?  A pretty figure you would make in
+a court of justice, to swear to a thing which you never saw.  Hold
+up your head, fellow.  When and where did you see it?  Now upon
+your oath, fellow, do you mean to say that this Roman stole the
+donkey's foal?  Oh, there's no one for cross-questioning like
+Counsellor P---.  Our people when they are in a hobble always like
+to employ him, though he is somewhat dear.  Now, brother, how can
+you get over the 'upon your oath, fellow, will you say that you
+have a soul?'"
+
+"Well, we will take no oaths on the subject; but you yourself
+believe in the soul.  I have heard you say that you believe in
+dukkerin; now what is dukkerin but the soul science?"
+
+"When did I say that I believed in it?"
+
+"Why, after that fight, when you pointed to the bloody mark in the
+cloud, whilst he you wot of was galloping in the barouche to the
+old town, amidst the rain-cataracts, the thunder, and flame of
+heaven."
+
+"I have some kind of remembrance of it, brother."
+
+"Then, again, I heard you say that the dook of Abershaw rode every
+night on horseback down the wooded hill."
+
+"I say, brother, what a wonderful memory you have!"
+
+"I wish I had not, Jasper; but I can't help it, it is my
+misfortune."
+
+"Misfortune! well, perhaps it is; at any rate it is very ungenteel
+to have such a memory.  I have heard my wife say that to show you
+have a long memory looks very vulgar; and that you can't give a
+greater proof of gentility than by forgetting a thing as soon as
+possible--more especially a promise, or an acquaintance when he
+happens to be shabby.  Well, brother, I don't deny that I may have
+said that I believe in dukkerin, and in Abershaw's dook, which you
+say is his soul; but what I believe one moment, or say I believe,
+don't be certain that I shall believe the next, or say I do."
+
+"Indeed, Jasper, I heard you say on a previous occasion, on quoting
+a piece of a song, that when a man dies he is cast into the earth,
+and there's an end of him."
+
+"I did, did I?  Lor' what a memory you have, brother.  But you are
+not sure that I hold that opinion now."
+
+"Certainly not, Jasper.  Indeed, after such a sermon as we have
+been hearing, I should be very shocked if you held such an
+opinion."
+
+"However, brother, don't be sure I do not, however shocking such an
+opinion may be to you."
+
+"What an incomprehensible people you are, Jasper."
+
+"We are rather so, brother; indeed, we have posed wiser heads than
+yours before now."
+
+"You seem to care for so little, and yet you rove about a distinct
+race."
+
+"I say, brother!"
+
+"Yes, Jasper."
+
+"What do you think of our women?"
+
+"They have certainly very singular names, Jasper."
+
+"Names!  Lavengro!  However, brother, if you had been as fond of
+things as of names, you would never have been a pal of ours."
+
+"What do you mean, Jasper?"
+
+"A'n't they rum animals?"
+
+"They have tongues of their own, Jasper."
+
+"Did you ever feel their teeth and nails, brother?"
+
+"Never, Jasper, save Mrs. Herne's.  I have always been very civil
+to them, so--"
+
+"They let you alone.  I say, brother, some part of the secret is in
+them."
+
+"They seem rather flighty, Jasper."
+
+"Ay, ay, brother!"
+
+"Rather fond of loose discourse!"
+
+"Rather so, brother."
+
+"Can you always trust them, Jasper?"
+
+"We never watch them, brother."
+
+"Can they always trust you?"
+
+"Not quite so well as we can them.  However, we get on very well
+together, except Mikailia and her husband; but Mikailia is a
+cripple, and is married to the beauty of the world, so she may be
+expected to be jealous--though he would not part with her for a
+duchess, no more than I would part with my rawnie, nor any other
+chal with his."
+
+"Ay, but would not the chi part with the chal for a duke, Jasper?"
+
+"My Pakomovna gave up the duke for me, brother."
+
+"But she occasionally talks of him, Jasper."
+
+"Yes, brother, but Pakomovna was born on a common not far from the
+sign of the gammon."
+
+"Gammon of bacon, I suppose."
+
+"Yes, brother; but gammon likewise means--"
+
+"I know it does, Jasper; it means fun, ridicule, jest; it is an
+ancient Norse word, and is found in the Edda."
+
+"Lor', brother! how learned in lils you are!"
+
+"Many words of Norse are to be found in our vulgar sayings, Jasper;
+for example--in that particularly vulgar saying of ours, 'Your
+mother is up,' there's a noble Norse word; mother, there, meaning
+not the female who bore us, but rage and choler, as I discovered by
+reading the Sagas, Jasper."
+
+"Lor', brother! how book-learned you be."
+
+"Indifferently so, Jasper.  Then you think you might trust your
+wife with the duke?"
+
+"I think I could, brother, or even with yourself."
+
+"Myself, Jasper!  Oh, I never troubled my head about your wife; but
+I suppose there have been love affairs between gorgios and Romany
+chies.  Why, novels are stuffed with such matters; and then even
+one of your own songs says so--the song which Ursula was singing
+the other afternoon."
+
+"That is somewhat of an old song, brother, and is sung by the chies
+as a warning at our solemn festivals."
+
+"Well! but there's your sister-in-law, Ursula, herself, Jasper."
+
+"Ursula, herself, brother?"
+
+"You were talking of my having her, Jasper."
+
+"Well, brother, why didn't you have her?"
+
+"Would she have had me?"
+
+"Of course, brother.  You are so much of a Roman, and speak Romany
+so remarkably well."
+
+"Poor thing! she looks very innocent!"
+
+"Remarkably so, brother! however, though not born on the same
+common with my wife, she knows a thing or two of Roman matters."
+
+"I should like to ask her a question or two, Jasper, in connection
+with that song."
+
+"You can do no better, brother.  Here we are at the camp.  After
+tea, take Ursula under a hedge, and ask her a question or two in
+connection with that song."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+
+Sunday Evening--Ursula--Action at Law--Meridiana--Married Already.
+
+
+I took tea that evening with Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro and Ursula,
+outside of their tent.  Tawno was not present, being engaged with
+his wife in his own tabernacle; Sylvester was there, however,
+lolling listlessly upon the ground.  As I looked upon this man, I
+thought him one of the most disagreeable fellows I had ever seen.
+His features were ugly, and, moreover, as dark as pepper; and,
+besides being dark, his skin was dirty.  As for his dress, it was
+torn and sordid.  His chest was broad, and his arms seemed
+powerful; but, upon the whole, he looked a very caitiff.  "I am
+sorry that man has lost his wife," thought I; "for I am sure he
+will never get another."  What surprises me is, that he ever found
+a woman disposed to unite her lot with his!
+
+After tea I got up and strolled about the field.  My thoughts were
+upon Isopel Berners.  I wondered where she was, and how long she
+would stay away.  At length becoming tired and listless, I
+determined to return to the dingle, and resume the reading of the
+Bible at the place where I had left off.  "What better could I do,"
+methought, "on a Sunday evening?"  I was then near the wood which
+surrounded the dingle, but at that side which was farthest from the
+encampment, which stood near the entrance.  Suddenly, on turning
+round the southern corner of the copse, which surrounded the
+dingle, I perceived Ursula seated under a thornbush.  I thought I
+never saw her look prettier than then, dressed as she was, in her
+Sunday's best.
+
+"Good evening, Ursula," said I; "I little thought to have the
+pleasure of seeing you here."
+
+"Nor would you, brother," said Ursula, "had not Jasper told me that
+you had been talking about me, and wanted to speak to me under a
+hedge; so, hearing that, I watched your motions, and came here and
+sat down."
+
+"I was thinking of going to my quarters in the dingle, to read the
+Bible, Ursula, but--"
+
+"Oh, pray then, go to your quarters, brother, and read the
+Miduveleskoe lil; you can speak to me under a hedge some other
+time."
+
+"I think I will sit down with you, Ursula; for, after all, reading
+godly books in dingles at eve, is rather sombre work.  Yes, I think
+I will sit down with you;" and I sat down by her side.
+
+"Well, brother, now you have sat down with me under the hedge, what
+have you to say to me?"
+
+"Why, I hardly know, Ursula."
+
+"Not know, brother; a pretty fellow you to ask young women to come
+and sit with you under hedges, and, when they come, not know what
+to say to them."
+
+"Oh! ah! I remember; do you know, Ursula, that I take a great
+interest in you?"
+
+"Thank ye, brother; kind of you, at any rate."
+
+"You must be exposed to a great many temptations, Ursula."
+
+"A great many indeed, brother.  It is hard, to see fine things,
+such as shawls, gold watches, and chains in the shops, behind the
+big glasses, and to know that they are not intended for one.
+Many's the time I have been tempted to make a dash at them; but I
+bethought myself that by so doing I should cut my hands, besides
+being almost certain of being grabbed and sent across the gull's
+bath to the foreign country."
+
+"Then you think gold and fine things temptations, Ursula?"
+
+"Of course, brother, very great temptations; don't you think them
+so?"
+
+"Can't say I do, Ursula."
+
+"Then more fool you, brother; but have the kindness to tell me what
+you would call a temptation?"
+
+"Why, for example, the hope of honour and renown, Ursula."
+
+"The hope of honour and renown! very good, brother; but I tell you
+one thing, that unless you have money in your pocket, and good
+broad-cloth on your back, you are not likely to obtain much honour
+and--what do you call it? amongst the gorgios, to say nothing of
+the Romany chals."
+
+"I should have thought, Ursula, that the Romany chals, roaming
+about the world as they do, free and independent, were above being
+led by such trifles."
+
+"Then you know nothing of the gypsies, brother; no people on earth
+are fonder of those trifles, as you call them, than the Romany
+chals, and more disposed to respect those who have them."
+
+"Then money and fine clothes would induce you to do anything,
+Ursula?"
+
+"Ay, ay, brother, anything."
+
+"To chore, Ursula?"
+
+"Like enough, brother; gypsies have been transported before now for
+choring."
+
+"To hokkawar?"
+
+"Ay, ay; I was telling dukkerin only yesterday, brother."
+
+"In fact, to break the law in everything?"
+
+"Who knows, brother, who knows? as I said before, gold and fine
+clothes are great temptations."
+
+"Well, Ursula, I am sorry for it, I should never have thought you
+so depraved."
+
+"Indeed, brother."
+
+"To think that I am seated by one who is willing to--to--"
+
+"Go on, brother."
+
+"To play the thief."
+
+"Go on, brother."
+
+"The liar."
+
+"Go on, brother."
+
+"The--the--"
+
+"Go on, brother."
+
+"The--the lubbeny."
+
+"The what, brother?" said Ursula, starting from her seat.
+
+"Why, the lubbeny; don't you--"
+
+"I tell you what, brother," said Ursula, looking somewhat pale, and
+speaking very low, "if I had only something in my hand, I would do
+you a mischief."
+
+"Why, what is the matter, Ursula?" said I; "how have I offended
+you?"
+
+"How have you offended me?  Why, didn't you insinivate just now
+that I was ready to play the--the--"
+
+"Go on, Ursula."
+
+"The--the--I'll not say it; but I only wish I had something in my
+hand."
+
+"If I have offended, Ursula, I am very sorry for it; any offence I
+may have given you was from want of understanding you.  Come, pray
+be seated, I have much to question you about--to talk to you
+about."
+
+"Seated, not I!  It was only just now that you gave me to
+understand that you was ashamed to be seated by me, a thief, a
+liar."
+
+"Well, did you not almost give me to understand that you were both,
+Ursula?"
+
+"I don't much care being called a thief and a liar," said Ursula;
+"a person may be a liar and thief, and yet a very honest woman,
+but--"
+
+"Well, Ursula."
+
+"I tell you what, brother, if you ever sinivate again that I could
+be the third thing, so help me duvel!  I'll do you a mischief.  By
+my God I will!"
+
+"Well, Ursula, I assure you that I shall sinivate, as you call it,
+nothing of the kind about you.  I have no doubt, from what you have
+said, that you are a very paragon of virtue--a perfect Lucretia;
+but--"
+
+"My name is Ursula, brother, and not Lucretia:  Lucretia is not of
+our family, but one of the Bucklands; she travels about
+Oxfordshire; yet I am as good as she any day."
+
+"Lucretia; how odd!  Where could she have got that name?  Well, I
+make no doubt, Ursula, that you are quite as good as she, and she
+as her namesake of ancient Rome; but there is a mystery in this
+same virtue, Ursula, which I cannot fathom; how a thief and a liar
+should be able, or indeed willing, to preserve her virtue is what I
+don't understand.  You confess that you are very fond of gold.
+Now, how is it that you don't barter your virtue for gold
+sometimes?  I am a philosopher, Ursula, and like to know
+everything.  You must be every now and then exposed to great
+temptation, Ursula; for you are of a beauty calculated to captivate
+all hearts.  Come, sit down and tell me how you are enabled to
+resist such a temptation as gold and fine clothes?"
+
+"Well, brother," said Ursula, "as you say you mean no harm, I will
+sit down beside you, and enter into discourse with you; but I will
+uphold that you are the coolest hand that I ever came nigh, and say
+the coolest things."
+
+And thereupon Ursula sat down by my side.
+
+"Well, Ursula, we will, if you please, discourse on the subject of
+your temptations.  I suppose that you travel very much about, and
+show yourself in all kinds of places?"
+
+"In all kinds, brother; I travels, as you say, very much about,
+attends fairs and races, and enters booths and public-houses, where
+I tells fortunes, and sometimes dances and sings."
+
+"And do not people often address you in a very free manner?"
+
+"Frequently, brother; and I give them tolerably free answers."
+
+"Do people ever offer to make you presents?  I mean presents of
+value, such as--"
+
+"Silk handkerchiefs, shawls, and trinkets; very frequently,
+brother."
+
+"And what do you do, Ursula?"
+
+"I takes what people offers me, brother, and stows it away as soon
+as I can."
+
+"Well, but don't people expect something for their presents?  I
+don't mean dukkerin, dancing, and the like; but such a moderate and
+innocent thing as a choomer, Ursula?"
+
+"Innocent thing, do you call it, brother?"
+
+"The world calls it so, Ursula.  Well, do the people who give you
+the fine things never expect a choomer in return?"
+
+"Very frequently, brother."
+
+"And do you ever grant it?"
+
+"Never, brother."
+
+"How do you avoid it?"
+
+"I gets away as soon as possible, brother.  If they follows me, I
+tries to baffle them, by means of jests and laughter; and if they
+persist, I uses bad and terrible language, of which I have plenty
+in store."
+
+"But if your terrible language has no effect?"
+
+"Then I screams for the constable, and if he comes not, I uses my
+teeth and nails."
+
+"And are they always sufficient?"
+
+"I have only had to use them twice, brother; but then I found them
+sufficient."
+
+"But suppose the person who followed you was highly agreeable,
+Ursula?  A handsome young officer of local militia, for example,
+all dressed in Lincoln green, would you still refuse him the
+choomer?"
+
+"We makes no difference, brother; the daughters of the gypsy-father
+makes no difference; and what's more, sees none."
+
+"Well, Ursula, the world will hardly give you credit for such
+indifference."
+
+"What cares we for the world, brother! we are not of the world."
+
+"But your fathers, brothers, and uncles, give you credit, I
+suppose, Ursula."
+
+"Ay, ay, brother, our fathers, brothers, and cokos gives us all
+manner of credit; for example, I am telling lies and dukkerin in a
+public-house where my batu or coko--perhaps both--are playing on
+the fiddle; well, my batu and my coko beholds me amongst the
+public-house crew, talking nonsense and hearing nonsense; but they
+are under no apprehension; and presently they sees the good-looking
+officer of militia, in his greens and Lincolns, get up and give me
+a wink, and I go out with him abroad, into the dark night perhaps;
+well, my batu and my coko goes on fiddling just as if I were six
+miles off asleep in the tent, and not out in the dark street with
+the local officer, with his Lincolns and his greens."
+
+"They know they can trust you, Ursula?"
+
+"Ay, ay, brother; and, what's more, I knows I can trust myself."
+
+"So you would merely go out to make a fool of him, Ursula?"
+
+"Merely go out to make a fool of him, brother, I assure you."
+
+"But such proceedings really have an odd look, Ursula."
+
+"Amongst gorgios, very so, brother."
+
+"Well, it must be rather unpleasant to lose one's character even
+amongst gorgios, Ursula; and suppose the officer, out of revenge
+for being tricked and duped by you, were to say of you the thing
+that is not, were to meet you on the race-course the next day, and
+boast of receiving favours which he never had, amidst a knot of
+jeering militia-men, how would you proceed, Ursula? would you not
+be abashed?"
+
+"By no means, brother; I should bring my action of law against
+him."
+
+"Your action at law, Ursula?"
+
+"Yes, brother, I should give a whistle, whereupon all one's cokos
+and batus, and all my near and distant relations, would leave their
+fiddling, dukkerin, and horse-dealing, and come flocking about me.
+'What's the matter, Ursula?' says my coko.  'Nothing at all,' I
+replies, 'save and except that gorgio, in his greens and his
+Lincolns, says that I have played the--with him.'  'Oho, he does,
+Ursula,' says my coko, 'try your action of law against him, my
+lamb,' and he puts something privily into my hands; whereupon I
+goes close up to the grinning gorgio, and staring him in the face,
+with my head pushed forward, I cries out:  'You say I did what was
+wrong with you last night when I was out with you abroad?'  'Yes,'
+says the local officer, 'I says you did,' looking down all the
+time.  'You are a liar,' says I, and forthwith I breaks his head
+with the stick which I holds behind me, and which my coko has
+conveyed privily into my hand."
+
+"And this is your action at law, Ursula?"
+
+"Yes, brother, this is my action at club-law."
+
+"And would your breaking the fellow's head quite clear you of all
+suspicion in the eyes of your batus, cokos, and what not?"
+
+"They would never suspect me at all, brother, because they would
+know that I would never condescend to be over-intimate with a
+gorgio; the breaking the head would be merely intended to justify
+Ursula in the eyes of the gorgios."
+
+"And would it clear you in their eyes?"
+
+"Would it not, brother? when they saw the blood running down from
+the fellow's cracked poll on his greens and Lincolns, they would be
+quite satisfied; why, the fellow would not be able to show his face
+at fair or merry-making for a year and three-quarters."
+
+"Did you ever try it, Ursula?"
+
+"Can't say I ever did, brother, but it would do."
+
+"And how did you ever learn such a method of proceeding?"
+
+"Why, 't is advised by gypsy liri, brother.  It's part of our way
+of settling difficulties amongst ourselves; for example, if a young
+Roman were to say the thing which is not respecting Ursula and
+himself, Ursula would call a great meeting of the people, who would
+all sit down in a ring, the young fellow amongst them; a coko would
+then put a stick in Ursula's hand, who would then get up and go to
+the young fellow, and say, 'Did I play the--with you?' and were he
+to say 'Yes,' she would crack his head before the eyes of all."
+
+"Well," said I, "Ursula, I was bred an apprentice to gorgio law,
+and of course ought to stand up for it, whenever I conscientiously
+can, but I must say the gypsy manner of bringing an action for
+defamation is much less tedious, and far more satisfactory, than
+the gorgiko one.  I wish you now to clear up a certain point which
+is rather mysterious to me.  You say that for a Romany chi to do
+what is unseemly with a gorgio is quite out of the question, yet
+only the other day I heard you singing a song in which a Romany chi
+confesses herself to be cambri by a grand gorgious gentleman."
+
+"A sad let down," said Ursula.
+
+"Well," said I, "sad or not, there's the song that speaks of the
+thing, which you give me to understand is not."
+
+"Well, if the thing ever was," said Ursula, "it was a long time
+ago, and perhaps, after all, not true."
+
+"Then why do you sing the song?"
+
+"I'll tell you, brother, we sings the song now and then to be a
+warning to ourselves to have as little to do as possible in the way
+of acquaintance with the gorgios; and a warning it is; you see how
+the young woman in the song was driven out of her tent by her
+mother, with all kind of disgrace and bad language; but you don't
+know that she was afterwards buried alive by her cokos and pals, in
+an uninhabited place; the song doesn't say it, but the story says
+it, for there is a story about it, though, as I said before, it was
+a long time ago, and perhaps, after all, wasn't true."
+
+"But if such a thing were to happen at present, would the cokos and
+pals bury the girl alive?"
+
+"I can't say what they would do," said Ursula; "I suppose they are
+not so strict as they were long ago; at any rate, she would be
+driven from the tan, and avoided by all her family and relations as
+a gorgio's acquaintance; so that, perhaps, at last, she would be
+glad if they would bury her alive."
+
+"Well, I can conceive that there would be an objection on the part
+of the cokos and batus that a Romany chi should form an improper
+acquaintance with a gorgio, but I should think that the batus and
+cokos could hardly object to the chi's entering into the honourable
+estate of wedlock with a gorgio."
+
+Ursula was silent.
+
+"Marriage is an honourable estate, Ursula."
+
+"Well, brother, suppose it be?"
+
+"I don't see why a Romany chi should object to enter into the
+honourable estate of wedlock with a gorgio."
+
+"You don't, brother; don't you?"
+
+"No," said I; "and, moreover, I am aware, notwithstanding your
+evasion, Ursula, that marriages and connections now and then occur
+between gorgios and Romany chies; the result of which is the mixed
+breed, called half and half, which is at present travelling about
+England, and to which the Flaming Tinman belongs, otherwise called
+Anselo Herne."
+
+"As for the half and halfs," said Ursula, "they are a bad set; and
+there is not a worse blackguard in England than Anselo Herne."
+
+"All that you say may be very true, Ursula, but you admit that
+there are half and halfs."
+
+"The more's the pity, brother."
+
+"Pity, or not, you admit the fact; but how do you account for it?"
+
+"How do I account for it? why, I will tell you, by the break up of
+a Roman family, brother--the father of a small family dies, and,
+perhaps, the mother; and the poor children are left behind;
+sometimes, they are gathered up by their relations, and sometimes,
+if they have none, by charitable Romans, who bring them up in the
+observance of gypsy law; but sometimes they are not so lucky, and
+falls into the company of gorgios, trampers, and basket-makers, who
+live in caravans, with whom they take up, and so--I hate to talk of
+the matter, brother; but so comes this race of the half and halfs."
+
+"Then you mean to say, Ursula, that no Romany chi, unless compelled
+by hard necessity, would have anything to do with a gorgio?"
+
+"We are not over-fond of gorgios, brother, and we hates basket-
+makers, and folks that live in caravans."
+
+"Well," said I, "suppose a gorgio who is not a basket-maker, a
+fine, handsome gorgious gentleman, who lives in a fine house--"
+
+"We are not fond of houses, brother; I never slept in a house in my
+life."
+
+"But would not plenty of money induce you?"
+
+"I hate houses, brother, and those who live in them."
+
+"Well, suppose such a person were willing to resign his fine house;
+and, for love of you, to adopt gypsy law, speak Romany, and live in
+a tan, would you have nothing to say to him?"
+
+"Bringing plenty of money with him, brother?"
+
+"Well, bringing plenty of money with him, Ursula."
+
+"Well, brother, suppose you produce your man; where is he?"
+
+"I was merely supposing such a person, Ursula."
+
+"Then you don't know of such a person, brother?"
+
+"Why, no, Ursula; why do you ask?"
+
+"Because, brother, I was almost beginning to think that you meant
+yourself."
+
+"Myself!  Ursula; I have no fine house to resign; nor have I money.
+Moreover, Ursula, though I have a great regard for you, and though
+I consider you very handsome, quite as handsome, indeed, as
+Meridiana in--"
+
+"Meridiana! where did you meet with her?" said Ursula, with a toss
+of her head.
+
+"Why, in old Pulci's--"
+
+"At old Fulcher's! that's not true, brother.  Meridiana is a
+Borzlam, and travels with her own people, and not with old Fulcher,
+who is a gorgio, and a basket-maker."
+
+"I was not speaking of old Fulcher, but Pulci, a great Italian
+writer, who lived many hundred years ago, and who, in his poem
+called 'Morgante Maggiore,' speaks of Meridiana, the daughter of--"
+
+"Old Carus Borzlam," said Ursula; "but if the fellow you mention
+lived so many hundred years ago, how, in the name of wonder, could
+he know anything of Meridiana?"
+
+"The wonder, Ursula, is, how your people could ever have got hold
+of that name, and similar ones.  The Meridiana of Pulci was not the
+daughter of old Carus Borzlam, but of Caradoro, a great pagan king
+of the East, who, being besieged in his capital by Manfredonio,
+another mighty pagan king, who wished to obtain possession of his
+daughter, who had refused him, was relieved in his distress by
+certain paladins of Charlemagne, with one of whom, Oliver, his
+daughter Meridiana fell in love."
+
+"I see," said, Ursula, "that it must have been altogether a
+different person, for I am sure that Meridiana Borzlam would never
+have fallen in love with Oliver.  Oliver! why, that is the name of
+the curo-mengro, who lost the fight near the chong gav, the day of
+the great tempest, when I got wet through.  No, no!  Meridiana
+Borzlam would never have so far forgot her blood as to take up with
+Tom Oliver."
+
+"I was not talking of that Oliver, Ursula, but of Oliver, peer of
+France, and paladin of Charlemagne, with whom Meridiana, daughter
+of Caradoro, fell in love, and for whose sake she renounced her
+religion and became a Christian, and finally ingravidata, or
+cambri, by him:-
+
+
+'E nacquene un figliuol, dice la storia,
+Che dette a Carlo-man poi gran vittoria;'
+
+
+which means--"
+
+"I don't want to know what it means," said Ursula; "no good, I'm
+sure.  Well, if the Meridiana of Charles's wain's pal was no
+handsomer than Meridiana Borzlam, she was no great catch, brother;
+for though I am by no means given to vanity, I think myself better
+to look at than she, though I will say she is no lubbeny, and would
+scorn--"
+
+"I make no doubt she would, Ursula, and I make no doubt that you
+are much handsomer than she, or even the Meridiana of Oliver.  What
+I was about to say, before you interrupted me, is this, that though
+I have a great regard for you, and highly admire you, it is only in
+a brotherly way, and--"
+
+"And you had nothing better to say to me," said Ursula, "when you
+wanted to talk to me beneath a hedge, than that you liked me in a
+brotherly way I well, I declare--"
+
+"You seem disappointed, Ursula."
+
+"Disappointed, brother! not I."
+
+"You were just now saying that you disliked gorgios, so, of course,
+could only wish that I, who am a gorgio, should like you in a
+brotherly way:  I wished to have a conversation with you beneath a
+hedge, but only with the view of procuring from you some
+information respecting the song which you sung the other day, and
+the conduct of Roman females, which has always struck me as being
+highly unaccountable; so, if you thought anything else--"
+
+"What else should I expect from a picker-up of old words, brother?
+Bah! I dislike a picker-up of old words worse than a picker-up of
+old rags."
+
+"Don't be angry, Ursula, I feel a great interest in you; you are
+very handsome, and very clever; indeed, with your beauty and
+cleverness, I only wonder that you have not long since been
+married."
+
+"You do, do you, brother?"
+
+"Yes.  However, keep up your spirits, Ursula, you are not much past
+the prime of youth, so--"
+
+"Not much past the prime of youth!  Don't be uncivil, brother, I
+was only twenty-two last month."
+
+"Don't be offended, Ursula, but twenty-two is twenty-two, or, I
+should rather say, that twenty-two in a woman is more than twenty-
+six in a man.  You are still very beautiful, but I advise you to
+accept the first offer that's made to you."
+
+"Thank you, brother, but your advice comes rather late; I accepted
+the first offer that was made me five years ago."
+
+"You married five years ago, Ursula! is it possible?"
+
+"Quite possible, brother, I assure you."
+
+"And how came I to know nothing about it?"
+
+"How comes it that you don't know many thousand things about the
+Romans, brother?  Do you think they tell you all their affairs?"
+
+"Married, Ursula, married! well, I declare!"
+
+"You seem disappointed, brother."
+
+"Disappointed!  Oh! no, not at all; but Jasper, only a few weeks
+ago, told me that you were not married; and, indeed, almost gave me
+to understand that you would be very glad to get a husband."
+
+"And you believed him?  I'll tell you, brother, for your
+instruction, that there is not in the whole world a greater liar
+than Jasper Petulengro."
+
+"I am sorry to hear it, Ursula; but with respect to him you
+married--who might he be?  A gorgio, or a Romany chal?"
+
+"Gorgio, or Romany chal!  Do you think I would ever condescend to a
+gorgio!  It was a Camomescro, brother, a Lovell, a distant relation
+of my own."
+
+"And where is he? and what became of him!  Have you any family?"
+
+"Don't think I am going to tell you all my history, brother; and,
+to tell you the truth, I am tired of sitting under hedges with you,
+talking nonsense.  I shall go to my house."
+
+"Do sit a little longer, sister Ursula.  I most heartily
+congratulate you on your marriage.  But where is this same Lovell?
+I have never seen him:  I wish to congratulate him too.  You are
+quite as handsome as the Meridiana of Pulci, Ursula, ay, or the
+Despina of Riciardetto.  Riciardetto, Ursula, is a poem written by
+one Fortiguerra, about ninety years ago, in imitation of the
+Morgante of Pulci.  It treats of the wars of Charlemagne and his
+Paladins with various barbarous nations, who came to besiege Paris.
+Despina was the daughter and heiress of Scricca, King of Cafria;
+she was the beloved of Riciardetto, and was beautiful as an angel;
+but I make no doubt you are quite as handsome as she."
+
+"Brother," said Ursula--but the reply of Ursula I reserve for
+another chapter, the present having attained to rather an uncommon
+length, for which, however, the importance of the matter discussed
+is a sufficient apology.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+
+Ursula's Tale--The Patteran--The Deep Water--Second Husband.
+
+
+"Brother," said Ursula, plucking a dandelion which grew at her
+feet, "I have always said that a more civil and pleasant-spoken
+person than yourself can't be found.  I have a great regard for you
+and your learning, and am willing to do you any pleasure in the way
+of words or conversation.  Mine is not a very happy story, but as
+you wish to hear it, it is quite at your service.  Launcelot Lovell
+made me an offer, as you call it, and we were married in Roman
+fashion; that is, we gave each other our right hands, and promised
+to be true to each other.  We lived together two years, travelling
+sometimes by ourselves, sometimes with our relations; I bore him
+two children, both of which were still-born, partly, I believe,
+from the fatigue I underwent in running about the country telling
+dukkerin when I was not exactly in a state to do so, and partly
+from the kicks and blows which my husband Launcelot was in the
+habit of giving me every night, provided I came home with less than
+five shillings, which it is sometimes impossible to make in the
+country, provided no fair or merry-making is going on.  At the end
+of two years my husband, Launcelot, whistled a horse from a
+farmer's field, and sold it for forty-pounds; and for that horse he
+was taken, put in prison, tried, and condemned to be sent to the
+other country for life.  Two days before he was to be sent away, I
+got leave to see him in the prison, and in the presence of the
+turnkey I gave him a thin cake of gingerbread, in which there was a
+dainty saw which could cut through iron.  I then took on
+wonderfully, turned my eyes inside out, fell down in a seeming fit,
+and was carried out of the prison.  That same night my husband
+sawed his irons off, cut through the bars of his window, and
+dropping down a height of fifty feet, lighted on his legs, and came
+and joined me on a heath where I was camped alone.  We were just
+getting things ready to be off, when we heard people coming, and
+sure enough they were runners after my husband, Launcelot Lovell;
+for his escape had been discovered within a quarter of an hour
+after he had got away.  My husband, without bidding me farewell,
+set off at full speed, and they after him, but they could not take
+him, and so they came back and took me, and shook me, and
+threatened me, and had me before the poknees, who shook his head at
+me, and threatened me in order to make me discover where my husband
+was, but I said I did not know, which was true enough; not that I
+would have told him if I had.  So at last the poknees and the
+runners, not being able to make anything out of me, were obliged to
+let me go, and I went in search of my husband.  I wandered about
+with my cart for several days in the direction in which I saw him
+run off, with my eyes bent on the ground, but could see no marks of
+him; at last, coming to four cross roads, I saw my husband's
+patteran."
+
+"You saw your husband's patteran?"
+
+"Yes, brother.  Do you know what patteran means?"
+
+"Of course, Ursula; the gypsy trail, the handful of grass which the
+gypsies strew in the roads as they travel, to give information to
+any of their companions who may be behind, as to the route they
+have taken.  The gypsy patteran has always had a strange interest
+for me, Ursula."
+
+"Like enough, brother; but what does patteran mean?"
+
+"Why, the gypsy trail, formed as I told you before."
+
+"And you know nothing more about patteran, brother?"
+
+"Nothing at all, Ursula; do you?"
+
+"What's the name for the leaf of a tree, brother?"
+
+"I don't know," said I; "it's odd enough that I have asked that
+question of a dozen Romany chals and chies, and they always told me
+that they did not know."
+
+"No more they did, brother; there's only one person in England that
+knows, and that's myself--the name for a leaf is patteran.  Now
+there are two that knows it--the other is yourself."
+
+"Dear me, Ursula, how very strange!  I am much obliged to you.  I
+think I never saw you look so pretty as you do now; but who told
+you?"
+
+"My mother, Mrs. Herne, told it me one day, brother, when she was
+in a good humour, which she very seldom was, as no one has a better
+right to know than yourself, as she hated you mortally:  it was one
+day when you had been asking our company what was the word for a
+leaf, and nobody could tell you, that she took me aside and told
+me, for she was in a good humour, and triumphed in seeing you
+balked.  She told me the word for leaf was patteran, which our
+people use now for trail, having forgotten the true meaning.  She
+said that the trail was called patteran, because the gypsies of old
+were in the habit of making the marks with the leaves and branches
+of trees, placed in a certain manner.  She said that nobody knew it
+but herself, who was one of the old sort, and begged me never to
+tell the word to any one but him I should marry; and to be
+particularly cautious never to let you know it, whom she hated.
+Well, brother, perhaps I have done wrong to tell you; but, as I
+said before, I likes you, and am always ready to do your pleasure
+in words and conversation; my mother, moreover, is dead and gone,
+and, poor thing, will never know anything about the matter.  So,
+when I married, I told my husband about the patteran, and we were
+in the habit of making our private trails with leaves and branches
+of trees, which none of the other gypsy people did; so, when I saw
+my husband's patteran, I knew it at once, and I followed it upwards
+of two hundred miles towards the north; and then I came to a deep,
+awful-looking water, with an overhanging bank, and on the bank I
+found the patteran, which directed me to proceed along the bank
+towards the east, and I followed my husband's patteran towards the
+east; and before I had gone half a mile, I came to a place where I
+saw the bank had given way, and fallen into the deep water.
+Without paying much heed, I passed on, and presently came to a
+public-house, not far from the water, and I entered the public-
+house to get a little beer, and perhaps to tell a dukkerin, for I
+saw a great many people about the door; and, when I entered, I
+found there was what they calls an inquest being held upon a body
+in that house, and the jury had just risen to go and look at the
+body; and being a woman, and having a curiosity, I thought I would
+go with them, and so I did; and no sooner did I see the body, than
+I knew it to be my husband's; it was much swelled and altered, but
+I knew it partly by the clothes, and partly by a mark on the
+forehead, and I cried out, 'It is my husband's body,' and I fell
+down in a fit, and the fit that time, brother, was not a seeming
+one."
+
+"Dear me," said I, "how terrible! but tell me, Ursula, how did your
+husband come by his death?"
+
+"The bank, overhanging the deep water, gave way under him, brother,
+and he was drowned; for, like most of our people, he could not
+swim, or only a little.  The body, after it had been in the water a
+long time, came up of itself, and was found floating.  Well,
+brother, when the people of the neighbourhood found that I was the
+wife of the drowned man, they were very kind to me, and made a
+subscription for me, with which, after having seen my husband
+buried, I returned the way I had come, till I met Jasper and his
+people, and with them I have travelled ever since:  I was very
+melancholy for a long time, I assure you, brother; for the death of
+my husband preyed very much upon my mind."
+
+"His death was certainly a very shocking one, Ursula; but, really,
+if he had died a natural one, you could scarcely have regretted it,
+for he appears to have treated you barbarously."
+
+"Women must bear, brother; and, barring that he kicked and beat me,
+and drove me out to tell dukkerin when I could scarcely stand, he
+was not a bad husband.  A man, by gypsy law, brother, is allowed to
+kick and beat his wife, and to bury her alive, if he thinks proper.
+I am a gypsy, and have nothing to say against the law."
+
+"But what has Mikailia Chikno to say about it?"
+
+"She is a cripple, brother, the only cripple amongst the Roman
+people:  so she is allowed to do and say as she pleases.  Moreover,
+her husband does not think fit to kick or beat her, though it is my
+opinion she would like him all the better if he were occasionally
+to do so, and threaten to bury her alive; at any rate, she would
+treat him better, and respect him more."
+
+"Your sister does not seem to stand much in awe of Jasper
+Petulengro, Ursula."
+
+"Let the matters of my sister and Jasper Petulengro alone, brother;
+you must travel in their company some time before you can
+understand them; they are a strange two, up to all kind of
+chaffing:  but two more regular Romans don't breathe, and I'll tell
+you, for your instruction, that there isn't a better mare-breaker
+in England than Jasper Petulengro, if you can manage Miss Isopel
+Berners as well as--"
+
+"Isopel Berners," said I, "how came you to think of her?"
+
+"How should I but think of her, brother, living as she does with
+you in Mumper's dingle, and travelling about with you; you will
+have, brother, more difficulty to manage her, than Jasper has to
+manage my sister Pakomovna.  I should have mentioned her before,
+only I wanted to know what you had to say to me; and when we got
+into discourse, I forgot her.  I say, brother, let me tell you your
+dukkerin, with respect to her, you will never--"
+
+"I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula."
+
+"Do let me tell you your dukkerin, brother, you will never manage--
+"
+
+"I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula, in connection with Isopel
+Berners.  Moreover, it is Sunday, we will change the subject; it is
+surprising to me that, after all you have undergone, you should
+look so beautiful.  I suppose you do not think of marrying again,
+Ursula?"
+
+"No, brother, one husband at a time is quite enough for any
+reasonable mort; especially such a good husband as I have got."
+
+"Such a good husband! why, I thought you told me your husband was
+drowned?"
+
+"Yes, brother, my first husband was."
+
+"And have you a second?"
+
+"To be sure, brother."
+
+"And who is he? in the name of wonder."
+
+"Who is he? why Sylvester, to be sure."
+
+"I do assure you, Ursula, that I feel disposed to be angry with
+you; such a handsome young woman as yourself to take up with such a
+nasty pepper-faced good for nothing--"
+
+"I won't hear my husband abused, brother; so you had better say no
+more."
+
+"Why, is he not the Lazarus of the gypsies? has he a penny of his
+own, Ursula?"
+
+"Then the more his want, brother, of a clever chi like me to take
+care of him and his childer.  I tell you what, brother, I will
+chore, if necessary, and tell dukkerin for Sylvester, if even so
+heavy as scarcely to be able to stand.  You call him lazy; you
+would not think him lazy if you were in a ring with him:  he is a
+proper man with his hands; Jasper is going to back him for twenty
+pounds against Slammocks of the Chong gav, the brother of Roarer
+and Bell-metal, he says he has no doubt that he will win."
+
+"Well, if you like him, I, of course, can have no objection.  Have
+you been long married?"
+
+"About a fortnight, brother; that dinner, the other day, when I
+sang the song, was given in celebration of the wedding."
+
+"Were you married in a church, Ursula?"
+
+"We were not, brother; none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys are
+ever married in a church:  we took each other's words.  Brother, I
+have been with you near three hours beneath this hedge.  I will go
+to my husband."
+
+"Does he know that you are here?"
+
+"He does, brother."
+
+"And is he satisfied?"
+
+"Satisfied! of course.  Lor', you gorgies!  Brother, I go to my
+husband and my house."  And, thereupon, Ursula rose and departed.
+
+After waiting a little time I also arose; it was now dark, and I
+thought I could do no better than betake myself to the dingle; at
+the entrance of it I found Mr. Petulengro.  "Well, brother," said
+he, "what kind of conversation have you and Ursula had beneath the
+hedge?"
+
+"If you wished to hear what we were talking about, you should have
+come and sat down beside us; you knew where we were."
+
+"Well, brother, I did much the same, for I went and sat down behind
+you."
+
+"Behind the hedge, Jasper?"
+
+"Behind the hedge, brother."
+
+"And heard all our conversation."
+
+"Every word, brother; and a rum conversation it was."
+
+"'Tis an old saying, Jasper, that listeners never hear any good of
+themselves; perhaps you heard the epithet that Ursula bestowed upon
+you."
+
+"If, by epitaph, you mean that she called me a liar, I did,
+brother, and she was not much wrong, for I certainly do not always
+stick exactly to truth; you, however, have not much to complain of
+me."
+
+"You deceived me about Ursula, giving me to understand she was not
+married."
+
+"She was not married when I told you so, brother; that is, not to
+Sylvester; nor was I aware that she was going to marry him.  I once
+thought you had a kind of regard for her, and I am sure she had as
+much for you as a Romany chi can have for a gorgio.  I half
+expected to have heard you make love to her behind the hedge, but I
+begin to think you care for nothing in this world but old words and
+strange stories.  Lor' to take a young woman under a hedge, and
+talk to her as you did to Ursula; and yet you got everything out of
+her that you wanted, with your gammon about old Fulcher and
+Meridiana.  You are a cunning one, brother."
+
+"There you are mistaken, Jasper.  I am not cunning.  If people
+think I am, it is because, being made up of art themselves,
+simplicity of character is a puzzle to them.  Your women are
+certainly extraordinary creatures, Jasper."
+
+"Didn't I say they were rum animals?  Brother, we Romans shall
+always stick together as long as they stick fast to us."
+
+"Do you think they always will, Jasper?"
+
+"Can't say, brother; nothing lasts for ever.  Romany chies are
+Romany chies still, though not exactly what they were sixty years
+ago.  My wife, though a rum one, is not Mrs. Herne, brother.  I
+think she is rather fond of Frenchmen and French discourse.  I tell
+you what, brother, if ever gypsyism breaks up, it will be owing to
+our chies having been bitten by that mad puppy they calls
+gentility."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+
+The Dingle at Night--The Two Sides of the Question--Roman Females--
+Filling the Kettle--The Dream--The Tall Figure.
+
+
+I descended to the bottom of the dingle.  It was nearly involved in
+obscurity.  To dissipate the feeling of melancholy which came over
+my mind, I resolved to kindle a fire; and having heaped dry sticks
+upon my hearth, and added a billet or two, I struck a light, and
+soon produced a blaze.  Sitting down, I fixed my eyes upon the
+blaze, and soon fell into a deep meditation.  I thought of the
+events of the day, the scene at church, and what I had heard at
+church, the danger of losing one's soul, the doubts of Jasper
+Petulengro as to whether one had a soul.  I thought over the
+various arguments which I had either heard, or which had come
+spontaneously to my mind, for or against the probability of a state
+of future existence.  They appeared to me to be tolerably evenly
+balanced.  I then thought that it was at all events taking the
+safest part to conclude that there was a soul.  It would be a
+terrible thing, after having passed one's life in the disbelief of
+the existence of a soul, to wake up after death a soul, and to find
+one's self a lost soul.  Yes, methought I would come to the
+conclusion that one has a soul.  Choosing the safe side, however,
+appeared to me to be playing a rather dastardly part.  I had never
+been an admirer of people who chose the safe side in everything;
+indeed I had always entertained a thorough contempt for them.
+Surely it would be showing more manhood to adopt the dangerous
+side, that of disbelief; I almost resolved to do so--but yet in a
+question of so much importance, I ought not to be guided by vanity.
+The question was not which was the safe, but the true side? yet how
+was I to know which was the true side?  Then I thought of the
+Bible--which I had been reading in the morning--that spoke of the
+soul and a future state; but was the Bible true?  I had heard
+learned and moral men say that it was true, but I had also heard
+learned and moral men say that it was not:  how was I to decide?
+Still that balance of probabilities!  If I could but see the way of
+truth, I would follow it, if necessary, upon hands and knees; on
+that I was determined; but I could not see it.  Feeling my brain
+begin to turn round, I resolved to think of something else; and
+forthwith began to think of what had passed between Ursula and
+myself in our discourse beneath the hedge.
+
+I mused deeply on what she had told me as to the virtue of the
+females of her race.  How singular that virtue must be which was
+kept pure and immaculate by the possessor, whilst indulging in
+habits of falsehood and dishonesty!  I had always thought the gypsy
+females extraordinary beings.  I had often wondered at them, their
+dress, their manner of speaking, and, not least, at their names;
+but, until the present day, I had been unacquainted with the most
+extraordinary point connected with them.  How came they possessed
+of this extraordinary virtue? was it because they were thievish?  I
+remembered that an ancient thief-taker, who had retired from his
+useful calling, and who frequently visited the office of my master
+at law, the respectable S---, who had the management of his
+property--I remembered to have heard this worthy, with whom I
+occasionally held discourse, philosophic and profound, when he and
+I chanced to be alone together in the office, say that all first-
+rate thieves were sober, and of well-regulated morals, their bodily
+passions being kept in abeyance by their love of gain; but this
+axiom could scarcely hold good with respect to these women--however
+thievish they might be, they did care for something besides gain:
+they cared for their husbands.  If they did thieve, they merely
+thieved for their husbands; and though, perhaps, some of them were
+vain, they merely prized their beauty because it gave them favour
+in the eyes of their husbands.  Whatever the husbands were--and
+Jasper had almost insinuated that the males occasionally allowed
+themselves some latitude--they appeared to be as faithful to their
+husbands as the ancient Roman matrons were to theirs.  Roman
+matrons! and, after all, might not these be in reality Roman
+matrons?  They called themselves Romans; might not they be the
+descendants of the old Roman matrons?  Might not they be of the
+same blood as Lucretia?  And were not many of their strange names--
+Lucretia amongst the rest--handed down to them from old Rome?  It
+is true their language was not that of old Rome; it was not,
+however, altogether different from it.  After all, the ancient
+Romans might be a tribe of these people, who settled down and
+founded a village with the tilts of carts, which, by degrees, and
+the influx of other people, became the grand city of the world.  I
+liked the idea of the grand city of the world owing its origin to a
+people who had been in the habit of carrying their houses in their
+carts.  Why, after all, should not the Romans of history be a
+branch of these Romans?  There were several points of similarity
+between them; if Roman matrons were chaste, both men and women were
+thieves.  Old Rome was the thief of the world; yet still there were
+difficulties to be removed before I could persuade myself that the
+old Romans and my Romans were identical; and in trying to remove
+these difficulties, I felt my brain once more beginning to turn,
+and in haste took up another subject of meditation, and that was
+the patteran, and what Ursula had told me about it.
+
+I had always entertained a strange interest for that sign by which
+in their wanderings the Romanese gave to those of their people who
+came behind intimation as to the direction which they took; but it
+now inspired me with greater interest than ever,--now that I had
+learnt that the proper meaning of it was the leaves of trees.  I
+had, as I had said in my dialogue with Ursula, been very eager to
+learn the word for leaf in the Romanian language, but had never
+learnt it till this day; so patteran signified leaf of a tree; and
+no one at present knew that but myself and Ursula, who had learnt
+it from Mrs. Herne, the last, it was said, of the old stock; and
+then I thought what strange people the gypsies must have been in
+the old time.  They were sufficiently strange at present, but they
+must have been far stranger of old; they must have been a more
+peculiar people--their language must have been more perfect--and
+they must have had a greater stock of strange secrets.  I almost
+wished that I had lived some two or three hundred years ago, that I
+might have observed these people when they were yet stranger than
+at present.  I wondered whether I could have introduced myself to
+their company at that period, whether I should have been so
+fortunate as to meet such a strange, half-malicious, half good-
+humoured being as Jasper, who would have instructed me in the
+language, then more deserving of note than at present.  What might
+I not have done with that language, had I known it in its purity?
+Why, I might have written books in it; yet those who spoke it would
+hardly have admitted me to their society at that period, when they
+kept more to themselves.  Yet I thought that I might possibly have
+gained their confidence, and have wandered about with them, and
+learnt their language, and all their strange ways, and then--and
+then--and a sigh rose from the depth of my breast; for I began to
+think, "Supposing I had accomplished all this, what would have been
+the profit of it; and in what would all this wild gypsy dream have
+terminated?"
+
+Then rose another sigh, yet more profound, for I began to think,
+"What was likely to be the profit of my present way of life; the
+living in dingles, making pony and donkey shoes, conversing with
+gypsy-women under hedges, and extracting from them their odd
+secrets?"  What was likely to be the profit of such a kind of life,
+even should it continue for a length of time?--a supposition not
+very probable, for I was earning nothing to support me, and the
+funds with which I had entered upon this life were gradually
+disappearing.  I was living, it is true, not unpleasantly, enjoying
+the healthy air of heaven; but, upon the whole, was I not sadly
+misspending my time?  Surely I was; and, as I looked back, it
+appeared to me that I had always been doing so.  What had been the
+profit of the tongues which I had learnt? had they ever assisted me
+in the day of hunger?  No, no! it appeared to me that I had always
+misspent my time, save in one instance, when by a desperate effort
+I had collected all the powers of my imagination, and written the
+"Life of Joseph Sell;" but even when I wrote the Life of Sell, was
+I not in a false position?  Provided I had not misspent my time,
+would it have been necessary to make that effort, which, after all,
+had only enabled me to leave London, and wander about the country
+for a time?  But could I, taking all circumstances into
+consideration, have done better than I had?  With my peculiar
+temperament and ideas, could I have pursued with advantage the
+profession to which my respectable parents had endeavoured to bring
+me up?  It appeared to me that I could not, and that the hand of
+necessity had guided me from my earliest years, until the present
+night, in which I found myself seated in the dingle, staring on the
+brands of the fire.  But ceasing to think of the past which, as
+irrecoverably gone, it was useless to regret, even were there cause
+to regret it, what should I do in future?  Should I write another
+book like the Life of Joseph Sell; take it to London, and offer it
+to a publisher?  But when I reflected on the grisly sufferings
+which I had undergone whilst engaged in writing the Life of Sell, I
+shrank from the idea of a similar attempt; moreover, I doubted
+whether I possessed the power to write a similar work--whether the
+materials for the life of another Sell lurked within the recesses
+of my brain?  Had I not better become in reality what I had
+hitherto been merely playing at--a tinker or a gypsy?  But I soon
+saw that I was not fitted to become either in reality.  It was much
+more agreeable to play the gypsy or the tinker than to become
+either in reality.  I had seen enough of gypsying and tinkering to
+be convinced of that.  All of a sudden the idea of tilling the soil
+came into my head; tilling the soil was a healthful and noble
+pursuit! but my idea of tilling the soil had no connection with
+Britain; for I could only expect to till the soil in Britain as a
+serf.  I thought of tilling it in America, in which it was said
+there was plenty of wild, unclaimed land, of which any one, who
+chose to clear it of its trees, might take possession.  I figured
+myself in America, in an immense forest, clearing the land
+destined, by my exertions, to become a fruitful and smiling plain.
+Methought I heard the crash of the huge trees as they fell beneath
+my axe; and then I bethought me that a man was intended to marry--I
+ought to marry; and if I married, where was I likely to be more
+happy as a husband and a father than in America, engaged in tilling
+the ground?  I fancied myself in America, engaged in tilling the
+ground, assisted by an enormous progeny.  Well, why not marry, and
+go and till the ground in America?  I was young, and youth was the
+time to marry in, and to labour in.  I had the use of all my
+faculties; my eyes, it is true, were rather dull from early study,
+and from writing the Life of Joseph Sell; but I could see tolerably
+well with them, and they were not bleared.  I felt my arms, and
+thighs, and teeth--they were strong and sound enough; so now was
+the time to labour, to marry, eat strong flesh, and beget strong
+children--the power of doing all this would pass away with youth,
+which was terribly transitory.  I bethought me that a time would
+come when my eyes would be bleared, and, perhaps, sightless; my
+arms and thighs strengthless and sapless; when my teeth would shake
+in my jaws, even supposing they did not drop out.  No going a
+wooing then--no labouring--no eating strong flesh, and begetting
+lusty children then; and I bethought me how, when all this should
+be, I should bewail the days of my youth as misspent, provided I
+had not in them founded for myself a home, and begotten strong
+children to take care of me in the days when I could not take care
+of myself; and thinking of these things, I became sadder and
+sadder, and stared vacantly upon the fire till my eyes closed in a
+doze.
+
+I continued dozing over the fire, until rousing myself I perceived
+that the brands were nearly consumed, and I thought of retiring for
+the night.  I arose, and was about to enter my tent, when a thought
+struck me.  "Suppose," thought I, "that Isopel Berners should
+return in the midst of the night, how dark and dreary would the
+dingle appear without a fire! truly, I will keep up the fire, and I
+will do more; I have no board to spread for her, but I will fill
+the kettle, and heat it, so that, if she comes, I may be able to
+welcome her with a cup of tea, for I know she loves tea."
+Thereupon, I piled more wood upon the fire, and soon succeeded in
+procuring a better blaze than before; then, taking the kettle, I
+set out for the spring.  On arriving at the mouth of the dingle,
+which fronted the east, I perceived that Charles's wain was nearly
+opposite to it, high above in the heavens, by which I knew that the
+night was tolerably well advanced.  The gypsy encampment lay before
+me; all was hushed and still within it, and its inmates appeared to
+be locked in slumber; as I advanced, however, the dogs, which were
+fastened outside the tents, growled and barked; but presently
+recognising me, they were again silent, some of them wagging their
+tails.  As I drew near a particular tent, I heard a female voice
+say--"Some one is coming!" and, as I was about to pass it, the
+cloth which formed the door was suddenly lifted up, and a black
+head and part of a huge naked body protruded.  It was the head and
+upper part of the giant Tawno, who, according to the fashion of
+gypsy men, lay next the door wrapped in his blanket; the blanket
+had, however, fallen off, and the starlight shone clear on his
+athletic tawny body, and was reflected from his large staring eyes.
+
+"It is only I, Tawno," said I, "going to fill the kettle, as it is
+possible that Miss Berners may arrive this night."  "Kos-ko,"
+drawled out Tawno, and replaced the curtain.  "Good, do you call
+it?" said the sharp voice of his wife; "there is no good in the
+matter! if that young chap were not living with the rawnee in the
+illegal and uncertificated line, he would not be getting up in the
+middle of the night to fill her kettles."  Passing on, I proceeded
+to the spring, where I filled the kettle, and then returned to the
+dingle.
+
+Placing the kettle upon the fire, I watched it till it began to
+boil; then removing it from the top of the brands, I placed it
+close beside the fire, and leaving it simmering, I retired to my
+tent; where, having taken off my shoes, and a few of my garments, I
+lay down on my palliasse, and was not long in falling asleep.  I
+believe I slept soundly for some time, thinking and dreaming of
+nothing; suddenly, however, my sleep became disturbed, and the
+subject of the patterans began to occupy my brain.  I imagined that
+I saw Ursula tracing her husband, Launcelot Lovel, by means of his
+patterans; I imagined that she had considerable difficulty in doing
+so; that she was occasionally interrupted by parish beadles and
+constables, who asked her whither she was travelling, to whom she
+gave various answers.  Presently methought that, as she was passing
+by a farm-yard, two fierce and savage dogs flew at her; I was in
+great trouble, I remember, and wished to assist her, but could not,
+for though I seemed to see her, I was still at a distance:  and now
+it appeared that she had escaped from the dogs, and was proceeding
+with her cart along a gravelly path which traversed a wild moor; I
+could hear the wheels grating amidst sand and gravel.  The next
+moment I was awake, and found myself sitting up in my tent; there
+was a glimmer of light through the canvas caused by the fire; a
+feeling of dread came over me, which was perhaps natural, on
+starting suddenly from one's sleep in that wild lone place; I half
+imagined that some one was nigh the tent; the idea made me rather
+uncomfortable, and, to dissipate it, I lifted up the canvas of the
+door and peeped out, and, lo! I had a distinct view of a tall
+figure standing by the tent.  "Who is that?" said I, whilst I felt
+my blood rush to my heart.  "It is I," said the voice of Isopel
+Berners; "you little expected me, I dare say; well, sleep on, I do
+not wish to disturb you."  "But I was expecting you," said I,
+recovering myself, "as you may see by the fire and kettle.  I will
+be with you in a moment."
+
+Putting on in haste the articles of dress which I had flung off, I
+came out of the tent, and addressing myself to Isopel, who was
+standing beside her cart, I said--"just as I was about to retire to
+rest I thought it possible that you might come to-night, and got
+everything in readiness for you.  Now, sit down by the fire whilst
+I lead the donkey and cart to the place where you stay; I will
+unharness the animal, and presently come and join you."  "I need
+not trouble you," said Isopel; "I will go myself and see after my
+things."  "We will go together," said I, "and then return and have
+some tea."  Isopel made no objection, and in about half-an-hour we
+had arranged everything at her quarters, I then hastened and
+prepared tea.  Presently Isopel rejoined me, bringing her stool;
+she had divested herself of her bonnet, and her hair fell over her
+shoulders; she sat down, and I poured out the beverage, handing her
+a cup.  "Have you made a long journey to-night?" said I.  "A very
+long one," replied Belle.  "I have come nearly twenty miles since
+six o'clock."  "I believe I heard you coming in my sleep," said I;
+"did the dogs above bark at you?"  "Yes," said Isopel, "very
+violently; did you think of me in your sleep?"  "No," said I, "I
+was thinking of Ursula and something she had told me."  "When and
+where was that?" said Isopel.  "Yesterday evening," said I,
+"beneath the dingle hedge."  "Then you were talking with her
+beneath the hedge?"  "I was," said I, "but only upon gypsy matters.
+Do you know, Belle, that she has just been married to Sylvester, so
+that you need not think that she and I--"  "She and you are quite
+at liberty to sit where you please," said Isopel.  "However, young
+man," she continued, dropping her tone, which she had slightly
+raised, "I believe what you said, that you were merely talking
+about gypsy matters, and also what you were going to say, if it
+was, as I suppose, that she and you had no particular
+acquaintance."  Isopel was now silent for some time.  "What are you
+thinking of?" said I.  "I was thinking," said Belle, "how
+exceedingly kind it was of you to get everything in readiness for
+me, though you did not know that I should come."  "I had a
+presentiment that you would come," said I; "but you forget that I
+have prepared the kettle for you before, though it was true that I
+was then certain that you would come."  "I had not forgotten your
+doing so, young man," said Belle; "but I was beginning to think
+that you were utterly selfish, caring for nothing but the
+gratification of your own selfish whims."  "I am very fond of
+having my own way," said I, "but utterly selfish I am not, as I
+dare say I shall frequently prove to you.  You will often find the
+kettle boiling when you come home."  "Not heated by you," said
+Isopel, with a sigh.  "By whom else?" said I; "surely you are not
+thinking of driving me away?"  "You have as much right here as
+myself," said Isopel, "as I have told you before; but I must be
+going myself."  "Well," said I, "we can go together; to tell you
+the truth, I am rather tired of this place."  "Our paths must be
+separate," said Belle.  "Separate," said I, "what do you mean?  I
+shan't let you go alone, I shall go with you; and you know the road
+is as free to me as to you; besides, you can't think of parting
+company with me, considering how much you would lose by doing so;
+remember that you know scarcely anything of the Armenian language;
+now, to learn Armenian from me would take you twenty years."
+
+Belle faintly smiled.  "Come," said I, "take another cup of tea."
+Belle took another cup of tea, and yet another; we had some
+indifferent conversation, after which I arose and gave her donkey a
+considerable feed of corn.  Belle thanked me, shook me by the hand,
+and then went to her own tabernacle, and I returned to mine.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+
+Visit to the Landlord--His Mortifications--Hunter and his Clan--
+Resolution.
+
+
+On the following morning, after breakfasting with Belle, who was
+silent and melancholy, I left her in the dingle, and took a stroll
+amongst the neighbouring lanes.  After some time I thought I would
+pay a visit to the landlord of the public-house, whom I had not
+seen since the day when he communicated to me his intention of
+changing his religion.  I therefore directed my steps to the house,
+and on entering it found the landlord standing in the kitchen.
+Just then two mean-looking fellows, who had been drinking at one of
+the tables, and who appeared to be the only customers in the house,
+got up, brushed past the landlord, and saying in a surly tone, we
+shall pay you some time or other, took their departure.  "That's
+the way they serve me now," said the landlord, with a sigh.  "Do
+you know those fellows," I demanded, "since you let them go away in
+your debt?"   "I know nothing about them," said the landlord, "save
+that they are a couple of scamps."  "Then why did you let them go
+away without paying you?" said I.  "I had not the heart to stop
+them," said the landlord; "and, to tell you the truth, everybody
+serves me so now, and I suppose they are right, for a child could
+flog me."  "Nonsense," said I, "behave more like a man, and with
+respect to those two fellows run after them, I will go with you,
+and if they refuse to pay the reckoning I will help you to shake
+some money out of their clothes."  "Thank you," said the landlord;
+"but as they are gone, let them go on.  What they have drank is not
+of much consequence."  "What is the matter with you?" said I,
+staring at the landlord, who appeared strangely altered; his
+features were wild and haggard, his formerly bluff cheeks were
+considerably sunken in, and his figure had lost much of its
+plumpness.  "Have you changed your religion already, and has the
+fellow in black commanded you to fast?"  "I have not changed my
+religion yet," said the landlord, with a kind of shudder; "I am to
+change it publicly this day fortnight, and the idea of doing so--I
+do not mind telling you--preys much upon my mind; moreover, the
+noise of the thing has got abroad, and everybody is laughing at me,
+and what's more, coming and drinking my beer, and going away
+without paying for it, whilst I feel myself like one bewitched,
+wishing but not daring to take my own part.  Confound the fellow in
+black, I wish I had never seen him! yet what can I do without him?
+The brewer swears that unless I pay him fifty pounds within a
+fortnight he'll send a distress warrant into the house, and take
+all I have.  My poor niece is crying in the room above; and I am
+thinking of going into the stable and hanging myself; and perhaps
+it's the best thing I can do, for it's better to hang myself before
+selling my soul than afterwards, as I'm sure I should, like Judas
+Iscariot, whom my poor niece, who is somewhat religiously inclined,
+has been talking to me about."  "I wish I could assist you," said
+I, "with money, but that is quite out of my power.  However, I can
+give you a piece of advice.  Don't change your religion by any
+means; you can't hope to prosper if you do; and if the brewer
+chooses to deal hardly with you, let him.  Everybody would respect
+you ten times more provided you allowed yourself to be turned into
+the roads rather than change your religion, than if you got fifty
+pounds for renouncing it."  "I am half inclined to take your
+advice," said the landlord, "only, to tell you the truth, I feel
+quite low, without any heart in me."  "Come into the bar," said I,
+"and let us have something together--you need not be afraid of my
+not paying for what I order."
+
+We went into the bar-room, where the landlord and I discussed
+between us two bottles of strong ale, which he said were part of
+the last six which he had in his possession.  At first he wished to
+drink sherry, but I begged him to do no such thing, telling him
+that sherry would do him no good under the present circumstances;
+nor, indeed, to the best of my belief, under any, it being of all
+wines the one for which I entertained the most contempt.  The
+landlord allowed himself to be dissuaded, and, after a glass or two
+of ale, confessed that sherry was a sickly, disagreeable drink, and
+that he had merely been in the habit of taking it from an idea he
+had that it was genteel.  Whilst quaffing our beverage, he gave me
+an account of the various mortifications to which he had of late
+been subject, dwelling with particular bitterness on the conduct of
+Hunter, who he said came every night and mouthed him, and
+afterwards went away without paying for what he had drank or
+smoked, in which conduct he was closely imitated by a clan of
+fellows who constantly attended him.  After spending several hours
+at the public-house I departed, not forgetting to pay for the two
+bottles of ale.  The landlord, before I went, shaking me by the
+hand, declared that he had now made up his mind to stick to his
+religion at all hazards, the more especially as he was convinced he
+should derive no good by giving it up.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+
+Preparations for the Fair--The Last Lesson--The Verb Siriel.
+
+
+It might be about five in the evening, when I reached the gypsy
+encampment.  Here I found Mr. Petulengro, Tawno Chikno, Sylvester,
+and others in a great bustle, clipping and trimming certain ponies
+and old horses which they had brought with them.  On inquiring of
+Jasper the reason of their being so engaged, he informed me that
+they were getting the horses ready for a fair, which was to be held
+on the morrow, at a place some miles distant, at which they should
+endeavour to dispose of them, adding--"Perhaps, brother, you will
+go with us, provided you have nothing better to do?"  Not having
+any particular engagement, I assured him that I should have great
+pleasure in being of the party.  It was agreed that we should start
+early on the following morning.  Thereupon I descended into the
+dingle.  Belle was sitting before the fire, at which the kettle was
+boiling.  "Were you waiting for me?" I inquired.  "Yes," said
+Belle, "I thought that you would come, and I waited for you."
+"That was very kind," said I.  "Not half so kind," said she, "as it
+was of you to get everything ready for me in the dead of last
+night, when there was scarcely a chance of my coming."  The tea-
+things were brought forward, and we sat down.  "Have you been far?"
+said Belle.  "Merely to that public-house," said I, "to which you
+directed me on the second day of our acquaintance."  "Young men
+should not make a habit of visiting public-houses," said Belle,
+"they are bad places."  "They may be so to some people," said I,
+"but I do not think the worst public-house in England could do me
+any harm."  "Perhaps you are so bad already," said Belle, with a
+smile, "that it would be impossible to spoil you."  "How dare you
+catch at my words?" said I; "come, I will make you pay for doing
+so--you shall have this evening the longest lesson in Armenian
+which I have yet inflicted upon you."  "You may well say
+inflicted," said Belle, "but pray spare me.  I do not wish to hear
+anything about Armenian, especially this evening."  "Why this
+evening?" said I.  Belle made no answer.  "I will not spare you,"
+said I; "this evening I intend to make you conjugate an Armenian
+verb."  "Well, be it so," said Belle; "for this evening you shall
+command."  "To command is hramahyel," said I.  "Ram her ill,
+indeed," said Belle; "I do not wish to begin with that."  "No,"
+said I, "as we have come to the verbs, we will begin regularly;
+hramahyel is a verb of the second conjugation.  We will begin with
+the first."  "First of all tell me," said Belle, "what a verb is?"
+"A part of speech," said I, "which, according to the dictionary,
+signifies some action or passion; for example, I command you, or I
+hate you."  "I have given you no cause to hate me," said Belle,
+looking me sorrowfully in the face.
+
+"I was merely giving two examples," said I, "and neither was
+directed at you.  In those examples, to command and hate are verbs.
+Belle, in Armenian there are four conjugations of verbs; the first
+ends in al, the second in yel, the third in oul, and the fourth in
+il.  Now, have you understood me?"
+
+"I am afraid, indeed, it will all end ill," said Belle.
+
+"Hold your tongue," said I, "or you will make me lose my patience."
+"You have already made me nearly lose mine," said Belle.  "Let us
+have no unprofitable interruptions," said I; "the conjugations of
+the Armenian verbs are neither so numerous nor so difficult as the
+declensions of the nouns; hear that, and rejoice.  Come, we will
+begin with the verb hntal, a verb of the first conjugation, which
+signifies to rejoice.  Come along; hntam, I rejoice; hntas, thou
+rejoicest; why don't you follow, Belle?"
+
+"I am sure I don't rejoice, whatever you may do," said Belle.  "The
+chief difficulty, Belle," said I, "that I find in teaching you the
+Armenian grammar, proceeds from your applying to yourself and me
+every example I give.  Rejoice, in this instance, is merely an
+example of an Armenian verb of the first conjugation, and has no
+more to do with your rejoicing than lal, which is, also a verb of
+the first conjugation, and which signifies to weep, would have to
+do with your weeping, provided I made you conjugate it.  Come
+along; hntam, I rejoice; hntas, thou rejoicest; hnta, he rejoices;
+hntamk we rejoice:  now, repeat those words."
+
+"I can't," said Belle, "they sound more like the language of horses
+than human beings.  Do you take me for--?"  "For what?" said I.
+Belle was silent.  "Were you going to say mare?" said I.  "Mare!
+mare! by the bye, do you know, Belle, that mare in old English
+stands for woman; and that when we call a female an evil mare, the
+strict meaning of the term is merely a bad woman.  So if I were to
+call you a mare without prefixing bad, you must not be offended."
+"But I should though," said Belle.  "I was merely attempting to
+make you acquainted with a philological fact," said I.  "If mare,
+which in old English, and likewise in vulgar English, signifies a
+woman, sounds the same as mare, which in modern and polite English
+signifies a female horse, I can't help it.  There is no such
+confusion of sounds in Armenian, not, at least, in the same
+instance.  Belle, in Armenian, woman is ghin, the same word, by the
+by, as our queen, whereas mare is madagh tzi, which signifies a
+female horse; and perhaps you will permit me to add, that a hard-
+mouthed jade is, in Armenian, madagh tzi hsdierah."
+
+"I can't bear this much longer," said Belle.  "Keep yourself
+quiet," said I; "I wish to be gentle with you; and to convince you,
+we will skip hntal, and also for the present verbs of the first
+conjugation and proceed to the second.  Belle, I will now select
+for you to conjugate the prettiest verb in Armenian; not only of
+the second, but also of all the four conjugations; that verb is
+siriel.  Here is the present tense:- siriem, siries, sire, siriemk,
+sirek, sirien.  You observe that it runs on just in the same manner
+as hntal, save and except that the e is substituted for a; and it
+will be as well to tell you that almost the only difference between
+the second, third, and fourth conjugation, and the first, is the
+substituting in the present, preterite and other tenses e or ou, or
+i for a; so you see that the Armenian verbs are by no means
+difficult.  Come on, Belle, and say siriem."  Belle hesitated.
+"Pray oblige me, Belle, by saying siriem!"  Belle still appeared to
+hesitate.  "You must admit, Belle, that it is much softer than
+hntam."  "It is so," said Belle; "and to oblige you I will say
+siriem."  "Very well indeed, Belle," said I. "No vartabied, or
+doctor, could have pronounced it better; and now, to show you how
+verbs act upon pronouns in Armenian, I will say siriem zkiez.
+Please to repeat siriem zkiez!"  "Siriem zkiez!" said Belle; "that
+last word is very hard to say."  "Sorry that you think so, Belle,"
+said I.  "Now please to say siria zis."  Belle did so.
+"Exceedingly well," said I.  "Now say, yerani the sireir zis."
+"Yerani the sireir zis," said Belle.  "Capital!" said I; "you have
+now said, I love you--love me--ah! would that you would love me!"
+
+"And I have said all these things?" said Belle.  "Yes," said I;
+"you have said them in Armenian."  "I would have said them in no
+language that I understood," said Belle; "and it was very wrong of
+you to take advantage of my ignorance, and make me say such
+things."  "Why so?" said I; "if you said them, I said them too."
+"You did so," said Belle; "but I believe you were merely bantering
+and jeering."  "As I told you before, Belle," said I, "the chief
+difficulty which I find in teaching you Armenian proceeds from your
+persisting in applying to yourself and me every example I give."
+"Then you meant nothing after all," said Belle, raising her voice.
+"Let us proceed," said I; "sirietsi, I loved."  "You never loved
+any one but yourself," said Belle; "and what's more--"
+"Sirietsits, I will love," said I; "sirietsies, thou wilt love."
+"Never one so thoroughly heartless," said Belle.  "I tell you what,
+Belle, you are becoming intolerable, but we will change the verb;
+or rather I will now proceed to tell you here, that some of the
+Armenian conjugations have their anomalies; one species of these I
+wish to bring before your notice.  As old Villotte says--from whose
+work I first contrived to pick up the rudiments of Armenian--'Est
+verborum transitivorum, quorum infinitivus--' but I forgot, you
+don't understand Latin.  He says there are certain transitive
+verbs, whose infinitive is in outsaniel; the preterite in outsi;
+the imperative in one; for example--parghatsout-saniem, I irritate-
+-"
+
+"You do, you do," said Belle; "and it will be better for both of
+us, if you leave off doing so."
+
+"You would hardly believe, Belle," said I, "that the Armenian is in
+some respects closely connected with the Irish, but so it is; for
+example, that word parghatsout-saniem is evidently derived from the
+same root as feargaim, which, in Irish, is as much as to say I
+vex."
+
+"You do, indeed," said Belle, sobbing.
+
+"But how do you account for it?"
+
+"O man, man!" said Belle, bursting into tears, "for what purpose do
+you ask a poor ignorant girl such a question, unless it be to vex
+and irritate her?  If you wish to display your learning, do so to
+the wise and instructed, and not to me, who can scarcely read or
+write.  Oh, leave off your nonsense; yet I know you will not do so,
+for it is the breath of your nostrils!  I could have wished we
+should have parted in kindness, but you will not permit it.  I have
+deserved better at your hands than such treatment.  The whole time
+we have kept company together in this place, I have scarcely had
+one kind word from you, but the strangest--" and here the voice of
+Belle was drowned in her sobs.
+
+"I am sorry to see you take on so, dear Belle," said I.  "I really
+have given you no cause to be so unhappy; surely teaching you a
+little Armenian was a very innocent kind of diversion."
+
+"Yes, but you went on so long, and in such a strange way, and made
+me repeat such strange examples, as you call them, that I could not
+bear it."
+
+"Why, to tell you the truth, Belle, it's just my way; and I have
+dealt with you just as I would with--"
+
+"A hard-mouthed jade," said Belle, "and you practising your horse-
+witchery upon her.  I have been of an unsubdued spirit, I
+acknowledge, but I was always kind to you; and if you have made me
+cry, it's a poor thing to boast of."
+
+"Boast of!" said I; "a pretty thing indeed to boast of; I had no
+idea of making you cry.  Come, I beg your pardon; what more can I
+do?  Come, cheer up, Belle.  You were talking of parting; don't let
+us part, but depart, and that together."
+
+"Our ways lie different," said Belle.
+
+"I don't see why they should," said I.  "Come, let us he off to
+America together."
+
+"To America together?" said Belle, looking full at me.
+
+"Yes," said I; "where we will settle down in some forest, and
+conjugate the verb siriel conjugally."
+
+"Conjugally?" said Belle.
+
+"Yes," said I; "as man and wife in America, air yew ghin."
+
+"You are jesting, as usual," said Belle.
+
+"Not I, indeed.  Come, Belle, make up your mind, and let us be off
+to America; and leave priests, humbug, learning, and languages
+behind us."
+
+"I don't think you are jesting," said Belle; "but I can hardly
+entertain your offers; however, young man, I thank you."
+
+"You had better make up your mind at once," said I, "and let us be
+off.  I shan't make a bad husband, I assure you.  Perhaps you think
+I am not worthy of you?  To convince you, Belle, that I am, I am
+ready to try a fall with you this moment upon the grass.
+Brynhilda, the valkyrie, swore that no one should ever marry her
+who could not fling her down.  Perhaps you have done the same.  The
+man who eventually married her, got a friend of his, who was called
+Sygurd, the serpent-killer, to wrestle with her, disguising him in
+his own armour.  Sygurd flung her down, and won her for his friend,
+though he loved her himself.  I shall not use a similar deceit, nor
+employ Jasper Petulengro to personate me--so get up, Belle, and I
+will do my best to fling you down."
+
+"I require no such thing of you, or anybody," said Belle; "you are
+beginning to look rather wild."
+
+"I every now and then do," said I; "come, Belle, what do you say?"
+
+"I will say nothing at present on the subject," said Belle, "I must
+have time to consider."
+
+"Just as you please," said I, "to-morrow I go to a fair with Mr.
+Petulengro, perhaps you will consider whilst I am away.  Come,
+Belle, let us have some more tea.  I wonder whether we shall be
+able to procure tea as good as this in the American forest."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+
+The Dawn of Day--The Last Farewell--Departure for the Fair--The
+Fine Horse--Return to the Dingle--No Isopel.
+
+
+It was about the dawn of day when I was awakened by the voice of
+Mr. Petulengro shouting from the top of the dingle, and bidding me
+get up.  I arose instantly, and dressed myself for the expedition
+to the fair.  On leaving my tent, I was surprised to observe Belle,
+entirely dressed, standing close to her own little encampment.
+"Dear me," said I, "I little expected to find you up so early.  I
+suppose Jasper's call awakened you, as it did me."  "I merely lay
+down in my things," said Belle, "and have not slept during the
+night."  "And why did you not take off your things and go to
+sleep?" said I.  "I did not undress," said Belle, "because I wished
+to be in readiness to bid you farewell when you departed; and as
+for sleeping, I could not."  "Well, God bless you!" said I, taking
+Belle by the hand.  Belle made no answer, and I observed that her
+hand was very cold.  "What is the matter with you?" said I, looking
+her in the face.  Belle looked at me for a moment in the eyes--and
+then cast down her own--her features were very pale.  "You are
+really unwell," said I, "I had better not go to the fair, but stay
+here, and take care of you."  "No," said Belle, "pray go, I am not
+unwell."  "Then go to your tent," said I, "and do not endanger your
+health by standing abroad in the raw morning air.  God bless you,
+Belle.  I shall be home to-night, by which time I expect you will
+have made up your mind; if not, another lesson in Armenian, however
+late the hour be."  I then wrung Belle's hand, and ascended to the
+plain above.
+
+I found the Romany party waiting for me, and everything in
+readiness for departing.  Mr. Petulengro and Tawno Chikno were
+mounted on two old horses.  The rest, who intended to go to the
+fair, amongst whom were two or three women, were on foot.  On
+arriving at the extremity of the plain, I looked towards the
+dingle.  Isopel Berners stood at the mouth, the beams of the early
+morning sun shone full on her noble face and figure.  I waved my
+hand towards her.  She slowly lifted up her right arm.  I turned
+away, and never saw Isopel Berners again.
+
+My companions and myself proceeded on our way.  In about two hours
+we reached the place where the fair was to be held.  After
+breakfasting on bread and cheese and ale behind a broken stone
+wall, we drove our animals to the fair.  The fair was a common
+cattle and horse fair:  there was little merriment going on, but
+there was no lack of business.  By about two o'clock in the
+afternoon, Mr. Petulengro and his people had disposed of their
+animals at what they conceived very fair prices--they were all in
+high spirits, and Jasper proposed to adjourn to a public-house.  As
+we were proceeding to one, a very fine horse, led by a jockey, made
+its appearance on the ground.  Mr. Petulengro stopped short, and
+looked at it stedfastly:  "Fino covar dove odoy sas miro--a fine
+thing were that if it were but mine!" he exclaimed.  "If you covet
+it," said I, "why do you not purchase it?"  "We low 'Gyptians never
+buy animals of that description; if we did we could never sell
+them, and most likely should be had up as horse-stealers."  "Then
+why did you say just now, 'It were a fine thing if it were but
+yours?'" said I.  "We 'Gyptians always say so when we see anything
+that we admire.  An animal like that is not intended for a little
+hare like me, but for some grand gentleman like yourself.  I say,
+brother, do you buy that horse!"  "How should I buy the horse, you
+foolish person?" said I.  "Buy the horse, brother," said Mr.
+Petulengro, "if you have not the money I can lend it you, though I
+be of lower Egypt."  "You talk nonsense," said I; "however, I wish
+you would ask the man the price of it."   Mr. Petulengro, going up
+to the jockey, inquired the price of the horse--the man, looking at
+him scornfully, made no reply.  "Young man," said I, going up to
+the jockey, "do me the favour to tell me the price of that horse,
+as I suppose it is to sell."  The jockey, who was a surly-looking
+man, of about fifty, looked at me for a moment, then, after some
+hesitation, said, laconically, "Seventy."  "Thank you," said I, and
+turned away.  "Buy that horse," said Mr. Petulengro, coming after
+me; "the dook tells me that in less than three months he will be
+sold for twice seventy."  "I will have nothing to do with him,"
+said I; "besides, Jasper, I don't like his tail.  Did you observe
+what a mean scrubby tail he has?"  "What a fool you are, brother,"
+said Mr. Petulengro; "that very tail of his shows his breeding.  No
+good bred horse ever yet carried a fine tail--'tis your scrubby-
+tailed horses that are your out-and-outers.  Did you ever hear of
+Syntax, brother?  That tail of his puts me in mind of Syntax.
+Well, I say nothing more, have your own way--all I wonder at is,
+that a horse like him was ever brought to such a fair of dog cattle
+as this."
+
+We then made the best of our way to a public-house, where we had
+some refreshment.  I then proposed returning to the encampment, but
+Mr. Petulengro declined, and remained drinking with his companions
+till about six o'clock in the evening, when various jockeys from
+the fair came in.  After some conversation a jockey proposed a game
+of cards; and in a little time, Mr. Petulengro and another gypsy
+sat down to play a game of cards with two of the jockeys.
+
+Though not much acquainted with cards, I soon conceived a suspicion
+that the jockeys were cheating Mr. Petulengro and his companion, I
+therefore called Mr. Petulengro aside, and gave him a hint to that
+effect.  Mr. Petulengro, however, instead of thanking me, told me
+to mind my own bread and butter, and forthwith returned to his
+game.  I continued watching the players for some hours.  The
+gypsies lost considerably, and I saw clearly that the jockeys were
+cheating them most confoundedly.  I therefore once more called Mr.
+Petulengro aside, and told him that the jockeys were cheating him,
+conjuring him to return to the encampment.  Mr. Petulengro, who was
+by this time somewhat the worse for liquor, now fell into a
+passion, swore several oaths, and asking me who had made me a Moses
+over him and his brethren, told me to return to the encampment by
+myself.  Incensed at the unworthy return which my well-meant words
+had received, I forthwith left the house, and having purchased a
+few articles of provision, I set out for the dingle alone.  It was
+a dark night when I reached it, and descending I saw the glimmer of
+a fire from the depths of the dingle; my heart beat with fond
+anticipation of a welcome.  "Isopel Berners is waiting for me,"
+said I, "and the first words that I shall hear from her lips is
+that she has made up her mind.  We shall go to America, and be so
+happy together."  On reaching the bottom of the dingle, however, I
+saw seated near the fire, beside which stood the kettle simmering,
+not Isopel Berners, but a gypsy girl, who told me that Miss Berners
+when she went away had charged her to keep up the fire, and have
+the kettle boiling against my arrival.  Startled at these words, I
+inquired at what hour Isopel had left, and whither she was gone,
+and was told that she had left the dingle, with her cart, about two
+hours after I departed; but where she was gone she, the girl, did
+not know.  I then asked whether she had left no message, and the
+girl replied that she had left none, but had merely given
+directions about the kettle and fire, putting, at the same time,
+six-pence into her hand.  "Very strange," thought I; then
+dismissing the gypsy girl I sat down by the fire.  I had no wish
+for tea, but sat looking on the embers, wondering what could be the
+motive of the sudden departure of Isopel.  "Does she mean to
+return?" thought I to myself.  "Surely she means to return," Hope
+replied, "or she would not have gone away without leaving any
+message"--"and yet she could scarcely mean to return," muttered
+Foreboding, "or she assuredly would have left some message with the
+girl."  I then thought to myself what a hard thing it would be, if,
+after having made up my mind to assume the yoke of matrimony, I
+should be disappointed of the woman of my choice.  "Well, after
+all," thought I, "I can scarcely be disappointed; if such an ugly
+scoundrel as Sylvester had no difficulty in getting such a nice
+wife as Ursula, surely I, who am not a tenth part so ugly, cannot
+fail to obtain the hand of Isopel Berners, uncommonly fine damsel
+though she be.  Husbands do not grow upon hedgerows; she is merely
+gone after a little business and will return to-morrow."
+
+Comforted in some degree by these hopeful imaginings, I retired to
+my tent, and went to sleep.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+
+Gloomy Forebodings--The Postman's Mother--The Letter--Bears and
+Barons--The Best of Advice.
+
+
+Nothing occurred to me of any particular moment during the
+following day.  Isopel Berners did not return; but Mr. Petulengro
+and his companions came home from the fair early in the morning.
+When I saw him, which was about midday, I found him with his face
+bruised and swelled.  It appeared that, some time after I had left
+him, he himself perceived that the jockeys with whom he was playing
+cards were cheating him and his companion; a quarrel ensued, which
+terminated in a fight between Mr. Petulengro and one of the
+jockeys, which lasted some time, and in which Mr. Petulengro,
+though he eventually came off victor, was considerably beaten.  His
+bruises, in conjunction with his pecuniary loss, which amounted to
+about seven pounds, were the cause of his being much out of humour;
+before night, however, he had returned to his usual philosophic
+frame of mind, and, coming up to me as I was walking about,
+apologized for his behaviour on the preceding day, and assured me
+that he was determined, from that time forward, never to quarrel
+with a friend for giving him good advice.
+
+Two more days passed, and still Isopel Berners did not return.
+Gloomy thoughts and forebodings filled my mind.  During the day I
+wandered about the neighbouring roads in the hopes of catching an
+early glimpse of her and her returning vehicle; and at night lay
+awake, tossing about on my hard couch, listening to the rustle of
+every leaf, and occasionally thinking that I heard the sound of her
+wheels upon the distant road.  Once at midnight, just as I was
+about to fall into unconsciousness, I suddenly started up, for I
+was convinced that I heard the sound of wheels.  I listened most
+anxiously, and the sound of wheels striking against stones was
+certainly plain enough.  "She comes at last," thought I, and for a
+few moments I felt as if a mountain had been removed from my
+breast;--"here she comes at last, now, how shall I receive her?
+Oh," thought I, "I will receive her rather coolly, just as if I was
+not particularly anxious about her--that's the way to manage these
+women."  The next moment the sound became very loud, rather too
+loud, I thought, to proceed from her wheels, and then by degrees
+became fainter.  Rushing out of my tent, I hurried up the path to
+the top of the dingle, where I heard the sound distinctly enough,
+but it was going from me, and evidently proceeded from something
+much larger than the cart of Isopel.  I could, moreover, hear the
+stamping of a horse's hoof at a lumbering trot.  Those only whose
+hopes have been wrought up to a high pitch, and then suddenly cast
+down, can imagine what I felt at that moment; and yet when I
+returned to my lonely tent, and lay down on my hard pallet, the
+voice of conscience told me that the misery I was then undergoing I
+had fully merited, for the unkind manner in which I had intended to
+receive her, when for a brief moment I supposed that she had
+returned.
+
+It was on the morning after this affair, and the fourth, if I
+forget not, from the time of Isopel's departure, that, as I was
+seated on my stone at the bottom of the dingle, getting my
+breakfast, I heard an unknown voice from the path above--apparently
+that of a person descending--exclaim, "Here's a strange place to
+bring a letter to;" and presently an old woman, with a belt round
+her middle, to which was attached a leathern bag, made her
+appearance, and stood before me.
+
+"Well, if I ever!" said she, as she looked about her.  "My good
+gentlewoman," said I, "pray what may you please to want?"
+"Gentlewoman!" said the old dame, "please to want--well, I call
+that speaking civilly, at any rate.  It is true, civil words cost
+nothing; nevertheless, we do not always get them.  What I please to
+want is to deliver a letter to a young man in this place; perhaps
+you be he?"  "What's the name on the letter?" said I, getting up,
+and going to her.  "There's no name upon it," said she, taking a
+letter out of her scrip, and looking at it.  "It is directed to the
+young man in Mumper's Dingle."  "Then it is for me, I make no
+doubt," said I, stretching out my hand to take it.  "Please to pay
+me ninepence first," said the old woman.  "However," said she,
+after a moment's thought, "civility is civility, and, being rather
+a scarce article, should meet with some return.  Here's the letter,
+young man, and I hope you will pay for it; for if you do not I must
+pay the postage myself."  "You are the postwoman, I suppose," said
+I, as I took the letter.  "I am the postman's mother," said the old
+woman; "but as he has a wide beat, I help him as much as I can, and
+I generally carry letters to places like this, to which he is
+afraid to come himself."  "You say the postage is ninepence," said
+I, "here's a shilling."  "Well, I call that honourable," said the
+old woman, taking the shilling, and putting it into her pocket--
+"here's your change, young man," said she, offering me threepence.
+"Pray keep that for yourself," said I; "you deserve it for your
+trouble."  "Well, I call that genteel," said the old woman; "and as
+one good turn deserves another, since you look as if you couldn't
+read, I will read your letter for you.  Let's see it; it's from
+some young woman or other, I dare say."  "Thank you," said I, "but
+I can read."  "All the better for you," said the old woman; "your
+being able to read will frequently save you a penny, for that's the
+charge I generally make for reading letters; though, as you behaved
+so genteelly to me, I should have charged you nothing.  Well, if
+you can read, why don't you open the letter, instead of keeping it
+hanging between your finger and thumb?"  "I am in no hurry to open
+it," said I, with a sigh.  The old woman looked at me for a moment-
+-"Well, young man," said she, "there are some--especially those who
+can read--who don't like to open their letters when anybody is by,
+more especially when they come from young women.  Well, I won't
+intrude upon you, but leave you alone with your letter.  I wish it
+may contain something pleasant.  God bless you," and with these
+words she departed.
+
+I sat down on my stone, with my letter in my hand.  I knew
+perfectly well that it could have come from no other person than
+Isopel Berners; but what did the letter contain?  I guessed
+tolerably well what its purport was--an eternal farewell! yet I was
+afraid to open the letter, lest my expectation should be confirmed.
+There I sat with the letter, putting off the evil moment as long as
+possible.  At length I glanced at the direction, which was written
+in a fine bold hand, and was directed, as the old woman had said,
+to the young man in "Mumpers' Dingle," with the addition, near -,
+in the county of-- Suddenly the idea occurred to me, that, after
+all, the letter might not contain an eternal farewell; and that
+Isopel might have written, requesting me to join her.  Could it be
+so?  "Alas! no," presently said Foreboding.  At last I became
+ashamed of my weakness.  The letter must be opened sooner or later.
+Why not at once?  So as the bather who, for a considerable time,
+has stood shivering on the bank, afraid to take the decisive
+plunge, suddenly takes it, I tore open the letter almost before I
+was aware.  I had no sooner done so than a paper fell out.  I
+examined it; it contained a lock of bright flaxen hair.  "This is
+no good sign," said I, as I thrust the lock and paper into my
+bosom, and proceeded to read the letter, which ran as follows:  -
+
+
+"TO THE YOUNG MAN IN MUMPERS' DINGLE.
+
+"SIR,--I send these lines, with the hope and trust that they will
+find you well, even as I am myself at this moment, and in much
+better spirits, for my own are not such as I could wish they were,
+being sometimes rather hysterical and vapourish, and at other
+times, and most often, very low.  I am at a sea-port, and am just
+going on shipboard; and when you get these I shall be on the salt
+waters, on my way to a distant country, and leaving my own behind
+me, which I do not expect ever to see again.
+
+"And now, young man, I will, in the first place, say something
+about the manner in which I quitted you.  It must have seemed
+somewhat singular to you that I went away without taking any leave,
+or giving you the slightest hint that I was going; but I did not do
+so without considerable reflection.  I was afraid that I should not
+be able to support a leave-taking; and as you had said that you
+were determined to go wherever I did, I thought it best not to tell
+you at all; for I did not think it advisable that you should go
+with me, and I wished to have no dispute.
+
+"In the second place, I wish to say something about an offer of
+wedlock which you made me; perhaps, young man, had you made it at
+the first period of our acquaintance, I should have accepted it,
+but you did not, and kept putting off and putting off, and behaving
+in a very strange manner, till I could stand your conduct no
+longer, but determined upon leaving you and Old England, which last
+step I had been long thinking about; so when you made your offer at
+last, everything was arranged--my cart and donkey engaged to be
+sold--and the greater part of my things disposed of.  However,
+young man, when you did make it, I frankly tell you that I had half
+a mind to accept it; at last, however, after very much
+consideration, I thought it best to leave you for ever, because,
+for some time past, I had become almost convinced, that though with
+a wonderful deal of learning, and exceedingly shrewd in some
+things, you were--pray don't be offended--at the root mad! and
+though mad people, I have been told, sometimes make very good
+husbands, I was unwilling that your friends, if you had any, should
+say that Belle Berners, the workhouse girl, took advantage of your
+infirmity; for there is no concealing that I was born and bred up
+in a workhouse; notwithstanding that, my blood is better than your
+own, and as good as the best; you having yourself told me that my
+name is a noble name, and once, if I mistake not, that it was the
+same word as baron, which is the same thing as bear; and that to be
+called in old times a bear was considered a great compliment--the
+bear being a mighty strong animal, on which account our forefathers
+called all their great fighting-men barons, which is the same as
+bears.
+
+"However, setting matters of blood and family entirely aside, many
+thanks to you, young man, from poor Belle, for the honour you did
+her in making that same offer; for, after all, it is an honour to
+receive an honourable offer, which she could see clearly yours was,
+with no floriness nor chaff in it; but, on the contrary, entire
+sincerity.  She assures you that she shall always bear it and
+yourself in mind, whether on land or water; and as a proof of the
+good-will she bears to you, she sends you a lock of the hair which
+she wears on her head, which you were often looking at, and were
+pleased to call flax, which word she supposes you meant as a
+compliment, even as the old people meant to pass a compliment to
+their great folks, when they called them bears; though she cannot
+help thinking that they might have found an animal as strong as a
+bear, and somewhat less uncouth, to call their great folks after:
+even as she thinks yourself, amongst your great store of words,
+might have found something a little more genteel to call her hair
+after than flax, which, though strong and useful, is rather a
+coarse and common kind of article.
+
+"And as another proof of the good-will she bears to you, she sends
+you, along with the lock, a piece of advice, which is worth all the
+hair in the world, to say nothing of the flax.
+
+"FEAR GOD, and take your own part.  There's Bible in that, young
+man:  see how Moses feared God, and how he took his own part
+against everybody who meddled with him.  And see how David feared
+God, and took his own part against all the bloody enemies which
+surrounded him--so fear God, young man, and never give in!  The
+world can bully, and is fond, provided it sees a man in a kind of
+difficulty, of getting about him, calling him coarse names, and
+even going so far as to hustle him:  but the world, like all
+bullies, carries a white feather in its tail, and no sooner sees
+the man taking off his coat, and offering to fight its best, than
+it scatters here and there, and is always civil to him afterwards.
+So when folks are disposed to ill-treat you, young man, say, 'Lord
+have mercy upon me!' and then tip them to Long Melford, which, as
+the saying goes, there is nothing comparable for shortness all the
+world over; and these last words, young man, are the last you will
+ever have from her who is nevertheless,
+
+Your affectionate female servant,
+
+ISOPEL BERNERS.
+
+
+After reading the letter I sat for some time motionless, holding it
+in my hand.  The daydream in which I had been a little time before
+indulging, of marrying Isopel Berners, of going with her to
+America, and having by her a large progeny, who were to assist me
+in felling trees, cultivating the soil, and who would take care of
+me when I was old, was now thoroughly dispelled.  Isopel had
+deserted me, and was gone to America by herself, where, perhaps,
+she would marry some other person, and would bear him a progeny,
+who would do for him what in my dream I had hoped my progeny by her
+would do for me.  Then the thought came into my head that though
+she was gone, I might follow her to America, but then I thought
+that if I did I might not find her; America was a very large place,
+and I did not know the port to which she was bound; but I could
+follow her to the port from which she had sailed, and there
+possibly discover the port to which she was bound; but I did not
+even know the port from which she had set out, for Isopel had not
+dated her letter from any place.  Suddenly it occurred to me that
+the post-mark on the letter would tell me from whence it came, so I
+forthwith looked at the back of the letter, and in the post-mark
+read the name of a well-known and not very distant sea-port.  I
+then knew with tolerable certainty the port where she had embarked,
+and I almost determined to follow her, but I almost instantly
+determined to do no such thing.  Isopel Berners had abandoned me,
+and I would not follow her; "Perhaps," whispered Pride, "if I
+overtook her, she would only despise me for running after her;" and
+it also told me pretty roundly, provided I ran after her, whether I
+overtook her or not, I should heartily despise myself.  So I
+determined not to follow Isopel Berners; I took her lock of hair,
+and looked at it, then put it in her letter, which I folded up and
+carefully stowed away, resolved to keep both for ever, but I
+determined not to follow her.  Two or three times, however, during
+the day, I wavered in my determination, and was again and again
+almost tempted to follow her, but every succeeding time the
+temptation was fainter.  In the evening I left the dingle, and sat
+down with Mr. Petulengro and his family by the door of his tent;
+Mr. Petulengro soon began talking of the letter which I had
+received in the morning.  "Is it not from Miss Berners, brother?"
+said he.  I told him it was.  "Is she coming back, brother?"
+"Never," said I; "she is gone to America, and has deserted me."  "I
+always knew that you two were never destined for each other," said
+he.  "How did you know that?" I inquired.  "The dook told me so,
+brother; you are born to be a great traveller."  "Well," said I,
+"if I had gone with her to America, as I was thinking of doing, I
+should have been a great traveller."  "You are to travel in another
+direction, brother," said he.  "I wish you would tell me all about
+my future wanderings," said I.  "I can't, brother," said Mr.
+Petulengro, "there's a power of clouds before my eye."  "You are a
+poor seer, after all," said I; and getting up, I retired to my
+dingle and my tent, where I betook myself to my bed, and there,
+knowing the worst, and being no longer agitated by apprehension,
+nor agonized by expectation, I was soon buried in a deep slumber,
+the first which I had fallen into for several nights.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+
+The Public-house--Landlord on His Legs Again--A Blow in Season--The
+Way of the World--The Grateful Mind--The Horse's Neigh.
+
+
+It was rather late on the following morning when I awoke.  At first
+I was almost unconscious of what had occurred on the preceding day;
+recollection, however, by degrees returned, and I felt a deep
+melancholy coming over me, but perfectly aware that no advantage
+could be derived from the indulgence of such a feeling, I sprang
+up, prepared my breakfast, which I ate with a tolerable appetite,
+and then left the dingle, and betook myself to the gypsy
+encampment, where I entered into discourse with various Romanies,
+both male and female.  After some time, feeling myself in better
+spirits, I determined to pay another visit to the landlord of the
+public-house.  From the position of his affairs when I had last
+visited him I entertained rather gloomy ideas with respect to his
+present circumstances.  I imagined that I should either find him
+alone in his kitchen smoking a wretched pipe, or in company with
+some surly bailiff or his follower, whom his friend the brewer had
+sent into the house in order to take possession of his effects.
+
+Nothing more entirely differing from either of these anticipations
+could have presented itself to my view than what I saw about one
+o'clock in the afternoon, when I entered the house.  I had come,
+though somewhat in want of consolation myself, to offer any
+consolation which was at my command to my acquaintance Catchpole,
+and perhaps like many other people who go to a house with "drops of
+compassion trembling on their eyelids," I felt rather disappointed
+at finding that no compassion was necessary.  The house was
+thronged with company, and cries for ale and porter, hot brandy and
+water, cold gin and water, were numerous; moreover, no desire to
+receive and not to pay for the landlord's liquids was manifested--
+on the contrary, everybody seemed disposed to play the most
+honourable part:  "Landlord, here's the money for this glass of
+brandy and water--do me the favour to take it; all right, remember
+I have paid you."  "Landlord, here's the money for the pint of
+half-and-half-fourpence halfpenny, ain't it?--here's sixpence; keep
+the change--confound the change!"  The landlord, assisted by his
+niece, bustled about; his brow erect, his cheeks plumped out, and
+all his features exhibiting a kind of surly satisfaction.  Wherever
+he moved, marks of the most cordial amity were shown him, hands
+were thrust out to grasp his, nor were looks of respect,
+admiration, nay, almost of adoration, wanting.  I observed one
+fellow, as the landlord advanced, take the pipe out of his mouth,
+and gaze upon him with a kind of grin of wonder, probably much the
+same as his ancestor, the Saxon lout of old, put on when he saw his
+idol Thur, dressed in a new kirtle.  To avoid the press, I got into
+a corner, where on a couple of chairs sat two respectable-looking
+individuals, whether farmers or sow-gelders, I know not, but highly
+respectable-looking, who were discoursing about the landlord.
+"Such another," said one, "you will not find in a summer's day."
+"No, nor in the whole of England," said the other.  "Tom of
+Hopton," said the first:  "ah!  Tom of Hopton," echoed the other;
+"the man who could beat Tom of Hopton could beat the world."  "I
+glory in him," said the first.  "So do I," said the second, "I'll
+back him against the world.  Let me hear any one say anything
+against him, and if I don't--" then, looking at me, he added, "have
+you anything to say against him, young man?"  "Not a word," said I,
+"save that he regularly puts me out."  "He'll put any one out,"
+said the man, "any one out of conceit with himself;" then, lifting
+a mug to his mouth, he added, with a hiccough, "I drink his
+health."  Presently the landlord, as he moved about, observing me,
+stopped short:  "Ah!" said he, "are you here?  I am glad to see
+you, come this way.  Stand back," said he to his company, as I
+followed him to the bar, "stand back for me and this gentleman."
+Two or three young fellows were in the bar, seemingly sporting
+yokels, drinking sherry and smoking.  "Come, gentlemen," said the
+landlord, "clear the bar, I must have a clear bar for me and my
+friend here."  "Landlord, what will you take," said one, "a glass
+of sherry?  I know you like it."  "- sherry and you too," said the
+landlord, "I want neither sherry nor yourself; didn't you hear what
+I told you?"  "All right, old fellow," said the other, shaking the
+landlord by the hand, "all right, don't wish to intrude--but I
+suppose when you and your friend have done, I may come in again;"
+then, with a "sarvant, sir," to me, he took himself into the
+kitchen, followed by the rest of the sporting yokels.
+
+Thereupon the landlord, taking a bottle of ale from a basket,
+uncorked it, and pouring the contents into two large glasses,
+handed me one, and motioning me to sit down, placed himself by me;
+then, emptying his own glass at a draught, he gave a kind of grunt
+of satisfaction, and fixing his eyes upon the opposite side of the
+bar, remained motionless, without saying a word, buried apparently
+in important cogitations.  With respect to myself, I swallowed my
+ale more leisurely, and was about to address my friend, when his
+niece, coming into the bar, said that more and more customers were
+arriving, and how she should supply their wants she did not know,
+unless her uncle would get and help her.
+
+"The customers!" said the landlord, "let the scoundrels wait till
+you have time to serve them, or till I have leisure to see after
+them."  "The kitchen won't contain half of them," said his niece.
+"Then let them sit out abroad," said the landlord.  "But there are
+not benches enough, uncle," said the niece.  "Then let them stand
+or sit on the ground," said the uncle, "what care I; I'll let them
+know that the man who beat Tom of Hopton stands as well again on
+his legs as ever."  Then opening a side door which led from the bar
+into the back yard, he beckoned me to follow him.  "You treat your
+customers in rather a cavalier manner," said I, when we were alone
+together in the yard.
+
+"Don't I?" said the landlord; "and I'll treat them more so yet; now
+I have got the whiphand of the rascals I intend to keep it.  I dare
+say you are a bit surprised with regard to the change which has
+come over things since you were last here.  I'll tell you how it
+happened.  You remember in what a desperate condition you found me,
+thinking of changing my religion, selling my soul to the man in
+black, and then going and hanging myself like Pontius Pilate; and I
+dare say you can't have forgotten how you gave me good advice, made
+me drink ale, and give up sherry.  Well, after you were gone, I
+felt all the better for your talk, and what you had made me drink,
+and it was a mercy that I did feel better; for my niece was gone
+out, poor thing, and I was left alone in the house, without a soul
+to look at, or to keep me from doing myself a mischief in case I
+was so inclined.  Well, things wore on in this way till it grew
+dusk, when in came that blackguard Hunter with his train to drink
+at my expense, and to insult me as usual; there were more than a
+dozen of them, and a pretty set they looked.  Well, they ordered
+about in a very free and easy manner for upwards of an hour and a
+half, occasionally sneering and jeering at me, as they had been in
+the habit of doing for some time past; so, as I said before, things
+wore on, and other customers came in, who, though they did not
+belong to Hunter's gang, also passed off their jokes upon me; for,
+as you perhaps know, we English are a set of low hounds, who will
+always take part with the many by way of making ourselves safe, and
+currying favour with the stronger side.  I said little or nothing,
+for my spirits had again become very low, and I was verily scared
+and afraid.  All of a sudden I thought of the ale which I had drank
+in the morning, and of the good it did me then, so I went into the
+bar, opened another bottle, took a glass, and felt better; so I
+took another, and feeling better still, I went back into the
+kitchen, just as Hunter and his crew were about leaving.  'Mr.
+Hunter,' said I, 'you and your people will please to pay me for
+what you have had?'  'What do you mean by my people?' said he, with
+an oath.  'Ah, what do you mean by calling us his people?' said the
+clan.  'We are nobody's people;' and then there was a pretty load
+of abuse, and threatening to serve me out.  'Well,' said I, 'I was
+perhaps wrong to call them your people, and beg your pardon and
+theirs.  And now you will please to pay me for what you have had
+yourself, and afterwards I can settle with them.'  'I shall pay you
+when I think fit,' said Hunter.  'Yes,' said the rest, 'and so
+shall we.  We shall pay you when we think fit.'  'I tell you what,'
+said Hunter, 'I conceives I do such an old fool as you an honour
+when I comes into his house and drinks his beer, and goes away
+without paying for it;' and then there was a roar of laughter from
+everybody, and almost all said the same thing.  'Now do you please
+to pay me, Mr. Hunter?' said I.  'Pay you!' said Hunter; 'pay you!
+Yes, here's the pay;' and thereupon he held out his thumb, twirling
+it round till it just touched my nose.  I can't tell you what I
+felt that moment; a kind of madhouse thrill came upon me, and all I
+know is, that I bent back as far as I could, then lunging out,
+struck him under the ear, sending him reeling two or three yards,
+when he fell on the floor.  I wish you had but seen how my company
+looked at me and at each other.  One or two of the clan went to
+raise Hunter, and get him to fight, but it was no go; though he was
+not killed, he had had enough for that evening.  Oh, I wish you had
+seen my customers; those who did not belong to the clan, but who
+had taken part with them, and helped to jeer and flout me, now came
+and shook me by the hand, wishing me joy, and saying as, how 'I was
+a brave fellow, and had served the bully right!'  As for the clan,
+they all said Hunter was bound to do me justice; so they made him
+pay me what he owed for himself, and the reckoning of those among
+them who said they had no money.  Two or three of them then led him
+away, while the rest stayed behind, and flattered me, and
+worshipped me, and called Hunter all kinds of dogs' names.  What do
+you think of that?"
+
+"Why," said I, "it makes good what I read in a letter which I
+received yesterday.  It is just the way of the world."
+
+"A'n't it," said the landlord.  "Well, that a'n't all; let me go
+on.  Good fortune never yet came alone.  In about an hour comes
+home my poor niece, almost in high sterricks with joy, smiling and
+sobbing.  She had been to the clergyman of M---, the great
+preacher, to whose church she was in the habit of going, and to
+whose daughters she was well known; and to him she told a
+lamentable tale about my distresses, and about the snares which had
+been laid for my soul; and so well did she plead my cause, and so
+strong did the young ladies back all she said, that the good
+clergyman promised to stand my friend, and to lend me sufficient
+money to satisfy the brewer, and to get my soul out of the snares
+of the man in black; and sure enough the next morning the two young
+ladies brought me the fifty pounds, which I forthwith carried to
+the brewer, who was monstrously civil, saying that he hoped any
+little misunderstanding we had had would not prevent our being good
+friends in future.  That a'n't all; the people of the neighbouring
+county hearing as if by art witchcraft that I had licked Hunter,
+and was on good terms with the brewer, forthwith began to come in
+crowds to look at me, pay me homage, and be my customers.
+Moreover, fifty scoundrels who owed me money, and would have seen
+me starve rather than help me as long as they considered me a down
+pin, remembered their debts, and came and paid me more than they
+owed.  That a'n't all; the brewer being about to establish a stage-
+coach and three, to run across the country, says it shall stop and
+change horses at my house, and the passengers breakfast and sup as
+it goes and returns.  He wishes me--whom he calls the best man in
+England--to give his son lessons in boxing, which he says he
+considers a fine manly English art, and a great defence against
+Popery--notwithstanding that only a month ago, when he considered
+me a down pin, he was in the habit of railing against it as a
+blackguard practice, and against me as a blackguard for following
+it; so I am going to commence with young hopeful to-morrow."
+
+"I really cannot help congratulating you on your good fortune,"
+said I.
+
+"That a'n't all," said the landlord.  "This very morning the folks
+of our parish made me churchwarden, which they would no more have
+done a month ago, when they considered me a down pin, than they--"
+
+"Mercy upon us!" said I, "if fortune pours in upon you in this
+manner, who knows but that within a year they may make you a
+justice of the peace?"
+
+"Who knows, indeed!" said the landlord.  "Well, I will prove myself
+worthy of my good luck by showing the grateful mind--not to those
+who would be kind to me now, but to those who were, when the days
+were rather gloomy.  My customers shall have abundance of rough
+language, but I'll knock any one down who says anything against the
+clergyman who lent me the fifty pounds, or against the Church of
+England, of which he is parson and I am churchwarden.  I am also
+ready to do anything in reason for him who paid me for the ale he
+drank, when I shouldn't have had the heart to collar him for the
+money had he refused to pay; who never jeered or flouted me like
+the rest of my customers when I was a down pin--and though he
+refused to fight cross FOR me was never cross WITH me, but listened
+to all I had to say, and gave me all kinds of good advice.  Now who
+do you think I mean by this last? why, who but yourself--who on
+earth but yourself?  The parson is a good man and a great preacher,
+and I'll knock anybody down who says to the contrary; and I mention
+him first, because why; he's a gentleman, and you a tinker.  But I
+am by no means sure you are not the best friend of the two; for I
+doubt, do you see, whether I should have had the fifty pounds but
+for you.  You persuaded me to give up that silly drink they call
+sherry, and drink ale; and what was it but drinking ale which gave
+me courage to knock down that fellow Hunter--and knocking him down
+was, I verily believe, the turning point of my disorder.  God don't
+love them who won't strike out for themselves; and as far as I can
+calculate with respect to time, it was just the moment after I had
+knocked down Hunter, that the parson consented to lend me the
+money, and everything began to grow civil to me.  So, dash my
+buttons if I show the ungrateful mind to you!  I don't offer to
+knock anybody down for you, because why--I dare say you can knock a
+body down yourself; but I'll offer something more to the purpose;
+as my business is wonderfully on the increase, I shall want
+somebody to help me in serving my customers, and keeping them in
+order.  If you choose to come and serve for your board, and what
+they'll give you, give me your fist; or if you like ten shillings a
+week better than their sixpences and ha'pence, only say so--though,
+to be open with you, I believe you would make twice ten shillings
+out of them--the sneaking, fawning, curry-favouring humbugs!"
+
+"I am much obliged to you," said I, "for your handsome offer,
+which, however, I am obliged to decline."
+
+"Why so?" said the landlord.
+
+"I am not fit for service," said I; "moreover, I am about to leave
+this part of the country."  As I spoke a horse neighed in the
+stable.  "What horse is that?" said I.
+
+"It belongs to a cousin of mine, who put it into my hands yesterday
+in the hopes that I might get rid of it for him, though he would no
+more have done so a week ago, when he considered me a down pin,
+than he would have given the horse away.  Are you fond of horses?"
+
+"Very much," said I.
+
+"Then come and look at it."  He led me into the stable, where, in a
+stall, stood a noble-looking animal.
+
+"Dear me," said I, "I saw this horse at--fair."
+
+"Like enough," said the landlord; "he was there and was offered for
+seventy pounds, but didn't find a bidder at any price.  What do you
+think of him?"
+
+"He's a splendid creature."
+
+"I am no judge of horses," said the landlord; "but I am told he's a
+first-rate trotter, good leaper, and has some of the blood of
+Syntax.  What does all that signify?--the game is against his
+master, who is a down pin, is thinking of emigrating, and wants
+money confoundedly.  He asked seventy pounds at the fair; but,
+between ourselves, he would be glad to take fifty here."
+
+"I almost wish," said I, "that I were a rich squire."
+
+"You would buy him then," said the landlord.  Here he mused for
+some time, with a very profound look.  "It would be a rum thing,"
+said he, "if, some time or other, that horse should come into your
+hands.  Didn't you hear how he neighed when you talked about
+leaving the country?  My granny was a wise woman, and was up to all
+kinds of signs and wonders, sounds and noises, the interpretation
+of the language of birds and animals, crowing and lowing, neighing
+and braying.  If she had been here, she would have said at once
+that that horse was fated to carry you away.  On that point,
+however, I can say nothing, for under fifty pounds no one can have
+him.  Are you taking that money out of your pocket to pay me for
+the ale?  That won't do; nothing to pay; I invited you this time.
+Now if you are going, you had best get into the road through the
+yard-gate.  I won't trouble you to make your way through the
+kitchen and my fine-weather company--confound them!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+
+Mr.  Petulengro's Device--The Leathern Purse--Consent to Purchase a
+Horse.
+
+
+As I returned along the road I met Mr. Petulengro and one of his
+companions, who told me that they were bound for the public-house;
+whereupon I informed Jasper how I had seen in the stable the horse
+which we had admired at the fair.  "I shouldn't wonder if you buy
+that horse after all, brother," said Mr. Petulengro.  With a smile
+at the absurdity of such a supposition, I left him and his
+companion, and betook myself to the dingle.  In the evening I
+received a visit from Mr. Petulengro, who forthwith commenced
+talking about the horse, which he had again seen, the landlord
+having shown it to him on learning that he was a friend of mine.
+He told me that the horse pleased him more than ever, he having
+examined his points with more accuracy than he had an opportunity
+of doing on the first occasion, concluding by pressing me to buy
+him.  I begged him to desist from such foolish importunity,
+assuring him that I had never so much money in all my life as would
+enable me to purchase the horse.  Whilst this discourse was going
+on, Mr. Petulengro and myself were standing together in the midst
+of the dingle.  Suddenly he began to move round me--in a very
+singular manner, making strange motions with his hands, and
+frightful contortions with his features, till I became alarmed, and
+asked him whether he had not lost his senses?  Whereupon, ceasing
+his movements and contortions, he assured me that he had not, but
+had merely been seized with a slight dizziness, and then once more
+returned to the subject of the horse.  Feeling myself very angry, I
+told him that if he continued persecuting me in that manner, I
+should be obliged to quarrel with him; adding, that I believed his
+only motive for asking me to buy the animal was to insult my
+poverty.  "Pretty poverty," said he, "with fifty pounds in your
+pocket; however, I have heard say that it is always the custom of
+your rich people to talk of their poverty, more especially when
+they wish to avoid laying out money."  Surprised at his saying that
+I had fifty pounds in my pocket, I asked him what he meant;
+whereupon he told me that he was very sure that I had fifty pounds
+in my pocket, offering to lay me five shillings to that effect.
+"Done!" said I; "I have scarcely more than the fifth part of what
+you say."  "I know better, brother," said Mr. Petulengro; "if you
+only pull out what you have in the pocket of your slop, I am sure
+you will have lost your wager."  Putting my hand into the pocket, I
+felt something which I had never felt there before, and pulling it
+out, perceived that it was a clumsy leathern purse, which I found
+on opening contained four ten-pound-notes, and several pieces of
+gold.  "Didn't I tell you so, brother?" said Mr. Petulengro.  "Now,
+in the first place, please to pay me the five shillings you have
+lost."  "This is only a foolish piece of pleasantry," said I; "you
+put it into my pocket whilst you were moving about me, making faces
+like a distracted person.  Here, take your purse back."  "I?" said
+Mr. Petulengro, "not I, indeed I don't think I am such a fool.  I
+have won my wager, so pay me the five shillings, brother."  "Do
+drop this folly," said I, "and take your purse;" and I flung it on
+the ground.  "Brother," said Mr. Petulengro, "you were talking of
+quarrelling with me just now.  I tell you now one thing, which is,
+that if you do not take back the purse I will quarrel with you; and
+it shall be for good and all.  I'll drop your acquaintance, no
+longer call you my pal, and not even say sarshan to you when I meet
+you by the roadside.  Hir mi diblis I never will."  I saw by
+Jasper's look and tone that he was in earnest, and, as I had really
+a regard for the strange being, I scarcely knew what to do.  "Now,
+be persuaded, brother," said Mr. Petulengro, taking up the purse,
+and handing it to me; "be persuaded; put the purse into your
+pocket, and buy the horse."  "Well," said I, "if I did so, would
+you acknowledge the horse to be yours, and receive the money again
+as soon as I should be able to repay you?"
+
+"I would, brother, I would," said he; "return me the money as soon
+as you please, provided you buy the horse."  "What motive have you
+for wishing me to buy that horse?" said I.  "He's to be sold for
+fifty pounds," said Jasper, "and is worth four times that sum;
+though, like many a splendid bargain, he is now going a begging;
+buy him, and I'm confident that, in a little time, a grand
+gentleman of your appearance may have anything he asks for him, and
+found a fortune by his means.  Moreover, brother, I want to dispose
+of this fifty pounds in a safe manner.  If you don't take it, I
+shall fool it away in no time, perhaps at card-playing, for you saw
+how I was cheated by those blackguard jockeys the other day--we
+gyptians don't know how to take care of money:  our best plan when
+we have got a handful of guineas is to make buttons with them; but
+I have plenty of golden buttons, and don't wish to be troubled with
+more, so you can do me no greater favour than vesting the money in
+this speculation, by which my mind will be relieved of considerable
+care and trouble for some time at least."
+
+Perceiving that I still hesitated, he said, "Perhaps, brother, you
+think I did not come honestly by the money:  by the honestest
+manner in the world, for it is the money I earnt by fighting in the
+ring:  I did not steal it, brother, nor did I get it by disposing
+of spavined donkeys, or glandered ponies--nor is it, brother, the
+profits of my wife's witchcraft and dukkerin."
+
+"But," said I, "you had better employ it in your traffic."  "I have
+plenty of money for my traffic, independent of this capital," said
+Mr. Petulengro; "ay, brother, and enough besides to back the
+husband of my wife's sister, Sylvester, against Slammocks of the
+Chong gav for twenty pounds, which I am thinking of doing."
+
+"But," said I, "after all, the horse may have found another
+purchaser by this time."  "Not he," said Mr. Petulengro, "there is
+nobody in this neighbourhood to purchase a horse like that, unless
+it be your lordship--so take the money, brother," and he thrust the
+purse into my hand.  Allowing myself to be persuaded, I kept
+possession of the purse.  "Are you satisfied now?" said I.  "By no
+means, brother," said Mr. Petulengro, "you will please to pay me
+the five shillings which you lost to me."  "Why," said I, "the
+fifty pounds which I found in my pocket were not mine, but put in
+by yourself."  "That's nothing to do with the matter, brother,"
+said Mr. Petulengro, "I betted you five shillings that you had
+fifty pounds in your pocket, which sum you had:  I did not say that
+they were your own, but merely that you had fifty pounds; you will
+therefore pay me, brother, or I shall not consider you an
+honourable man."  Not wishing to have any dispute about such a
+matter, I took five shillings out of my under pocket, and gave them
+to him.  Mr. Petulengro took the money with great glee, observing--
+"These five shillings I will take to the public-house forthwith,
+and spend in drinking with four of my brethren, and doing so will
+give me an opportunity of telling the landlord that I have found a
+customer for his horse, and that you are the man.  It will be as
+well to secure the horse as soon as possible; for though the dook
+tells me that the horse is intended for you, I have now and then
+found that the dock is, like myself, somewhat given to lying."
+
+He then departed, and I remained alone in the dingle.  I thought at
+first that I had committed a great piece of folly in consenting to
+purchase this horse; I might find no desirable purchaser for him,
+until the money in my possession should be totally exhausted, and
+then I might be compelled to sell him for half the price I had
+given for him, or be even glad to find a person who would receive
+him at a gift; I should then remain sans horse, and indebted to Mr.
+Petulengro.  Nevertheless, it was possible that I might sell the
+horse very advantageously, and by so doing obtain a fund sufficient
+to enable me to execute some grand enterprise or other.  My present
+way of life afforded no prospect of support, whereas the purchase
+of the horse did afford a possibility of bettering my condition,
+so, after all, had I not done right in consenting to purchase the
+horse? the purchase was to be made with another person's property,
+it is true, and I did not exactly like the idea of speculating with
+another person's property, but Mr. Petulengro had thrust his money
+upon me, and if I lost his money, he could have no one but himself
+to blame; so I persuaded myself that I had, upon the whole, done
+right, and having come to that persuasion, I soon began to enjoy
+the idea of finding myself on horseback again, and figured to
+myself all kinds of strange adventures which I should meet with on
+the roads before the horse and I should part company.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+
+Trying the Horse--The Feats of Tawno--Man with the Red Waist-coat--
+Disposal of Property.
+
+
+I saw nothing more of Mr. Petulengro that evening--on the morrow,
+however, he came and informed me that he had secured the horse for
+me, and that I was to go and pay for it at noon.  At the hour
+appointed, therefore, I went with Mr. Petulengro and Tawno to the
+public, where, as before, there was a crowd of company.  The
+landlord received us in the bar with marks of much satisfaction and
+esteem, made us sit down, and treated us with some excellent mild
+draught ale.  "Who do you think has been here this morning?" he
+said to me, "why, that fellow in black, who came to carry me off to
+a house of Popish devotion, where I was to pass seven days and
+nights in meditation, as I think he called it, before I publicly
+renounced the religion of my country.  I read him a pretty lecture,
+calling him several unhandsome names, and asking him what he meant
+by attempting to seduce a church-warden of the Church of England.
+I tell you what, he ran some danger; for some of my customers,
+learning his errand, laid hold on him, and were about to toss him
+in a blanket, and then duck him in the horse-pond.  I, however,
+interfered, and said, 'that what he came about was between me and
+him, and that it was no business of theirs.'  To tell you the
+truth, I felt pity for the poor devil, more especially when I
+considered that they merely sided against him because they thought
+him the weakest, and that they would have wanted to serve me in the
+same manner had they considered me a down pin; so I rescued him
+from their hands, told him not to be afraid, for that nobody should
+touch him, and offered to treat him to some cold gin and water with
+a lump of sugar in it; and on his refusing, told him that he had
+better make himself scarce, which he did, and I hope I shall never
+see him again.  So I suppose you are come for the horse; mercy upon
+us! who would have thought you would have become the purchaser?
+The horse, however, seemed to know it by his neighing.  How did you
+ever come by the money? however, that's no matter of mine.  I
+suppose you are strongly backed by certain friends you have."
+
+I informed the landlord that he was right in supposing that I came
+for the horse, but that, before I paid for him, I should wish to
+prove his capabilities.  "With all my heart," said the landlord.
+"You shall mount him this moment."  Then going into the stable, he
+saddled and bridled the horse, and presently brought him out before
+the door.  I mounted him, Mr. Petulengro putting a heavy whip into
+my hand, and saying a few words to me in his own mysterious
+language.  "The horse wants no whip," said the landlord.  "Hold
+your tongue, daddy," said Mr. Petulengro.  "My pal knows quite well
+what to do with the whip, he's not going to beat the horse with
+it."  About four hundred yards from the house there was a hill, to
+the foot of which the road ran almost on a perfect level; towards
+the foot of this hill I trotted the horse, who set off at a long,
+swift pace, seemingly at the rate of about sixteen miles an hour.
+On reaching the foot of the hill, I wheeled the animal round, and
+trotted him towards the house--the horse sped faster than before.
+Ere he had advanced a hundred yards, I took off my hat, in
+obedience to the advice which Mr. Petulengro had given me, in his
+own language, and holding it over the horse's head commenced
+drumming on the crown with the knob of the whip; the horse gave a
+slight start, but instantly recovering himself, continued his trot
+till he arrived at the door of the public-house, amidst the
+acclamations of the company, who had all rushed out of the house to
+be spectators of what was going on. "I see now what you wanted the
+whip for," said the landlord, "and sure enough, that drumming on
+your hat was no bad way of learning whether the horse was quiet or
+not.  Well, did you ever see a more quiet horse, or a better
+trotter?"  "My cob shall trot against him," said a fellow, dressed
+in velveteen, mounted on a low powerful-looking animal.  "My cob
+shall trot against him to the hill and back again--come on!"  We
+both started; the cob kept up gallantly against the horse for about
+half way to the hill, when he began to lose ground; at the foot of
+the hill he was about fifteen yards behind.  Whereupon I turned
+slowly and waited for him.  We then set off towards the house, but
+now the cob had no chance, being at least twenty yards behind when
+I reached the door.  This running of the horse, the wild uncouth
+forms around me, and the ale and beer which were being guzzled from
+pots and flagons, put me wonderfully in mind of the ancient horse-
+races of the heathen north.  I almost imagined myself Gunnar of
+Hlitharend at the race of -
+
+"Are you satisfied?" said the landlord.  "Didn't you tell me that
+he could leap?" I demanded.  "I am told he can," said the landlord;
+"but I can't consent that he should be tried in that way, as he
+might be damaged."  "That's right!" said Mr. Petulengro, "don't
+trust my pal to leap that horse, he'll merely fling him down, and
+break his neck and his own.  There's a better man than he close by;
+let him get on his back and leap him."  "You mean yourself, I
+suppose," said the landlord.  "Well, I call that talking modestly,
+and nothing becomes a young man more than modesty."  "It a'n't I,
+daddy," said Mr. Petulengro.  "Here's the man," said he, pointing
+to Tawno.  "Here's the horse-leaper of the world!"  "You mean the
+horse-back breaker," said the landlord.  "That big fellow would
+break down my cousin's horse."  "Why, he weighs only sixteen
+stone," said Mr. Petulengro.  "And his sixteen stone, with his way
+of handling a horse, does not press so much as any other one's
+thirteen.  Only let him get on the horse's back, and you'll see
+what he can do!"  "No," said the landlord, "it won't do." Whereupon
+Mr. Petulengro became very much excited; and pulling out a handful
+of money, said, "I'll tell you what, I'll forfeit these guineas, if
+my black pal there does the horse any kind of damage; duck me in
+the horse-pond if I don't."  "Well," said the landlord, "for the
+sport of the thing I consent, so let your white pal get down, and
+our black pal mount as soon as he pleases."  I felt rather
+mortified at Mr. Petulengro's interference; and showed no
+disposition to quit my seat; whereupon he came up to me and said,
+"Now, brother, do get out of the saddle--you are no bad hand at
+trotting, I am willing to acknowledge that; but at leaping a horse
+there is no one like Tawno.  Let every dog be praised for his own
+gift.  You have been showing off in your line for the last half-
+hour; now do give Tawno a chance of exhibiting a little; poor
+fellow, he hasn't often a chance of exhibiting, as his wife keeps
+him so much out of sight."  Not wishing to appear desirous of
+engrossing the public attention, and feeling rather desirous to see
+how Tawno, of whose exploits in leaping horses I had frequently
+heard, would acquit himself in the affair, I at length dismounted,
+and Tawno, at a bound, leaped into the saddle, where he really
+looked like Gunnar of Hlitharend, save and except the complexion of
+Gunnar was florid, whereas that of Tawno was of nearly Mulatto
+darkness; and that all Tawno's features were cast in the Grecian
+model, whereas Gunnar had a snub nose.  "There's a leaping-bar
+behind the house," said the landlord.  "Leaping-bar!" said Mr.
+Petulengro, scornfully.  "Do you think my black pal ever rides at a
+leaping-bar?  No more than a windle-straw.  Leap over that meadow-
+wall, Tawno."  Just past the house, in the direction in which I had
+been trotting, was a wall about four feet high, beyond which was a
+small meadow.  Tawno rode the horse gently up to the wall,
+permitted him to look over, then backed him for about ten yards,
+and pressing his calves against the horse's sides, he loosed the
+rein, and the horse launching forward, took the leap in gallant
+style.  "Well done, man and horse!" said Mr. Petulengro, "now come
+back, Tawno."  The leap from the side of the meadow was, however,
+somewhat higher; and the horse, when pushed at it, at first turned
+away; whereupon Tawno backed him to a greater distance, pushed the
+horse to a full gallop, giving a wild cry; whereupon the horse
+again took the wall, slightly grazing one of his legs against it.
+"A near thing," said the landlord; "but a good leap.  Now, no more
+leaping, so long as I have control over the animal."  The horse was
+then led back to the stable; and the landlord, myself and
+companions going into the bar, I paid down the money for the horse.
+
+Scarcely was the bargain concluded, when two or three of the
+company began to envy me the possession of the horse, and forcing
+their way into the bar, with much noise and clamour, said that the
+horse had been sold too cheap.  One fellow, in particular, with a
+red waistcoat, the son of a wealthy farmer, said that if he had but
+known that the horse had been so good a one, he would have bought
+it at the first price asked for it, which he was now willing to
+pay, that is to-morrow, supposing--"supposing your father will let
+you have the money," said the landlord, "which, after all, might
+not be the case; but, however that may be, it is too late now.  I
+think myself the horse has been sold for too little money, but if
+so all the better for the young man, who came forward when no other
+body did with his money in his hand.  There, take yourselves out of
+my bar," he said to the fellows; "and a pretty scoundrel you," said
+he to the man of the red waistcoat, "to say the horse has been sold
+too cheap; why, it was only yesterday you said he was good for
+nothing, and were passing all kinds of jokes at him.  Take yourself
+out of my bar, I say, you and all of you," and he turned the
+fellows out.  I then asked the landlord whether he would permit the
+horse to remain in the stable for a short time, provided I paid for
+his entertainment; and on his willingly consenting, I treated my
+friends with ale, and then returned with them to the encampment.
+
+That evening I informed Mr. Petulengro and his party that on the
+morrow I intended to mount my horse, and leave that part of the
+country in quest of adventures; inquiring of Jasper where, in the
+event of my selling the horse advantageously, I might meet with
+him, and repay the money I had borrowed of him; whereupon Mr.
+Petulengro informed me that in about ten weeks I might find him at
+a certain place at the Chong gav.  I then stated that as I could
+not well carry with me the property which I possessed in the
+dingle, which after all was of no considerable value, I had
+resolved to bestow the said property, namely, the pony, tent,
+tinker-tools, etc., on Ursula and her husband, partly because they
+were poor, and partly on account of the great kindness which I bore
+to Ursula, from whom I had, on various occasions, experienced all
+manner of civility, particularly in regard to crabbed words.  On
+hearing this intelligence, Ursula returned many thanks to her
+gentle brother, as she called me, and Sylvester was so overjoyed
+that, casting aside his usual phlegm, he said I was the best friend
+he had ever had in the world, and in testimony of his gratitude
+swore that he would permit his wife to give me a choomer in the
+presence of the whole company, which offer, however, met with a
+very mortifying reception, the company frowning disapprobation,
+Ursula protesting against anything of the kind, and I myself
+showing no forwardness to avail myself of it, having inherited from
+nature a considerable fund of modesty, to which was added no slight
+store acquired in the course of my Irish education.  I passed that
+night alone in the dingle in a very melancholy manner, with little
+or no sleep, thinking of Isopel Berners; and in the morning when I
+quitted it I shed several tears, as I reflected that I should
+probably never again see the spot where I had passed so many hours
+in her company.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+
+
+Farewell to the Romans--The Landlord and His Niece--Set Out as a
+Traveller.
+
+
+On reaching the plain above, I found my Romany friends
+breakfasting, and on being asked by Mr. Petulengro to join them, I
+accepted the invitation.  No sooner was breakfast over than I
+informed Ursula and her husband that they would find the property,
+which I had promised them, in the dingle, commanding the little
+pony Ambrol to their best care.  I took leave of the whole company,
+which was itself about to break up camp and to depart in the
+direction of London, and made the best of my way to the public-
+house.  I had a small bundle in my hand, and was dressed in the
+same manner as when I departed from London, having left my
+waggoner's slop with the other effects in the dingle.  On arriving
+at the public-house, I informed the landlord that I was come for my
+horse, inquiring, at the same time, whether he could not
+accommodate me with a bridle and saddle.  He told me that the
+bridle and saddle, with which I had ridden the horse on the
+preceding day, were at my service for a trifle; that he had
+received them some time since in payment for a debt, and that he
+had himself no use for them.  The leathers of the bridle were
+rather shabby, and the bit rusty, and the saddle was old fashioned;
+but I was happy to purchase them for seven shillings, more
+especially as the landlord added a small valise, which he said
+could be strapped to the saddle, and which I should find very
+convenient for carrying my things in.  I then proceeded to the
+stable, told the horse we were bound on an expedition, and giving
+him a feed of corn, left him to discuss it, and returned to the
+bar-room to have a little farewell chat with the landlord, and at
+the same time to drink with him a farewell glass of ale.  Whilst we
+were talking and drinking, the niece came and joined us:  she was a
+decent, sensible young woman, who appeared to take a great interest
+in her uncle, whom she regarded with a singular mixture of pride
+and, disapprobation--pride for the renown which he had acquired by
+his feats of old, and disapprobation for his late imprudences.  She
+said that she hoped that his misfortunes would be a warning to him
+to turn more to his God than he had hitherto done, and to give up
+cock-fighting and other low-life practices.  To which the landlord
+replied, that with respect to cock-fighting he intended to give it
+up entirely, being determined no longer to risk his capital upon
+birds, and with respect to his religious duties, he should attend
+the church of which he was churchwarden at least once a quarter,
+adding, however, that he did not intend to become either canter or
+driveller, neither of which characters would befit a publican
+surrounded by such customers as he was, and that to the last day of
+his life he hoped to be able to make use of his fists.  After a
+stay of about two hours I settled accounts, and having bridled and
+saddled my horse, and strapped on my valise, I mounted, shook hands
+with the landlord and his niece, and departed, notwithstanding that
+they both entreated me to tarry until the evening, it being then
+the heat of the day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+
+
+An Adventure on the Road--The Six Flint Stone--A Rural Scene--Mead-
+-The Old Man and His Bees.
+
+
+I bent my course in the direction of the north, more induced by
+chance than any particular motive; all quarters of the world having
+about equal attractions for me.  I was in high spirits at finding
+myself once more on horse-back, and trotted gaily on, until the
+heat of the weather induced me to slacken my pace, more out of pity
+for my horse than because I felt any particular inconvenience from
+it--heat and cold being then, and still, matters of great
+indifference to me.  What I thought of I scarcely know, save and
+except that I have a glimmering recollection that I felt some
+desire to meet with one of those adventures which upon the roads of
+England are generally as plentiful as blackberries in autumn; and
+Fortune, who has generally been ready to gratify my inclinations,
+provided it cost her very little by so doing, was not slow in
+furnishing me with an adventure, perhaps as characteristic of the
+English roads as anything which could have happened.
+
+I might have travelled about six miles amongst cross roads and
+lanes, when suddenly I found myself upon a broad and very dusty
+road which seemed to lead due north.  As I wended along this I saw
+a man upon a donkey riding towards me.  The man was commonly
+dressed, with a broad felt hat on his head, and a kind of satchel
+on his back; he seemed to be in a mighty hurry, and was every now
+and then belabouring the donkey with a cudgel.  The donkey,
+however, which was a fine large creature of the silver-grey
+species, did not appear to sympathize at all with its rider in his
+desire to get on, but kept its head turned back as much as
+possible, moving from one side of the road to the other, and not
+making much forward way.  As I passed, being naturally of a very
+polite disposition, I gave the man the sele of the day, asking him,
+at the same time, why he beat the donkey; whereupon the fellow
+eyeing me askance, told me to mind my own business, with the
+addition of something which I need not repeat.  I had not proceeded
+a furlong before I saw seated on the dust by the wayside, close by
+a heap of stones, and with several flints before him, a
+respectable-looking old man, with a straw hat and a white smock,
+who was weeping bitterly.
+
+"What are you crying for, father?" said I.  "Have you come to any
+hurt?"  "Hurt enough," sobbed the old man, "I have just been
+tricked out of the best ass in England by a villain, who gave me
+nothing but these trash in return," pointing to the stones before
+him.  "I really scarcely understand you," said I, "I wish you would
+explain yourself more clearly."  "I was riding on my ass from
+market," said the old man, "when I met here a fellow with a sack on
+his back, who, after staring at the ass and me a moment or two,
+asked me if I would sell her.  I told him that I could not think of
+selling her, as she was very useful to me, and though an animal, my
+true companion, whom I loved as much as if she were my wife and
+daughter.  I then attempted to pass on, but the fellow stood before
+me, begging me to sell her, saying that he would give me anything
+for her; well, seeing that he persisted, I said at last that if I
+sold her, I must have six pounds for her, and I said so to get rid
+of him, for I saw that he was a shabby fellow, who had probably not
+six shillings in the world; but I had better have held my tongue,"
+said the old man, crying more bitterly than before, "for the words
+were scarcely out of my mouth, when he said he would give me what I
+asked, and taking the sack from his back, he pulled out a
+steelyard, and going to the heap of stones there, he took up
+several of them and weighed them, then flinging them down before
+me, he said, 'There are six pounds, neighbour; now, get off the
+ass, and hand her over to me.'  Well, I sat like one dumbfoundered
+for a time, till at last I asked him what he meant?  'What do I
+mean?' said he, 'you old rascal, why, I mean to claim my purchase,'
+and then he swore so awfully, that scarcely knowing what I did I
+got down, and he jumped on the animal and rode off as fast as he
+could."  "I suppose he was the fellow," said I, "whom I just now
+met upon a fine gray ass, which he was beating with a cudgel."  "I
+dare say he was," said the old man, "I saw him beating her as he
+rode away, and I thought I should have died."  "I never heard such
+a story," said I; "well, do you mean to submit to such a piece of
+roguery quietly?"  "Oh, dear," said the old man, "what can I do?  I
+am seventy-nine years of age; I am bad on my feet, and dar'n't go
+after him."--"Shall I go?" said I; "the fellow is a thief, and any
+one has a right to stop him."  "Oh, if you could but bring her
+again to me," said the old man, "I would bless you till my dying
+day; but have a care; I don't know but after all the law may say
+that she is his lawful purchase.  I asked six pounds for her, and
+he gave me six pounds."  "Six flints, you mean," said I, "no, no,
+the law is not quite so bad as that either; I know something about
+her, and am sure that she will never sanction such a quibble.  At
+all events, I'll ride after the fellow."  Thereupon turning my
+horse round, I put him to his very best trot; I rode nearly a mile
+without obtaining a glimpse of the fellow, and was becoming
+apprehensive that he had escaped me by turning down some by-path,
+two or three of which I had passed.  Suddenly, however, on the road
+making a slight turning, I perceived him right before me, moving at
+a tolerably swift pace, having by this time probably overcome the
+resistance of the animal.  Putting my horse to a full gallop, I
+shouted at the top of my voice, "Get off that donkey, you rascal,
+and give her up to me, or I'll ride you down."  The fellow hearing
+the thunder of the horse's hoofs behind him, drew up on one side of
+the road.  "What do you want?" said he, as I stopped my charger,
+now almost covered with sweat and foam close beside him.  "Do you
+want to rob me?"  "To rob you?" said I.  "No! but to take from you
+that ass, of which you have just robbed its owner."  "I have robbed
+no man," said the fellow; "I just now purchased it fairly of its
+master, and the law will give it to me; he asked six pounds for it,
+and I gave him six pounds."  "Six stones, you mean, you rascal,"
+said I; "get down, or my horse shall be upon you in a moment;" then
+with a motion of my reins, I caused the horse to rear, pressing his
+sides with my heels as if I intended to make him leap.  "Stop,"
+said the man, "I'll get down, and then try if I can't serve you
+out."  He then got down, and confronted me with his cudgel; he was
+a horrible-looking fellow, and seemed prepared for anything.
+Scarcely, however, had he dismounted, when the donkey jerked the
+bridle out of his hand, and probably in revenge for the usage she
+had received, gave him a pair of tremendous kicks on the hip with
+her hinder legs, which overturned him, and then scampered down the
+road the way she had come.  "Pretty treatment this," said the
+fellow, getting up without his cudgel, and holding his hand to his
+side, "I wish I may not be lamed for life."  "And if you be," said
+I, "it will merely serve you right, you rascal, for trying to cheat
+a poor old man out of his property by quibbling at words."
+"Rascal!" said the fellow, "you lie, I am no rascal; and as for
+quibbling with words--suppose I did!  What then?  All the first
+people does it!  The newspapers does it! the gentlefolks that calls
+themselves the guides of the popular mind does it!  I'm no
+ignoramus.  I read the newspapers, and knows what's what."  "You
+read them to some purpose," said I.  "Well, if you are lamed for
+life, and unfitted for any active line--turn newspaper editor; I
+should say you are perfectly qualified, and this day's adventure
+may be the foundation of your fortune," thereupon I turned round
+and rode off.  The fellow followed me with a torrent of abuse.
+"Confound you," said he--yet that was not the expression either--"I
+know you; you are one of the horse-patrol come down into the
+country on leave to see your relations.  Confound you, you and the
+like of you have knocked my business on the head near Lunnon, and I
+suppose we shall have you shortly in the country."  "To the
+newspaper office," said I, "and fabricate falsehoods out of flint
+stones;" then touching the horse with my heels, I trotted off, and
+coming to the place where I had seen the old man, I found him
+there, risen from the ground, and embracing his ass.
+
+I told him that I was travelling down the road, and said, that if
+his way lay in the same direction as mine he could do no better
+than accompany me for some distance, lest the fellow who, for aught
+I knew, might be hovering nigh, might catch him alone, and again
+get his ass from him.  After thanking me for my offer, which he
+said he would accept, he got upon his ass, and we proceeded
+together down the road.  My new acquaintance said very little of
+his own accord; and when I asked him a question, answered rather
+incoherently.  I heard him every now and then say, "Villain!" to
+himself, after which he would pat the donkey's neck, from which
+circumstance I concluded that his mind was occupied with his late
+adventure.  After travelling about two miles, we reached a place
+where a drift-way on the right led from the great road; here my
+companion stopped, and on my asking him whether he was going any
+farther, he told me that the path to the right was the way to his
+home.
+
+I was bidding him farewell, when he hemmed once or twice, and said,
+that as he did not live far off, he hoped that I would go with him
+and taste some of his mead.  As I had never tasted mead, of which I
+had frequently read in the compositions of the Welsh bards, and,
+moreover, felt rather thirsty from the heat of the day, I told him
+that I should have great pleasure in attending him.  Whereupon,
+turning off together, we proceeded about half a mile, sometimes
+between stone walls, and at other times hedges, till we reached a
+small hamlet, through which we passed, and presently came to a very
+pretty cottage, delightfully situated within a garden, surrounded
+by a hedge of woodbines.  Opening a gate at one corner of the
+garden he led the way to a large shed, which stood partly behind
+the cottage, which he said was his stable; thereupon he dismounted
+and led his donkey into the shed, which was without stalls, but had
+a long rack and manger.  On one side he tied his donkey, after
+taking off her caparisons, and I followed his example, tying my
+horse at the other side with a rope halter which he gave me; he
+then asked me to come in and taste his mead, but I told him that I
+must attend to the comfort of my horse first, and forthwith, taking
+a wisp of straw, rubbed him carefully down.  Then taking a pailful
+of clear water which stood in the shed, I allowed the horse to
+drink about half a pint; and then turning to the old man, who all
+the time had stood by looking at my proceedings, I asked him
+whether he had any oats?  "I have all kinds of grain," he replied;
+and, going out, he presently returned with two measures, one a
+large and the other a small one, both filled with oats, mixed with
+a few beans, and handing the large one to me for the horse, he
+emptied the other before the donkey, who, before she began to
+despatch it, turned her nose to her master's face, and fairly
+kissed him.  Having given my horse his portion, I told the old man
+that I was ready to taste his mead as soon as he pleased, whereupon
+he ushered me into his cottage, where, making me sit down by a deal
+table in a neatly sanded kitchen, he produced from an old-fashioned
+closet a bottle, holding about a quart, and a couple of cups, which
+might each contain about half a pint, then opening the bottle and
+filling the cups with a brown-coloured liquor, he handed one to me,
+and taking a seat opposite to me, he lifted the other, nodded, and
+saying to me--"Health and welcome," placed it to his lips and
+drank.
+
+"Health and thanks," I replied; and being very thirsty, emptied my
+cup at a draught; I had scarcely done so, however, when I half
+repented.  The mead was deliciously sweet and mellow, but appeared
+strong as brandy; my eyes reeled in my head, and my brain became
+slightly dizzy.  "Mead is a strong drink," said the old man, as he
+looked at me, with a half smile on his countenance.  "This is at
+any rate," said I, "so strong, indeed, that I would not drink
+another cup for any consideration."  "And I would not ask you,"
+said the old man; "for, if you did, you would most probably be
+stupid all day, and wake the next morning with a headache.  Mead is
+a good drink, but woundily strong, especially to those who be not
+used to it, as I suppose you are not."  "Where do you get it?" said
+I.  "I make it myself," said the old man, "from the honey which my
+bees make."  "Have you many bees?" I inquired.  "A great many,"
+said the old man.  "And do you keep them," said I, "for the sake of
+making mead with their honey?"  "I keep them," he replied, "partly
+because I am fond of them, and partly for what they bring me in;
+they make me a great deal of honey, some of which I sell, and with
+a little I make some mead to warm my poor heart with, or
+occasionally to treat a friend with like yourself."  "And do you
+support yourself entirely by means of your bees?"  "No," said the
+old man; "I have a little bit of ground behind my house, which is
+my principal means of support."  "And do you live alone?"  "Yes,"
+said he; "with the exception of the bees and the donkey, I live
+quite alone."  "And have you always lived alone?"  The old man
+emptied his cup, and his heart being warmed with the mead, he told
+his history, which was simplicity itself.  His father was a small
+yeoman, who, at his death, had left him, his only child, the
+cottage, with a small piece of ground behind it, and on this little
+property he had lived ever since.  About the age of twenty-five he
+had married an industrious young woman, by whom he had one
+daughter, who died before reaching years of womanhood.  His wife,
+however, had survived her daughter many years, and had been a great
+comfort to him, assisting him in his rural occupations; but, about
+four years before the present period, he had lost her, since which
+time he had lived alone, making himself as comfortable as he could;
+cultivating his ground, with the help of a lad from the
+neighbouring village, attending to his bees, and occasionally
+riding his donkey to market, and hearing the word of God, which he
+said he was sorry he could not read, twice a week regularly at the
+parish church.  Such was the old man's tale.
+
+When he had finished speaking, he led me behind his house, and
+showed me his little domain.  It consisted of about two acres in
+admirable cultivation; a small portion of it formed a kitchen
+garden, while the rest was sown with four kinds of grain, wheat,
+barley, peas, and beans.  The air was full of ambrosial sweets,
+resembling those proceeding from an orange grove; a place which
+though I had never seen at that time, I since have.  In the garden
+was the habitation of the bees, a long box, supported upon three
+oaken stumps.  It was full of small round glass windows, and
+appeared to be divided into a great many compartments, much
+resembling drawers placed sideways.  He told me that, as one
+compartment was filled, the bees left it for another; so that,
+whenever he wanted honey, he could procure some without injury to
+the insects.  Through the little round windows I could see several
+of the bees at work; hundreds were going in and out of the doors;
+hundreds were buzzing about on the flowers, the woodbines, and
+beans.  As I looked around on the well-cultivated field, the
+garden, and the bees, I thought I had never before seen so rural
+and peaceful a scene.
+
+When we returned to the cottage we again sat down, and I asked the
+old man whether he was not afraid to live alone.  He told me that
+he was not, for that, upon the whole, his neighbours were very kind
+to him.  I mentioned the fellow who had swindled him of his donkey
+upon the road.  "That was no neighbour of mine," said the old man,
+"and, perhaps, I shall never see him again, or his like."  "It's a
+dreadful thing," said I, "to have no other resource, when injured,
+than to shed tears on the road."  "It is so," said the old man;
+"but God saw the tears of the old, and sent a helper."  "Why did
+you not help yourself?" said I.  "Instead of getting off your ass,
+why did you not punch at the fellow, or at any rate use dreadful
+language, call him villain, and shout robbery?"  "Punch!" said the
+old man, "shout! what, with these hands, and this voice--Lord, how
+you run on!  I am old, young chap, I am old!"  "Well," said I, "it
+is a shameful thing to cry even when old."  "You think so now,"
+said the old man, "because you are young and strong; perhaps when
+you are as old as I, you will not be ashamed to cry."
+
+Upon the whole I was rather pleased with the old man, and much with
+all about him.  As evening drew nigh, I told him that I must
+proceed on my journey; whereupon he invited me to tarry with him
+during the night, telling me that he had a nice room and bed above
+at my service.  I, however, declined; and bidding him farewell,
+mounted my horse, and departed.  Regaining the road, I proceeded
+once more in the direction of the north; and, after a few hours,
+coming to a comfortable public-house, I stopped, and put up for the
+night.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+
+
+The Singular Noise--Sleeping in a Meadow--The Book--Cure for
+Wakefulness--Literary Tea Party--Poor Byron.
+
+
+I did not awake till rather late the next morning; and when I did,
+I felt considerable drowsiness, with a slight headache, which I was
+uncharitable enough to attribute to the mead which I had drunk on
+the preceding day.  After feeding my horse, and breakfasting, I
+proceeded on my wanderings.  Nothing occurred worthy of relating
+till mid-day was considerably past, when I came to a pleasant
+valley, between two gentle hills.  I had dismounted, in order to
+ease my horse, and was leading him along by the bridle, when, on my
+right, behind a bank in which some umbrageous ashes were growing,
+heard a singular noise.  I stopped short and listened, and
+presently said to myself, "Surely this is snoring, perhaps that of
+a hedgehog."  On further consideration, however, I was convinced
+that the noise which I heard, and which certainly seemed to be
+snoring, could not possibly proceed from the nostrils of so small
+an animal, but must rather come from those of a giant, so loud and
+sonorous was it.  About two or three yards farther was a gate,
+partly open, to which I went, and peeping into the field, saw a man
+lying on some rich grass, under the shade of one of the ashes; he
+was snoring away at a great rate.  Impelled by curiosity, I
+fastened the bridle of my horse to the gate, and went up to the
+man.  He was a genteelly-dressed individual; rather corpulent, with
+dark features, and seemingly about forty-five.  He lay on his back,
+his hat slightly over his brow, and at his right hand lay an open
+book.  So strenuously did he snore that the wind from his nostrils
+agitated, perceptibly, a fine cambric frill which he wore at his
+bosom.  I gazed upon him for some time, expecting that he might
+awake; but he did not, but kept on snoring, his breast heaving
+convulsively.  At last, the noise he made became so terrible, that
+I felt alarmed for his safety, imagining that a fit might seize
+him, and he lose his life while fast asleep.  I therefore
+exclaimed, "Sir, sir, awake! you sleep over-much."  But my voice
+failed to rouse him, and he continued snoring as before; whereupon
+I touched him slightly with my riding wand, but failing to wake
+him, I touched him again more vigorously; whereupon he opened his
+eyes, and, probably imagining himself in a dream, closed them
+again.  But I was determined to arouse him, and cried as loud as I
+could, "Sir, sir, pray sleep no more!"  He heard what I said,
+opened his eyes again, stared at me with a look of some
+consciousness, and, half raising himself upon his elbows, asked me
+what was the matter.  "I beg your pardon," said I, "but I took the
+liberty of awaking you, because you appeared to be much disturbed
+in your sleep--I was fearful, too, that you might catch a fever
+from sleeping under a tree."  "I run no risk," said the man, "I
+often come and sleep here; and as for being disturbed in my sleep,
+I felt very comfortable; I wish you had not awoke me."  "Well,"
+said I, "I beg your pardon once more.  I assure you that what I did
+was with the best intention."  "Oh! pray make no further apology,"
+said the individual, "I make no doubt that what you did was done
+kindly; but there's an old proverb, to the effect, 'that you should
+let sleeping dogs lie,'" he added with a smile.  Then, getting up,
+and stretching himself with a yawn, he took up his book and said,
+"I have slept quite long enough, and it's quite time for me to be
+going home."  "Excuse my curiosity," said I, "if I inquire what may
+induce you to come and sleep in this meadow?"  "To tell you the
+truth," answered he, "I am a bad sleeper."  "Pray pardon me," said
+I, "if I tell you that I never saw one sleep more heartily."  "If I
+did so," said the individual, "I am beholden to this meadow and
+this book; but I am talking riddles, and will explain myself.  I am
+the owner of a very pretty property, of which this valley forms
+part.  Some years ago, however, up started a person who said the
+property was his; a lawsuit ensued, and I was on the brink of
+losing my all, when, most unexpectedly, the suit was determined in
+my favour.  Owing, however, to the anxiety to which my mind had
+been subjected for several years, my nerves had become terribly
+shaken; and no sooner was the trial terminated than sleep forsook
+my pillow.  I sometimes passed nights without closing an eye; I
+took opiates, but they rather increased than alleviated my malady.
+About three weeks ago a friend of mine put this book into my hand,
+and advised me to take it every day to some pleasant part of my
+estate, and try and read a page or two, assuring me, if I did, that
+I should infallibly fall asleep.  I took his advice, and selecting
+this place, which I considered the pleasantest part of my property,
+I came, and lying down, commenced reading the book, and before
+finishing a page was in a dead slumber.  Every day since then I
+have repeated the experiment, and every time with equal success.  I
+am a single man, without any children; and yesterday I made my
+will, in which, in the event of my friend's surviving me, I have
+left him all my fortune, in gratitude for his having procured for
+me the most invaluable of all blessings--sleep."
+
+"Dear me," said I, "how very extraordinary!  Do you think that your
+going to sleep is caused by the meadow or the book?"  "I suppose by
+both," said my new acquaintance, "acting in co-operation."  "It may
+be so," said I; "the magic influence does certainly not proceed
+from the meadow alone; for since I have been here, I have not felt
+the slightest inclination to sleep.  Does the book consist of prose
+or poetry?"  "It consists of poetry," said the individual.  "Not
+Byron's?" said I.  "Byron's!" repeated the individual, with a smile
+of contempt; "no, no; there is nothing narcotic in Byron's poetry.
+I don't like it.  I used to read it, but it thrilled, agitated, and
+kept me awake.  No; this is not Byron's poetry, but the inimitable
+-'s"--mentioning a name which I had never heard till then.  "Will
+you permit me to look at it?" said I.  "With pleasure," he
+answered, politely handing me the book.  I took the volume, and
+glanced over the contents.  It was written in blank verse, and
+appeared to abound in descriptions of scenery; there was much
+mention of mountains, valleys, streams, and waterfalls, harebells
+and daffodils.  These descriptions were interspersed with
+dialogues, which, though they proceeded from the mouths of pedlars
+and rustics, were of the most edifying description; mostly on
+subjects moral or metaphysical, and couched in the most gentlemanly
+and unexceptionable language, without the slightest mixture of
+vulgarity, coarseness, or pie-bald grammar.  Such appeared to me to
+be the contents of the book; but before I could form a very clear
+idea of them, I found myself nodding, and a surprising desire to
+sleep coming over me.  Rousing myself, however, by a strong effort,
+I closed the book, and, returning it to the owner, inquired of him,
+"Whether he had any motive in coming and lying down in the meadow,
+besides the wish of enjoying sleep?"  "None whatever," he replied;
+"indeed, I should be very glad not to be compelled to do so, always
+provided I could enjoy the blessing of sleep; for by lying down
+under trees, I may possibly catch the rheumatism, or be stung by
+serpents; and, moreover, in the rainy season and winter the thing
+will be impossible, unless I erect a tent, which will possibly
+destroy the charm."  "Well," said I, "you need give yourself no
+further trouble about coming here, as I am fully convinced that
+with this book in your hand, you may go to sleep anywhere, as your
+friend was doubtless aware, though he wished to interest your
+imagination for a time by persuading you to lie abroad; therefore,
+in future, whenever you feel disposed to sleep, try to read the
+book, and you will be sound asleep in a minute; the narcotic
+influence lies in the book, and not in the field."  "I will follow
+your advice," said the individual; "and this very night take it
+with me to bed; though I hope in time to be able to sleep without
+it, my nerves being already much quieted from the slumbers I have
+enjoyed in this field."  He then moved towards the gate, where we
+parted; he going one way, and I and my horse the other.
+
+More than twenty years subsequent to this period, after much
+wandering about the world, returning to my native country, I was
+invited to a literary tea-party, where, the discourse turning upon
+poetry, I, in order to show that I was not more ignorant than my
+neighbours, began to talk about Byron, for whose writings I really
+entertained considerable admiration, though I had no particular
+esteem for the man himself.  At first, I received no answer to what
+I said--the company merely surveying me with a kind of sleepy
+stare.  At length a lady, about the age of forty, with a large wart
+on her face, observed, in a drawling tone, "That she had not read
+Byron--at least, since her girlhood--and then only a few passages;
+but that the impression on her mind was, that his writings were of
+a highly objectionable character."  "I also read a little of him in
+my boyhood," said a gentleman about sixty, but who evidently, from
+his dress and demeanour, wished to appear about thirty, "but I
+highly disapproved of him; for, notwithstanding he was a nobleman,
+he is frequently very coarse, and very fond of raising emotion.
+Now emotion is what I dislike;" drawling out the last syllable of
+the word dislike.  "There is only one poet for me--the divine--"
+and then he mentioned a name which I had only once heard, and
+afterwards quite forgotten; the same mentioned by the snorer in the
+field.  "Ah! there is no one like him!" murmured some more of the
+company; "the poet of nature--of nature without its vulgarity."  I
+wished very much to ask these people whether they were ever bad
+sleepers, and whether they had read the poet, so called, from a
+desire of being set to sleep.  Within a few days, however, I learnt
+that it had of late become very fashionable and genteel to appear
+half asleep, and that one could exhibit no better mark of superfine
+breeding than by occasionally in company setting one's rhomal organ
+in action.  I then ceased to wonder at the popularity, which I
+found nearly universal, of -'s poetry; for, certainly in order to
+make one's self appear sleepy in company, or occasionally to induce
+sleep, nothing could be more efficacious than a slight prelection
+of his poems.  So poor Byron, with his fire and emotion--to say
+nothing of his mouthings and coxcombry--was dethroned, as I
+prophesied he would be more than twenty years before, on the day of
+his funeral, though I had little idea that his humiliation would
+have been brought about by one, whose sole strength consists in
+setting people to sleep.  Well, all things are doomed to terminate
+in sleep.  Before that termination, however, I will venture to
+prophesy that people will become a little more awake--snoring and
+yawning be a little less in fashion--and poor Byron be once more
+reinstated on his throne, though his rival will always stand a good
+chance of being worshipped by those whose ruined nerves are
+insensible to the narcotic powers of opium and morphine.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+
+
+Drivers and Front Outside Passengers--Fatigue of Body and Mind--
+Unexpected Greeting--My Inn--The Governor--Engagement.
+
+
+I continued my journey, passing through one or two villages.  The
+day was exceedingly hot, and the roads dusty.  In order to cause my
+horse as little fatigue as possible, and not to chafe his back, I
+led him by the bridle, my doing which brought upon me a shower of
+remarks, jests, and would-be witticisms from the drivers and front
+outside passengers of sundry stage-coaches which passed me in one
+direction or the other.  In this way I proceeded till considerably
+past noon, when I felt myself very fatigued, and my horse appeared
+no less so; and it is probable that the lazy and listless manner in
+which we were moving on, tired us both much more effectually than
+hurrying along at a swift trot would have done, for I have observed
+that when the energies of the body are not exerted a languor
+frequently comes over it.  At length arriving at a very large
+building with an archway, near the entrance of a town, I sat down
+on what appeared to be a stepping-block, and presently experienced
+a great depression of spirits.  I began to ask myself whither I was
+going, and what I should do with myself and the horse which I held
+by the bridle?  It appeared to me that I was alone in the world
+with the poor animal, who looked for support to me, who knew not
+how to support myself.  Then the image of Isopel Berners came into
+my mind, and when I thought how I had lost her for ever, and how
+happy I might have been with her in the New World had she not
+deserted me, I became yet more miserable.
+
+As I sat in this state of mind, I suddenly felt some one clap me on
+the shoulder, and heard a voice say, "Ha! comrade of the dingle,
+what chance has brought you into these parts?"  I turned round, and
+beheld a man in the dress of a postillion, whom I instantly
+recognized as he to whom I had rendered assistance on the night of
+the storm.
+
+"Ah!" said I, "is it you?  I am glad to see you, for I was feeling
+very lonely and melancholy."
+
+"Lonely and melancholy," he replied, "how is that? how can any one
+be lonely and melancholy with such a noble horse as that you hold
+by the bridle?"
+
+"The horse," said I, "is one cause of my melancholy, for I know not
+in the world what to do with it."
+
+"It is your own?"
+
+"Yes," said I, "I may call it my own, though I borrowed the money
+to purchase it."
+
+"Well, why don't you sell it?"
+
+"It is not always easy to find a purchaser for a horse like this,"
+said I; "can you recommend me one?"
+
+"I?  Why no, not exactly; but you'll find a purchaser shortly--
+pooh! if you have no other cause for disquiet than that horse,
+cheer up, man, don't be cast down.  Have you nothing else on your
+mind?  By the bye, what's become of the young woman you were
+keeping company with in that queer lodging place of yours?"
+
+"She has left me," said I.
+
+"You quarrelled, I suppose?"
+
+"No," said I, "we did not exactly quarrel, but we are parted."
+
+"Well," replied he, "but you will soon come together again."
+
+"No," said I, "we are parted for ever."
+
+"For ever!  Pooh! you little know how people sometimes come
+together again who think they are parted for ever.  Here's
+something on that point relating to myself.  You remember, when I
+told you my story in that dingle of yours, that I mentioned a young
+woman, my fellow-servant when I lived with the English family in
+Mumbo Jumbo's town, and how she and I, when our foolish governors
+were thinking of changing their religion, agreed to stand by each
+other, and be true to old Church of England, and to give our
+governors warning, provided they tried to make us renegades.  Well,
+she and I parted soon after that, and never to meet again, yet we
+met the other day in the fields, for she lately came to live with a
+great family not far from here, and we have since agreed to marry,
+to take a little farm, for we have both a trifle of money, and live
+together till 'death us do part.'  So much for parting for ever!
+But what do I mean by keeping you broiling in the sun with your
+horse's bridle in your hand, and you on my own ground?  Do you know
+where you are?  Why, that great house is my inn, that is, it's my
+master's, the best fellow in -.  Come along, you and your horse
+both will find a welcome at my inn."
+
+Thereupon he led the way into a large court in which there were
+coaches, chaises, and a great many people; taking my horse from me,
+he led it into a nice cool stall, and fastened it to the rack--he
+then conducted me into a postillion's keeping-room, which at that
+time chanced to be empty, and he then fetched a pot of beer and sat
+down by me.
+
+After a little conversation he asked me what I intended to do, and
+I told him frankly that I did not know; whereupon he observed that,
+provided I had no objection, he had little doubt that I could be
+accommodated for some time at his inn.  "Our upper ostler," said
+he, "died about a week ago; he was a clever fellow, and, besides
+his trade, understood reading and accounts."
+
+"Dear me," said I, interrupting him, "I am not fitted for the place
+of ostler--moreover, I refused the place of ostler at a public-
+house, which was offered to me only a few days ago."  The
+postillion burst into a laugh.  "Ostler at a public-house, indeed!
+why, you would not compare a berth at a place like that with the
+situation of ostler at my inn, the first road-house in England!
+However, I was not thinking of the place of ostler for you; you
+are, as you say, not fitted for it, at any rate, not at a house
+like this.  We have, moreover, the best under-ostler in all
+England--old Bill, with the drawback that he is rather fond of
+drink.  We could make shift with him very well, provided we could
+fall in with a man of writing and figures, who could give an
+account of the hay and corn which comes in and goes out, and
+wouldn't object to give a look occasionally at the yard.  Now it
+appears to me that you are just such a kind of man, and, if you
+will allow me to speak to the governor, I don't doubt that he will
+gladly take you, as he feels kindly disposed towards you from what
+he has heard me say concerning you."
+
+"And what should I do with my horse?" said I.
+
+"The horse need give you no uneasiness," said the postillion; "I
+know he will be welcome here both for bed and manger, and, perhaps,
+in a little time you may find a purchaser, as a vast number of
+sporting people frequent this house."  I offered two or three more
+objections, which the postillion overcame with great force of
+argument, and the pot being nearly empty, he drained it to the
+bottom drop, and then starting up, left me alone.
+
+In about twenty minutes he returned, accompanied by a highly
+intelligent-looking individual, dressed in blue and black, with a
+particularly white cravat, and without a hat on his head:  this
+individual, whom I should have mistaken for a gentleman but for the
+intelligence depicted in his face, he introduced to me as the
+master of the inn.  The master of the inn shook me warmly by the
+hand, told me that he was happy to see me in his house, and thanked
+me in the handsomest terms for the kindness I had shown to his
+servant in the affair of the thunderstorm.  Then saying that he was
+informed I was out of employ, he assured me that he should be most
+happy to engage me to keep his hay and corn account, and as general
+superintendent of the yard, and that with respect to the horse,
+which he was told I had, he begged to inform me that I was
+perfectly at liberty to keep it at the inn upon the very best,
+until I could find a purchaser,--that with regard to wages--but he
+had no sooner mentioned wages than I cut him short, saying, that
+provided I stayed I should be most happy to serve him for bed and
+board, and requested that he would allow me until the next morning
+to consider of his offer; he willingly consented to my request,
+and, begging that I would call for anything I pleased, left me
+alone with the postillion.
+
+I passed that night until about ten o'clock with the postillion,
+when he left me, having to drive a family about ten miles across
+the country; before his departure, however, I told him that I had
+determined to accept the offer of his governor, as he called him.
+At the bottom of my heart I was most happy that an offer had been
+made, which secured to myself and the animal a comfortable retreat
+at a moment when I knew not whither in the world to take myself and
+him.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+
+
+An Inn of Times gone by--A First-rate Publican--Hay and Corn--Old-
+fashioned Ostler--Highwaymen--Mounted Police--Grooming.
+
+
+The inn, of which I had become an inhabitant, was a place of
+infinite life and bustle.  Travellers of all descriptions, from all
+the cardinal points, were continually stopping at it; and to attend
+to their wants, and minister to their convenience, an army of
+servants, of one description or other, was kept; waiters,
+chambermaids, grooms, postillions, shoe-blacks, cooks, scullions,
+and what not, for there was a barber and hair-dresser, who had been
+at Paris, and talked French with a cockney accent; the French
+sounding all the better, as no accent is so melodious as the
+cockney.  Jacks creaked in the kitchens turning round spits, on
+which large joints of meat piped and smoked before great big fires.
+There was running up and down stairs, and along galleries, slamming
+of doors, cries of "Coming, sir," and "Please to step this way,
+ma'am," during eighteen hours of the four-and-twenty.  Truly a very
+great place for life and bustle was this inn.  And often in after
+life, when lonely and melancholy, I have called up the time I spent
+there, and never failed to become cheerful from the recollection.
+
+I found the master of the house a very kind and civil person.
+Before being an inn-keeper he had been in some other line of
+business; but on the death of the former proprietor of the inn had
+married his widow, who was still alive, but, being somewhat infirm,
+lived in a retired part of the house.  I have said that he was kind
+and civil; he was, however, not one of those people who suffer
+themselves to be made fools of by anybody; he knew his customers,
+and had a calm, clear eye, which would look through a man without
+seeming to do so.  The accommodation of his house was of the very
+best description; his wines were good, his viands equally so, and
+his charges not immoderate; though he very properly took care of
+himself.  He was no vulgar inn-keeper, had a host of friends, and
+deserved them all.  During the time I lived with him, he was
+presented by a large assemblage of his friends and customers with a
+dinner at his own house, which was very costly, and at which the
+best of wines were sported, and after the dinner with a piece of
+plate estimated at fifty guineas.  He received the plate, made a
+neat speech of thanks, and when the bill was called for, made
+another neat speech, in which he refused to receive one farthing
+for the entertainment, ordering in at the same time two dozen more
+of the best champagne, and sitting down amidst uproarious applause,
+and cries of "You shall be no loser by it!"  Nothing very wonderful
+in such conduct, some people will say; I don't say there is, nor
+have I any intention to endeavour to persuade the reader that the
+landlord was a Carlo Boromeo; he merely gave a quid pro quo; but it
+is not every person who will give you a quid pro quo.  Had he been
+a vulgar publican, he would have sent in a swinging bill after
+receiving the plate; "but then no vulgar publican would have been
+presented with plate;" perhaps not, but many a vulgar public
+character has been presented with plate, whose admirers never
+received a quid pro quo, except in the shape of a swinging bill.
+
+I found my duties of distributing hay and corn, and keeping an
+account thereof, anything but disagreeable, particularly after I
+had acquired the good-will of the old ostler, who at first looked
+upon me with rather an evil eye, considering me somewhat in the
+light of one who had usurped an office which belonged to himself by
+the right of succession; but there was little gall in the old
+fellow, and, by speaking kindly to him, never giving myself any
+airs of assumption; but, above all, by frequently reading the
+newspapers to him--for though passionately fond of news and
+politics, he was unable to read--I soon succeeded in placing myself
+on excellent terms with him.  A regular character was that old
+ostler; he was a Yorkshireman by birth, but had seen a great deal
+of life in the vicinity of London, to which, on the death of his
+parents, who were very poor people, he went at a very early age.
+Amongst other places where he had served as ostler was a small inn
+at Hounslow, much frequented by highwaymen, whose exploits he was
+fond of narrating, especially those of Jerry Abershaw, who, he
+said, was a capital rider; and on hearing his accounts of that
+worthy, I half regretted that the old fellow had not been in
+London, and I had not formed his acquaintance about the time I was
+thinking of writing the life of the said Abershaw, not doubting
+that with his assistance, I could have produced a book at least as
+remarkable as the life and adventures of that entirely imaginary
+personage Joseph Sell; perhaps, however, I was mistaken; and
+whenever Abershaw's life shall appear before the public--and my
+publisher credibly informs me that it has not yet appeared--I beg
+and entreat the public to state which it likes best, the life of
+Abershaw, or that of Sell, for which latter work I am informed that
+during the last few months there has been a prodigious demand.  My
+old friend, however, after talking of Abershaw, would frequently
+add, that, good rider as Abershaw certainly was, he was decidedly
+inferior to Richard Ferguson, generally called Galloping Dick, who
+was a pal of Abershaw's, and had enjoyed a career as long, and
+nearly as remarkable as his own.  I learned from him that both were
+capital customers at the Hounslow inn, and that he had frequently
+drank with them in the corn-room.  He said that no man could desire
+more jolly or entertaining companions over a glass of "summut;" but
+that upon the road it was anything but desirable to meet them;
+there they were terrible, cursing and swearing, and thrusting the
+muzzles of their pistols into people's mouths; and at this part of
+his locution the old man winked, and said, in a somewhat lower
+voice, that upon the whole they were right in doing so, and that
+when a person had once made up his mind to become a highwayman, his
+best policy was to go the whole hog, fearing nothing, but making
+everybody afraid of him; that people never thought of resisting a
+savage-faced, foul-mouthed highwayman, and if he were taken, were
+afraid to bear witness against him, lest he should get off and cut
+their throats some time or other upon the roads; whereas people
+would resist being robbed by a sneaking, pale-visaged rascal, and
+would swear bodily against him on the first opportunity,--adding,
+that Abershaw and Ferguson, two most awful fellows, had enjoyed a
+long career, whereas two disbanded officers of the army, who wished
+to rob a coach like gentlemen, had begged the passengers' pardon,
+and talked of hard necessity, had been set upon by the passengers
+themselves, amongst whom were three women, pulled from their
+horses, conducted to Maidstone, and hanged with as little pity as
+such contemptible fellows deserved.  "There is nothing like going
+the whole hog," he repeated, "and if ever I had been a highwayman,
+I would have done so; I should have thought myself all the more
+safe; and, moreover, shouldn't have despised myself.  To curry
+favour with those you are robbing, sometimes at the expense of your
+own comrades, as I have known fellows do, why, it is the greatest--
+"
+
+"So it is," interposed my friend the postillion, who chanced to be
+present at a considerable part of the old ostler's discourse; "it
+is, as you say, the greatest of humbug, and merely, after all, gets
+a fellow into trouble; but no regular bred highwayman would do it.
+I say, George, catch the Pope of Rome trying to curry favour with
+anybody he robs; catch old Mumbo Jumbo currying favour with the
+Archbishop of Canterbury and the Dean and Chapter, should he meet
+them in a stage-coach; it would be with him, Bricconi Abbasso, as
+he knocked their teeth out with the butt of his trombone; and the
+old regular-built ruffian would be all the safer for it, as Bill
+would say, as ten to one the Archbishop and Chapter, after such a
+spice of his quality, would be afraid to swear against him, and to
+hang him, even if he were in their power, though that would be the
+proper way; for, if it is the greatest of all humbug for a
+highwayman to curry favour with those he robs, the next greatest is
+to try to curry favour with a highwayman when you have got him, by
+letting him off."
+
+Finding the old man so well acquainted with the history of
+highwaymen, and taking considerable interest in the subject, having
+myself edited a book containing the lives of many remarkable people
+who had figured on the highway, I forthwith asked him how it was
+that the trade of highwaymen had become extinct in England, as at
+present we never heard of any one following it.  Whereupon he told
+me that many causes had contributed to bring about that result; the
+principal of which were the following:- the refusal to license
+houses which were known to afford shelter to highwaymen, which,
+amongst many others, had caused the inn at Hounslow to be closed;
+the inclosure of many a wild heath in the country, on which they
+were in the habit of lurking, and particularly the establishing in
+the neighbourhood of London of a well-armed mounted patrol, who
+rode the highwaymen down, and delivered them up to justice, which
+hanged them without ceremony.
+
+"And that would be the way to deal with Mumbo Jumbo and his gang,"
+said the postillion, "should they show their visages in these
+realms; and I hear by the newspapers that they are becoming every
+day more desperate.  Take away the license from their public-
+houses, cut down the rookeries and shadowy old avenues in which
+they are fond of lying in wait, in order to sally out upon people
+as they pass in the roads; but, above all, establish a good mounted
+police to ride after the ruffians and drag them by the scruff of
+the neck to the next clink, where they might lie till they could be
+properly dealt with by law; instead of which, the Government are
+repealing the wise old laws enacted against such characters, giving
+fresh licenses every day to their public-houses, and saying that it
+would be a pity to cut down their rookeries and thickets because
+they look so very picturesque; and, in fact, giving them all kind
+of encouragement; why, if such behaviour is not enough to drive an
+honest man mad, I know not what is.  It is of no use talking, I
+only wish the power were in my hands, and if I did not make short
+work of them, might I be a mere jackass postillion all the
+remainder of my life."
+
+Besides acquiring from the ancient ostler a great deal of curious
+information respecting the ways and habits of the heroes of the
+road, with whom he had come in contact in the early portion of his
+life, I picked up from him many excellent hints relating to the art
+of grooming horses.  Whilst at the inn, I frequently groomed the
+stage and post-horses, and those driven up by travellers in their
+gigs:  I was not compelled, nor indeed expected, to do so; but I
+took pleasure in the occupation; and I remember at that period one
+of the principal objects of my ambition was to be a first-rate
+groom, and to make the skins of the creatures I took in hand look
+sleek and glossy like those of moles.  I have said that I derived
+valuable hints from the old man, and, indeed, became a very
+tolerable groom, but there was a certain finishing touch which I
+could never learn from him, though he possessed it himself, and
+which I could never attain to by my own endeavours; though my want
+of success certainly did not proceed from want of application, for
+I have rubbed the horses down, purring and buzzing all the time,
+after the genuine ostler fashion, until the perspiration fell in
+heavy drops upon my shoes, and when I had done my best and asked
+the old fellow what he thought of my work, I could never extract
+from him more than a kind of grunt, which might be translated, "Not
+so very bad, but I have seen a horse groomed much better," which
+leads me to suppose that a person, in order to be a first-rate
+groom, must have something in him when he is born which I had not,
+and, indeed, which many other people have not who pretend to be
+grooms.  What does the reader think?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+
+
+Stable Hartshorn--How to Manage a Horse on a Journey--Your Best
+Friend.
+
+
+Of one thing I am certain, that the reader must be much delighted
+with the wholesome smell of the stable, with which many of these
+pages are redolent; what a contrast to the sickly odours exhaled
+from those of some of my contemporaries, especially of those who
+pretend to be of the highly fashionable class, and who treat of
+reception-rooms, well may they be styled so, in which dukes,
+duchesses, earls, countesses, archbishops, bishops, mayors,
+mayoresses--not forgetting the writers themselves, both male and
+female--congregate and press upon one another; how cheering, how
+refreshing, after having been nearly knocked down with such an
+atmosphere, to come in contact with genuine stable hartshorn.  Oh!
+the reader shall have yet more of the stable, and of that old
+ostler, for which he or she will doubtless exclaim, "Much
+obliged!"--and, lest I should forget to perform my promise, the
+reader shall have it now.
+
+I shall never forget an harangue from the mouth of the old man,
+which I listened to one warm evening as he and I sat on the
+threshold of the stable, after having attended to some of the wants
+of a batch of coach-horses.  It related to the manner in which a
+gentleman should take care of his horse and self, whilst engaged in
+a journey on horseback, and was addressed to myself, on the
+supposition of my one day coming to an estate, and of course
+becoming a gentleman.
+
+"When you are a gentleman," said he, "should you ever journey on a
+horse of your own, and you could not have a much better than the
+one you have here eating its fill in the box yonder--I wonder, by
+the bye, how you ever came by it--you can't do better than follow
+the advice I am about to give you, both with respect to your animal
+and yourself.  Before you start, merely give your horse a couple of
+handfuls of corn and a little water, somewhat under a quart, and if
+you drink a pint of water yourself out of the pail, you will feel
+all the better during the whole day; then you may walk and trot
+your animal for about ten miles, till you come to some nice inn,
+where you may get down and see your horse led into a nice stall,
+telling the ostler not to feed him till you come.  If the ostler
+happens to be a dog-fancier, and has an English terrier-dog like
+that of mine there, say what a nice dog it is, and praise its black
+and tawn; and if he does not happen to be a dog-fancier, ask him
+how he's getting on, and whether he ever knew worse times; that
+kind of thing will please the ostler, and he will let you do just
+what you please with your own horse, and when your back is turned,
+he'll say to his comrades what a nice gentleman you are, and how he
+thinks he has seen you before; then go and sit down to breakfast,
+and, before you have finished breakfast, get up and go and give
+your horse a feed of corn; chat with the ostler two or three
+minutes till your horse has taken the shine out of his corn, which
+will prevent the ostler taking any of it away when your back is
+turned, for such things are sometimes done--not that I ever did
+such a thing myself when I was at the inn at Hounslow.  Oh, dear
+me, no!  Then go and finish your breakfast, and when you have
+finished your breakfast and called for the newspaper, go and water
+your horse, letting him have one pailful, then give him another
+feed of corn, and enter into discourse with the ostler about bull-
+baiting, the prime minister, and the like; and when your horse has
+once more taken the shine out of his corn, go back to your room and
+your newspaper--and I hope for your sake it may be the Globe, for
+that's the best paper going--then pull the bell-rope and order in
+your bill, which you will pay without counting it up--supposing you
+to be a gentleman.  Give the waiter sixpence, and order out your
+horse, and when your horse is out, pay for the corn, and give the
+ostler a shilling, then mount your horse and walk him gently for
+five miles; and whilst you are walking him in this manner, it may
+be as well to tell you to take care that you do not let him down
+and smash his knees, more especially if the road be a particularly
+good one, for it is not at a desperate hiverman pace, and over very
+bad roads, that a horse tumbles and smashes his knees, but on your
+particularly nice road, when the horse is going gently and lazily,
+and is half asleep, like the gemman on his back; well, at the end
+of the five miles, when the horse has digested his food, and is all
+right, you may begin to push your horse on, trotting him a mile at
+a heat, and then walking him a quarter of a one, that his wind may
+be not distressed; and you may go on in that way for thirty miles,
+never galloping, of course, for none but fools or hivermen ever
+gallop horses on roads; and at the end of that distance you may
+stop at some other nice inn to dinner.  I say, when your horse is
+led into the stable, after that same thirty miles' trotting and
+walking, don't let the saddle be whisked off at once, for if you do
+your horse will have such a sore back as will frighten you, but let
+your saddle remain on your horse's back, with the girths loosened,
+till after his next feed of corn, and be sure that he has no corn,
+much less water, till after a long hour and more; after he is fed
+he may be watered to the tune of half a pail, and then the ostler
+can give him a regular rub down; you may then sit down to dinner,
+and when you have dined get up and see to your horse as you did
+after breakfast, in fact, you must do much after the same fashion
+you did at t'other inn; see to your horse, and by no means
+disoblige the ostler.  So when you have seen to your horse a second
+time, you will sit down to your bottle of wine--supposing you to be
+a gentleman--and after you have finished it, and your argument
+about the corn-laws with any commercial gentleman who happens to be
+in the room, you may mount your horse again--not forgetting to do
+the proper thing to the waiter and ostler; you may mount your horse
+again and ride him, as you did before, for about five and twenty
+miles, at the end of which you may put up for the night after a
+very fair day's journey, for no gentleman--supposing he weighs
+sixteen stone, as I suppose you will by the time you become a
+gentleman--ought to ride a horse more than sixty-five miles in one
+day, provided he has any regard for his horse's back, or his own
+either.  See to your horse at night, and have him well rubbed down.
+The next day you may ride your horse forty miles, just as you
+please, but never foolishly, and those forty miles will bring you
+to your journey's end, unless your journey be a plaguy long one,
+and if so, never ride your horse more than five and thirty miles a
+day, always, however, seeing him well fed, and taking more care of
+him than yourself; which is but right and reasonable, seeing as how
+the horse is the best animal of the two."
+
+"When you are a gentleman," said he, after a pause, "the first
+thing you must think about is to provide yourself with a good horse
+for your own particular riding; you will, perhaps, keep a coach and
+pair, but they will be less your own than your lady's, should you
+have one, and your young gentry, should you have any; or, if you
+have neither, for madam, your housekeeper, and the upper female
+servants; so you need trouble your head less about them, though, of
+course, you would not like to pay away your money for screws; but
+be sure you get a good horse for your own riding; and that you may
+have a good chance of having a good one, buy one that's young and
+has plenty of belly--a little more than the one has which you now
+have, though you are not yet a gentleman; you will, of course, look
+to his head, his withers, legs and other points, but never buy a
+horse at any price that has not plenty of belly; no horse that has
+not belly is ever a good feeder, and a horse that a'n't a good
+feeder can't be a good horse; never buy a horse that is drawn up in
+the belly behind; a horse of that description can't feed, and can
+never carry sixteen stone.
+
+"So when you have got such a horse be proud of it--as I daresay you
+are of the one you have now--and wherever you go swear there a'n't
+another to match it in the country, and if anybody gives you the
+lie, take him by the nose and tweak it off, just as you would do if
+anybody were to speak ill of your lady, or, for want of her, of
+your housekeeper.  Take care of your horse, as you would of the
+apple of your eye--I am sure I would, if I were a gentleman, which
+I don't ever expect to be, and hardly wish, seeing as how I am
+sixty-nine, and am rather too old to ride--yes, cherish and take
+care of your horse as perhaps the best friend you have in the
+world; for, after all, who will carry you through thick and thin as
+your horse will? not your gentlemen friends, I warrant, nor your
+upper servants, male or female; perhaps your lady would, that is,
+if she is a whopper, and one of the right sort; the others would be
+more likely to take up mud and pelt you with it, provided they saw
+you in trouble, than to help you.  So take care of your horse, and
+feed him every day with your own hands; give him three quarters of
+a peck of corn each day, mixed up with a little hay-chaff, and
+allow him besides one hundredweight of hay in the course of the
+week; some say that the hay should be hardland hay, because it is
+the wholesomest, but I say, let it be clover hay, because the horse
+likes it best; give him through summer and winter, once a week, a
+pailful of bran mash, cold in summer and in winter hot; ride him
+gently about the neighbourhood every day, by which means you will
+give exercise to yourself and horse, and, moreover, have the
+satisfaction of exhibiting yourself and your horse to advantage,
+and hearing, perhaps, the men say what a fine horse, and the ladies
+saying what a fine man:  never let your groom mount your horse, as
+it is ten to one, if you do, your groom will be wishing to show off
+before company, and will fling your horse down.  I was groom to a
+gemman before I went to the inn at Hounslow, and flung him a horse
+down worth ninety guineas, by endeavouring to show off before some
+ladies that I met on the road.  Turn your horse out to grass
+throughout May and the first part of June, for then the grass is
+sweetest, and the flies don't sting so bad as they do later in
+summer; afterwards merely turn him out occasionally in the swale of
+the morn and the evening; after September the grass is good for
+little, lash and sour at best; every horse should go out to grass,
+if not his blood becomes full of greasy humours, and his wind is
+apt to become affected, but he ought to be kept as much as possible
+from the heat and flies, always got up at night, and never turned
+out late in the year--Lord! if I had always such a nice attentive
+person to listen to me as you are, I could go on talking about
+'orses to the end of time."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+
+
+The Stage--Coachmen of England--A Bully Served Out--Broughton's
+Guard--The Brazen Head.
+
+
+I lived on very good terms, not only with the master and the old
+ostler, but with all the domestics and hangers on at the inn;
+waiters, chambermaids, cooks, and scullions, not forgetting the
+"boots," of which there were three.  As for the postillions, I was
+sworn brother with them all, and some of them went so far as to
+swear that I was the best fellow in the world; for which high
+opinion entertained by them of me, I believe I was principally
+indebted to the good account their comrade gave of me, whom I had
+so hospitably received in the dingle.  I repeat that I lived on
+good terms with all the people connected with the inn, and was
+noticed and spoken kindly to by some of the guests--especially by
+that class termed commercial travellers--all of whom were great
+friends and patronizers of the landlord, and were the principal
+promoters of the dinner, and subscribers to the gift of plate,
+which I have already spoken of, the whole fraternity striking me as
+the jolliest set of fellows imaginable, the best customers to an
+inn, and the most liberal to servants; there was one description of
+persons, however, frequenting the inn, which I did not like at all,
+and which I did not get on well with, and these people were the
+stage-coachmen.
+
+The stage-coachmen of England, at the time of which I am speaking,
+considered themselves mighty fine gentry, nay, I verily believe the
+most important personages of the realm, and their entertaining this
+high opinion of themselves can scarcely be wondered at; they were
+low fellows, but masters at driving; driving was in fashion, and
+sprigs of nobility used to dress as coachmen and imitate the slang
+and behaviour of the coachmen, from whom occasionally they would
+take lessons in driving as they sat beside them on the box, which
+post of honour any sprig of nobility who happened to take a place
+on a coach claimed as his unquestionable right; and these sprigs
+would smoke cigars and drink sherry with the coachmen in bar-rooms,
+and on the road; and, when bidding them farewell, would give them a
+guinea or a half-guinea, and shake them by the hand, so that these
+fellows, being low fellows, very naturally thought no small liquor
+of themselves, but would talk familiarly of their friends lords so
+and so, the honourable misters so and so, and Sir Harry and Sir
+Charles, and be wonderfully saucy to any one who was not a lord, or
+something of the kind; and this high opinion of themselves received
+daily augmentation from the servile homage paid them by the
+generality of the untitled male passengers, especially those on the
+fore part of the coach, who used to contend for the honour of
+sitting on the box with the coachman when no sprig was nigh to put
+in his claim.  Oh! what servile homage these craven creatures did
+pay these same coach fellows, more especially after witnessing this
+or t'other act of brutality practised upon the weak and
+unoffending--upon some poor friendless woman travelling with but
+little money, and perhaps a brace of hungry children with her, or
+upon some thin and half-starved man travelling on the hind part of
+the coach from London to Liverpool with only eighteen pence in his
+pocket after his fare was paid, to defray his expenses on the road;
+for as the insolence of these knights was vast, so was their
+rapacity enormous; they had been so long accustomed to have crowns
+and half-crowns rained upon them by their admirers and flatterers,
+that they would look at a shilling, for which many an honest
+labourer was happy to toil for ten hours under a broiling sun, with
+the utmost contempt; would blow upon it derisively, or fillip it
+into the air before they pocketed it; but when nothing was given
+them, as would occasionally happen--for how could they receive from
+those who had nothing? and nobody was bound to give them anything,
+as they had certain wages from their employers--then what a scene
+would ensue!  Truly the brutality and rapacious insolence of
+English coachmen had reached a climax; it was time that these
+fellows should be disenchanted, and the time--thank Heaven!--was
+not far distant.  Let the craven dastards who used to curry favour
+with them, and applaud their brutality, lament their loss now that
+they and their vehicles have disappeared from the roads; I, who
+have ever been an enemy to insolence, cruelty, and tyranny, loathe
+their memory, and, what is more, am not afraid to say so, well
+aware of the storm of vituperation, partly learnt from them, which
+I may expect from those who used to fall down and worship them.
+
+Amongst the coachmen who frequented the inn was one who was called
+"the bang-up coachman."  He drove to our inn, in the fore part of
+every day, one of what were called the fast coaches, and afterwards
+took back the corresponding vehicle.  He stayed at our house about
+twenty minutes, during which time the passengers of the coach which
+he was to return with dined; those at least who were inclined for
+dinner, and could pay for it.  He derived his sobriquet of "the
+bang-up coachman" partly from his being dressed in the extremity of
+coach dandyism, and partly from the peculiar insolence of his
+manner, and the unmerciful fashion in which he was in the habit of
+lashing on the poor horses committed to his charge.  He was a large
+tall fellow, of about thirty, with a face which, had it not been
+bloated by excess, and insolence and cruelty stamped most visibly
+upon it, might have been called good-looking.  His insolence indeed
+was so great, that he was hated by all the minor fry connected with
+coaches along the road upon which he drove, especially the ostlers,
+whom he was continually abusing or finding fault with.  Many was
+the hearty curse which he received when his back was turned; but
+the generality of people were much afraid of him, for he was a
+swinging strong fellow, and had the reputation of being a fighter,
+and in one or two instances had beaten in a barbarous manner
+individuals who had quarrelled with him.
+
+I was nearly having a fracas with this worthy.  One day, after he
+had been drinking sherry with a sprig, he swaggered into the yard
+where I happened to be standing; just then a waiter came by
+carrying upon a tray part of a splendid Cheshire cheese, with a
+knife, plate, and napkin.  Stopping the waiter, the coachman cut
+with the knife a tolerably large lump out of the very middle of the
+cheese, stuck it on the end of the knife, and putting it to his
+mouth nibbled a slight piece off it, and then, tossing the rest
+away with disdain, flung the knife down upon the tray, motioning
+the waiter to proceed; "I wish," said I, "you may not want before
+you die what you have just flung away," whereupon the fellow turned
+furiously towards me; just then, however, his coach being standing
+at the door, there was a cry for coachman, so that he was forced to
+depart, contenting himself for the present with shaking his fist at
+me, and threatening to serve me out on the first opportunity;
+before, however, the opportunity occurred he himself got served out
+in a most unexpected manner.
+
+The day after this incident he drove his coach to the inn, and
+after having dismounted and received the contributions of the
+generality of the passengers, he strutted up, with a cigar in his
+mouth, to an individual who had come with him, and who had just
+asked me a question with respect to the direction of a village
+about three miles off, to which he was going.  "Remember the
+coachman," said the knight of the box to this individual, who was a
+thin person of about sixty, with a white hat, rather shabby black
+coat, and buff-coloured trousers, and who held an umbrella and a
+small bundle in his hand.  "If you expect me to give you anything,"
+said he to the coachman, "you are mistaken; I will give you
+nothing.  You have been very insolent to me as I rode behind you on
+the coach, and have encouraged two or three trumpery fellows, who
+rode along with you, to cut scurvy jokes at my expense, and now you
+come to me for money; I am not so poor, but I could have given you
+a shilling had you been civil; as it is, I will give you nothing."
+"Oh! you won't, won't you?" said the coachman; "dear me!  I hope I
+shan't starve because you won't give me anything--a shilling I why,
+I could afford to give you twenty if I thought fit, you pauper!
+civil to you, indeed! things are come to a fine pass if I need be
+civil to you!  Do you know who you are speaking to? why, the best
+lords in the country are proud to speak to me.  Why, it was only
+the other day that the Marquis of--said to me--" and then he went
+on to say what the Marquis said to him; after which, flinging down
+his cigar, he strutted up the road, swearing to himself about
+paupers.
+
+"You say it is three miles to -," said the individual to me; "I
+think I shall light my pipe, and smoke it as I go along."
+Thereupon he took out from a side-pocket a tobacco-box and short
+meerschaum pipe, and implements for striking a light, filled his
+pipe, lighted it, and commenced smoking.  Presently the coachman
+drew near.  I saw at once that there was mischief in his eye; the
+man smoking was standing with his back towards him, and he came so
+nigh to him, seemingly purposely, that as he passed a puff of smoke
+came of necessity against his face.  "What do you mean by smoking
+in my face?" said he, striking the pipe of the elderly individual
+out of his mouth.  The other, without manifesting much surprise,
+said, "I thank you; and if you will wait a minute, I will give you
+a receipt for that favour;" then gathering up his pipe, and taking
+off his coat and hat, he laid them on a stepping-block which stood
+near, and rubbing his hands together, he advanced towards the
+coachman in an attitude of offence, holding his hands crossed very
+near to his face.  The coachman, who probably expected anything but
+such a movement from a person of the age and appearance of the
+individual whom he had insulted, stood for a moment motionless with
+surprise; but, recollecting himself, he pointed at him derisively
+with his finger; the next moment, however, the other was close upon
+him, had struck aside the extended hand with his left fist, and
+given him a severe blow on the nose with his right, which he
+immediately followed by a left-hand blow in the eye; then drawing
+his body slightly backward, with the velocity of lightning he
+struck the coachman full in the mouth, and the last blow was the
+severest of all, for it cut the coachman's lips nearly through;
+blows so quickly and sharply dealt I had never seen.  The coachman
+reeled like a fir-tree in a gale, and seemed nearly unsensed.  "Ho!
+what's this? a fight! a fight!" sounded from a dozen voices, and
+people came running from all directions to see what was going on.
+The coachman, coming somewhat to himself, disencumbered himself of
+his coat and hat; and, encouraged by two or three of his brothers
+of the whip, showed some symptoms of fighting, endeavouring to
+close with his foe, but the attempt was vain, for his foe was not
+to be closed with; he did not shift or dodge about, but warded off
+the blows of his opponent with the greatest sang-froid, always
+using the guard which I have already described, and putting in, in
+return, short chopping blows with the swiftness of lightning.  In a
+very few minutes the countenance of the coachman was literally cut
+to pieces, and several of his teeth were dislodged; at length he
+gave in; stung with mortification, however, he repented, and asked
+for another round; it was granted, to his own complete demolition.
+The coachman did not drive his coach back that day, he did not
+appear on the box again for a week; but he never held up his head
+afterwards.  Before I quitted the inn, he had disappeared from the
+road, going no one knew where.
+
+The coachman, as I have said before, was very much disliked upon
+the road, but there was an esprit de corps amongst the coachmen,
+and those who stood by did not like to see their brother chastised
+in such tremendous fashion.  "I never saw such a fight before,"
+said one.  "Fight! why, I don't call it a fight at all; this chap
+here ha'n't got a scratch, whereas Tom is cut to pieces; it is all
+along of that guard of his; if Tom could have got within his guard
+he would have soon served the old chap out."  "So he would," said
+another, "it was all owing to that guard.  However, I think I see
+into it, and if I had not to drive this afternoon, I would have a
+turn with the old fellow and soon serve him out."  "I will fight
+him now for a guinea," said the other coachman, half taking off his
+coat; observing, however, that the elderly individual made a motion
+towards him, he hitched it upon his shoulder again, and added,
+"that is, if he had not been fighting already, but as it is, I am
+above taking an advantage, especially of such a poor old creature
+as that."  And when he had said this, he looked around him, and
+there was a feeble titter of approbation from two or three of the
+craven crew, who were in the habit of currying favour with the
+coachmen.  The elderly individual looked for a moment at these
+last, and then said, "To such fellows as you I have nothing to
+say;" then turning to the coachmen, "and as for you," he said, "ye
+cowardly bullies, I have but one word, which is, that your reign
+upon the roads is nearly over, and that a time is coming when ye
+will no longer be wanted or employed in your present capacity, when
+ye will either have to drive dung-carts, assist as ostlers at
+village ale-houses, or rot in the workhouse."  Then putting on his
+coat and hat, and taking up his bundle, not forgetting his
+meerschaum, and the rest of his smoking apparatus, he departed on
+his way.  Filled with curiosity, I followed him.
+
+"I am quite astonished that you should be able to use your hands in
+the way you have done," said I, as I walked with this individual in
+the direction in which he was bound.
+
+"I will tell you how I became able to do so," said the elderly
+individual, proceeding to fill and light his pipe as he walked
+along.  "My father was a journeyman engraver, who lived in a very
+riotous neighbourhood in the outskirts of London.  Wishing to give
+me something of an education, he sent me to a day-school, two or
+three streets distant from where we lived, and there, being rather
+a puny boy, I suffered much persecution from my schoolfellows, who
+were a very blackguard set.  One day, as I was running home, with
+one of my tormentors pursuing me, old Sergeant Broughton, the
+retired fighting-man, seized me by the arm--"
+
+"Dear me," said I, "has it ever been your luck to be acquainted
+with Sergeant Broughton?"
+
+"You may well call it luck," said the elderly individual; but for
+him I should never have been able to make my way through the world.
+He lived only four doors from our house; so, as I was running along
+the street, with my tyrant behind me, Sergeant Broughton seized me
+by the arm.  'Stop, my boy,' said he; 'I have frequently seen that
+scamp ill-treating you; now I will teach you how to send him home
+with a bloody nose; down with your bag of books; and now, my game
+chick,' whispered he to me, placing himself between me and my
+adversary, so that he could not observe his motions; 'clench your
+fist in this manner, and hold your arms in this, and when he
+strikes at you, move them as I now show you, and he can't hurt you;
+now, don't be afraid, but go at him.'  I confess that I was
+somewhat afraid, but I considered myself in some degree under the
+protection of the famous Sergeant, and, clenching my fist, I went
+at my foe, using the guard which my ally recommended.  The result
+corresponded to a certain degree with the predictions of the
+Sergeant; I gave my foe a bloody nose and a black eye, though,
+notwithstanding my recent lesson in the art of self-defence, he
+contrived to give me two or three clumsy blows.  From that moment I
+was the especial favourite of the Sergeant, who gave me further
+lessons, so that in a little time I became a very fair boxer,
+beating everybody of my own size who attacked me.  The old
+gentleman, however, made me promise never to be quarrelsome, nor to
+turn his instructions to account, except in self-defence.  I have
+always borne in mind my promise, and have made it a point of
+conscience never to fight unless absolutely compelled.  Folks may
+rail against boxing if they please, but being able to box may
+sometimes stand a quiet man in good stead.  How should I have fared
+to-day, but for the instructions of Sergeant Broughton?  But for
+them, the brutal ruffian who insulted me must have passed
+unpunished.  He will not soon forget the lesson which I have just
+given him--the only lesson he could understand.  What would have
+been the use of reasoning with a fellow of that description?  Brave
+old Broughton!  I owe him much."
+
+"And your manner of fighting," said I, "was the manner employed by
+Sergeant Broughton?"
+
+"Yes," said my new acquaintance; "it was the manner in which he
+beat every one who attempted to contend with him, till, in an evil
+hour, he entered the ring with Slack, without any training or
+preparation, and by a chance blow lost the battle to a man who had
+been beaten with ease by those who, in the hands of Broughton,
+appeared like so many children.  It was the way of fighting of him
+who first taught Englishmen to box scientifically, who was the head
+and father of the fighters of what is now called the old school,
+the last of which were Johnson and Big Ben."
+
+"A wonderful man, that Big Ben," said I.
+
+"He was so," said the elderly individual; "but had it not been for
+Broughton, I question whether Ben would have ever been the fighter
+he was.  Oh! there was no one like old Broughton; but for him I
+should at the present moment be sneaking along the road, pursued by
+the hissings and hootings of the dirty flatterers of that
+blackguard coachman."
+
+"What did you mean," said I, "by those words of yours, that the
+coachmen would speedily disappear from the roads?"
+
+"I meant," said he, "that a new method of travelling is about to be
+established, which will supersede the old.  I am a poor engraver,
+as my father was before me; but engraving is an intellectual trade,
+and by following it, I have been brought in contact with some of
+the cleverest men in England.  It has even made me acquainted with
+the projector of the scheme, which he has told me many of the
+wisest heads of England have been dreaming of during a period of
+six hundred years, and which it seems was alluded to by a certain
+Brazen Head in the story-book of Friar Bacon, who is generally
+supposed to have been a wizard, but in reality was a great
+philosopher.  Young man, in less than twenty years, by which time I
+shall be dead and gone, England will be surrounded with roads of
+metal, on which armies may travel with mighty velocity, and of
+which the walls of brass and iron by which the friar proposed to
+defend his native land are the types."  He then, shaking me by the
+hand, proceeded on his way, whilst I returned to the inn.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+
+
+Francis Ardry--His Misfortunes--Dog and Lion Fight--Great Men of
+the World.
+
+
+A few days after the circumstance which I have last commemorated,
+it chanced that, as I was standing at the door of the inn, one of
+the numerous stage-coaches which were in the habit of stopping
+there, drove up, and several passengers got down.  I had assisted a
+woman with a couple of children to dismount, and had just delivered
+to her a band-box, which appeared to be her only property, which
+she had begged me to fetch down from the roof, when I felt a hand
+laid upon my shoulder, and heard a voice exclaim, "Is it possible,
+old fellow, that I find you in this place?"  I turned round, and,
+wrapped in a large blue cloak, I beheld my good friend Francis
+Ardry.  I shook him most warmly by the hand, and said, "If you are
+surprised to see me, I am no less so to see you; where are you
+bound to?"
+
+"I am bound for L-; at any rate, I am booked for that sea-port,"
+said my friend in reply.
+
+"I am sorry for it," said I, "for in that case we shall have to
+part in a quarter of an hour, the coach by which you came stopping
+no longer."
+
+"And whither are you bound?" demanded my friend.
+
+"I am stopping at present in this house, quite undetermined as to
+what to do."
+
+"Then come along with me," said Francis Ardry.
+
+"That I can scarcely do," said I; "I have a horse in the stall
+which I cannot afford to ruin by racing to L--- by the side of your
+coach."
+
+My friend mused for a moment:  "I have no particular business at L-
+--," said he; "I was merely going thither to pass a day or two,
+till an affair, in which I am deeply interested, at C--- shall come
+off.  I think I shall stay with you for four-and-twenty hours at
+least; I have been rather melancholy of late, and cannot afford to
+part with a friend like you at the present moment; it is an
+unexpected piece of good fortune to have met you; and I have not
+been very fortunate of late," he added, sighing.
+
+"Well," said I, "I am glad to see you once more, whether fortunate,
+or not; where is your baggage?"
+
+"Yon trunk is mine," said Francis, pointing to a trunk of black
+Russian leather upon the coach.
+
+"We will soon have it down," said I; and at a word which I gave to
+one of the hangers-on of the inn, the trunk was taken from the top
+of the coach.  "Now," said I to Francis Ardry, "follow me, I am a
+person of some authority in this house;" thereupon I led Francis
+Ardry into the house, and a word which I said to a waiter forthwith
+installed Francis Ardry in a comfortable private sitting-room, and
+his trunk in the very best sleeping-room of our extensive
+establishment.
+
+It was now about one o'clock:  Francis Ardry ordered dinner for
+two, to be ready at four, and a pint of sherry to be brought
+forthwith, which I requested my friend the waiter might be the very
+best, and which in effect turned out as I requested; we sat down,
+and when we had drunk to each other's health, Frank requested me to
+make known to him how I had contrived to free myself from my
+embarrassments in London, what I had been about since I quitted
+that city, and the present posture of my affairs.
+
+I related to Francis Ardry how I had composed the Life of Joseph
+Sell, and how the sale of it to the bookseller had enabled me to
+quit London with money in my pocket, which had supported me during
+a long course of ramble in the country, into the particulars of
+which I, however, did not enter with any considerable degree of
+fulness.  I summed up my account by saying that "I was at present a
+kind of overlooker in the stables of the inn, had still some pounds
+in my purse, and, moreover, a capital horse in the stall."
+
+"No very agreeable posture of affairs," said Francis Ardry, looking
+rather seriously at me.
+
+"I make no complaints," said I, "my prospects are not very bright,
+it is true, but sometimes I have visions both waking and sleeping,
+which, though always strange, are invariably agreeable.  Last
+night, in my chamber near the hayloft, I dreamt that I had passed
+over an almost interminable wilderness--an enormous wall rose
+before me, the wall, methought, was the great wall of China:-
+strange figures appeared to be beckoning to me from the top of the
+wall; such visions are not exactly to be sneered at.  Not that such
+phantasmagoria," said I, raising my voice, "are to be compared for
+a moment with such desirable things as fashion, fine clothes,
+cheques from uncles, parliamentary interest, the love of splendid
+females.  Ah! woman's love," said I, and sighed.
+
+"What's the matter with the fellow?" said Francis Ardry.
+
+"There is nothing like it," said I.
+
+"Like what?"
+
+"Love, divine love," said I.
+
+"Confound love," said Francis Ardry, "I hate the very name; I have
+made myself a pretty fool by it, but trust me for ever being at
+such folly again.  In an evil hour I abandoned my former pursuits
+and amusements for it; in one morning spent at Joey's there was
+more real pleasure than in--"
+
+"Surely," said I, "you are not hankering after dog-fighting again,
+a sport which none but the gross and unrefined care anything for?
+No, one's thoughts should be occupied by something higher and more
+rational than dog-fighting; and what better than love--divine love?
+Oh, there's nothing like it!"
+
+"Pray, don't talk nonsense," said Francis Ardry.
+
+"Nonsense," said I; "why I was repeating, to the best of my
+recollection, what I heard you say on a former occasion."
+
+"If ever I talked such stuff," said Francis Ardry, "I was a fool;
+and indeed I cannot deny that I have been one:  no, there's no
+denying that I have been a fool.  What do you think? that false
+Annette has cruelly abandoned me."
+
+"Well," said I, "perhaps you have yourself to thank for her having
+done so; did you never treat her with coldness, and repay her marks
+of affectionate interest with strange fits of eccentric humour?"
+
+"Lord! how little you know of women," said Francis Ardry; "had I
+done as you suppose, I should probably have possessed her at the
+present moment.  I treated her in a manner diametrically opposite
+to that.  I loaded her with presents, was always most assiduous to
+her, always at her feet, as I may say, yet she nevertheless
+abandoned me--and for whom?  I am almost ashamed to say--for a
+fiddler."
+
+I took a glass of wine, Francis Ardry followed my example, and then
+proceeded to detail to me the treatment which he had experienced
+from Annette, and from what he said, it appeared that her conduct
+to him had been in the highest degree reprehensible;
+notwithstanding he had indulged her in everything, she was never
+civil to him, but loaded him continually with taunts and insults,
+and had finally, on his being unable to supply her with a sum of
+money which she had demanded, decamped from the lodgings which he
+had taken for her, carrying with her all the presents which at
+various times he had bestowed upon her, and had put herself under
+the protection of a gentleman who played the bassoon at the Italian
+Opera, at which place it appeared that her sister had lately been
+engaged as a danseuse.  My friend informed me that at first he had
+experienced great agony at the ingratitude of Annette, but at last
+had made up his mind to forget her, and, in order more effectually
+to do so, had left London with the intention of witnessing a fight,
+which was shortly coming off at a town in these parts, between some
+dogs and a lion; which combat, he informed me, had for some time
+past been looked forward to with intense eagerness by the gentlemen
+of the sporting world.
+
+I commended him for his resolution, at the same time advising him
+not to give up his mind entirely to dog-fighting, as he had
+formerly done, but, when the present combat should be over, to
+return to his rhetorical studies, and above all to marry some rich
+and handsome lady on the first opportunity, as, with his person and
+expectations, he had only to sue for the hand of the daughter of a
+marquis to be successful, telling him, with a sigh, that all women
+were not Annettes, and that, upon the whole, there was nothing like
+them.  To which advice he answered, that he intended to return to
+rhetoric as soon as the lion fight should be over, but that he
+never intended to marry, having had enough of women; adding that he
+was glad he had no sister, as, with the feelings which he
+entertained with respect to her sex, he should be unable to treat
+her with common affection, and concluded by repeating a proverb
+which he had learnt from an Arab whom he had met at Venice, to the
+effect, that, "one who has been stung by a snake, shivers at the
+sight of a sting."
+
+After a little more conversation, we strolled to the stable, where
+my horse was standing; my friend, who was a connoisseur in
+horseflesh, surveyed the animal with attention, and after inquiring
+where and how I had obtained him, asked what I intended to do with
+him; on my telling him that I was undetermined, and that I was
+afraid the horse was likely to prove a burden to me, he said, "It
+is a noble animal, and if you mind what you are about, you may make
+a small fortune by him.  I do not want such an animal myself, nor
+do I know any one who does; but a great horse-fair will be held
+shortly at a place where, it is true, I have never been, but of
+which I have heard a great deal from my acquaintances, where it is
+said a first-rate horse is always sure to fetch its value; that
+place is Horncastle, in Lincolnshire, you should take him thither."
+
+Francis Ardry and myself dined together, and after dinner partook
+of a bottle of the best port which the inn afforded.  After a few
+glasses, we had a great deal of conversation; I again brought the
+subject of marriage and love, divine love, upon the carpet, but
+Francis almost immediately begged me to drop it; and on my having
+the delicacy to comply, he reverted to dog-fighting, on which he
+talked well and learnedly; amongst other things, he said it was a
+princely sport of great antiquity, and quoted from Quintus Curtius
+to prove that the princes of India must have been of the fancy,
+they having, according to that author, treated Alexander to a fight
+between certain dogs and a lion.  Becoming, notwithstanding my
+friend's eloquence and learning, somewhat tired of the subject, I
+began to talk about Alexander.  Francis Ardry said he was one of
+the two great men whom the world has produced, the other being
+Napoleon; I replied that I believed Tamerlane was a greater man
+than either; but Francis Ardry knew nothing of Tamerlane, save what
+he had gathered from the play of Timour the Tartar.  "No," said he,
+"Alexander and Napoleon are the great men of the world, their names
+are known everywhere.  Alexander has been dead upwards of two
+thousand years, but the very English bumpkins sometimes christen
+their boys by the name of Alexander--can there be a greater
+evidence of his greatness?  As for Napoleon, there are some parts
+of India in which his bust is worshipped."  Wishing to make up a
+triumvirate, I mentioned the name of Wellington, to which Francis
+Ardry merely said, "bah!" and resumed the subject of dog-fighting.
+
+Francis Ardry remained at the inn during that day and the next, and
+then departed to the dog and lion fight; I never saw him
+afterwards, and merely heard of him once after a lapse of some
+years, and what I then heard was not exactly what I could have
+wished to hear.  He did not make much of the advantages which he
+possessed, a pity, for how great were those advantages--person,
+intellect, eloquence, connection, riches! yet, with all these
+advantages, one thing highly needful seems to have been wanting in
+Francis.  A desire, a craving, to perform something great and good.
+Oh! what a vast deal may be done with intellect, courage, riches,
+accompanied by the desire of ,doing something great and good!  Why,
+a person may carry the blessings of civilization and religion to
+barbarous, yet at the same time beautiful and romantic lands; and
+what a triumph there is for him who does so! what a crown of glory!
+of far greater value than those surrounding the brows of your mere
+conquerors.  Yet who has done so in these times?  Not many; not
+three, not two, something seems to have been always wanting; there
+is, however, one instance, in which the various requisites have
+been united, and the crown, the most desirable in the world--at
+least which I consider to be the most desirable--achieved, and only
+one, that of Brooke of Borneo.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+
+
+Mr. Platitude and the Man in Black--The Postillion's Adventures--
+The Lone House--A Goodly Assemblage.
+
+
+It never rains, but it pours.  I was destined to see at this inn
+more acquaintances than one.  On the day of Francis Ardry's
+departure, shortly after he had taken leave of me, as I was
+standing in the corn-chamber, at a kind of writing-table or desk,
+fastened to the wall, with a book before me, in which I was making
+out an account of the corn and hay lately received and distributed,
+my friend the postillion came running in out of breath.  "Here they
+both are," he gasped out; "pray do come and look at them."
+
+"Whom do you mean?" said I.
+
+"Why, that red-haired Jack Priest, and that idiotic parson,
+Platitude; they have just been set down by one of the coaches, and
+want a postchaise to go across the country in; and what do you
+think?  I am to have the driving of them.  I have no time to lose,
+for I must get myself ready; so do come and look at them."
+
+I hastened into the yard of the inn; two or three of the helpers of
+our establishment were employed in drawing forward a postchaise out
+of the chaise-house, which occupied one side of the yard, and which
+was spacious enough to contain nearly twenty of these vehicles,
+though it was never full, several of them being always out upon the
+roads, as the demand upon us for postchaises across the country was
+very great.  "There they are," said the postillion, softly, nodding
+towards two individuals, in one of whom I recognized the man in
+black, and in the other Mr. Platitude; "there they are; have a good
+look at them, while I go and get ready."  The man in black and Mr.
+Platitude were walking up and down the yard, Mr. Platitude was
+doing his best to make himself appear ridiculous, talking very
+loudly in exceedingly bad Italian, evidently for the purpose of
+attracting the notice of the bystanders, in which he succeeded, all
+the stable-boys and hangers-on about the yard, attracted by his
+vociferation, grinning at his ridiculous figure as he limped up and
+down.  The man in black said little or nothing, but from the
+glances which he cast sideways appeared to be thoroughly ashamed of
+his companion; the worthy couple presently arrived close to where I
+was standing, and the man in black, who was nearest to me,
+perceiving me, stood still as if hesitating, but recovering himself
+in a moment, he moved on without taking any farther notice; Mr.
+Platitude exclaimed as they passed in broken lingo, "I hope we
+shall find the holy doctors all assembled," and as they returned,
+"I make no doubt that they will all be rejoiced to see me."  Not
+wishing to be standing an idle gazer, I went to the chaise and
+assisted in attaching the horses, which had now been brought out,
+to the pole.  The postillion presently arrived, and finding all
+ready took the reins and mounted the box, whilst I very politely
+opened the door for the two travellers; Mr. Platitude got in first,
+and, without taking any notice of me, seated himself on the farther
+side.  In got the man in black, and seated himself nearest to me.
+"All is right," said I, as I shut the door, whereupon the
+postillion cracked his whip, and the chaise drove out of the yard.
+Just as I shut the door, however, and just as Mr. Platitude had
+recommenced talking in jergo, at the top of his voice, the man in
+black turned his face partly towards me, and gave me a wink with
+his left eye.
+
+I did not see my friend the postillion till the next morning, when
+he gave me an account of the adventures he had met with on his
+expedition.  It appeared that he had driven the man in black and
+the Reverend Platitude across the country by roads and lanes which
+he had some difficulty in threading.  At length, when he had
+reached a part of the country where he had never been before, the
+man in black pointed out to him a house near the corner of a wood,
+to which he informed him they were bound.  The postillion said it
+was a strange-looking house, with a wall round it; and, upon the
+whole, bore something of the look of a madhouse.  There was already
+a postchaise at the gate, from which three individuals had
+alighted--one of them the postillion said was a mean-looking
+scoundrel, with a regular petty-larceny expression in his
+countenance.  He was dressed very much like the man in black, and
+the postillion said that he could almost have taken his Bible oath
+that they were both of the same profession.  The other two he said
+were parsons, he could swear that, though he had never seen them
+before; there could be no mistake about them.  Church of England
+parsons the postillion swore they were, with their black coats,
+white cravats, and airs, in which clumsiness and conceit were most
+funnily blended--Church of England parsons of the Platitude
+description, who had been in Italy, and seen the Pope, and kissed
+his toe, and picked up a little broken Italian, and come home
+greater fools than they went forth.  It appeared that they were all
+acquaintances of Mr. Platitude, for when the postillion had
+alighted and let Mr. Platitude and his companion out of the chaise,
+Mr. Platitude shook the whole three by the hand, conversed with his
+two brothers in a little broken jergo, and addressed the petty-
+larceny looking individual by the title of Reverend Doctor.  In the
+midst of these greetings, however, the postillion said the man in
+black came up to him, and proceeded to settle with him for the
+chaise; he had shaken hands with nobody, and had merely nodded to
+the others; "and now," said the postillion, "he evidently wished to
+get rid of me, fearing, probably, that I should see too much of the
+nonsense that was going on.  It was whilst settling with me that he
+seemed to recognize me for the first time, for he stared hard at
+me, and at last asked whether I had not been in Italy; to which
+question, with a nod and a laugh, I replied that I had.  I was then
+going to ask him about the health of the image of Holy Mary, and to
+say that I hoped it had recovered from its horsewhipping; but he
+interrupted me, paid me the money for the fare, and gave me a crown
+for myself, saying he would not detain me any longer.  I say,
+partner, I am a poor postillion, but when he gave me the crown I
+had a good mind to fling it in his face.  I reflected, however,
+that it was not mere gift-money, but coin which I had earned, and
+hardly too, so I put it in my pocket, and I bethought me, moreover,
+that, knave as I knew him to be, he had always treated me with
+civility; so I nodded to him, and he said something which, perhaps,
+he meant for Latin, but which sounded very much like 'vails,' and
+by which he doubtless alluded to the money which he had given me.
+He then went into the house with the rest, the coach drove away
+which had brought the others, and I was about to get on the box and
+follow; observing, however, two more chaises driving up, I thought
+I would be in no hurry, so I just led my horses and chaise a little
+out of the way, and pretending to be occupied about the harness, I
+kept a tolerably sharp look-out at the new arrivals.  Well,
+partner, the next vehicle that drove up was a gentleman's carriage
+which I knew very well, as well as those within it, who were a
+father and son, the father a good kind old gentleman, and a justice
+of the peace, therefore not very wise, as you may suppose; the son
+a puppy who has been abroad, where he contrived to forget his own
+language, though only nine months absent, and now rules the roast
+over his father and mother, whose only child he is, and by whom he
+is thought wondrous clever.  So this foreigneering chap brings his
+poor old father to this out-of-the-way house to meet these
+Platitudes and petty-larceny villains, and perhaps would have
+brought his mother too, only, simple thing, by good fortune she
+happens to be laid up with the rheumatic.  Well, the father and
+son, I beg pardon, I mean the son and father, got down and went in,
+and then after their carriage was gone, the chaise behind drove up,
+in which was a huge fat fellow, weighing twenty stone at least, but
+with something of a foreign look, and with him--who do you think?
+Why, a rascally Unitarian minister, that is, a fellow who had been
+such a minister, but who, some years ago leaving his own people,
+who had bred him up and sent him to their college at York, went
+over to the High Church, and is now, I suppose, going over to some
+other church, for he was talking, as he got down, wondrous fast in
+Latin, or what sounded something like Latin, to the fat fellow, who
+appeared to take things wonderfully easy, and merely grunted to the
+dog Latin which the scoundrel had learnt at the expense of the poor
+Unitarians at York.  So they went into the house, and presently
+arrived another chaise, but ere I could make any further
+observations, the porter of the out-of-the-way house came up to me,
+asking what I was stopping there for? bidding me go away, and not
+pry into other people's business.  'Pretty business,' said I to
+him, 'that is being transacted in a place like this,' and then I
+was going to say something uncivil, but he went to attend to the
+new corners, and I took myself away on my own business as he bade
+me, not, however, before observing that these two last were a
+couple of blackcoats."
+
+The postillion then proceeded to relate how he made the best of his
+way to a small public-house, about a mile off, where he had
+intended to bait, and how he met on the way a landau and pair,
+belonging to a Scotch coxcomb whom he had known in London, about
+whom he related some curious particulars, and then continued:
+"Well, after I had passed him and his turn-out, I drove straight to
+the public-house, where I baited my horses, and where I found some
+of the chaises and drivers who had driven the folks to the lunatic-
+looking mansion, and were now waiting to take them up again.
+Whilst my horses were eating their bait, I sat me down, as the
+weather was warm, at a table outside, and smoked a pipe, and drank
+some ale, in company with the coachman of the old gentleman who had
+gone to the house with his son, and the coachman then told me that
+the house was a Papist house, and that the present was a grand
+meeting of all the fools and rascals in the country, who came to
+bow down to images, and to concert schemes--pretty schemes no
+doubt--for overturning the religion of the country, and that for
+his part he did not approve of being concerned with such doings,
+and that he was going to give his master warning next day.  So, as
+we were drinking and discoursing, up drove the chariot of the
+Scotchman, and down got his valet and the driver, and whilst the
+driver was seeing after the horses, the valet came and sat down at
+the table where the gentleman's coachman and I were drinking.  I
+knew the fellow well, a Scotchman like his master, and just of the
+same kidney, with white kid gloves, red hair frizzled, a patch of
+paint on his face, and his hands covered with rings.  This very
+fellow, I must tell you, was one of those most busy in endeavouring
+to get me turned out of the servants' club in Park Lane, because I
+happened to serve a literary man; so he sat down, and in a kind of
+affected tone cried out, 'Landlord, bring me a glass of cold
+negus.'  The landlord, however, told him that there was no negus,
+but that if he pleased, he could have a jug of as good beer as any
+in the country.  'Confound the beer,' said the valet, 'do you think
+that I am accustomed to such vulgar beverage?'  However, as he
+found there was nothing better to be had, he let the man bring him
+some beer, and when he had got it, soon showed that he could drink
+it easily enough; so, when he had drunk two or three draughts, he
+turned his eyes in a contemptuous manner, first, on the coachman,
+and then on me:  I saw the scamp recollected me, for after staring
+at me and my dress for about half a minute, he put on a broad grin,
+and flinging his head back, he uttered a loud laugh.  Well, I did
+not like this, as you may well believe, and taking the pipe out of
+my mouth, I asked him if he meant anything personal, to which he
+answered, that he had said nothing to me, and that he had a right
+to look where he pleased, and laugh when he pleased.  Well, as to a
+certain extent he was right, as to looking and laughing; and as I
+have occasionally looked at a fool and laughed, though I was not
+the fool in this instance, I put my pipe into my mouth and said no
+more.  This quiet and well-regulated behaviour of mine, however,
+the fellow interpreted into fear; so, after drinking a little more,
+he suddenly started up, and striding once or twice before the
+table, he asked me what I meant by that impertinent question of
+mine, saying that he had a good mind to wring my nose for my
+presumption.  'You have?' said I, getting up, and laying down my
+pipe.  'Well, I'll now give you an opportunity.'  So I put myself
+in an attitude, and went up to him, saying 'I have an old score to
+settle with you, you scamp; you wanted to get me turned out of the
+club, didn't you?'  And thereupon, remembering that he had
+threatened to wring my nose, I gave him a snorter upon his own.  I
+wish you could have seen the fellow when he felt the smart; so far
+from trying to defend himself, he turned round, and with his hand
+to his face, attempted to run away; but I was now in a regular
+passion, and following him up, got before him, and was going to
+pummel away at him, when he burst into tears, and begged me not to
+hurt him, saying that he was sorry if he had offended me, and that,
+if I pleased, he would go down on his knees, or do anything else I
+wanted.  Well, when I heard him talk in this manner, I, of course,
+let him be; I could hardly help laughing at the figure he cut; his
+face all blubbered with tears, and blood and paint; but I did not
+laugh at the poor creature either, but went to the table and took
+up my pipe, and smoked and drank as if nothing had happened; and
+the fellow, after having been to the pump, came and sat down,
+crying, and trying to curry favour with me and the coachman;
+presently, however, putting on a confidential look, he began to
+talk of the Popish house, and of the doings there, and said he
+supposed as how we were of the party, and that it was all right;
+and then he began to talk of the Pope of Rome, and what a nice man
+he was, and what a fine thing it was to be of his religion,
+especially if folks went over to him; and how it advanced them in
+the world, and gave them consideration; and how his master, who had
+been abroad and seen the Pope, and kissed his toe, was going over
+to the Popish religion, and had persuaded him to consent to do so,
+and to forsake his own, which I think the scoundrel called the
+'Piscopal Church of Scotland, and how many others of that church
+were going over, thinking to better their condition in life by so
+doing, and to be more thought on; and how many of the English
+Church were thinking of going over too--and that he had no doubt
+that it would all end right and comfortably.  Well, as he was going
+on in this way, the old coachman began to spit, and getting up,
+flung all the beer that was in his jug upon the ground, and going
+away, ordered another jug of beer, and sat down at another table,
+saying that he would not drink in such company; and I too got up,
+and flung what beer remained in my jug, there wasn't more than a
+drop, in the fellow's face, saying, I would scorn to drink any more
+in such company; and then I went to my horses, put them to, paid my
+reckoning, and drove home."
+
+The postillion having related his story, to which I listened with
+all due attention, mused for a moment, and then said, "I dare say
+you remember how, some time since, when old Bill had been telling
+us how the Government a long time ago, had done away with robbing
+on the highway, by putting down the public-houses and places which
+the highwaymen frequented, and by sending a good mounted police to
+hunt them down, I said that it was a shame that the present
+Government did not employ somewhat the same means in order to stop
+the proceedings of Mumbo Jumbo and his gang now-a-days in England.
+Howsomever, since I have driven a fare to a Popish rendezvous, and
+seen something of what is going on there, I should conceive that
+the Government are justified in allowing the gang the free exercise
+of their calling.  Anybody is welcome to stoop and pick up nothing,
+or worse than nothing, and if Mumbo Jumbo's people, after their
+expeditions, return to their haunts with no better plunder in the
+shape of converts than what I saw going into yonder place of call,
+I should say they are welcome to what they get; for if that's the
+kind of rubbish they steal out of the Church of England, or any
+other church, who in his senses but would say a good riddance, and
+many thanks for your trouble:  at any rate, that is my opinion of
+the matter."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+
+
+Deliberations with Self-Resolution--Invitation to Dinner--The
+Commercial Traveller--The Landlord's Offer--The Comet Wine.
+
+
+It was now that I had frequent deliberations with myself.  Should I
+continue at the inn in my present position?  I was not very much
+captivated with it; there was little poetry in keeping an account
+of the corn, hay, and straw which came in, and was given out, and I
+was fond of poetry; moreover, there was no glory at all to be
+expected in doing so, and I was fond of glory.  Should I give up
+that situation, and remaining at the inn, become ostler under old
+Bill?  There was more poetry in rubbing down horses than in keeping
+an account of straw, hay, and corn; there was also some prospect of
+glory attached to the situation of ostler, for the grooms and
+stable-boys occasionally talked of an ostler, a great way down the
+road, who had been presented by some sporting people, not with a
+silver vase, as our governor had been, but with a silver currycomb,
+in testimony of their admiration for his skill; but I confess that
+the poetry of rubbing down had become, as all other poetry becomes,
+rather prosy by frequent repetition, and with respect to the chance
+of deriving glory from the employment, I entertained, in the event
+of my determining to stay, very slight hope of ever attaining skill
+in the ostler art sufficient to induce sporting people to bestow
+upon me a silver currycomb.  I was not half so good an ostler as
+old Bill, who had never been presented with a silver currycomb, and
+I never expected to become so, therefore what chance had I?  It was
+true, there was a prospect of some pecuniary emolument to be
+derived by remaining in either situation.  It was very probable
+that, provided I continued to keep an account of the hay and corn
+coming in and expended, the landlord would consent to allow me a
+pound a week, which at the end of a dozen years, provided I kept
+myself sober, would amount to a considerable sum.  I might, on the
+retirement of old Bill, by taking his place, save up a decent sum
+of money, provided, unlike him, I kept myself sober, and laid by
+all the shillings and sixpences I got; but the prospect of laying
+up a decent sum of money was not of sufficient importance to induce
+me to continue either at my wooden desk, or in the inn-yard.  The
+reader will remember what difficulty I had to make up my mind to
+become a merchant under the Armenian's auspices, even with the
+prospect of making two or three hundred thousand pounds by
+following the Armenian way of doing business, so it was not
+probable that I should feel disposed to be a book-keeper or ostler
+all my life with no other prospect than being able to make a tidy
+sum of money.  If indeed, besides the prospect of making a tidy sum
+at the end of perhaps forty years' ostlering, I had been certain of
+being presented with a silver currycomb with my name engraved upon
+it, which I might have left to my descendants, or, in default
+thereof, to the parish church destined to contain my bones, with
+directions that it might be soldered into the wall above the arch
+leading from the body of the church into the chancel--I will not
+say with such a certainty of immortality, combined with such a
+prospect of moderate pecuniary advantage,--I might not have thought
+it worth my while to stay, but I entertained no such certainty,
+and, taking everything into consideration, I determined to mount my
+horse and leave the inn.
+
+This horse had caused me for some time past no little perplexity; I
+had frequently repented of having purchased him, more especially as
+the purchase had been made with another person's money, and had
+more than once shown him to people who, I imagined, were likely to
+purchase him; but, though they were profuse in his praise, as
+people generally are in the praise of what they don't intend to
+purchase, they never made me an offer, and now that I had
+determined to mount on his back and ride away, what was I to do
+with him in the sequel?  I could not maintain him long.  Suddenly I
+bethought me of Horncastle, which Francis Ardry had mentioned as a
+place where the horse was likely to find a purchaser, and not
+having determined upon any particular place to which to repair, I
+thought that I could do no better than betake myself to Horncastle
+in the first instance, and there endeavour to dispose of my horse.
+
+On making inquiries with respect to the situation of Horncastle,
+and the time when the fair would be held, I learned that the town
+was situated in Lincolnshire, about a hundred and fifty miles from
+the inn at which I was at present sojourning, and that the fair
+would be held nominally within about a month, but that it was
+always requisite to be on the spot some days before the nominal day
+of the fair, as all the best horses were generally sold before that
+time, and the people who came to purchase gone away with what they
+had bought.
+
+The people of the inn were very sorry on being informed of my
+determination to depart.  Old Bill told me that he had hoped as how
+I had intended to settle down there, and to take his place as
+ostler when he was fit for no more work, adding, that though I did
+not know much of the business, yet he had no doubt but that I might
+improve.  My friend the postillion was particularly sorry, and
+taking me with him to the tap-room called for two pints of beer, to
+one of which he treated me; and whilst we were drinking told me how
+particularly sorry he was at the thought of my going, but that he
+hoped I should think better of the matter.  On my telling him that
+I must go, he said that he trusted I should put off my departure
+for three weeks, in order that I might be present at his marriage,
+the banns of which were just about to be published.  He said that
+nothing would give him greater pleasure than to see me dance a
+minuet with his wife after the marriage dinner; but I told him it
+was impossible that I should stay, my affairs imperatively calling
+me elsewhere; and that with respect to my dancing a minuet, such a
+thing was out of the question, as I had never learned to dance.  At
+which he said that he was exceedingly sorry, and finding me
+determined to go, wished me success in all my undertakings.
+
+The master of the house, to whom, as in duty bound, I communicated
+my intention before I spoke of it to the servants, was, I make no
+doubt, very sorry, though he did not exactly tell me so.  What he
+said was, that he had never expected that I should remain long
+there, as such a situation never appeared to him quite suitable to
+me, though I had been very diligent, and had given him perfect
+satisfaction.  On his inquiring when I intended to depart, I
+informed him next day, whereupon he begged that I would defer my
+departure till the next day but one, and do him the favour of
+dining with him on the morrow.  I informed him that I should be
+only too happy.
+
+On the following day at four o'clock I dined with the landlord, in
+company with a commercial traveller.  The dinner was good, though
+plain, consisting of boiled mackerel--rather a rarity in those
+parts at that time--with fennel sauce, a prime baron of roast beef
+after the mackerel, then a tart and noble Cheshire cheese; we had
+prime sherry at dinner, and whilst eating the cheese prime porter,
+that of Barclay, the only good porter in the world.  After the
+cloth was removed we had a bottle of very good port; and whilst
+partaking of the port I had an argument with the commercial
+traveller on the subject of the corn-laws.
+
+The commercial traveller, having worsted me in the argument on the
+subject of the corn-laws, got up in great glee, saying that he must
+order his gig, as business must be attended to.  Before leaving the
+room, however, he shook me patronizingly by the hand, and said
+something to the master of the house, but in so low a tone that it
+escaped my ear.
+
+No sooner had he departed than the master of the house told me that
+his friend the traveller had just said that I was a confounded
+sensible young fellow, and not at all opinionated, a sentiment in
+which he himself perfectly agreed--then hemming once or twice, he
+said that as I was going on a journey he hoped I was tolerably well
+provided with money, adding that travelling was rather expensive,
+especially on horseback, the manner in which he supposed, as I had
+a horse in the stable, I intended to travel.  I told him that
+though I was not particularly well supplied with money, I had
+sufficient for the expenses of my journey, at the end of which I
+hoped to procure more.  He then hemmed again, and said that since I
+had been at the inn I had rendered him a great deal of service in
+more ways than one, and that he should not think of permitting me
+to depart without making me some remuneration; then putting his
+hand into his waistcoat pocket, he handed me a cheque for ten
+pounds, which he had prepared beforehand, the value of which he
+said I could receive at the next town, or that, if I wished it, any
+waiter in the house would cash it for me.  I thanked him for his
+generosity in the best terms I could select, but, handing him back
+the cheque, I told him that I could not accept it, saying, that, so
+far from his being my debtor, I believed myself to be indebted to
+him, as not only myself but my horse had been living at his house
+for several weeks.  He replied, that as for my board at a house
+like his it amounted to nothing, and as for the little corn and hay
+which the horse had consumed it was of no consequence, and that he
+must insist upon my taking the cheque.  But I again declined,
+telling him that doing so would be a violation of a rule which I
+had determined to follow, and which nothing but the greatest
+necessity would ever compel me to break through--never to incur
+obligations.  "But," said he, "receiving this money will not be
+incurring an obligation, it is your due."  "I do not think so,"
+said I; "I did not engage to serve you for money, nor will I take
+any from you."  "Perhaps you will take it as a loan?" said he.
+"No," I replied, "I never borrow."  "Well," said the landlord,
+smiling, "you are different from all others that I am acquainted
+with.  I never yet knew any one else who scrupled to borrow and
+receive obligations; why, there are two baronets in the
+neighbourhood who have borrowed money of me, ay, and who have never
+repaid what they borrowed; and there are a dozen squires who are
+under considerable obligations to me, who I dare say will never
+return them.  Come, you need not be more scrupulous than your
+superiors--I mean in station."  "Every vessel must stand on its own
+bottom," said I; "they take pleasure in receiving obligations, I
+take pleasure in being independent.  Perhaps they are wise, and I
+am a fool, I know not, but one thing I am certain of, which is,
+that were I not independent I should be very unhappy:  I should
+have no visions then."  "Have you any relations?" said the
+landlord, looking at me compassionately; "excuse me, but I don't
+think you are exactly fit to take care of yourself."  "There you
+are mistaken," said I, "I can take precious good care of myself;
+ay, and can drive a precious hard bargain when I have occasion, but
+driving bargains is a widely different thing from receiving gifts.
+I am going to take my horse to Horncastle, and when there I shall
+endeavour to obtain his full value--ay to the last penny."
+
+"Horncastle!" said the landlord, "I have heard of that place; you
+mustn't be dreaming visions when you get there, or they'll steal
+the horse from under you.  Well," said he, rising, "I shall not
+press you further on the subject of the cheque.  I intend, however,
+to put you under an obligation to me."  He then rang the bell, and
+having ordered two fresh glasses to be brought, he went out and
+presently returned with a small pint bottle, which he uncorked with
+his own hand; then sitting down, he said, "The wine that I bring
+here, is port of eighteen hundred and eleven, the year of the
+comet, the best vintage on record; the wine which we have been
+drinking," he added, "is good, but not to be compared with this,
+which I never sell, and which I am chary of.  When you have drunk
+some of it, I think you will own that I have conferred an
+obligation upon you;" he then filled the glasses, the wine which he
+poured out diffusing an aroma through the room; then motioning me
+to drink, he raised his own glass to his lips, saying, "Come,
+friend, I drink to your success at Horncastle."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+
+
+Triumphal Departure--No Season like Youth--Extreme Old Age--
+Beautiful England--The Ratcatcher--A Misadventure.
+
+
+I departed from the inn much in the same fashion as I had come to
+it, mounted on a splendid horse indifferently well caparisoned,
+with the small valise attached to my crupper, in which, besides the
+few things I had brought with me, was a small book of roads with a
+map which had been presented to me by the landlord.  I must not
+forget to state that I did not ride out of the yard, but that my
+horse was brought to me at the front door by old Bill, who insisted
+upon doing so, and who refused a five-shilling piece which I
+offered him; and it will be as well to let the reader know that the
+landlord shook me by the hand as I mounted, and that the people
+attached to the inn, male and female--my friend the postillion at
+the head--assembled before the house to see me off, and gave me
+three cheers as I rode away.  Perhaps no person ever departed from
+an inn with more eclat or better wishes; nobody looked at me
+askance, except two stage-coachmen who were loitering about, one of
+whom said to his companion, "I say, Jim! twig his portmanteau! a
+regular Newmarket turn-out, by--!"
+
+It was in the cool of the evening of a bright day--all the days of
+that summer were bright--that I departed.  I felt at first rather
+melancholy at finding myself again launched into the wide world,
+and leaving the friends whom I had lately made behind me; but by
+occasionally trotting the horse, and occasionally singing a song of
+Romanvile, I had dispelled the feeling of melancholy by the time I
+had proceeded three miles down the main road.  It was at the end of
+these three miles, just opposite a milestone, that I struck into a
+cross road.  After riding about seven miles, threading what are
+called, in postillion parlance, cross-country roads, I reached
+another high road, tending to the east, along which I proceeded for
+a mile or two, when coming to a small inn, about nine o'clock, I
+halted and put up for the night.
+
+Early on the following morning I proceeded on my journey, but
+fearing to gall the horse, I no longer rode him, but led him by the
+bridle, until I came to a town at the distance of about ten miles
+from the place where I had passed the night.  Here I stayed during
+the heat of the day, more on the horse's account than my own, and
+towards evening resumed my journey, leading the animal by the
+bridle as before; and in this manner I proceeded for several days,
+travelling on an average from twenty to twenty-five miles a day,
+always leading the animal, except perhaps now and then of an
+evening, when, if I saw a good piece of road before me, I would
+mount and put the horse into a trot, which the creature seemed to
+enjoy as much as myself, showing his satisfaction by snorting and
+neighing, whilst I gave utterance to my own exhilaration by shouts,
+or by "the chi she is kaulo she soves pre lakie dumo," or by
+something else of the same kind in Romanvile.
+
+On the whole, I journeyed along very pleasantly, certainly quite as
+pleasantly as I do at present, now that I am become a gentleman and
+weigh sixteen stone, though some people would say that my present
+manner of travelling is much the most preferable, riding as I now
+do, instead of leading my horse; receiving the homage of ostlers
+instead of their familiar nods; sitting down to dinner in the
+parlour of the best inn I can find, instead of passing the
+brightest part of the day in the kitchen of a village alehouse;
+carrying on my argument after dinner on the subject of the corn-
+laws, with the best commercial gentlemen on the road, instead of
+being glad, whilst sipping a pint of beer, to get into conversation
+with blind trampers, or maimed Abraham sailors, regaling themselves
+on half-pints at the said village hostelries.  Many people will
+doubtless say that things have altered wonderfully with me for the
+better, and they would say right, provided I possessed now what I
+then carried about with me in my journeys--the spirit of youth.
+Youth is the only season for enjoyment, and the first twenty-five
+years of one's life are worth all the rest of the longest life of
+man, even though those five-and-twenty be spent in penury and
+contempt, and the rest in the possession of wealth, honours,
+respectability, ay, and many of them in strength and health, such
+as will enable one to ride forty miles before dinner, and over
+one's pint of port--for the best gentleman in the land should not
+drink a bottle--carry on one's argument, with gravity and decorum,
+with any commercial gentleman who, responsive to one's challenge,
+takes the part of humanity and common sense against "protection"
+and the lord of the land.
+
+Ah! there is nothing like youth--not that after-life is valueless.
+Even in extreme old age one may get on very well, provided we will
+but accept of the bounties of God.  I met the other day an old man,
+who asked me to drink.  "I am not thirsty," said I, "and will not
+drink with you."  "Yes, you will," said the old man, "for I am this
+day one hundred years old; and you will never again have an
+opportunity of drinking the health of a man on his hundredth
+birthday."  So I broke my word, and drank.  "Yours is a wonderful
+age," said I.  "It is a long time to look back to the beginning of
+it," said the old man; "yet, upon the whole, I am not sorry to have
+lived it all."  "How have you passed your time?" said I.  "As well
+as I could," said the old man; "always enjoying a good thing when
+it came honestly within my reach; not forgetting to praise God for
+putting it there."  "I suppose you were fond of a glass of good ale
+when you were young?"  "Yes," said the old man, "I was; and so,
+thank God, I am still."  And he drank off a glass of ale.
+
+On I went in my journey, traversing England from west to east--
+ascending and descending hills--crossing rivers by bridge and
+ferry--and passing over extensive plains.  What a beautiful country
+is England!  People run abroad to see beautiful countries, and
+leave their own behind unknown, unnoticed--their own the most
+beautiful!  And then, again, what a country for adventures!
+especially to those who travel on foot, or on horseback.  People
+run abroad in quest of adventures, and traverse Spain or Portugal
+on mule or on horseback; whereas there are ten times more
+adventures to be met with in England than in Spain, Portugal, or
+stupid Germany to boot.  Witness the number of adventures narrated
+in the present book--a book entirely devoted to England.  Why,
+there is not a chapter in the present book which is not full of
+adventures, with the exception of the present one, and this is not
+yet terminated.
+
+After traversing two or three counties, I reached the confines of
+Lincolnshire.  During one particularly hot day I put up at a
+public-house, to which, in the evening, came a party of harvesters
+to make merry, who, finding me wandering about the house a
+stranger, invited me to partake of their ale; so I drank with the
+harvesters, who sang me songs about rural life, such as -
+
+
+"Sitting in the swale; and listening to the swindle of the flail,
+as it sounds dub-a-dub on the corn, from the neighbouring barn."
+
+
+In requital for which I treated them with a song, not of Romanvile,
+but the song of "Sivory and the horse Grayman."  I remained with
+them till it was dark, having, after sunset, entered into deep
+discourse with a celebrated ratcatcher, who communicated to me the
+secrets of his trade, saying, amongst other things, "When you see
+the rats pouring out of their holes, and running up my hands and
+arms, it's not after me they comes, but after the oils I carries
+about me they comes;" and who subsequently spoke in the most
+enthusiastic manner of his trade, saying that it was the best trade
+in the world, and most diverting, and that it was likely to last
+for ever; for whereas all other kinds of vermin were fast
+disappearing from England, rats were every day becoming more
+abundant.  I had quitted this good company, and having mounted my
+horse, was making my way towards a town at about six miles'
+distance, at a swinging trot, my thoughts deeply engaged on what I
+had gathered from the ratcatcher, when all on a sudden a light
+glared upon the horse's face, who purled round in great terror, and
+flung me out of the saddle, as from a sling, or with as much
+violence as the horse Grayman, in the ballad, flings Sivord the
+Snareswayne.  I fell upon the ground--felt a kind of crashing about
+my neck--and forthwith became senseless.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+
+
+A Novel Situation--The Elderly Individual--The Surgeon--A Kind
+Offer--Chimerical Ideas--Strange Dream.
+
+
+How long I remained senseless I cannot say, for a considerable
+time, I believe; at length, opening my eyes, I found myself lying
+on a bed in a middle-sized chamber, lighted by a candle, which
+stood on a table--an elderly man stood near me, and a yet more
+elderly female was holding a phial of very pungent salts to my
+olfactory organ.  I attempted to move, but felt very stiff--my
+right arm appeared nearly paralysed, and there was a strange dull
+sensation in my head.  "You had better remain still, young man,"
+said the elderly individual, "the surgeon will be here presently; I
+have sent a message for him to the neighbouring village."  "Where
+am I?" said I, "and what has happened?"  "You are in my house,"
+said the old man, "and you have been flung from a horse.  I am
+sorry to say that I was the cause.  As I was driving home, the
+lights in my gig frightened the animal."  "Where is the horse?"
+said I.  "Below, in my stable," said the elderly individual.  "I
+saw you fall, but knowing that on account of my age I could be of
+little use to you, I instantly hurried home, the accident did not
+occur more than a furlong off, and procuring the assistance of my
+lad, and two or three neighbouring cottagers, I returned to the
+spot where you were lying senseless.  We raised you up, and brought
+you here.  My lad then went in quest of the horse, who had run away
+as we drew nigh.  When we saw him first he was standing near you;
+he caught him with some difficulty, and brought him home.  What are
+you about?" said the old man, as I strove to get off the bed.  "I
+want to see the horse," said I.  "I entreat you to be still," said
+the old man; "the horse is safe, I assure you."  "I am thinking
+about his knees," said I.  "Instead of thinking about your horse's
+knees," said the old man, "be thankful that you have not broke your
+own neck."  "You do not talk wisely," said I; "when a man's neck is
+broke, he is provided for; but when his horse's knees are broke, he
+is a lost jockey, that is, if he has nothing but his horse to
+depend upon.  A pretty figure I should cut at Horncastle, mounted
+on a horse blood-raw at the knees."  "Oh, you are going to
+Horncastle," said the old man, seriously, "then I can sympathize
+with you in your anxiety about your horse, being a Lincolnshire
+man, and the son of one who bred horses.  I will myself go down
+into the stable, and examine into the condition of your horse, so
+pray remain quiet till I return; it would certainly be a terrible
+thing to appear at Horncastle on a broken-kneed horse."
+
+He left the room and returned in about ten minutes, followed by
+another person.  "Your horse is safe," said he, "and his knees are
+unblemished; not a hair ruffled.  He is a fine animal, and will do
+credit to Horncastle; but here is the surgeon come to examine into
+your own condition."  The surgeon was a man about thirty-five,
+thin, and rather tall; his face was long and pale, and his hair,
+which was light, was carefully combed back as much as possible from
+his forehead.  He was dressed very neatly, and spoke in a very
+precise tone.  "Allow me to feel your pulse, friend?" said he,
+taking me by the right wrist.  I uttered a cry, for at the motion
+which he caused a thrill of agony darted through my arm.  "I hope
+your arm is not broke, my friend," said the surgeon, "allow me to
+see; first of all, we must divest you of this cumbrous frock."
+
+The frock was removed with some difficulty, and then the upper
+vestments of my frame, with more difficulty still.  The surgeon
+felt my arm, moving it up and down, causing me unspeakable pain.
+"There is no fracture," said he, at last, "but a contusion--a
+violent contusion.  I am told you were going to Horncastle; I am
+afraid you will be hardly able to ride your horse thither in time
+to dispose of him; however, we shall see--your arm must be
+bandaged, friend; after which I shall bleed you, and administer a
+composing draught."
+
+To be short, the surgeon did as he proposed, and when he had
+administered the composing draught, he said, "Be of good cheer; I
+should not be surprised if you are yet in time for Horncastle."  He
+then departed with the master of the house, and the woman, leaving
+me to my repose.  I soon began to feel drowsy, and was just
+composing myself to slumber, lying on my back, as the surgeon had
+advised me, when I heard steps ascending the stairs, and in a
+moment more the surgeon entered again, followed by the master of
+the house.  "I hope I don't disturb you," said the former; "my
+reason for returning is to relieve your mind from any anxiety with
+respect to your horse.  I am by no means sure that you will be
+able, owing to your accident, to reach Horncastle in time:  to
+quiet you, however, I will buy your horse for any reasonable sum.
+I have been down to the stable, and approve of his figure.  What do
+you ask for him?"  "This is a strange time of night," said I, "to
+come to me about purchasing my horse, and I am hardly in a fitting
+situation to be applied to about such a matter.  What do you want
+him for?"  "For my own use," said the surgeon; "I am a professional
+man, and am obliged to be continually driving about; I cover at
+least one hundred and fifty miles every week."  "He will never
+answer your purpose," said I, "he is not a driving horse, and was
+never between shafts in his life; he is for riding, more especially
+for trotting, at which he has few equals."  "It matters not to me
+whether he is for riding or driving," said the surgeon, "sometimes
+I ride, sometimes drive; so, if we can come to terms, I will buy
+him, though remember it is chiefly to remove any anxiety from your
+mind about him."  "This is no time for bargaining," said I, "if you
+wish to have the horse for a hundred guineas, you may; if not--"
+"A hundred guineas!" said the surgeon, "my good friend, you must
+surely be light-headed; allow me to feel your pulse," and he
+attempted to feel my left wrist.  "I am not light-headed," said I,
+"and I require no one to feel my pulse; but I should be light-
+headed if I were to sell my horse for less than I have demanded;
+but I have a curiosity to know what you would be willing to offer."
+"Thirty pounds," said the surgeon, "is all I can afford to give;
+and that is a great deal for a country surgeon to offer for a
+horse."  "Thirty pounds!" said I, "why, he cost me nearly double
+that sum.  To tell you the truth, I am afraid that you want to take
+advantage of my situation."  "Not in the least, friend," said the
+surgeon, "not in the least; I only wished to set your mind at rest
+about your horse; but as you think he is worth more than I can
+afford to offer, take him to Horncastle by all means; I will do my
+best to cure you in time.  Good night, I will see you again on the
+morrow."  Thereupon he once more departed with the master of the
+house.  "A sharp one," I heard him say, with a laugh, as the door
+closed upon him.
+
+Left to myself, I again essayed to compose myself to rest, but for
+some time in vain.  I had been terribly shaken by my fall, and had
+subsequently, owing to the incision of the surgeon's lancet, been
+deprived of much of the vital fluid; it is when the body is in such
+a state that the merest trifles affect and agitate the mind; no
+wonder, then, that the return of the surgeon and the master of the
+house for the purpose of inquiring whether I would sell my horse,
+struck me as being highly extraordinary, considering the hour of
+the night, and the situation in which they knew me to be.  What
+could they mean by such conduct--did they wish to cheat me of the
+animal?  "Well, well," said I, "if they did, what matters, they
+found their match; yes, yes," said I, "but I am in their power,
+perhaps"--but I instantly dismissed the apprehension which came
+into my mind, with a pooh, nonsense!  In a little time, however, a
+far more foolish and chimerical idea began to disturb me--the idea
+of being flung from my horse; was I not disgraced for ever as a
+horseman by being flung from my horse?  Assuredly, I thought; and
+the idea of being disgraced as a horseman, operating on my nervous
+system, caused me very acute misery.  "After all," said I to
+myself, "it was perhaps the contemptible opinion which the surgeon
+must have formed of my equestrian powers, which induced him to
+offer to take my horse off my hands; he perhaps thought I was
+unable to manage a horse, and therefore in pity returned in the
+dead of night to offer to purchase the animal which had flung me;"
+and then the thought that the surgeon had conceived a contemptible
+opinion of my equestrian powers, caused me the acutest misery, and
+continued tormenting me until some other idea (I have forgot what
+it was, but doubtless equally foolish) took possession of my mind.
+At length, brought on by the agitation of my spirits, there came
+over me the same feeling of horror that I had experienced of old
+when I was a boy, and likewise of late within the dingle; it was,
+however, not so violent as it had been on those occasions, and I
+struggled manfully against it, until by degrees it passed away, and
+then I fell asleep; and in my sleep I had an ugly dream.  I dreamt
+that I had died of the injuries I had received from my fall, and
+that no sooner had my soul departed from my body than it entered
+that of a quadruped, even my own horse in the stable--in a word, I
+was, to all intents and purposes, my own steed; and as I stood in
+the stable chewing hay (and I remember that the hay was exceedingly
+tough), the door opened, and the surgeon who had attended me came
+in.  "My good animal," said he, "as your late master has scarcely
+left enough to pay for the expenses of his funeral, and nothing to
+remunerate me for my trouble, I shall make bold to take possession
+of you.  If your paces are good, I shall keep you for my own
+riding; if not, I shall take you to Horncastle, your original
+destination."  He then bridled and saddled me, and, leading me out,
+mounted, and then trotted me up and down before the house, at the
+door of which the old man, who now appeared to be dressed in
+regular jockey fashion, was standing.  "I like his paces well,"
+said the surgeon; "I think I shall take him for my own use."  "And
+what am I to have for all the trouble his master caused me?" said
+my late entertainer, on whose countenance I now observed, for the
+first time, a diabolical squint.  "The consciousness of having done
+your duty to a fellow-creature in succouring him in a time of
+distress, must be your reward," said the surgeon.  "Pretty gammon,
+truly," said my late entertainer; "what would you say if I were to
+talk in that way to you?  Come, unless you choose to behave
+jonnock, I shall take the bridle and lead the horse back into the
+stable."  "Well," said the surgeon, "we are old friends, and I
+don't wish to dispute with you, so I'll tell you what I will do; I
+will ride the animal to Horncastle, and we will share what he
+fetches like brothers."  "Good," said the old man, "but if you say
+that you have sold him for less than a hundred, I shan't consider
+you jonnock; remember what the young fellow said--that young
+fellow--"  I heard no more, for the next moment I found myself on a
+broad road leading, as I supposed, in the direction of Horncastle,
+the surgeon still in the saddle, and my legs moving at a rapid
+trot.  "Get on," said the surgeon, jerking my mouth with the bit;
+whereupon, full of rage, I instantly set off at a full gallop,
+determined, if possible, to dash my rider to the earth.  The
+surgeon, however, kept his seat, and, so far from attempting to
+abate my speed, urged me on to greater efforts with a stout stick,
+which methought he held in his hand.  In vain did I rear and kick,
+attempting to get rid of my foe; but the surgeon remained as
+saddle-fast as ever the Maugrabin sorcerer in the Arabian tale what
+time he rode the young prince transformed into a steed to his
+enchanted palace in the wilderness.  At last, as I was still madly
+dashing on, panting and blowing, and had almost given up all hope,
+I saw at a distance before me a heap of stones by the side of the
+road, probably placed there for the purpose of repairing it; a
+thought appeared to strike me--I will shy at those stones, and, if
+I can't get rid of him so, resign myself to my fate.  So I
+increased my speed, till arriving within about ten yards of the
+heap, I made a desperate start, turning half round with nearly the
+velocity of a mill-stone.  Oh, the joy I experienced when I felt my
+enemy canted over my neck, and saw him lying senseless in the road.
+"I have you now in my power," I said, or rather neighed, as, going
+up to my prostrate foe, I stood over him.  "Suppose I were to rear
+now, and let my fore feet fall upon you, what would your life be
+worth? that is, supposing you are not killed already; but lie
+there, I will do you no further harm, but trot to Horncastle
+without a rider, and when there--" and without further reflection
+off I trotted in the direction of Horncastle, but had not gone far
+before my bridle, falling from my neck, got entangled with my off
+fore foot.  I felt myself falling, a thrill of agony shot through
+me--my knees would be broken, and what should I do at Horncastle
+with a pair of broken knees?  I struggled, but I could not
+disengage my off fore foot, and downward I fell, but before I had
+reached the ground I awoke, and found myself half out of bed, my
+bandaged arm in considerable pain, and my left hand just touching
+the floor.
+
+With some difficulty I readjusted myself in bed.  It was now early
+morning, and the first rays of the sun were beginning to penetrate
+the white curtains of a window on my left, which probably looked
+into the garden, as I caught a glimpse or two of the leaves of
+trees through a small uncovered part at the side.  For some time I
+felt uneasy and anxious, my spirits being in a strange fluttering
+state.  At last my eyes fell upon a small row of tea-cups seemingly
+of china, which stood on a mantelpiece exactly fronting the bottom
+of the bed.  The sight of these objects, I know not why, soothed
+and pacified me; I kept my eyes fixed upon them, as I lay on my
+back on the bed, with my head upon the pillow, till at last I fell
+into a calm and refreshing sleep.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+
+
+The Morning after a Fall--The Teapot--Unpretending Hospitality--The
+Chinese Student.
+
+
+It might be about eight o'clock in the morning when I was awakened
+by the entrance of the old man.  "How have you rested?" said he,
+coming up to the bedside, and looking me in the face.  "Well," said
+I, "and I feel much better, but I am still very sore."  I surveyed
+him now for the first time with attention.  He was dressed in a
+sober-coloured suit, and was apparently between sixty and seventy.
+In stature he was rather above the middle height, but with a slight
+stoop; his features were placid, and expressive of much
+benevolence, but, as it appeared to me, with rather a melancholy
+cast--as I gazed upon them, I felt ashamed that I should ever have
+conceived in my brain a vision like that of the preceding night, in
+which he appeared in so disadvantageous a light.  At length he
+said, "It is now time for you to take some refreshment.  I hear my
+old servant coming up with your breakfast."  In a moment the
+elderly female entered with a tray, on which was some bread and
+butter, a teapot and cup.  The cup was of common blue earthenware,
+but the pot was of china, curiously fashioned, and seemingly of
+great antiquity.  The old man poured me out a cupful of tea, and
+then, with the assistance of the woman, raised me higher, and
+propped me up with the pillows.  I ate and drank; when the pot was
+emptied of its liquid (it did not contain much), I raised it up
+with my left hand to inspect it.  The sides were covered with
+curious characters, seemingly hieroglyphics.  After surveying them
+for some time, I replaced it upon the tray.  "You seem fond of
+china," said I, to the old man, after the servant had retired with
+the breakfast things, and I had returned to my former posture; "you
+have china on the mantelpiece, and that was a remarkable teapot out
+of which I have just been drinking."
+
+The old man fixed his eyes intently on me, and methought the
+expression of his countenance became yet more melancholy.  "Yes,"
+said he, at last, "I am fond of china--I have reason to be fond of
+china--but for china I should--" and here he sighed again.
+
+"You value it for the quaintness and singularity of its form," said
+I; "it appears to be less adapted for real use than our own
+pottery."
+
+"I care little about its form," said the old man; "I care for it
+simply on account of--however, why talk to you on the subject which
+can have no possible interest to you?  I expect the surgeon here
+presently."
+
+"I do not like that surgeon at all," said I; "how strangely he
+behaved last night, coming back, when I was just falling asleep, to
+ask me if I would sell my horse."
+
+The old man smiled.  "He has but one failing," said he, "an itch
+for horse-dealing; but for that he might be a much richer man than
+he is; he is continually buying and exchanging horses, and
+generally finds himself a loser by his bargains:  but he is a
+worthy creature, and skilful in his profession--it is well for you
+that you are under his care."
+
+The old man then left me, and in about an hour returned with the
+surgeon, who examined me and reported favourably as to my case.  He
+spoke to me with kindness and feeling, and did not introduce the
+subject of the horse.  I asked him whether he thought I should be
+in time for the fair.  "I saw some people making their way thither
+to-day," said he; "the fair lasts three weeks, and it has just
+commenced.  Yes, I think I may promise you that you will be in time
+for the very heat of it.  In a few days you will be able to mount
+your saddle with your arm in a sling, but you must by no means
+appear with your arm in a sling at Horncastle, as people would
+think that your horse had flung you, and that you wanted to dispose
+of him because he was a vicious brute.  You must, by all means,
+drop the sling before you get to Horncastle."
+
+For three days I kept my apartment by the advice of the surgeon.  I
+passed my time as I best could.  Stretched on my bed, I either
+abandoned myself to reflection, or listened to the voices of the
+birds in the neighbouring garden.  Sometimes, as I lay awake at
+night, I would endeavour to catch the tick of a clock, which
+methought sounded from some distant part of the house.
+
+The old man visited me twice or thrice every day to inquire into my
+state.  His words were few on these occasions, and he did not stay
+long.  Yet his voice and his words were kind.  What surprised me
+most in connection with this individual was, the delicacy of
+conduct which he exhibited in not letting a word proceed from his
+lips which could testify curiosity respecting who I was, or whence
+I came.  All he knew of me was, that I had been flung from my horse
+on my way to a fair for the purpose of disposing of the animal; and
+that I was now his guest.  I might be a common horse-dealer for
+what he knew, yet I was treated by him with all the attention which
+I could have expected, had I been an alderman of Boston's heir, and
+known to him as such.  The county in which I am now, thought I at
+last, must be either extraordinarily devoted to hospitality, or
+this old host of mine must be an extraordinary individual.  On the
+evening of the fourth day, feeling tired of my confinement, I put
+my clothes on in the best manner I could, and left the chamber.
+Descending a flight of stairs, I reached a kind of quadrangle, from
+which branched two or three passages; one of these I entered, which
+had a door at the farther end, and one on each side; the one to the
+left standing partly open, I entered it, and found myself in a
+middle-sized room with a large window, or rather glass-door, which
+looked into a garden, and which stood open.  There was nothing
+remarkable in this room, except a large quantity of china.  There
+was china on the mantelpiece--china on two tables, and a small
+beaufet, which stood opposite the glass-door, was covered with
+china--there were cups, teapots, and vases of various forms, and on
+all of them I observed characters--not a teapot, not a tea-cup, not
+a vase of whatever form or size, but appeared to possess
+hieroglyphics on some part or other.  After surveying these
+articles for some time with no little interest, I passed into the
+garden, in which there were small parterres of flowers, and two or
+three trees, and which, where the house did not abut, was bounded
+by a wall; turning to the right by a walk by the side of a house, I
+passed by a door--probably the one I had seen at the end of the
+passage--and arrived at another window similar to that through
+which I had come, and which also stood open; I was about to pass
+through it, when I heard the voice of my entertainer exclaiming,
+"Is that you? pray come in."
+
+I entered the room, which seemed to be a counterpart of the one
+which I had just left.  It was of the same size, had the same kind
+of furniture, and appeared to be equally well stocked with china;
+one prominent article it possessed, however, which the other room
+did not exhibit--namely, a clock, which, with its pendulum moving
+tick-a-tick, hung against the wall opposite to the door, the sight
+of which made me conclude that the sound which methought I had
+heard in the stillness of the night was not an imaginary one.
+There it hung on the wall, with its pendulum moving tick-a-tick.
+The old gentleman was seated in an easy chair a little way into the
+room, having the glass-door on his right hand.  On a table before
+him lay a large open volume, in which I observed Roman letters as
+well as characters.  A few inches beyond the book on the table,
+covered all over with hieroglyphics, stood a china vase.  The eyes
+of the old man were fixed upon it.
+
+"Sit down," said he, motioning me with his hand to a stool close
+by, but without taking his eyes from the vase.
+
+"I can't make it out," said he, at last, removing his eyes from the
+vase, and leaning back on the chair, "I can't make it out."
+
+"I wish I could assist you," said I.
+
+"Assist me," said the old man, looking at me with a half smile.
+
+"Yes," said I, "but I don't understand Chinese."
+
+"I suppose not," said the old man, with another slight smile; "but-
+-but--"
+
+"Pray proceed," said I.
+
+"I wished to ask you," said the old man, "how you knew that the
+characters on yon piece of crockery were Chinese; or, indeed, that
+there was such a language?"
+
+"I knew the crockery was china," said I, "and naturally enough
+supposed what was written upon it to be Chinese; as for there being
+such a language--the English have a language, the French have a
+language, and why not the Chinese?"
+
+"May I ask you a question?"
+
+"As many as you like."
+
+"Do you know any language besides English?"
+
+"Yes," said I, "I know a little of two or three."
+
+"May I ask their names?"
+
+"Why not?" said I, "I know a little French."
+
+"Anything else?"
+
+"Yes, a little Welsh, and a little Haik."
+
+"What is Haik?"
+
+"Armenian."
+
+"I am glad to see you in my house," said the old man, shaking me by
+the hand; "how singular that one coming as you did should know
+Armenian!"
+
+"Not more singular," said I, "than that one living in such a place
+as this should know Chinese.  How came you to acquire it?"
+
+The old man looked at me, and sighed.  "I beg pardon," said I, "for
+asking what is, perhaps, an impertinent question; I have not
+imitated your own delicacy; you have never asked me a question
+without first desiring permission, and here I have been days and
+nights in your house an intruder on your hospitality, and you have
+never so much as asked me who I am."
+
+"In forbearing to do that," said the old man, "I merely obeyed the
+Chinese precept, 'Ask no questions of a guest;' it is written on
+both sides of the teapot out of which you have had your tea."
+
+"I wish I knew Chinese," said I.  "Is it a difficult language to
+acquire?"
+
+"I have reason to think so," said the old man.  "I have been
+occupied upon it five-and-thirty years, and I am still very
+imperfectly acquainted with it; at least, I frequently find upon my
+crockery sentences the meaning of which to me is very dark, though
+it is true these sentences are mostly verses, which are, of course,
+more difficult to understand than mere prose."
+
+"Are your Chinese studies," said I, "confined to crockery
+literature?"
+
+"Entirely," said the old man; "I read nothing else."
+
+"I have heard," said I, "that the Chinese have no letters, but that
+for every word they have a separate character--is it so?"
+
+"For every word they have a particular character," said the old
+man; "though, to prevent confusion, they have arranged their words
+under two hundred and fourteen what we should call radicals, but
+which they call keys.  As we arrange all our words in a dictionary
+under twenty-four letters, so do they arrange all their words, or
+characters, under two hundred and fourteen radical signs; the
+simplest radicals being the first, and the more complex the last."
+
+"Does the Chinese resemble any of the European languages in words?"
+said I.
+
+"I am scarcely competent to inform you," said the old man; "but I
+believe not."
+
+"What does that character represent?" said I, pointing to one on
+the vase.
+
+"A knife," said the old man, "that character is one of the simplest
+radicals or keys."
+
+"And what is the sound of it?" said I.
+
+"Tau," said the old man.
+
+"Tau!" said I; "tau!"
+
+"A strange word for a knife is it not?" said the old man.
+
+"Tawse!" said I; "tawse!"
+
+"What is tawse?" said the old man.
+
+"You were never at school at Edinburgh, I suppose?"
+
+"Never," said the old man.
+
+"That accounts for your not knowing the meaning of tawse," said I;
+"had you received the rudiments of a classical education at the
+High School, you would have known the meaning of tawse full well.
+It is a leathern thong, with which refractory urchins are recalled
+to a sense of their duty by the dominie.  Tau--tawse--how
+singular!"
+
+"I cannot see what the two words have in common, except a slight
+agreement in sound."
+
+"You will see the connection," said I, "when I inform you that the
+thong, from the middle to the bottom, is cut or slit into two or
+three parts, from which slits or cuts, unless I am very much
+mistaken, it derives its name--tawse, a thong with slits or cuts,
+used for chastising disorderly urchins at the High School, from the
+French tailler, to cut; evidently connected with the Chinese tau, a
+knife--how very extraordinary!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+
+
+Convalescence--The Surgeon's Bill--Letter of Recommendation--
+Commencement of the Old Man's History.
+
+
+Two days--three days passed away--and I still remained at the house
+of my hospitable entertainer; my bruised limb rapidly recovering
+the power of performing its functions.  I passed my time agreeably
+enough, sometimes in my chamber, communing with my own thoughts;
+sometimes in the stable, attending to, and not unfrequently
+conversing with, my horse; and at meal-time--for I seldom saw him
+at any other--discoursing with the old gentleman, sometimes on the
+Chinese vocabulary, sometimes on Chinese syntax, and once or twice
+on English horseflesh; though on this latter subject,
+notwithstanding his descent from a race of horse-traders, he did
+not enter into with much alacrity.  As a small requital for his
+kindness, I gave him one day, after dinner, unasked, a brief
+account of my history and pursuits.  He listened with attention;
+and when it was concluded, thanked me for the confidence which I
+had reposed in him.  "Such conduct," said he, "deserves a return.
+I will tell you my own history; it is brief, but may perhaps not
+prove uninteresting to you--though the relation of it will give me
+some pain."  "Pray, then, do not recite it," said I.  "Yes," said
+the old man, "I will tell you, for I wish you to know it."  He was
+about to begin, when he was interrupted by the arrival of the
+surgeon.  The surgeon examined into the state of my bruised limb,
+and told me, what indeed I already well knew, that it was rapidly
+improving.  "You will not even require a sling," said he, "to ride
+to Horncastle.  When do you propose going?" he demanded.  "When do
+you think I may venture?" I replied.  "I think, if you are a
+tolerably good horseman, you may mount the day after to-morrow,"
+answered the medical man.  "By-the-bye, are you acquainted with
+anybody at Horncastle?" "With no living soul," I answered.  "Then
+you would scarcely find stable-room for your horse.  But I am happy
+to be able to assist you.  I have a friend there who keeps a small
+inn, and who, during the time of the fair, keeps a stall vacant for
+any quadruped I may bring, until he knows whether I am coming or
+not.  I will give you a letter to him, and he will see after the
+accommodation of your horse.  To-morrow I will pay you a farewell
+visit, and bring you the letter."  "Thank you," said I; "and do not
+forget to bring your bill."  The surgeon looked at the old man, who
+gave him a peculiar nod.  "Oh!" said he, in reply to me, "for the
+little service I have rendered you, I require no remuneration.  You
+are in my friend's house, and he and I understand each other."  "I
+never receive such favours," said I, "as you have rendered me,
+without remunerating them; therefore I shall expect your bill."
+"Oh! just as you please," said the surgeon; and shaking me by the
+hand more warmly than he had hitherto done, he took his leave.
+
+On the evening of the next day, the last which I spent with my kind
+entertainer, I sat at tea with him in a little summer-house in his
+garden, partially shaded by the boughs of a large fig-tree.  The
+surgeon had shortly before paid me his farewell visit, and had
+brought me the letter of introduction to his friend at Horncastle,
+and also his bill, which I found anything but extravagant.  After
+we had each respectively drank the contents of two cups--and it may
+not be amiss here to inform the reader that though I took cream
+with my tea, as I always do when I can procure that addition, the
+old man, like most people bred up in the country, drank his without
+it--he thus addressed me:- "I am, as I told you on the night of
+your accident, the son of a breeder of horses, a respectable and
+honest man.  When I was about twenty he died, leaving me, his only
+child, a comfortable property, consisting of about two hundred
+acres of land and some fifteen hundred pounds in money.  My mother
+had died about three years previously.  I felt the death of my
+mother keenly, but that of my father less than was my duty; indeed,
+truth compels me to acknowledge that I scarcely regretted his
+death.  The cause of this want of proper filial feeling was the
+opposition which I had experienced from him in an affair which
+deeply concerned me.  I had formed an attachment for a young female
+in the neighbourhood, who, though poor, was of highly respectable
+birth, her father having been a curate of the Established Church.
+She was, at the time of which I am speaking, an orphan, having lost
+both her parents, and supported herself by keeping a small school.
+My attachment was returned, and we had pledged our vows, but my
+father, who could not reconcile himself to her lack of fortune,
+forbade our marriage in the most positive terms.  He was wrong, for
+she was a fortune in herself--amiable and accomplished.  Oh! I
+cannot tell you all she was--" and here the old man drew his hand
+across his eyes.  "By the death of my father, the only obstacle to
+our happiness appeared to be removed.  We agreed, therefore, that
+our marriage should take place within the course of a year; and I
+forthwith commenced enlarging my house and getting my affairs in
+order.  Having been left in the easy circumstances which I have
+described, I determined to follow no business, but to pass my life
+in a strictly domestic manner, and to be very, very happy.  Amongst
+other property derived from my father were several horses, which I
+disposed of in this neighbourhood, with the exception of two
+remarkably fine ones, which I determined to take to the next fair
+at Horncastle, the only place where I expected to be able to obtain
+what I considered to be their full value.  At length the time
+arrived for the commencement of the fair, which was within three
+months of the period which my beloved and myself had fixed upon for
+the celebration of our nuptials.  To the fair I went, a couple of
+trusty men following me with the horses.  I soon found a purchaser
+for the animals, a portly, plausible person, of about forty,
+dressed in a blue riding coat, brown top boots, and leather
+breeches.  There was a strange-looking urchin with him, attired in
+nearly similar fashion, with a beam in one of his eyes, who called
+him father.  The man paid me for the purchase in bank-notes--three
+fifty-pound notes for the two horses.  As we were about to take
+leave of each other, he suddenly produced another fifty-pound note,
+inquiring whether I could change it, complaining, at the same time,
+of the difficulty of procuring change in the fair.  As I happened
+to have plenty of small money in my possession, and as I felt
+obliged to him for having purchased my horses at what I considered
+to be a good price, I informed him that I should be very happy to
+accommodate him; so I changed him the note, and he, having taken
+possession of the horses, went his way, and I myself returned home.
+
+"A month passed; during this time I paid away two of the notes
+which I had received at Horncastle from the dealer--one of them in
+my immediate neighbourhood, and the other at a town about fifteen
+miles distant, to which I had repaired for the purpose of
+purchasing some furniture.  All things seemed to be going on most
+prosperously, and I felt quite happy, when one morning, as I was
+overlooking some workmen who were employed about my house, I was
+accosted by a constable, who informed me that he was sent to
+request my immediate appearance before a neighbouring bench of
+magistrates.  Concluding that I was merely summoned on some
+unimportant business connected with the neighbourhood, I felt no
+surprise, and forthwith departed in company with the officer.  The
+demeanour of the man upon the way struck me as somewhat singular.
+I had frequently spoken to him before, and had always found him
+civil and respectful, but he was now reserved and sullen, and
+replied to two or three questions which I put to him in anything
+but a courteous manner.  On arriving at the place where the
+magistrates were sitting--an inn at a small town about two miles
+distant--I found a more than usual number of people assembled, who
+appeared to be conversing with considerable eagerness.  At sight of
+me they became silent, but crowded after me as I followed the man
+into the magistrates' room.  There I found the tradesman to whom I
+had paid the note for the furniture at the town fifteen miles off
+in attendance, accompanied by an agent of the Bank of England; the
+former, it seems, had paid the note into a provincial bank, the
+proprietors of which, discovering it to be a forgery, had forthwith
+written up to the Bank of England, who had sent down their agent to
+investigate the matter.  A third individual stood beside them--the
+person in my own immediate neighbourhood to whom I had paid the
+second note; this, by some means or other, before the coming down
+of the agent, had found its way to the same provincial bank, and
+also being pronounced a forgery, it had speedily been traced to the
+person to whom I had paid it.  It was owing to the apparition of
+this second note that the agent had determined, without further
+inquiry, to cause me to be summoned before the rural tribunal.
+
+"In a few words the magistrates' clerk gave me to understand the
+state of the case.  I was filled with surprise and consternation.
+I knew myself to be perfectly innocent of any fraudulent intention,
+but at the time of which I am speaking it was a matter fraught with
+the greatest danger to be mixed up, however innocently, with the
+passing of false money.  The law with respect to forgery was
+terribly severe, and the innocent as well as the guilty
+occasionally suffered.  Of this I was not altogether ignorant;
+unfortunately, however, in my transactions with the stranger, the
+idea of false notes being offered to me, and my being brought into
+trouble by means of them, never entered my mind.  Recovering myself
+a little, I stated that the notes in question were two of three
+notes which I had received at Horncastle, for a pair of horses,
+which it was well known I had carried thither.
+
+"Thereupon, I produced from my pocket-book the third note, which
+was forthwith pronounced a forgery.  I had scarcely produced the
+third note, when I remembered the one which I had changed for the
+Horncastle dealer, and with the remembrance came the almost certain
+conviction that it was also a forgery; I was tempted for a moment
+to produce it, and to explain the circumstance--would to God I had
+done so!--but shame at the idea of having been so wretchedly duped
+prevented me, and the opportunity was lost.  I must confess that
+the agent of the bank behaved, upon the whole, in a very handsome
+manner; he said that as it was quite evident that I had disposed of
+certain horses at the fair, it was very probable that I might have
+received the notes in question in exchange for them, and that he
+was willing, as he had received a very excellent account of my
+general conduct, to press the matter no farther, that is, provided-
+-"  And here he stopped.  Thereupon, one of the three magistrates,
+who were present, asked me whether I chanced to have any more of
+these spurious notes in my possession.  He certainly had a right to
+ask the question; but there was something peculiar in his tone-
+insinuating suspicion.  It is certainly difficult to judge of the
+motives which rule a person's conduct, but I cannot help imagining
+that he was somewhat influenced in his behaviour on that occasion,
+which was anything but friendly, by my having refused to sell him
+the horses at a price less than that which I expected to get at the
+fair; be this as it may, the question filled me with embarrassment,
+and I bitterly repented not having at first been more explicit.
+Thereupon the magistrate in the same kind of tone, demanded to see
+my pocket-book.  I knew that to demur would be useless, and
+produced it, and therewith, amongst two or three small country
+notes, appeared the fourth which I had received from the Horncastle
+dealer.  The agent took it up and examined it with attention.
+'Well, is it a genuine note?' asked the magistrate.  'I am sorry to
+say that it is not,' said the agent; 'it is a forgery, like the
+other three.'  The magistrate shrugged his shoulders, as indeed did
+several people in the room.  'A regular dealer in forged notes,'
+said a person close behind me; 'who would have thought it?'
+
+"Seeing matters begin to look so serious, I aroused myself, and
+endeavoured to speak in my own behalf, giving a candid account of
+the manner in which I became possessed of the notes; but my
+explanation did not appear to meet much credit; the magistrate, to
+whom I have in particular alluded, asked, why I had not at once
+stated the fact of my having received a fourth note; and the agent,
+though in a very quiet tone, observed that he could not help
+thinking it somewhat strange that I should have changed a note of
+so much value for a perfect stranger, even supposing that he had
+purchased my horses, and had paid me their value in hard cash; and
+I noticed that he laid particular emphasis on the last words.  I
+might have observed that I was an inexperienced young man, who,
+meaning no harm myself, suspected none in others, but I was
+confused, stunned, and my tongue seemed to cleave to the roof of my
+mouth.  The men who had taken my horses to Horncastle, and for whom
+I had sent, as they lived close at hand, now arrived, but the
+evidence which they could give was anything but conclusive in my
+favour; they had seen me in company with an individual at
+Horncastle, to whom, by my orders, they had delivered certain
+horses, but they had seen no part of the money transaction; the
+fellow, whether from design or not, having taken me aside into a
+retired place, where he had paid me the three spurious notes, and
+induced me to change the fourth, which throughout the affair was
+what bore most materially against me.  How matters might have
+terminated I do not know, I might have gone to prison, and I might
+have been--just then, when I most needed a friend, and least
+expected to find one, for though amongst those present there were
+several who were my neighbours, and who had professed friendship
+for me, none of them when they saw that I needed support and
+encouragement, came forward to yield me any, but, on the contrary,
+appeared by their looks to enjoy my terror and confusion--just then
+a friend entered the room in the person of the surgeon of the
+neighbourhood, the father of him who has attended you; he was not
+on very intimate terms with me, but he had occasionally spoken to
+me, and had attended my father in his dying illness, and chancing
+to hear that I was in trouble, he now hastened to assist me.  After
+a short preamble, in which he apologized to the bench for
+interfering, he begged to be informed of the state of the case,
+whereupon the matter was laid before him in all its details.  He
+was not slow in taking a fair view of it, and spoke well and
+eloquently in my behalf--insisting on the improbability that a
+person of my habits and position would be wilfully mixed up with a
+transaction like that of which it appeared I was suspected--adding,
+that as he was fully convinced of my innocence, he was ready to
+enter into any surety with respect to my appearance at any time to
+answer anything which might be laid to my charge.  This last
+observation had particular effect, and as he was a person
+universally respected, both for his skill in his profession and his
+general demeanour, people began to think that a person in whom he
+took an interest could scarcely be concerned in anything criminal,
+and though my friend the magistrate--I call him so ironically--made
+two or three demurs, it was at last agreed between him and his
+brethren of the bench, that, for the present, I should be merely
+called upon to enter into my own recognizance for the sum of two
+hundred pounds, to appear whenever it should be deemed requisite to
+enter into any further investigation of the matter.
+
+"So I was permitted to depart from the tribunal of petty justice
+without handcuffs, and uncollared by a constable; but people looked
+coldly and suspiciously upon me.  The first thing I did was to
+hasten to the house of my beloved, in order to inform her of every
+circumstance attending the transaction.  I found her, but how?  A
+malicious female individual had hurried to her with a distorted
+tale, to the effect that I had been taken up as an utterer of
+forged notes; that an immense number had been found in my
+possession; that I was already committed, and that probably I
+should be executed.  My affianced one tenderly loved me, and her
+constitution was delicate; fit succeeded fit; she broke a blood-
+vessel, and I found her deluged in blood; the surgeon had been sent
+for; he came and afforded her every possible relief.  I was
+distracted; he bade me have hope, but I observed he looked very
+grave.
+
+"By the skill of the surgeon, the poor girl was saved in the first
+instance from the arms of death, and for a few weeks she appeared
+to be rapidly recovering; by degrees, however, she became
+melancholy; a worm preyed upon her spirit; a slow fever took
+possession of her frame.  I subsequently learned that the same
+malicious female who had first carried to her an exaggerated
+account of the affair, and who was a distant relative of her own,
+frequently visited her, and did all in her power to excite her
+fears with respect to its eventual termination.  Time passed on in
+a very wretched manner.  Our friend the surgeon showing to us both
+every mark of kindness and attention.
+
+"It was owing to this excellent man that my innocence was
+eventually established.  Having been called to a town on the
+borders of Yorkshire to a medical consultation, he chanced to be
+taking a glass of wine with the landlord of the inn at which he
+stopped, when the waiter brought in a note to be changed, saying
+'That the Quaker gentleman, who had been for some days in the
+house, and was about to depart, had sent it to be changed, in order
+that he might pay his bill.'  The landlord took the note, and
+looked at it.  'A fifty-pound bill,' said he; 'I don't like
+changing bills of that amount, lest they should prove bad ones;
+however, as it comes from a Quaker gentleman, I suppose it is all
+right.'  The mention of a fifty-pound note aroused the attention of
+my friend, and he requested to be permitted to look at it; he had
+scarcely seen it, when he was convinced that it was one of the same
+description as those which had brought me into trouble, as it
+corresponded with them in two particular features, which the agent
+of the bank had pointed out to him and others as evidence of their
+spuriousness.  My friend, without a moment's hesitation, informed
+the landlord that the note was a bad one, expressing at the same
+time a great wish to see the Quaker gentleman who wanted to have it
+changed.  'That you can easily do,' said the landlord, and
+forthwith conducted him into the common room, where he saw a
+respectable-looking man, dressed like a Quaker, and seemingly about
+sixty years of age.
+
+"My friend, after a short apology, showed him the note which he
+held in his hand, stating that he had no doubt it was a spurious
+one, and begged to be informed where he had taken it, adding, that
+a particular friend of his was at present in trouble, owing to his
+having taken similar notes from a stranger at Horncastle; but that
+he hoped that he, the Quaker, could give information, by means of
+which the guilty party, or parties, could be arrested.  At the
+mention of Horncastle, it appeared to my friend that the Quaker
+gave a slight start.  At the conclusion of this speech, however, he
+answered, with great tranquillity, that he had received it in the
+way of business at -, naming one of the principal towns in
+Yorkshire, from a very respectable person, whose name he was
+perfectly willing to communicate, and likewise his own, which he
+said was James, and that he was a merchant residing at Liverpool;
+that he would write to his friend at -, requesting him to make
+inquiries on the subject; that just at that moment he was in a
+hurry to depart, having some particular business at a town about
+ten miles off, to go to which he had bespoken a post-chaise of the
+landlord; that with respect to the note, it was doubtless a very
+disagreeable thing to have a suspicious one in his possession, but
+that it would make little difference to him, as he had plenty of
+other money, and thereupon he pulled out a purse, containing
+various other notes, and some gold, observing, 'that his only
+motive for wishing to change the other note was a desire to be well
+provided with change;' and finally, that if they had any suspicion
+with respect to him, he was perfectly willing to leave the note in
+their possession till he should return, which he intended to do in
+about a fortnight.  There was so much plausibility in the speech of
+the Quaker, and his appearance and behaviour were so perfectly
+respectable, that my friend felt almost ashamed of the suspicion
+which at first he had entertained of him, though, at the same time,
+he felt an unaccountable unwillingness to let the man depart
+without some further interrogation.  The landlord, however, who did
+not wish to disoblige one who had been, and might probably be
+again, a profitable customer, declared that he was perfectly
+satisfied; and that he had no wish to detain the note, which he
+made no doubt the gentleman had received in the way of business,
+and that as the matter concerned him alone, he would leave it to
+him to make the necessary inquiries.  'Just as you please, friend,'
+said the Quaker, pocketing the suspicious note, 'I will now pay my
+bill.'  Thereupon he discharged the bill with a five-pound note,
+which he begged the landlord to inspect carefully, and with two
+pieces of gold.
+
+"The landlord had just taken the money, receipted the bill, and was
+bowing to his customer, when the door opened, and a lad, dressed in
+a kind of grey livery, appeared, and informed the Quaker that the
+chaise was ready.  'Is that boy your servant?' said the surgeon.
+'He is, friend,' said the Quaker.  'Hast thou any reason for asking
+me that question?'  'And has he been long in your service?'
+'Several years,' replied the Quaker, 'I took him into my house out
+of compassion, he being an orphan, but as the chaise is waiting, I
+will bid thee farewell.'  'I am afraid I must stop your journey for
+the present,' said the surgeon; 'that boy has exactly the same
+blemish in the eye which a boy had who was in company with the man
+at Horncastle, from whom my friend received the forged notes, and
+who there passed for his son.'  'I know nothing about that,' said
+the Quaker, 'but I am determined to be detained here no longer,
+after the satisfactory account which I have given as to the note's
+coming into my possession.'  He then attempted to leave the room,
+but my friend detained him, a struggle ensued, during which a wig
+which the Quaker wore fell off, whereupon he instantly appeared to
+lose some twenty years of his age.  'Knock the fellow down,
+father,' said the boy, 'I'll help you.'
+
+"And, forsooth, the pretended Quaker took the boy's advice, and
+knocked my friend down in a twinkling.  The landlord, however, and
+waiter, seeing how matters stood, instantly laid hold of him; but
+there can be no doubt that he would have escaped from the whole
+three, had not certain guests who were in the house, hearing the
+noise, rushed in, and helped to secure him.  The boy was true to
+his word, assisting him to the best of his ability, flinging
+himself between the legs of his father's assailants, causing
+several of them to stumble and fall.  At length, the fellow was
+secured, and led before a magistrate; the boy, to whom he was heard
+to say something which nobody understood, and to whom, after the
+man's capture, no one paid much attention, was no more seen.
+
+"The rest, as far as this man was concerned, may be told in a few
+words; nothing to criminate him was found on his person, but on his
+baggage being examined, a quantity of spurious notes were
+discovered.  Much of his hardihood now forsook him, and in the hope
+of saving his life he made some very important disclosures; amongst
+other things, he confessed that it was he who had given me the
+notes in exchange for the horses, and also the note to be changed.
+He was subsequently tried on two indictments, in the second of
+which I appeared against him.  He was condemned to die; but, in
+consideration of the disclosures he had made, his sentence was
+commuted to perpetual transportation.
+
+"My innocence was thus perfectly established before the eyes of the
+world, and all my friends hastened to congratulate me.  There was
+one who congratulated me more than all the rest--it was my beloved
+one, but--but--she was dying--"
+
+Here the old man drew his hand before his eyes, and remained for
+some time without speaking; at length he removed his hand, and
+commenced again with a broken voice:  "You will pardon me if I
+hurry over this part of my story, I am unable to dwell upon it.
+How dwell upon a period when I saw my only earthly treasure pine
+away gradually day by day, and knew that nothing could save her!
+She saw my agony, and did all she could to console me, saying that
+she was herself quite resigned.  A little time before her death she
+expressed a wish that we should be united.  I was too happy to
+comply with her request.  We were united, I brought her to this
+house, where, in less than a week, she expired in my arms."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+
+
+The Old Man's Story continued--Misery in the Head--The Strange
+Marks--Tea-dealer from London--Difficulties of the Chinese
+Language.
+
+
+After another pause the old man once more resumed his narration:-
+"If ever there was a man perfectly miserable it was myself, after
+the loss of that cherished woman.  I sat solitary in the house, in
+which I had hoped in her company to realize the choicest earthly
+happiness, a prey to the bitterest reflections; many people
+visited, and endeavoured to console me--amongst them was the
+clergyman of the parish, who begged me to be resigned, and told me
+that it was good to be afflicted.  I bowed my head, but I could not
+help thinking how easy it must be for those who feel no affliction,
+to bid others to be resigned, and to talk of the benefit resulting
+from sorrow; perhaps I should have paid more attention to his
+discourse than I did, provided he had been a person for whom it was
+possible to entertain much respect, but his own heart was known to
+be set on the things of this world.
+
+"Within a little time he had an opportunity, in his own case, of
+practising resignation, and of realizing the benefit of being
+afflicted.  A merchant, to whom he had entrusted all his fortune,
+in the hope of a large interest, became suddenly a bankrupt, with
+scarcely any assets.  I will not say that it was owing to this
+misfortune that the divine died in less than a month after its
+occurrence, but such was the fact.  Amongst those who most
+frequently visited me was my friend the surgeon; he did not confine
+himself to the common topics of consolation, but endeavoured to
+impress upon me the necessity of rousing myself, advising me to
+occupy my mind with some pursuit, particularly recommending
+agriculture; but agriculture possessed no interest for me, nor,
+indeed, any pursuit within my reach; my hopes of happiness had been
+blighted, and what cared I for anything? so at last he thought it
+best to leave me to myself, hoping that time would bring with it
+consolation; and I remained solitary in my house, waited upon by a
+male and a female servant.  Oh, what dreary moments I passed!  My
+only amusement--and it was a sad one--was to look at the things
+which once belonged to my beloved, and which were new in my
+possession.  Oh, how fondly would I dwell upon them!  There were
+some books; I cared not for books, but these had belonged to my
+beloved.  Oh, how fondly did I dwell on them!  Then there was her
+hat and bonnet--oh, me, how fondly did I gaze upon them! and after
+looking at her things for hours, I would sit and ruminate on the
+happiness I had lost.  How I execrated the moment I had gone to the
+fair to sell horses!  'Would that I had never been to Horncastle to
+sell horses!' I would say; 'I might at this moment have been
+enjoying the company of my beloved, leading a happy, quiet, easy
+life, but for that fatal expedition;' that thought worked on my
+brain, till my brain seemed to turn round.
+
+"One day I sat at the breakfast-table gazing vacantly around me, my
+mind was in a state of inexpressible misery; there was a whirl in
+my brain, probably like that which people feel who are rapidly
+going mad; this increased to such a degree that I felt giddiness
+coming upon me.  To abate this feeling I no longer permitted my
+eyes to wander about, but fixed them upon an object on the table,
+and continued gazing at it for several minutes without knowing what
+it was; at length, the misery in my head was somewhat stilled, my
+lips moved, and I heard myself saying, 'What odd marks!'  I had
+fastened my eyes on the side of a teapot, and by keeping them fixed
+upon it, had become aware of a fact that had escaped my notice
+before--namely, that there were marks upon it.  I kept my eyes
+fixed upon them, and repeated at intervals, 'What strange marks!'--
+for I thought that looking upon the marks tended to abate the whirl
+in my head:  I kept tracing the marks one after the other, and I
+observed that though they all bore a general resemblance to each
+other, they were all to a certain extent different.  The smallest
+portion possible of curious interest had been awakened within me,
+and, at last, I asked myself, within my own mind, 'What motive
+could induce people to put such odd marks on their crockery? they
+were not pictures, they were not letters; what motive could people
+have for putting them there?'  At last I removed my eyes from the
+teapot, and thought for a few moments about the marks; presently,
+however, I felt the whirl returning; the marks became almost
+effaced from my mind, and I was beginning to revert to my miserable
+ruminations, when suddenly methought I heard a voice say, 'The
+marks! the marks! cling to the marks? or--'  So I fixed my eyes
+again upon the marks, inspecting them more attentively, if
+possible, than I had done before, and, at last, I came to the
+conclusion that they were not capricious or fanciful marks, but
+were arranged systematically; when I had gazed at them for a
+considerable time, I turned the teapot round, and on the other side
+I observed marks of a similar kind, which I soon discovered were
+identical with the ones I had been observing.  All the marks were
+something alike, but all somewhat different, and on comparing them
+with each other, I was struck with the frequent occurrence of a
+mark crossing an upright line, or projecting from it, now on the
+right, now on the left side; and I said to myself, 'Why does this
+mark sometimes cross the upright line, and sometimes project?' and
+the more I thought on the matter, the less did I feel of the misery
+in my head.
+
+"The things were at length removed, and I sat, as I had for some
+time past been wont to sit after my meals, silent and motionless;
+but in the present instance my mind was not entirely abandoned to
+the one mournful idea which had so long distressed it.  It was, to
+a certain extent, occupied with the marks on the teapot; it is true
+that the mournful idea strove hard with the marks on the teapot for
+the mastery in my mind, and at last the painful idea drove the
+marks of the teapot out; they, however, would occasionally return
+and flit across my mind for a moment or two, and their coming was
+like a momentary relief from intense pain.  I thought once or twice
+that I would have the teapot placed before me, that I might examine
+the marks at leisure, but I considered that it would be as well to
+defer the re-examination of the marks till the next morning; at
+that time I did not take tea of an evening.  By deferring the
+examination thus, I had something to look forward to on the next
+morning.  The day was a melancholy one, but it certainly was more
+tolerable to me than any of the others had been since the death of
+my beloved.  As I lay awake that night I occasionally thought of
+the marks, and in my sleep methought I saw them upon the teapot
+vividly before me.  On the morrow, I examined the marks again; how
+singular they looked!  Surely they must mean something, and if so,
+what could they mean? and at last I thought within myself whether
+it would be possible for me to make out what they meant:  that day
+I felt more relief than on the preceding one, and towards night I
+walked a little about.
+
+"In about a week's time I received a visit from my friend the
+surgeon; after a little discourse, he told me that he perceived I
+was better than when he had last seen me, and asked me what I had
+been about; I told him that I had been principally occupied in
+considering certain marks which I had found on a teapot, and
+wondering what they could mean; he smiled at first, but instantly
+assuming a serious look, he asked to see the teapot.  I produced
+it, and after having surveyed the marks with attention, he observed
+that they were highly curious, and also wondered what they meant.
+'I strongly advise you,' said he, 'to attempt to make them out, and
+also to take moderate exercise, and to see after your concerns.'  I
+followed his advice; every morning I studied the marks on the
+teapot, and in the course of the day took moderate exercise, and
+attended to little domestic matters, as became the master of a
+house.
+
+"I subsequently learned that the surgeon, in advising me to study
+the marks, and endeavour to make out their meaning, merely hoped
+that by means of them my mind might by degrees be diverted from the
+mournful idea on which I had so long brooded.  He was a man well
+skilled in his profession, but had read and thought very little on
+matters unconnected with it.  He had no idea that the marks had any
+particular signification, or were anything else but common and
+fortuitous ones.  That I became at all acquainted with their nature
+was owing to a ludicrous circumstance which I will now relate.
+
+"One day, chancing to be at a neighbouring town, I was struck with
+the appearance of a shop recently established.  It had an immense
+bow-window, and every part of it, to which a brush could be
+applied, was painted in a gaudy flaming style.  Large bowls of
+green and black tea were placed upon certain chests, which stood at
+the window.  I stopped to look at them, such a display, whatever it
+may be at the present time, being, at the period of which I am
+speaking, quite uncommon in a country town.  The tea, whether black
+or green, was very shining and inviting, and the bowls, of which
+there were three, standing on as many chests, were very grand and
+foreign looking.  Two of these were white, with figures and trees
+painted upon them in blue; the other, which was the middlemost, had
+neither trees nor figures upon it, but, as I looked through the
+window, appeared to have on its sides the very same kind of marks
+which I had observed on the teapot at home; there were also marks
+on the tea-chests, somewhat similar, but much larger, and,
+apparently, not executed with so much care.  'Best teas direct from
+China,' said a voice close to my side; and looking round I saw a
+youngish man, with a frizzled head, flat face, and an immensely
+wide mouth, standing in his shirt-sleeves by the door.  'Direct
+from China,' said he; 'perhaps you will do me the favour to walk in
+and scent them?'  'I do not want any tea,' said I; 'I was only
+standing at the window examining those marks on the bowl and the
+chests.  I have observed similar ones on a teapot at home.'  'Pray
+walk in, sir,' said the young fellow, extending his mouth till it
+reached nearly from ear to ear; 'pray walk in, and I shall be happy
+to give you any information respecting the manners and customs of
+the Chinese in my power.'  Thereupon I followed him into his shop,
+where he began to harangue on the manners, customs, and
+peculiarities of the Chinese, especially their manner of preparing
+tea, not forgetting to tell me that the only genuine Chinese tea
+ever imported into England was to be found in his shop.  'With
+respect to those marks,' said he, 'on the bowl and chests, they are
+nothing more nor less than Chinese writing expressing something,
+though what I can't exactly tell you.  Allow me to sell you this
+pound of tea,' he added, showing me a paper parcel.  'On the
+envelope there is a printed account of the Chinese system of
+writing, extracted from authors of the most established reputation.
+These things I print, principally with the hope of, in some degree,
+removing the worse than Gothic ignorance prevalent amongst natives
+of these parts.  I am from London myself.  With respect to all that
+relates to the Chinese real imperial tea, I assure you sir, that--'
+Well, to make short of what you doubtless consider a very tiresome
+story, I purchased the tea and carried it home.  The tea proved
+imperially bad, but the paper envelope really contained some
+information on the Chinese language and writing, amounting to about
+as much as you gained from me the other day.  On learning that the
+marks on the teapot expressed words, I felt my interest with
+respect to them considerably increased, and returned to the task of
+inspecting them with greater zeal than before, hoping, by
+continually looking at them, to be able eventually to understand
+their meaning, in which hope you may easily believe I was
+disappointed, though my desire to understand what they represented
+continued on the increase.  In this dilemma I determined to apply
+again to the shopkeeper from whom I bought the tea.  I found him in
+rather low spirits, his shirt-sleeves were soiled, and his hair was
+out of curl.  On my inquiring how he got on, he informed me that he
+intended speedily to leave, having received little or no
+encouragement, the people, in their Gothic ignorance, preferring to
+deal with an old-fashioned shopkeeper over the way, who, so far
+from possessing any acquaintance with the polity and institutions
+of the Chinese, did not, he believed, know that tea came from
+China.  'You are come for some more, I suppose?' said he.  On
+receiving an answer in the negative he looked somewhat blank, but
+when I added that I came to consult with him as to the means which
+I must take in order to acquire the Chinese language he brightened
+up.  'You must get a grammar,' said he, rubbing his hands.  'Have
+you not one?' said I.  'No,' he replied, 'but any bookseller can
+procure you one.'  As I was taking my departure, he told me that as
+he was about to leave the neighbourhood, the bowl at the window,
+which bore the inscription, besides some other pieces of porcelain
+of a similar description, were at my service, provided I chose to
+purchase them.  I consented, and two or three days afterwards took
+from off his hands all the china in his possession which bore the
+inscriptions, paying what he demanded.  Had I waited till the sale
+of his effects, which occurred within a few weeks, I could probably
+have procured it for a fifth part of the sum which I paid, the
+other pieces realizing very little.  I did not, however, grudge the
+poor fellow what he got from me, as I considered myself to be
+somewhat in his debt for the information he had afforded me.
+
+"As for the rest of my story, it may be briefly told.  I followed
+the advice of the shopkeeper, and applied to a bookseller who wrote
+to his correspondent in London.  After a long interval, I was
+informed that if I wished to learn Chinese, I must do so through
+the medium of French, there being neither Chinese grammar nor
+dictionary in our language.  I was at first very much disheartened.
+I determined, however, at last to gratify my desire of learning
+Chinese, even at the expense of learning French.  I procured the
+books, and in order to qualify myself to turn them to account, took
+lessons in French from a little Swiss, the usher of a neighbouring
+boarding-school.  I was very stupid in acquiring French;
+perseverance, however, enabled me to acquire a knowledge sufficient
+for the object I had in view.  In about two years I began to study
+Chinese by myself, through the medium of the French."
+
+"Well," said I, "and how did you get on with the study of the
+Chinese?"
+
+And then the old man proceeded to inform me how he got on with the
+study of Chinese, enumerated all the difficulties he had had to
+encounter; dilating upon his frequent despondency of mind, and
+occasionally his utter despair of ever mastering Chinese.  He told
+me that more than once he had determined upon giving up the study,
+but when the misery in his head forthwith returned, to escape from
+which he had as often resumed it.  It appeared, however, that ten
+years elapsed before he was able to use ten of the two hundred and
+fourteen keys, which serve to undo the locks of Chinese writing.
+
+"And are you able at present to use the entire number?" I demanded.
+
+"Yes," said the old man; "I can at present use the whole number.  I
+know the key for every particular lock, though I frequently find
+the wards unwilling to give way."
+
+"Has nothing particular occurred to you," said I, "during the time
+that you have been prosecuting your studies?"
+
+"During the whole time in which I have been engaged in these
+studies," said the old man, "only one circumstance has occurred
+which requires any particular mention--the death of my old friend
+the surgeon--who was carried off suddenly by a fit of apoplexy.
+His death was a great shock to me, and for a time interrupted my
+studies.  His son, however, who succeeded him, was very kind to me,
+and, in some degree, supplied his father's place; and I gradually
+returned to my Chinese locks and keys."
+
+"And in applying keys to the Chinese locks you employ your time?"
+
+"Yes," said the old man, "in making out the inscriptions on the
+various pieces of porcelain, which I have at different times
+procured, I pass my time.  The first inscription which I translated
+was that on the teapot of my beloved."
+
+"And how many other pieces of porcelain may you have at present in
+your possession?"
+
+"About fifteen hundred."
+
+"And how did you obtain them?" I demanded.
+
+"Without much labour," said the old man, "in the neighbouring towns
+and villages--chiefly at auctions--of which, about twenty years
+ago, there were many in these parts."
+
+"And may I ask your reasons for confining your studies entirely to
+the crockery literature of China, when you have all the rest at
+your disposal?"
+
+"The inscriptions enable me to pass my time," said the old man;
+"what more would the whole literature of China do?"
+
+"And from these inscriptions," said I, "what a book it is in your
+power to make, whenever so disposed.  'Translations from the
+crockery literature of China.'  Such a book would be sure to take;
+even glorious John himself would not disdain to publish it."  The
+old man smiled.  "I have no desire for literary distinction," said
+he; "no ambition.  My original wish was to pass my life in easy,
+quiet obscurity, with her whom I loved.  I was disappointed in my
+wish; she was removed, who constituted my only felicity in this
+life; desolation came to my heart, and misery to my head.  To
+escape from the latter I had recourse to Chinese.  By degrees the
+misery left my head, but the desolation of the heart yet remains."
+
+"Be of good cheer," said I; "through the instrumentality of this
+affliction you have learnt Chinese, and, in so doing, learnt to
+practise the duties of hospitality.  Who but a man who could read
+Runes on a teapot, would have received an unfortunate wayfarer as
+you have received me?"
+
+"Well," said the old man, "let us hope that all is for the best.  I
+am by nature indolent, and, but for this affliction, should,
+perhaps, have hardly taken the trouble to do my duty to my fellow-
+creatures.  I am very, very indolent," said he, slightly glancing
+towards the clock; "therefore let us hope that all is for the best;
+but, oh! these trials, they are very hard to bear."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV
+
+
+
+The Leave-taking--Spirit of the Hearth--What's o'Clock?
+
+
+The next morning, having breakfasted with my old friend, I went
+into the stable to make the necessary preparations for my
+departure; there, with the assistance of a stable lad, I cleaned
+and caparisoned my horse, and then, returning into the house, I
+made the old female attendant such a present as I deemed would be
+some compensation for the trouble I had caused.  Hearing that the
+old gentleman was in his study, I repaired to him.  "I am come to
+take leave of you," said I, "and to thank you for all the
+hospitality which I have received at your hands."  The eyes of the
+old man were fixed steadfastly on the inscription which I had found
+him studying on a former occasion.  "At length," he murmured to
+himself, "I have it--I think I have it;" and then, looking at me,
+he said, "So you are about to depart?"
+
+"Yes," said I, "my horse will be at the front door in a few
+minutes; I am glad, however, before I go, to find that you have
+mastered the inscription."
+
+"Yes," said the old man, "I believe I have mastered it; it seems to
+consist of some verses relating to the worship of the Spirit of the
+Hearth."
+
+"What is the Spirit of the Hearth?" said I.
+
+"One of the many demons which the Chinese worship," said the old
+man; "they do not worship one God, but many."  And then the old man
+told me a great many highly-interesting particulars respecting the
+demon worship of the Chinese.
+
+After the lapse of at least half an hour I said, "I must not linger
+here any longer, however willing.  Horncastle is distant, and I
+wish to be there to-night.  Pray can you inform me what's o'clock?"
+
+The old man, rising, looked towards the clock which hung on the
+side of the room at his left hand, on the farther side of the table
+at which he was seated.
+
+"I am rather short-sighted," said I, "and cannot distinguish the
+number, at that distance."
+
+"It is ten o'clock," said the old man; "I believe somewhat past."
+
+"A quarter, perhaps?"
+
+"Yes," said the old man "a quarter or--"
+
+"Seven minutes, or ten minutes past ten."
+
+"I do not understand you."
+
+"Why, to tell you the truth," said the old man, with a smile,
+"there is one thing to the knowledge of which I could never exactly
+attain."
+
+"Do you mean to say," said I, "that you do not know what's
+o'clock?"
+
+"I can give a guess," said the old man, "to within a few minutes."
+
+"But you cannot tell the exact moment?"
+
+"No," said the old man.
+
+"In the name of wonder," said I, "with that thing there on the wall
+continually ticking in your ear, how comes it that you do not know
+what's o'clock?"
+
+"Why," said the old man, "I have contented myself with giving a
+tolerably good guess; to do more would have been too great
+trouble."
+
+"But you have learnt Chinese," said I.
+
+"Yes," said the old man, "I have learnt Chinese."
+
+"Well," said I, "I really would counsel you to learn to know what's
+o'clock as soon as possible.  Consider what a sad thing it would be
+to go out of the world not knowing what's o'clock.  A millionth
+part of the trouble required to learn Chinese would, if employed,
+infallibly teach you to know what's o'clock."
+
+"I had a motive for learning Chinese," said the old man, "the hope
+of appeasing the misery in my head.  With respect to not knowing
+what's o'clock, I cannot see anything particularly sad in the
+matter.  A man may get through the world very creditably without
+knowing what's o'clock.  Yet, upon the whole, it is no bad thing to
+know what's o'clock--you, of course, do?  It would be too good a
+joke if two people were to be together, one knowing Armenian and
+the other Chinese, and neither knowing what's o'clock.  I'll now
+see you off."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI
+
+
+
+Arrival at Horncastle--The Inn and Ostlers--The Garret--Figure of a
+Man with a Candle.
+
+
+Leaving the house of the old man who knew Chinese, but could not
+tell what was o'clock, I wended my way to Horncastle, which I
+reached in the evening of the same day, without having met any
+adventure on the way worthy of being marked down in this very
+remarkable history.
+
+The town was a small one, seemingly ancient, and was crowded with
+people and horses.  I proceeded, without delay, to the inn to which
+my friend the surgeon had directed me.  "It is of no use coming
+here," said two or three ostlers, as I entered the yard--"all full-
+-no room whatever;" whilst one added in an undertone, "That ere
+a'n't a bad-looking horse."  "I want to see the master of this
+inn," said I, as I dismounted from the horse.  "See the master,"
+said an ostler--the same who had paid the negative kind of
+compliment to the horse--"a likely thing, truly; my master is
+drinking wine with some of the grand gentry, and can't be disturbed
+for the sake of the like of you."  "I bring a letter to him," said
+I, pulling out the surgeon's epistle.  "I wish you would deliver it
+to him," I added, offering a half-crown.  "Oh, it's you, is it?"
+said the ostler, taking the letter and the half-crown; "my master
+will be right glad to see you; why, you ha'n't been here for many a
+year; I'll carry the note to him at once."  And with these words he
+hurried into the house.  "That's a nice horse, young man," said
+another ostler, "what will you take for it?" to which interrogation
+I made no answer.  "If you wish to sell him," said the ostler,
+coming up to me, and winking knowingly, "I think I and my partners
+might offer you a summut under seventy pounds;" to which kind and
+half-insinuated offer I made no reply, save by winking in the same
+kind of knowing manner in which I observed him wink.  "Rather
+leary!" said a third ostler.  "Well, young man, perhaps you will
+drink to-night with me and my partners, when we can talk the matter
+over."  Before I had time to answer, the landlord, a well-dressed,
+good-looking man, made his appearance with the ostler; he bore the
+letter in his hand.  Without glancing at me, he betook himself at
+once to consider the horse, going round him, and observing every
+point with the utmost minuteness.  At last, having gone round the
+horse three times, he stopped beside me, and keeping his eyes on
+the horse, bent his head towards his right shoulder.  "That horse
+is worth some money," said he, turning towards me suddenly, and
+slightly touching me on the arm with the letter which he held in
+his hand; to which observation I made no reply, save by bending my
+head towards the right shoulder as I had seen him do.  "The young
+man is going to talk to me and my partners about it to-night," said
+the ostler who had expressed an opinion that he and his friends
+might offer me somewhat under seventy pounds for the animal.
+"Pooh!" said the landlord, "the young man' knows what he is about;
+in the meantime lead the horse to the reserved stall, and see well
+after him.  My friend," said he, taking me aside after the ostler
+had led the animal away, "recommends you to me in the strongest
+manner, on which account alone I take you and your horse in.  I
+need not advise you not to be taken in, as I should say, by your
+look, that you are tolerably awake; but there are queer hands at
+Horncastle at this time, and those fellows of mine, you understand
+me--; but I have a great deal to do at present, so you must excuse
+me."  And thereupon went into the house.
+
+That same evening I was engaged at least two hours in the stable,
+in rubbing the horse down, and preparing him for the exhibition
+which I intended he should make in the fair on the following day.
+The ostler, to whom I had given the half-crown, occasionally
+assisted me, though he was too much occupied by the horses of other
+guests to devote any length of time to the service of mine; he more
+than once repeated to me his firm conviction that himself and
+partners could afford to offer me summut for the horse; and at a
+later hour when, in compliance with his invitation, I took a glass
+of summut with himself and partners, in a little room surrounded
+with corn-chests, on which we sat, both himself and partners
+endeavoured to impress upon me, chiefly by means of nods and winks,
+their conviction that they could afford to give me summut for the
+horse, provided I were disposed to sell him; in return for which
+intimation, with as many nods and winks as they had all
+collectively used, I endeavoured to impress upon them my conviction
+that I could get summut handsomer in the fair than they might be
+disposed to offer me, seeing as how--which how I followed by a wink
+and a nod, which they seemed perfectly to understand, one or two of
+them declaring that if the case was so, it made a great deal of
+difference, and that they did not wish to be any hindrance to me,
+more particularly as it was quite clear I had been an ostler like
+themselves.
+
+It was late at night when I began to think of retiring to rest.  On
+inquiring if there was any place in which I could sleep, I was
+informed that there was a bed at my service, provided I chose to
+sleep in a two-bedded room, one of the beds of which was engaged by
+another gentleman.  I expressed my satisfaction at this
+arrangement, and was conducted by a maid-servant up many pairs of
+stairs to a garret, in which were two small beds, in one of which
+she gave me to understand another gentleman slept; he had, however,
+not yet retired to rest; I asked who he was, but the maid-servant
+could give me no information about him, save that he was a highly
+respectable gentleman, and a friend of her master's.  Presently,
+bidding me good night, she left me with a candle; and I, having
+undressed myself and extinguished the light, went to bed.
+Notwithstanding the noises which sounded from every part of the
+house, I was not slow in falling asleep, being thoroughly tired.  I
+know not how long I might have been in bed, perhaps two hours, when
+I was partially awakened by a light shining upon my face,
+whereupon, unclosing my eyes, I perceived the figure of a man, with
+a candle in one hand, staring at my face, whilst with the other
+hand, he held back the curtain of the bed.  As I have said before,
+I was only partially awakened, my power of conception was
+consequently very confused; it appeared to me, however, that the
+man was dressed in a green coat; that he had curly brown or black
+hair, and that there was something peculiar in his look.  Just as I
+was beginning to recollect myself, the curtain dropped, and I
+heard, or thought I heard, a voice say, "Don't know the cove."
+Then there was a rustling like a person undressing, whereupon being
+satisfied that it was my fellow-lodger, I dropped asleep, but was
+awakened again by a kind of heavy plunge upon the other bed, which
+caused it to rock and creak, when I observed that the light had
+been extinguished, probably blown out, if I might judge from a
+rather disagreeable smell of burnt wick which remained in the room,
+and which kept me awake till I heard my companion breathing hard,
+when, turning on the other side, I was again once more speedily in
+the arms of slumber.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII
+
+
+
+Horncastle Fair.
+
+
+It had been my intention to be up and doing early on the following
+morning, but my slumbers proved so profound, that I did not wake
+until about eight; on arising, I again found myself the sole
+occupant of the apartment, my more alert companion having probably
+risen at a much earlier hour.  Having dressed myself, I descended,
+and going to the stable, found my horse under the hands of my
+friend the ostler, who was carefully rubbing him down.  "There
+a'n't a better horse in the fair," said he to me, "and as you are
+one of us, and appear to be all right, I'll give you a piece of
+advice--don't take less than a hundred and fifty for him; if you
+mind your hits, you may get it, for I have known two hundred given
+in this fair for one no better, if so good."  "Well," said I,
+"thank you for your advice, which I will take, and, if successful,
+will give you 'summut' handsome."  "Thank you," said the ostler;
+"and now let me ask whether you are up to all the ways of this here
+place?"  "I have never been here before," said I, "but I have a
+pair of tolerably sharp eyes in my head."  "That I see you have,"
+said the ostler, "but many a body, with as sharp a pair of eyes as
+yourn, has lost his horse in this fair, for want of having been
+here before, therefore," said he, "I'll give you a caution or two."
+Thereupon the ostler proceeded to give me at least half a dozen
+cautions, only two of which I shall relate to the reader: --the
+first, not to stop to listen to what any chance customer might have
+to say; and the last--the one on which he appeared to lay most
+stress--by no manner of means to permit a Yorkshireman to get up
+into the saddle, "for," said he, "if you do, it is three to one
+that he rides off with the horse; he can't help it; trust a cat
+amongst cream, but never trust a Yorkshireman on the saddle of a
+good horse; by-the-by," he continued, "that saddle of yours is not
+a particularly good one, no more is the bridle.  I tell you what,
+as you seem a decent kind of a young chap, I'll lend you a saddle
+and bridle of my master's, almost bran new; he won't object, I
+know, as you are a friend of his, only you must not forget your
+promise to come down with summut handsome after you have sold the
+animal."
+
+After a slight breakfast I mounted the horse, which, decked out in
+his borrowed finery, really looked better by a large sum of money
+than on any former occasion.  Making my way out of the yard of the
+inn, I was instantly in the principal street of the town, up and
+down which an immense number of horses were being exhibited, some
+led, and others with riders.  "A wonderful small quantity of good
+horses in the fair this time!" I heard a stout jockey-looking
+individual say, who was staring up the street with his side towards
+me.  "Halloo, young fellow!" said he, a few moments after I had
+passed, "whose horse is that?  Stop!  I want to look at him!"
+Though confident that he was addressing himself to me, I took no
+notice, remembering the advice of the ostler, and proceeded up the
+street.  My horse possessed a good walking step; but walking, as
+the reader knows, was not his best pace, which was the long trot,
+at which I could not well exercise him in the street, on account of
+the crowd of men and animals; however, as he walked along, I could
+easily perceive that he attracted no slight attention amongst those
+who, by their jockey dress and general appearance, I imagined to be
+connoisseurs; I heard various calls to stop, to none of which I
+paid the slightest attention.  In a few minutes I found myself out
+of the town, when, turning round for the purpose of returning, I
+found I had been followed by several of the connoisseur-looking
+individuals, whom I had observed in the fair.  "Now would be the
+time for a display," thought I; and looking around me I observed
+two five-barred gates, one on each side of the road, and fronting
+each other.  Turning my horse's head to one, I pressed my heels to
+his sides, loosened the reins, and gave an encouraging cry,
+whereupon the animal cleared the gate in a twinkling.  Before he
+had advanced ten yards in the field to which the gate opened, I had
+turned him round, and again giving him cry and rein, I caused him
+to leap back again into the road, and still allowing him head, I
+made him leap the other gate; and forthwith turning him round, I
+caused him to leap once more into the road, where he stood proudly
+tossing his head, as much as to say, "What more?"  "A fine horse! a
+capital horse!" said several of the connoisseurs.  "What do you ask
+for him?"  "Too much for any of you to pay," said I.  "A horse like
+this is intended for other kind of customers than any of you."
+"How do you know that?" said one; the very same person whom I had
+heard complaining in the street of the paucity of good horses in
+the fair.  "Come, let us know what you ask for him?"  "A hundred
+and fifty pounds!" said I; "neither more nor less."  "Do you call
+that a great price?" said the man.  "Why, I thought you would have
+asked double that amount!  You do yourself injustice, young man."
+"Perhaps I do," said I, "but that's my affair; I do not choose to
+take more."  "I wish you would let me get into the saddle," said
+the man; "the horse knows you, and therefore shows to more
+advantage; but I should like to see how he would move under me, who
+am a stranger.  Will you let me get into the saddle, young man?"
+"No," said I; "I will not let you get into the saddle."  "Why not?"
+said the man.  "Lest you should be a Yorkshireman," said I; "and
+should run away with the horse."  "Yorkshire?" said the man; "I am
+from Suffolk; silly Suffolk--so you need not be afraid of my
+running away with the horse."  "Oh! if that's the case," said I, "I
+should be afraid that the horse would run away with you; so I will
+by no means let you mount."  "Will you let me look in his mouth?"
+said the man.  "If you please," said I; "but I tell you, he's apt
+to bite."  "He can scarcely be a worse bite than his master," said
+the man, looking into the horse's mouth; "he's four off.  I say,
+young man, will you warrant this horse?"  "No," said I; "I never
+warrant horses; the horses that I ride can always warrant
+themselves."  "I wish you would let me speak a word to you," said
+he.  "Just come aside.  It's a nice horse," said he, in a half
+whisper, after I had ridden a few paces aside with him.  "It's a
+nice horse," said he, placing his hand upon the pommel of the
+saddle, and looking up in my face, "and I think I can find you a
+customer.  If you would take a hundred, I think my lord would
+purchase it, for he has sent me about the fair to look him up a
+horse, by which he could hope to make an honest penny."  "Well,"
+said I, "and could he not make an honest penny, and yet give me the
+price I ask?"  "Why," said the go-between, "a hundred and fifty
+pounds is as much as the animal is worth, or nearly so; and my
+lord, do you see--"  "I see no reason at all," said I, "why I
+should sell the animal for less than he is worth, in order that his
+lordship may be benefited by him; so that if his lordship wants to
+make an honest penny, he must find some person who would consider
+the disadvantage of selling him a horse for less than it is worth,
+as counterbalanced by the honour of dealing with a lord, which I
+should never do; but I can't be wasting my time here.  I am going
+back to the -, where, if you, or any person, are desirous of
+purchasing the horse, you must come within the next half hour, or I
+shall probably not feel disposed to sell him at all."  "Another
+word, young man," said the jockey; but without staying to hear what
+he had to say, I put the horse to his best trot, and re-entering
+the town, and threading my way as well as I could through the
+press, I returned to the yard of the inn, where, dismounting, I
+stood still, holding the horse by the bridle.
+
+I had been standing in this manner about five minutes, when I saw
+the jockey enter the yard, accompanied by another individual.  They
+advanced directly towards me.  "Here is my lord come to look at the
+horse, young man," said the jockey.  My lord, as the jockey called
+him, was a tall figure, of about five-and-thirty.  He had on his
+head a hat somewhat rusty, and on his back a surtout of blue rather
+the worse for wear.  His forehead, if not high, was exceedingly
+narrow; his eyes were brown, with a rat-like glare in them; the
+nose was rather long, and the mouth very wide; the cheek-bones
+high, and the cheeks, as to hue and consistency, exhibiting very
+much the appearance of a withered red apple; there was a gaunt
+expression of hunger in the whole countenance.  He had scarcely
+glanced at the horse, when drawing in his cheeks, he thrust out his
+lips very much after the manner of a baboon, when he sees a piece
+of sugar held out towards him.  "Is this horse yours?" said he,
+suddenly turning towards me, with a kind of smirk.  "It's my
+horse," said I; "are you the person who wishes to make an honest
+penny by it?"  "How!" said he, drawing up his head with a very
+consequential look, and speaking with a very haughty tone, "what do
+you mean?"  We looked at each other full in the face; after a few
+moments, the muscles of the mouth of him of the hungry look began
+to move violently, the face was puckered into innumerable wrinkles,
+and the eyes became half closed.  "Well," said I, "have you ever
+seen me before?  I suppose you are asking yourself that question."
+"Excuse me, sir," said he, dropping his lofty look, and speaking in
+a very subdued and civil tone, "I have never had the honour of
+seeing you before, that is"--said he, slightly glancing at me
+again, and again moving the muscles of his mouth, "no, I have never
+seen you before," he added, making me a bow.  "I have never had
+that pleasure; my business with you, at present, is to inquire the
+lowest price you are willing to take for this horse.  My agent here
+informs me that you ask one hundred and fifty pounds, which I
+cannot think of giving--the horse is a showy horse, but look, my
+dear sir, he has a defect here, and there in his near fore leg I
+observe something which looks very like a splint--yes, upon my
+credit," said he, touching the animal, "he has a splint, or
+something which will end in one.  A hundred and fifty pounds, sir!
+what could have induced you ever to ask anything like that for this
+animal?  I protest that, in my time, I have frequently bought a
+better for-- Who are you, sir?  I am in treaty for this horse,"
+said he to a man who had come up whilst he was talking, and was now
+looking into the horse's mouth.  "Who am I?" said the man, still
+looking into the horse's mouth; "who am I? his lordship asks me.
+Ah, I see, close on five," said he, releasing the horse's jaws, and
+looking at me.  This new corner was a thin, wiry-made individual,
+with wiry curling brown hair; his face was dark, and wore an arch
+and somewhat roguish expression; upon one of his eyes was a kind of
+speck or beam; he might be about forty, wore a green jockey coat,
+and held in his hand a black riding whip, with a knob of silver
+wire.  As I gazed upon his countenance, it brought powerfully to my
+mind the face which, by the light of the candle, I had seen staring
+over me on the preceding night, when lying in bed and half asleep.
+Close beside him, and seemingly in his company, stood an
+exceedingly tall figure, that of a youth, seemingly about one-and-
+twenty, dressed in a handsome riding dress, and wearing on his head
+a singular hat, green in colour, and with a very high peak.  "What
+do you ask for this horse?" said he of the green coat, winking at
+me with the eye which had a beam in it, whilst the other shone and
+sparkled like Mrs. Colonel W-'s Golconda diamond.  "Who are you,
+sir, I demand once more?" said he of the hungry look.  "Who am I?
+why, who should I be but Jack Dale, who buys horses for himself and
+other folk; I want one at present for this short young gentleman,"
+said he, motioning with his finger to the gigantic youth.  "Well,
+sir," said the other, "and what business have you to interfere
+between me and any purchase I may be disposed to make?"  "Well,
+then," said the other, "be quick and purchase the horse, or,
+perhaps, I may."  "Do you think I am to be dictated to by a fellow
+of your description?" said his lordship, "begone, or--"  "What do
+you ask for this horse?" said the other to me, very coolly.  "A
+hundred and fifty," said I.  "I shouldn't mind giving it to you,"
+said he.  "You will do no such thing," said his lordship, speaking
+so fast that he almost stuttered.  "Sir," said he to me, "I must
+give you what you ask; Symmonds, take possession of the animal for
+me," said he to the other jockey who attended him.  "You will
+please to do no such thing without my consent," said I, "I have not
+sold him."  "I have this moment told you that I will give you the
+price you demand," said his lordship; "is not that sufficient?"
+"No," said I, "there is a proper manner of doing everything--had
+you come forward in a manly and gentlemanly manner to purchase the
+horse, I should have been happy to sell him to you, but after all
+the fault you have found with him, I would not sell him to you at
+any price, so send your friend to find up another."  "You behave in
+this manner, I suppose," said his lordship, "because this fellow
+has expressed a willingness to come to your terms.  I would advise
+you to be cautious how you trust the animal in his hands; I think I
+have seen him before, and could tell you--"  "What can you tell of
+me?" said the other, going up to him; "except that I have been a
+poor dicky-boy, and that now I am a dealer in horses, and that my
+father was lagged; that's all you could tell of me, and that I
+don't mind telling myself:  but there are two things they can't say
+of me, they can't say that I am either a coward or a screw either,
+except so far as one who gets his bread by horses may be expected
+to be; and they can't say of me that I ever ate up an ice which a
+young woman was waiting for, or that I ever backed out of a fight.
+Horse!" said he, motioning with his finger tauntingly to the other;
+"what do you want with a horse, except to take the bread out of the
+mouth of a poor man--to-morrow is not the battle of Waterloo, so
+that you don't want to back out of danger, by pretending to have
+hurt yourself by falling from the creature's back, my lord of the
+white feather--come, none of your fierce looks--I am not afraid of
+you."  In fact, the other had assumed an expression of the
+deadliest malice, his teeth were clenched, his lips quivered, and
+were quite pale; the rat-like eyes sparkled, and he made a half
+spring, a la rat, towards his adversary, who only laughed.
+Restraining himself, however, he suddenly turned to his
+understrapper, saying, "Symmonds, will you see me thus insulted? go
+and trounce this scoundrel; you can, I know."  "Symmonds trounce
+me!" said the other, going up to the person addressed, and drawing
+his hand contemptuously over his face; "why, I beat Symmonds in
+this very yard in one round three years ago; didn't I, Symmonds?"
+said he to the understrapper, who held down his head, muttering, in
+a surly tone, "I didn't come here to fight; let every one take his
+own part."  "That's right, Symmonds," said the other, "especially
+every one from whom there is nothing to be got.  I would give you
+half-a-crown for all the trouble you have had, provided I were not
+afraid that my Lord Plume there would get it from you as soon as
+you leave the yard together.  Come, take yourselves both off;
+there's nothing to be made here."  Indeed, his lordship seemed to
+be of the same opinion, for after a further glance at the horse, a
+contemptuous look at me, and a scowl at the jockey, he turned on
+his heel, muttering something which sounded like fellows, and
+stalked out of the yard, followed by Symmonds.
+
+"And now, young man," said the jockey, or whatever he was, turning
+to me with an arch leer, "I suppose I may consider myself as the
+purchaser of this here animal, for the use and behoof of this young
+gentleman?" making a sign with his head to the tall young man by
+his side.  "By no means," said I, "I am utterly unacquainted with
+either of you, and before parting with the horse I must be
+satisfied as to the respectability of the purchaser."  "Oh! as to
+that matter," said he, "I have plenty of vouchers for my
+respectability about me;" and thrusting his hand into his bosom
+below his waistcoat, he drew out a large bundle of notes.  "These
+are the kind of things," said he, "which vouch best for a man's
+respectability."  "Not always," said I; "indeed, sometimes these
+kind of things need vouchers for themselves."  The man looked at me
+with a peculiar look.  "Do you mean to say that these notes are not
+sufficient notes?" said he, "because if you do I shall take the
+liberty of thinking you are not over civil, and when I thinks a
+person is not over and above civil I sometimes takes off my coat;
+and when my coat is off--"  "You sometimes knock people down," I
+added; "well, whether you knock me down or not, I beg leave to tell
+you that I am a stranger in this fair, and that I shall part with
+the horse to nobody who has no better guarantee for his
+respectability than a roll of bank-notes, which may be good or not
+for what I know, who am not a judge of such things."  "Oh! if you
+are a stranger here," said the man, "as I believe you are, never
+having seen you here before except last night, when I think I saw
+you above stairs by the glimmer of a candle--I say, if you are a
+stranger, you are quite right to be cautious; queer things being
+done in this fair, as nobody knows better than myself," he added
+with a leer; "but I suppose if the landlord of the house vouches
+for me and my notes, you will have no objection to part with the
+horse to me?"  "None whatever," said I, "and in the meantime the
+horse can return to the stable."
+
+Thereupon I delivered the horse to my friend the ostler.
+
+The landlord of the house on being questioned by me as to the
+character and condition of my new acquaintance, informed me that he
+was a respectable horsedealer, and an intimate friend of his,
+whereupon the purchase was soon brought to a satisfactory
+conclusion.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII
+
+
+
+High Dutch.
+
+
+It was evening:  and myself and the two acquaintances I had made in
+the fair--namely, the jockey and the tall foreigner--sat in a large
+upstairs room, which looked into a court; we had dined with several
+people connected with the fair at a long table d'hote; they had now
+departed, and we sat at a small side-table with wine and a candle
+before us; both my companions had pipes in their mouths--the jockey
+a common pipe, and the foreigner, one, the syphon of which, made of
+some kind of wood, was at least six feet long, and the bowl of
+which, made of a white kind of substance like porcelain, and
+capable of holding nearly an ounce of tobacco, rested on the
+ground.  The jockey frequently emptied and replenished his glass;
+the foreigner sometimes raised his to his lips, for no other
+purpose seemingly than to moisten them, as he never drained his
+glass.  As for myself, though I did not smoke, I had a glass before
+me, from which I sometimes took a sip.  The room, notwithstanding
+the window was flung open, was in general so filled with smoke,
+chiefly that which was drawn from the huge bowl of the foreigner,
+that my companions and I were frequently concealed from each
+other's eyes.  The conversation, which related entirely to the
+events of the fair, was carried on by the jockey and myself, the
+foreigner, who appeared to understand the greater part of what we
+said, occasionally putting in a few observations in broken English.
+At length the jockey, after the other had made some ineffectual
+attempts to express something intelligibly which he wished to say,
+observed, "Isn't it a pity that so fine a fellow as meinheer, and
+so clever a fellow too, as I believe him to be, is not a better
+master of our language?"
+
+"Is the gentleman a German?" said I; "if so, I can interpret for
+him anything he wishes to say."
+
+"The deuce you can," said the jockey, taking his pipe out of his
+mouth, and staring at me through the smoke.
+
+"Ha! you speak German," vociferated the foreigner in that language.
+"By Isten, I am glad of it!  I wanted to say--"  And here he said
+in German what he wished to say, and which was of no great
+importance, and which I translated into English.
+
+"Well, if you don't put me out," said the jockey; "what language is
+that--Dutch?"
+
+"High Dutch," said I.
+
+"High Dutch, and you speak High Dutch,--why, I had booked you for
+as great an ignoramus as myself, who can't write--no, nor
+distinguish in a book a great A from a bull's foot."
+
+"A person may be a very clever man," said I--"no, not a clever man,
+for clever signifies clerkly, and a clever man one who is able to
+read and write, and entitled to the benefit of his clergy or
+clerkship; but a person may be a very acute person without being
+able to read or write.  I never saw a more acute countenance than
+your own."
+
+"No soft soap," said the jockey, "for I never uses any.  However,
+thank you for your information; I have hitherto thought myself
+a'nition clever fellow, but from henceforth shall consider myself
+just the contrary, and only--what's the word?--confounded 'cute."
+
+"Just so," said I.
+
+"Well," said the jockey, "as you say you can speak High Dutch, I
+should like to hear you and master six foot six fire away at each
+other."
+
+"I cannot speak German," said I, "but I can understand tolerably
+well what others say in it."
+
+"Come no backing out," said the jockey, "let's hear you fire away
+for the glory of Old England."
+
+"Then you are a German?" said I, in German to the foreigner.
+
+"That will do," said the jockey, "keep it up."
+
+"A German!" said the tall foreigner.  "No, I thank God that I do
+not belong to the stupid sluggish Germanic race, but to a braver,
+taller, and handsomer people;" here taking the pipe out of his
+mouth, he stood up proudly erect, so that his head nearly touched
+the ceiling of the room, then reseating himself, and again putting
+the syphon to his lips, he added, "I am a Magyar."
+
+"What is that?" said I.
+
+The foreigner looked at me for a moment, somewhat contemptuously,
+through the smoke, then said, in a voice of thunder, "A Hungarian!"
+
+"What a voice the chap has when he pleases!" interposed the jockey;
+"what is he saying?"
+
+"Merely that he is a Hungarian," said I; but I added, "the
+conversation of this gentleman and myself in a language which you
+can't understand must be very tedious to you, we had better give it
+up."
+
+"Keep on with it," said the jockey, "I shall go on listening very
+contentedly till I fall asleep, no bad thing to do at most times."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX
+
+
+
+The Hungarian.
+
+
+"Then you are a countryman of Tekeli, and of the queen who made the
+celebrated water," said I, speaking to the Hungarian in German,
+which I was able to do tolerably well, owing to my having
+translated the Publisher's philosophy into that language, always
+provided I did not attempt to say much at a time.
+
+Hungarian.  Ah! you have heard of Tekeli, and of L'eau de la Reine
+d'Hongrie.  How is that?
+
+Myself.  I have seen a play acted, founded on the exploits of
+Tekeli, and have read Pigault Le Brun's beautiful romance, entitled
+the "Barons of Felsheim," in which he is mentioned.  As for the
+water, I have heard a lady, the wife of a master of mine, speak of
+it.
+
+Hungarian.  Was she handsome?
+
+Myself.  Very.
+
+Hungarian.  Did she possess the water?
+
+Myself.  I should say not; for I have heard her express a great
+curiosity about it.
+
+Hungarian.  Was she growing old?
+
+Myself.  Of course not; but why do you put all these questions?
+
+Hungarian.  Because the water is said to make people handsome, and
+above all, to restore to the aged the beauty of their youth.  Well!
+Tekeli was my countryman, and I have the honour of having some of
+the blood of the Tekelis in my veins, but with respect to the
+queen, pardon me if I tell you that she was not an Hungarian; she
+was a Pole--Ersebet by name, daughter of Wladislaus Locticus King
+of Poland; she was the fourth spouse of Caroly the Second, King of
+the Magyar country, who married her in 1320.  She was a great woman
+and celebrated politician, though at present chiefly known by her
+water.
+
+Myself.  How came she to invent it?
+
+Hungarian.  If her own account may be believed, she did not invent
+it.  After her death, as I have read in Florentius of Buda, there
+was found a statement of the manner in which she came by it,
+written in her own hand, on a fly-leaf of her breviary, to the
+following effect:- Being afflicted with a grievous disorder at the
+age of seventy-two, she received the medicine which was called her
+water, from an old hermit whom she never saw before or afterwards;
+it not only cured her, but restored to her all her former beauty,
+so that the King of Poland fell in love with her, and made her an
+offer of marriage, which she refused for the glory of God, from
+whose holy angel she believed she had received the water.  The
+receipt for making it and directions for using it, were also found
+on the fly-leaf.  The principal component parts were burnt wine and
+rosemary, passed through an alembic; a drachm of it was to be taken
+once a week, "etelbenn vagy italbann," in the food or the drink,
+early in the morning, and the cheeks were to be moistened with it
+every day.  The effects according to the statement, were wonderful-
+-and perhaps they were upon the queen; but whether the water has
+been equally efficacious on other people, is a point which I cannot
+determine.  I should wish to see some old woman who has been
+restored to youthful beauty by the use of L'eau de la Reine
+d'Hongrie.
+
+Myself.  Perhaps, if you did, the old gentlewoman would hardly be
+so ingenuous as the queen.  But who are the Hungarians--descendants
+of Attila and his people?
+
+The Hungarian shook his head, and gave me to understand that he did
+not believe that his nation were the descendants of Attila and his
+people, though he acknowledged that they were probably of the same
+race.  Attila and his armies, he said, came and disappeared in a
+very mysterious manner, and that nothing could be said with
+positiveness about them; that the people now known as Magyars first
+made their appearance in Muscovy in the year 884, under the
+leadership of Almus, called so from Alom, which, in the Hungarian
+language, signifies a dream; his mother, before his birth, having
+dreamt that the child with which she was enceinte would be the
+father of a long succession of kings, which, in fact, was the case;
+that after beating the Russians he entered Hungary, and coming to a
+place called Ungvar, from which many people believed that modern
+Hungary derived its name, he captured it, and held in it a grand
+festival, which lasted four days, at the end of which time he
+resigned the leadership of the Magyars to his son Arpad.  This
+Arpad and his Magyars utterly subdued Pannonia--that is, Hungary
+and Transylvania, wresting the government of it from the Sclavonian
+tribes who inhabited it, and settling down amongst them as
+conquerors!  After giving me this information, the Hungarian
+exclaimed with much animation,--"A goodly country that which they
+had entered on, consisting of a plain surrounded by mountains, some
+of which intersect it here and there, with noble rapid rivers, the
+grandest of which is the mighty Dunau; a country with tiny
+volcanoes, casting up puffs of smoke and steam, and from which hot
+springs arise, good for the sick; with many fountains, some of
+which are so pleasant to the taste as to be preferred to wine; with
+a generous soil which, warmed by a beautiful sun, is able to
+produce corn, grapes, and even the Indian weed; in fact, one of the
+finest countries in the world, which even a Spaniard would
+pronounce to be nearly equal to Spain.  Here they rested--
+meditating, however, fresh conquests.  Oh, the Magyars soon showed
+themselves a mighty people.  Besides Hungary and Transylvania, they
+subdued Bulgaria and Bosnia, and the land of Tot, now called
+Sclavonia.  The generals of Zoltan, the son of Arpad, led troops of
+horsemen to the banks of the Rhine.  One of them, at the head of a
+host, besieged Constantinople.  It was then that Botond engaged in
+combat with a Greek of gigantic stature, who came out of the city
+and challenged the two best men in the Magyar army.  'I am the
+feeblest of the Magyars,' said Botond, 'but I will kill thee;' and
+he performed his word, having previously given a proof of the
+feebleness of his arm by striking his battle-axe through the brazen
+gate, making a hole so big that a child of five years old could
+walk through it."
+
+Myself.  Of what religion were the old Hungarians?
+
+Hungarian.  They had some idea of a Supreme Being, whom they called
+Isten, which word is still used by the Magyars for God; but their
+chief devotion was directed to sorcerers and soothsayers, something
+like the Schamans of the Siberian steppes.  They were converted to
+Christianity chiefly through the instrumentality of Istvan or
+Stephen, called after his death St. Istvan, who ascended the throne
+in the year one thousand.  He was born in heathenesse, and his
+original name was Vojk:  he was the first kiraly, or king of the
+Magyars.  Their former leaders had been called fejedelmek, or
+dukes.  The Magyar language has properly no term either for king or
+house.  Kiraly is a word derived from the Sclaves; haz, or house,
+from the Germans, who first taught them to build houses, their
+original dwellings having been tilted waggons.
+
+Myself.  Many thanks for your account of the great men of your
+country.
+
+Hungarian.  The great men of my country!  I have only told you of
+the-- Well, I acknowledge that Almus and Arpad were great men, but
+Hungary has produced many greater; I will not trouble you by
+recapitulating all, but there is one name I cannot forbear
+mentioning--but you have heard of it--even at Horncastle, the name
+of Hunyadi must be familiar.
+
+Myself.  It may be so, though I rather doubt it; but, however that
+may be, I confess my ignorance.  I have never, until this moment,
+heard the name of Hunyadi.
+
+Hungarian.  Not of Hunyadi Janos, not of Hunyadi John--for the
+genius of our language compels us to put a man's Christian name
+after his other; perhaps you have heard of the name of Corvinus?
+
+Myself.  Yes, I have heard the name of Corvinus.
+
+Hungarian.  By my God, I am glad of it; I thought our hammer of
+destruction, our thunderbolt, whom the Greeks called Achilles, must
+be known to the people of Horncastle.  Well, Hunyadi and Corvinus
+are the same.
+
+Myself.  Corvinus means the man of the crow, or raven.  I suppose
+that your John, when a boy, climbed up to a crow or a raven's nest,
+and stole the young; a bold feat, well befitting a young hero.
+
+Hungarian.  By Isten, you are an acute guesser; a robbery there
+was, but it was not Hunyadi who robbed the raven, but the raven who
+robbed Hunyadi.
+
+Myself.  How was that?
+
+Hungarian.  In this manner:  Hunyadi, according to tradition, was
+the son of King Sigmond, by a peasant's daughter.  The king saw and
+fell in love with her, whilst marching against the vaivode of
+Wallachia.  He had some difficulty in persuading her to consent to
+his wishes, and she only yielded at last, on the king making her a
+solemn promise that, in the event of her becoming with child by
+him, he would handsomely provide for her and the infant.  The king
+proceeded on his expedition; and on his returning in triumph from
+Wallachia, again saw the girl, who informed him that she was
+enceinte by him; the king was delighted with the intelligence, gave
+the girl money, and at the same time a ring, requesting her, if she
+brought forth a son, to bring the ring to Buda with the child, and
+present it to him.  When her time was up, the peasant's daughter
+brought forth a fair son, who was baptized by the name of John.
+After some time the young woman communicated the whole affair to
+her elder brother, whose name was Gaspar, and begged him to convey
+her and the child to the king at Buda.  The brother consented, and
+both set out, taking the child with them.  On their way, the woman,
+wanting to wash her clothes, laid the child down, giving it the
+king's ring to play with.  A raven, who saw the glittering ring,
+came flying, and plucking it out of the child's hand, carried it up
+into a tree; the child suddenly began to cry, and the mother,
+hearing it, left her washing, and running to the child, forthwith
+missed the ring, but hearing the raven croak in the tree, she
+lifted up her eyes, and saw it with the ring in its beak.  The
+woman, in great terror, called her brother, and told him what had
+happened, adding that she durst not approach the king if the raven
+took away the ring.  Gaspar, seizing his cross-bow and quiver, ran
+to the tree, where the raven was yet with the ring, and discharged
+an arrow at it, but, being in a great hurry, he missed it; with his
+second shot he was more lucky, for he hit the raven in the breast,
+which, together with the ring, fell to the ground.  Taking up the
+ring, they went on their way, and shortly arrived at Buda.  One
+day, as the king was walking after dinner in his outer hall, the
+woman appeared before him with the child, and, showing him the
+ring, said, "Mighty lord! behold this token! and take pity upon me
+and your own son."  King Sigmond took the child and kissed it, and,
+after a pause, said to the mother, "You have done right in bringing
+me the boy; I will take care of you, and make him a nobleman."  The
+king was as good as his word, he provided for the mother; caused
+the boy to be instructed in knightly exercises, and made him a
+present of the town of Hunyad, in Transylvania, on which account he
+was afterwards called Hunyadi, and gave him, as an armorial sign, a
+raven bearing a ring in his beak.
+
+Such, oh young man of Horncastle! is the popular account of the
+birth of the great captain of Hungary, as related by Florentius of
+Buda.  There are other accounts of his birth, which is, indeed,
+involved in much mystery, and of the reason of his being called
+Corvinus, but as this is the most pleasing, and is, upon the whole,
+founded on quite as good evidence as the others, I have selected it
+for recitation.
+
+Myself.  I heartily thank you; but you must tell me something more
+of Hunyadi.  You call him your great captain; what did he do?
+
+Hungarian.  Do! what no other man of his day could have done.  He
+broke the power of the Turk when he was coming to overwhelm Europe.
+From the blows inflicted by Hunyadi, the Turk never thoroughly
+recovered; he has been frequently worsted in latter times, but none
+but Hunyadi could have routed the armies of Amurath and Mahomed the
+Second.
+
+Myself.  How was it that he had an opportunity of displaying his
+military genius?
+
+Hungarian.  I can hardly tell you, but his valour soon made him
+famous; King Albert made him Ban of Szorenyi.  He became eventually
+waivode of Transylvania, and governor of Hungary.  His first grand
+action was the defeat of Bashaw Isack; and though himself surprised
+and routed at St. Imre, he speedily regained his prestige by
+defeating the Turks, with enormous slaughter, killing their leader,
+Mezerbeg; and subsequently, at the battle of the Iron Gates, he
+destroyed ninety thousand Turks, sent by Amurath to avenge the late
+disgrace.  It was then that the Greeks called him Achilles.
+
+Myself.  He was not always successful.
+
+Hungarian.  Who could be always successful against the early Turk?
+He was defeated in the battle in which King Vladislaus lost his
+life, but his victories outnumbered his defeats three-fold.  His
+grandest victory--perhaps the grandest ever achieved by man--was
+over the terrible Mahomed the Second; who, after the taking of
+Constantinople in 1453, said, "One God in Heaven--one king on
+earth;" and marched to besiege Belgrade at the head of one hundred,
+and fifty thousand men; swearing by the beard of the prophet, "That
+he would sup within it ere two months were elapsed."  He brought
+with him dogs, to eat the bodies of the Christians whom he should
+take or slay; so says Florentius; hear what he also says:  The Turk
+sat down before the town towards the end of June, 1454, covering
+the Dunau and Szava with ships:  and on the 4th of July he began to
+cannonade Belgrade with cannons twenty-five feet long, whose roar
+could be heard at Szeged, a distance of twenty-four leagues, at
+which place Hunyadi had assembled his forces.  Hunyadi had been
+able to raise only fifteen thousand of well-armed and disciplined
+men, though he had with him vast bands of people, who called
+themselves Soldiers of the Cross, but who consisted of
+inexperienced lads from school, peasants, and hermits, armed with
+swords, slings, and clubs.  Hunyadi, undismayed by the great
+disparity between his forces and those of the Turk, advanced to
+relieve Belgrade, and encamped at Szalankemen with his army.  There
+he saw at once, that his first step must be to attack the flotilla;
+he therefore privately informed Szilagy, his wife's brother, who at
+that time defended Belgrade, that it was his intention to attack
+the ships of the Turks on the 14th day of July in front, and
+requested his co-operation in the rear.  On the 14th came on the
+commencement of the great battle of Belgrade, between Hunyadi and
+the Turk.  Many days it lasted.
+
+Myself.  Describe it.
+
+Hungarian.  I cannot.  One has described it well--Florentius of
+Buda.  I can only repeat a few of his words: --"On the appointed
+day, Hunyadi, with two hundred vessels, attacked the Turkish
+flotilla in front, whilst Szilagy, with forty vessels, filled with
+the men of Belgrade, assailed it in the rear; striving for the same
+object, they sunk many of the Turkish vessels, captured seventy-
+four, burnt many, and utterly annihilated the whole fleet.  After
+this victory, Hunyadi, with his army, entered Belgrade, to the
+great joy of the Magyars.  But though the force of Mahomed upon the
+water was destroyed, that upon the land remained entire; and with
+this, during six days and nights, he attacked the city without
+intermission, destroying its walls in many parts.  His last and
+most desperate assault was made on the 21st day of July.  Twice did
+the Turks gain possession of the outer town, and twice was it
+retaken with indescribable slaughter.  The next day the combat
+raged without ceasing till mid-day, when the Turks were again
+beaten out of the town, and pursued by the Magyars to their camp.
+There the combat was renewed, both sides displaying the greatest
+obstinacy, until Mahomed received a great wound over his left eye.
+The Turks then, turning their faces, fled, leaving behind them
+three hundred cannon in the hands of the Christians, and more than
+twenty-four thousand slain on the field of battle."
+
+Myself.  After that battle, I suppose Hunyadi enjoyed his triumphs
+in peace?
+
+Hungarian.  In the deepest, for he shortly died.  His great soul
+quitted his body, which was exhausted by almost superhuman
+exertions, on the 11th of August, 1456.  Shortly before he died,
+according to Florentius, a comet appeared, sent, as it would seem,
+to announce his coming end.  The whole Christian world mourned his
+loss.  The Pope ordered the cardinals to perform a funeral ceremony
+at Rome in his honour.  His great enemy himself grieved for him,
+and pronounced his finest eulogium.  When Mahomed the Second heard
+of his death, he struck his head for some time against the ground
+without speaking.  Suddenly he broke silence with these words,
+"Notwithstanding he was my enemy, yet do I bewail his loss; since
+the sun has shone in heaven, no Prince had ever yet such a man."
+
+Myself.  What was the name of his Prince?
+
+Hungarian.  Laszlo the Fifth; who, though under infinite
+obligations to Hunyadi, was anything but grateful to him; for he
+once consented to a plan which was laid to assassinate him,
+contrived by his mortal enemy Ulrik, Count of Cilejia; and after
+Hunyadi's death, caused his eldest son, Hunyadi Laszlo, to be
+executed on a false accusation, and imprisoned his younger son,
+Matyas, who, on the death of Laszlo, was elected by the Magyars to
+be their king, on the 24th of January, 1458.
+
+Myself.  Was this Matyas a good king?
+
+Hungarian.  Was Matyas Corvinus a good king?  O young man of
+Horncastle! he was the best and greatest that ever Hungary
+possessed, and, after his father, the most renowned warrior,--some
+of our best laws were framed by him.  It was he who organized the
+Hussar force, and it was he who took Vienna.  Why does your
+Government always send fools to represent it at Vienna?
+
+Myself.  I really cannot say; but with respect to the Hussar force,
+is it of Hungarian origin?
+
+Hungarian.  Its name shows its origin.  Huz, in Hungarian, is
+twenty and the Hussar force is so called because it is formed of
+twentieths.  A law was issued by which it was ordered that every
+Hungarian nobleman, out of every twenty dependents, should produce
+a well-equipped horseman, and with him proceed to the field of
+battle.
+
+Myself.  Why did Matyas capture Venna?
+
+Hungarian.  Because the Emperor Frederick took part against him
+with the King of Poland, who claimed the kingdom of Hungary for his
+son, and had also assisted the Turk.  He captured it in the year
+1487, but did not survive his triumph long, expiring there in the
+year 1490.  He was so veracious a man, that it was said of him,
+after his death, "Truth died with Matyas."  It might be added that
+the glory of Hungary departed with him.  I wish to say nothing more
+connected with Hungarian history.
+
+Myself.  Another word.  Did Matyas leave a son?
+
+Hungarian.  A natural son, Hunyadi John, called so after the great
+man.  He would have been universally acknowledged as King of
+Hungary but for the illegitimacy of his birth.  As it was, Ulaszlo,
+the son of the King of Poland, afterwards called Ulaszlo the
+Second, who claimed Hungary as being descended from Albert, was
+nominated king by a great majority of the Magyar electors.  Hunyadi
+John for some time disputed the throne with him; there was some
+bloodshed, but Hunyadi John eventually submitted, and became the
+faithful captain of Ulaszlo, notwithstanding that the Turk offered
+to assist him with an army of two hundred thousand men.
+
+Myself.  Go on.
+
+Hungarian.  To what?  Tche Drak, to the Mohacs Veszedelem.  Ulaszlo
+left a son, Lajos the Second, born without skin, as it is said,
+certainly without a head.  He, contrary to the advice of all his
+wise counsellors,--and amongst them was Batory Stephen, who became
+eventually King of Poland--engaged, with twenty-five thousand men,
+at Mohacs, Soliman the Turk, who had an army of two hundred
+thousand.  Drak! the Magyars were annihilated, King Lajos
+disappeared with his heavy horse and armour in a bog.  We call that
+battle, which was fought on the 29th of August, 1526, the
+destruction of Mohacs, but it was the destruction of Hungary.
+
+Myself.  You have twice used the word drak, what is the meaning of
+it?  Is it Hungarian?
+
+Hungarian.  No! it belongs to the mad Wallacks.  They are a nation
+of madmen on the other side of Transylvania.  Their country was
+formerly a fief of Hungary, like Moldavia, which is inhabited by
+the same race, who speak the same language and are equally mad.
+
+Myself.  What language do they speak?
+
+Hungarian.  A strange mixture of Latin and Sclavonian--they
+themselves being a mixed race of Romans and Sclavonians.  Trajan
+sent certain legions to form military colonies in Dacia; and the
+present Wallacks and Moldavians are, to a certain extent, the
+descendants of the Roman soldiers, who married the women of the
+country.  I say to a certain extent, for the Sclavonian element
+both in blood and language seems to prevail.
+
+Myself.  And what is drak?
+
+Hungarian.  Dragon; which the Wallacks use for "devil."  The term
+is curious, as it shows that the old Romans looked upon the dragon
+as an infernal being.
+
+Myself.  You have been in Wallachia?
+
+Hungarian.  I have, and glad I was to get out of it.  I hate the
+mad Wallacks.
+
+Myself.  Why do you call them mad?
+
+Hungarian.  They are always drinking or talking.  I never saw a
+Wallachian eating or silent.  They talk like madmen, and drink like
+madmen.  In drinking they use small phials, the contents of which
+they pour down their throats.  When I first went amongst them I
+thought the whole nation was under a course of physic, but the
+terrible jabber of their tongues soon undeceived me.  Drak was the
+first word I heard on entering Dacia, and the last when I left it.
+The Moldaves, if possible, drink more, and talk more than the
+Wallachians.
+
+Myself.  It is singular enough that the only Moldavian I have known
+could not speak.  I suppose he was born dumb.
+
+Hungarian.  A Moldavian born dumb!  Excuse me, the thing is
+impossible,--all Moldavians are born talking!  I have known a
+Moldavian who could not speak, but he was not born dumb.  His
+master, an Armenian, snipped off part of his tongue at Adrianople.
+He drove him mad with his jabber.  He is now in London, where his
+master has a house.  I have letters of credit on the house:  the
+clerk paid me money in London, the master was absent; the money
+which you received for the horse belonged to that house.
+
+Myself.  Another word with respect to Hungarian history.
+
+Hungarian.  Drak!  I wish to say nothing more about Hungarian
+history.
+
+Myself.  The Turk, I suppose, after Mohacs, got possession of
+Hungary?
+
+Hungarian.  Not exactly.  The Turk, upon the whole, showed great
+moderation; not so the Austrian.  Ferdinand the First claimed the
+crown of Hungary as being the cousin of Maria, widow of Lajos; he
+found too many disposed to support him.  His claim, however, was
+resisted by Zapolya John, a Hungarian magnate, who caused himself
+to be elected king.  Hungary was for a long time devastated by wars
+between the partisans of Zapolya and Ferdinand.  At last Zapolya
+called in the Turk.  Soliman behaved generously to him, and after
+his death befriended his young son, and Isabella his queen;
+eventually the Turks became masters of Transylvania and the greater
+part of Hungary.  They were not bad masters, and had many friends
+in Hungary, especially amongst those of the reformed faith, to
+which I have myself the honour of belonging; those of the reformed
+faith found the Mufti more tolerant than the Pope.  Many Hungarians
+went with the Turks to the siege of Vienna, whilst Tekeli and his
+horsemen guarded Hungary for them.  A gallant enterprise that siege
+of Vienna, the last great effort of the Turk; it failed, and he
+speedily lost Hungary, but he did not sneak from Hungary like a
+frightened hound.  His defence of Buda will not be soon forgotten,
+where Apty Basha, the governor, died fighting like a lion in the
+breach.  There's many a Hungarian would prefer Stamboul to Vienna.
+Why does your Government always send fools to represent it at
+Vienna?
+
+Myself.  I have already told you that I cannot say.  What became of
+Tekeli?
+
+Hungarian.  When Hungary was lost he retired with the Turks into
+Turkey.  Count Renoncourt, in his Memoirs, mentions having seen him
+at Adrianople.  The Sultan, in consideration of the services which
+he had rendered to the Moslem in Hungary, made over the revenues of
+certain towns and districts for his subsistence.  The count says
+that he always went armed to the teeth, and was always attended by
+a young female dressed in male attire, who had followed him in his
+wars, and had more than once saved his life.  His end is wrapped in
+mystery, I--whose greatest boast, next to being a Hungarian, is to
+be of his blood--know nothing of his end.
+
+Myself.  Allow me to ask who you are?
+
+Hungarian.  Egy szegeny Magyar Nemes ember, a poor Hungarian
+nobleman, son of one yet poorer.  I was born in Transylvania, not
+far to the west of good Coloscvar.  I served some time in the
+Austrian army as a noble Hussar, but am now equerry to a great
+nobleman, to whom I am distantly related.  In his service I have
+travelled far and wide, buying horses.  I have been in Russia and
+in Turkey, and am now at Horncastle, where I have had the
+satisfaction to meet with you, and to buy your horse, which is, in
+truth, a noble brute.
+
+Myself.  For a soldier and equerry you seem to know a great deal of
+the history of your country.
+
+Hungarian.  All I know is derived from Florentius of Buda, whom we
+call Budai Ferentz.  He was professor of Greek and Latin at the
+Reformed College of Debreczen, where I was educated; he wrote a
+work entitled "Magyar Polgari Lexicon," Lives of Great Hungarian
+Citizens.  He was dead before I was born, but I found his book,
+when I was a child, in the solitary home of my father, which stood
+on the confines of a puszta, or wilderness, and that book I used to
+devour in winter nights when the winds were whistling around the
+house.  Oh I how my blood used to glow at the descriptions of
+Magyar valour, and likewise of Turkish; for Florentius has always
+done justice to the Turk.  Many a passage similar to this have I
+got by heart; it is connected with a battle on the plain of Rigo,
+which Hunyadi lost:- "The next day, which was Friday, as the two
+armies were drawn up in battle array, a Magyar hero riding forth,
+galloped up and down, challenging the Turks to single combat.  Then
+came out to meet him the son of a renowned bashaw of Asia; rushing
+upon each other, both broke their lances, but the Magyar hero and
+his horse rolled over upon the ground, for the Turks had always the
+best horses."  O young man of Horncastle! if ever you learn
+Hungarian--and learn it assuredly you will after what I have told
+you--read the book of Florentius of Buda, even if you go to Hungary
+to get it, for you will scarcely find it elsewhere, and even there
+with difficulty, for the book has been long out of print.  It
+describes the actions of the great men of Hungary down to the
+middle of the sixteenth century; and besides being written in the
+purest Hungarian, has the merit of having for its author a
+professor of the Reformed College of Debreczen.
+
+Myself.  I will go to Hungary rather than not read it.  I am glad
+that the Turk beat the Magyar.  When I used to read the ballads of
+Spain I always sided with the Moor against the Christian.
+
+Hungarian.  It was a drawn fight after all, for the terrible horse
+of the Turk presently flung his own master, whereupon the two
+champions returned to their respective armies; but in the grand
+conflict which ensued, the Turks beat the Magyars, pursuing them
+till night, and striking them on the necks with their scymetars.
+The Turk is a noble fellow; I should wish to be a Turk, were I not
+a Magyar.
+
+Myself.  The Turk always keeps his word, I am told.
+
+Hungarian.  Which the Christian very seldom does, and even the
+Hungarian does not always.  In 1444 Ulaszlo made, at Szeged, peace
+with Amurath for ten years, which he swore with an oath to keep,
+but at the instigation of the Pope Julian he broke it, and induced
+his great captain, Hunyadi John, to share in the perjury.  The
+consequence was the battle of Varna, of the 10th of November, in
+which Hunyadi was routed, and Ulaszlo slain.  Did you ever hear his
+epitaph? it is both solemn and edifying:-
+
+
+Romulidae Cannas ego Varnam clade notavi;
+Discite rnortales non temerare fidem:
+Me nisi Pontifices jussissent rumpere foedus
+Non ferret Scythicum Pannonis ora jugum."
+
+
+"Halloo!" said the jockey, starting up from a doze in which he had
+been indulging for the last hour, his head leaning upon his breast,
+"what is that?  That's not high Dutch; I bargained for high Dutch,
+and I left you speaking high Dutch, as it sounded very much like
+the language of horses, as I have been told high Dutch does; but as
+for what you are speaking now, whatever you may call it, it sounds
+more like the language of another kind of animal.  I suppose you
+want to insult me, because I was once a dicky-boy."
+
+"Nothing of the kind," said I; "the gentleman was making a
+quotation in Latin."
+
+"Latin, was it?" said the jockey; "that alters the case.  Latin is
+genteel, and I have sent my eldest boy to an academy to learn it.
+Come, let us hear you fire away in Latin," he continued, proceeding
+to re-light his pipe, which, before going to sleep, he had laid on
+the table.
+
+"If you wish to follow the discourse in Latin," said the Hungarian,
+in very bad English, "I can oblige you; I learned to speak very
+good Latin in the college of Debreczen."
+
+"That's more," said I, "than I have done in the colleges where I
+have been; in any little conversation which we may yet have, I wish
+you would use German."
+
+"Well," said the jockey, taking a whiff, "make your conversation as
+short as possible, whether in Latin or Dutch, for, to tell you the
+truth, I am rather tired of merely playing listener."
+
+"You were saying you had been in Russia," said I; "I believe the
+Russians are part of the Sclavonian race."
+
+Hungarian.  Yes, part of the great Sclavonian family; one of the
+most numerous races in the world.  The Russians themselves are very
+numerous; would that the Magyars could boast of the fifth part of
+their number!
+
+Myself.  What is the number of the Magyars?
+
+Hungarian.  Barely four millions.  We came a tribe of Tartars into
+Europe, and settled down amongst Sclavonians, whom we conquered,
+but who never coalesced with us.  The Austrian at present plays in
+Pannonia the Sclavonian against us, and us against the Sclavonian;
+but the downfall of the Austrian is at hand; they, like us, are not
+a numerous people.
+
+Myself.  Who will bring about his downfall?
+
+Hungarian.  The Russians.  The Rysckie Tsar will lead his people
+forth, all the Sclavonians will join him, he will conquer all
+before him.
+
+Myself.  Are the Russians good soldiers?
+
+Hungarian.  They are stubborn and unflinching to an astonishing
+degree, and their fidelity to their Tsar is quite admirable.  See
+how the Russians behaved at Plescova, in Livonia, in the old time,
+against our great Batory Stephen; they defended the place till it
+was a heap of rubbish, and mark how they behaved after they had
+been made prisoners.  Stephen offered them two alternatives:- to
+enter into his service, in which they would have good pay,
+clothing, and fair treatment; or to be allowed to return to Russia.
+Without the slightest hesitation they, to a man, chose the latter,
+though well aware that their beloved Tsar, the cruel Ivan
+Basilowits, would put them all to death, amidst tortures the most
+horrible, for not doing what was impossible--preserving the town.
+
+Myself.  You speak Russian?
+
+Hungarian.  A little.  I was born in the vicinity of a Sclavonian
+tribe; the servants of our house were Sclavonians, and I early
+acquired something of their language, which differs not much from
+that of Russia; when in that country I quickly understood what was
+said.
+
+Myself.  Have the Russians any literature?
+
+Hungarian.  Doubtless; but I am not acquainted with it, as I do not
+read their language; but I know something of their popular tales,
+to which I used to listen in their izbushkas; a principal personage
+in these is a creation quite original--called Baba Yaga.
+
+Myself.  Who is the Baba Yaga?
+
+Hungarian.  A female phantom, who is described as hurrying along
+the puszta, or steppe, in a mortar, pounding with a pestle at a
+tremendous rate, and leaving a long trace on the ground behind her
+with her tongue, which is three yards long, and with which she
+seizes any men and horses coming in her way, swallowing them down
+into her capacious belly.  She has several daughters, very
+handsome, and with plenty of money; happy the young Mujik who
+catches and marries one of them, for they make excellent wives.
+
+"Many thanks," said I, "for the information you have afforded me:
+this is rather poor wine," I observed, as I poured out a glass--"I
+suppose you have better wine in Hungary?"
+
+"Yes, we have better wine in Hungary.  First of all there is Tokay,
+the most celebrated in the world, though I confess I prefer the
+wine of Eger--Tokay is too sweet."
+
+"Have you ever been at Tokay?"
+
+"I have," said the Hungarian.
+
+"What kind of place is Tokay?"
+
+"A small town situated on the Tyzza, a rapid river descending from
+the north; the Tokay Mountain is just behind the town, which stands
+on the right bank.  The top of the mountain is called Kopacs Teto,
+or the bald tip; the hill is so steep that during thunder-storms
+pieces frequently fall down upon the roofs of the houses.  It was
+planted with vines by King Lajos, who ascended the throne in 1342.
+The best wine called Tokay is, however, not made at Tokay, but at
+Kassau, two leagues farther into the Carpathians, of which Tokay is
+a spur.  If you wish to drink the best Tokay, you must go to
+Vienna, to which place all the prime is sent.  For the third time I
+ask you, O young man of Horncastle! why does your Government always
+send fools to represent it at Vienna?"
+
+"And for the third time I tell you, O son of Almus! that I cannot
+say; perhaps, however, to drink the sweet Tokay wine; fools, you
+know, always like sweet things."
+
+"Good," said the Hungarian; "it must be so, and when I return to
+Hungary, I will state to my countrymen your explanation of a
+circumstance which has frequently caused them great perplexity.
+Oh! the English are a clever people, and have a deep meaning in all
+they do.  What a vision of deep policy opens itself to my view!
+they do not send their fool to Vienna in order to gape at
+processions, and to bow and scrape at a base Papist court, but to
+drink at the great dinners the celebrated Tokay of Hungary, which
+the Hungarians, though they do not drink it, are very proud of, and
+by doing so to intimate the sympathy which the English entertain
+for their fellow religionists of Hungary.  Oh! the English are a
+deep people."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL
+
+
+
+The Horncastle Welcome--Tzernebock and Bielebock.
+
+
+The pipe of the Hungarian had, for some time past, exhibited
+considerable symptoms of exhaustion, little or no ruttling having
+been heard in the tube, and scarcely a particle of smoke, drawn
+through the syphon, having been emitted from the lips of the
+possessor.  He now rose from his seat, and going to a corner of the
+room, placed his pipe against the wall, then striding up and down
+the room, he cracked his fingers several times, exclaiming, in a
+half-musing manner, "Oh, the deep nation, which, in order to
+display its sympathy for Hungary, sends its fool to Vienna, to
+drink the sweet wine of Tokay!"
+
+The jockey, having looked for some time at the tall figure with
+evident approbation, winked at me with that brilliant eye of his on
+which there was no speck, saying, "'Did you ever see a taller
+fellow?"
+
+"Never," said I.
+
+"Or a finer?"
+
+"That's another question," said I, "which I am not so willing to
+answer; however, as I am fond of truth, and scorn to flatter, I
+will take the liberty of saying that I have seen a finer."
+
+"A finer! where?" said the jockey; whilst the Hungarian, who
+appeared to understand what we said, stood still, and looked full
+at me.
+
+"Amongst a strange set of people," said I, "whom, if I were to
+name, you would, I dare say, only laugh at me."
+
+"Who be they?" said the jockey.  "Come, don't be ashamed; I have
+occasionally kept queerish company myself."
+
+"The people whom we call gypsies," said I; "whom the Germans call
+Zigeuner, and who call themselves Romany chals."
+
+"Zigeuner!" said the Hungarian; "by Isten!  I do know those
+people."
+
+"Romany chals!" said the jockey; "whew!  I begin to smell a rat."
+
+"What do you mean by smelling a rat?" said I.
+
+"I'll bet a crown," said the jockey, "that you be the young chap
+what certain folks call 'the Romany Rye.'"
+
+"Ah!" said I, "how came you to know that name?"
+
+"Be not you he?" said the jockey.
+
+"Why, I certainly have been called by that name."
+
+"I could have sworn it," said the jockey; then rising from his
+chair, he laid his pipe on the table, took a large hand-bell which
+stood on the side-board, and going to the door, opened it, and
+commenced ringing in a most tremendous manner on the staircase.
+The noise presently brought up a waiter, to whom the jockey
+vociferated, "Go to your master, and tell him to send immediately
+three bottles of champagne, of the pink kind, mind you, which is
+twelve guineas a dozen;" the waiter hurried away, and the jockey
+resumed his seat and his pipe.  I sat in silent astonishment until
+the waiter returned with a basket containing the wine, which, with
+three long glasses, he placed on the table.  The jockey then got
+up, and going to a large bow-window at the end of the room, which
+looked into a court-yard, peeped out; then saying, "the coast is
+clear," he shut down the principal sash which was open for the sake
+of the air, and taking up a bottle of champagne, he placed another
+in the hands of the Hungarian, to whom he said something in
+private.  The latter, who seemed to understand him, answered by a
+nod.  The two then going to the end of the table fronting the
+window, and about eight paces from it, stood before it, holding the
+bottles by their necks; suddenly the jockey lifted up his arm.
+"Surely," said I, "you are not mad enough to fling that bottle
+through the window?"  "Here's to the Romany Rye; here's to the
+sweet master," said the jockey, dashing the bottle through the pane
+in so neat a manner that scarcely a particle of glass fell into the
+room.
+
+"Eljen edes csigany ur--eljen gul eray!" said the Hungarian,
+swinging round his bottle, and discharging it at the window; but,
+either not possessing the jockey's accuracy of aim, or reckless of
+the consequences, he flung his bottle so, that it struck against
+part of the wooden setting of the panes, breaking along with the
+wood and itself three or four panes to pieces.  The crash was
+horrid, and wine and particles of glass flew back into the room, to
+the no small danger of its inmates.  "What do you think of that?"
+said the jockey; "were you ever so honoured before?"  "Honoured!"
+said I.  "God preserve me in future from such honour;" and I put my
+finger to my cheek, which was slightly hurt by a particle of the
+glass.  "That's the way we of the cofrady honour great men at
+Horncastle," said the jockey.  "What, you are hurt! never mind; all
+the better; your scratch shows that you are the body the compliment
+was paid to."  "And what are you going to do with the other
+bottle?" said I.  "Do with it!" said the jockey, "why, drink it,
+cosily and comfortably, whilst holding a little quiet talk.  The
+Romany Rye at Horncastle, what an idea!"
+
+"And what will the master of the house say to all this damage which
+you have caused him!"
+
+"What will your master say, William?" said the jockey to the
+waiter, who had witnessed the singular scene just described without
+exhibiting the slightest mark of surprise.  William smiled, and
+slightly shrugging his shoulders, replied, "Very little, I dare
+say, sir; this a'n't the first time your honour has done a thing of
+this kind."  "Nor will it be the first time that I shall have paid
+for it," said the jockey; "well, I shall never have paid for a
+certain item in the bill with more pleasure than I shall pay for it
+now.  Come, William, draw the cork, and let us taste the pink
+champagne."
+
+The waiter drew the cork, and filled the glasses with a pinky
+liquor, which bubbled, hissed, and foamed.  "How do you like it?"
+said the jockey, after I had imitated the example of my companions,
+by despatching my portion at a draught.
+
+"It is wonderful wine," said I; "I have never tasted champagne
+before, though I have frequently heard it praised; it more than
+answers my expectations; but, I confess, I should not wish to be
+obliged to drink it every day."
+
+"Nor I," said the jockey, "for every-day drinking give me a glass
+of old port, or--"
+
+"Of hard old ale," I interposed, "which, according to my mind, is
+better than all the wine in the world."
+
+"Well said, Romany Rye," said the jockey, "just my own opinion;
+now, William, make yourself scarce."
+
+The waiter withdrew, and I said to the jockey, " How did you become
+acquainted with the Romany chals?"
+
+"I first became acquainted with them," said the jockey, "when I
+lived with old Fulcher the basketmaker, who took me up when I was
+adrift upon the world; I do not mean the present Fulcher, who is
+likewise called old Fulcher, but his father, who has been dead this
+many a year; while living with him in the caravan, I frequently met
+them in the green lanes, and of latter years I have had occasional
+dealings with them in the horse line."
+
+"And the gypsies have mentioned me to you?" said I.
+
+"Frequently," said the jockey, "and not only those of these parts;
+why, there's scarcely a part of England in which I have not heard
+the name of the Romany Rye mentioned by these people.  The power
+you have over them is wonderful; that is, I should have thought it
+wonderful, had they not more than once told me the cause."
+
+"And what is the cause?" said I, "for I am sure I do not know."
+
+"The cause is this," said the jockey, "they never heard a bad word
+proceed from your mouth, and never knew you do a bad thing."
+
+"They are a singular people," said I.
+
+"And what a singular language they have got," said the jockey.
+
+"Do you know it?" said I.
+
+"Only a few words," said the jockey, "they were always chary in
+teaching me any."
+
+"They were vary sherry to me too," said the Hungarian, speaking in
+broken English; "I only could learn from them half-a-dozen words,
+for example, gul eray, which, in the czigany of my country, means
+sweet gentleman; or edes ur in my own Magyar."
+
+"Gudlo Rye, in the Romany of mine, means a sugar'd gentleman," said
+I; "then there are gypsies in your country?"
+
+"Plenty," said the Hungarian, speaking German, "and in Russia and
+Turkey too; and wherever they are found, they are alike in their
+ways and language.  Oh, they are a strange race, and how little
+known!  I know little of them, but enough to say, that one horse-
+load of nonsense has been written about them; there is one Valter
+Scott--"
+
+"Mind what you say about him," said I; "he is our grand authority
+in matters of philology and history."
+
+"A pretty philologist," said the Hungarian, "who makes the gypsies
+speak Roth-Welsch, the dialect of thieves; a pretty historian, who
+couples together Thor and Tzernebock."
+
+"Where does he do that?" said I.
+
+"In his conceited romance of 'Ivanhoe,' he couples Thor and
+Tzernebock together, and calls them gods of the heathen Saxons."
+
+"Well," said I, "Thur or Thor was certainly a god of the heathen
+Saxons."
+
+"True," said the Hungarian; "but why couple him with Tzernebock?
+Tzernebock was a word which your Valter had picked up somewhere
+without knowing the meaning.  Tzernebock was no god of the Saxons,
+but one of the gods of the Sclaves, on the southern side of the
+Baltic.  The Sclaves had two grand gods to whom they sacrificed,
+Tzernebock and Bielebock; that is, the black and white gods, who
+represented the powers of dark and light.  They were overturned by
+Waldemar, the Dane, the great enemy of the Sclaves; the account of
+whose wars you will find in one fine old book, written by Saxo
+Gramaticus, which I read in the library of the college of
+Debreczen.  The Sclaves, at one time, were masters of all the
+southern shore of the Baltic, where their descendants are still to
+be found, though they have lost their language, and call themselves
+Germans; but the word Zernevitz near Dantzic, still attests that
+the Sclavic language was once common in those parts.  Zernevitz
+means the thing of blackness, as Tzernebock means the god of
+blackness.  Prussia itself merely means, in Sclavish, Lower Russia.
+There is scarcely a race or language in the world more extended
+than the Sclavic.  On the other side of the Dunau you will find the
+Sclaves and their language.  Czernavoda is Sclavic, and means black
+water; in Turkish, kara su; even as Tzernebock means black god; and
+Belgrade, or Belograd, means the white town; even as Bielebock, or
+Bielebog, means the white god.  Oh! he is one great ignorant, that
+Valter.  He is going, they say, to write one history about
+Napoleon.  I do hope that in his history he will couple his Thor
+and Tzernebock together.  By my God! it would be good diversion
+that."
+
+"Walter Scott appears to be no particular favourite of yours," said
+I.
+
+"He is not," said the Hungarian; "I hate him for his slavish
+principles.  He wishes to see absolute power restored in this
+country, and Popery also--and I hate him because--what do you
+think?  In one of his novels, published a few months ago, he has
+the insolence to insult Hungary in the presence of one of her sons.
+He makes his great braggart, Coeur de Lion, fling a Magyar over his
+head.  Ha! it was well for Richard that he never felt the gripe of
+a Hungarian.  I wish the braggart could have felt the gripe of me,
+who am 'a' magyarok kozt legkissebb,' the least among the Magyars.
+I do hate that Scott, and all his vile gang of Lowlanders and
+Highlanders.  The black corps, the fekete regiment of Matyjas
+Hunyadi, was worth all the Scots, high or low, that ever pretended
+to be soldiers; and would have sent them all headlong into the
+Black Sea, had they dared to confront it on its shores; but why be
+angry with an ignorant, who couples together Thor and Tzernebock?
+Ha! Ha!"
+
+"You have read his novels?" said I.
+
+"Yes, I read them now and then.  I do not speak much English, but I
+can read it well, and I have read some of his romances, and mean to
+read his 'Napoleon,' in the hope of finding Thor and Tzernebock
+coupled together in it, as in his high-flying 'Ivanhoe.'"
+
+"Come," said the jockey, "no more Dutch, whether high or low.  I am
+tired of it; unless we can have some English, I am off to bed."
+
+"I should be very glad to hear some English," said I; "especially
+from your mouth.  Several things which you have mentioned, have
+awakened my curiosity.  Suppose you give us your history?"
+
+"My history?" said the jockey.  "A rum idea! however, lest
+conversation should lag, I'll give it you.  First of all, however,
+a glass of champagne to each."
+
+After we had each taken a glass of champagne, the jockey commenced
+his history.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI
+
+
+
+The Jockey's Tale--Thieves' Latin--Liberties with Coin--The Smasher
+in Prison--Old Fulcher--Every One has His Gift--Fashion of the
+English.
+
+
+"My grandfather was a shorter, and my father was a smasher; the one
+was scragg'd, and the other lagg'd."
+
+I here interrupted the jockey by observing that his discourse was,
+for the greater part, unintelligible to me.
+
+"I do not understand much English," said the Hungarian, who, having
+replenished and resumed his mighty pipe, was now smoking away;
+"but, by Isten, I believe it is the gibberish which that great
+ignorant Valther Scott puts into the mouths of the folks he calls
+gypsies."
+
+"Something like it, I confess," said I, "though this sounds more
+genuine than his dialect, which he picked up out of the canting
+vocabulary at the end of the 'English Rogue,' a book which, however
+despised, was written by a remarkable genius.  What do you call the
+speech you were using?" said I, addressing myself to the jockey.
+
+"Latin," said the jockey, very coolly, "that is, that dialect of it
+which is used by the light-fingered gentry."
+
+"He is right," said the Hungarian; "it is what the Germans call
+Roth-Welsch:  they call it so because there are a great many Latin
+words in it, introduced by the priests, who, at the time of the
+Reformation, being too lazy to work and too stupid to preach,
+joined the bands of thieves and robbers who prowled about the
+country.  Italy, as you are aware, is called by the Germans
+Welschland, or the land of the Welschers; and I may add that
+Wallachia derives its name from a colony of Welschers which Trajan
+sent there.  Welsch and Wallack being one and the same word, and
+tantamount to Latin."
+
+"I dare say you are right," said I; "but why was Italy termed
+Welschland?"
+
+"I do not know," said the Hungarian.
+
+"Then I think I can tell you," said I; "it was called so because
+the original inhabitants were a Cimbric tribe, who were called
+Gwyltiad, that is, a race of wild people, living in coverts, who
+were of the same blood, and spoke the same language as the present
+inhabitants of Wales.  Welsh seems merely a modification of
+Gwyltiad.  Pray continue your history," said I to the jockey, "only
+please to do so in a language which we can understand, and first of
+all interpret the sentence with which you began it."
+
+"I told you that my grandfather was a shorter," said the jockey,
+"by which is meant a gentleman who shortens or reduces the current
+coin of these realms, for which practice he was scragged, that is,
+hung by the scrag of the neck.  And when I said that my father was
+a smasher, I meant one who passes forged notes, thereby doing his
+best to smash the Bank of England; by being lagged, I meant he was
+laid fast, that is, had a chain put round his leg and then
+transported."
+
+"Your explanations are quite satisfactory," said I; "the three
+first words are metaphorical, and the fourth, lagged, is the old
+genuine Norse term, lagda, which signifies laid, whether in
+durance, or in bed, has nothing to do with the matter.  What you
+have told me confirms me in an opinion which I have long
+entertained, that thieves' Latin is a strange mysterious speech,
+formed of metaphorical terms, and words derived from the various
+ancient languages.  Pray tell me, now, how the gentleman, your
+grandfather, contrived to shorten the coin of these realms?"
+
+"You shall hear," said the jockey; "but I have one thing to beg of
+you, which is, that when I have once begun my history you will not
+interrupt me with questions, I don't like them, they stops one, and
+puts one out of one's tale, and are not wanted; for anything which
+I think can't be understood, I should myself explain, without being
+asked.  My grandfather reduced or shortened the coin of this
+country by three processes.  By aquafortis, by clipping, and by
+filing.  Filing and clipping he employed in reducing all sorts of
+coin, whether gold or silver; but aquafortis he used merely in
+reducing gold coin, whether guineas, jacobuses, or Portugal pieces,
+otherwise called moidores, which were at one time as current as
+guineas.  By laying a guinea in aquafortis for twelve hours, he
+could filch from it to the value of ninepence, and by letting it
+remain there for twenty-four to the value of eighteenpence, the
+aquafortis eating the gold away, and leaving it like a sediment in
+the vessel.  He was generally satisfied with taking the value of
+ninepence from a guinea, of eighteenpence from a jacobus or
+moidore, or half-a-crown from a broad Spanish piece, whether he
+reduced them by aquafortis, filing, or clipping.  From a five-
+shilling piece, which is called a bull in Latin because it is round
+like a bull's head, he would file or clip to the value of
+fivepence, and from lesser coin in proportion.  He was connected
+with a numerous gang, or set, of people, who had given up their
+minds and talents entirely to shortening."
+
+Here I interrupted the jockey.  "How singular," said I, "is the
+fall and debasement of words; you talk of a gang, or set, of
+shorters; you are, perhaps, not aware that gang and set were, a
+thousand years ago, only connected with the great and Divine; they
+are ancient Norse words, which may be found in the heroic poems of
+the north, and in the Edda, a collection of mythologic and heroic
+songs.  In these poems we read that such and such a king invaded
+Norway with a gang of heroes; or so and so, for example, Erik
+Bloodaxe, was admitted to the set of gods; but at present gang and
+set are merely applied to the vilest of the vile, and the lowest of
+the low,--we say a gang of thieves and shorters, or a set of
+authors.  How touching is this debasement of words in the course of
+time; it puts me in mind of the decay of old houses and names.  I
+have known a Mortimer who was a hedger and ditcher, a Berners who
+was born in a workhouse, and a descendant of the De Burghs, who
+bore the falcon, mending old kettles, and making horse and pony
+shoes in a dingle."
+
+"Odd enough," said the jockey; "but you were saying you knew one
+Berners--man or woman?  I would ask."
+
+"A woman," said I.
+
+"What might her Christian name be?" said the jockey.
+
+"It is not to be mentioned lightly," said I, with a sigh.
+
+"I shouldn't wonder if it were Isopel," said the jockey with an
+arch glance of his one brilliant eye.
+
+"It was Isopel," said I; "did you know Isopel Berners?"
+
+"Ay, and have reason to know her," said the jockey, putting his
+hand into his left waistcoat pocket, as if to feel for something,
+"for she gave me what I believe few men could do--a most confounded
+whopping.  But now, Mr. Romany Rye, I have again to tell you that I
+don't like to be interrupted when I'm speaking, and to add that if
+you break in upon me a third time, you and I shall quarrel."
+
+"Pray proceed with your story," said I; "I will not interrupt you
+again."
+
+"Good!" said the jockey.  "Where was I?  Oh, with a set of people
+who had given up their minds to shortening!  Reducing the coin,
+though rather a lucrative, was a very dangerous trade.  Coin filed
+felt rough to the touch; coin clipped could be easily detected by
+the eye; and as for coin reduced by aquafortis, it was generally so
+discoloured that, unless a great deal of pains was used to polish
+it, people were apt to stare at it in a strange manner, and to say,
+'What have they been doing to this here gold?'  My grandfather, as
+I have said before, was connected with a gang of shorters, and
+sometimes shortened money, and at other times passed off what had
+been shortened by other gentry.
+
+"Passing off what had been shortened by others was his ruin; for
+once, in trying to pass off a broad piece which had been laid in
+aquafortis for four-and-twenty hours, and was very black, not
+having been properly rectified, he was stopped and searched, and
+other reduced coins being found about him, and in his lodgings, he
+was committed to prison, tried, and executed.  He was offered his
+life, provided he would betray his comrades; but he told the big-
+wigs, who wanted him to do so, that he would see them farther
+first, and died at Tyburn, amidst the cheers of the populace,
+leaving my grandmother and father, to whom he had always been a
+kind husband and parent--for, setting aside the crime for which he
+suffered, he was a moral man; leaving them, I say, to bewail his
+irreparable loss.
+
+"'Tis said that misfortune never comes alone; this is, however, not
+always the case.  Shortly after my grandfather's misfortune, as my
+grandmother and her son were living in great misery in
+Spitalfields, her only relation--a brother from whom she had been
+estranged some years, on account of her marriage with my
+grandfather, who had been in an inferior station to herself--died,
+leaving all his property to her and the child.  This property
+consisted of a farm of about a hundred acres, with its stock, and
+some money besides.  My grandmother, who knew something of
+business, instantly went into the country, where she farmed the
+property for her own benefit and that of her son, to whom she gave
+an education suitable to a person in his condition, till he was old
+enough to manage the farm himself.  Shortly after the young man
+came of age, my grandmother died, and my father, in about a year,
+married the daughter of a farmer, from whom he expected some little
+fortune, but who very much deceived him, becoming a bankrupt almost
+immediately after the marriage of his daughter, and himself and
+family going into the workhouse.
+
+"My mother, however, made my father an excellent wife; and if my
+father in the long run did not do well it was no fault of hers.  My
+father was not a bad man by nature, he was of an easy, generous
+temper, the most unfortunate temper, by the bye, for success in
+this life that any person can be possessed of, as those who have it
+are almost sure to be made dupes of by the designing.  But, though
+easy and generous, he was anything but a fool; he had a quick and
+witty tongue of his own when he chose to exert it, and woe be to
+those who insulted him openly, for there was not a better boxer in
+the whole country round.  My parents were married several years
+before I came into the world, who was their first and only child.
+I may be called an unfortunate creature; I was born with this beam
+or scale on my left eye, which does not allow me to see with it;
+and though I can see tolerably sharply with the other, indeed more
+than most people can with both of theirs, it is a great misfortune
+not to have two eyes like other people.  Moreover, setting aside
+the affair of my eye, I had a very ugly countenance; my mouth being
+slightly wrung aside, and my complexion swarthy.  In fact, I looked
+so queer that the gossips and neighbours, when they first saw me,
+swore I was a changeling--perhaps it would have been well if I had
+never been born; for my poor father, who had been particularly
+anxious to have a son, no sooner saw me than he turned away, went
+to the neighbouring town, and did not return for two days.  I am by
+no means certain that I was not the cause of his ruin, for till I
+came into the world he was fond of his home, and attended much to
+business, but afterwards he went frequently into company, and did
+not seem to care much about his affairs:  he was, however, a kind
+man, and when his wife gave him advice never struck her, nor do I
+ever remember that he kicked me when I came in his way, or so much
+as cursed my ugly face, though it was easy to see that he didn't
+over-like me.  When I was six years old I was sent to the village-
+school, where I was soon booked for a dunce, because the master
+found it impossible to teach me either to read or write.  Before I
+had been at school two years, however, I had beaten boys four years
+older than myself, and could fling a stone with my left hand (for
+if I am right-eyed I am left-handed) higher and farther than any
+one in the parish.  Moreover, no boy could equal me at riding, and
+no people ride so well or desperately as boys.  I could ride a
+donkey--a thing far more difficult to ride than a horse--at full
+gallop over hedges and ditches, seated, or rather floating upon his
+hinder part,--so, though anything but clever, as this here Romany
+Rye would say, I was yet able to do things which few other people
+could do.  By the time I was ten my father's affairs had got into a
+very desperate condition, for he had taken to gambling and horse-
+racing, and, being unsuccessful, had sold his stock, mortgaged his
+estate, and incurred very serious debts.  The upshot was, that
+within a little time all he had was seized, himself imprisoned, and
+my mother and myself put into a cottage belonging to the parish,
+which, being very cold and damp, was the cause of her catching a
+fever, which speedily carried her off.  I was then bound apprentice
+to a farmer, in whose service I underwent much coarse treatment,
+cold, and hunger.
+
+"After lying in prison near two years, my father was liberated by
+an Act for the benefit of insolvent debtors; he was then lost sight
+of for some time; at last, however, he made his appearance in the
+neighbourhood dressed like a gentleman, and seemingly possessed of
+plenty of money.  He came to see me, took me into a field, and
+asked me how I was getting on.  I told him I was dreadfully used,
+and begged him to take me away with him; he refused, and told me to
+be satisfied with my condition, for that he could do nothing for
+me.  I had a great love for my father, and likewise a great
+admiration for him on account of his character as a boxer, the only
+character which boys in general regard, so I wished much to be with
+him, independently of the dog's life I was leading where I was; I
+therefore said if he would not take me with him, I would follow
+him; he replied that I must do no such thing, for that if I did, it
+would be my ruin.  I asked him what he meant, but he made no reply,
+only saying that he would go and speak to the farmer.  Then taking
+me with him, he went to the farmer, and in a very civil manner said
+that he understood I had not been very kindly treated by him, but
+he hoped that in future I should be used better.  The farmer
+answered in a surly tone, that I had been only too well treated,
+for that I was a worthless young scoundrel; high words ensued, and
+the farmer, forgetting the kind of man he had to deal with, checked
+him with my grandsire's misfortune, and said he deserved to be
+hanged like his father.  In a moment my father knocked him down,
+and on his getting up, gave him a terrible beating, then taking me
+by the hand he hastened away; as we were going down a lane he said
+we were now both done for:  'I don't care a straw for that,
+father,' said I, 'provided I be with you.'  My father took me to
+the neighbouring town, and going into the yard of a small inn, he
+ordered out a pony and light cart which belonged to him, then
+paying his bill, he told me to mount upon the seat, and getting up
+drove away like lightning; we drove for at least six hours without
+stopping, till we came to a cottage by the side of a heath; we put
+the pony and cart into a shed, and went into the cottage, my father
+unlocking the door with a key which he took out of his pocket;
+there was nobody in the cottage when we arrived, but shortly after
+there came a man and a woman, and then some more people, and by ten
+o'clock at night there were a dozen of us in the cottage.  The
+people were companions of my father.  My father began talking to
+them in Latin, but I did not understand much of the discourse,
+though I believe it was about myself, as their eyes were frequently
+turned to me.  Some objections appeared to be made to what he said;
+however, all at last seemed to be settled, and we all sat down to
+some food.  After that, all the people got up and went away, with
+the exception of the woman, who remained with my father and me.
+The next day my father also departed, leaving me with the woman,
+telling me before he went that she would teach me some things which
+it behoved me to know.  I remained with her in the cottage upwards
+of a week; several of those who had been there coming and going.
+The woman, after making me take an oath to be faithful, told me
+that the people whom I had seen were a gang who got their
+livelihood by passing forged notes, and that my father was a
+principal man amongst them, adding, that I must do my best to
+assist them.  I was a poor ignorant child at that time, and I made
+no objection, thinking that whatever my father did must be right;
+the woman then gave me some instructions in the smasher's dialect
+of the Latin language.  I made great progress, because, for the
+first time in my life, I paid great attention to my lessons.  At
+last my father returned, and, after some conversation with the
+woman, took me away in his cart.  I shall be very short about what
+happened to my father and myself during two years.  My father did
+his best to smash the Bank of England by passing forged notes, and
+I did my best to assist him.  We attended races and fairs in all
+kinds of disguises; my father was a first-rate hand at a disguise,
+and could appear of all ages, from twenty to fourscore; he was,
+however, grabbed at last.  He had said, as I have told you, that he
+should be my ruin, but I was the cause of his, and all owing to the
+misfortune of this here eye of mine.  We came to this very place of
+Horncastle, where my father purchased two horses of a young man,
+paying for them with three forged notes, purporting to be Bank of
+Englanders of fifty pounds each, and got the young man to change
+another of the like amount; he at that time appeared as a
+respectable dealer, and I as his son, as I really was.
+
+"As soon as we had got the horses, we conveyed them to one of the
+places of call belonging to our gang, of which there were several.
+There they were delivered into the hands of our companions, who
+speedily sold them in a distant part of the country.  The sum which
+they fetched--for the gang kept very regular accounts--formed an
+important item on the next day of sharing, of which there were
+twelve in the year.  The young man, whom my father had paid for the
+horses with his smashing notes, was soon in trouble about them, and
+ran some risk, as I heard, of being executed; but he bore a good
+character, told a plain story, and, above all, had friends, and was
+admitted to bail; to one of his friends he described my father and
+myself.  This person happened to be at an inn in Yorkshire, where
+my father, disguised as a Quaker, attempted to pass a forged note.
+The note was shown to this individual, who pronounced it a forgery,
+it being exactly similar to those for which the young man had been
+in trouble, and which he had seen.  My father, however, being
+supposed a respectable man, because he was dressed as a Quaker--the
+very reason, by the bye, why anybody who knew aught of the Quakers
+would have suspected him to be a rogue--would have been let go, had
+I not made my appearance, dressed as his footboy.  The friend of
+the young man looked at my eye, and seized hold of my father, who
+made a desperate resistance, I assisting him, as in duty bound.
+Being, however, overpowered by numbers, he bade me by a look, and a
+word or two in Latin, to make myself scarce.  Though my heart was
+fit to break, I obeyed my father, who was speedily committed.  I
+followed him to the county town in which he was lodged, where
+shortly after I saw him tried, convicted, and condemned.  I then,
+having made friends with the jailor's wife, visited him in his
+cell, where I found him very much cast down.  He said, that my
+mother had appeared to him in a dream, and talked to him about a
+resurrection and Christ Jesus; there was a Bible before him, and he
+told me the chaplain had just been praying with him.  He reproached
+himself much, saying, he was afraid he had been my ruin, by
+teaching me bad habits.  I told him not to say any such thing, for
+that I had been the cause of his, owing to the misfortune of my
+eye.  He begged me to give over all unlawful pursuits, saying, that
+if persisted in, they were sure of bringing a person to
+destruction.  I advised him to try and make his escape, proposing,
+that when the turnkey came to let me out, he should knock him down,
+and fight his way out, offering to assist him; showing him a small
+saw, with which one of our companions, who was in the
+neighbourhood, had provided me, and with which he could have cut
+through his fetters in five minutes; but he told me he had no wish
+to escape, and was quite willing to die.  I was rather hard at that
+time; I am not very soft now; and I felt rather ashamed of my
+father's want of what I called spirit.  He was not executed after
+all; for the chaplain, who was connected with a great family, stood
+his friend, and got his sentence commuted, as they call it, to
+transportation; and in order to make the matter easy, he induced my
+father to make some valuable disclosures with respect to the
+smashers' system.  I confess that I would have been hanged before I
+would have done so, after having reaped the profit of it; that is,
+I think so now, seated comfortably in my inn, with my bottle of
+champagne before me.  He, however, did not show himself carrion; he
+would not betray his companions, who had behaved very handsomely to
+him, having given the son of a lord, a great barrister, not a
+hundred-pound forged bill, but a hundred hard guineas, to plead his
+cause, and another ten, to induce him, after pleading, to put his
+hand to his breast, and say, that, upon his honour, he believed the
+prisoner at the bar to be an honest and injured man.  No; I am glad
+to be able to say, that my father did not show himself exactly
+carrion, though I could almost have wished he had let himself--
+However, I am here with my bottle of champagne and the Romany Rye,
+and he was in his cell, with bread and water and the prison
+chaplain.  He took an affectionate leave of me before he was sent
+away, giving me three out of five guineas, all the money he had
+left.  He was a kind man, but not exactly fitted to fill my
+grandfather's shoes.  I afterwards learned that he died of fever,
+as he was being carried across the sea.
+
+"During the 'sizes I had made acquaintance with old Fulcher.  I was
+in the town on my father's account, and he was there on his son's,
+who, having committed a small larceny, was in trouble.  Young
+Fulcher, however, unlike my father, got off, though he did not give
+the son of a lord a hundred guineas to speak for him, and ten more
+to pledge his sacred honour for his honesty, but gave Counsellor P-
+-- one-and-twenty shillings to defend him, who so frightened the
+principal evidence, a plain honest farming-man, that he flatly
+contradicted what he had first said, and at last acknowledged
+himself to be all the rogues in the world, and, amongst other
+things, a perjured villain.  Old Fulcher, before he left the town
+with his son,--and here it will be well to say that he and his son
+left it in a kind of triumph, the base drummer of a militia
+regiment, to whom they had given half-a-crown, beating his drum
+before them--old Fulcher, I say, asked me to go and visit him,
+telling me where, at such a time, I might find him and his caravan
+and family; offering, if I thought fit, to teach me basket-making:
+so, after my father had been sent off, I went and found up old
+Fulcher, and became his apprentice in the basket-making line.  I
+stayed with him till the time of his death, which happened in about
+three months, travelling about with him and his family, and living
+in green lanes, where we saw gypsies and trampers, and all kinds of
+strange characters.  Old Fulcher, besides being an industrious
+basket-maker, was an out-and-out thief, as was also his son, and,
+indeed, every member of his family.  They used to make baskets
+during the day, and thieve during a great part of the night.  I had
+not been with them twelve hours before old Fulcher told me that I
+must thieve as well as the rest.  I demurred at first, for I
+remembered the fate of my father, and what he had told me about
+leaving off bad courses, but soon allowed myself to be over-
+persuaded; more especially as the first robbery I was asked to do
+was a fruit robbery.  I was to go with young Fulcher, and steal
+some fine Morell cherries, which grew against a wall in a
+gentleman's garden; so young Fulcher and I went and stole the
+cherries, one half of which we ate, and gave the rest to the old
+man, who sold them to a fruiterer ten miles off from the place
+where we had stolen them.  The next night old Fulcher took me out
+with himself.  He was a great thief, though in a small way.  He
+used to say, that they were fools, who did not always manage to
+keep the rope below their shoulders, by which he meant, that it was
+not advisable to commit a robbery, or do anything which could bring
+you to the gallows.  He was all for petty larceny, and knew where
+to put his hand upon any little thing in England, which it was
+possible to steal.  I submit it to the better judgment of the
+Romany Rye, who I see is a great hand for words and names, whether
+he ought not to have been called old Filcher, instead of Fulcher.
+I shan't give a regular account of the larcenies he committed
+during the short time I knew him, either alone by himself, or with
+me and his son.  I shall merely relate the last.
+
+"A melancholy gentleman, who lived a very solitary life, had a
+large carp in a shady pond in a meadow close to his house; he was
+exceedingly fond of it, and used to feed it with his own hand, the
+creature being so tame that it would put its snout out of the water
+to be fed when it was whistled to; feeding and looking at his carp
+were the only pleasures the poor melancholy gentleman possessed.
+Old Fulcher--being in the neighbourhood, and having an order from a
+fishmonger for a large fish, which was wanted at a great city
+dinner, at which His Majesty was to be present--swore he would
+steal the carp, and asked me to go with him.  I had heard of the
+gentleman's fondness for his creature, and begged him to let it be,
+advising him to go and steal some other fish; but old Fulcher
+swore, and said he would have the carp, although its master should
+hang himself; I told him he might go by himself, but he took his
+son and stole the carp, which weighed seventeen pounds.  Old
+Fulcher got thirty shillings for the carp, which I afterwards heard
+was much admired and relished by His Majesty.  The master, however,
+of the carp, on losing his favourite, became more melancholy than
+ever, and in a little time hanged himself.  'What's sport for one,
+is death to another,' I once heard at the village-school read out
+of a copy-book.
+
+"This was the last larceny old Fulcher ever committed.  He could
+keep his neck always out of the noose, but he could not always keep
+his leg out of the trap.  A few nights after, having removed to a
+distance, he went to an osier car in order to steal some osiers for
+his basket-making, for he never bought any.  I followed a little
+way behind.  Old Fulcher had frequently stolen osiers out of the
+car, whilst in the neighbourhood, but during his absence the
+property, of which the car was a part, had been let to a young
+gentleman, a great hand for preserving game.  Old Fulcher had not
+got far into the car before he put his foot into a man-trap.
+Hearing old Fulcher shriek, I ran up, and found him in a dreadful
+condition.  Putting a large stick which I carried into the jaws of
+the trap, I contrived to prize them open, and get old Fulcher's leg
+out, but the leg was broken.  So I ran to the caravan, and told
+young Fulcher of what had happened, and he and I helped his father
+home.  A doctor was sent for, who said that it was necessary to
+take the leg off, but old Fulcher, being very much afraid of pain,
+said it should not be taken off, and the doctor went away, but
+after some days, old Fulcher becoming worse, ordered the doctor to
+be sent for, who came and took off his leg, but it was then too
+late, mortification had come on, and in a little time old Fulcher
+died.
+
+"Thus perished old Fulcher; he was succeeded in his business by his
+son, young Fulcher, who, immediately after the death of his father,
+was called old Fulcher, it being our English custom to call
+everybody old, as soon as their fathers are buried; young Fulcher--
+I mean he who had been called young, but was now old Fulcher--
+wanted me to go out and commit larcenies with him; but I told him
+that I would have nothing more to do with thieving, having seen the
+ill effects of it, and that I should leave them in the morning.
+Old Fulcher begged me to think better of it, and his mother joined
+with him.  They offered, if I would stay, to give me Mary Fulcher
+as a mort, till she and I were old enough to be regularly married,
+she being the daughter of the one, and the sister of the other.  I
+liked the girl very well, for she had always been civil to me, and
+had a fair complexion and nice red hair, both of which I like,
+being a bit of a black myself; but I refused, being determined to
+see something more of the world than I could hope to do with the
+Fulchers, and, moreover, to live honestly, which I could never do
+along with them.  So the next morning I left them:  I was, as I
+said before, quite determined upon an honest livelihood, and I soon
+found one.  He is a great fool who is ever dishonest in England.
+Any person who has any natural gift, and everybody has some natural
+gift, is sure of finding encouragement in this noble country of
+ours, provided he will but exhibit it.  I had not walked more than
+three miles before I came to a wonderfully high church steeple,
+which stood close by the road; I looked at the steeple, and going
+to a heap of smooth pebbles which lay by the roadside, I took up
+some, and then went into the churchyard, and placing myself just
+below the tower, my right foot resting on a ledge, about two foot
+from the ground, I, with my left hand--being a left-handed person,
+do you see--flung or chucked up a stone, which, lighting on the top
+of the steeple, which was at least a hundred and fifty feet high,
+did there remain.  After repeating this feat two or three times, I
+'hulled' up a stone, which went clean over the tower, and then one,
+my right foot still on the ledge, which rising at least five yards
+above the steeple, did fall down just at my feet.  Without knowing
+it, I was showing off my gift to others besides myself, doing what,
+perhaps, not five men in England could do.  Two men, who were
+passing by, stopped and looked at my proceedings, and when I had
+done flinging came into the churchyard, and, after paying me a
+compliment on what they had seen me do, proposed that I should join
+company with them; I asked them who they were, and they told me.
+The one was Hopping Ned, and the other Biting Giles.  Both had
+their gifts, by which they got their livelihood; Ned could hop a
+hundred yards with any man in England, and Giles could lift up with
+his teeth any dresser or kitchen-table in the country, and,
+standing erect, hold it dangling in his jaws.  There's many a big
+oak table and dresser in certain districts of England, which bear
+the marks of Giles's teeth; and I make no doubt that, a hundred or
+two years hence, there'll be strange stories about those marks, and
+that people will point them out as a proof that there were giants
+in bygone time, and that many a dentist will moralize on the decays
+which human teeth have undergone.
+
+"They wanted me to go about with them, and exhibit my gift
+occasionally, as they did theirs, promising that the money that was
+got by the exhibitions should be honestly divided.  I consented,
+and we set off together, and that evening coming to a village, and
+putting up at the ale-house, all the grand folks of the village
+being there smoking their pipes, we contrived to introduce the
+subject of hopping--the upshot being that Ned hopped against the
+school-master for a pound, and beat him hollow; shortly after,
+Giles, for a wager, took up the kitchen table in his jaws, though
+he had to pay a shilling to the landlady for the marks he left,
+whose grandchildren will perhaps get money by exhibiting them.  As
+for myself, I did nothing that day, but the next, on which my
+companions did nothing, I showed off at hulling stones against a
+cripple, the crack man for stone-throwing, of a small town, a few
+miles farther on.  Bets were made to the tune of some pounds; I
+contrived to beat the cripple, and just contrived; for to do him
+justice I must acknowledge he was a first-rate hand at stones,
+though he had a game hip, and went sideways; his head, when he
+walked--if his movements could be called walking--not being above
+three feet above the ground.  So we travelled, I and my companions,
+showing off our gifts, Giles and I occasionally for a gathering,
+but Ned never hopping, unless against somebody for a wager.  We
+lived honestly and comfortably, making no little money by our
+natural endowments, and were known over a great part of England as
+'Hopping Ned,' 'Biting Giles,' and 'Hull over the Head Jack,' which
+was my name, it being the blackguard fashion of the English, do you
+see, to--"
+
+Here I interrupted the jockey.  "You may call it a blackguard
+fashion," said I, "and I dare say it is, or it would scarcely be
+English; but it is an immensely ancient one, and is handed down to
+us from our northern ancestry, especially the Danes, who were in
+the habit of giving people surnames, or rather nicknames, from some
+quality of body or mind, but generally from some disadvantageous
+peculiarity of feature; for there is no denying that the English,
+Norse, or whatever we may please to call them, are an envious,
+depreciatory set of people, who not only give their poor comrades
+contemptuous names, but their great people also.  They didn't call
+you the matchless Hurler, because, by doing so, they would have
+paid you a compliment, but Hull over the Head Jack, as much as to
+say that after all you were a scrub; so, in ancient time, instead
+of calling Regner the great conqueror, the Nation Tamer, they
+surnamed him Lodbrog, which signifies Rough or Hairy Breeks--lod or
+loddin signifying rough or hairy; and instead of complimenting
+Halgerdr, the wife of Gunnar of Hlitharend, the great champion of
+Iceland, upon her majestic presence, by calling her Halgerdr, the
+stately or tall; what must they do but term her Ha-brokr, or
+Highbreeks, it being the fashion in old times for Northern ladies
+to wear breeks, or breeches, which English ladies of the present
+day never think of doing; and just, as of old, they called Halgerdr
+Long-breeks, so this very day a fellow of Horncastle called, in my
+hearing, our noble-looking Hungarian friend here, Long-stockings.
+Oh, I could give you a hundred instances, both ancient and modern,
+of this unseemly propensity of our illustrious race, though I will
+only trouble you with a few more ancient ones; they not only
+nicknamed Regner, but his sons also, who were all kings, and
+distinguished men:  one, whose name was Biorn, they nicknamed
+Ironsides; another, Sigurd, Snake in the Eye; another, White Sark,
+or White Shirt--I wonder they did not call him Dirty Shirt; and
+Ivarr, another, who was king of Northumberland, they called
+Bienlausi, or the Legless, because he was spindle-shanked, had no
+sap in his bones, and consequently no children.  He was a great
+king, it is true, and very wise, nevertheless his blackguard
+countrymen, always averse, as their descendants are, to give credit
+to anybody, for any valuable quality or possession, must needs lay
+hold, do you see--"
+
+But before I could say any more, the jockey, having laid down his
+pipe, rose, and having taken off his coat, advanced towards me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII
+
+
+
+A Short-tempered Person--Gravitation--The Best Endowment--Mary
+Fulcher--Fair Dealing--Horse-witchery--Darius and his Groom--The
+Jockey's Tricks--The Two Characters--The Jockey's Song.
+
+
+The jockey, having taken off his coat and advanced towards me, as I
+have stated in the preceding chapter, exclaimed, in an angry tone,
+"This is the third time you have interrupted me in my tale, Mr.
+Rye; I passed over the two first times with a simple warning, but
+you will now please to get up and give me the satisfaction of a
+man."
+
+"I am really sorry," said I, "if I have given you offence, but you
+were talking of our English habits of bestowing nicknames, and I
+could not refrain from giving a few examples tending to prove what
+a very ancient habit it is."
+
+"But you interrupted me," said the jockey, "and put me out of my
+tale, which you had no right to do; and as for your examples, how
+do you know that I wasn't going to give some as old or older than
+yourn?  Now stand up, and I'll make an example of you."
+
+"Well," said I, "I confess it was wrong in me to interrupt you, and
+I ask your pardon."
+
+"That won't do," said the jockey, "asking pardon won't do."
+
+"Oh," said I, getting up, "if asking pardon does not satisfy you,
+you are a different man from what I considered you."
+
+But here the Hungarian, also getting up, interposed his tall form
+and pipe between us, saying in English, scarcely intelligible, "Let
+there be no dispute!  As for myself, I am very much obliged to the
+young man of Horncastle for his interruption, though he has told me
+that one of his dirty townsmen called me 'Long-stocking.'  By
+Isten! there is more learning in what he has just said than in all
+the verdammt English histories of Thor and Tzernebock I ever read."
+
+"I care nothing for his learning," said the jockey.  "I consider
+myself as good a man as he, for all his learning; so stand out of
+the way, Mr. Sixfooteleven, or--"
+
+"I shall do no such thing," said the Hungarian.  "I wonder you are
+not ashamed of yourself.  You ask a young man to drink champagne
+with you, you make him dronk, he interrupt you with very good
+sense; he ask your pardon, yet you not--"
+
+"Well," said the jockey, "I am satisfied.  I am rather a short-
+tempered person, but I bear no malice.  He is, as you say, drinking
+my wine, and has perhaps taken a drop too much, not being used to
+such high liquor; but one doesn't like to be put out of one's tale,
+more especially when one was about to moralize, do you see,
+oneself, and to show off what little learning one has.  However, I
+bears no malice.  Here is a hand to each of you; we'll take another
+glass each, and think no more about it."
+
+The jockey having shaken both of our hands, and filled our glasses
+and his own with what champagne remained in the bottle, put on his
+coat, sat down, and resumed his pipe and story.
+
+"Where was I?  Oh, roaming about the country with Hopping Ned and
+Biting Giles.  Those were happy days, and a merry and prosperous
+life we led.  However, nothing continues under the sun in the same
+state in which it begins, and our firm was soon destined to undergo
+a change.  We came to a village where there was a very high church
+steeple, and in a little time my comrades induced a crowd of people
+to go and see me display my gift by flinging stones above the heads
+of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, who stood at the four corners on
+the top, carved in stone.  The parson, seeing the crowd, came
+waddling out of his rectory to see what was going on.  After I had
+flung up the stones, letting them fall just where I liked--and one,
+I remember, fell on the head of Mark, where I dare say it remains
+to the present day--the parson, who was one of the description of
+people called philosophers, held up his hand, and asked me to let
+the next stone I flung up fall upon it.  He wished, do you see, to
+know with what weight the stone would fall down, and talked
+something about gravitation--a word which I could never understand
+to the present day, save that it turned out a grave matter to me.
+I, like a silly fellow myself, must needs consent, and, flinging
+the stone up to a vast height, contrived so that it fell into the
+parson's hand, which it cut dreadfully.  The parson flew into a
+great rage, more particularly as everybody laughed at him, and,
+being a magistrate, ordered his clerk, who was likewise constable,
+to conduct me to prison as a rogue and vagabond, telling my
+comrades that if they did not take themselves off, he would serve
+them in the same manner.  So Ned hopped off, and Giles ran after
+him, without making any gathering, and I was led to Bridewell, my
+mittimus following at the end of a week, the parson's hand not
+permitting him to write before that time.  In the Bridewell I
+remained a month, when, being dismissed, I went in quest of my
+companions, whom, after some time, I found up, but they refused to
+keep my company any longer; telling me that I was a dangerous
+character, likely to bring them more trouble than profit; they had,
+moreover, filled up my place.  Going into a cottage to ask for a
+drink of water, they saw a country fellow making faces to amuse his
+children; the faces were so wonderful that Hopping Ned and Biting
+Giles at once proposed taking him into partnership, and the man--
+who was a fellow not very fond of work--after a little entreaty,
+went away with them.  I saw him exhibit his gift, and couldn't
+blame the others for preferring him to me; he was a proper ugly
+fellow at all times, but when he made faces his countenance was
+like nothing human.  He was called Ugly Moses.  I was so amazed at
+his faces, that though poor myself I gave him sixpence, which I
+have never grudged to this day, for I never saw anything like them.
+The firm throve wonderfully after he had been admitted into it.  He
+died some little time ago, keeper of a public-house, which he had
+been enabled to take from the profits of his faces.  A son of his,
+one of the children he was making faces to when my comrades entered
+his door, is at present a barrister, and a very rising one.  He has
+his gift--he has not, it is true, the gift of the gab, but he has
+something better, he was born with a grin on his face, a quiet
+grin; he would not have done to grin through a collar like his
+father, and would never have been taken up by Hopping Ned and
+Biting Giles, but that grin of his caused him to be noticed by a
+much greater person than either; an attorney observing it took a
+liking to the lad, and prophesied that he would some day be heard
+of in the world; and in order to give him the first lift, took him
+into his office, at first to light fires and do such kind of work,
+and after a little time taught him to write, then promoted him to a
+desk, articled him afterwards, and being unmarried, and without
+children, left him what he had when he died.  The young fellow,
+after practising at the law some time, went to the bar, where, in a
+few years, helped on by his grin, for he had nothing else to
+recommend him, he became, as I said before, a rising barrister.  He
+comes our circuit, and I occasionally employ him, when I am obliged
+to go to law about such a thing as an unsound horse.  He generally
+brings me through--or rather that grin of his does--and yet I don't
+like the fellow, confound him, but I'm an oddity--no, the one I
+like, and whom I generally employ, is a fellow quite different, a
+bluff sturdy dog, with no grin on his face, but with a look that
+seems to say I am an honest man, and what cares I for any one?  And
+an honest man he is, and something more.  I have known coves with a
+better gift of the gab, though not many, but he always speaks to
+the purpose, and understands law thoroughly; and that's not all.
+When at college, for he has been at college, he carried off
+everything before him as a Latiner, and was first-rate at a game
+they call matthew mattocks.  I don't exactly know what it is, but I
+have heard that he who is first-rate at matthew mattocks is thought
+more of than if he were first-rate Latiner.
+
+"Well, the chap that I'm talking about, not only came out first-
+rate Latiner, but first-rate at matthew mattocks too; doing, in
+fact, as I am told by those who knows, for I was never at college
+myself, what no one had ever done before.  Well, he makes his
+appearance at our circuit, does very well, of course, but he has a
+somewhat high front, as becomes an honest man, and one who has beat
+every one at Latin and matthew mattocks; and one who can speak
+first-rate law and sense;--but see now, the cove with the grin, who
+has like myself never been at college; knows nothing of Latin, or
+matthew mattocks, and has no particular gift of the gab, has two
+briefs for his one, and I suppose very properly, for that grin of
+his curries favour with the juries; and mark me, that grin of his
+will enable him to beat the other in the long run.  We all know
+what all barrister coves looks forward to--a seat on the hop sack.
+Well, I'll bet a bull to fivepence, that the grinner gets upon it,
+and the snarler doesn't; at any rate, that he gets there first.  I
+calls my cove--for he is my cove--a snarler; because your first-
+rates at matthew mattocks are called snarlers, and for no other
+reason; for the chap, though with a high front, is a good chap, and
+once drank a glass of ale with me, after buying an animal out of my
+stable.  I have often thought it a pity he wasn't born with a grin
+on his face like the son of Ugly Moses.  It is true he would
+scarcely then have been an out and outer at Latin and matthew
+mattocks, but what need of either to a chap born with a grin?  Talk
+of being born with a silver spoon in one's mouth! give me a cove
+born with a grin on his face--a much better endowment.
+
+"I will now shorten my history as much as I can, for we have talked
+as much as folks do during a whole night in the Commons' House,
+though, of course, not with so much learning, or so much to the
+purpose, because--why?  They are in the House of Commons, and we in
+a public room of an inn at Horncastle.  The goodness of the ale, do
+ye see, never depending on what it is made of, oh, no! but on the
+fashion and appearance of the jug in which it is served up.  After
+being turned out of the firm, I got my living in two or three
+honest ways, which I shall not trouble you with describing.  I did
+not like any of them, however, as they did not exactly suit my
+humour; at last I found one which did.  One Saturday afternoon, I
+chanced to be in the cattle-market of a place about eighty miles
+from here; there I won the favour of an old gentleman who sold
+dickeys.  He had a very shabby squad of animals, without soul or
+spirit; nobody would buy them, till I leaped upon their hinder
+ends, and by merely wriggling in a particular manner, made them
+caper and bound so to people's liking, that in a few hours every
+one of them was sold at very sufficient prices.  The old gentleman
+was so pleased with my skill, that he took me home with him, and in
+a very little time into partnership.  It's a good thing to have a
+gift, but yet better to have two.  I might have got a very decent
+livelihood by throwing stones, but I much question whether I should
+ever have attained to the position in society which I now occupy,
+but for my knowledge of animals.  I lived very comfortably with the
+old gentleman till he died, which he did in about a fortnight after
+he had laid his old lady in the ground.  Having no children, he
+left me what should remain after he had been buried decently, and
+the remainder was six dickeys and thirty shillings in silver.  I
+remained in the dickey trade ten years, during which time I saved a
+hundred pounds.  I then embarked in the horse line.  One day, being
+in the--market on a Saturday, I saw Mary Fulcher with a halter
+round her neck, led about by a man, who offered to sell her for
+eighteen-pence.  I took out the money forthwith and bought her; the
+man was her husband, a basket-maker, with whom she had lived
+several years without having any children; he was a drunken,
+quarrel-some fellow, and having had a dispute with her the day
+before, he determined to get rid of her, by putting a halter round
+her neck and leading her to the cattle-market, as if she were a
+mare, which he had, it seems, a right to do;--all women being
+considered mares by old English law, and, indeed, still called
+mares in certain counties, where genuine old English is still
+preserved.  That same afternoon, the man who had been her husband,
+having got drunk in a public-house, with the money which he had
+received for her, quarrelled with another man, and receiving a blow
+under the ear, fell upon the floor, and died of artiflex; and in
+less than three weeks I was married to Mary Fulcher, by virtue of
+regular bans.  I am told she was legally my property by virtue of
+my having bought her with a halter round her neck; but, to tell you
+the truth, I think everybody should live by his trade, and I didn't
+wish to act shabbily towards our parson, who is a good fellow, and
+has certainly a right to his fees.  A better wife than Mary
+Fulcher--I mean Mary Dale--no one ever had; she has borne me
+several children, and has at all times shown a willingness to
+oblige me, and to be my faithful wife.  Amongst other things, I
+begged her to have done with her family, and I believe she has
+never spoken to them since.
+
+"I have thriven very well in business, and my name is up as being a
+person who can be depended on, when folks treats me handsomely.  I
+always make a point when a gentleman comes to me, and says, 'Mr.
+Dale,' or 'John,' for I have no objection to be called John by a
+gentleman--'I wants a good horse, and am ready to pay a good
+price'--I always makes a point, I say, to furnish him with an
+animal worth the money; but when I sees a fellow, whether he calls
+himself gentleman or not, wishing to circumvent me, what does I do?
+I doesn't quarrel with him; not I; but, letting him imagine he is
+taking me in, I contrives to sell him a screw for thirty pounds,
+not worth thirty shillings.  All honest respectable people have at
+present great confidence in me, and frequently commissions me to
+buy them horses at great fairs like this.
+
+"This short young gentleman was recommended to me by a great landed
+proprietor, to whom he bore letters of recommendation from some
+great prince in his own country, who had a long time ago been
+entertained at the house of the landed proprietor, and the
+consequence is, that I brings young six foot six to Horncastle, and
+purchases for him the horse of the Romany Rye.  I don't do these
+kind things for nothing, it is true; that can't be expected; for
+every one must live by his trade; but, as I said before, when I am
+treated handsomely, I treat folks so.  Honesty, I have discovered,
+as perhaps some other people have, is by far the best policy;
+though, as I also said before, when I'm along with thieves, I can
+beat them at their own game.  If I am obliged to do it, I can pass
+off the veriest screw as a flying drummedary, for even when I was a
+child I had found out by various means what may be done with
+animals.  I wish now to ask a civil question, Mr. Romany Rye.
+Certain folks have told me that you are a horse witch; are you one,
+or are you not?"
+
+"I, like yourself," said I, "know, to a certain extent, what may be
+done with animals."
+
+"Then how would you, Mr. Romany Rye, pass off the veriest screw in
+the world for a flying drummedary?"
+
+"By putting a small live eel down his throat; as long as the eel
+remained in his stomach, the horse would appear brisk and lively in
+a surprising degree."
+
+"And how would you contrive to make a regular kicker and biter
+appear so tame and gentle, that any respectable fat old gentleman
+of sixty, who wanted an easy goer, would be glad to purchase him
+for fifty pounds?"
+
+"By pouring down his throat four pints of generous old ale, which
+would make him so happy and comfortable, that he would not have the
+heart to kick or bite anybody, for a season at least."
+
+"And where did you learn all this?" said the jockey.
+
+"I have read about the eel in an old English book, and about the
+making drunk in a Spanish novel, and, singularly enough, I was told
+the same things by a wild blacksmith in Ireland.  Now tell me, do
+you bewitch horses in this way?"
+
+"I?" said the jockey; "mercy upon us!  I wouldn't do such things
+for a hatful of money.  No, no, preserve me from live eels and
+hocussing!  And now let me ask you, how would you spirit a horse
+out of a field?"
+
+"How would I spirit a horse out of a field?"
+
+"Yes; supposing you were down in the world, and had determined on
+taking up the horse-stealing line of business."
+
+"Why, I should-- But I tell you what, friend, I see you are trying
+to pump me, and I tell you plainly that I will hear something from
+you with respect to your art, before I tell you anything more.  Now
+how would you whisper a horse out of a field, provided you were
+down in the world, and so forth?"
+
+"Ah, ah, I see you are up to a game, Mr. Romany:  however, I am a
+gentleman in mind, if not by birth, and I scorn to do the
+unhandsome thing to anybody who has dealt fairly towards me.  Now
+you told me something I didn't know, and I'll tell you something
+which perhaps you do know.  I whispers a horse out of a field in
+this way:  I have a mare in my stable; well, in the early season of
+the year I goes into my stable--Well, I puts the sponge into a
+small bottle which I keeps corked.  I takes my bottle in my hand,
+and goes into a field, suppose by night, where there is a very fine
+stag horse.  I manage with great difficulty to get within ten yards
+of the horse, who stands staring at me just ready to run away.  I
+then uncorks my bottle, presses my fore-finger to the sponge, and
+holds it out to the horse, the horse gives a sniff, then a start,
+and comes nearer.  I corks up my bottle and puts it into my pocket.
+My business is done, for the next two hours the horse would follow
+me anywhere--the difficulty, indeed, would be to get rid of him.
+Now is that your way of doing business?"
+
+"My way of doing business?  Mercy upon us!  I wouldn't steal a
+horse in that way, or, indeed, in any way, for all the money in the
+world:  however, let me tell you, for your comfort, that a trick
+somewhat similar is described in the history of Herodotus."
+
+"In the history of Herod's ass!" said the jockey; "well, if I did
+write a book, it should be about something more genteel than a
+dickey."
+
+"I did not say Herod's ass," said I, "but Herodotus, a very genteel
+writer, I assure you, who wrote a history about very genteel
+people, in a language no less genteel than Greek, more than two
+thousand years ago.  There was a dispute as to who should be king
+amongst certain imperious chieftains.  At last they agreed to obey
+him whose horse should neigh first on a certain day, in front of
+the royal palace, before the rising of the sun; for you must know
+that they did not worship the person who made the sun as we do, but
+the sun itself.  So one of these chieftains, talking over the
+matter to his groom, and saying he wondered who would be king, the
+fellow said, 'Why you, master, or I don't know much about horses.'
+So the day before the day of trial, what does the groom do, but
+take his master's horse before the palace and introduce him to a
+mare in the stable, and then lead him forth again.  Well, early the
+next day all the chieftains on their horses appeared in front of
+the palace before the dawn of day.  Not a horse neighed but one,
+and that was the horse of him who had consulted with his groom,
+who, thinking of the animal within the stable, gave such a neigh
+that all the buildings rang.  His rider was forthwith elected king,
+and a brave king he was.  So this shows what seemingly wonderful
+things may be brought about by a little preparation."
+
+"It doth," said the jockey; "what was the chap's name?"
+
+"His name--his name--Darius Hystaspes."
+
+"And the groom's?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"And he made a good king?"
+
+"First-rate."
+
+"Only think! well, if he made a good king, what a wonderful king
+the groom would have made, through whose knowledge of 'orses he was
+put on the throne.  And now another question, Mr. Romany Rye, have
+you particular words which have power to soothe or aggravate
+horses?"
+
+"You should ask me," said I, "whether I have horses that can be
+aggravated or soothed by particular words.  No words have any
+particular power over horses or other animals who have never heard
+them before--how, should they?  But certain animals connect ideas
+of misery or enjoyment with particular words which they are
+acquainted with.  I'll give you an example.  I knew a cob in
+Ireland that could be driven to a state of kicking madness by a
+particular word, used by a particular person, in a particular tone;
+but that word was connected with a very painful operation which had
+been performed upon him by that individual, who had frequently
+employed it at a certain period whilst the animal had been under
+his treatment.  The same cob could be soothed in a moment by
+another word, used by the same individual in a very different kind
+of tone; the word was deaghblasda, or sweet tasted.  Some time
+after the operation, whilst the cob was yet under his hands, the
+fellow--who was what the Irish call a fairy smith--had done all he
+could to soothe the creature, and had at last succeeded by giving
+it gingerbread-buttons, of which the cob became passionately fond.
+Invariably, however, before giving it a button, he said,
+'Deaghblasda,' with which word the cob by degrees associated an
+idea of unmixed enjoyment:  so if he could rouse the cob to madness
+by the word which recalled the torture to its remembrance, he could
+as easily soothe it by the other word, which the cob knew would be
+instantly followed by the button, which the smith never failed to
+give him after using the word deaghblasda."
+
+"There is nothing wonderful to be done," said the jockey, "without
+a good deal of preparation, as I know myself.  Folks stare and
+wonder at certain things which they would only laugh at if they
+knew how they were done; and to prove what I say is true, I will
+give you one or two examples.  Can either of you lend me a
+handkerchief?  That won't do," said he, as I presented him with a
+silk one.  "I wish for a delicate white handkerchief.  That's just
+the kind of thing," said he, as the Hungarian offered him a fine
+white cambric handkerchief, beautifully worked with gold at the
+hems; "now you shall see me set this handkerchief on fire."  "Don't
+let him do so by any means," said the Hungarian, speaking to me in
+German, "it is the gift of a lady whom I highly admire, and I would
+not have it burnt for the world."  "He has no occasion to be under
+any apprehension," said the jockey, after I had interpreted to him
+what the Hungarian had said, "I will restore it to him uninjured,
+or my name is not Jack Dale."  Then sticking the handkerchief
+carelessly into the left side of his bosom, he took the candle,
+which by this time had burnt very low, and holding his head back,
+he applied the flame to the handkerchief, which instantly seemed to
+catch fire.  "What do you think of that?" said he to the Hungarian.
+"Why, that you have ruined me," said the latter.  "No harm done, I
+assure you," said the jockey, who presently, clapping his hand on
+his bosom, extinguished the fire, and returned the handkerchief to
+the Hungarian, asking him if it was burnt.  "I see no burn upon
+it," said the Hungarian; "but in the name of Gott, how could you
+set it on fire without burning it?"  "I never set it on fire at
+all," said the jockey; "I set this on fire," showing us a piece of
+half-burnt calico.  "I placed this calico above it, and lighted not
+the handkerchief, but the rag.  Now I will show you something else.
+I have a magic shilling in my pocket, which I can make run up along
+my arm.  But, first of all, I would gladly know whether either of
+you can do the like."  Thereupon the Hungarian and myself, putting
+our hands into our pockets, took out shillings, and endeavoured to
+make them run up our arms, but utterly failed; both shillings,
+after we had made two or three attempts, falling to the ground.
+"What noncomposses you both are," said the jockey; and placing a
+shilling on the end of the fingers of his right hand he made
+strange faces to it, drawing back his head, whereupon the shilling
+instantly began to run up his arm, occasionally hopping and jumping
+as if it were bewitched, always endeavouring to make towards the
+head of the jockey.
+
+"How do I do that?" said he, addressing himself to me.  "I really
+do not know," said I, "unless it is by the motion of your arm."
+"The motion of my nonsense," said the jockey, and, making a
+dreadful grimace, the shilling hopped upon his knee, and began to
+run up his thigh and to climb up his breast.  "How is that done?"
+said he again.  "By witchcraft, I suppose," said I.  "There you are
+right," said the jockey; "by the witchcraft of one of Miss Berners'
+hairs; the end of one of her long hairs is tied to that shilling by
+means of a hole in it, and the other end goes round my neck by
+means of a loop; so that, when I draw back my head, the shilling
+follows it.  I suppose you wish to know how I got the hair," said
+he, grinning at me.  "I will tell you.  I once, in the course of my
+ridings, saw Miss Berners beneath a hedge, combing out her long
+hair, and, being rather a modest kind of person, what must I do but
+get off my horse, tie him to a gate, go up to her, and endeavour to
+enter into conversation with her.  After giving her the sele of the
+day, and complimenting her on her hair, I asked her to give me one
+of the threads; whereupon she gave me such a look, and, calling me
+fellow, told me to take myself off.  'I must have a hair first,'
+said I, making a snatch at one.  I believe I hurt her; but, whether
+I did or not, up she started, and, though her hair was unbound,
+gave me the only drubbing I ever had in my life.  Lor! how, with
+her right hand, she fibbed me whilst she held me round the neck
+with her left arm; I was soon glad to beg her pardon on my knees,
+which she gave me in a moment, when she saw me in that condition,
+being the most placable creature in the world, and not only her
+pardon, but one of the hairs which I longed for, which I put
+through a shilling, with which I have on evenings after fairs, like
+this, frequently worked what seemed to those who looked on
+downright witchcraft, but which is nothing more than pleasant
+deception.  And now, Mr. Romany Rye, to testify my regard for you,
+I give you the shilling and the hair.  I think you have a kind of
+respect for Miss Berners; but whether you have or not, keep them as
+long as you can, and whenever you look at them think of the finest
+woman in England, and of John Dale, the jockey of Horncastle.  I
+believe I have told you my history," said he--"no, not quite; there
+is one circumstance I had passed over.  I told you that I have
+thriven very well in business, and so I have, upon the whole; at
+any rate, I find myself comfortably off now.  I have horses, money,
+and owe nobody a groat; at any rate, nothing but what I could pay
+to-morrow.  Yet I have had my dreary day, ay, after I had obtained
+what I call a station in the world.  All of a sudden, about five
+years ago, everything seemed to go wrong with me--horses became
+sick or died, people who owed me money broke or ran away, my house
+caught fire, in fact, everything went against me; and not from any
+mismanagement of my own.  I looked round for help, but--what do you
+think?--nobody would help me.  Somehow or other it had got abroad
+that I was in difficulties, and everybody seemed disposed to avoid
+me, as if I had got the plague.  Those who were always offering me
+help when I wanted none, now, when they thought me in trouble,
+talked of arresting me.  Yes; two particular friends of mine, who
+had always been offering me their purses when my own was stuffed
+full, now talked of arresting me, though I only owed the scoundrels
+a hundred pounds each; and they would have done so, provided I had
+not paid them what I owed them; and how did I do that?  Why, I was
+able to do it because I found a friend--and who was that friend?
+Why, a man who has since been hung, of whom everybody has heard,
+and of whom everybody for the next hundred years will occasionally
+talk.
+
+"One day, whilst in trouble, I was visited by a person I had
+occasionally met at sporting-dinners.  He came to look after a
+Suffolk Punch, the best horse, by the bye, that anybody can
+purchase to drive, it being the only animal of the horse kind in
+England that will pull twice at a dead weight.  I told him that I
+had none at that time that I could recommend; in fact, that every
+horse in my stable was sick.  He then invited me to dine with him
+at an inn close by, and I was glad to go with him, in the hope of
+getting rid of unpleasant thoughts.  After dinner, during which he
+talked nothing but slang, observing I looked very melancholy, he
+asked me what was the matter with me, and I, my heart being opened
+by the wine he had made me drink, told him my circumstances without
+reserve.  With an oath or two for not having treated him at first
+like a friend, he said he would soon set me all right; and pulling
+out two hundred pounds, told me to pay him when I could.  I felt as
+I never felt before; however, I took his notes, paid my sneaks, and
+in less than three months was right again, and had returned him his
+money.  On paying it to him, I said that I had now a lunch which
+would just suit him, saying that I would give it to him--a free
+gift--for nothing.  He swore at me;--telling me to keep my Punch,
+for that he was suited already.  I begged him to tell me how I
+could requite him for his kindness, whereupon, with the most
+dreadful oath I ever heard, he bade me come and see him hanged when
+his time was come.  I wrung his hand, and told him I would, and I
+kept my word.  The night before the day he was hanged at H---, I
+harnessed a Suffolk Punch to my light gig, the same Punch which I
+had offered to him, which I have ever since kept, and which brought
+me and this short young man to Horncastle, and in eleven hours I
+drove that Punch one hundred and ten miles.  I arrived at H--- just
+in the nick of time.  There was the ugly jail--the scaffold--and
+there upon it stood the only friend I ever had in the world.
+Driving my Punch, which was all in a foam, into the midst of the
+crowd, which made way for me as if it knew what I came for, I stood
+up in my gig, took off my hat, and shouted, 'God Almighty bless
+you, Jack!'  The dying man turned his pale grim face towards me--
+for his face was always somewhat grim, do you see--nodded and said,
+or I thought I heard him say, 'All right, old chap.'  The next
+moment--my eyes water.  He had a high heart, got into a scrape
+whilst in the marines, lost his half-pay, took to the turf, ring,
+gambling, and at last cut the throat of a villain who had robbed
+him of nearly all he had.  But he had good qualities, and I know
+for certain that he never did half the bad things laid to his
+charge; for example, he never bribed Tom Oliver to fight cross, as
+it was said he did on the day of the awful thunder-storm.  Ned
+Flatnose fairly beat Tom Oliver, for though Ned was not what's
+called a good fighter, he had a particular blow, which if he could
+put in he was sure to win.  His right shoulder, do you see, was two
+inches farther back than it ought to have been, and consequently
+his right fist generally fell short; but if he could swing himself
+round, and put in a blow with that right arm, he could kill or take
+away the senses of anybody in the world.  It was by putting in that
+blow in his second fight with Spring that he beat noble Tom.
+Spring beat him like a sack in the first battle, but in the second
+Ned Painter--for that was his real name--contrived to put in his
+blow, and took the senses out of Spring; and in like manner he took
+the senses out of Tom Oliver.
+
+"Well, some are born to be hanged, and some are not; and many of
+those who are not hanged are much worse than those who are.  Jack,
+with many a good quality, is hanged, whilst that fellow of a lord,
+who wanted to get the horse from you at about two-thirds of his
+value, without a single good quality in the world, is not hanged,
+and probably will remain so.  You ask the reason why, perhaps.
+I'll tell you; the lack of a certain quality called courage, which
+Jack possessed in abundance, will preserve him; from the love which
+he bears his own neck he will do nothing which can bring him to the
+gallows.  In my rough way I'll draw their characters from their
+childhood, and then ask whether Jack was not the best character of
+the two.  Jack was a rough, audacious boy, fond of fighting, going
+a birds'-nesting, but I never heard he did anything particularly
+cruel save once, I believe, tying a canister to a butcher's dog's
+tail; whilst this fellow of a lord was by nature a savage beast,
+and when a boy would in winter pluck poor fowls naked, and set them
+running on the ice and in the snow, and was particularly fond of
+burning cats alive in the fire.  Jack, when a lad, gets a
+commission on board a ship as an officer of horse marines, and in
+two or three engagements behaves quite up to the mark--at least of
+a marine; the marines having no particular character for courage,
+you know--never having run to the guns and fired them like madmen
+after the blue jackets had had more than enough.  Oh, dear me, no!
+My lord gets into the valorous British army, where cowardice--Oh,
+dear me!--is a thing almost entirely unknown; and being on the
+field of Waterloo the day before the battle, falls off his horse,
+and, pretending to be hurt in the back, gets himself put on the
+sick list--a pretty excuse--hurting his back--for not being present
+at such a fight.  Old Benbow, after part of both his legs had been
+shot away in a sea-fight, made the carpenter make him a cradle to
+hold his bloody stumps, and continued on deck, cheering his men
+till he died.  Jack returns home, and gets into trouble, and having
+nothing to subsist by but his wits, gets his living by the ring and
+the turf, doing many an odd kind of thing, I dare say, but not half
+those laid to his charge.  My lord does much the same without the
+excuse for doing so which Jack had, for he had plenty of means, is
+a leg, and a black, only in a more polished way, and with more
+cunning, and I may say success, having done many a rascally thing
+never laid to his charge.  Jack at last cuts the throat of a
+villain who had cheated him of all he had in the world, and who, I
+am told, was in many points the counterpart of this screw and white
+feather, is taken up, tried, and executed; and certainly taking
+away a man's life is a dreadful thing; but is there nothing as bad?
+Whitefeather will cut no person's throat--I will not say who has
+cheated him, for, being a cheat himself, he will take good care
+that nobody cheats him, but he'll do something quite as bad; out of
+envy to a person who never injured him, and whom he hates for being
+more clever and respected than himself, he will do all he possibly
+can, by backbiting and every unfair means, to do that person a
+mortal injury.  But Jack is hanged, and my lord it not.  Is that
+right?  My wife, Mary Fulcher--I beg her pardon, Mary Dale--who is
+a Methodist, and has heard the mighty preacher, Peter Williams,
+says some people are preserved from hanging by the grace of God.
+With her I differs, and says it is from want of courage.  This
+Whitefeather, with one particle of Jack's courage, and with one
+tithe of his good qualities, would have been hanged long ago, for
+he has ten times Jack's malignity.  Jack was hanged because, along
+with his bad qualities, he had courage and generosity; this fellow
+is not, because with all Jack's bad qualities, and many more,
+amongst which is cunning, he has neither courage nor generosity.
+Think of a fellow like that putting down two hundred pounds to
+relieve a distressed fellow-creature; why he would rob, but for the
+law and the fear it fills him with, a workhouse child of its
+breakfast, as the saying is--and has been heard to say that he
+would not trust his own father for sixpence, and he can't imagine
+why such a thing as credit should be ever given.  I never heard a
+person give him a good word--stay, stay, yes!  I once heard an old
+parson, to whom I sold a Punch, say that he had the art of
+receiving company gracefully and dismissing them without
+refreshment.  I don't wish to be too hard with him, and so let him
+make the most of that compliment.  Well! he manages to get on,
+whilst Jack is hanged; not quite enviably, however; he has had his
+rubs, and pretty hard ones--everybody knows he slunk from Waterloo,
+and occasionally checks him with so doing; whilst he has been
+rejected by a woman--what a mortification to the low pride of which
+the scoundrel has plenty!  There's a song about both circumstances,
+which may, perhaps, ring in his ears on a dying bed.  It's a funny
+kind of song, set to the old tune of the Lord-Lieutenant or Deputy,
+and with it I will conclude my discourse, for I really think it's
+past one."  The jockey then, with a very tolerable voice, sung the
+following song:-
+
+
+THE JOCKEY'S SONG.
+
+Now list to a ditty both funny and true! -
+Merrily moves the dance along -
+A ditty that tells of a coward and screw,
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+Sir Plume, though not liking a bullet at all, -
+Merrily moves the dance along -
+Had yet resolution to go to a BALL,
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+"Woulez wous danser, mademoiselle?" -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+Said she, "Sir, to dance I should like very well,"
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+They danc'd to the left, and they danc'd to the right, -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+And her troth the fair damsel bestow'd on the knight,
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+"Now what shall I fetch you, mademoiselle?" -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+Said she, "Sir, an ice I should like very well,"
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+But the ice, when he'd got it, he instantly ate, -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+Although his poor partner was all in a fret,
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+He ate up the ice like a prudent young lord, -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+For he saw 't was the very last ice on the board, -
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+"Now, when shall we marry?" the gentleman cried; -
+Merrily moves the dance along; -
+"Sir, get you to Jordan," the damsel replied,
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+"I never will wed with the pitiful elf" -
+Merrily moves the dance along -
+"Who ate up the ice which I wanted myself,"
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+"I'd pardon your backing from red Waterloo," -
+Merrily moves the dance along -
+"But I never will wed with a coward and screw,"
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII
+
+
+
+The Church.
+
+
+The next morning I began to think of departing; I had sewed up the
+money which I had received for the horse in a portion of my
+clothing, where I entertained no fears for its safety, with the
+exception of a small sum in notes, gold, and silver, which I
+carried in my pocket.  Ere departing, however, I determined to
+stroll about and examine the town, and observe more particularly
+the humours of the fair than I had hitherto an opportunity of
+doing.  The town, when I examined it, offered no object worthy of
+attention but its church--an edifice of some antiquity; under the
+guidance of an old man, who officiated as sexton, I inspected its
+interior attentively, occasionally conversing with my guide, who,
+however, seemed much more disposed to talk about horses than the
+church.  "No good horses in the fair this time, measter," said he;
+"none but one brought hither by a chap whom nobody knows, and
+bought by a foreigneering man, who came here with Jack Dale.  The
+horse fetched a good swinging price, which is said, however, to be
+much less than its worth; for the horse is a regular clipper; not
+such a one, 'tis said, has been seen in the fair for several
+summers.  Lord Whitefeather says that he believes the fellow who
+brought him to be a highwayman, and talks of having him taken up,
+but Lord Whitefeather is only in a rage because he could not get
+him for himself.  The chap would not sell it to un; Lord Screw
+wanted to beat him down, and the chap took huff, said he wouldn't
+sell it to him at no price, and accepted the offer of the
+foreigneering man, or of Jack, who was his 'terpreter, and who
+scorned to higgle about such a hanimal, because Jack is a
+gentleman, though bred a dickey-boy, whilst t'other, though bred a
+lord, is a screw and a whitefeather.  Every one says the cove was
+right, and I says so too; I likes spirit, and if the cove were
+here, and in your place, measter, I would invite him to drink a
+pint of beer.  Good horses are scarce now, measter, ay, and so are
+good men, quite a different set from what there were when I was
+young; that was the time for men and horses.  Lord bless you, I
+know all the breeders about here; they are not a bad set, and they
+breed a very fairish set of horses, but they are not like what
+their fathers were, nor are their horses like their fathers'
+horses.  Now there is Mr.--the great breeder, a very fairish man,
+with very fairish horses; but, Lord bless you, he's nothing to what
+his father was, nor his steeds to his father's; I ought to know,
+for I was at the school here with his father, and afterwards for
+many a year helped him to get up his horses; that was when I was
+young, measter--those were the days.  You look at that monument,
+measter," said he, as I stopped and looked attentively at a
+monument on the southern side of the church near the altar; "that
+was put up for a rector of this church, who lived a long time ago,
+in Oliver's time, and was ill-treated and imprisoned by Oliver and
+his men; you will see all about it on the monument.  There was a
+grand battle fought nigh this place, between Oliver's men and the
+Royal party, and the Royal party had the worst of it, as I'm told
+they generally had; and Oliver's men came into the town, and did a
+great deal of damage, and ill-treated the people.  I can't remember
+anything about the matter myself, for it happened just one hundred
+years before I was born, but my father was acquainted with an old
+countryman, who lived not many miles from here, who said he
+remembered perfectly well the day of the battle; that he was a boy
+at the time, and was working in a field near the place where the
+battle was fought; and heard shouting, and noise of firearms, and
+also the sound of several balls, which fell in the field near him.
+Come this way, measter, and I will show you some remains of that
+day's field."  Leaving the monument, on which was inscribed an
+account of the life and sufferings of the Royalist Rector of
+Horncastle, I followed the sexton to the western end of the church,
+where, hanging against the wall, were a number of scythes stuck in
+the ends of poles.  "Those are the weapons, measter," said the
+sexton, "which the great people put into the hands of the country
+folks, in order that they might use them against Oliver's men; ugly
+weapons enough; however, Oliver's men won, and Sir Jacob Ashley and
+his party were beat.  And a rare time Oliver and his men had of it,
+till Oliver died, when the other party got the better, not by
+fighting, 'tis said, but through a General Monk, who turned sides.
+Ah, the old fellow that my father knew, said he well remembered the
+time when General Monk went over and proclaimed Charles the Second.
+Bonfires were lighted everywhere, oxen roasted, and beer drunk by
+pailfuls; the country folks were drunk with joy, and something
+else; sung scurvy songs about Oliver to the tune of Barney Banks,
+and pelted his men, wherever they found them, with stones and
+dirt."  "The more ungrateful scoundrels they," said I.  "Oliver and
+his men fought the battle of English independence against a
+wretched king and corrupt lords.  Had I been living at the time, I
+should have been proud to be a trooper of Oliver."  "You would,
+measter, would you?  Well, I never quarrels with the opinions of
+people who come to look at the church, and certainly independence
+is a fine thing.  I like to see a chap of an independent spirit,
+and if I were now to see the cove that refused to sell his horse to
+my Lord Screw and Whitefeather, and let Jack Dale have him, I would
+offer to treat him to a pint of beer--e'es, I would, verily.  Well,
+measter, you have now seen the church, and all there's in it worth
+seeing--so I'll just lock up, and go and finish digging the grave I
+was about when you came, after which I must go into the fair to see
+how matters are going on.  Thank ye, measter," said he, as I put
+something into his hand; "thank ye kindly; 'tis not every one who
+gives me a shilling now-a-days who comes to see the church, but
+times are very different from what they were when I was young; I
+was not sexton then, but something better; helped Mr.--with his
+horses, and got many a broad crown.  Those were the days, measter,
+both for men and horses--and I say, measter, if men and horses were
+so much better when I was young than they are now, what, I wonder,
+must they have been in the time of Oliver and his men?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV
+
+
+
+An Old Acquaintance.
+
+
+Leaving the church, I strolled through the fair, looking at the
+horses, listening to the chaffering of the buyers and sellers, and
+occasionally putting in a word of my own, which was not always
+received with much deference; suddenly, however, on a whisper
+arising that I was the young cove who had brought the wonderful
+horse to the fair which Jack Dale had bought for the foreigneering
+man, I found myself an object of the greatest attention; those who
+had before replied with stuff! and nonsense! to what I said, now
+listened with the greatest eagerness to any nonsense I wished to
+utter, and I did not fail to utter a great deal; presently,
+however, becoming disgusted with the beings about me, I forced my
+way, not very civilly, through my crowd of admirers; and passing
+through an alley and a back street, at last reached an outskirt of
+the fair, where no person appeared to know me.  Here I stood,
+looking vacantly on what was going on, musing on the strange
+infatuation of my species, who judge of a person's words, not from
+their intrinsic merit, but from the opinion--generally an erroneous
+one--which they have formed of the person.  From this reverie I was
+roused by certain words which sounded near me, uttered in a strange
+tone, and in a strange cadence--the words were, "them that finds,
+wins; and them that can't find, loses."  Turning my eyes in the
+direction from which the words proceeded, I saw six or seven
+people, apparently all countrymen, gathered round a person standing
+behind a tall white table of very small compass.  "What!" said I,
+"the thimble-engro of--Fair here at Horncastle."  Advancing nearer,
+however, I perceived that though the present person was a thimble-
+engro, he was a very different one from my old acquaintance of--
+Fair.  The present one was a fellow about half-a-foot taller than
+the other.  He had a long, haggard, wild face, and was dressed in a
+kind of jacket, something like that of a soldier, with dirty hempen
+trousers, and with a foreign-looking peaked hat on his head.  He
+spoke with an accent evidently Irish, and occasionally changed the
+usual thimble formule, "them that finds wins, and them that can't--
+och, sure!--they loses;" saying also frequently, "your honour,"
+instead of "my lord."  I observed, on drawing nearer, that he
+handled the pea and thimble with some awkwardness, like that which
+might be expected from a novice in the trade.  He contrived,
+however, to win several shillings, for he did not seem to play for
+gold, from "their honours."  Awkward, as he was, he evidently did
+his best, and never flung a chance away by permitting any one to
+win.  He had just won three shillings from a farmer, who, incensed
+at his loss, was calling him a confounded cheat, and saying that he
+would play no more, when up came my friend of the preceding day,
+Jack, the jockey.  This worthy, after looking at the thimble-man a
+moment or two, with a peculiarly crafty glance, cried out, as he
+clapped down a shilling on the table, "I will stand you, old
+fellow!"  "Them that finds wins; and them that can't--och, sure!--
+they loses," said the thimble-man.  The game commenced, and Jack
+took up the thimble without finding the pea; another shilling was
+produced, and lost in the same manner; "this is slow work," said
+Jack, banging down a guinea on the table; "can you cover that, old
+fellow?"  The man of the thimble looked at the gold, and then at
+him who produced it, and scratched his head.  "Come, cover that, or
+I shall be off," said the jockey.  "Och, sure, my lord!--no, I mean
+your honour--no, sure, your lordship," said the other, "if I covers
+it at all, it must be with silver, for divil a bit of gold have I
+by me."  "Well, then, produce the value in silver," said the
+jockey, "and do it quickly, for I can't be staying here all day."
+The thimble-man hesitated, looked at Jack with a dubious look, then
+at the gold, and then scratched his head.  There was now a laugh
+amongst the surrounders, which evidently nettled the fellow, who
+forthwith thrust his hand into his pocket, and pulling out all his
+silver treasure, just contrived to place the value of the guinea on
+the table.  "Them that finds wins, and them that can't find--
+LOSES," interrupted Jack, lifting up a thimble, out of which rolled
+a pea.  "There, paddy, what do you think of that?" said he, seizing
+the heap of silver with one hand, whilst he pocketed the guinea
+with the other.  The thimble-engro stood, for some time, like one
+transfixed, his eyes glaring wildly, now at the table, and now at
+his successful customers; at last he said, "Arrah, sure, master!--
+no, I manes my lord--you are not going to ruin a poor boy!"  "Ruin
+you!" sail the other; "what! by winning a guinea's change? a pretty
+small dodger you--if you have not sufficient capital, why do you
+engage in so deep a trade as thimbling? come, will you stand
+another game?"  "Och, sure, master, no! the twenty shillings and
+one which you have cheated me of were all I had in the world."
+"Cheated you," said Jack, "say that again, and I will knock you
+down."  "Arrah! sure, master, you knows that the pea under the
+thimble was not mine; here is mine, master; now give me back my
+money."  "A likely thing," said Jack; "no, no, I know a trick worth
+two or three of that; whether the pea was yours or mine, you will
+never have your twenty shillings and one again; and if I have
+ruined you, all the better; I'd gladly ruin all such villains as
+you, who ruin poor men with your dirty tricks, whom you would knock
+down and rob on the road, if you had but courage; not that I mean
+to keep your shillings, with the exception of the two you cheated
+from me, which I'll keep.  A scramble, boys! a scramble!" said he,
+flinging up all the silver into the air, with the exception of the
+two shillings; and a scramble there instantly was, between the
+rustics who had lost their money and the urchins who came running
+up; the poor thimble-engro tried likewise to have his share; and
+though he flung himself down, in order to join more effectually in
+the scramble, he was unable to obtain a single sixpence; and having
+in his rage given some of his fellow-scramblers a cuff or two, he
+was set upon by the boys and country fellows, and compelled to make
+an inglorious retreat with his table, which had been flung down in
+the scuffle, and had one of its legs broken.  As he retired, the
+rabble hooted, and Jack, holding up in derision the pea with which
+he had outmanoeuvred him, exclaimed, "I always carry this in my
+pocket in order to be a match for vagabonds like you."
+
+The tumult over, Jack gone, and the rabble dispersed, I followed
+the discomfited adventurer at a distance, who, leaving the town,
+went slowly on, carrying his dilapidated piece of furniture; till
+coming to an old wall by the roadside, he placed it on the ground,
+and sat down, seemingly in deep despondency, holding his thumb to
+his mouth.  Going nearly up to him, I stood still, whereupon he
+looked up, and perceiving I was looking steadfastly at him, he
+said, in an angry tone, "Arrah! what for are you staring at me so?
+By my shoul, I think you are one of the thaives who are after
+robbing me.  I think I saw you among them, and if I were only sure
+of it, I would take the liberty of trying to give you a big
+bating."  "You have had enough of trying to give people a beating,"
+said I; "you had better be taking your table to some skilful
+carpenter to get it repaired.  He will do it for sixpence."  "Divil
+a sixpence did you and your thaives leave me," said he; "and if you
+do not take yourself off, joy, I will be breaking your ugly head
+with the foot of it."  "Arrah, Murtagh!" said I, "would ye be
+breaking the head of your friend and scholar, to whom you taught
+the blessed tongue of Oilien nan Naomha, in exchange for a pack of
+cards?"  Murtagh, for he it was, gazed at me for a moment with a
+bewildered look; then, with a gleam of intelligence in his eye, he
+said, "Shorsha! no, it can't be--yes, by my faith it is!"  Then,
+springing up, and seizing me by the hand, he said, "Yes, by the
+powers, sure enough it is Shorsha agra!  Arrah, Shorsha! where have
+you been this many a day?  Sure, you are not one of the spalpeens
+who are after robbing me?"  "Not I," I replied, "but I saw all that
+happened.  Come, you must not take matters so to heart; cheer up;
+such things will happen in connection with the trade you have taken
+up."  "Sorrow befall the trade, and the thief who taught it me,"
+said Murtagh; "and yet the trade is not a bad one, if I only knew
+more of it, and had some one to help and back me.  Och! the idea of
+being cheated and bamboozled by that one-eyed thief in the
+horseman's dress."  "Let bygones be bygones, Murtagh," said I; "it
+is no use grieving for the past; sit down, and let us have a little
+pleasant gossip.  Arrah, Murtagh! when I saw you sitting under the
+wall, with your thumb to your mouth, it brought to my mind tales
+which you used to tell me all about Finn-ma-Coul.  You have not
+forgotten Finn-ma-Coul, Murtagh, and how he sucked wisdom out of
+his thumb."  "Sorrow a bit have I forgot about him, Shorsha," said
+Murtagh, as we sat down together, "nor what you yourself told me
+about the snake.  Arrah, Shorsha! what ye told me about the snake,
+bates anything I ever told you about Finn.  Ochone, Shorsha!
+perhaps you will be telling me about the snake once more?  I think
+the tale would do me good, and I have need of comfort, God knows,
+ochone!"  Seeing Murtagh in such a distressed plight, I forthwith
+told him over again the tale of the snake, in precisely the same
+words as I have related it in the first part of this history.
+After which, I said, "Now, Murtagh, tit for tat; ye will be telling
+me one of the old stories of Finn-ma-Coul."  "Och, Shorsha!  I
+haven't heart enough," said Murtagh.  "Thank you for your tale, but
+it makes me weep; it brings to my mind Dungarvon times of old--I
+mean the times we were at school together."  "Cheer up, man," said
+I, "and let's have the story, and let it be about Ma-Coul and the
+salmon and his thumb."  "Arrah, Shorsha!  I can't.  Well, to oblige
+you, I'll give it you.  Well, you know Ma-Coul was an exposed
+child, and came floating over the salt sea in a chest which was
+cast ashore at Veintry Bay.  In the corner of that bay was a
+castle, where dwelt a giant and his wife, very respectable and
+decent people, and this giant, taking his morning walk along the
+bay, came to the place where the child had been cast ashore in his
+box.  Well, the giant looked at the child, and being filled with
+compassion for his exposed state, took the child up in his box, and
+carried him home to his castle, where he and his wife, being dacent
+respectable people, as I telled ye before, fostered the child and
+took care of him, till he became old enough to go out to service
+and gain his livelihood, when they bound him out apprentice to
+another giant, who lived in a castle up the country, at some
+distance from the bay.
+
+"This giant, whose name was Darmod David Odeen, was not a
+respectable person at all, but a big old vagabond.  He was twice
+the size of the other giant, who, though bigger than any man, was
+not a big giant; for, as there are great and small men, so there
+are great and small giants--I mean some are small when compared
+with the others.  Well, Finn served this giant a considerable time,
+doing all kinds of hard and unreasonable service for him, and
+receiving all kinds of hard words, and many a hard knock and kick
+to boot--sorrow befall the old vagabond who could thus ill-treat a
+helpless foundling.  It chanced that one day the giant caught a
+salmon, near a salmon-leap upon his estate--for, though a big ould
+blackguard, he was a person of considerable landed property, and
+high sheriff for the county Cork.  Well, the giant brings home the
+salmon by the gills, and delivers it to Finn, telling him to roast
+it for the giant's dinner; 'but take care, ye young blackguard,' he
+added, 'that in roasting it--and I expect ye to roast it well--you
+do not let a blister come upon its nice satin skin, for if ye do, I
+will cut the head off your shoulders.'  'Well,' thinks Finn, 'this
+is a hard task; however, as I have done many hard tasks for him, I
+will try and do this too, though I was never set to do anything yet
+half so difficult.'  So he prepared his fire, and put his gridiron
+upon it, and lays the salmon fairly and softly upon the gridiron,
+and then he roasts it, turning it from one side to the other just
+in the nick of time, before the soft satin skin could be blistered.
+However, on turning it over the eleventh time--and twelve would
+have settled the business--he found he had delayed a little bit of
+time too long in turning it over, and that there was a small, tiny
+blister on the soft outer skin.  Well, Finn was in a mighty panic,
+remembering the threats of the ould giant; however, he did not lose
+heart, but clapped his thumb upon the blister in order to smooth it
+down.  Now the salmon, Shorsha, was nearly done, and the flesh
+thoroughly hot, so Finn's thumb was scalt, and he, clapping it to
+his mouth, sucked it, in order to draw out the pain, and in a
+moment--hubbuboo!--became imbued with all the wisdom of the world.
+
+Myself.  Stop, Murtagh! stop!
+
+Murtagh.  All the witchcraft, Shorsha.
+
+Myself.  How wonderful!
+
+Murtagh.  Was it not, Shorsha?  The salmon, do you see, was a fairy
+salmon.
+
+Myself.  What a strange coincidence
+
+Murtagh.  A what, Shorsha?
+
+Myself.  Why, that the very same tale should be told of Finn-ma-
+Coul, which is related of Sigurd Fafnisbane.
+
+"What thief was that, Shorsha?"
+
+"Thief!  'Tis true, he took the treasure of Fafnir.  Sigurd was the
+hero of the North, Murtagh, even as Finn is the great hero of
+Ireland.  He, too, according to one account, was an exposed child,
+and came floating in a casket to a wild shore, where he was suckled
+by a hind, and afterwards found and fostered by Mimir, a fairy
+blacksmith; he, too, sucked wisdom from a burn.  According to the
+Edda, he burnt his finger whilst feeling of the heart of Fafnir,
+which he was roasting, and putting it into his mouth in order to
+suck out the pain, became imbued with all the wisdom of the world,
+the knowledge of the language of birds, and what not.  I have heard
+you tell the tale of Finn a dozen times in the blessed days of old,
+but its identity with the tale of Sigurd never occurred to me till
+now.  It is true, when I knew you of old, I had never read the tale
+of Sigurd, and have since almost dismissed matters of Ireland from
+my mind; but as soon as you told me again about Finn's burning his
+finger, the coincidence struck me.  I say, Murtagh, the Irish owe
+much to the Danes--"
+
+"Devil a bit, Shorsha, do they owe to the thaives, except many a
+bloody bating and plundering, which they never paid them back.
+Och, Shorsha! you, edicated in ould Ireland, to say that the Irish
+owes anything good to the plundering villains--the Siol Loughlin."
+
+"They owe them half their traditions, Murtagh, and amongst others,
+Finn-ma-Coul and the burnt finger; and if ever I publish the
+Loughlin songs, I'll tell the world so."
+
+"But, Shorsha, the world will never believe ye--to say nothing of
+the Irish part of it."
+
+"Then the world, Murtagh--to say nothing of the Irish part of it--
+will be a fool, even as I have often thought it; the grand thing,
+Murtagh, is to be able to believe oneself, and respect oneself.
+How few whom the world believes believe and respect themselves."
+
+"Och, Shorsha! shall I go on with the tale of Finn?"
+
+"I'd rather you should not, Murtagh; I know all about it already."
+
+"Then why did you bother me to tell it at first, Shorsha?  Och, it
+was doing my ownself good, and making me forget my own sorrowful
+state, when ye interrupted me with your thaives of Danes!  Och,
+Shorsha! let me tell you how Finn, by means of sucking his thumb,
+and the witchcraft he imbibed from it, contrived to pull off the
+arm of the ould wagabone, Darmod David Odeen, whilst shaking hands
+with him--for Finn could do no feat of strength without sucking his
+thumb, Shorsha, as Conan the Bald told the son of Oisin in the song
+which I used to sing ye in Dungarvon times of old;" and here
+Murtagh repeated certain Irish words to the following effect:  -
+
+
+"O little the foolish words I heed
+O Oisin's son, from thy lips which come;
+No strength were in Finn for valorous deed,
+Unless to the gristle he suck'd his thumb."
+
+
+"Enough is as good as a feast, Murtagh, I am no longer in the cue
+for Finn.  I would rather hear your own history.  Now tell us, man,
+all that has happened to ye since Dungarvon times of old?"
+
+"Och, Shorsha, it would be merely bringing all my sorrows back upon
+me!"
+
+"Well, if I know all your sorrows, perhaps I shall be able to find
+a help for them.  I owe you much, Murtagh; you taught me Irish, and
+I will do all I can to help you."
+
+"Why, then, Shorsha, I'll tell ye my history.  Here goes!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLV
+
+
+
+Murtagh's Tale.
+
+
+"Well, Shorsha, about a year and a half after you left us--and a
+sorrowful hour for us it was when ye left us, losing, as we did,
+your funny stories of your snake--and the battles of your military-
+-they sent me to Paris and Salamanca, in order to make a saggart of
+me."
+
+"Pray excuse me," said I, "for interrupting you, but what kind of
+place is Salamanca?"
+
+"Divil a bit did I ever see of it, Shorsha!"
+
+"Then why did ye say ye were sent there?  Well, what kind of place
+is Paris?  Not that I care much about Paris."
+
+"Sorrow a bit did I ever see of either them, Shorsha, for no one
+sent me to either.  When we says at home a person is going to Paris
+and Salamanca, it manes that he is going abroad to study to be a
+saggart, whether he goes to them places or not.  No, I never saw
+either--bad luck to them--I was shipped away from Cork up the
+straits to a place called Leghorn, from which I was sent to--to a
+religious house, where I was to be instructed in saggarting till
+they had made me fit to cut a dacent figure in Ireland.  We had a
+long and tedious voyage, Shorsha; not so tedious, however, as it
+would have been had I been fool enough to lave your pack of cards
+behind me, as the thaif, my brother Denis, wanted to persuade me to
+do, in order that he might play with them himself.  With the cards
+I managed to have many a nice game with the sailors, winning from
+them ha'pennies and sixpences until the captain said I was ruining
+his men, and keeping them from their duty; and, being a heretic and
+a Dutchman, swore that unless I gave over he would tie me up to the
+mast and give me a round dozen.  This threat obliged me to be more
+on my guard, though I occasionally contrived to get a game at
+night, and to win sixpennies and ha'pennies.
+
+"We reached Leghorn at last, and glad I was to leave the ship and
+the master, who gave me a kick as I was getting over the side, bad
+luck to the dirty heretic for kicking a son of the church, for I
+have always been a true son of the church, Shorsha, and never
+quarrelled with it unless it interfered with me in my playing at
+cards.  I left Leghorn with certain muleteers, with whom I played
+at cards at the baiting-houses, and who speedily won from me all
+the ha'pennies and sixpences I had won from the sailors.  I got my
+money's worth, however, for I learnt from the muleteers all kind of
+quaint tricks upon the cards, which I knew nothing of before; so I
+did not grudge them what they chated me of, and when we parted we
+did so in kindness on both sides.  On getting to--I was received
+into the religious house for Irishes.  It was the Irish house,
+Shorsha, into which I was taken, for I do not wish ye to suppose
+that I was in the English religious house which there is in that
+city, in which a purty set are educated, and in which purty doings
+are going on if all tales be true.
+
+"In this Irish house I commenced my studies, learning to sing and
+to read the Latin prayers of the church.  'Faith, Shorsha, many's
+the sorrowful day I passed in that house learning the prayers and
+litanies, being half-starved, with no earthly diversion at all, at
+all; until I took the cards out of my chest and began instructing
+in card-playing the chum which I had with me in my cell; then I had
+plenty of diversion along with him during the times when I was not
+engaged in singing, and chanting, and saying the prayers of the
+church; there was, however, some drawback in playing with my chum,
+for though he was very clever in learning, divil a sixpence had he
+to play with, in which respect he was like myself, the master who
+taught him, who had lost all my money to the muleteers who taught
+me the tricks upon the cards; by degrees, however, it began to be
+noised about the religious house that Murtagh, from Hibrodary, {1}
+had a pack of cards with which he played with his chum in the cell;
+whereupon other scholars of the religious house came to me, some to
+be taught and others to play, so with some I played, and others I
+taught, but neither to those who could play, or to those who could
+not, did I teach the elegant tricks which I learnt from the
+muleteers.  Well, the scholars came to me for the sake of the
+cards, and the porter and cook of the religious house, who could
+both play very well, came also; at last I became tired of playing
+for nothing, so I borrowed a few bits of silver from the cook, and
+played against the porter, and by means of my tricks I won money
+from the porter, and then I paid the cook the bits of silver which
+I had borrowed of him; and played with him, and won a little of his
+money, which I let him win back again, as I had lived long enough
+in a religious house to know that it is dangerous to take money
+from the cook.  In a little time, Shorsha, there was scarcely
+anything going on in the house but card-playing; the almoner played
+with me, and so did the sub-rector, and I won money from both; not
+too much, however, lest they should tell the rector, who had the
+character of a very austere man, and of being a bit of a saint;
+however, the thief of a porter, whose money I had won, informed the
+rector of what was going on, and one day the rector sent for me
+into his private apartment, and gave me so long and pious a lecture
+upon the heinous sin of card-playing, that I thought I should sink
+into the ground; after about half-an-hour's inveighing against
+card-playing, he began to soften his tone, and with a long sigh
+told me that at one time of his life he had been a young man
+himself, and had occasionally used the cards; he then began to ask
+me some questions about card-playing, which questions I afterwards
+found were to pump from me what I knew about the science.  After a
+time he asked me whether I had got my cards with me, and on my
+telling him I had, he expressed a wish to see them, whereupon I
+took the pack out of my pocket, and showed it to him; he looked at
+it very attentively, and at last, giving another deep sigh, he
+said, that though he was nearly weaned from the vanities of the
+world, he had still an inclination to see whether he had entirely
+lost the little skill which at one time he possessed.  When I heard
+him speak in this manner, I told him that if his reverence was
+inclined for a game of cards, I should be very happy to play one
+with him; scarcely had I uttered these words than he gave a third
+sigh, and looked so very much like a saint that I was afraid he was
+going to excommunicate me.  Nothing of the kind, however, for
+presently he gets up and locks the door, then sitting down at the
+table, he motioned me to do the same, which I did, and in five
+minutes we were playing at cards, his reverence and myself.
+
+"I soon found that his reverence knew quite as much about card-
+playing as I did.  Divil a trick was there connected with cards
+that his reverence did not seem awake to.  As, however, we were not
+playing for money, this circumstance did not give me much
+uneasiness; so we played game after game for two hours, when his
+reverence, having business, told me I might go, so I took up my
+cards, make my obedience, and left him.  The next day I had other
+games with him, and so on for a very long time, still playing for
+nothing.  At last his reverence grew tired of playing for nothing,
+and proposed that we should play for money.  Now, I had no desire
+to play with his reverence for money, as I knew that doing so would
+bring on a quarrel.  As long as we were playing for nothing, I
+could afford to let his reverence use what tricks he pleased; but
+if we played for money, I couldn't do so.  If he played his tricks,
+I must play mine, and use every advantage to save my money; and
+there was one I possessed which his reverence did not.  The cards
+being my own, I had put some delicate little marks on the trump
+cards, just at the edges, so that when I dealt, by means of a
+little sleight of hand, I could deal myself any trump card I
+pleased.  But I wished, as I said before, to have no dealings for
+money with his reverence, knowing that he was master in the house,
+and that he could lead me a dog of a life if I offended him, either
+by winning his money, or not letting him win mine.  So I told him I
+had no money to play with, but the ould thief knew better; he knew
+that I was every day winning money from the scholars, and the sub-
+rector, and the other people of the house, and the ould thaif had
+determined to let me go on in that way winning money, and then by
+means of his tricks, which he thought I dare not resent, to win
+from me all my earnings--in a word, Shorsha, to let me fill myself
+like a sponge, and then squeeze me for his own advantage.  So he
+made me play with him, and in less than three days came on the
+quarrel; his reverence chated me, and I chated his reverence; the
+ould thaif knew every trick that I knew, and one or two more; but
+in daling out the cards I nicked his reverence; scarcely a trump
+did I ever give him, Shorsha, and won his money purty freely.  Och,
+it was a purty quarrel!  All the delicate names in the 'Newgate
+Calendar,' if ye ever heard of such a book; all the hang-dog names
+in the Newgate histories, and the lives of Irish rogues, did we
+call each other--his reverence and I!  Suddenly, however, putting
+out his hand, he seized the cards, saying, 'I will examine these
+cards, ye cheating scoundrel! for I believe there are dirty marks
+on them, which ye have made in order to know the winning cards.'
+'Give me back my pack,' said I, 'or m'anam on Dioul if I be not the
+death of ye!'  His reverence, however, clapped the cards into his
+pocket, and made the best of his way to the door, I hanging upon
+him.  He was a gross, fat man, but, like most fat men, deadly
+strong, so he forced his way to the door, and, opening it, flung
+himself out, with me still holding on him like a terrier dog on a
+big fat pig; then he shouts for help, and in a little time I was
+secured and thrust into a lock-up room, where I was left to myself.
+Here was a purty alteration.  Yesterday I was the idol of the
+religious house, thought more on than his reverence, every one
+paying me court and wurtship, and wanting to play cards with me,
+and to learn my tricks, and fed, moreover, on the tidbits of the
+table; and to-day I was in a cell, nobody coming to look at me but
+the blackguard porter who had charge of me, my cards taken from me,
+and with nothing but bread and water to live upon.  Time passed
+dreary enough for a month, at the end of which time his reverence
+came to me, leaving the porter just outside the door in order to
+come to his help should I be violent; and then he read me a very
+purty lecture on my conduct, saying I had turned the religious
+house topsy-turvy, and corrupted the scholars, and that I was the
+cheat of the world, for that on inspecting the pack he had
+discovered the dirty marks which I had made upon the trump cards
+for to know them by.  He said a great deal more to me, which is not
+worth relating, and ended by telling me that he intended to let me
+out of confinement next day, but that if ever I misconducted myself
+any more, he would clap me in again for the rest of my life.  I had
+a good mind to call him an ould thaif, but the hope of getting out
+made me hold my tongue, and the next day I was let out; and need
+enough I had to be let out, for what with being alone, and living
+on bread and water, I was becoming frighted, or, as the doctors
+call it, narvous.  But when I was out--oh, what a change I found in
+the religious house! no card-playing, for it had been forbidden to
+the scholars, and there was now nothing going on but reading and
+singing; divil a merry visage to be seen, but plenty of prim airs
+and graces; but the case of the scholars, though bad enough, was
+not half so bad as mine, for they could spake to each other,
+whereas I could not have a word of conversation, for the ould thaif
+of a rector had ordered them to send me to 'Coventry,' telling them
+that I was a gambling cheat, with morals bad enough to corrupt a
+horse regiment; and whereas they were allowed to divert themselves
+with going out, I was kept reading and singing from morn till
+night.  The only soul who was willing to exchange a word with me
+was the cook, and sometimes he and I had a little bit of discourse
+in a corner, and we condoled with each other, for he liked the
+change in the religious house almost as little as myself; but he
+told me that, for all the change below stairs, there was still
+card-playing on above, for that the ould thaif of a rector, and the
+sub-rector, and the almoner played at cards together, and that the
+rector won money from the others--the almoner had told him so--and,
+moreover, that the rector was the thaif of the world, and had once
+been kicked out of a club-house at Dublin for cheating at cards,
+and after that circumstance had apparently reformed and lived
+decently till the time when I came to the religious house with my
+pack, but that the sight of that had brought him back to his ould
+gambling.  He told the cook, moreover, that the rector frequently
+went out at night to the houses of the great clergy and cheated at
+cards.
+
+"In this melancholy state, with respect to myself, things continued
+a long time, when suddenly there was a report that his Holiness the
+Pope intended to pay a visit to the religious house in order to
+examine into its discipline.  When I heard this I was glad, for I
+determined after the Pope had done what he had come to do, to fall
+upon my knees before him, and make a regular complaint of the
+treatment I had received, to tell him of the cheating at cards of
+the rector, and to beg him to make the ould thaif give me back my
+pack again.  So the day of the visit came, and his Holiness made
+his appearance with his attendants, and, having looked over the
+religious house, he went into the rector's room with the rector,
+the sub-rector, and the almoner.  I intended to have waited until
+his Holiness came out, but finding he stayed a long time I thought
+I would e'en go into him, so I went up to the door without anybody
+observing me--his attendants being walking about the corridor--and
+opening it I slipped in, and there what do you think I saw?  Why,
+his Holiness the Pope, and his reverence the rector, and the sub-
+rector, and the almoner seated at cards; and the ould thaif of a
+rector was dealing out the cards which ye had given me, Shorsha, to
+his Holiness the Pope, the sub-rector, the almoner, and himself."
+
+In this part of his history I interrupted Murtagh, saying that I
+was afraid he was telling untruths, and that it was highly
+improbable that the Pope would leave the Vatican to play cards with
+Irish at their religious house, and that I was sure, if on his,
+Murtagh's authority, I were to tell the world so, the world would
+never believe it.
+
+"Then the world, Shorsha, would be a fool, even as you were just
+now saying you had frequently believed it to be; the grand thing,
+Shorsha, is to be able to believe oneself; if ye can do that, it
+matters very little whether the world believe ye or no.  But a
+purty thing for you and the world to stickle at the Pope's playing
+at cards at a religious house of Irish; och! if I were to tell you
+and the world, what the Pope has been sometimes at, at the
+religious house of English thaives, I would excuse you and the
+world for turning up your eyes.  However, I wish to say nothing
+against the Pope.  I am a son of the church, and if the Pope don't
+interfere with my cards, divil a bit will I have to say against
+him; but I saw the Pope playing, or about to play, with the pack
+which had been taken from me, and when I told the Pope, the Pope
+did not--Ye had better let me go on with my history, Shorsha;
+whether you or the world believe it or not, I am sure it is quite
+as true as your tale of the snake, or saying that Finn got his
+burnt finger from the thaives of Loughlin; and whatever you may
+say, I am sure the world will think so too."
+
+I apologized to Murtagh for interrupting him, and telling him that
+his history, whether true or not, was infinitely diverting, begged
+him to continue it.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVI
+
+
+
+Murtagh's Story continued--The Priest, Exorcist, and Thimble-engro-
+-How to Check a Rebellion.
+
+I was telling ye, Shorsha, when ye interrupted me, that I found the
+Pope, the rector, the sub-rector, and the almoner seated at the
+table, the rector with my pack of cards in his hands, about to deal
+out to the Pope and the rest, not forgetting himself, for whom he
+intended all the trump-cards, no doubt.  No sooner did they
+perceive me than they seemed taken all aback; but the rector,
+suddenly starting up with the cards in his hand, asked me what I
+did there, threatening to have me well disciplined if I did not go
+about my business; 'I am come for my pack,' said I, 'ye ould thaif,
+and to tell his Holiness how I have been treated by ye;' then going
+down on my knees before his Holiness, I said, 'Arrah, now, your
+Holiness! will ye not see justice done to a poor boy who has been
+sadly misused?  The pack of cards which that old ruffian has in his
+hand are my cards, which he has taken from me, in order to chate
+with.  Arrah! don't play with him, your Holiness, for he'll only
+chate ye--there are dirty marks upon the cards which bear the
+trumps, put there in order to know them by; and the ould thaif in
+daling out will give himself all the good cards, and chate ye of
+the last farthing in your pocket; so let them be taken from him,
+your Holiness, and given back to me; and order him to lave the
+room, and then, if your Holiness be for an honest game, don't think
+I am the boy to baulk ye.  I'll take the old ruffian's place, and
+play with ye till evening, and all night besides, and divil an
+advantage will I take of the dirty marks, though I know them all,
+having placed them on the cards myself.'  I was going on in this
+way when the ould thaif of a rector, flinging down the cards, made
+at me as if to kick me out of the room, whereupon I started up and
+said, 'If ye are for kicking, sure two can play at that;' and then
+I kicked at his reverence, and his reverence at me, and there was a
+regular scrimmage between us, which frightened the Pope, who,
+getting up, said some words which I did not understand, but which
+the cook afterwards told me were, 'English extravagance, and this
+is the second edition;' for it seems that, a little time before,
+his Holiness had been frightened in St. Peter's Church by the
+servant of an English family, which those thaives of the English
+religious house had been endeavouring to bring over to the Catholic
+faith, and who didn't approve of their being converted.  Och! his
+Holiness did us all sore injustice to call us English, and to
+confound our house with the other; for however dirty our house
+might be, our house was a clane house compared with the English
+house, and we honest people compared with those English thaives.
+Well, his Holiness was frighted, and the almoner ran out, and
+brought in his Holiness's attendants, and they laid hold of me, but
+I struggled hard, and said, 'I will not go without my pack; arrah,
+your Holiness! make them give me my pack, which Shorsha gave me in
+Dungarvon times of old;' but my struggles were of no use.  I was
+pulled away and put out in the ould dungeon, and his Holiness went
+away sore frighted, crossing himself much, and never returned
+again.
+
+"In the old dungeon I was fastened to the wall by a chain, and
+there I was disciplined once every other day for the first three
+weeks, and then I was left to myself, and my chain, and hunger; and
+there I sat in the dungeon, sometimes screeching, sometimes
+hallooing, for I soon became frighted, having nothing in the cell
+to divert me.  At last the cook found his way to me by stealth, and
+comforted me a little, bringing me tidbits out of the kitchen; and
+he visited me again and again--not often, however, for he dare only
+come when he could steal away the key from the custody of the thaif
+of a porter.  I was three years in the dungeon, and should have
+gone mad but for the cook, and his words of comfort, and his
+tidbits, and nice books which he brought me out of the library,
+which were the 'Calendars of Newgate,' and the 'Lives of Irish
+Rogues and Raparees,' the only English books in the library.
+However, at the end of three years, the ould thaif of a rector,
+wishing to look at them books, missed them from the library, and
+made a perquisition about them, and the thaif of a porter said that
+he shouldn't wonder if I had them; saying that he had once seen me
+reading; and then the rector came with others to my cell, and took
+my books from me, from under my straw, and asked me how I came by
+them; and on my refusal to tell, they disciplined me again till the
+blood ran down my back; and making more perquisition they at last
+accused the cook of having carried the books to me, and not
+denying, he was given warning to leave next day, but he left that
+night, and took me away with him; for he stole the key, and came to
+me and cut my chain through, and then he and I escaped from the
+religious house through a window--the cook with a bundle,
+containing what things he had.  No sooner had we got out than the
+honest cook gave me a little bit of money and a loaf, and told me
+to follow a way which he pointed out, which he said would lead to
+the sea; and then, having embraced me after the Italian way, he
+left me, and I never saw him again.  So I followed the way which
+the cook pointed out, and in two days reached a seaport called
+Chiviter Vik, terribly foot-foundered, and there I met a sailor who
+spoke Irish, and who belonged to a vessel just ready to sail for
+France; and the sailor took me on board his vessel, and said I was
+his brother, and the captain gave me a passage to a place in France
+called Marseilles; and when I got there, the captain and sailor got
+a little money for me and a passport, and I travelled across the
+country towards a place they directed me to called Bayonne, from
+which they said I might, perhaps, get to Ireland.  Coming, however,
+to a place called Pau, all my money being gone, I enlisted into a
+regiment called the Army of the Faith, which was going into Spain,
+for the King of Spain had been dethroned and imprisoned by his own
+subjects, as perhaps you may have heard; and the King of France,
+who was his cousin, was sending an army to help him, under the
+command of his own son, whom the English called Prince Hilt,
+because when he was told that he was appointed to the command, he
+clapped his hand on the hilt of his sword.  So I enlisted into the
+regiment of the Faith, which was made up of Spaniards, many of them
+priests who had run out of Spain, and broken Germans, and foot-
+foundered Irish, like myself.  It was said to be a blackguard
+regiment, that same regiment of the Faith; but, 'faith, I saw
+nothing blackguardly going on in it, for you would hardly reckon
+card-playing and dominoes, and pitch and toss blackguardly, and I
+saw nothing else in it.  There was one thing in it which I
+disliked--the priests drawing their Spanish knives occasionally,
+when they lost their money.  After we had been some time at Pau,
+the army of the Faith was sent across the mountains into Spain, as
+the vanguard of the French; and no sooner did the Spaniards see the
+Faith than they made a dash at it, and the Faith ran away, myself
+along with it, and got behind the French army, which told it to
+keep there, and the Faith did so, and followed the French army,
+which soon scattered the Spaniards, and in the end placed the king
+on his throne again.  When the war was over the Faith was
+disbanded; some of the foreigners, however, amongst whom I was one,
+were put into a Guard regiment, and there I continued for more than
+a year.
+
+"One day, being at a place called the Escurial, I took stock, as
+the tradesmen say, and found I possessed the sum of eighty dollars
+won by playing at cards, for though I could not play so well with
+the foreign cards as with the pack you gave me, Shorsha, I had yet
+contrived to win money from the priests and soldiers of the Faith.
+Finding myself possessed of such a capital, I determined to leave
+the service, and to make the best of my way to Ireland; so I
+deserted, but coming in an evil hour to a place they calls Torre
+Lodones, I found the priest playing at cards with his parishioners.
+The sight of the cards made me stop, and then, fool like,
+notwithstanding the treasure I had about me, I must wish to play,
+so not being able to speak their language, I made signs to them to
+let me play, and the priest and his thaives consented willingly; so
+I sat down to cards with the priest and two of his parishioners,
+and in a little time had won plenty of their money, but I had
+better never have done any such thing, for suddenly the priest and
+all his parishioners set upon me and bate me, and took from me all
+I had, and cast me out of the village more dead than alive.  Och!
+it's a bad village that, and if I had known what it was I would
+have avoided it, or run straight through it, though I saw all the
+card-playing in the world going on in it.  There is a proverb about
+it, as I was afterwards told, old as the time of the Moors, which
+holds good to the present day--it is, that in Torre Lodones there
+are twenty-four housekeepers, and twenty-five thieves, maning that
+all the people are thaives, and the clergyman to boot, who is not
+reckoned a housekeeper; and troth I found the clergyman the
+greatest thaif of the lot.  After being cast out of that village I
+travelled for nearly a month, subsisting by begging tolerably well,
+for though most of the Spanish are thaives, they are rather
+charitable; but though charitable thaives they do not like their
+own being taken from them without leave being asked, as I found to
+my cost; for on my entering a garden near Seville, without leave,
+to take an orange, the labourer came running up and struck me to
+the ground with a hatchet, giving me a big wound in the arm.  I
+fainted with loss of blood, and on reviving I found myself in a
+hospital at Seville, to which the labourer and the people of the
+village had taken me.  I should have died of starvation in that
+hospital had not some English people heard of me and come to see
+me; they tended me with food till I was cured, and then paid my
+passage on board a ship to London, to which place the ship carried
+me.
+
+"And now I was in London with five shillings in my pocket--all I
+had in the world--and that did not last for long; and when it was
+gone I begged in the streets, but I did not get much by that,
+except a month's hard labour in the correction-house; and when I
+came out I knew not what to do, but thought I would take a walk in
+the country, for it was spring-time, and the weather was fine, so I
+took a walk about seven miles from London, and came to a place
+where a great fair was being held; and there I begged, but got
+nothing but a halfpenny, and was thinking of going farther, when I
+saw a man with a table, like that of mine, playing with thimbles,
+as you saw me.  I looked at the play, and saw him win money, and
+run away, and hunted by constables more than once.  I kept
+following the man, and at last entered into conversation with him;
+and learning from him that he was in want of a companion to help
+him, I offered to help him if he would pay me; he looked at me from
+top to toe, and did not wish at first to have anything to do with
+me, as he said my appearance was against me.  'Faith, Shorsha, he
+had better have looked at home, for his appearance was not much in
+his favour:  he looked very much like a Jew, Shorsha.  However, he
+at last agreed to take me to be his companion, or bonnet as he
+called it; and I was to keep a look-out, and let him know when
+constables were coming, and to spake a good word for him
+occasionally, whilst he was chating folks with his thimbles and his
+pea.  So I became his bonnet, and assisted him in the fair, and in
+many other fairs beside; but I did not like my occupation much, or
+rather my master, who, though not a big man, was a big thaif, and
+an unkind one, for do all I could I could never give him pleasure;
+and he was continually calling me fool and bogtrotter, and twitting
+me because I could not learn his thaives' Latin, and discourse with
+him in it, and comparing me with another acquaintance, or bit of a
+pal of his, whom he said he had parted with in the fair, and of
+whom he was fond of saying all kinds of wonderful things, amongst
+others, that he knew the grammar of all tongues.  At last, wearied
+with being twitted by him with not being able to learn his thaives'
+Greek, I proposed that I should teach him Irish, that we should
+spake it together when we had anything to say in secret.  To that
+he consented willingly; but, och! a purty hand he made with Irish,
+'faith, not much better than I did with his thaives' Hebrew.  Then
+my turn came, and I twitted him nicely with dulness, and compared
+him with a pal that I had in ould Ireland, in Dungarvon times of
+yore, to whom I teached Irish, telling him that he was the broth of
+a boy, and not only knew the grammar of all human tongues, but the
+dialects of the snakes besides; in fact, I tould him all about your
+own sweet self, Shorsha, and many a dispute and quarrel had we
+together about our pals, which was the cleverest fellow, his or
+mine.
+
+"Well, after having been wid him about two months, I quitted him
+without noise, taking away one of his tables, and some peas and
+thimbles; and that I did with a safe conscience, for he paid me
+nothing, and was not over free with the meat and the drink, though
+I must say of him that he was a clever fellow, and perfect master
+of his trade, by which he made a power of money, and bating his not
+being able to learn Irish, and a certain Jewish lisp which he had,
+a great master of his tongue, of which he was very proud; so much
+so, that he once told me that when he had saved a certain sum of
+money he meant to leave off the thimbling business, and enter
+Parliament; into which, he said, he could get at any time, through
+the interest of a friend of his, a Tory Peer--my Lord Whitefeather,
+with whom, he said, he had occasionally done business.  With the
+table, and other things which I had taken, I commenced trade on my
+own account, having contrived to learn a few of his tricks.  My
+only capital was the change for half-a-guinea, which he had once
+let fall, and which I picked up, which was all I could ever get
+from him:  for it was impossible to stale any money from him, he
+was so awake, being up to all the tricks of thaives, having
+followed the diving trade, as he called it, for a considerable
+time.  My wish was to make enough by my table to enable me to
+return with credit to ould Ireland, where I had no doubt of being
+able to get myself ordained as priest; and, in troth,
+notwithstanding I was a beginner, and without any companion to help
+me, I did tolerably well, getting my meat and drink, and increasing
+my small capital, till I came to this unlucky place of Horncastle,
+where I was utterly ruined by the thaif in the rider's dress.  And
+now, Shorsha, I am after telling you my history; perhaps you will
+now be telling me something about yourself?"
+
+I told Murtagh all about myself that I deemed necessary to relate,
+and then asked him what he intended to do; he repeated that he was
+utterly ruined, and that he had no prospect before him but
+starving, or making away with himself.  I inquired "How much would
+take him to Ireland, and establish him there with credit."  "Five
+pounds," he answered, adding, "but who in the world would be fool
+enough to tend me five pounds, unless it be yourself, Shorsha, who,
+may be, have not got it; for when you told me about yourself, you
+made no boast of the state of your affairs."  "I am not very rich,"
+I replied, "but I think I can accommodate you with what you want.
+I consider myself under great obligations to you, Murtagh; it was
+you who instructed me in the language of Oilein nan Naomha, which
+has been the foundation of all my acquisitions in philology;
+without you, I should not have been what I am--Lavengro! which
+signifies a philologist.  Here is the money, Murtagh," said I,
+putting my hand into my pocket, and taking out five pounds, "much
+good may it do you."  He took the money, stared at it, and then at
+me--"And you mane to give me this, Shorsha?"  "It is no longer mine
+to give," said I; "it is yours."  "And you give it me for the
+gratitude you bear me?"  "Yes, " said I, "and for Dungarvon times
+of old."  "Well, Shorsha," said he, "you are a broth of a boy, and
+I'll take your benefaction--five pounds! och, Jasus!"  He then put
+the money in his pocket, and springing up, waved his hat three
+times, uttering some old Irish cry; then, sitting down, he took my
+hand, and said, "Sure, Shorsha, I'll be going thither; and when I
+get there, it is turning over another leaf I will be; I have learnt
+a thing or two abroad; I will become a priest; that's the trade,
+Shorsha! and I will cry out for repale; that's the cry, Shorsha!
+and I'll be a fool no longer."  "And what will you do with your
+table?" said I.  "'Faith, I'll be taking it with me, Shorsha; and
+when I gets to Ireland, I'll get it mended, and I will keep it in
+the house which I shall have; and when I looks upon it, I will be
+thinking of all I have undergone."  "You had better leave it behind
+you," said I; "if you take it with you, you will, perhaps, take up
+the thimble trade again before you get to Ireland, and lose the
+money I am after giving you."  "No fear of that, Shorsha; never
+will I play on that table again, Shorsha, till I get it mended,
+which shall not be till I am a priest, and have a house in which to
+place it."
+
+Murtagh and I then went into the town, where we had some
+refreshment together, and then parted on our several ways.  I heard
+nothing of him for nearly a quarter of a century, when a person who
+knew him well, coming from Ireland, and staying at my humble house,
+told me a great deal about him.  He reached Ireland in safety, soon
+reconciled himself with his Church, and was ordained a priest; in
+the priestly office he acquitted himself in a way very
+satisfactory, upon the whole, to his superiors, having, as he
+frequently said, learned wisdom abroad.  The Popish Church never
+fails to turn to account any particular gift which its servants may
+possess; and discovering soon that Murtagh was endowed with
+considerable manual dexterity--proof of which he frequently gave at
+cards, and at a singular game which he occasionally played at
+thimbles--it selected him as a very fit person to play the part of
+exorcist; and accordingly he travelled through a great part of
+Ireland, casting out devils from people possessed, which he
+afterwards exhibited, sometimes in the shape of rabbits, and
+occasionally birds and fishes.  There is a holy island in a lake in
+Ireland, to which the people resort at a particular season of the
+year.  Here Murtagh frequently attended, and it was here that he
+performed a cure which will cause his name long to be remembered in
+Ireland, delivering a possessed woman of two demons, which he
+brandished aloft in his hands, in the shape of two large eels, and
+subsequently hurled into the lake, amidst the shouts of an
+enthusiastic multitude.  Besides playing the part of an exorcist,
+he acted that of a politician with considerable success; he
+attached himself to the party of the sire of agitation--"the man of
+paunch," and preached and hallooed for repeal with the loudest and
+best, as long as repeal was the cry; as soon, however, as the Whigs
+attained the helm of Government, and the greater part of the loaves
+and fishes--more politely termed the patronage of Ireland--was
+placed at the disposition of the priesthood, the tone of Murtagh,
+like that of the rest of his brother saggarts, was considerably
+softened; he even went so far as to declare that politics were not
+altogether consistent with sacerdotal duty; and resuming his
+exorcisms, which he had for some time abandoned, he went to the
+Isle of Holiness, and delivered a possessed woman of six demons in
+the shape of white mice.  He, however, again resumed the political
+mantle in the year 1848, during the short period of the rebellion
+of the so-called Young Irelanders.  The priests, though they
+apparently sided with this party, did not approve of it, as it was
+chiefly formed of ardent young men, fond of what they termed
+liberty, and by no means admirers of priestly domination, being
+mostly Protestants.  Just before the outbreak of this rebellion, it
+was determined between the priests and the -, that this party
+should be rendered comparatively innocuous by being deprived of the
+sinews' of war--in other words, certain sums of money which they
+had raised for their enterprise.  Murtagh was deemed the best
+qualified person in Ireland to be entrusted with the delicate
+office of getting their money from them.  Having received his
+instructions, he invited the leaders to his parsonage amongst the
+mountains, under pretence of deliberating with them about what was
+to be done.  They arrived there just before nightfall, dressed in
+red, yellow, and green, the colours so dear to enthusiastic
+Irishmen; Murtagh received them with great apparent cordiality, and
+entered into a long discourse with them, promising them the
+assistance of himself and order, and received from them a profusion
+of thanks.  After a time Murtagh, observing, in a jocular tone,
+that consulting was dull work, proposed a game of cards, and the
+leaders, though somewhat surprised, assenting, he went to a closet,
+and taking out a pack of cards, laid it upon the table; it was a
+strange dirty pack, and exhibited every mark of having seen very
+long service.  On one of its guests making some remarks on the
+"ancientness" of its appearance, Murtagh observed that there was a
+very wonderful history attached to that pack; it had been presented
+to him, he said, by a young gentleman, a disciple of his, to whom,
+in Dungarvon times of yore, he had taught the Irish language, and
+of whom he related some very extraordinary things; he added that
+he, Murtagh, had taken it to -, where it had once the happiness of
+being in the hands of the Holy Father; by a great misfortune, he
+did not say what, he had lost possession of it, and had returned
+without it, but had some time since recovered it; a nephew of his,
+who was being educated at--for a priest, having found it in a nook
+of the college, and sent it to him.
+
+Murtagh and the leaders then played various games with this pack,
+more especially one called by the initiated "blind hockey," the
+result being that at the end of about two hours the leaders found
+they had lost one-half of their funds; they now looked serious, and
+talked of leaving the house, but Murtagh begging them to stay to
+supper, they consented.  After supper, at which the guests drank
+rather freely, Murtagh said that, as he had not the least wish to
+win their money, he intended to give them their revenge; he would
+not play at cards with them, he added, but at a funny game of
+thimbles, at which they would be sure of winning back their own;
+then going out, he brought in a table, tall and narrow, on which
+placing certain thimbles and a pea, he proposed that they should
+stake whatever they pleased on the almost certainty of finding the
+pea under the thimbles.  The leaders, after some hesitation,
+consented, and were at first eminently successful, winning back the
+greater part of what they had lost; after some time, however,
+Fortune, or rather Murtagh, turned against them, and then, instead
+of leaving off, they doubled and trebled their stakes, and
+continued doing so until they had lost nearly the whole of their
+funds.  Quite furious, they now swore that Murtagh had cheated
+them, and insisted on having their property restored to them.
+Murtagh, without a word of reply, went to the door, and shouting
+into the passage something in Irish, the room was instantly filled
+with bogtrotters, each at least six feet high, with a stout
+shillelah in his hand.  Murtagh then turning to his guests, asked
+them what they meant by insulting an anointed priest; telling them
+that it was not for the likes of them to avenge the wrongs of
+Ireland.  "I have been clane mistaken in the whole of ye," said he,
+"I supposed ye Irish, but have found, to my sorrow, that ye are
+nothing of the kind; purty fellows to pretend to be Irish, when
+there is not a word of Irish on the tongue of any of ye, divil a
+ha'porth; the illigant young gentleman to whom I taught Irish, in
+Dungarvon times of old, though not born in Ireland, has more Irish
+in him than any ten of ye.  He is the boy to avenge the wrongs of
+Ireland, if ever foreigner is to do it."  Then saying something to
+the bogtrotters, they instantly cleared the room of the young
+Irelanders, who retired sadly disconcerted; nevertheless, being
+very silly young fellows, they hoisted the standard of rebellion;
+few, however, joining them, partly because they had no money, and
+partly because the priests abused them with might and main, their
+rebellion ended in a lamentable manner; themselves being seized and
+tried, and though convicted, not deemed of sufficient importance to
+be sent to the scaffold, where they might have had the satisfaction
+of saying -
+
+
+"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori."
+
+
+My visitor, after saying that of the money won, Murtagh retained a
+considerable portion, that a part went to the hierarchy for what
+were called church purposes, and that the--took the remainder,
+which it employed in establishing a newspaper, in which the private
+characters of the worthiest and most loyal Protestants in Ireland
+were traduced and vilified, concluded his account by observing,
+that it was the common belief that Murtagh, having by his services,
+ecclesiastical and political, acquired the confidence of the
+priesthood and favour of the Government, would, on the first
+vacancy, be appointed to the high office of Popish Primate of
+Ireland.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVII
+
+
+
+Departure from Horncastle--Recruiting Sergeant--Kauloes and
+Lolloes.
+
+
+Leaving Horncastle I bent my steps in the direction of the east.  I
+walked at a brisk rate, and late in the evening reached a large
+town, situate at the entrance of an extensive firth, or arm of the
+sea, which prevented my farther progress eastward.  Sleeping that
+night in the suburbs of the town, I departed early next morning in
+the direction of the south.  A walk of about twenty miles brought
+me to another large town, situated on a river, where I again turned
+towards the east.  At the end of the town I was accosted by a
+fiery-faced individual, somewhat under the middle size, dressed as
+a recruiting sergeant.
+
+"Young man," said the recruiting sergeant, "you are just the kind
+of person to serve the Honourable East India Company."
+
+"I had rather the Honourable Company should serve me," said I.
+
+"Of course, young man.  Well, the Honourable East India Company
+shall serve you--that's reasonable.  Here, take this shilling; 'tis
+service-money.  The Honourable Company engages to serve you, and
+you the Honourable Company; both parties shall be thus served;
+that's just and reasonable."
+
+"And what must I do for the Company?"
+
+"Only go to India; that's all."
+
+"And what should I do in India?"
+
+"Fight, my brave boy! fight, my youthful hero!"
+
+"What kind of country is India?"
+
+"The finest country in the world!  Rivers, bigger than the Ouse.
+Hills, higher than anything near Spalding!  Trees--you never saw
+such trees!  Fruits--you never saw such fruits!"
+
+"And the people--what kind of folk are they?"
+
+"Pah!  Kauloes--blacks--a set of rascals not worth regarding."
+
+"Kauloes!" said I; "blacks!"
+
+"Yes," said the recruiting sergeant; "and they call us lolloes,
+which, in their beastly gibberish, means red."
+
+"Lolloes!" said I; "reds!"
+
+"Yes," said the recruiting sergeant, "kauloes and lolloes; and all
+the lolloes have to do is to kick and cut down the kauloes, and
+take from them their rupees, which mean silver money.  Why do you
+stare so?"
+
+"Why," said I, "this is the very language of Mr. Petulengro."
+
+"Mr. Pet-?"
+
+"Yes," said I, "and Tawno Chikno."
+
+"Tawno Chik-?  I say, young fellow, I don't like your way of
+speaking; no, nor your way of looking.  You are mad, sir; you are
+mad; and what's this?  Why, your hair is grey!  You won't do for
+the Honourable Company--they like red.  I'm glad I didn't give you
+the shilling.  Good day to you."
+
+"I shouldn't wonder," said I, as I proceeded rapidly along a broad
+causeway, in the direction of the east, "if Mr. Petulengro and
+Tawno Chikno came originally from India.  I think I'll go there."
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+
+A Word for Lavengro.
+
+
+Lavengro is the history up to a certain period of one of rather a
+peculiar mind and system of nerves, with an exterior shy and cold,
+under which lurk much curiosity, especially with regard to what is
+wild and extraordinary, a considerable quantity of energy and
+industry, and an unconquerable love of independence.  It narrates
+his earliest dreams and feelings, dwells with minuteness on the
+ways, words, and characters of his father, mother, and brother,
+lingers on the occasional resting-places of his wandering half
+military childhood, describes the gradual hardening of his bodily
+frame by robust exercises, his successive struggles, after his
+family and himself have settled down in a small local capital, to
+obtain knowledge of every kind, but more particularly philological
+lore; his visits to the tent of the Romany chal, and the parlour of
+the Anglo-German philosopher; the effect produced upon his
+character by his flinging himself into contact with people all
+widely differing from each other, but all extraordinary; his
+reluctance to settle down to the ordinary pursuits of life; his
+struggles after moral truth; his glimpses of God and the
+obscuration of the Divine Being, to his mind's eye; and his being
+cast upon the world of London by the death of his father, at the
+age of nineteen.  In the world within a world, the world of London,
+it shows him playing his part for some time as he best can, in the
+capacity of a writer for reviews and magazines, and describes what
+he saw and underwent whilst labouring in that capacity; it
+represents him, however, as never forgetting that he is the son of
+a brave but poor gentleman, and that if he is a hack author, he is
+likewise a scholar.  It shows him doing no dishonourable jobs, and
+proves that if he occasionally associates with low characters, he
+does so chiefly to gratify the curiosity of a scholar.  In his
+conversations with the apple-woman of London Bridge, the scholar is
+ever apparent, so again in his acquaintance with the man of the
+table, for the book is no raker up of the uncleanness of London,
+and if it gives what at first sight appears refuse, it invariably
+shows that a pearl of some kind, generally a philological one, is
+contained amongst it; it shows its hero always accompanied by his
+love of independence, scorning in the greatest poverty to receive
+favours from anybody, and describes him finally rescuing himself
+from peculiarly miserable circumstances by writing a book, an
+original book, within a week, even as Johnson is said to have
+written his "Rasselas," and Beckford his "Vathek," and tells how,
+leaving London, he betakes himself to the roads and fields.
+
+In the country it shows him leading a life of roving adventure,
+becoming tinker, gypsy, postillion, ostler; associating with
+various kinds of people, chiefly of the lower classes, whose ways
+and habits are described; but, though leading this erratic life, we
+gather from the book that his habits are neither vulgar nor
+vicious, that he still follows to a certain extent his favourite
+pursuits, hunting after strange characters, or analysing strange
+words and names.  At the conclusion of the last chapter, which
+terminates the first part of the history, it hints that he is about
+to quit his native land on a grand philological expedition.
+
+Those who read this book with attention--and the author begs to
+observe that it would be of little utility to read it hurriedly--
+may derive much information with respect to matters of philology
+and literature; it will be found treating of most of the principal
+languages from Ireland to China, and of the literature which they
+contain; and it is particularly minute with regard to the ways,
+manners, and speech of the English section of the most
+extraordinary and mysterious clan or tribe of people to be found in
+the whole world--the children of Roma.  But it contains matters of
+much more importance than anything in connection with philology,
+and the literature and manners of nations.  Perhaps no work was
+ever offered to the public in which the kindness and providence of
+God have been set forth by more striking examples, or the
+machinations of priestcraft been more truly and lucidly exposed, or
+the dangers which result to a nation when it abandons itself to
+effeminacy, and a rage for what is novel and fashionable, than the
+present.
+
+With respect to the kindness and providence of God, are they not
+exemplified in the case of the old apple-woman and her son?  These
+are beings in many points bad, but with warm affections, who, after
+an agonizing separation, are restored to each other, but not until
+the hearts of both are changed and purified by the influence of
+affliction.  Are they not exemplified in the case of the rich
+gentleman, who touches objects in order to avert the evil chance?
+This being has great gifts and many amiable qualifies, but does not
+everybody see that his besetting sin is selfishness?  He fixes his
+mind on certain objects, and takes inordinate interest in them,
+because they are his own, and those very objects, through the
+providence of God, which is kindness in disguise, become snakes and
+scorpions to whip him.  Tired of various pursuits, he at last
+becomes an author, and publishes a book, which is very much
+admired, and which he loves with his usual inordinate affection;
+the book, consequently, becomes a viper to him, and at last he
+flings it aside and begins another; the book, however, is not flung
+aside by the world, who are benefited by it, deriving pleasure and
+knowledge from it:  so the man who merely wrote to gratify self,
+has already done good to others, and got himself an honourable
+name.  But God will not allow that man to put that book under his
+head and use it as a pillow:  the book has become a viper to him,
+he has banished it, and is about another, which he finishes and
+gives to the world; it is a better book than the first, and every
+one is delighted with it; but it proves to the writer a scorpion,
+because he loves it with inordinate affection; but it was good for
+the world that he produced this book, which stung him as a
+scorpion.  Yes; and good for himself, for the labour of writing it
+amused him, and perhaps prevented him from dying of apoplexy; but
+the book is banished, and another is begun, and herein, again, is
+the providence of God manifested; the man has the power of
+producing still, and God determines that he shall give to the world
+what remains in his brain, which he would not do, had he been
+satisfied with the second work; he would have gone to sleep upon
+that as he would upon the first, for the man is selfish and lazy.
+In his account of what he suffered during the composition of this
+work, his besetting sin of selfishness is manifest enough; the work
+on which he is engaged occupies his every thought, it is his idol,
+his deity, it shall be all his own, he won't borrow a thought from
+any one else, and he is so afraid lest, when he publishes it, that
+it should be thought that he had borrowed from any one, that he is
+continually touching objects, his nervous system, owing to his
+extreme selfishness, having become partly deranged.  He is left
+touching, in order to banish the evil chance from his book, his
+deity.  No more of his history is given; but does the reader think
+that God will permit that man to go to sleep on his third book,
+however extraordinary it may be?  Assuredly not.  God will not
+permit that man to rest till he has cured him to a certain extent
+of his selfishness, which has, however, hitherto been very useful
+to the world.
+
+Then, again, in the tale of Peter Williams, is not the hand of
+Providence to be seen?  This person commits a sin in his childhood,
+utters words of blasphemy, the remembrance of which, in after life,
+preying upon his imagination, unfits him for quiet pursuits, to
+which he seems to have been naturally inclined; but for the
+remembrance of that sin, he would have been Peter Williams the
+quiet and respectable Welsh farmer, somewhat fond of reading the
+ancient literature of his country in winter evenings, after his
+work was done.  God, however, was aware that there was something in
+Peter Williams to entitle him to assume a higher calling; he
+therefore permits this sin, which, though a childish affair, was
+yet a sin, and committed deliberately, to prey upon his mind till
+he becomes at last an instrument in the hand of God, a humble Paul,
+the great preacher, Peter Williams, who, though he considers
+himself a reprobate and a castaway, instead of having recourse to
+drinking in mad desperation, as many do who consider themselves
+reprobates, goes about Wales and England preaching the word of God,
+dilating on his power and majesty, and visiting the sick and
+afflicted, until God sees fit to restore to him his peace of mind;
+which he does not do, however, until that mind is in a proper
+condition to receive peace, till it has been purified by the pain
+of the one idea which has so long been permitted to riot in his
+brain; which pain, however, an angel, in the shape of a gentle
+faithful wife, had occasionally alleviated; for God is merciful
+even in the blows which He bestoweth, and will not permit any one
+to be tempted beyond the measure which he can support.  And here it
+will be as well for the reader to ponder upon the means by which
+the Welsh preacher is relieved from his mental misery:  he is not
+relieved by a text from the Bible, by the words of consolation and
+wisdom addressed to him by his angel-minded wife, nor by the
+preaching of one yet more eloquent than himself; but by a quotation
+made by Lavengro from the life of Mary Flanders, cut-purse and
+prostitute, which life Lavengro had been in the habit of reading at
+the stall of his old friend the apple-woman, on London Bridge, who
+had herself been very much addicted to the perusal of it, though
+without any profit whatever.  Should the reader be dissatisfied
+with the manner in which Peter Williams is made to find relief, the
+author would wish to answer, that the Almighty frequently
+accomplishes his purposes by means which appear very singular to
+the eyes of men, and at the same time to observe that the manner in
+which that relief is obtained, is calculated to read a lesson to
+the proud, fanciful, and squeamish, who are ever in a fidget lest
+they should be thought to mix with low society, or to bestow a
+moment's attention on publications which are not what is called of
+a perfectly unobjectionable character.  Had not Lavengro formed the
+acquaintance of the apple-woman on London Bridge, he would not have
+had an opportunity of reading the life of Mary Flanders; and,
+consequently, of storing in a memory, which never forgets anything,
+a passage which contained a balm for the agonized mind of poor
+Peter Williams.  The best medicines are not always found in the
+finest shops.  Suppose, for example, if, instead of going to London
+Bridge to read, he had gone to Albemarle Street, and had received
+from the proprietors of the literary establishment in that very
+fashionable street, permission to read the publications on the
+tables of the saloons there, does the reader think he would have
+met any balm in those publications for the case of Peter Williams?
+does the reader suppose that he would have found Mary Flanders
+there?  He would certainly have found that highly unobjectionable
+publication, "Rasselas," and the "Spectator," or "Lives of Royal
+and Illustrious Personages," but, of a surety, no Mary Flanders; so
+when Lavengro met with Peter Williams, he would have been
+unprovided with a balm to cure his ulcerated mind, and have parted
+from him in a way not quite so satisfactory as the manner in which
+he took his leave of him; for it is certain that he might have read
+"Rasselas," and all other unexceptionable works to be found in the
+library of Albemarle Street, over and over again, before he would
+have found any cure in them for the case of Peter Williams.
+Therefore the author requests the reader to drop any squeamish
+nonsense he may wish to utter about Mary Flanders, and the manner
+in which Peter Williams was cured.
+
+And now with respect to the old man who knew Chinese, but could not
+tell what was o'clock.  This individual was a man whose natural
+powers would have been utterly buried and lost beneath a mountain
+of sloth and laziness, had not God determined otherwise.  He had in
+his early years chalked out for himself a plan of life in which he
+had his own ease and self-indulgence solely in view; he had no
+particular bad passions to gratify, he only wished to live a happy
+quiet life, just as if the business of this mighty world could be
+carried on by innocent people fond of ease or quiet, or that
+Providence would permit innocent quiet drones to occupy any portion
+of the earth and to cumber it.  God had at any rate decreed that
+this man should not cumber it as a drone.  He brings a certain
+affliction upon him, the agony of which produces that terrible
+whirling of the brain which, unless it is stopped in time, produces
+madness; he suffers indescribable misery for a period, until one
+morning his attention is arrested, and his curiosity is aroused, by
+certain Chinese letters on a teapot; his curiosity increases more
+and more, and, of course, in proportion as his curiosity is
+increased with respect to the Chinese marks, the misery in his
+brain, produced by his mental affliction, decreases.  He sets about
+learning Chinese, and after the lapse of many years, during which
+his mind subsides into a certain state of tranquillity, he acquires
+sufficient knowledge of Chinese to be able to translate with ease
+the inscriptions to be found on its singular crockery.  Yes, the
+laziest of human beings, through the Providence of God, a being too
+of rather inferior capacity, acquires the written part of a
+language so difficult that, as Lavengro said on a former occasion,
+none but the cleverest people in Europe, the French, are able to
+acquire it.  But God did not intend that man should merely acquire
+Chinese.  He intended that he should be of use to his species, and
+by the instrumentality of the first Chinese inscription which he
+translates, the one which first arrested his curiosity, he is
+taught the duty of hospitality; yes, by means of an inscription in
+the language of a people, who have scarcely an idea of hospitality
+themselves, God causes the slothful man to play a useful and
+beneficent part in the world, relieving distressed wanderers, and,
+amongst others, Lavengro himself.  But a striking indication of the
+man's surprising sloth is still apparent in what he omits to do; he
+has learnt Chinese, the most difficult of languages, and he
+practises acts of hospitality, because he believes himself enjoined
+to do so by the Chinese inscription, but he cannot tell the hour of
+the day by the clock within his house; he can get on, he thinks,
+very well without being able to do so; therefore from this one
+omission, it is easy to come to a conclusion as to what a
+sluggard's part the man would have played in life, but for the
+dispensation of Providence; nothing but extreme agony could have
+induced such a man to do anything useful.  He still continues, with
+all he has acquired, with all his usefulness, and with all his
+innocence of character, without any proper sense of religion,
+though he has attained a rather advanced age.  If it be observed,
+that this want of religion is a great defect in the story, the
+author begs leave to observe that he cannot help it.  Lavengro
+relates the lives of people so far as they were placed before him,
+but no further.  It was certainly a great defect in so good a man
+to be without religion; it was likewise a great defect in so
+learned a man not to be able to tell what was o'clock.  It is
+probable that God, in his loving kindness, will not permit that man
+to go out of the world without religion; who knows but some
+powerful minister of the church full of zeal for the glory of God,
+will illume that man's dark mind; perhaps some clergyman will come
+to the parish who will visit him and teach him his duty to his God.
+Yes, it is very probable that such a man, before he dies, will have
+been made to love his God; whether he will ever learn to know
+what's o'clock is another matter.  It is probable that he will go
+out of the world without knowing what's o'clock.  It is not so
+necessary to be able to tell the time of day by the clock as to
+know one's God through His inspired word; a man cannot get to
+heaven without religion, but a man can get there very comfortably
+without knowing what's o'clock.
+
+But, above all, the care and providence of God are manifested in
+the case of Lavengro himself, by the manner in which he is enabled
+to make his way in the world up to a certain period, without
+falling a prey either to vice or poverty.  In his history, there is
+a wonderful illustration of part of the text, quoted by his mother,
+"I have been young, but now am old, yet never saw I the righteous
+forsaken, or his seed begging his bread."  He is the son of good
+and honourable parents, but at the critical period of life, that of
+entering into the world, he finds himself without any earthly
+friend to help him, yet he manages to make his way; he does not
+become a Captain in the Life Guards, it is true, nor does he get
+into Parliament, nor does the last volume conclude in the most
+satisfactory and unobjectionable manner, by his marrying a dowager
+countess, as that wise man Addison did, or by his settling down as
+a great country gentleman, perfectly happy and contented, like the
+very moral Roderick Random, or the equally estimable Peregrine
+Pickle; he is hack author, gypsy, tinker, and postillion, yet, upon
+the whole, he seems to be quite as happy as the younger sons of
+most earls, to have as high feelings of honour; and when the reader
+loses sight of him, he has money in his pocket honestly acquired,
+to enable him to commence a journey quite as laudable as those
+which the younger sons of earls generally undertake.  Surely all
+this is a manifestation of the kindness and providence of God:  and
+yet he is not a religious person; up to the time when the reader
+loses sight of him, he is decidedly not a religious person; he has
+glimpses, it is true, of that God who does not forsake him, but he
+prays very seldom, is not fond of going to church; and, though he
+admires Tate and Brady's version of the Psalms, his admiration is
+rather caused by the beautiful poetry which that version contains
+than the religion; yet his tale is not finished--like the tale of
+the gentleman who touched objects, and that of the old man who knew
+Chinese without knowing what was o'clock; perhaps, like them, he is
+destined to become religious, and to have, instead of occasional
+glimpses, frequent and distinct views of his God; yet, though he
+may become religious, it is hardly to be expected that he will
+become a very precise and straightlaced person; it is probable that
+he will retain, with his scholarship, something of his gypsyism,
+his predilection for the hammer and tongs, and perhaps some
+inclination to put on certain gloves, not white kid, with any
+friend who may be inclined for a little old English diversion, and
+a readiness to take a glass of ale, with plenty of malt in it, and
+as little hop as may well be--ale at least two years old--with the
+aforesaid friend, when the diversion is over; for, as it is the
+belief of the writer that a person may get to heaven very
+comfortably without knowing what's o'clock, so it is his belief
+that he will not be refused admission there, because to the last he
+has been fond of healthy and invigorating exercises, and felt a
+willingness to partake of any of the good things which it pleases
+the Almighty to put within the reach of his children during their
+sojourn upon earth.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+
+On Priestcraft.
+
+
+The writer will now say a few words about priestcraft, and the
+machinations of Rome, and will afterwards say something about
+himself, and his motives for writing against them.
+
+With respect to Rome, and her machinations, much valuable
+information can be obtained from particular parts of Lavengro, and
+its sequel.  Shortly before the time when the hero of the book is
+launched into the world, the Popish agitation in England had
+commenced.  The Popish propaganda had determined to make a grand
+attempt on England; Popish priests were scattered over the land,
+doing the best they could to make converts to the old superstition.
+With the plans of Rome, and her hopes, and the reasons on which
+those hopes are grounded, the hero of the book becomes acquainted,
+during an expedition which he makes into the country, from certain
+conversations which he holds with a priest in a dingle, in which
+the hero had taken up his residence; he likewise learns from the
+same person much of the secret history of the Roman See, and many
+matters connected with the origin and progress of the Popish
+superstition.  The individual with whom he holds these
+conversations is a learned, intelligent, but highly-unprincipled
+person, of a character however very common amongst the priests of
+Rome, who in general are people void of all religion, and who,
+notwithstanding they are tied to Rome by a band which they have
+neither the power nor wish to break, turn her and her practices,
+over their cups with their confidential associates, to a ridicule
+only exceeded by that to which they turn those who become the dupes
+of their mistress and themselves.
+
+It is now necessary that the writer should say something with
+respect to himself, and his motives for waging war against Rome.
+First of all, with respect to himself, he wishes to state, that to
+the very last moment of his life, he will do and say all that in
+his power may be to hold up to contempt and execration the
+priestcraft and practices of Rome; there is, perhaps, no person
+better acquainted than himself, not even among the choicest spirits
+of the priesthood, with the origin and history of Popery.  From
+what he saw and heard of Popery in England, at a very early period
+of his life, his curiosity was aroused, and he spared himself no
+trouble, either by travel or study, to make himself well acquainted
+with it in all its phases, the result being a hatred of it, which
+he hopes and trusts he shall retain till the moment when his spirit
+quits the body.  Popery is the great lie of the world; a source
+from which more misery and social degradation have flowed upon the
+human race, than from all the other sources from which those evils
+come.  It is the oldest of all superstitions; and though in Europe
+it assumes the name of Christianity, it existed and flourished
+amidst the Himalayan hills at least two thousand years before the
+real Christ was born in Bethlehem of Judea; in a word, it is
+Buddhism; and let those who may be disposed to doubt this
+assertion, compare the Popery of Rome, and the superstitious
+practices of its followers, with the doings of the priests who
+surround the grand Lama; and the mouthings, bellowing, turnings
+round, and, above all, the penances of the followers of Buddh with
+those of Roman devotees.  But he is not going to dwell here on this
+point; it is dwelt upon at tolerable length in the text, and has
+likewise been handled with extraordinary power by the pen of the
+gifted but irreligious Volney; moreover, the elite of the Roman
+priesthood are perfectly well aware that their system is nothing
+but Buddhism under a slight disguise, and the European world in
+general has entertained for some time past an inkling of the fact.
+
+And now a few words with respect to the motives of the writer for
+expressing a hatred for Rome.
+
+This expressed abhorrence of the author for Rome might be entitled
+to little regard, provided it were possible to attribute it to any
+self-interested motive.  There have been professed enemies of Rome,
+or of this or that system; but their professed enmity may
+frequently be traced to some cause which does them little credit;
+but the writer of these lines has no motive, and can have no
+motive, for his enmity to Rome, save the abhorrence of an honest
+heart for what is false, base, and cruel.  A certain clergyman
+wrote with much heat against the Papists in the time of--who was
+known to favour the Papists, but was not expected to continue long
+in office, and whose supposed successor, the person, indeed, who
+did succeed him, was thought to be hostile to the Papists.  This
+divine, who obtained a rich benefice from the successor of--who
+during -'s time had always opposed him in everything he proposed to
+do, and who, of course, during that time affected to be very
+inimical to Popery--this divine might well be suspected of having a
+motive equally creditable for writing against the Papists, as that
+which induced him to write for them, as soon as his patron, who
+eventually did something more for him, had espoused their cause;
+but what motive, save an honest one, can the present writer have,
+for expressing an abhorrence of Popery?  He is no clergyman, and
+consequently can expect neither benefices nor bishoprics, supposing
+it were the fashion of the present, or likely to be the fashion of
+any future administration, to reward clergymen with benefices or
+bishoprics, who, in the defence of the religion of their country
+write, or shall write, against Popery, and not to reward those who
+write, or shall write, in favour of it, and all its nonsense and
+abominations.
+
+"But if not a clergyman, he is the servant of a certain society,
+which has the overthrow of Popery in view, and therefore," etc.
+This assertion, which has been frequently made, is incorrect, even
+as those who have made it probably knew it to be.  He is the
+servant of no society whatever.  He eats his own bread, and is one
+of the very few men in England who are independent in every sense
+of the word.
+
+It is true he went to Spain with the colours of that society on his
+hat--oh! the blood glows in his veins! oh! the marrow awakes in his
+old bones when he thinks of what he accomplished in Spain in the
+cause of religion and civilization with the colours of that society
+in his hat, and its weapon in his hand, even the sword of the word
+of God; how with that weapon he hewed left and right, making the
+priests fly before him, and run away squeaking:  "Vaya! que demonio
+es este!"  Ay, and when he thinks of the plenty of Bible swords
+which he left behind him, destined to prove, and which have already
+proved, pretty calthrops in the heels of Popery.  "Halloo!
+Batuschca," he exclaimed the other night, on reading an article in
+a newspaper; "what do you think of the present doings in Spain?
+Your old friend the zingaro, the gitano who rode about Spain, to
+say nothing of Galicia, with the Greek Buchini behind him as his
+squire, had a hand in bringing them about; there are many brave
+Spaniards connected with the present movement who took Bibles from
+his hands, and read them and profited by them, learning from the
+inspired page the duties of one man towards another, and the real
+value of a priesthood and their head, who set at nought the word of
+God, and think only of their own temporal interests; ay, and who
+learned Gitano--their own Gitano--from the lips of the London
+Caloro, and also songs in the said Gitano, very fit to dumbfounder
+your semi-Buddhist priests when they attempt to bewilder people's
+minds with their school-logic and pseudo-ecclesiastical nonsense,
+songs such as -
+
+
+"Un Erajai
+Sinaba chibando un sermon--."
+
+
+- But with that society he has long since ceased to have any
+connection; he bade it adieu with feelings of love and admiration
+more than fourteen years ago; so, in continuing to assault Popery,
+no hopes of interest founded on that society can sway his mind--
+interest! who, with worldly interest in view, would ever have
+anything to do with that society?  It is poor and supported, like
+its founder Christ, by poor people; and so far from having
+political influence, it is in such disfavour, and has ever been,
+with the dastardly great, to whom the government of England has for
+many years past been confided, that they having borne its colours
+only for a month would be sufficient to exclude any man, whatever
+his talents, his learning, or his courage may be, from the
+slightest chance of being permitted to serve his country either for
+fee, or without.  A fellow who unites in himself the bankrupt
+trader, the broken author, or rather book-maker, and the laughed-
+down single speech spouter of the House of Commons, may look
+forward, always supposing that at one time he has been a foaming
+radical, to the government of an important colony.  Ay, an ancient
+fox who has lost his tail may, provided he has a score of radical
+friends, who will swear that he can bark Chinese, though Chinese is
+not barked but sung, be forced upon a Chinese colony, though it is
+well known that to have lost one's tail is considered by the
+Chinese in general as an irreparable infamy, whilst to have been
+once connected with a certain society, to which, to its honour be
+it said, all the radical party are vehemently hostile, would be
+quite sufficient to keep any one not only from a government, but
+something much less, even though he could translate the rhymed
+"Sessions of Hariri," and were versed, still retaining his tail, in
+the two languages in which Kien-Loung wrote his Eulogium on
+Moukden, that piece which, translated by Amyot, the learned Jesuit,
+won the applause of the celebrated Voltaire.
+
+No! were the author influenced by hopes of fee or reward, he would,
+instead of writing against Popery, write for it; all the trumpery
+titled--he will not call them great again--would then be for him,
+and their masters the radicals, with their hosts of newspapers,
+would be for him, more especially if he would commence maligning
+the society whose colours he had once on his hat--a society which,
+as the priest says in the text, is one of the very few Protestant
+institutions for which the Popish Church entertains any fear, and
+consequently respect, as it respects nothing which it does not
+fear.  The writer said that certain "rulers" would never forgive
+him for having been connected with that society; he went perhaps
+too far in saying "never."  It is probable that they would take him
+into favour on one condition, which is, that he should turn his pen
+and his voice against that society; such a mark "of a better way of
+thinking" would perhaps induce them to give him a government,
+nearly as good as that which they gave to a certain ancient radical
+fox at the intercession of his radical friends (who were bound to
+keep him from the pauper's kennel), after he had promised to foam,
+bark, and snarl at corruption no more; he might even entertain
+hopes of succeeding, nay, of superseding, the ancient creature in
+his government; but even were he as badly off as he is well off, he
+would do no such thing.  He would rather exist on crusts and water;
+he has often done so, and been happy; nay, he would rather starve
+than be a rogue--for even the feeling of starvation is happiness
+compared with what he feels who knows himself to be a rogue,
+provided he has any feeling at all.  What is the use of a mitre or
+knighthood to a man who has betrayed his principles?  What is the
+use of a gilt collar, nay, even of a pair of scarlet breeches, to a
+fox who has lost his tail?  Oh! the horror which haunts the mind of
+a fox who has lost his tail; and with reason, for his very mate
+loathes him, and more especially if, like himself, she has lost her
+brush.  Oh! the horror which haunts the mind of the two-legged
+rogue who has parted with his principles, or those which he
+professed--for what?  We'll suppose a government.  What's the use
+of a government, if the next day after you have received it, you
+are obliged for very shame to scurry off to it with the hoot of
+every honest man sounding in your ears?
+
+
+"Lightly liar leaped and away ran."
+PIERS PLOWMAN.
+
+
+But bigotry, it has been said, makes the author write against
+Popery; and thorough-going bigotry, indeed, will make a person say
+or do anything.  But the writer is a very pretty bigot truly!
+Where will the public find traces of bigotry in anything he has
+written?  He has written against Rome with all his heart, with all
+his mind, with all his soul, and with all his strength; but as a
+person may be quite honest, and speak and write against Rome, in
+like manner he may speak and write against her, and be quite free
+from bigotry; though it is impossible for any one but a bigot or a
+bad man to write or speak in her praise; her doctrines, actions,
+and machinations being what they are.
+
+Bigotry!  The author was born, and has always continued in the
+wrong church for bigotry, the quiet, unpretending Church of
+England; a church which, had it been a bigoted church, and not long
+suffering almost to a fault, might with its opportunities, as the
+priest says in the text, have stood in a very different position
+from that which it occupies at present.  No! let those who are in
+search of bigotry, seek for it in a church very different from the
+inoffensive Church of England, which never encourages cruelty or
+calumny.  Let them seek for it amongst the members of the Church of
+Rome, and more especially amongst those who have renegaded to it.
+There is nothing, however false and horrible, which a pervert to
+Rome will not say for his church, and which his priests will not
+encourage him in saying; and there is nothing, however horrible--
+the more horrible indeed and revolting to human nature, the more
+eager he would be to do it--which he will not do for it, and which
+his priests will not encourage him in doing.
+
+Of the readiness which converts to Popery exhibit to sacrifice all
+the ties of blood and affection on the shrine of their newly-
+adopted religion, there is a curious illustration in the work of
+Luigi Pulci.  This man, who was born at Florence in the year 1432,
+and who was deeply versed in the Bible, composed a poem, called the
+"Morgante Maggiore," which he recited at the table of Lorenzo de
+Medici, the great patron of Italian genius.  It is a mock-heroic
+and religious poem, in which the legends of knight-errantry, and of
+the Popish Church, are turned to unbounded ridicule.  The pretended
+hero of it is a converted giant, called Morgante; though his
+adventures do not occupy the twentieth part of the poem, the
+principal personages being Charlemagne, Orlando, and his cousin
+Rinaldo of Montalban.  Morgante has two brothers, both of them
+giants, and in the first canto of the poem, Morgante is represented
+with his brothers as carrying on a feud with the abbot and monks of
+a certain convent, built upon the confines of heathenesse; the
+giants being in the habit of flinging down stones, or rather huge
+rocks, on the convent.  Orlando, however, who is banished from the
+court of Charlemagne, arriving at the convent, undertakes to
+destroy them, and, accordingly, kills Passamonte and Alabastro, and
+converts Morgante, whose mind had been previously softened by a
+vision, in which the "Blessed Virgin" figures.  No sooner is he
+converted than, as a sign of his penitence, what does he do, but
+hastens and cuts off the hands of his two brothers, saying -
+
+
+"Io vo' tagliar le mani a tutti quanti
+E porterolle a que' monaci santi."
+
+
+And he does cut off the hands of his brethren, and carries them to
+the abbot, who blesses him for so doing.  Pulci here is holding up
+to ridicule and execration the horrid butchery or betrayal of
+friends by popish converts, and the encouragement they receive from
+the priest.  No sooner is a person converted to Popery, than his
+principal thought is how he can bring the hands and feet of his
+brethren, however harmless they may be, and different from the
+giants, to the "holy priests," who, if he manages to do so, never
+fail to praise him, saying to the miserable wretch, as the abbot
+said to Morgante:-
+
+
+"Tu sarai or perfetto e vero amico
+A Cristo, quanto tu gli eri nemico."
+
+
+Can the English public deny the justice of Pulci's illustration,
+after something which it has lately witnessed?  Has it not seen
+equivalents for the hands and feet of brothers carried by popish
+perverts to the "holy priests," and has it not seen the manner in
+which the offering has been received?  Let those who are in quest
+of bigotry seek for it among the perverts to Rome, and not amongst
+those who, born in the pale of the Church of England, have always
+continued in it.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+
+On Foreign Nonsense.
+
+
+With respect to the third point, various lessons which the book
+reads to the nation at large, and which it would be well for the
+nation to ponder and profit by.
+
+There are many species of nonsense to which the nation is much
+addicted, and of which the perusal of Lavengro ought to give them a
+wholesome shame.  First of all, with respect to the foreign
+nonsense so prevalent now in England.  The hero is a scholar; but,
+though possessed of a great many tongues, he affects to be neither
+Frenchman, nor German, nor this or that foreigner; he is one who
+loves his country, and the language and literature of his country,
+and speaks up for each and all when there is occasion to do so.
+Now what is the case with nine out of ten amongst those of the
+English who study foreign languages?  No sooner have they picked up
+a smattering of this or that speech than they begin to abuse their
+own country, and everything connected with it, more especially its
+language.  This is particularly the case with those who call
+themselves German students.  It is said, and the writer believes
+with truth, that when a woman falls in love with a particularly
+ugly fellow, she squeezes him with ten times more zest than she
+would a handsome one, if captivated by him.  So it is with these
+German students; no sooner have they taken German in hand than
+there is nothing like German.  Oh, the dear delightful German!  How
+proud I am that it is now my own, and that its divine literature is
+within my reach!  And all this whilst mumbling the most uncouth
+speech, and crunching the most crabbed literature in Europe.  The
+writer is not an exclusive admirer of everything English; he does
+not advise his country people never to go abroad, never to study
+foreign languages, and he does not wish to persuade them that there
+is nothing beautiful or valuable in foreign literature; he only
+wishes that they would not make themselves fools with respect to
+foreign people, foreign languages or reading; that if they chance
+to have been in Spain, and have picked up a little Spanish, they
+would not affect the airs of Spaniards; that if males they would
+not make Tomfools of themselves by sticking cigars into their
+mouths, dressing themselves in zamarras, and saying, carajo! {2}
+and if females that they would not make zanies of themselves by
+sticking cigars into their mouths, flinging mantillas over their
+heads, and by saying carai, and perhaps carajo too; or if they have
+been in France or Italy, and have picked up a little French or
+Italian, they would not affect to be French or Italians; and
+particularly, after having been a month or two in Germany, or
+picked up a little German in England, they would not make
+themselves foolish about everything German, as the Anglo-German in
+the book does--a real character, the founder of the Anglo-German
+school in England, and the cleverest Englishman who ever talked or
+wrote encomiastic nonsense about Germany and the Germans.  Of all
+infatuations connected with what is foreign, the infatuation about
+everything that is German, to a certain extent prevalent in
+England, is assuredly the most ridiculous.  One can find something
+like a palliation for people making themselves somewhat foolish
+about particular languages, literatures, and people.  The Spanish
+certainly is a noble language, and there is something wild and
+captivating in the Spanish character, and its literature contains
+the grand book of the world.  French is a manly language.  The
+French are the great martial people in the world; and French
+literature is admirable in many respects.  Italian is a sweet
+language, and of beautiful simplicity--its literature perhaps the
+first in the world.  The Italians!--wonderful men have sprung up in
+Italy.  Italy is not merely famous for painters, poets, musicians,
+singers, and linguists--the greatest linguist the world ever saw,
+the late Cardinal Mezzofanti, was an Italian; but it is celebrated
+for men--men emphatically speaking:  Columbus was an Italian,
+Alexander Farnese was an Italian, so was the mightiest of the
+mighty, Napoleon Bonaparte;--but the German language, German
+literature, and the Germans!  The writer has already stated his
+opinion with respect to German; he does not speak from ignorance or
+prejudice; he has heard German spoken, and many other languages.
+German literature!  He does not speak from ignorance, he has read
+that and many a literature, and he repeats-- However, he
+acknowledges that there is one fine poem in the German language,
+that poem is the "Oberon;" a poem, by the bye, ignored by the
+Germans--a speaking fact--and of course, by the Anglo-Germanists.
+The Germans! he has been amongst them, and amongst many other
+nations, and confesses that his opinion of the Germans, as men, is
+a very low one.  Germany, it is true, has produced one very great
+man, the monk who fought the Pope, and nearly knocked him down; but
+this man his countrymen--a telling fact--affect to despise, and, of
+course, the Anglo-Germanists:  the father of Anglo-Germanism was
+very fond of inveighing against Luther.
+
+The madness, or rather foolery, of the English for foreign customs,
+dresses, and languages, is not an affair of to-day, or yesterday--
+it is of very ancient date, and was very properly exposed nearly
+three centuries ago by one Andrew Borde, who under the picture of a
+"Naked man, with a pair of shears in one hand, and a roll of cloth
+in the other," {3} inserted the following lines along with others:-
+
+
+"I am an Englishman, and naked I stand here,
+Musing in my mind what garment I shall weare;
+For now I will weare this, and now I will weare that,
+Now I will weare, I cannot tell what.
+All new fashions be pleasant to mee,
+I will have them, whether I thrive or thee;
+What do I care if all the world me fail?
+I will have a garment reach to my taile;
+Then am I a minion, for I wear the new guise.
+The next yeare after I hope to be wise,
+Not only in wearing my gorgeous array,
+For I will go to learning a whole summer's day;
+I will learn Latine, Hebrew, Greek, and French,
+And I will learn Dutch, sitting on my bench.
+I had no peere if to myself I were true,
+Because I am not so, divers times do I rue.
+Yet I lacke nothing, I have all things at will
+If I were wise and would hold myself still,
+And meddle with no matters but to me pertaining,
+But ever to be true to God and my king.
+But I have such matters rowling in my pate,
+That I will and do--I cannot tell what," etc.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+
+On Gentility Nonsense--Illustrations of Gentility.
+
+
+What is gentility?  People in different stations in England--
+entertain different ideas of what is genteel, {4} but it must be
+something gorgeous, glittering, or tawdry, to be considered genteel
+by any of them.  The beau-ideal of the English aristocracy, of
+course with some exceptions, is some young fellow with an imperial
+title, a military personage of course, for what is military is so
+particularly genteel, with flaming epaulets, a cocked hat and
+plume, a prancing charger, and a band of fellows called generals
+and colonels, with flaming epaulets, cocked hats and plumes, and
+prancing chargers vapouring behind him.  It was but lately that the
+daughter of an English marquis was heard to say, that the sole
+remaining wish of her heart--she had known misfortunes, and was not
+far from fifty--was to be introduced to--whom?  The Emperor of
+Austria!  The sole remaining wish of the heart of one who ought to
+have been thinking of the grave and judgment, was to be introduced
+to the miscreant who had caused the blood of noble Hungarian
+females to be whipped out of their shoulders, for no other crime
+than devotion to their country, and its tall and heroic sons.  The
+middle classes--of course there are some exceptions--admire the
+aristocracy, and consider them pinks, the aristocracy who admire
+the Emperor of Austria, and adored the Emperor of Russia, till he
+became old, ugly, and unfortunate, when their adoration instantly
+terminated; for what is more ungenteel than age, ugliness, and
+misfortune!  The beau-ideal with those of the lower classes, with
+peasants and mechanics, is some flourishing railroad contractor:
+look, for example, how they worship Mr. Flamson.  This person makes
+his grand debut in the year 'thirty-nine, at a public meeting in
+the principal room of a country inn.  He has come into the
+neighbourhood with the character of a man worth a million pounds,
+who is to make everybody's fortune; at this time, however, he is
+not worth a shilling of his own, though he flashes about
+dexterously three or four thousand pounds, part of which sum he has
+obtained by specious pretences, and part from certain individuals
+who are his confederates.  But in the year 'forty-nine, he is
+really in possession of the fortune which he and his agents
+pretended to be worth ten years before--he is worth a million
+pounds.  By what means has he come by them?  By railroad contracts,
+for which he takes care to be paid in hard cash before he attempts
+to perform them, and to carry out which he makes use of the sweat
+and blood of wretches who, since their organization, have
+introduced crimes and language into England to which it was
+previously almost a stranger--by purchasing, with paper, shares by
+hundreds in the schemes to execute which he contracts, and which
+are his own devising; which shares he sells as soon as they are at
+a high premium, to which they are speedily forced by means of
+paragraphs, inserted by himself and agents, in newspapers devoted
+to his interest, utterly reckless of the terrible depreciation to
+which they are almost instantly subjected.  But he is worth a
+million pounds, there can be no doubt of the fact--he has not made
+people's fortunes, at least those whose fortunes it was said he
+would make; he has made them away; but his own he has made,
+emphatically made it; he is worth a million pounds.  Hurrah for the
+millionnaire!  The clown who views the pandemonium of red brick
+which he has built on the estate which he has purchased in the
+neighbourhood of the place of his grand debut, in which every
+species of architecture, Greek, Indian, and Chinese, is employed in
+caricature--who hears of the grand entertainment he gives at
+Christmas in the principal dining-room, the hundred wax-candles,
+the waggon-load of plate, and the ocean of wine which form parts of
+it, and above all the two ostrich poults, one at the head, and the
+other at the foot of the table, exclaims, "Well! if he a'n't bang
+up, I don't know who be; why he beats my lord hollow!"  The
+mechanic of the borough town, who sees him dashing through the
+streets in an open landau, drawn by four milk-white horses, amidst
+his attendant out-riders; his wife, a monster of a woman, by his
+side, stout as the wife of Tamerlane, who weighed twenty stone, and
+bedizened out like her whose person shone with the jewels of
+plundered Persia, stares with silent wonder, and at last exclaims
+"That's the man for my vote!"  You tell the clown that the man of
+the mansion has contributed enormously to corrupt the rural
+innocence of England; you point to an incipient branch railroad,
+from around which the accents of Gomorrah are sounding, and beg him
+to listen for a moment, and then close his ears.  Hodge scratches
+his head and says, "Well, I have nothing to say to that; all I know
+is, that he is bang up, and I wish I were he;" perhaps he will add-
+-a Hodge has been known to add--"He has been kind enough to put my
+son on that very railroad; 'tis true the company is somewhat queer,
+and the work rather killing, but he gets there half-a-crown a day,
+whereas from the farmers he would only get eighteen-pence."  You
+remind the mechanic that the man in the landau has been the ruin of
+thousands and you mention people whom he himself knows, people in
+various grades of life, widows and orphans amongst them, whose
+little all has been dissipated, and whom he has reduced to beggary
+by inducing them to become sharers in his delusive schemes.  But
+the mechanic says, "Well, the more fools they to let themselves be
+robbed.  But I don't call that kind of thing robbery, I merely call
+it out-witting; and everybody in this free country has a right to
+outwit others if he can.  What a turn-out he has!"  One was once
+heard to add, "I never saw a more genteel-looking man in all my
+life except one, and that was a gentleman's walley, who was much
+like him.  It is true that he is rather under-sized, but then
+madam, you know, makes up for all."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+
+Subject of Gentility continued.
+
+
+In the last chapter have been exhibited specimens of gentility, so
+considered by different classes; by one class power, youth, and
+epaulets are considered the ne plus ultra of gentility; by another
+class pride, stateliness, and title; by another, wealth and flaming
+tawdriness.  But what constitutes a gentleman?  It is easy to say
+at once what constitutes a gentleman, and there are no distinctions
+in what is gentlemanly, {5} as there are in what is genteel.  The
+characteristics of a gentleman are high feeling--a determination
+never to take a cowardly advantage of another--a liberal education-
+-absence of narrow views--generosity and courage, propriety of
+behaviour.  Now a person may be genteel according to one or another
+of the three standards described above, and not possess one of the
+characteristics of a gentleman.  Is the emperor a gentleman, with
+spatters of blood on his clothes, scourged from the backs of noble
+Hungarian women?  Are the aristocracy gentlefolks, who admire him?
+Is Mr. Flamson a gentleman, although he has a million pounds?  No!
+cowardly miscreants, admirers of cowardly miscreants, and people
+who make a million pounds by means compared with which those
+employed to make fortunes by the getters up of the South Sea Bubble
+might be called honest dealing, are decidedly not gentlefolks.  Now
+as it is clearly demonstrable that a person may be perfectly
+genteel according to some standard or other, and yet be no
+gentleman, so it is demonstrable that a person may have no
+pretensions to gentility, and yet be a gentleman.  For example,
+there is Lavengro!  Would the admirers of the emperor, or the
+admirers of those who admire the emperor, or the admirers of Mr.
+Flamson, call him genteel? and gentility with them is everything!
+Assuredly they would not; and assuredly they would consider him
+respectively as a being to be shunned, despised, or hooted.
+Genteel!  Why at one time he is a hack author--writes reviewals for
+eighteenpence a page--edits a Newgate chronicle.  At another he
+wanders the country with a face grimy from occasionally mending
+kettles; and there is no evidence that his clothes are not seedy
+and torn, and his shoes down at the heel; but by what process of
+reasoning will they prove that he is no gentleman?  Is he not
+learned?  Has he not generosity and courage?  Whilst a hack author,
+does he pawn the books entrusted to him to review?  Does he break
+his word to his publisher?  Does he write begging letters?  Does he
+get clothes or lodgings without paying for them?  Again, whilst a
+wanderer, does he insult helpless women on the road with loose
+proposals or ribald discourse?  Does he take what is not his own
+from the hedges?  Does he play on the fiddle, or make faces in
+public-houses, in order to obtain pence or beer? or does he call
+for liquor, swallow it, and then say to a widowed landlady,
+"Mistress, I have no brass?"  In a word, what vice and crime does
+he perpetrate--what low acts does he commit?  Therefore, with his
+endowments, who will venture to say that he is no gentleman?--
+unless it be an admirer of Mr. Flamson--a clown--who will, perhaps,
+shout--"I say he is no gentleman; for who can be a gentleman who
+keeps no gig?"
+
+The indifference exhibited by Lavengro for what is merely genteel,
+compared with his solicitude never to infringe the strict laws of
+honour, should read a salutary lesson.  The generality of his
+countrymen are far more careful not to transgress the customs of
+what they call gentility, than to violate the laws of honour or
+morality.  They will shrink from carrying their own carpet-bag, and
+from speaking to a person in seedy raiment, whilst to matters of
+much higher importance they are shamelessly indifferent.  Not so
+Lavengro; he will do anything that he deems convenient, or which
+strikes his fancy, provided it does not outrage decency, or is
+unallied to profligacy; is not ashamed to speak to a beggar in
+rags, and will associate with anybody, provided he can gratify a
+laudable curiosity.  He has no abstract love for what is low, or
+what the world calls low.  He sees that many things which the world
+looks down upon are valuable, so he prizes much which the world
+condemns; he sees that many things which the world admires are
+contemptible, so he despises much which the world does not; but
+when the world prizes what is really excellent, he does not contemn
+it, because the world regards it.  If he learns Irish, which all
+the world scoffs at, he likewise learns Italian, which all the
+world melts at.  If he learns Gypsy, the language of the tattered
+tent, he likewise learns Greek, the language of the college-hall.
+If he learns smithery, he also learns--ah! what does he learn to
+set against smithery?--the law?  No; he does not learn the law,
+which, by the way, is not very genteel.  Swimming?  Yes, he learns
+to swim.  Swimming, however, is not genteel; and the world--at
+least the genteel part of it--acts very wisely in setting its face
+against it; for to swim you must be naked, and how would many a
+genteel person look without his clothes?  Come, he learns
+horsemanship; a very genteel accomplishment, which every genteel
+person would gladly possess, though not all genteel people do.
+
+Again as to associates:  if he holds communion when a boy with
+Murtagh, the scarecrow of an Irish academy, he associates in after
+life with Francis Ardry, a rich and talented young Irish gentleman
+about town.  If he accepts an invitation from Mr. Petulengro to his
+tent, he has no objection to go home with a rich genius to dinner;
+who then will say that he prizes a thing or a person because they
+are ungenteel?  That he is not ready to take up with everything
+that is ungenteel he gives a proof, when he refuses, though on the
+brink of starvation, to become bonnet to the thimble-man, an
+office, which, though profitable, is positively ungenteel.  Ah! but
+some sticker-up for gentility will exclaim, "The hero did not
+refuse this office from an insurmountable dislike to its
+ungentility, but merely from a feeling of principle."  Well! the
+writer is not fond of argument, and he will admit that such was the
+case; he admits that it was a love of principle, rather than an
+over-regard for gentility, which prevented the hero from accepting,
+when on the brink of starvation, an ungenteel though lucrative
+office, an office which, the writer begs leave to observe, many a
+person with a great regard for gentility, and no particular regard
+for principle, would in a similar strait have accepted; for when
+did a mere love for gentility keep a person from being a dirty
+scoundrel, when the alternatives were "either be a dirty scoundrel
+or starve?"  One thing, however, is certain, which is, that
+Lavengro did not accept the office, which if a love for what is low
+had been his ruling passion he certainly would have done;
+consequently, he refuses to do one thing which no genteel person
+would willingly do, even as he does many things which every genteel
+person would gladly do, for example, speaks Italian, rides on
+horseback, associates with a fashionable young man, dines with a
+rich genius, et cetera.  Yet--and it cannot be minced--he and
+gentility with regard to many things are at strange divergency; he
+shrinks from many things at which gentility placidly hums a tune,
+or approvingly simpers, and does some things at which gentility
+positively shrinks.  He will not run into debt for clothes or
+lodgings, which he might do without any scandal to gentility; he
+will not receive money from Francis Ardry, and go to Brighton with
+the sister of Annette Le Noir, though there is nothing ungenteel in
+borrowing money from a friend, even when you never intend to repay
+him, and something poignantly genteel in going to a watering-place
+with a gay young Frenchwoman; but he has no objection, after
+raising twenty pounds by the sale of that extraordinary work
+"Joseph Sell," to set off into the country, mend kettles under
+hedge-rows, and make pony and donkey shoes in a dingle.  Here,
+perhaps, some plain, well-meaning person will cry--and with much
+apparent justice--how can the writer justify him in this act?  What
+motive, save a love for what is low, could induce him to do such a
+thing?  Would the writer have everybody who is in need of
+recreation go into the country, mend kettles under hedges, and make
+pony shoes in dingles?  To such an observation the writer would
+answer, that Lavengro had an excellent motive in doing what he did,
+but that the writer is not so unreasonable as to wish everybody to
+do the same.  It is not everybody who can mend kettles.  It is not
+everybody who is in similar circumstances to those in which
+Lavengro was.  Lavengro flies from London and hack authorship, and
+takes to the roads from fear of consumption; it is expensive to put
+up at inns, and even at public-houses, and Lavengro has not much
+money; so he buys a tinker's cart and apparatus, and sets up as
+tinker, and subsequently as blacksmith; a person living in a tent,
+or in anything else, must do something or go mad; Lavengro had a
+mind, as he himself well knew, with some slight tendency to
+madness, and had he not employed himself, he must have gone wild;
+so to employ himself he drew upon one of his resources, the only
+one available at the time.  Authorship had nearly killed him, he
+was sick of reading, and had besides no books; but he possessed the
+rudiments of an art akin to tinkering; he knew something of
+smithery, having served a kind of apprenticeship in Ireland to a
+fairy smith; so he draws upon his smithery to enable him to acquire
+tinkering, he speedily acquires that craft, even as he had speedily
+acquired Welsh, owing to its connection with Irish, which language
+he possessed; and with tinkering he amuses himself until he lays it
+aside to resume smithery.  A man who has an innocent resource, has
+quite as much right to draw upon it in need, as he has upon a
+banker in whose hands he has placed a sum; Lavengro turns to
+advantage, under particular circumstances, a certain resource which
+he has, but people who are not so forlorn as Lavengro, and have not
+served the same apprenticeship which he had, are not advised to
+follow his example.  Surely he was better employed in plying the
+trades of tinker and smith than in having recourse to vice, in
+running after milk-maids, for example.  Running after milk-maids is
+by no means an ungenteel rural diversion; but let any one ask some
+respectable casuist (the Bishop of London for example), whether
+Lavengro was not far better employed, when in the country, at
+tinkering and smithery than he would have been in running after all
+the milk-maids in Cheshire, though tinkering is in general
+considered a very ungenteel employment, and smithery little better,
+notwithstanding that an Orcadian poet, who wrote in Norse about
+eight hundred years ago, reckons the latter among nine noble arts
+which he possessed, naming it along with playing at chess, on the
+harp, and ravelling runes, or as the original has it, "treading
+runes"--that is, compressing them into a small compass by mingling
+one letter with another, even as the Turkish caligraphists ravel
+the Arabic letters, more especially those who write talismans.
+
+
+"Nine arts have I, all noble;
+I play at chess so free,
+At ravelling runes I'm ready,
+At books and smithery;
+I'm skilled o'er ice at skimming
+On skates, I shoot and row,
+And few at harping match me,
+Or minstrelsy, I trow."
+
+
+But though Lavengro takes up smithery, which, though the Orcadian
+ranks it with chess-playing and harping, is certainly somewhat of a
+grimy art, there can be no doubt that, had he been wealthy and not
+so forlorn as he was, he would have turned to many things,
+honourable, of course, in preference.  He has no objection to ride
+a fine horse when he has the opportunity:  he has his day-dream of
+making a fortune of two hundred thousand pounds by becoming a
+merchant and doing business after the Armenian fashion; and there
+can be no doubt that he would have been glad to wear fine clothes,
+provided he had had sufficient funds to authorize him in wearing
+them.  For the sake of wandering the country and plying the hammer
+and tongs, he would not have refused a commission in the service of
+that illustrious monarch George the Fourth, provided he had thought
+that he could live on his pay, and not be forced to run in debt to
+tradesmen, without any hope of paying them, for clothes and
+luxuries, as many highly genteel officers in that honourable
+service were in the habit of doing.  For the sake of tinkering, he
+would certainly not have refused a secretaryship of an embassy to
+Persia, in which he might have turned his acquaintance with
+Persian, Arabic, and the Lord only knows what other languages, to
+account.  He took to tinkering and smithery, because no better
+employments were at his command.  No war is waged in the book
+against rank, wealth, fine clothes, or dignified employments; it is
+shown, however, that a person may be a gentleman and a scholar
+without them.  Rank, wealth, fine clothes, and dignified
+employments, are no doubt very fine things, but they are merely
+externals, they do not make a gentleman, they add external grace
+and dignity to the gentleman and scholar, but they make neither;
+and is it not better to be a gentleman without them than not a
+gentleman with them?  Is not Lavengro, when he leaves London on
+foot with twenty pounds in his pocket, entitled to more respect
+than Mr. Flamson flaming in his coach with a million?  And is not
+even the honest jockey at Horncastle, who offers a fair price to
+Lavengro for his horse, entitled to more than the scoundrel lord,
+who attempts to cheat him of one-fourth of its value?
+
+Millions, however, seem to think otherwise, by their servile
+adoration of people whom without rank, wealth, and fine clothes
+they would consider infamous, but whom possessed of rank, wealth,
+and glittering habiliments they seem to admire all the more for
+their profligacy and crimes.  Does not a blood-spot, or a lust-
+spot, on the clothes of a blooming emperor, give a kind of zest to
+the genteel young god?  Do not the pride, superciliousness, and
+selfishness of a certain aristocracy make it all the more regarded
+by its worshippers? and do not the clownish and gutter-blood
+admirers of Mr. Flamson like him all the more because they are
+conscious that he is a knave?  If such is the case --and, alas! is
+it not the case?--they cannot be too frequently told that fine
+clothes, wealth, and titles adorn a person in proportion as he
+adorns them; that if worn by the magnanimous and good they are
+ornaments indeed, but if by the vile and profligate they are merely
+san benitos, and only serve to make their infamy doubly apparent;
+and that a person in seedy raiment and tattered hat, possessed of
+courage, kindness, and virtue, is entitled to more respect from
+those to whom his virtues are manifested than any cruel profligate
+emperor, selfish aristocrat, or knavish millionaire in the world.
+
+The writer has no intention of saying that all in England are
+affected with the absurd mania for gentility; nor is such a
+statement made in the book; it is shown therein that individuals of
+certain classes can prize a gentleman, notwithstanding seedy
+raiment, dusty shoes or tattered hat,--for example, the young
+Irishman, the rich genius, the postillion, and his employer.
+Again, when the life of the hero is given to the world, amidst the
+howl about its lowness and vulgarity, raised by the servile crew
+whom its independence of sentiment has stung, more than one
+powerful voice has been heard testifying approbation of its
+learning and the purity of its morality.  That there is some salt
+in England, minds not swayed by mere externals, he is fully
+convinced; if he were not, he would spare himself the trouble of
+writing; but to the fact that the generality of his countrymen are
+basely grovelling before the shrine of what they are pleased to
+call gentility, he cannot shut his eyes.
+
+ Oh! what a clever person that Cockney was, who, travelling in the
+Aberdeen railroad carriage, after edifying the company with his
+remarks on various subjects, gave it as his opinion that Lieutenant
+P--- would, in future, be shunned by all respectable society!  And
+what a simple person that elderly gentleman was, who, abruptly
+starting, asked in rather an authoritative voice, "and why should
+Lieutenant P--- be shunned by respectable society?" and who, after
+entering into what was said to be a masterly analysis of the entire
+evidence of the case, concluded by stating, "that having been
+accustomed to all kinds of evidence all his life, he had never
+known a case in which the accused had obtained a more complete and
+triumphant justification than Lieutenant P--- had done in the late
+trial."
+
+Now the Cockney, who is said to have been a very foppish Cockney,
+was perfectly right in what he said, and therein manifested a
+knowledge of the English mind and character, and likewise of the
+modern English language, to which his catechist, who, it seems, was
+a distinguished member of the Scottish bar, could lay no
+pretensions.  The Cockney knew what the Lord of Session knew not,
+that the British public is gentility crazy, and he knew, moreover,
+that gentility and respectability are synonymous.  No one in
+England is genteel or respectable that is "looked at," who is the
+victim of oppression; he may be pitied for a time, but when did not
+pity terminate in contempt?  A poor, harmless young officer--but
+why enter into the details of the infamous case? they are but too
+well known, and if ever cruelty, pride, and cowardice, and things
+much worse than even cruelty, cowardice, and pride were brought to
+light, and, at the same time, countenanced, they were in that case.
+What availed the triumphant justification of the poor victim?
+There was at first a roar of indignation against his oppressors,
+but how long did it last?  He had been turned out of the service,
+they remained in it with their red coats and epaulets; he was
+merely the son of a man who had rendered good service to his
+country, they were, for the most part, highly connected--they were
+in the extremest degree genteel, he quite the reverse; so the
+nation wavered, considered, thought the genteel side was the safest
+after all, and then with the cry of, "Oh! there is nothing like
+gentility," ratted bodily.  Newspaper and public turned against the
+victim, scouted him, apologized for the--what should they be
+called?--who were not only admitted into the most respectable
+society, but courted to come, the spots not merely of wine on their
+military clothes, giving them a kind of poignancy.  But there is a
+God in heaven; the British glories are tarnished--Providence has
+never smiled on British arms since that case--oh!  Balaklava! thy
+name interpreted is net of fishes, and well dost thou deserve that
+name.  How many a scarlet golden fish has of late perished in the
+mud amidst thee, cursing the genteel service, and the genteel
+leader which brought him to such a doom.
+
+Whether the rage for gentility is most prevalent amongst the upper,
+middle, or lower classes it is difficult to say; the priest in the
+text seems to think that it is exhibited in the most decided manner
+in the middle class; it is the writer's opinion, however, that in
+no class is it more strongly developed than in the lower:  what
+they call being well-born goes a great way amongst them, but the
+possession of money much farther, whence Mr. Flamson's influence
+over them.  Their rage against, and scorn for, any person who by
+his courage and talents has advanced himself in life, and still
+remains poor, are indescribable; "he is no better than ourselves,"
+they say, "why should he be above us?"--for they have no conception
+that anybody has a right to ascendency over themselves except by
+birth or money.  This feeling amongst the vulgar has been, to a
+certain extent, the bane of two services, naval and military.  The
+writer does not make this assertion rashly; he observed this
+feeling at work in the army when a child, and he has good reason
+for believing that it was as strongly at work in the navy at the
+same time, and is still as prevalent in both.  Why are not brave
+men raised from the ranks? is frequently the cry; why are not brave
+sailors promoted?  The Lord help brave soldiers and sailors who are
+promoted; they have less to undergo from the high airs of their
+brother officers, and those are hard enough to endure, than from
+the insolence of the men.  Soldiers and sailors promoted to command
+are said to be in general tyrants; in nine cases out of ten, when
+they are tyrants, they have been obliged to have recourse to
+extreme severity in order to protect themselves from the insolence
+and mutinous spirit of the men,--"He is no better than ourselves:
+shoot him, bayonet him, or fling him overboard!" they say of some
+obnoxious individual raised above them by his merit.  Soldiers and
+sailors, in general, will bear any amount of tyranny from a lordly
+sot, or the son of a man who has "plenty of brass"--their own term-
+-but will mutiny against the just orders of a skilful and brave
+officer who "is no better than themselves."  There was the affair
+of the "Bounty," for example:  Bligh was one of the best seamen
+that ever trod deck, and one of the bravest of men; proofs of his
+seamanship he gave by steering, amidst dreadful weather, a deeply-
+laden boat for nearly four thousand miles over an almost unknown
+ocean--of his bravery, at the fight of Copenhagen, one of the most
+desperate ever fought, of which after Nelson he was the hero:  he
+was, moreover, not an unkind man; but the crew of the "Bounty"
+mutinied against him, and set him half naked in an open boat, with
+certain of his men who remained faithful to him, and ran away with
+the ship.  Their principal motive for doing so was an idea, whether
+true or groundless the writer cannot say, that Bligh was "no better
+than themselves;" he was certainly neither a lord's illegitimate,
+nor possessed of twenty thousand pounds.  The writer knows what he
+is writing about, having been acquainted in his early years with an
+individual who was turned adrift with Bligh, and who died about the
+year '22, a lieutenant in the navy, in a provincial town in which
+the writer was brought up.  The ringleaders in the mutiny were two
+scoundrels, Christian and Young, who had great influence with the
+crew, because they were genteelly connected.  Bligh, after leaving
+the "Bounty," had considerable difficulty in managing the men who
+had shared his fate, because they considered themselves "as good
+men as he," notwithstanding, that to his conduct and seamanship
+they had alone to look, under Heaven, for salvation from the
+ghastly perils that surrounded them.  Bligh himself, in his
+journal, alludes to this feeling.  Once, when he and his companions
+landed on a desert island, one of them said, with a mutinous look,
+that he considered himself "as good a man as he;" Bligh, seizing a
+cutlass, called upon him to take another and defend himself,
+whereupon the man said that Bligh was going to kill him, and made
+all manner of concessions; now why did this fellow consider himself
+as good a man as Bligh?  Was he as good a seaman? no, nor a tenth
+part as good.  As brave a man? no, nor a tenth part as brave; and
+of these facts he was perfectly well aware, but bravery and
+seamanship stood for nothing with him, as they still stand with
+thousands of his class; Bligh was not genteel by birth or money,
+therefore Bligh was no better than himself.  Had Bligh, before he
+sailed, got a twenty-thousand pound prize in the lottery, he would
+have experienced no insolence from this fellow, for there would
+have been no mutiny in the "Bounty."  "He is our betters," the crew
+would have said, "and it is our duty to obey him."
+
+The wonderful power of gentility in England is exemplified in
+nothing more than in what it is producing amongst Jews, Gypsies,
+and Quakers.  It is breaking up their venerable communities.  All
+the better, some one will say.  Alas! alas!  It is making the
+wealthy Jews forsake the synagogue for the opera-house, or the
+gentility chapel, in which a disciple of Mr. Platitude, in a white
+surplice, preaches a sermon at noon-day from a desk, on each side
+of which is a flaming taper.  It is making them abandon their
+ancient literature, their "Mischna," their "Gemara," their "Zohar,"
+for gentility novels, "The Young Duke," the most unexceptionably
+genteel book ever written, being the principal favourite.  It makes
+the young Jew ashamed of the young Jewess, it makes her ashamed of
+the young Jew.  The young Jew marries an opera-dancer, or if the
+dancer will not have him, as is frequently the case, the cast-off
+Miss of the Honourable Spencer So-and-so.  It makes the young
+Jewess accept the honourable offer of a cashiered lieutenant of the
+Bengal Native Infantry; or, if such a person does not come forward,
+the dishonourable offer of a cornet of a regiment of crack hussars.
+It makes poor Jews, male and female, forsake the synagogue for the
+sixpenny theatre or penny hop; the Jew to take up with an Irish
+female of loose character, and the Jewess with a musician of the
+Guards, or the Tipperary servant of Captain Mulligan.  With respect
+to the gypsies, it is making the women what they never were before-
+-harlots; and the men what they never were before--careless fathers
+and husbands.  It has made the daughter of Ursula the chaste take
+up with the base drummer of a wild-beast show.  It makes Gorgiko
+Brown, the gypsy man, leave his tent and his old wife, of an
+evening, and thrust himself into society which could well dispense
+with him.  "Brother," said Mr. Petulengro to the Romany Rye, after
+telling him many things connected with the decadence of gypsyism,
+"there is one Gorgiko Brown, who, with a face as black as a tea-
+kettle, wishes to be mistaken for a Christian tradesman; he goes
+into the parlour of a third-rate inn of an evening, calls for rum
+and water, and attempts to enter into conversation with the company
+about politics and business; the company flout him and give him the
+cold shoulder, or perhaps complain to the landlord, who comes and
+asks him what business he has in the parlour, telling him if he
+wants to drink to go into the tap-room, and perhaps collars him and
+kicks him out, provided he refuses to move."  With respect to the
+Quakers, it makes the young people like the young Jews, crazy after
+gentility diversions, worship, marriages, or connections, and makes
+old Pease do what it makes Gorgiko Brown do, thrust himself into
+society which could well dispense with him, and out of which he is
+not kicked, because unlike the gypsy he is not poor.  The writer
+would say much more on these points, but want of room prevents him;
+he must therefore request the reader to have patience until he can
+lay before the world a pamphlet, which he has been long meditating,
+to be entitled "Remarks on the strikingly similar Effects which a
+Love for Gentility has produced, and is producing, amongst Jews,
+Gypsies, and Quakers."
+
+The Priest in the book has much to say on the subject of this
+gentility-nonsense; no person can possibly despise it more
+thoroughly than that very remarkable individual seems to do, yet he
+hails its prevalence with pleasure, knowing the benefits which will
+result from it to the church of which he is the sneering slave.
+"The English are mad after gentility," says he; "well, all the
+better for us; their religion for a long time past has been a plain
+and simple one, and consequently by no means genteel; they'll quit
+it for ours, which is the perfection of what they admire; with
+which Templars, Hospitalers, mitred abbots, Gothic abbeys, long-
+drawn aisles, golden censers, incense, et cetera, are connected;
+nothing, or next to nothing, of Christ, it is true, but weighed in
+the balance against gentility, where will Christianity be? why,
+kicking against the beam--ho! ho!"  And in connection with the
+gentility-nonsense, he expatiates largely, and with much contempt,
+on a species of literature by which the interests of his church in
+England have been very much advanced--all genuine priests have a
+thorough contempt for everything which tends to advance the
+interests of their church--this literature is made up of pseudo
+Jacobitism, Charlie o'er the waterism, or nonsense about Charlie
+o'er the water.  And the writer will now take the liberty of saying
+a few words about it on his own account.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+
+On Scotch Gentility-Nonsense--Charlie o'er the Waterism.
+
+
+Of the literature just alluded to Scott was the inventor.  It is
+founded on the fortunes and misfortunes of the Stuart family, of
+which Scott was the zealous defender and apologist, doing all that
+in his power lay to represent the members of it as noble,
+chivalrous, high-minded, unfortunate princes; though, perhaps, of
+all the royal families that ever existed upon the earth, this
+family was the worst.  It was unfortunate enough, it is true; but
+it owed its misfortunes entirely to its crimes, viciousness, bad
+faith, and cowardice.  Nothing will be said of it here until it
+made its appearance in England to occupy the English throne.
+
+The first of the family which we have to do with, James, was a
+dirty, cowardly miscreant, of whom the less said the better.  His
+son, Charles the First, was a tyrant--exceedingly cruel and
+revengeful, but weak and dastardly; he caused a poor fellow to be
+hanged in London, who was not his subject, because he had heard
+that the unfortunate creature had once bitten his own glove at
+Cadiz, in Spain, at the mention of his name; and he permitted his
+own bull-dog, Strafford, to be executed by his own enemies, though
+the only crime of Strafford was, that he had barked furiously at
+those enemies, and had worried two or three of them, when Charles
+shouted, "Fetch 'em."  He was a bitter, but yet a despicable enemy,
+and the coldest and most worthless of friends; for though he always
+hoped to be able, some time or other, to hang his enemies, he was
+always ready to curry favour with them, more especially if he could
+do so at the expense of his friends.  He was the haughtiest, yet
+meanest of mankind.  He once caned a young nobleman for appearing
+before him in the drawing-room not dressed exactly according to the
+court etiquette; yet he condescended to flatter and compliment him
+who, from principle, was his bitterest enemy, namely, Harrison,
+when the republican colonel was conducting him as a prisoner to
+London.  His bad faith was notorious; it was from abhorrence of the
+first public instance which he gave of his bad faith, his breaking
+his word to the Infanta of Spain, that the poor Hiberno-Spaniard
+bit his glove at Cadiz; and it was his notorious bad faith which
+eventually cost him his head; for the Republicans would gladly have
+spared him, provided they could put the slightest confidence in any
+promise, however solemn, which he might have made to them.  Of
+them, it would be difficult to say whether they most hated or
+despised him.  Religion he had none.  One day he favoured Popery;
+the next, on hearing certain clamours of the people, he sent his
+wife's domestics back packing to France, because they were Papists.
+Papists, however, should make him a saint, for he was certainly the
+cause of the taking of Rochelle.
+
+His son, Charles the Second, though he passed his youth in the
+school of adversity, learned no other lesson from it than the
+following one--take care of yourself, and never do an action,
+either good or bad, which is likely to bring you into any great
+difficulty; and this maxim he acted up to as soon as he came to the
+throne.  He was a Papist, but took especial care not to acknowledge
+his religion, at which he frequently scoffed, till just before his
+last gasp, when he knew that he could lose nothing, and hoped to
+gain everything by it.  He was always in want of money, but took
+care not to tax the country beyond all endurable bounds; preferring
+to such a bold and dangerous course, to become the pensioner of
+Louis, to whom, in return for his gold, he sacrificed the honour
+and interests of Britain.  He was too lazy and sensual to delight
+in playing the part of a tyrant himself; but he never checked
+tyranny in others save in one instance.  He permitted beastly
+butchers to commit unmentionable horrors on the feeble, unarmed,
+and disunited Covenanters of Scotland, but checked them when they
+would fain have endeavoured to play the same game on the numerous
+united, dogged, and warlike Independents of England.  To show his
+filial piety, he bade the hangman dishonour the corpses of some of
+his father's judges, before whom, when alive, he ran like a
+screaming hare; but permitted those who had lost their all in
+supporting his father's cause, to pine in misery and want.  He
+would give to a painted harlot a thousand pounds for a loathsome
+embrace, and to a player or buffoon a hundred for a trumpery pun,
+but would refuse a penny to the widow or orphan of an old Royalist
+soldier.  He was the personification of selfishness; and as he
+loved and cared for no one, so did no one love or care for him.  So
+little had he gained the respect or affection of those who
+surrounded him, that after his body had undergone an after-death
+examination, parts of it were thrown down the sinks of the palace,
+to become eventually the prey of the swine and ducks of
+Westminster.
+
+His brother, who succeeded him, James the Second, was a Papist, but
+sufficiently honest to acknowledge his Popery, but upon the whole,
+he was a poor creature; though a tyrant, he was cowardly, had he
+not been a coward he would never have lost his throne.  There were
+plenty of lovers of tyranny in England who would have stood by him,
+provided he would have stood by them, and would, though not
+Papists, have encouraged him in his attempt to bring back England
+beneath the sway of Rome, and perhaps would eventually have become
+Papists themselves; but the nation raising a cry against him, and
+his son-in-law, the Prince of Orange, invading the country, he
+forsook his friends, of whom he had a host, but for whom he cared
+little--left his throne, for which he cared a great deal--and
+Popery in England, for which he cared yet more, to their fate, and
+escaped to France, from whence, after taking a little heart, he
+repaired to Ireland, where he was speedily joined by a gallant army
+of Papists whom he basely abandoned at the Boyne, running away in a
+most lamentable condition, at the time when by showing a little
+courage he might have enabled them to conquer.  This worthy, in his
+last will, bequeathed his heart to England--his right arm to
+Scotland--and his bowels to Ireland.  What the English and Scotch
+said to their respective bequests is not known, but it is certain
+that an old Irish priest, supposed to have been a great-grand-uncle
+of the present Reverend Father Murtagh, on hearing of the bequest
+to Ireland, fell into a great passion, and having been brought up
+at "Paris and Salamanca," expressed his indignation in the
+following strain:- "Malditas sean tus tripas! teniamos bastante del
+olor de tus tripas al tiempo de tu nuida dela batalla del Boyne!"
+
+His son, generally called the Old Pretender, though born in
+England, was carried in his infancy to France, where he was brought
+up in the strictest principles of Popery, which principles,
+however, did not prevent him becoming (when did they ever prevent
+any one?) a worthless and profligate scoundrel; there are some
+doubts as to the reality of his being a son of James, which doubts
+are probably unfounded, the grand proof of his legitimacy being the
+thorough baseness of his character.  It was said of his father that
+he could speak well, and it may be said of him that he could write
+well, the only thing he could do which was worth doing, always
+supposing that there is any merit in being able to write.  He was
+of a mean appearance, and, like his father, pusillanimous to a
+degree.  The meanness of his appearance disgusted, and his
+pusillanimity discouraged the Scotch when he made his appearance
+amongst them in the year 1715, some time after the standard of
+rebellion had been hoisted by Mar.  He only stayed a short time in
+Scotland, and then, seized with panic, retreated to France, leaving
+his friends to shift for themselves as they best could.  He died a
+pensioner of the Pope.
+
+The son of this man, Charles Edward, of whom so much in later years
+has been said and written, was a worthless ignorant youth, and a
+profligate and illiterate old man.  When young, the best that can
+be said of him is, that he had occasionally springs of courage,
+invariably at the wrong time and place, which merely served to lead
+his friends into inextricable difficulties.  When old, he was
+loathsome and contemptible to both friend and foe.  His wife
+loathed him, and for the most terrible of reasons; she did not
+pollute his couch, for to do that was impossible--he had made it so
+vile; but she betrayed it, inviting to it not only Alfieri the
+Filthy, but the coarsest grooms.  Doctor King, the warmest and
+almost last adherent of his family, said, that there was not a vice
+or crime of which he was not guilty; as for his foes, they scorned
+to harm him even when in their power.  In the year 1745 he came
+down from the Highlands of Scotland, which had long been a focus of
+rebellion.  He was attended by certain clans of the Highlands,
+desperadoes used to free-bootery from their infancy, and,
+consequently, to the use of arms, and possessed of a certain
+species of discipline; with these he defeated at Prestonpans a body
+of men called soldiers, but who were in reality peasants and
+artizans, levied about a month before, without discipline or
+confidence in each other, and who were miserably massacred by the
+Highland army; he subsequently invaded England, nearly destitute of
+regular soldiers, and penetrated as far as Derby, from which place
+he retreated on learning that regular forces which had been hastily
+recalled from Flanders were coming against him, with the Duke of
+Cumberland at their head; he was pursued, and his rearguard
+overtaken and defeated by the dragoons of the duke at Clifton, from
+which place the rebels retreated in great confusion across the Eden
+into Scotland, where they commenced dancing Highland reels and
+strathspeys on the bank of the river, for joy at their escape,
+whilst a number of wretched girls, paramours of some of them, were
+perishing in the waters of the swollen river in an attempt to
+follow them; they themselves passed over by eighties and by
+hundreds, arm in arm, for mutual safety, without the loss of a man,
+but they left the poor paramours to shift for themselves, nor did
+any of these canny people after passing the stream dash back to
+rescue a single female life,--no, they were too well employed upon
+the bank in dancing strathspeys to the tune of "Charlie o'er the
+water."  It was, indeed, Charlie o'er the water, and canny
+Highlanders o'er the water, but where were the poor prostitutes
+meantime?  IN THE WATER.
+
+The Jacobite farce, or tragedy, was speedily brought to a close by
+the battle of Culloden; there did Charlie wish himself back again
+o'er the water, exhibiting the most unmistakable signs of
+pusillanimity; there were the clans cut to pieces, at least those
+who could be brought to the charge, and there fell Giles Mac Bean,
+or as he was called in Gaelic, Giliosa Mac Beathan, a kind of
+giant, six feet four inches and a quarter high, "than whom," as his
+wife said in a coronach she made upon him, "no man who stood at
+Cuiloitr was taller"--Giles Mac Bean the Major of the clan Cattan--
+a great drinker--a great fisher--a great shooter, and the champion
+of the Highland host.
+
+The last of the Stuarts was a cardinal.
+
+Such were the Stuarts, such their miserable history.  They were
+dead and buried in every sense of the word until Scott resuscitated
+them--how? by the power of fine writing and by calling to his aid
+that strange divinity, gentility.  He wrote splendid novels about
+the Stuarts, in which he represents them as unlike what they really
+were as the graceful and beautiful papillon is unlike the hideous
+and filthy worm.  In a word, he made them genteel, and that was
+enough to give them paramount sway over the minds of the British
+people.  The public became Stuart-mad, and everybody, specially the
+women, said, "What a pity it was that we hadn't a Stuart to
+govern."  All parties, Whig, Tory, or Radical, became Jacobite at
+heart, and admirers of absolute power.  The Whigs talked about the
+liberty of the subject, and the Radicals about the rights of man
+still, but neither party cared a straw for what it talked about,
+and mentally swore that, as soon as by means of such stuff they
+could get places, and fill their pockets, they would be as Jacobite
+as the Jacobs themselves.  As for Tories, no great change in them
+was necessary; everything favouring absolutism and slavery being
+congenial to them.  So the whole nation, that is, the reading part
+of the nation, with some exceptions, for thank God there has always
+been some salt in England, went over the water to Charlie.  But
+going over to Charlie was not enough, they must, or at least a
+considerable part of them, go over to Rome too, or have a hankering
+to do so.  As the Priest sarcastically observes in the text, "As
+all the Jacobs were Papists, so the good folks who through Scott's
+novels admire the Jacobs must be Papists too."  An idea got about
+that the religion of such genteel people as the Stuarts must be the
+climax of gentility, and that idea was quite sufficient.  Only let
+a thing, whether temporal or spiritual, be considered genteel in
+England, and if it be not followed it is strange indeed; so Scott's
+writings not only made the greater part of the nation Jacobite, but
+Popish.
+
+Here some people will exclaim--whose opinions remain sound and
+uncontaminated--what you say is perhaps true with respect to the
+Jacobite nonsense at present so prevalent being derived from
+Scott's novels, but the Popish nonsense, which people of the
+genteeler classes are so fond of, is derived from Oxford.  We sent
+our sons to Oxford nice honest lads, educated in the principles of
+the Church of England, and at the end of the first term they came
+home puppies, talking Popish nonsense, which they had learned from
+the pedants to whose care we had entrusted them; ay, not only
+Popery but Jacobitism, which they hardly carried with them from
+home, for we never heard them talking Jacobitism before they had
+been at Oxford; but now their conversation is a farrago of Popish
+and Jacobite stuff--"Complines and Claverse."  Now, what these
+honest folks say is, to a certain extent, founded on fact; the
+Popery which has overflowed the land during the last fourteen or
+fifteen years, has come immediately from Oxford, and likewise some
+of the Jacobitism, Popish and Jacobite nonsense, and little or
+nothing else, having been taught at Oxford for about that number of
+years.  But whence did the pedants get the Popish nonsense with
+which they have corrupted youth?  Why, from the same quarter from
+which they got the Jacobite nonsense with which they have
+inoculated those lads who were not inoculated with it before--
+Scott's novels.  Jacobitism and Laudism, a kind of half Popery, had
+at one time been very prevalent at Oxford, but both had been long
+consigned to oblivion there, and people at Oxford cared as little
+about Laud as they did about the Pretender.  Both were dead and
+buried there, as everywhere else, till Scott called them out of
+their graves, when the pedants of Oxford hailed both--ay, and the
+Pope, too, as soon as Scott had made the old fellow fascinating,
+through particular novels, more especially the "Monastery" and
+"Abbot."  Then the quiet, respectable, honourable Church of England
+would no longer do for the pedants of Oxford; they must belong to a
+more genteel church--they were ashamed at first to be downright
+Romans--so they would be Lauds.  The pale-looking, but exceedingly
+genteel non-juring clergyman in Waverley was a Laud; but they soon
+became tired of being Lauds, for Laud's Church, gew-gawish and
+idolatrous as it was, was not sufficiently tinselly and idolatrous
+for them, so they must be Popes, but in a sneaking way, still
+calling themselves Church-of-England men, in order to batten on the
+bounty of the church which they were betraying, and likewise have
+opportunities of corrupting such lads as might still resort to
+Oxford with principles uncontaminated.
+
+So the respectable people, whose opinions are still sound, are, to
+a certain extent, right when they say that the tide of Popery,
+which has flowed over the land, has come from Oxford.  It did come
+immediately from Oxford, but how did it get to Oxford?  Why, from
+Scott's novels.  Oh! that sermon which was the first manifestation
+of Oxford feeling, preached at Oxford some time in the year '38 by
+a divine of a weak and confused intellect, in which Popery was
+mixed up with Jacobitism!  The present writer remembers perfectly
+well, on reading some extracts from it at the time in a newspaper,
+on the top of a coach, exclaiming--"Why, the simpleton has been
+pilfering from Walter Scott's novels!"
+
+O Oxford pedants!  Oxford pedants! ye whose politics and religion
+are both derived from Scott's novels! what a pity it is that some
+lad of honest parents, whose mind ye are endeavouring to stultify
+with your nonsense about "Complines and Claverse," has not the
+spirit to start up and cry, "Confound your gibberish!  I'll have
+none of it.  Hurrah for the Church, and the principles of my
+FATHER!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+
+Same Subject continued.
+
+
+Now what could have induced Scott to write novels tending to make
+people Papists and Jacobites, and in love with arbitrary power?
+Did he think that Christianity was a gaudy mummery?  He did not, he
+could not, for he had read the Bible; yet was he fond of gaudy
+mummeries, fond of talking about them.  Did he believe that the
+Stuarts were a good family, and fit to govern a country like
+Britain?  He knew that they were a vicious, worthless crew, and
+that Britain was a degraded country as long as they swayed the
+sceptre; but for those facts he cared nothing, they governed in a
+way which he liked, for he had an abstract love of despotism, and
+an abhorrence of everything savouring of freedom and the rights of
+man in general.  His favourite political picture was a joking,
+profligate, careless king, nominally absolute--the heads of great
+houses paying court to, but in reality governing, that king, whilst
+revelling with him on the plunder of a nation, and a set of
+crouching, grovelling vassals (the literal meaning of vassal is a
+wretch), who, after allowing themselves to be horsewhipped, would
+take a bone if flung to them, and be grateful; so that in love with
+mummery, though he knew what Christianity was, no wonder he admired
+such a church as that of Rome, and that which Laud set up; and by
+nature formed to be the holder of the candle to ancient worm-eaten
+and profligate families, no wonder that all his sympathies were
+with the Stuarts and their dissipated insolent party, and all his
+hatred directed against those who endeavoured to check them in
+their proceedings, and to raise the generality of mankind something
+above a state of vassalage, that is, wretchedness.  Those who were
+born great, were, if he could have had his will, always to remain
+great, however worthless their characters.  Those who were born
+low, were always to remain so, however great their talents; though,
+if that rule were carried out, where would he have been himself?
+
+In the book which he called the "History of Napoleon Bonaparte," in
+which he plays the sycophant to all the legitimate crowned heads in
+Europe, whatever their crimes, vices, or miserable imbecilities,
+he, in his abhorrence of everything low which by its own vigour
+makes itself illustrious, calls Murat of the sabre the son of a
+pastry-cook, of a Marseilleise pastry-cook.  It is a pity that
+people who give themselves hoity-toity airs--and the Scotch in
+general are wonderfully addicted to giving themselves hoity-toity
+airs, and checking people better than themselves with their birth
+{6} and their country--it is a great pity that such people do not
+look at home-son of a pastry-cook, of a Marseilleise pastry-cook!
+Well, and what was Scott himself?  Why, son of a pettifogger, of an
+Edinburgh pettifogger.  "Oh, but Scott was descended from the old
+cow-stealers of Buccleuch, and therefore--" descended from old cow-
+stealers, was he?  Well, had he nothing to boast of beyond such a
+pedigree, he would have lived and died the son of a pettifogger,
+and been forgotten, and deservedly so; but he possessed talents,
+and by his talents rose like Murat, and like him will be remembered
+for his talents alone, and deservedly so.  "Yes, but Murat was
+still the son of a pastry-cook, and though he was certainly good at
+the sabre, and cut his way to a throne, still--"  Lord! what fools
+there are in the world; but as no one can be thought anything of in
+this world without a pedigree, the writer will now give a pedigree
+for Murat, of a very different character from the cow-stealing one
+of Scott, but such a one as the proudest he might not disdain to
+claim.  Scott was descended from the old cow-stealers of Buccleuch-
+-was he?  Good! and Murat was descended from the old Moors of
+Spain, from the Abencerages (sons of the saddle) of Granada.  The
+name Murat is Arabic, and is the same as Murad (Le Desire, or the
+wished-for one).  Scott in his genteel Life of Bonaparte, says that
+"when Murat was in Egypt, the similarity between the name of the
+celebrated Mameluke Mourad and that of Bonaparte's Meilleur Sabreur
+was remarked, and became the subject of jest amongst the comrades
+of the gallant Frenchman."  But the writer of the novel of
+Bonaparte did not know that the names were one and the same.  Now
+which was the best pedigree, that of the son of the pastry-cook, or
+that of the son of the pettifogger?  Which was the best blood?  Let
+us observe the workings of the two bloods.  He who had the blood of
+the "sons of the saddle" in him, became the wonderful cavalier of
+the most wonderful host that ever went forth to conquest, won for
+himself a crown, and died the death of a soldier, leaving behind
+him a son, only inferior to himself in strength, in prowess, and in
+horsemanship.  The descendant of the cow-stealer became a poet, a
+novel writer, the panegyrist of great folk and genteel people;
+became insolvent because, though an author, he deemed it ungenteel
+to be mixed up with the business part of the authorship; died
+paralytic and broken-hearted because he could no longer give
+entertainments to great folks, leaving behind him, amongst other
+children, who were never heard of, a son, who, through his father's
+interest, had become lieutenant-colonel in a genteel cavalry
+regiment.  A son who was ashamed of his father because his father
+was an author; a son who--paugh--why ask which was the best blood?
+
+So, owing to his rage for gentility, Scott must needs become the
+apologist of the Stuarts and their party; but God made this man pay
+dearly for taking the part of the wicked against the good; for
+lauding up to the skies the miscreants and robbers, and
+calumniating the noble spirits of Britain, the salt of England, and
+his own country.  As God had driven the Stuarts from their throne,
+and their followers from their estates, making them vagabonds and
+beggars on the face of the earth, taking from them all that they
+cared for, so did that same God, who knows perfectly well how and
+where to strike, deprive the apologist of that wretched crew of all
+that rendered life pleasant in his eyes, the lack of which
+paralysed him in body and mind, rendered him pitiable to others,
+loathsome to himself,--so much so, that he once said, "Where is the
+beggar who would change places with me, notwithstanding all my
+fame?"  Ah! God knows perfectly well how to strike.  He permitted
+him to retain all his literary fame to the very last--his literary
+fame for which he cared nothing; but what became of the sweetness
+of life, his fine house, his grand company, and his entertainments?
+The grand house ceased to be his; he was only permitted to live in
+it on sufferance, and whatever grandeur it might still retain, it
+soon became as desolate a looking house as any misanthrope could
+wish to see--where were the grand entertainments and the grand
+company? there are no grand entertainments where there is no money;
+no lords and ladies where there are no entertainments--and there
+lay the poor lodger in the desolate house, groaning on a bed no
+longer his, smitten by the hand of God in the part where he was
+most vulnerable.  Of what use telling such a man to take comfort,
+for he had written the "Minstrel" and "Rob Roy,"--telling him to
+think of his literary fame?  Literary fame, indeed! he wanted back
+his lost gentility:-
+
+
+"Retain my altar,
+I care nothing for it--but, oh! touch not my BEARD."
+PORNY'S War of the Gods.
+
+
+He dies, his children die too, and then comes the crowning judgment
+of God on what remains of his race and the house which he had
+built.  He was not a Papist himself, nor did he wish any one
+belonging to him to be Popish, for he had read enough of the Bible
+to know that no one can be saved through Popery, yet had he a
+sneaking affection for it, and would at times in an underhand
+manner, give it a good word both in writing and discourse, because
+it was a gaudy kind of worship, and ignorance and vassalage
+prevailed so long as it flourished--but he certainly did not wish
+any of his people to become Papists, nor the house which he had
+built to become a Popish house, though the very name he gave it
+savoured of Popery; but Popery becomes fashionable through his
+novels and poems--the only one that remains of his race, a female
+grandchild, marries a person who, following the fashion, becomes a
+Papist, and makes her a Papist too.  Money abounds with the
+husband, who buys the house, and then the house becomes the rankest
+Popish house in Britain.  A superstitious person might almost
+imagine that one of the old Scottish Covenanters, whilst the grand
+house was being built from the profits resulting from the sale of
+writings favouring Popery and persecution, and calumniatory of
+Scotland's saints and martyrs, had risen from the grave, and banned
+Scott, his race, and his house, by reading a certain psalm.
+
+In saying what he has said about Scott, the author has not been
+influenced by any feeling of malice or ill-will, but simply by a
+regard for truth, and a desire to point out to his countrymen the
+harm which has resulted from the perusal of his works;--he is not
+one of those who would depreciate the talents of Scott--he admires
+his talents, both as a prose writer and a poet; as a poet
+especially he admires him, and believes him to have been by far the
+greatest, with perhaps the exception of Mickiewicz, who only wrote
+for unfortunate Poland, that Europe has given birth to during the
+last hundred years.  As a prose writer he admires him, less, it is
+true, but his admiration for him in that capacity is very high, and
+he only laments that he prostituted his talents to the cause of the
+Stuarts and gentility.  What book of fiction of the present century
+can you read twice, with the exception of "Waverley" and "Rob Roy?"
+There is "Pelham," it is true, which the writer of these lines has
+seen a Jewess reading in the steppe of Debreczin, and which a young
+Prussian Baron, a great traveller, whom he met at Constantinople in
+'44 told him he always carried in his valise.  And, in conclusion,
+he will say, in order to show the opinion which he entertains of
+the power of Scott as a writer, that he did for the sceptre of the
+wretched Pretender what all the kings of Europe could not do for
+his body--placed it on the throne of these realms; and for Popery,
+what Popes and Cardinals strove in vain to do for three centuries--
+brought back its mummeries and nonsense into the temples of the
+British Isles.
+
+Scott during his lifetime had a crowd of imitators, who, whether
+they wrote history so called--poetry so called--or novels--nobody
+would call a book a novel if he could call it anything else--wrote
+Charlie o'er the water nonsense; and now that he has been dead
+nearly a quarter of a century, there are others daily springing up
+who are striving to imitate Scott in his Charlie o'er the water
+nonsense--for nonsense it is, even when flowing from his pen.
+They, too, must write Jacobite histories, Jacobite songs, and
+Jacobite novels, and much the same figure as the scoundrel menials
+in the comedy cut when personating their masters, and retailing
+their masters' conversation, do they cut as Walter Scotts.  In
+their histories, they too talk about the Prince and Glenfinnan, and
+the pibroch; and in their songs about "Claverse" and "Bonny
+Dundee."  But though they may be Scots, they are not Walter Scotts.
+But it is perhaps chiefly in the novel that you see the veritable
+hog in armour; the time of the novel is of course the '15 or '45;
+the hero a Jacobite, and connected with one or other of the
+enterprises of those periods; and the author, to show how
+unprejudiced he is, and what ORIGINAL views he takes of subjects,
+must needs speak up for Popery, whenever he has occasion to mention
+it; though, with all his originality, when he brings his hero and
+the vagabonds with which he is concerned before a barricadoed
+house, belonging to the Whigs, he can make them get into it by no
+other method than that which Scott makes his rioters employ to get
+into the Tolbooth, BURNING DOWN the door.
+
+To express the more than utter foolishness of this latter Charlie
+o'er the water nonsense, whether in rhyme or prose, there is but
+one word, and that word a Scotch word.  Scotch, the sorriest of
+jargons, compared with which even Roth Welsch is dignified and
+expressive, has yet one word to express what would be inexpressible
+by any word or combination of words in any language, or in any
+other jargon in the world; and very properly; for as the nonsense
+is properly Scotch, so should the word be Scotch which expresses
+it--that word is "fushionless," pronounced FOOSHIONLESS; and when
+the writer has called the nonsense fooshionless--and he does call
+it fooshionless--he has nothing more to say, but leaves the
+nonsense to its fate.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+
+On Canting Nonsense.
+
+
+The writer now wishes to say something on the subject of canting
+nonsense, of which there is a great deal in England.  There are
+various cants in England, amongst which is the religious cant.  He
+is not going to discuss the subject of religious cant:  lest,
+however, he should be misunderstood, he begs leave to repeat that
+he is a sincere member of the Church of England, in which he
+believes there is more religion, and consequently less cant, than
+in any other church in the world; nor is he going to discuss many
+other cants; he shall content himself with saying something about
+two--the temperance cant and the unmanly cant.  Temperance canters
+say that "it is unlawful to drink a glass of ale."  Unmanly canters
+say that "it is unlawful to use one's fists."  The writer begs
+leave to tell both these species of canters that they do not speak
+words of truth.
+
+It is very lawful to take a cup of ale, or wine, for the purpose of
+cheering or invigorating yourself when you are faint and down-
+hearted; and likewise to give a cup of ale or wine to others when
+they are in a similar condition.  The Holy Scripture sayeth nothing
+to the contrary, but rather encourageth people in so doing by the
+text, "Wine maketh glad the heart of man."  But it is not lawful to
+intoxicate yourself with frequent cups of ale or wine, nor to make
+others intoxicated, nor does the Holy Scripture say it is.  The
+Holy Scripture no more says that it is lawful to intoxicate
+yourself or others, than it says that it is unlawful to take a cup
+of ale or wine yourself, or to give one to others.  Noah is not
+commended in the Scripture for making himself drunken on the wine
+he brewed.  Nor is it said that the Saviour, when he supplied the
+guests with first-rate wine at the marriage-feast, told them to
+make themselves drunk upon it.  He is said to have supplied them
+with first-rate wine, but He doubtless left the quantity which each
+should drink to each party's reason and discretion.  When you set a
+good dinner before your guests, you do not expect that they should
+gorge themselves with the victuals you set before them.  Wine may
+be abused, and so may a leg of mutton.
+
+Second.  It is lawful for any one to use his fists in his own
+defence, or in the defence of others, provided they can't help
+themselves; but it is not lawful to use them for purposes of
+tyranny or brutality.  If you are attacked by a ruffian, as the
+elderly individual in Lavengro is in the inn-yard, it is quite
+lawful, if you can, to give him as good a thrashing as the elderly
+individual gave the brutal coachman; and if you see a helpless
+woman--perhaps your own sister--set upon by a drunken lord, a
+drunken coachman, or a drunken coalheaver, or a brute of any
+description, either drunk or sober, it is not only lawful but
+laudable, to give them, if you can, a good drubbing; but it is not
+lawful because you have a strong pair of fists, and know how to use
+them, to go swaggering through a fair, jostling against unoffending
+individuals; should you do so, you would be served quite right if
+you were to get a drubbing, more particularly if you were served
+out by some one less strong, but more skilful than yourself--even
+as the coachman was served out by a pupil of the immortal
+Broughton--sixty years old, it is true, but possessed of
+Broughton's guard and chop.  Moses is not blamed in the Scripture
+for taking part with the oppressed, and killing an Egyptian
+persecutor.  We are not told how Moses killed the Egyptian; but it
+is quite as creditable to Moses to suppose that he killed the
+Egyptian by giving him a buffet under the left ear, as by stabbing
+him with a knife.  It is true that the Saviour in the New Testament
+tells His disciples to turn the left cheek to be smitten, after
+they had received a blow on the right; but He was speaking to
+people divinely inspired, or whom He intended divinely to inspire--
+people selected by God for a particular purpose.  He likewise tells
+these people to part with various articles of raiment when asked
+for them, and to go a-travelling without money, and take no thought
+of the morrow.  Are those exhortations carried out by very good
+people in the present day?  Do Quakers, when smitten on the right
+cheek, turn the left to the smiter?  When asked for their coat, do
+they say, "Friend, take my shirt also?"  Has the Dean of Salisbury
+no purse?  Does the Archbishop of Canterbury go to an inn, run up a
+reckoning, and then say to his landlady, "Mistress, I have no
+coin?"  Assuredly the Dean has a purse, and a tolerably well-filled
+one; and, assuredly, the Archbishop, on departing from an inn, not
+only settles his reckoning, but leaves something handsome for the
+servants, and does not say that he is forbidden by the gospel to
+pay for what he has eaten, or the trouble he has given, as a
+certain Spanish cavalier said he was forbidden by the statutes of
+chivalry.  Now, to take the part of yourself, or the part of the
+oppressed, with your fists, is quite as lawful in the present day
+as it is to refuse your coat and shirt also to any vagabond who may
+ask for them, and not to refuse to pay for supper, bed, and
+breakfast, at the Feathers, or any other inn, after you have had
+the benefit of all three.
+
+The conduct of Lavengro with respect to drink may, upon the whole,
+serve as a model.  He is no drunkard, nor is he fond of
+intoxicating other people; yet when the horrors are upon him he has
+no objection to go to a public-house and call for a pint of ale,
+nor does he shrink from recommending ale to others when they are
+faint and downcast.  In one instance, it is true, he does what
+cannot be exactly justified; he encourages the Priest in the
+dingle, in more instances than one, in drinking more hollands and
+water than is consistent with decorum.  He has a motive indeed in
+doing so; a desire to learn from the knave in his cups the plans
+and hopes of the Propaganda of Rome.  Such conduct, however, was
+inconsistent with strict fair dealing and openness; and the author
+advises all those whose consciences never reproach them for a
+single unfair or covert act committed by them, to abuse him
+heartily for administering hollands and water to the Priest of
+Rome.  In that instance the hero is certainly wrong; yet in all
+other cases with regard to drink, he is manifestly right.  To tell
+people that they are never to drink a glass of ale or wine
+themselves, or to give one to others, is cant; and the writer has
+no toleration for cant of any description.  Some cants are not
+dangerous; but the writer believes that a more dangerous cant than
+the temperance cant, or as it is generally called, teetotalism, is
+scarcely to be found.  The writer is willing to believe that it
+originated with well meaning, though weak people; but there can be
+no doubt that it was quickly turned to account by people who were
+neither well meaning nor weak.  Let the reader note particularly
+the purpose to which this cry has been turned in America; the land,
+indeed, par excellence, of humbug and humbug cries.  It is there
+continually in the mouth of the most violent political party, and
+is made an instrument of almost unexampled persecution.  The writer
+would say more on the temperance cant, both in England and America,
+but want of space prevents him.  There is one point on which he
+cannot avoid making a few brief remarks--that is, the inconsistent
+conduct of its apostles in general.  The teetotal apostle says, it
+is a dreadful thing to be drunk.  So it is, teetotaller; but if so,
+why do you get drunk?  I get drunk?  Yes, unhappy man, why do you
+get drunk on smoke and passion?  Why are your garments impregnated
+with the odour of the Indian weed?  Why is there a pipe or a cigar
+always in your mouth?  Why is your language more dreadful than that
+of a Poissarde?  Tobacco-smoke is more deleterious than ale,
+teetotaller; bile more potent than brandy.  You are fond of telling
+your hearers what an awful thing it is to die drunken.  So it is,
+teetotaller.  Then take good care that you do not die with smoke
+and passion, drunken, and with temperance language on your lips;
+that is, abuse and calumny against all those who differ from you.
+One word of sense you have been heard to say, which is, that
+spirits may be taken as a medicine.  Now you are in a fever of
+passion, teetotaller; so, pray take this tumbler of brandy; take it
+on the homoeopathic principle, that heat is to be expelled by heat.
+You are in a temperance fury, so swallow the contents of this
+tumbler, and it will, perhaps, cure you.  You look at the glass
+wistfully--you occasionally take a glass medicinally--and it is
+probable you do.  Take one now.  Consider what a dreadful thing it
+would be to die passion drunk; to appear before your Maker with
+intemperate language on your lips.  That's right!  You don't seem
+to wince at the brandy.  That's right!--well done!  All down in two
+pulls.  Now you look like a reasonable being!
+
+If the conduct of Lavengro with retard to drink is open to little
+censure, assuredly the use which he makes of his fists is entitled
+to none at all.  Because he has a pair of tolerably strong fists,
+and knows to a certain extent how to use them, is he a swaggerer or
+oppressor?  To what ill account does he turn them?  Who more quiet,
+gentle, and inoffensive than he?  He beats off a ruffian who
+attacks him in a dingle; has a kind of friendly tuzzle with Mr.
+Petulengro, and behold the extent of his fistic exploits.
+
+Ay, but he associates with prize-fighters; and that very fellow,
+Petulengro, is a prize-fighter, and has fought for a stake in a
+ring.  Well, and if he had not associated with prize-fighters, how
+could he have used his fists?  Oh, anybody can use his fists in his
+own defence, without being taught by prize-fighters.  Can they?
+Then why does not the Italian, or Spaniard, or Affghan use his
+fists when insulted or outraged, instead of having recourse to the
+weapons which he has recourse to?  Nobody can use his fists without
+being taught the use of them by those who have themselves been
+taught, no more than any one can "whiffle" without being taught by
+a master of the art.  Now let any man of the present day try to
+whiffle.  Would not any one who wished to whiffle have to go to a
+master of the art?  Assuredly! but where would he find one at the
+present day?  The last of the whifflers hanged himself about a
+fortnight ago on a bell-rope in a church steeple of "the old town,"
+from pure grief that there was no further demand for the exhibition
+of his art, there being no demand for whiffling since the
+discontinuation of Guildhall banquets.  Whiffling is lost.  The old
+chap left his sword behind him; let any one take up the old chap's
+sword and try to whiffle.  Now much the same hand as he would make
+who should take up the whiffler's sword and try to whiffle, would
+he who should try to use his fists who had never had the advantage
+of a master.  Let no one think that men use their fists naturally
+in their own disputes--men have naturally recourse to any other
+thing to defend themselves or to offend others; they fly to the
+stick, to the stone, to the murderous and cowardly knife, or to
+abuse as cowardly as the knife, and occasionally more murderous.
+Now which is best when you hate a person, or have a pique against a
+person, to clench your fist and say "Come on," or to have recourse
+to the stone, the knife,--or murderous calumny?  The use of the
+fist is almost lost in England.  Yet are the people better than
+they were when they knew how to use their fists?  The writer
+believes not.  A fisty combat is at present a great rarity, but the
+use of the knife, the noose, and of poison, to say nothing of
+calumny, are of more frequent occurrence in England than perhaps in
+any country in Europe.  Is polite taste better than when it could
+bear the details of a fight?  The writer believes not.  Two men
+cannot meet in a ring to settle a dispute in a manly manner without
+some trumpery local newspaper letting loose a volley of abuse
+against "the disgraceful exhibition," in which abuse it is sure to
+be sanctioned by its dainty readers; whereas some murderous horror,
+the discovery for example of the mangled remains of a woman in some
+obscure den, is greedily seized hold of by the moral journal, and
+dressed up for its readers, who luxuriate and gloat upon the
+ghastly dish.  Now, the writer of Lavengro has no sympathy with
+those who would shrink from striking a blow, but would not shrink
+from the use of poison or calumny; and his taste has little in
+common with that which cannot tolerate the hardy details of a
+prize-fight, but which luxuriates on descriptions of the murder
+dens of modern England.  But prize-fighters and pugilists are
+blackguards, a reviewer has said; and blackguards they would be
+provided they employed their skill and their prowess for purposes
+of brutality and oppression; but prize-fighters and pugilists are
+seldom friends to brutality and oppression; and which is the
+blackguard, the writer would ask, he who uses his fists to take his
+own part, or instructs others to use theirs for the same purpose,
+or the being who from envy and malice, or at the bidding of a
+malicious scoundrel, endeavours by calumny, falsehood, and
+misrepresentation to impede the efforts of lonely and unprotected
+genius?
+
+One word more about the race, all but extinct, of the people
+opprobriously called prize-fighters.  Some of them have been as
+noble, kindly men as the world ever produced.  Can the rolls of the
+English aristocracy exhibit names belonging to more noble, more
+heroic men than those who were called respectively Pearce, Cribb,
+and Spring?  Did ever one of the English aristocracy contract the
+seeds of fatal consumption by rushing up the stairs of a burning
+edifice, even to the topmost garret, and rescuing a woman from
+seemingly inevitable destruction?  The writer says no.  A woman was
+rescued from the top of a burning house; but the man who rescued
+her was no aristocrat; it was Pearce, not Percy, who ran up the
+burning stairs.  Did ever one of those glittering ones save a
+fainting female from the libidinous rage of six ruffians?  The
+writer believes not.  A woman was rescued from the libidinous fury
+of six monsters on--Down; but the man who rescued her was no
+aristocrat; it was Pearce not Paulet, who rescued the woman, and
+thrashed my lord's six gamekeepers--Pearce, whose equal never was,
+and probably never will be, found in sturdy combat.  Are there any
+of the aristocracy of whom it can be said that they never did a
+cowardly, cruel, or mean action, and that they invariably took the
+part of the unfortunate and weak against cruelty and oppression?
+As much can be said of Cribb, of Spring, and the other; but where
+is the aristocrat of whom as much can be said?  Wellington?
+Wellington indeed! a skilful general, and a good man of valour, it
+is true, but with that cant word of "duty" continually on his lips,
+did he rescue Ney from his butchers?  Did he lend a helping hand to
+Warner?
+
+In conclusion, the writer would advise those of his country-folks
+who read his book to have nothing to do with the two kinds of
+canting nonsense described above, but in their progress through
+life to enjoy as well as they can, but always with moderation, the
+good things of this world, to put confidence in God, to be as
+independent as possible, and to take their own parts.  If they are
+low-spirited, let them not make themselves foolish by putting on
+sackcloth, drinking water, or chewing ashes, but let them take
+wholesome exercise, and eat the most generous food they can get,
+taking up and reading occasionally, not the lives of Ignatius
+Loyola and Francis Spira, but something more agreeable; for
+example, the life and adventures of Mr. Duncan Campbell, the deaf
+and dumb gentleman; the travels of Captain Falconer in America, and
+the journal of John Randall, who went to Virginia and married an
+Indian wife; not forgetting, amidst their eating and drinking,
+their walks over heaths, and by the sea-side, and their agreeable
+literature, to be charitable to the poor, to read the Psalms and to
+go to church twice on a Sunday.  In their dealings with people, to
+be courteous to everybody, as Lavengro was, but always independent
+like him; and if people meddle with them, to give them as good as
+they bring, even as he and Isopel Berners were in the habit of
+doing; and it will be as well for him to observe that he by no
+means advises women to be too womanly, but bearing the conduct of
+Isopel Berners in mind, to take their own parts, and if anybody
+strikes them, to strike again.
+
+Beating of women by the lords of the creation has become very
+prevalent in England since pugilism has been discountenanced.  Now
+the writer strongly advises any woman who is struck by a ruffian to
+strike him again; or if she cannot clench her fists, and he advises
+all women in these singular times to learn to clench their fists,
+to go at him with tooth and nail, and not to be afraid of the
+result, for any fellow who is dastard enough to strike a woman,
+would allow himself to be beaten by a woman, were she to make at
+him in self-defence, even if, instead of possessing the stately
+height and athletic proportions of the aforesaid Isopel, she were
+as diminutive in stature, and had a hand as delicate, and foot as
+small, as a certain royal lady, who was some time ago assaulted by
+a fellow upwards of six feet high, whom the writer has no doubt she
+could have beaten had she thought proper to go at him.  Such is the
+deliberate advice of the author to his countrymen and women--advice
+in which he believes there is nothing unscriptural or repugnant to
+common sense.
+
+The writer is perfectly well aware that, by the plain language
+which he has used in speaking of the various kinds of nonsense
+prevalent in England, he shall make himself a multitude of enemies;
+but he is not going to conceal the truth or to tamper with
+nonsense, from the fear of provoking hostility.  He has a duty to
+perform and he will perform it resolutely; he is the person who
+carried the Bible to Spain; and as resolutely as he spoke in Spain
+against the superstitions of Spain, will he speak in England
+against the nonsense of his own native land.  He is not one of
+those who, before they sit down to write a book, say to themselves,
+what cry shall we take up? what principles shall we advocate? what
+principles shall we abuse? before we put pen to paper we must find
+out what cry is the loudest, what principle has the most advocates,
+otherwise, after having written our book, we may find ourselves on
+the weaker side.
+
+A sailor of the "Bounty," waked from his sleep by the noise of the
+mutiny, lay still in his hammock for some time, quite undecided
+whether to take part with the captain or to join the mutineers.  "I
+must mind what I do," said he to himself, "lest, in the end, I find
+myself on the weaker side;" finally, on hearing that the mutineers
+were successful, he went on deck, and seeing Bligh pinioned to the
+mast, he put his fist to his nose, and otherwise insulted him.
+Now, there are many writers of the present day whose conduct is
+very similar to that of the sailor.  They lie listening in their
+corners till they have ascertained which principle has most
+advocates; then, presently, they make their appearance on the deck
+of the world with their book; if truth has been victorious, then
+has truth the hurrah! but if truth is pinioned against the mast,
+then is their fist thrust against the nose of truth, and their gibe
+and their insult spirted in her face.  The strongest party had the
+sailor, and the strongest party has almost invariably the writer of
+the present day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+
+Pseudo-Critics.
+
+
+A certain set of individuals calling themselves critics have
+attacked Lavengro with much virulence and malice.  If what they
+call criticism had been founded on truth, the author would have had
+nothing to say.  The book contains plenty of blemishes, some of
+them, by the bye, wilful ones, as the writer will presently show;
+not one of these, however, has been detected and pointed out; but
+the best passages in the book, indeed whatever was calculated to
+make the book valuable, have been assailed with abuse and
+misrepresentation.  The duty of the true critic is to play the part
+of a leech, and not of a viper.  Upon true and upon malignant
+criticism there is an excellent fable by the Spaniard Iriarte.  The
+viper says to the leech, "Why do people invite your bite, and flee
+from mine?"  "Because," says the leech, "people receive health from
+my bite, and poison from yours."  "There is as much difference,"
+says the clever Spaniard, "between true and malignant criticism, as
+between poison and medicine."  Certainly a great many meritorious
+writers have allowed themselves to be poisoned by malignant
+criticism; the writer, however, is not one of those who allow
+themselves to be poisoned by pseudo-critics; no! no! he will rather
+hold them up by their tails, and show the creatures wriggling,
+blood and foam streaming from their broken jaws.  First of all,
+however, he will notice one of their objections.  "The book isn't
+true," say they.  Now one of the principal reasons with those that
+have attacked Lavengro for their abuse of it is, that it is
+particularly true in one instance, namely, that it exposes their
+own nonsense, their love of humbug, their slavishness, their
+dressings, their goings out, their scraping and bowing to great
+people; it is the showing up of "gentility-nonsense" in Lavengro
+that has been one principal reason for raising the above cry; for
+in Lavengro is denounced the besetting folly of the English people,
+a folly which those who call themselves guardians of the public
+taste are far from being above.  "We can't abide anything that
+isn't true!" they exclaim.  Can't they?  Then why are they so
+enraptured with any fiction that is adapted to purposes of humbug,
+which tends to make them satisfied with their own proceedings, with
+their own nonsense, which does not tell them to reform, to become
+more alive to their own failings, and less sensitive about the
+tyrannical goings on of the masters, and the degraded condition,
+the sufferings, and the trials of the serfs in the star Jupiter?
+Had Lavengro, instead of being the work of an independent mind,
+been written in order to further any of the thousand and one cants,
+and species of nonsense prevalent in England, the author would have
+heard much less about its not being true, both from public
+detractors and private censurers.
+
+"But Lavengro pretends to be an autobiography," say the critics;
+and here the writer begs leave to observe, that it would be well
+for people who profess to have a regard for truth, not to exhibit
+in every assertion which they make a most profligate disregard of
+it; this assertion of theirs is a falsehood, and they know it to be
+a falsehood.  In the preface Lavengro is stated to be a dream; and
+the writer takes this opportunity of stating that he never said it
+was an autobiography; never authorized any person to say that it
+was one; and that he has in innumerable instances declared in
+public and private, both before and after the work was published,
+that it was not what is generally termed an autobiography:  but a
+set of people who pretend to write criticisms on books, hating the
+author for various reasons,--amongst others, because, having the
+proper pride of a gentleman and a scholar, he did not, in the year
+'43, choose to permit himself to be exhibited and made a zany of in
+London, and especially because he will neither associate with, nor
+curry favour with, them who are neither gentlemen nor scholars,--
+attack his book with abuse and calumny.  He is, perhaps,
+condescending too much when he takes any notice of such people; as,
+however, the English public is wonderfully led by cries and shouts,
+and generally ready to take part against any person who is either
+unwilling or unable to defend himself, he deems it advisable not to
+be altogether quiet with those who assail him.  The best way to
+deal with vipers is to tear out their teeth; and the best way to
+deal with pseudo-critics is to deprive them of their poison-bag,
+which is easily done by exposing their ignorance.  The writer knew
+perfectly well the description of people with whom he would have to
+do, he therefore very quietly prepared a stratagem, by means of
+which he could at any time exhibit them, powerless and helpless, in
+his hand.  Critics, when they review books, ought to have a
+competent knowledge of the subjects which those books discuss.
+
+Lavengro is a philological book, a poem if you choose to call it
+so.  Now, what a fine triumph it would have been for those who
+wished to vilify the book and its author, provided they could have
+detected the latter tripping in his philology--they might have
+instantly said that he was an ignorant pretender to philology--they
+laughed at the idea of his taking up a viper by its tail, a trick
+which hundreds of country urchins do every September, but they were
+silent about the really wonderful part of the book, the
+philological matter--they thought philology was his stronghold, and
+that it would be useless to attack him there; they of course would
+give him no credit as a philologist, for anything like fair
+treatment towards him was not to be expected at their hands, but
+they were afraid to attack his philology--yet that was the point,
+and the only point in which they might have attacked him
+successfully; he was vulnerable there.  How was this?  Why, in
+order to have an opportunity of holding up pseudo-critics by the
+tails, he wilfully spelt various foreign words wrong--Welsh words,
+and even Italian words--did they detect these misspellings? not one
+of them, even as he knew they would not, and he now taunts them
+with ignorance; and the power of taunting them with ignorance is
+the punishment which he designed for them--a power which they might
+but for their ignorance have used against him.  The writer besides
+knowing something of Italian and Welsh, knows a little of Armenian
+language and literature; but who knowing anything of the Armenian
+language, unless he had an end in view, would say, that the word
+sea in Armenian is anything like the word tide in English?  The
+word for sea in Armenian is dzow, a word connected with the
+Tebetian word for water, and the Chinese shuy, and the Turkish su,
+signifying the same thing; but where is the resemblance between
+dzow and tide?  Again, the word for bread in ancient Armenian is
+hats; yet the Armenian on London Bridge is made to say zhats, which
+is not the nominative of the Armenian noun for bread, but the
+accusative:  now, critics, ravening against a man because he is a
+gentleman and a scholar, and has not only the power but also the
+courage to write original works, why did you not discover that weak
+point?  Why, because you were ignorant, so here ye are held up!
+Moreover, who with a name commencing with Z, ever wrote fables in
+Armenian?  There are two writers of fables in Armenian--Varthan and
+Koscht, and illustrious writers they are, one in the simple, and
+the other in the ornate style of Armenian composition, but neither
+of their names begins with a Z.  Oh, what a precious opportunity ye
+lost, ye ravening crew, of convicting the poor, half-starved,
+friendless boy of the book, of ignorance or misrepresentation, by
+asking who with a name beginning with Z ever wrote fables in
+Armenian; but ye couldn't help yourselves, ye are duncie.  We
+duncie!  Ay, duncie.  So here ye are held up by the tails, blood
+and foam streaming from your jaws.
+
+The writer wishes to ask here, what do you think of all this,
+Messieurs les Critiques?  Were ye ever served so before?  But don't
+you richly deserve it?  Haven't you been for years past bullying
+and insulting everybody whom you deemed weak, and currying favour
+with everybody whom you thought strong?  "We approve of this.  We
+disapprove of that.  Oh, this will never do.  These are fine
+lines!"  The lines perhaps some horrid sycophantic rubbish
+addressed to Wellington, or Lord So-and-so.  To have your ignorance
+thus exposed, to be shown up in this manner, and by whom?  A gypsy!
+Ay, a gypsy was the very right person to do it.  But is it not
+galling, after all?
+
+"Ah, but WE don't understand Armenian, it cannot be expected that
+WE should understand Armenian, or Welsh, or--Hey, what's this?  The
+mighty WE not understand Armenian or Welsh, or--Then why does the
+mighty WE pretend to review a book like Lavengro?  From the
+arrogance with which it continually delivers itself, one would
+think that the mighty WE is omniscient; that it understands every
+language; is versed in every literature; yet the mighty WE does not
+even know the word for bread in Armenian.  It knows bread well
+enough by name in England, and frequently bread in England only by
+its name, but the truth is, that the mighty WE, with all its
+pretension, is in general a very sorry creature, who, instead of
+saying nous disons, should rather say nous dis:  Porny in his
+"Guerre des Dieux," very profanely makes the three in one say, Je
+faisons; now, Lavengro, who is anything but profane, would suggest
+that critics, especially magazine and Sunday newspaper critics,
+should commence with nous dis, as the first word would be
+significant of the conceit and assumption of the critic, and the
+second of the extent of the critic's information.  The WE says its
+say, but when fawning sycophancy or vulgar abuse are taken from
+that say, what remains?  Why a blank, a void like Ginnungagap.
+
+As the writer, of his own accord, has exposed some of the blemishes
+of his book--a task, which a competent critic ought to have done--
+he will now point out two or three of its merits, which any critic,
+not altogether blinded with ignorance might have done, or not
+replete with gall and envy would have been glad to do.  The book
+has the merit of communicating a fact connected with physiology,
+which in all the pages of the multitude of books was never
+previously mentioned--the mysterious practice of touching objects
+to baffle the evil chance.  The miserable detractor will, of
+course, instantly begin to rave about such a habit being common:
+well and good; but was it ever before described in print, or all
+connected with it dissected?  He may then vociferate something
+about Johnson having touched:- the writer cares not whether
+Johnson, who, by the bye, during the last twenty or thirty years,
+owing to people having become ultra Tory mad from reading Scott's
+novels and the "Quarterly Review," has been a mighty favourite,
+especially with some who were in the habit of calling him a half
+crazy old fool--touched, or whether he did or not; but he asks
+where did Johnson ever describe the feelings which induced him to
+perform the magic touch, even supposing that he did perform it?
+Again, the history gives an account of a certain book called the
+"Sleeping Bard," the most remarkable prose work of the most
+difficult language but one, of modern Europe,--a book, for a notice
+of which, he believes, one might turn over in vain the pages of any
+review printed in England, or, indeed, elsewhere.--So here are two
+facts, one literary and the other physiological, for which any
+candid critic was bound to thank the author, even as in Romany Rye
+there is a fact connected with Iro Norman Myth, for the disclosing
+of which, any person who pretends to have a regard for literature
+is bound to thank him, namely, that the mysterious Finn or Fingal
+of "Ossian's Poems" is one and the same person as the Sigurd
+Fofnisbane of the Edda and the Wilkina, and the Siegfried Horn of
+the Lay of the Niebelungs.
+
+The writer might here conclude, and, he believes, most
+triumphantly; as, however, he is in the cue for writing, which he
+seldom is, he will for his own gratification, and for the sake of
+others, dropping metaphors about vipers and serpents, show up in
+particular two or three sets or cliques of people, who, he is happy
+to say, have been particularly virulent against him and his work,
+for nothing indeed could have given him greater mortification than
+their praise.
+
+In the first place, he wishes to dispose of certain individuals who
+call themselves men of wit and fashion--about town--who he is told
+have abused his book "vaustly"--their own word.  These people paint
+their cheeks, wear white kid gloves, and dabble in literature, or
+what they conceive to be literature.  For abuse from such people,
+the writer was prepared.  Does any one imagine that the writer was
+not well aware, before he published his book, that, whenever he
+gave it to the world, he should be attacked by every literary
+coxcomb in England who had influence enough to procure the
+insertion of a scurrilous article in a magazine or newspaper!  He
+has been in Spain, and has seen how invariably the mule attacks the
+horse; now why does the mule attack the horse?  Why, because the
+latter carries about with him that which the envious hermaphrodite
+does not possess.
+
+They consider, forsooth, that his book is low--but he is not going
+to waste words about them--one or two of whom, he is told, have
+written very duncie books about Spain, and are highly enraged with
+him, because certain books which he wrote about Spain were not
+considered duncie.  No, he is not going to waste words upon them,
+for verily he dislikes their company, and so he'll pass them by,
+and proceed to others.
+
+The Scotch Charlie o'er the water people have been very loud in the
+abuse of Lavengro--this again might be expected; the sarcasms of
+the Priest about the Charlie o'er the water nonsense of course
+stung them.  Oh! it is one of the claims which Lavengro has to
+respect, that it is the first, if not the only work, in which that
+nonsense is, to a certain extent, exposed.  Two or three of their
+remarks on passages of Lavengro, he will reproduce and laugh at.
+Of course your Charlie o'er the water people are genteel
+exceedingly, and cannot abide anything low.  Gypsyism they think is
+particularly low, and the use of gypsy words in literature beneath
+its gentility; so they object to gypsy words being used in Lavengro
+where gypsies are introduced speaking--"What is Romany forsooth?"
+say they.  Very good!  And what is Scotch? has not the public been
+nauseated with Scotch for the last thirty years?  "Ay, but Scotch
+is not"--the writer believes he knows much better than the Scotch
+what Scotch is and what it is not; he has told them before what it
+is, a very sorry jargon.  He will now tell them what it is not--a
+sister or an immediate daughter of the Sanscrit, which Romany is.
+"Ay, but the Scotch are"--foxes, foxes, nothing else than foxes,
+even like the gypsies--the difference between the gypsy and Scotch
+fox being that the first is wild, with a mighty brush, the other a
+sneak with a gilt collar and without a tail.
+
+A Charlie o'er the water person attempts to be witty, because the
+writer has said that perhaps a certain old Edinburgh High-School
+porter, of the name of Boee, was perhaps of the same blood as a
+certain Bui, a Northern Kemp who distinguished himself at the
+battle of Horinger Bay.  A pretty matter, forsooth, to excite the
+ridicule of a Scotchman!  Why, is there a beggar or trumpery fellow
+in Scotland, who does not pretend to be somebody, or related to
+somebody?  Is not every Scotchman descended from some king, kemp,
+or cow-stealer of old, by his own account at least?  Why, the
+writer would even go so far as to bet a trifle that the poor
+creature, who ridicules Boee's supposed ancestry, has one of his
+own, at least as grand and as apocryphal as old Boee's of the High
+School.
+
+The same Charlie o'er the water person is mightily indignant that
+Lavengro should have spoken disrespectfully of William Wallace;
+Lavengro, when he speaks of that personage, being a child of about
+ten years old, and repeating merely what he had heard.  All the
+Scotch, by the bye, for a great many years past, have been great
+admirers of William Wallace, particularly the Charlie o'er the
+water people, who in their nonsense-verses about Charlie generally
+contrive to bring in the name of William, Willie, or Wullie
+Wallace.  The writer begs leave to say that he by no means wishes
+to bear hard against William Wallace, but he cannot help asking
+why, if William, Willie, or Wullie Wallace was such a particularly
+nice person, did his brother Scots betray him to a certain renowned
+southern warrior, called Edward Longshanks, who caused him to be
+hanged and cut into four in London, and his quarters to be placed
+over the gates of certain towns?  They got gold, it is true, and
+titles, very nice things, no doubt; but, surely, the life of a
+patriot is better than all the gold and titles in the world--at
+least Lavengro thinks so--but Lavengro has lived more with gypsies
+than Scotchmen, and gypsies do not betray their brothers.  It would
+be some time before a gypsy would hand over his brother to the
+harum-beck, even supposing you would not only make him a king, but
+a justice of the peace, and not only give him the world, but the
+best farm on the Holkham estate; but gypsies are wild foxes, and
+there is certainly a wonderful difference between the way of
+thinking of the wild fox who retains his brush, and that of the
+scurvy kennel creature who has lost his tail.
+
+Ah! but thousands of Scotch, and particularly the Charlie o'er the
+water people, will say, "We didn't sell Willie Wallace, it was our
+forbears who sold Willie Wallace--If Edward Longshanks had asked us
+to sell Wullie Wallace, we would soon have shown him that--"  Lord
+better ye, ye poor trumpery set of creatures, ye would not have
+acted a bit better than your forefathers; remember how ye have ever
+treated the few amongst ye who, though born in the kennel, have
+shown something of the spirit of the wood.  Many of ye are still
+alive who delivered over men, quite as honest and patriotic as
+William Wallace, into the hands of an English minister, to be
+chained and transported for merely venturing to speak and write in
+the cause of humanity, at the time when Europe was beginning to
+fling off the chains imposed by kings and priests.  And it is not
+so very long since Burns, to whom ye are now building up obelisks
+rather higher than he deserves, was permitted by his countrymen to
+die in poverty and misery, because he would not join with them in
+songs of adulation to kings and the trumpery great.  So say not
+that ye would have acted with respect to William Wallace one whit
+better than your fathers--and you in particular, ye children of
+Charlie, whom do ye write nonsense-verses about?  A family of
+dastard despots, who did their best, during a century and more, to
+tread out the few sparks of independent feeling still glowing in
+Scotland--but enough has been said about ye.
+
+Amongst those who have been prodigal in abuse and defamation of
+Lavengro, have been your modern Radicals, and particularly a set of
+people who filled the country with noise against the King and
+Queen, Wellington, and the Tories, in '32.  About these people the
+writer will presently have occasion to say a good deal, and also of
+real Radicals.  As, however, it may be supposed that he is one of
+those who delight to play the sycophant to kings and queens, to
+curry favour with Tories, and to bepraise Wellington, he begs leave
+to state that such is not the case.
+
+About kings and queens he has nothing to say; about Tories, simply
+that he believes them to be a bad set; about Wellington, however,
+it will be necessary for him to say a good deal, of mixed import,
+as he will subsequently frequently have occasion to mention him in
+connection with what he has to say about pseudo-Radicals.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+
+Pseudo-Radicals.
+
+
+About Wellington, then, he says, that he believes him at the
+present day to be infinitely overrated.  But there certainly was a
+time when he was shamefully underrated.  Now what time was that?
+Why the time of pseudo-Radicalism, par excellence, from '20 to '32.
+Oh, the abuse that was heaped on Wellington by those who traded in
+Radical cant--your newspaper editors and review writers! and how he
+was sneered at then by your Whigs, and how faintly supported he was
+by your Tories, who were half ashamed of him; for your Tories,
+though capital fellows as followers, when you want nobody to back
+you, are the faintest creatures in the world when you cry in your
+agony, "Come and help me!"  Oh, assuredly Wellington was infamously
+used at that time, especially by your traders in Radicalism, who
+howled at and hooted him; said he had every vice--was no general--
+was beaten at Waterloo--was a poltroon--moreover a poor illiterate
+creature, who could scarcely read or write; nay, a principal
+Radical paper said boldly he could not read, and devised an
+ingenious plan for teaching Wellington how to read.  Now this was
+too bad; and the writer, being a lover of justice, frequently spoke
+up for Wellington, saying, that as for vice, he was not worse than
+his neighbours; that he was brave; that he won the fight at
+Waterloo, from a half-dead man, it is true, but that he did win it.
+Also, that he believed he had read "Rules for the Manual and
+Platoon Exercises" to some purpose; moreover, that he was sure he
+could write, for that he the writer had once written to Wellington,
+and had received an answer from him; nay, the writer once went so
+far as to strike a blow for Wellington; for the last time he used
+his fists was upon a Radical sub-editor, who was mobbing Wellington
+in the street, from behind a rank of grimy fellows; but though the
+writer spoke up for Wellington to a certain extent, when he was
+shamefully underrated, and once struck a blow for him when he was
+about being hustled, he is not going to join in the loathsome
+sycophantic nonsense which it has been the fashion to use with
+respect to Wellington these last twenty years.  Now what have those
+years been to England!  Why the years of ultra-gentility, everybody
+in England having gone gentility mad during the last twenty years,
+and no people more so than your pseudo-Radicals.  Wellington was
+turned out, and your Whigs and Radicals got in, and then commenced
+the period of ultra-gentility in England.  The Whigs and Radicals
+only hated Wellington as long as the patronage of the country was
+in his hands, none of which they were tolerably sure he would
+bestow on them; but no sooner did they get it into their own, than
+they forthwith became admirers of Wellington.  And why?  Because he
+was a duke, petted at Windsor and by foreign princes, and a very
+genteel personage.  Formerly many of your Whigs and Radicals had
+scarcely a decent coat on their backs; but now the plunder of the
+country was at their disposal, and they had as good a chance of
+being genteel as any people.  So they were willing to worship
+Wellington because he was very genteel, and could not keep the
+plunder of the country out of their hands.  And Wellington has been
+worshipped, and prettily so, during the last fifteen or twenty
+years.  He is now a noble fine-hearted creature; the greatest
+general the world ever produced; the bravest of men; and--and--
+mercy upon us! the greatest of military writers!  Now the present
+writer will not join in such sycophancy.  As he was not afraid to
+take the part of Wellington when he was scurvily used by all
+parties, and when it was dangerous to take his part, so he is not
+afraid to speak the naked truth about Wellington in these days,
+when it is dangerous to say anything about him but what is
+sycophantically laudatory.  He said in '32, that as to vice,
+Wellington was not worse than his neighbours; but he is not going
+to say, in '54, that Wellington was a noble-hearted fellow; for he
+believes that a more cold-hearted individual never existed.  His
+conduct to Warner, the poor Vaudois, and Marshal Ney, showed that.
+He said, in '32, that he was a good general and a brave man; but he
+is not going, in '54, to say that he was the best general, or the
+bravest man the world ever saw.  England has produced a better
+general--France two or three--both countries many braver men.  The
+son of the Norfolk clergyman was a brave man; Marshal Ney was a
+braver man.  Oh, that battle of Copenhagen!  Oh, that covering the
+retreat of the Grand Army!  And though he said in '32 that he could
+write, he is not going to say in '54 that he is the best of all
+military writers.  On the contrary, he does not hesitate to say
+that any Commentary of Julius Caesar, or any chapter in Justinus,
+more especially the one about the Parthians, is worth the ten
+volumes of Wellington's Despatches; though he has no doubt that, by
+saying so, he shall especially rouse the indignation of a certain
+newspaper, at present one of the most genteel journals imaginable--
+with a slight tendency to Liberalism, it is true, but perfectly
+genteel--which is nevertheless the very one which, in '32, swore
+bodily that Wellington could neither read nor write, and devised an
+ingenious plan for teaching him how to read.
+
+Now, after the above statement, no one will venture to say, if the
+writer should be disposed to bear hard upon Radicals, that he would
+be influenced by a desire to pay court to princes, or to curry
+favour with Tories, or from being a blind admirer of the Duke of
+Wellington; but the writer is not going to declaim against
+Radicals, that is, real Republicans, or their principles; upon the
+whole, he is something of an admirer of both.  The writer has
+always had as much admiration for everything that is real and
+honest as he has had contempt for the opposite.  Now real
+Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, a much finer thing
+than Toryism, a system of common robbery, which is nevertheless far
+better than Whiggism {7}--a compound of petty larceny, popular
+instruction, and receiving of stolen goods.  Yes, real
+Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, and your real
+Radicals and Republicans are certainly very fine fellows, or rather
+were fine fellows, for the Lord only knows where to find them at
+the present day--the writer does not.  If he did, he would at any
+time go five miles to invite one of them to dinner, even supposing
+that he had to go to a workhouse in order to find the person he
+wished to invite.  Amongst the real Radicals of England, those who
+flourished from the year '16 to '20, there were certainly
+extraordinary characters, men partially insane, perhaps, but honest
+and brave--they did not make a market of the principles which they
+professed, and never intended to do so; they believed in them, and
+were willing to risk their lives in endeavouring to carry them out.
+The writer wishes to speak in particular of two of these men, both
+of whom perished on the scaffold--their names were Thistlewood and
+Ings.  Thistlewood, the best known of them, was a brave soldier,
+and had served with distinction as an officer in the French
+service; he was one of the excellent swordsmen of Europe; had
+fought several duels in France, where it is no child's play to
+fight a duel; but had never unsheathed his sword for single combat,
+but in defence of the feeble and insulted--he was kind and open-
+hearted, but of too great simplicity; he had once ten thousand
+pounds left him, all of which he lent to a friend, who disappeared
+and never returned a penny.  Ings was an uneducated man, of very
+low stature, but amazing strength and resolution; he was a kind
+husband and father, and though a humble butcher, the name he bore
+was one of the royal names of the heathen Anglo-Saxons.  These two
+men, along with five others, were executed, and their heads hacked
+off, for levying war against George the Fourth; the whole seven
+dying in a manner which extorted cheers from the populace; the most
+of then uttering philosophical or patriotic sayings.  Thistlewood,
+who was, perhaps, the most calm and collected of all, just before
+he was turned off, said, "We are now going to discover the great
+secret."  Ings, the moment before he was choked, was singing "Scots
+wha ha' wi' Wallace bled."  Now there was no humbug about those
+men, nor about many more of the same time and of the same
+principles.  They might be deluded about Republicanism, as Algernon
+Sidney was, and as Brutus was, but they were as honest and brave as
+either Brutus or Sidney; and as willing to die for their
+principles.  But the Radicals who succeeded them were beings of a
+very different description; they jobbed and traded in
+Republicanism, and either parted with it, or at the present day are
+eager to part with it for a consideration.  In order to get the
+Whigs into power, and themselves places, they brought the country
+by their inflammatory language to the verge of a revolution, and
+were the cause that many perished on the scaffold; by their
+incendiary harangues and newspaper articles they caused the Bristol
+conflagration, for which six poor creatures were executed; they
+encouraged the mob to pillage, pull down and burn, and then rushing
+into garrets looked on.  Thistlewood tells the mob the Tower is a
+second Bastile; let it be pulled down.  A mob tries to pull down
+the Tower; but Thistlewood is at the head of that mob; he is not
+peeping from a garret on Tower Hill like Gulliver at Lisbon.
+Thistlewood and Ings say to twenty ragged individuals, Liverpool
+and Castlereagh are two satellites of despotism; it would be highly
+desirable to put them out of the way.  And a certain number of
+ragged individuals are surprised in a stable in Cato Street, making
+preparations to put Castlereagh and Liverpool out of the way, and
+are fired upon with muskets by Grenadiers, and are hacked at with
+cutlasses by Bow Street runners; but the twain who encouraged those
+ragged individuals to meet in Cato Street are not far off, they are
+not on the other side of the river, in the Borough, for example, in
+some garret or obscure cellar.  The very first to confront the
+Guards and runners are Thistlewood and Ings; Thistlewood whips his
+long thin rapier through Smithers' lungs, and Ings makes a dash at
+Fitzclarence with his butcher's knife.  Oh, there was something in
+those fellows! honesty and courage--but can as much be said for the
+inciters of the troubles of '32?  No; they egged on poor ignorant
+mechanics and rustics, and got them hanged for pulling down and
+burning, whilst the highest pitch to which their own daring ever
+mounted was to mob Wellington as he passed in the streets.
+
+Now, these people were humbugs, which Thistlewood and Ings were
+not.  They raved and foamed against kings, queens, Wellington, the
+aristocracy, and what not, till they had got the Whigs into power,
+with whom they were in secret alliance, and with whom they
+afterwards openly joined in a system of robbery and corruption,
+more flagitious than the old Tory one, because there was more cant
+about it; for themselves they got consulships, commissionerships,
+and in some instances governments; for their sons clerkships in
+public offices; and there you may see those sons with the never-
+failing badge of the low scoundrel-puppy, the gilt chain at the
+waistcoat pocket; and there you may hear and see them using the
+languishing tones, and employing the airs and graces which wenches
+use and employ, who, without being in the family way, wish to make
+their keepers believe that they are in the family way.  Assuredly
+great is the cleverness of your Radicals of '32, in providing for
+themselves and their families.  Yet, clever as they are, there is
+one thing they cannot do--they get governments for themselves,
+commissionerships for their brothers, clerkships for their sons,
+but there is one thing beyond their craft--they cannot get husbands
+for their daughters, who, too ugly for marriage, and with their
+heads filled with the nonsense they have imbibed from gentility-
+novels, go over from Socinus to the Pope, becoming sisters in fusty
+convents, or having heard a few sermons in Mr. Platitude's
+"chapelle," seek for admission at the establishment of mother S---,
+who, after employing them for a time in various menial offices, and
+making them pluck off their eyebrows hair by hair, generally
+dismisses them on the plea of sluttishness; whereupon they return
+to their papas to eat the bread of the country, with the
+comfortable prospect of eating it still in the shape of a pension
+after their sires are dead.  Papa (ex uno disce omnes) living as
+quietly as he can; not exactly enviably, it is true, being now and
+then seen to cast an uneasy and furtive glance behind, even as an
+animal is wont, who has lost by some mischance a very slight
+appendage; as quietly however as he can, and as dignifiedly, a
+great admirer of every genteel thing and genteel personage, the
+Duke in particular, whose "Despatches," bound in red morocco, you
+will find on his table.  A disliker of coarse expressions, and
+extremes of every kind, with a perfect horror for revolutions and
+attempts to revolutionize, exclaiming now and then, as a shriek
+escapes from whipped and bleeding Hungary, a groan from gasping
+Poland, and a half-stifled curse from down-trodden but scowling
+Italy, "Confound the revolutionary canaille, why can't it be
+quiet!" in a word, putting one in mind of the parvenu in the
+"Walpurgis Nacht."  The writer is no admirer of Gothe, but the idea
+of that parvenu was certainly a good one.  Yes, putting one in mind
+of the individual who says -
+
+
+"Wir waren wahrlich auch nicht dumm,
+Und thaten oft was wir nicht sollten;
+Doch jetzo kehrt sich alles um und um,
+Und eben da wir's fest erhalten wollten."
+
+We were no fools, as every one discern'd,
+And stopp'd at nought our projects in fulfilling;
+But now the world seems topsy-turvy turn'd,
+To keep it quiet just when we were willing.
+
+
+Now, this class of individuals entertain a mortal hatred for
+Lavengro and its writer, and never lose an opportunity of
+vituperating both.  It is true that such hatred is by no means
+surprising.  There is certainly a great deal of difference between
+Lavengro and their own sons; the one thinking of independence and
+philology, whilst he is clinking away at kettles, and hammering
+horse-shoes in dingles; the others stuck up at public offices with
+gilt chains at their waistcoat-pockets, and giving themselves the
+airs and graces of females of a certain description.  And there
+certainly is a great deal of difference between the author of
+Lavengro and themselves--he retaining his principles and his brush;
+they with scarlet breeches on, it is true, but without their
+Republicanism, and their tails.  Oh, the writer can well afford to
+be vituperated by your pseudo-Radicals of '32!
+
+Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his
+wife; but the matter is too rich not to require a chapter to
+itself.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+
+The Old Radical.
+
+
+"This very dirty man, with his very dirty face,
+Would do any dirty act, which would get him a place."
+
+
+Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his
+wife; but before he relates the manner in which they set upon him,
+it will be as well to enter upon a few particulars tending to
+elucidate their reasons for so doing.
+
+The writer had just entered into his eighteenth year, when he met
+at the table of a certain Anglo-Germanist an individual, apparently
+somewhat under thirty, of middle stature, a thin and weaselly
+figure, a sallow complexion, a certain obliquity of vision, and a
+large pair of spectacles.  This person, who had lately come from
+abroad, and had published a volume of translations, had attracted
+some slight notice in the literary world, and was looked upon as a
+kind of lion in a small provincial capital.  After dinner he argued
+a great deal, spoke vehemently against the church, and uttered the
+most desperate Radicalism that was perhaps ever heard, saying, he
+hoped that in a short time there would not be a king or queen in
+Europe, and inveighing bitterly against the English aristocracy,
+and against the Duke of Wellington in particular, whom he said, if
+he himself was ever president of an English republic--an event
+which he seemed to think by no means improbable--he would hang for
+certain infamous acts of profligacy and bloodshed which he had
+perpetrated in Spain.  Being informed that the writer was something
+of a philologist, to which character the individual in question
+laid great pretensions, he came and sat down by him, and talked
+about languages and literature.  The writer, who was only a boy,
+was a little frightened at first, but, not wishing to appear a
+child of absolute ignorance, he summoned what little learning he
+had, and began to blunder out something about the Celtic languages
+and literature, and asked the Lion who he conceived Finn-Ma-Coul to
+be? and whether he did not consider the "Ode to the Fox," by Red
+Rhys of Eryry, to be a masterpiece of pleasantry?  Receiving no
+answer to these questions from the Lion, who, singular enough,
+would frequently, when the writer put a question to him, look
+across the table, and flatly contradict some one who was talking to
+some other person, the writer dropped the Celtic languages and
+literature, and asked him whether he did not think it a funny thing
+that Temugin, generally called Genghis Khan, should have married
+the daughter of Prester John?  {8} The Lion, after giving a side-
+glance at the writer through his left spectacle glass, seemed about
+to reply, but was unfortunately prevented, being seized with an
+irresistible impulse to contradict a respectable doctor of
+medicine, who was engaged in conversation with the master of the
+house at the upper and farther end of the table, the writer being a
+poor ignorant lad, sitting of course at the bottom.  The doctor,
+who had served in the Peninsula, having observed that Ferdinand the
+Seventh was not quite so bad as had been represented, the Lion
+vociferated that he was ten times worse, and that he hoped to see
+him and the Duke of Wellington hanged together.  The doctor, who,
+being a Welshman, was somewhat of a warm temper, growing rather
+red, said that at any rate he had been informed that Ferdinand the
+Seventh knew sometimes how to behave himself like a gentleman--this
+brought on a long dispute, which terminated rather abruptly.  The
+Lion having observed that the doctor must not talk about Spanish
+matters with one who had visited every part of Spain, the doctor
+bowed, and said he was right, for that he believed no people in
+general possessed such accurate information about countries as
+those who had travelled them as bagmen.  On the Lion asking the
+doctor what he meant, the Welshman, whose under jaw began to move
+violently, replied, that he meant what he said.  Here the matter
+ended, for the Lion, turning from him, looked at the writer.  The
+writer, imagining that his own conversation hitherto had been too
+trivial and common-place for the Lion to consider worth his while
+to take much notice of it, determined to assume a little higher
+ground, and after repeating a few verses of the Koran, and gabbling
+a little Arabic, asked the Lion what he considered to be the
+difference between the Hegira and the Christian era, adding, that
+he thought the general computation was in error by about one year;
+and being a particularly modest person, chiefly, he believes, owing
+to his having been at school in Ireland, absolutely blushed at
+finding that the Lion returned not a word in answer.  "What a
+wonderful individual I am seated by," thought he, "to whom Arabic
+seems a vulgar speech, and a question about the Hegira not worthy
+of an answer!" not reflecting that as lions come from the Sahara,
+they have quite enough of Arabic at home, and that the question
+about the Hegira was rather mal a propos to one used to prey on the
+flesh of hadjis.  "Now I only wish he would vouchsafe me a little
+of his learning," thought the boy to himself, and in this wish he
+was at last gratified; for the Lion, after asking him whether he
+was acquainted at all with the Sclavonian languages, and being
+informed that he was not, absolutely dumb-foundered him by a
+display of Sclavonian erudition.
+
+Years rolled by--the writer was a good deal about, sometimes in
+London, sometimes in the country, sometimes abroad; in London he
+occasionally met the man of the spectacles, who was always very
+civil to him, and, indeed, cultivated his acquaintance.  The writer
+thought it rather odd that, after he himself had become acquainted
+with the Sclavonian languages and literature, the man of the
+spectacles talked little or nothing about them.  In a little time,
+however, the matter ceased to cause him the slightest surprise, for
+he had discovered a key to the mystery.  In the mean time the man
+of spectacles was busy enough; he speculated in commerce, failed,
+and paid his creditors twenty pennies in the pound; published
+translations, of which the public at length became heartily tired;
+having, indeed, got an inkling of the manner in which those
+translations were got up.  He managed, however, to ride out many a
+storm, having one trusty sheet-anchor--Radicalism.  This he turned
+to the best advantage--writing pamphlets and articles in reviews,
+all in the Radical interest, and for which he was paid out of the
+Radical fund; which articles and pamphlets, when Toryism seemed to
+reel on its last legs, exhibited a slight tendency to Whiggism.
+Nevertheless, his abhorrence of desertion of principle was so great
+in the time of the Duke of Wellington's administration, that when
+S--- left the Whigs and went over, he told the writer, who was
+about that time engaged with him in a literary undertaking, that
+the said S--- was a fellow with a character so infamous, that any
+honest man would rather that you spit in his face than insult his
+ears with the mention of the name of S---.
+
+The literary project having come to nothing,--in which, by the bye,
+the writer was to have all the labour, and his friend all the
+credit, provided any credit should accrue from it,--the writer did
+not see the latter for some years, during which time considerable
+political changes took place; the Tories were driven from, and the
+Whigs placed in, office, both events being brought about by the
+Radicals coalescing with the Whigs, over whom they possessed great
+influence for the services which they had rendered.  When the
+writer next visited his friend, he found him very much altered; his
+opinions were by no means so exalted as they had been--he was not
+disposed even to be rancorous against the Duke of Wellington,
+saying that there were worse men than he, and giving him some
+credit as a general; a hankering after gentility seeming to pervade
+the whole family, father and sons, wife and daughters, all of whom
+talked about genteel diversions--gentility novels, and even seemed
+to look with favour on High Churchism, having in former years, to
+all appearance, been bigoted Dissenters.  In a little time the
+writer went abroad; as, indeed, did his friend; not, however, like
+the writer, at his own expense, but at that of the country--the
+Whigs having given him a travelling appointment, which he held for
+some years, during which he received upwards of twelve thousand
+pounds of the money of the country, for services which will,
+perhaps, be found inscribed on certain tablets, when another
+Astolfo shall visit the moon.  This appointment, however, he lost
+on the Tories resuming power--when the writer found him almost as
+Radical and patriotic as ever, just engaged in trying to get into
+Parliament, into which he got by the assistance of his Radical
+friends, who, in conjunction with the Whigs, were just getting up a
+crusade against the Tories, which they intended should be a
+conclusive one.
+
+A little time after the publication of "The Bible in Spain," the
+Tories being still in power, this individual, full of the most
+disinterested friendship for the author, was particularly anxious
+that he should be presented with an official situation, in a
+certain region a great many miles off.  "You are the only person
+for that appointment," said he; "you understand a great deal about
+the country, and are better acquainted with the two languages
+spoken there than any one in England.  Now I love my country, and
+have, moreover, a great regard for you, and as I am in Parliament,
+and have frequent opportunities of speaking to the Ministry, I
+shall take care to tell them how desirable it would be to secure
+your services.  It is true they are Tories, but I think that even
+Tories would give up their habitual love of jobbery in a case like
+yours, and for once show themselves disposed to be honest men and
+gentlemen; indeed, I have no doubt they will, for having so
+deservedly an infamous character, they would be glad to get
+themselves a little credit, by a presentation which could not
+possibly be traced to jobbery or favouritism."
+
+The writer begged his friend to give himself no trouble about the
+matter, as he was not desirous of the appointment, being in
+tolerably easy circumstances, and willing to take some rest after a
+life of labour.  All, however, that he could say was of no use, his
+friend indignantly observing, that the matter ought to be taken
+entirely out of his hands, and the appointment thrust upon him for
+the credit of the country.  "But may not many people be far more
+worthy of the appointment than myself?" said the writer.  "Where?"
+said the friendly Radical.  "If you don't get it, it will be made a
+job of, given to the son of some steward, or, perhaps, to some
+quack who has done dirty work; I tell you what, I shall ask it for
+you, in spite of you; I shall, indeed!" and his eyes flashed with
+friendly and patriotic fervour through the large pair of spectacles
+which he wore.
+
+And, in fact, it would appear that the honest and friendly patriot
+put his threat into execution.  "I have spoken," said he, "more
+than once to this and that individual in Parliament, and everybody
+seems to think that the appointment should be given to you.  Nay,
+that you should be forced to accept it.  I intend next to speak to
+Lord A--- "  And so he did, at least it would appear so.  On the
+writer calling upon him one evening, about a week afterwards, in
+order to take leave of him, as the writer was about to take a long
+journey for the sake of his health, his friend no sooner saw him
+than he started up in a violent fit of agitation, and glancing
+about the room, in which there were several people, amongst others
+two Whig members of Parliament, said, "I am glad you are come, I
+was just speaking about you.  This," said he, addressing the two
+members, "is so and so, the author of so and so, the well-known
+philologist; as I was telling you, I spoke to Lord A--- this day
+about him, and said that he ought forthwith to have the head
+appointment in--and what did the fellow say?  Why, that there was
+no necessity for such an appointment at all, and if there were,
+why--and then he hummed and ha'd.  Yes," said he, looking at the
+writer, "he did indeed.  What a scandal! what an infamy!  But I see
+how it will be, it will be a job.  The place will be given to some
+son of a steward or to some quack, as I said before.  Oh, these
+Tories!  Well, if this does not make one-- "  Here he stopped
+short, crunched his teeth, and looked the image of desperation.
+
+Seeing the poor man in this distressed condition, the writer begged
+him to be comforted, and not to take the matter so much to heart;
+but the indignant Radical took the matter very much to heart, and
+refused all comfort whatever, bouncing about the room, and, whilst
+his spectacles flashed in the light of four spermaceti candles,
+exclaiming, "It will be a job--a Tory job!  I see it all, I see it
+all, I see it all!"
+
+And a job it proved, and a very pretty job, but no Tory job.
+Shortly afterwards the Tories were out, and the Whigs were in.
+From that time the writer heard not a word about the injustice done
+to the country in not presenting him with the appointment to -; the
+Radical, however, was busy enough to obtain the appointment, not
+for the writer, but for himself, and eventually succeeded, partly
+through Radical influence, and partly through that of a certain
+Whig lord, for whom the Radical had done, on a particular occasion,
+work of a particular kind.  So, though the place was given to a
+quack, and the whole affair a very pretty job, it was one in which
+the Tories had certainly no hand.
+
+In the meanwhile, however, the friendly Radical did not drop the
+writer.  Oh, no!  On various occasions he obtained from the writer
+all the information about the country in question, and was
+particularly anxious to obtain from the writer, and eventually did
+obtain, a copy of a work written in the court language of that
+country, edited by the writer, a language exceedingly difficult,
+which the writer, at the expense of a considerable portion of his
+eyesight, had acquired, at least as far as by the eyesight it could
+be acquired.  What use the writer's friend made of the knowledge he
+had gained from him, and what use he made of the book, the writer
+can only guess; but he has little doubt that when the question of
+sending a person to--was mooted in a Parliamentary Committee--which
+it was at the instigation of the writer's friend--the Radical on
+being examined about the country, gave the information which he had
+obtained from the writer as his own, and flashed the book and its
+singular characters in the eyes of the Committee; and then of
+course his Radical friends would instantly say, "This is the man!
+there is no one like him.  See what information he possesses; and
+see that book written by himself in the court language of Serendib.
+This is the only man to send there.  What a glory, what a triumph
+it would be to Britain, to send out a man so deeply versed in the
+mysterious lore of--as our illustrious countryman; a person who
+with his knowledge could beat with their own weapons the wise men
+of-- Is such an opportunity to be lost?  Oh, no! surely not; if it
+is, it will be an eternal disgrace to England, and the world will
+see that Whigs are no better than Tories."
+
+Let no one think the writer uncharitable in these suppositions.
+The writer is only too well acquainted with the antecedents of the
+individual, to entertain much doubt that he would shrink from any
+such conduct, provided he thought that his temporal interest would
+be forwarded by it.  The writer is aware of more than one instance
+in which he has passed off the literature of friendless young men
+for his own, after making them a slight pecuniary compensation and
+deforming what was originally excellent by interpolations of his
+own.  This was his especial practice with regard to translation, of
+which he would fain be esteemed the king.  This Radical literato is
+slightly acquainted with four or five of the easier dialects of
+Europe, on the strength of which knowledge be would fain pass for a
+universal linguist, publishing translations of pieces originally
+written in various difficult languages; which translations,
+however, were either made by himself from literal renderings done
+for him into French or German, or had been made from the originals
+into English, by friendless young men, and then deformed by his
+alterations.
+
+Well, the Radical got the appointment, and the writer certainly did
+not grudge it him.  He, of course, was aware that his friend had
+behaved in a very base manner towards him, but he bore him no ill-
+will, and invariably when he heard him spoken against, which was
+frequently the case, took his part when no other person would;
+indeed, he could well afford to bear him no ill-will.  He had never
+sought for the appointment, nor wished for it, nor, indeed, ever
+believed himself to be qualified for it.  He was conscious, it is
+true, that he was not altogether unacquainted with the language and
+literature of the country with which the appointment was connected.
+He was likewise aware that he was not altogether deficient in
+courage and in propriety of behaviour.  He knew that his appearance
+was not particularly against him; his face not being like that of a
+convicted pickpocket, nor his gait resembling that of a fox who has
+lost his tail; yet he never believed himself adapted for the
+appointment, being aware that he had no aptitude for the doing of
+dirty work, if called to do it, nor pliancy which would enable him
+to submit to scurvy treatment, whether he did dirty work or not--
+requisites, at the time of which he is speaking, indispensable in
+every British official; requisites, by the bye, which his friend
+the Radical possessed in a high degree; but though he bore no ill-
+will towards his friend, his friend bore anything but good-will
+towards him; for from the moment that he had obtained the
+appointment for himself, his mind was filled with the most bitter
+malignity against the writer, and naturally enough; for no one ever
+yet behaved in a base manner towards another, without forthwith
+conceiving a mortal hatred against him.  You wrong another, know
+yourself to have acted basely, and are enraged, not against
+yourself--for no one hates himself--but against the innocent cause
+of your baseness; reasoning very plausibly, "But for that fellow, I
+should never have been base; for had he not existed I could not
+have been so, at any rate against him;" and this hatred is all the
+more bitter, when you reflect that you have been needlessly base.
+
+Whilst the Tories are in power the writer's friend, of his own
+accord, raves against the Tories because they do not give the
+writer a certain appointment, and makes, or says he makes,
+desperate exertions to make them do so; but no sooner are the
+Tories out, with whom he has no influence, and the Whigs in, with
+whom he, or rather his party, has influence, than he gets the place
+for himself, though, according to his own expressed opinion--an
+opinion with which the writer does not, and never did, concur--the
+writer was the only person competent to hold it.  Now had he,
+without saying a word to the writer, or about the writer with
+respect to the employment, got the place for himself when he had an
+opportunity, knowing, as he very well knew, himself to be utterly
+unqualified for it, the transaction, though a piece of jobbery,
+would not have merited the title of a base transaction; as the
+matter stands, however, who can avoid calling the whole affair not
+only a piece of--come, come, out with the word--scoundrelism on the
+part of the writer's friend, but a most curious piece of uncalled-
+for scoundrelism? and who, with any knowledge of fallen human
+nature, can wonder at the writer's friend entertaining towards him
+a considerable portion of gall and malignity?
+
+This feeling on the part of the writer's friend was wonderfully
+increased by the appearance of Lavengro, many passages of which the
+Radical in his foreign appointment applied to himself and family--
+one or two of his children having gone over to Popery, the rest
+become members of Mr. Platitude's chapel, and the minds of all
+being filled with ultra notions of gentility.
+
+The writer, hearing that his old friend had returned to England, to
+apply, he believes, for an increase of salary, and for a title,
+called upon him, unwillingly, it is true, for he had no wish to see
+a person for whom, though he bore him no ill-will, he could not
+avoid feeling a considerable portion of contempt; the truth is,
+that his sole object in calling was to endeavour to get back a
+piece of literary property which his friend had obtained from him
+many years previously, and which, though he had frequently applied
+for it, he never could get back.  Well, the writer called; he did
+not get his property, which, indeed, he had scarcely time to press
+for, being almost instantly attacked by his good friend and his
+wife--yes, it was then that the author was set upon by an old
+Radical and his wife--the wife, who looked the very image of shame
+and malignity, did not say much, it is true, but encouraged her
+husband in all he said.  Both of their own accord introduced the
+subject of Lavengro.  The Radical called the writer a grumbler,
+just as if there had ever been a greater grumbler than himself
+until, by the means above described, he had obtained a place:  he
+said that the book contained a melancholy view of human nature--
+just as if anybody could look in his face without having a
+melancholy view of human nature.  On the writer quietly observing
+that the book contained an exposition of his principles, the
+pseudo-Radical replied, that he cared nothing for his principles--
+which was probably true, it not being likely that he would care for
+another person's principles after having shown so thorough a
+disregard for his own.  The writer said that the book, of course,
+would give offence to humbugs; the Radical then demanded whether he
+thought him a humbug?--the wretched wife was the Radical's
+protection, even as he knew she would be; it was on her account
+that the writer did not kick his good friend; as it was, he looked
+at him in the face and thought to himself, "How is it possible I
+should think you a humbug, when only last night I was taking your
+part in a company in which everybody called you a humbug?"
+
+The Radical, probably observing something in the writer's eye which
+he did not like, became all on a sudden abjectly submissive, and,
+professing the highest admiration for the writer, begged him to
+visit him in his government; this the writer promised faithfully to
+do, and he takes the present opportunity of performing his promise.
+
+This is one of the pseudo-Radical calumniators of Lavengro and its
+author; were the writer on his deathbed he would lay his hand on
+his heart and say, that he does not believe that there is one trait
+of exaggeration in the portrait which he has drawn.  This is one of
+the pseudo-Radical calumniators of Lavengro and its author; and
+this is one of the genus, who, after having railed against jobbery
+for perhaps a quarter of a century, at present batten on large
+official salaries which they do not earn.  England is a great
+country, and her interests require that she should have many a
+well-paid official both at home and abroad; but will England long
+continue a great country if the care of her interests, both at home
+and abroad, is in many instances intrusted to beings like him
+described above, whose only recommendation for an official
+appointment was that he was deeply versed in the secrets of his
+party and of the Whigs?
+
+Before he concludes, the writer will take the liberty of saying of
+Lavengro that it is a book written for the express purpose of
+inculcating virtue, love of country, learning, manly pursuits, and
+genuine religion, for example, that of the Church of England, and
+for awakening a contempt for nonsense of every kind, and a hatred
+for priestcraft, more especially that of Rome.
+
+And in conclusion, with respect to many passages of his book in
+which he has expressed himself in terms neither measured nor mealy,
+he will beg leave to observe, in the words of a great poet, who
+lived a profligate life, it is true, but who died a sincere
+penitent--thanks, after God, to good Bishop Burnet -
+
+
+"All this with indignation I have hurl'd
+At the pretending part of this proud world,
+Who, swollen with selfish vanity, devise
+False freedoms, formal cheats, and holy lies,
+Over their fellow fools to tyrannize."
+ROCHESTER.
+
+
+
+Footnotes
+
+{1}  Tipperary.
+
+{2}  An obscene oath.
+
+{3}  See "Muses' Library," pp. 86, 87.  London, 1738.
+
+{4}  Genteel with them seems to be synonymous with Gentile and
+Gentoo; if so, the manner in which it has been applied for ages
+ceases to surprise, for genteel is heathenish.  Ideas of barbaric
+pearl and gold, glittering armour, plumes, tortures, blood-
+shedding, and lust, should always be connected with it.  Wace, in
+his grand Norman poem, calls the Baron genteel:-
+
+
+"La furent li gentil Baron," etc.
+
+
+And he certainly could not have applied the word better than to the
+strong Norman thief, armed cap-a-pie, without one particle of truth
+or generosity; for a person to be a pink of gentility, that is
+heathenism, should have no such feelings; and, indeed, the admirers
+of gentility seldom or never associate any such feelings with it.
+It was from the Norman, the worst of all robbers and miscreants,
+who built strong castles, garrisoned them with devils, and tore out
+poor wretches' eyes, as the Saxon Chronicle says, that the English
+got their detestable word genteel.  What could ever have made the
+English such admirers of gentility, it would be difficult to say;
+for, during three hundred years, they suffered enough by it.  Their
+genteel Norman landlords were their scourgers, their torturers, the
+plunderers of their homes, the dishonourers of their wives, and the
+deflourers of their daughters.  Perhaps, after all, fear is at the
+root of the English veneration for gentility.
+
+{5}  Gentle and gentlemanly may be derived from the same root as
+genteel; but nothing can be more distinct from the mere genteel,
+than the ideas which enlightened minds associate with these words.
+Gentle and gentlemanly mean something kind and genial; genteel,
+that which is glittering or gaudy.  A person can be a gentleman in
+rags, but nobody can be genteel.
+
+{6}  The writer has been checked in print by the Scotch with being
+a Norfolk man.  Surely, surely, these latter times have not been
+exactly the ones in which it was expedient for Scotchmen to check
+the children of any county in England with the place of their
+birth, more especially those who have had the honour of being born
+in Norfolk--times in which British fleets, commanded by Scotchmen,
+have returned laden with anything but laurels from foreign shores.
+It would have been well for Britain had she had the old Norfolk man
+to dispatch to the Baltic or the Black sea, lately, instead of
+Scotch admirals.
+
+{7}  As the present work will come out in the midst of a vehement
+political contest, people may be led to suppose that the above was
+written expressly for the time.  The writer therefore begs to state
+that it was written in the year 1854.  He cannot help adding that
+he is neither Whig, Tory, nor Radical, and cares not a straw what
+party governs England, provided it is governed well.  But he has no
+hopes of good government from the Whigs.  It is true that amongst
+them there is one very great man, Lord Palmerston, who is indeed
+the sword and buckler, the chariots and the horses of the party;
+but it is impossible for his lordship to govern well with such
+colleagues as he has--colleagues which have been forced upon him by
+family influence, and who are continually pestering him into
+measures anything but conducive to the country's honour and
+interest.  If Palmerston would govern well, he must get rid of
+them; but from that step, with all his courage and all his
+greatness, he will shrink.  Yet how proper and easy a step it would
+be!  He could easily get better, but scarcely worse, associates.
+They appear to have one object in view, and only one--jobbery.  It
+was chiefly owing to a most flagitious piece of jobbery, which one
+of his lordship's principal colleagues sanctioned and promoted,
+that his lordship experienced his late parliamentary disasters.
+
+{8}  A fact.
+
+
+
+
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+<title>The Romany Rye</title>
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+<a href="#startoftext">The Romany Rye, by George Borrow</a>
+</h2>
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+Title: The Romany Rye
+
+Author: George Borrow
+
+Release Date: February, 1996  [EBook #422]
+[This file was first posted on December 20, 1995]
+[Most recently updated: August 18, 2002]
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+<p>
+<a name="startoftext"></a>
+Transcribed from the 1907 J. M. Dent Edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+THE ROMANY RYE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER I<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Making of the Linch-pin - The Sound Sleeper - Breakfast - The Postillion&rsquo;s
+Departure.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I awoke at the first break of day, and, leaving the postillion fast
+asleep, stepped out of the tent.&nbsp; The dingle was dank and dripping.&nbsp;
+I lighted a fire of coals, and got my forge in readiness.&nbsp; I then
+ascended to the field, where the chaise was standing as we had left
+it on the previous evening.&nbsp; After looking at the cloud-stone near
+it, now cold, and split into three pieces, I set about prying narrowly
+into the condition of the wheel and axletree - the latter had sustained
+no damage of any consequence, and the wheel, as far as I was able to
+judge, was sound, being only slightly injured in the box.&nbsp; The
+only thing requisite to set the chaise in a travelling condition appeared
+to be a linch-pin, which I determined to make.&nbsp; Going to the companion
+wheel, I took out the linch-pin, which I carried down with me to the
+dingle, to serve as a model.<br>
+<br>
+I found Belle by this time dressed, and seated near the forge: with
+a slight nod to her like that which a person gives who happens to see
+an acquaintance when his mind is occupied with important business, I
+forthwith set about my work.&nbsp; Selecting a piece of iron which I
+thought would serve my purpose, I placed it in the fire, and plying
+the bellows in a furious manner, soon made it hot; then seizing it with
+the tongs, I laid it on my anvil, and began to beat it with my hammer,
+according to the rules of my art.&nbsp; The dingle resounded with my
+strokes.&nbsp; Belle sat still, and occasionally smiled, but suddenly
+started up, and retreated towards her encampment, on a spark which I
+purposely sent in her direction alighting on her knee.&nbsp; I found
+the making of a linch-pin no easy matter; it was, however, less difficult
+than the fabrication of a pony-shoe; my work, indeed, was much facilitated
+by my having another pin to look at.&nbsp; In about three-quarters of
+an hour I had succeeded tolerably well, and had produced a linch-pin
+which I thought would serve.&nbsp; During all this time, notwithstanding
+the noise which I was making, the postillion never showed his face.&nbsp;
+His non-appearance at first alarmed me: I was afraid he might be dead,
+but, on looking into the tent, I found him still buried in the soundest
+sleep.&nbsp; &ldquo;He must surely be descended from one of the seven
+sleepers,&rdquo; said I, as I turned away, and resumed my work.&nbsp;
+My work finished, I took a little oil, leather, and sand, and polished
+the pin as well as I could; then, summoning Belle, we both went to the
+chaise, where, with her assistance, I put on the wheel.&nbsp; The linch-pin
+which I had made fitted its place very well, and having replaced the
+other, I gazed at the chaise for some time with my heart full of that
+satisfaction which results from the consciousness of having achieved
+a great action; then, after looking at Belle in the hope of obtaining
+a compliment from her lips, which did not come, I returned to the dingle,
+without saying a word, followed by her.&nbsp; Belle set about making
+preparations for breakfast; and I taking the kettle, went and filled
+it at the spring.&nbsp; Having hung it over the fire, I went to the
+tent in which the postillion was still sleeping, and called upon him
+to arise.&nbsp; He awoke with a start, and stared around him at first
+with the utmost surprise, not unmixed, I could observe, with a certain
+degree of fear.&nbsp; At last, looking in my face, he appeared to recollect
+himself.&nbsp; &ldquo;I had quite forgot,&rdquo; said he, as he got
+up, &ldquo;where I was, and all that happened yesterday.&nbsp; However,
+I remember now the whole affair, thunder-storm, thunder-bolt, frightened
+horses, and all your kindness.&nbsp; Come, I must see after my coach
+and horses; I hope we shall be able to repair the damage.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;The damage is already quite repaired,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;as
+you will see, if you come to the field above.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+don&rsquo;t say so,&rdquo; said the postillion, coming out of the tent;
+&ldquo;well, I am mightily beholden to you.&nbsp; Good morning, young
+gentle-woman,&rdquo; said he, addressing Belle, who, having finished
+her preparations, was seated near the fire.&nbsp; &ldquo;Good morning,
+young man,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;I suppose you would be glad of
+some breakfast; however, you must wait a little, the kettle does not
+boil.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Come and look at your chaise,&rdquo; said
+I; &ldquo;but tell me how it happened that the noise which I have been
+making did not awake you; for three-quarters of an hour at least I was
+hammering close at your ear.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I heard you all the
+time,&rdquo; said the postillion, &ldquo;but your hammering made me
+sleep all the sounder; I am used to hear hammering in my morning sleep.&nbsp;
+There&rsquo;s a forge close by the room where I sleep when I&rsquo;m
+at home, at my inn; for we have all kinds of conveniences at my inn
+- forge, carpenter&rsquo;s shop, and wheel-wright&rsquo;s, - so that
+when I heard you hammering I thought, no doubt, that it was the old
+noise, and that I was comfortable in my bed at my own inn.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+We now ascended to the field, where I showed the postillion his chaise.&nbsp;
+He looked at the pin attentively, rubbed his hands, and gave a loud
+laugh.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is it not well done?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;It
+will do till I get home,&rdquo; he replied.&nbsp; &ldquo;And that is
+all you have to say?&rdquo; I demanded.&nbsp; &ldquo;And that&rsquo;s
+a good deal,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;considering who made it.&nbsp; But
+don&rsquo;t be offended,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;I shall prize it all
+the more for its being made by a gentleman, and no blacksmith; and so
+will my governor, when I show it to him.&nbsp; I shan&rsquo;t let it
+remain where it is, but will keep it, as a remembrance of you, as long
+as I live.&rdquo;&nbsp; He then again rubbed his hands with great glee,
+and said, &ldquo;I will now go and see after my horses, and then to
+breakfast, partner, if you please.&rdquo;&nbsp; Suddenly, however, looking
+at his hands, he said, &ldquo;Before sitting down to breakfast I am
+in the habit of washing my hands and face: I suppose you could not furnish
+me with a little soap and water.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;As much water as
+you please,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but if you want soap, I must go and
+trouble the young gentle-woman for some.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;By no means,&rdquo;
+said the postillion, &ldquo;water will do at a pinch.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Follow
+me,&rdquo; said I, and leading him to the pond of the frogs and newts,
+I said, &ldquo;this is my ewer; you are welcome to part of it - the
+water is so soft that it is scarcely necessary to add soap to it;&rdquo;
+then lying down on the bank, I plunged my head into the water, then
+scrubbed my hands and face, and afterwards wiped them with some long
+grass which grew on the margin of the pond.&nbsp; &ldquo;Bravo,&rdquo;
+said the postillion, &ldquo;I see you know how to make a shift:&rdquo;
+he then followed my example, declared he never felt more refreshed in
+his life, and, giving a bound, said, &ldquo;he would go and look after
+his horses.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+We then went to look after the horses, which we found not much the worse
+for having spent the night in the open air.&nbsp; My companion again
+inserted their heads in the corn-bags, and, leaving the animals to discuss
+their corn, returned with me to the dingle, where we found the kettle
+boiling.&nbsp; We sat down, and Belle made tea and did the honours of
+the meal.&nbsp; The postillion was in high spirits, ate heartily, and,
+to Belle&rsquo;s evident satisfaction, declared that he had never drank
+better tea in his life, or indeed any half so good.&nbsp; Breakfast
+over, he said that he must now go and harness his horses, as it was
+high time for him to return to his inn.&nbsp; Belle gave him her hand
+and wished him farewell: the postillion shook her hand warmly, and was
+advancing close up to her - for what purpose I cannot say - whereupon
+Belle, withdrawing her hand, drew herself up with an air which caused
+the postillion to retreat a step or two with an exceedingly sheepish
+look.&nbsp; Recovering himself, however, he made a low bow, and proceeded
+up the path.&nbsp; I attended him, and helped to harness his horses
+and put them to the vehicle; he then shook me by the hand, and taking
+the reins and whip, mounted to his seat; ere he drove away he thus addressed
+me: &ldquo;If ever I forget your kindness and that of the young woman
+below, dash my buttons.&nbsp; If ever either of you should enter my
+inn you may depend upon a warm welcome, the best that can be set before
+you, and no expense to either, for I will give both of you the best
+of characters to the governor, who is the very best fellow upon all
+the road.&nbsp; As for your linch-pin, I trust it will serve till I
+get home, when I will take it out and keep it in remembrance of you
+all the days of my life:&rdquo; then giving the horses a jerk with his
+reins, he cracked his whip and drove off.<br>
+<br>
+I returned to the dingle, Belle had removed the breakfast things, and
+was busy in her own encampment: nothing occurred, worthy of being related,
+for two hours, at the end of which time Belle departed on a short expedition,
+and I again found myself alone in the dingle.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER II<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Man in Black - The Emperor of Germany - Nepotism - Donna Olympia
+- Omnipotence - Camillo Astalli - The Five Propositions.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+In the evening I received another visit from the man in black.&nbsp;
+I had been taking a stroll in the neighbourhood, and was sitting in
+the dingle in rather a listless manner, scarcely knowing how to employ
+myself; his coming, therefore, was by no means disagreeable to me.&nbsp;
+I produced the hollands and glass from my tent, where Isopel Berners
+had requested me to deposit them, and also some lump sugar, then taking
+the gotch I fetched water from the spring, and, sitting down, begged
+the man in black to help himself; he was not slow in complying with
+my desire, and prepared for himself a glass of hollands and water with
+a lump of sugar in it.&nbsp; After he had taken two or three sips with
+evident satisfaction, I, remembering his chuckling exclamation of &ldquo;Go
+to Rome for money,&rdquo; when he last left the dingle, took the liberty,
+after a little conversation, of reminding him of it, whereupon, with
+a he! he! he! he replied, &ldquo;Your idea was not quite so original
+as I supposed.&nbsp; After leaving you the other night, I remembered
+having read of an Emperor of Germany who conceived the idea of applying
+to Rome for money, and actually put it into practice.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Urban the Eighth then occupied the papal chair, of the family
+of the Barbarini, nicknamed the Mosche, or Flies, from the circumstance
+of bees being their armorial bearing.&nbsp; The Emperor having exhausted
+all his money in endeavouring to defend the church against Gustavus
+Adolphus, the great King of Sweden, who was bent on its destruction,
+applied in his necessity to the Pope for a loan of money.&nbsp; The
+Pope, however, and his relations, whose cellars were at that time full
+of the money of the church, which they had been plundering for years,
+refused to lend him a scudo; whereupon a pasquinade picture was stuck
+up at Rome, representing the church lying on a bed, gashed with dreadful
+wounds, and beset all over with flies, which were sucking her, whilst
+the Emperor of Germany was kneeling before her with a miserable face,
+requesting a little money towards carrying on the war against the heretics,
+to which the poor church was made to say: &lsquo;How can I assist you,
+O my champion, do you not see that the flies have sucked me to the very
+bones?&rsquo;&nbsp; Which story,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;shows that the
+idea of going to Rome for money was not quite so original as I imagined
+the other night, though utterly preposterous.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;This affair,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;occurred in what were called
+the days of nepotism.&nbsp; Certain popes, who wished to make themselves
+in some degree independent of the cardinals, surrounded themselves with
+their nephews and the rest of their family, who sucked the church and
+Christendom as much as they could, none doing so more effectually than
+the relations of Urban the Eighth, at whose death, according to the
+book called the &lsquo;Nipotismo di Roma,&rsquo; there were in the Barbarini
+family two hundred and twenty-seven governments, abbeys and high dignities;
+and so much hard cash in their possession, that threescore and ten mules
+were scarcely sufficient to convey the plunder of one of them to Palestrina.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+He added, however, that it was probable that Christendom fared better
+whilst the popes were thus independent, as it was less sucked, whereas
+before and after that period it was sucked by hundreds instead of tens,
+by the cardinals and all their relations, instead of by the pope and
+his nephews only.<br>
+<br>
+Then, after drinking rather copiously of his hollands, he said that
+it was certainly no bad idea of the popes to surround themselves with
+nephews, on whom they bestowed great church dignities, as by so doing
+they were tolerably safe from poison, whereas a pope, if abandoned to
+the cardinals, might at any time be made away with by them, provided
+they thought that he lived too long, or that he seemed disposed to do
+anything which they disliked; adding, that Ganganelli would never have
+been poisoned provided he had had nephews about him to take care of
+his life, and to see that nothing unholy was put into his food, or a
+bustling stirring brother&rsquo;s wife like Donna Olympia.&nbsp; He
+then with a he! he! he! asked me if I had ever read the book called
+the &ldquo;Nipotismo di Roma&rdquo;; and on my replying in the negative,
+he told me that it was a very curious and entertaining book, which he
+occasionally looked at in an idle hour, and proceeded to relate to me
+anecdotes out of the &ldquo;Nipotismo di Roma,&rdquo; about the successor
+of Urban, Innocent the Tenth, and Donna Olympia, showing how fond he
+was of her, and how she cooked his food, and kept the cardinals away
+from it, and how she and her creatures plundered Christendom, with the
+sanction of the Pope, until Christendom, becoming enraged, insisted
+that he should put her away, which he did for a time, putting a nephew
+- one Camillo Astalli - in her place, in which, however, he did not
+continue long; for the Pope, conceiving a pique against him, banished
+him from his sight, and recalled Donna Olympia, who took care of his
+food, and plundered Christendom until Pope Innocent died.<br>
+<br>
+I said that I only wondered that between pope and cardinals the whole
+system of Rome had not long fallen to the ground, and was told, in reply,
+that its not having fallen was the strongest proof of its vital power,
+and the absolute necessity for the existence of the system.&nbsp; That
+the system, notwithstanding its occasional disorders, went on.&nbsp;
+Popes and cardinals might prey upon its bowels, and sell its interests,
+but the system survived.&nbsp; The cutting off of this or that member
+was not able to cause Rome any vital loss; for, as soon as she lost
+a member, the loss was supplied by her own inherent vitality; though
+her popes had been poisoned by cardinals, and her cardinals by popes;
+and though priests occasionally poisoned popes, cardinals, and each
+other, after all that had been, and might be, she had still, and would
+ever have, her priests, cardinals, and pope.<br>
+<br>
+Finding the man in black so communicative and reasonable, I determined
+to make the best of my opportunity, and learn from him all I could with
+respect to the papal system, and told him that he would particularly
+oblige me by telling me who the Pope of Rome was; and received for answer,
+that he was an old man elected by a majority of cardinals to the papal
+chair; who, immediately after his election, became omnipotent and equal
+to God on earth.&nbsp; On my begging him not to talk such nonsense,
+and asking him how a person could be omnipotent who could not always
+preserve himself from poison, even when fenced round by nephews, or
+protected by a bustling woman, he, after taking a long sip of hollands
+and water, told me that I must not expect too much from omnipotence;
+for example, that as it would be unreasonable to expect that One above
+could annihilate the past - for instance, the Seven Years&rsquo; War,
+or the French Revolution - though any one who believed in Him would
+acknowledge Him to be omnipotent, so would it be unreasonable for the
+faithful to expect that the Pope could always guard himself from poison.&nbsp;
+Then, after looking at me for a moment stedfastly, and taking another
+sip, he told me that popes had frequently done impossibilities; for
+example, Innocent the Tenth had created a nephew; for, not liking particularly
+any of his real nephews, he had created the said Camillo Astalli his
+nephew; asking me, with a he! he!&nbsp; &ldquo;What but omnipotence
+could make a young man nephew to a person to whom he was not in the
+slightest degree related?&rdquo;&nbsp; On my observing that of course
+no one believed that the young fellow was really the Pope&rsquo;s nephew,
+though the Pope might have adopted him as such, the man in black replied,
+&ldquo;that the reality of the nephewship of Camillo Astalli had hitherto
+never become a point of faith; let, however, the present pope, or any
+other pope, proclaim that it is necessary to believe in the reality
+of the nephewship of Camillo Astalli, and see whether the faithful would
+not believe in it.&nbsp; Who can doubt that,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;seeing
+that they believe in the reality of the five propositions of Jansenius?&nbsp;
+The Jesuits, wishing to ruin the Jansenists, induced a pope to declare
+that such and such damnable opinions, which they called five propositions,
+were to be found in a book written by Jansen, though, in reality, no
+such propositions were to be found there; whereupon the existence of
+these propositions became forthwith a point of faith to the faithful.&nbsp;
+Do you then think,&rdquo; he demanded, &ldquo;that there is one of the
+faithful who would not swallow, if called upon, the nephewship of Camillo
+Astalli as easily as the five propositions of Jansenius?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Surely, then,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;the faithful must be a pretty
+pack of simpletons!&rdquo;&nbsp; Whereupon the man in black exclaimed,
+&ldquo;What! a Protestant, and an infringer of the rights of faith!&nbsp;
+Here&rsquo;s a fellow, who would feel himself insulted if any one were
+to ask him how he could believe in the miraculous conception, calling
+people simpletons who swallow the five propositions of Jansenius, and
+are disposed, if called upon, to swallow the reality of the nephewship
+of Camillo Astalli.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was about to speak, when I was interrupted by the arrival of Belle.&nbsp;
+After unharnessing her donkey, and adjusting her person a little, she
+came and sat down by us.&nbsp; In the meantime I had helped my companion
+to some more hollands and water, and had plunged with him into yet deeper
+discourse.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER III<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Necessity of Religion - The Great Indian One - Image-worship - Shakespeare
+- The Pat Answer - Krishna - Amen.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Having told the man in black that I should like to know all the truth
+with regard to the Pope and his system, he assured me he should be delighted
+to give me all the information in his power; that he had come to the
+dingle, not so much for the sake of the good cheer which I was in the
+habit of giving him, as in the hope of inducing me to enlist under the
+banners of Rome, and to fight in her cause; and that he had no doubt
+that, by speaking out frankly to me, he ran the best chance of winning
+me over.<br>
+<br>
+He then proceeded to tell me that the experience of countless ages had
+proved the necessity of religion; the necessity, he would admit, was
+only for simpletons; but as nine-tenths of the dwellers upon this earth
+were simpletons, it would never do for sensible people to run counter
+to their folly, but, on the contrary, it was their wisest course to
+encourage them in it, always provided that, by so doing, sensible people
+would derive advantage; that the truly sensible people of this world
+were the priests, who, without caring a straw for religion for its own
+sake, made use of it as a cord by which to draw the simpletons after
+them; that there were many religions in this world, all of which had
+been turned to excellent account by the priesthood; but that the one
+the best adapted for the purposes of priestcraft was the popish, which,
+he said, was the oldest in the world and the best calculated to endure.&nbsp;
+On my inquiring what he meant by saying the popish religion was the
+oldest in the world, whereas there could be no doubt that the Greek
+and Roman religion had existed long before it, to say nothing of the
+old Indian religion still in existence and vigour; he said, with a nod,
+after taking a sip at his glass, that, between me and him, the popish
+religion, that of Greece and Rome, and the old Indian system were, in
+reality, one and the same.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You told me that you intended to be frank,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;but,
+however frank you may be, I think you are rather wild.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We priests of Rome,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;even
+those amongst us who do not go much abroad, know a great deal about
+church matters, of which you heretics have very little idea.&nbsp; Those
+of our brethren of the Propaganda, on their return home from distant
+missions, not unfrequently tell us very strange things relating to our
+dear mother; for example, our first missionaries to the East were not
+slow in discovering and telling to their brethren that our religion
+and the great Indian one were identical, no more difference between
+them than between Ram and Rome.&nbsp; Priests, convents, beads, prayers,
+processions, fastings, penances, all the same, not forgetting anchorites
+and vermin, he! he!&nbsp; The pope they found under the title of the
+grand lama, a sucking child surrounded by an immense number of priests.&nbsp;
+Our good brethren, some two hundred years ago, had a hearty laugh, which
+their successors have often re-echoed; they said that helpless suckling
+and its priests put them so much in mind of their own old man, surrounded
+by his cardinals, he! he!&nbsp; Old age is second childhood.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Did they find Christ?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They found him too,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;that
+is, they saw his image; he is considered in India as a pure kind of
+being, and on that account, perhaps, is kept there rather in the background,
+even as he is here.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All this is very mysterious to me,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very likely,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;but of this
+I am tolerably sure, and so are most of those of Rome, that modern Rome
+had its religion from ancient Rome, which had its religion from the
+East.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But how?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It was brought about, I believe, by the wanderings of nations,&rdquo;
+said the man in black.&nbsp; &ldquo;A brother of the Propaganda, a very
+learned man, once told me - I do not mean Mezzofanti, who has not five
+ideas - this brother once told me that all we of the Old World, from
+Calcutta to Dublin, are of the same stock, and were originally of the
+same language, and - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All of one religion,&rdquo; I put in.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All of one religion,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;and
+now follow different modifications of the same religion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We Christians are not image-worshippers,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You heretics are not, you mean,&rdquo; said the man in black;
+&ldquo;but you will be put down, just as you have always been, though
+others may rise up after you; the true religion is image-worship; people
+may strive against it, but they will only work themselves to an oil;
+how did it fare with that Greek Emperor, the Iconoclast, what was his
+name, Leon the Isaurian?&nbsp; Did not his image-breaking cost him Italy,
+the fairest province of his empire, and did not ten fresh images start
+up at home for every one which he demolished?&nbsp; Oh! you little know
+the craving which the soul sometimes feels after a good bodily image.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have indeed no conception of it,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I have
+an abhorrence of idolatry - the idea of bowing before a graven figure!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The idea, indeed!&rdquo; said Belle, who had now joined us.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Did you never bow before that of Shakespeare?&rdquo; said the
+man in black, addressing himself to me, after a low bow to Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t remember that I ever did,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but
+even suppose I did?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Suppose you did,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;shame on
+you, Mr. Hater of Idolatry; why, the very supposition brings you to
+the ground; you must make figures of Shakespeare, must you? then why
+not of St. Antonio, or Ignacio, or of a greater personage still!&nbsp;
+I know what you are going to say,&rdquo; he cried, interrupting me,
+as I was about to speak.&nbsp; &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t make his image
+in order to pay it divine honours, but only to look at it, and think
+of Shakespeare; but this looking at a thing in order to think of a person
+is the very basis of idolatry.&nbsp; Shakespeare&rsquo;s works are not
+sufficient for you; no more are the Bible or the legend of Saint Anthony
+or Saint Ignacio for us, that is for those of us who believe in them;
+I tell you, Zingara, that no religion can exist long which rejects a
+good bodily image.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you think,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that Shakespeare&rsquo;s
+works would not exist without his image?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I believe,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;that Shakespeare&rsquo;s
+image is looked at more than his works, and will be looked at, and perhaps
+adored, when they are forgotten.&nbsp; I am surprised that they have
+not been forgotten long ago; I am no admirer of them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But I can&rsquo;t imagine,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;how you will
+put aside the authority of Moses.&nbsp; If Moses strove against image-worship,
+should not his doing so be conclusive as to the impropriety of the practice:
+what higher authority can you have than that of Moses?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The practice of the great majority of the human race,&rdquo;
+said the man in black, &ldquo;and the recurrence to image-worship where
+image-worship has been abolished.&nbsp; Do you know that Moses is considered
+by the church as no better than a heretic, and though, for particular
+reasons, it has been obliged to adopt his writings, the adoption was
+merely a sham one, as it never paid the slightest attention to them?&nbsp;
+No, no, the church was never led by Moses, nor by one mightier than
+he, whose doctrine it has equally nullified - I allude to Krishna in
+his second avatar; the church, it is true, governs in his name, but
+not unfrequently gives him the lie, if he happens to have said anything
+which it dislikes.&nbsp; Did you never hear the reply which Padre Paolo
+Segani made to the French Protestant Jean Anthoine Guerin, who had asked
+him whether it was easier for Christ to have been mistaken in his Gospel,
+than for the Pope to be mistaken in his decrees?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I never heard their names before,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The answer was pat,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;though
+he who made it was confessedly the most ignorant fellow of the very
+ignorant order to which he belonged, the Augustine.&nbsp; &lsquo;Christ
+might err as a man,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;but the Pope can never err,
+being God.&rsquo;&nbsp; The whole story is related in the Nipotismo.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I wonder you should ever have troubled yourself with Christ at
+all,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What was to be done?&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;the
+power of that name suddenly came over Europe, like the power of a mighty
+wind; it was said to have come from Judea, and from Judea it probably
+came when it first began to agitate minds in these parts; but it seems
+to have been known in the remote East, more or less, for thousands of
+years previously.&nbsp; It filled people&rsquo;s minds with madness;
+it was followed by books which were never much regarded, as they contained
+little of insanity; but the name! what fury that breathed into people!
+the books were about peace and gentleness, but the name was the most
+horrible of war-cries - those who wished to uphold old names at first
+strove to oppose it, but their efforts were feeble, and they had no
+good war-cry; what was Mars as a war-cry compared with the name of .
+. . ?&nbsp; It was said that they persecuted terribly, but who said
+so?&nbsp; The Christians.&nbsp; The Christians could have given them
+a lesson in the art of persecution, and eventually did so.&nbsp; None
+but Christians have ever been good persecutors; well, the old religion
+succumbed, Christianity prevailed, for the ferocious is sure to prevail
+over the gentle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I thought,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you stated a little time ago
+that the Popish religion and the ancient Roman are the same?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In every point but that name, that Krishna and the fury and love
+of persecution which it inspired,&rdquo; said the man in black.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;A hot blast came from the East, sounding Krishna; it absolutely
+maddened people&rsquo;s minds, and the people would call themselves
+his children; we will not belong to Jupiter any longer, we will belong
+to Krishna, and they did belong to Krishna; that is in name, but in
+nothing else; for who ever cared for Krishna in the Christian world,
+or who ever regarded the words attributed to him, or put them in practice?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, we Protestants regard his words, and endeavour to practise
+what they enjoin as much as possible.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But you reject his image,&rdquo; sad the man in black; &ldquo;better
+reject his words than his image: no religion can exist long which rejects
+a good bodily image.&nbsp; Why, the very negro barbarians of High Barbary
+could give you a lesson on that point; they have their fetish images,
+to which they look for help in their afflictions; they have likewise
+a high priest, whom they call - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Mumbo Jumbo,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I know all about him already.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How came you to know anything about him?&rdquo; said the man
+in black, with a look of some surprise.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Some of us poor Protestants tinkers,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;though
+we live in dingles, are also acquainted with a thing or two.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I really believe you are,&rdquo; said the man in black, staring
+at me; &ldquo;but, in connection with this Mumbo Jumbo, I could relate
+to you a comical story about a fellow, an English servant, I once met
+at Rome.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It would be quite unnecessary,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I would
+much sooner hear you talk about Krishna, his words and image.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Spoken like a true heretic,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;one
+of the faithful would have placed his image before his words; for what
+are all the words in the world compared with a good bodily image!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I believe you occasionally quote his words?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He! he!&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;occasionally.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;For example,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;upon this rock I will found
+my church.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He! he!&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;you must really
+become one of us.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yet you must have had some difficulty in getting the rock to
+Rome?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;None whatever,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;faith can
+remove mountains, to say nothing of rocks - ho! ho!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But I cannot imagine,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;what advantage you
+could derive from perverting those words of Scripture in which the Saviour
+talks about eating his body.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not know, indeed, why we troubled our heads about the matter
+at all,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;but when you talk about
+perverting the meaning of the text, you speak ignorantly, Mr. Tinker;
+when he whom you call the Saviour gave his followers the sop, and bade
+them eat it, telling them it was his body, he delicately alluded to
+what it was incumbent upon them to do after his death, namely, to eat
+his body.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You do not mean to say that he intended they should actually
+eat his body?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you suppose ignorantly,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;eating
+the bodies of the dead was a heathenish custom, practised by the heirs
+and legatees of people who left property; and this custom is alluded
+to in the text.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But what has the New Testament to do with heathen customs,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;except to destroy them?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;More than you suppose,&rdquo; said the man in black.&nbsp; &ldquo;We
+priests of Rome, who have long lived at Rome, know much better what
+the New Testament is made of than the heretics and their theologians,
+not forgetting their Tinkers; though I confess some of the latter have
+occasionally surprised us - for example, Bunyan.&nbsp; The New Testament
+is crowded with allusions to heathen customs, and with words connected
+with pagan sorcery.&nbsp; Now, with respect to words, I would fain have
+you, who pretend to be a philologist, tell me the meaning of Amen.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I made no answer.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We of Rome,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;know two or
+three things of which the heretics are quite ignorant; for example,
+there are those amongst us - those, too, who do not pretend to be philologists
+- who know what Amen is, and, moreover, how we got it.&nbsp; We got
+it from our ancestors, the priests of ancient Rome; and they got the
+word from their ancestors of the East, the priests of Buddh and Brahma.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what is the meaning of the word?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Amen,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;is a modification
+of the old Hindoo formula, Omani batsikhom, by the almost ceaseless
+repetition of which the Indians hope to be received finally to the rest
+or state of forgetfulness of Buddh or Brahma; a foolish practice you
+will say, but are you heretics much wiser, who are continually sticking
+Amen to the end of your prayers, little knowing when you do so, that
+you are consigning yourselves to the repose of Buddh!&nbsp; Oh, what
+hearty laughs our missionaries have had when comparing the eternally-sounding
+Eastern gibberish of Omani batsikhom, Omani batsikhom, and the Ave Maria
+and Amen Jesus of our own idiotical devotees.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have nothing to say about the Ave Marias and Amens of your
+superstitious devotees,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I dare say that they use
+them nonsensically enough, but in putting Amen to the end of a prayer,
+we merely intend to express, &lsquo;So let it be.&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It means nothing of the kind,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;and
+the Hindoos might just as well put your national oath at the end of
+their prayers, as perhaps they will after a great many thousand years,
+when English is forgotten, and only a few words of it remembered by
+dim tradition without being understood.&nbsp; How strange if, after
+the lapse of four thousand years, the Hindoos should damn themselves
+to the blindness so dear to their present masters, even as their masters
+at present consign themselves to the forgetfulness so dear to the Hindoos;
+but my glass has been empty for a considerable time; perhaps, Bellissima
+Biondina,&rdquo; said he, addressing Belle, &ldquo;you will deign to
+replenish it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shall do no such thing,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;you have
+drunk quite enough, and talked more than enough, and to tell you the
+truth I wish you would leave us alone.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Shame on you, Belle,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;consider the obligations
+of hospitality.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sick of that word,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;you are so
+frequently misusing it; were this place not Mumpers&rsquo; Dingle, and
+consequently as free to the fellow as ourselves, I would lead him out
+of it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray be quiet, Belle,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;You had better
+help yourself,&rdquo; said I, addressing myself to the man in black,
+&ldquo;the lady is angry with you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sorry for it,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;if she
+is angry with me, I am not so with her, and shall be always proud to
+wait upon her; in the meantime, I will wait upon myself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Proposal - The Scotch Novel - Latitude - Miracles - Pestilent Heretics
+- Old Fraser - Wonderful Texts - No Armenian.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The man in black having helped himself to some more of his favourite
+beverage, and tasted it, I thus addressed him: &ldquo;The evening is
+getting rather advanced, and I can see that this lady,&rdquo; pointing
+to Belle, &ldquo;is anxious for her tea, which she prefers to take cosily
+and comfortably with me in the dingle: the place, it is true, is as
+free to you as to ourselves, nevertheless, as we are located here by
+necessity, whilst you merely come as a visitor, I must take the liberty
+of telling you that we shall be glad to be alone, as soon as you have
+said what you have to say, and have finished the glass of refreshment
+at present in your hand.&nbsp; I think you said some time ago that one
+of your motives for coming hither was to induce me to enlist under the
+banner of Rome.&nbsp; I wish to know whether that was really the case?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Decidedly so,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;I come here
+principally in the hope of enlisting you in our regiment, in which I
+have no doubt you could do us excellent service.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Would you enlist my companion as well?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We should be only too proud to have her among us, whether she
+comes with you or alone,&rdquo; said the man in black, with a polite
+bow to Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Before we give you an answer,&rdquo; I replied, &ldquo;I would
+fain know more about you; perhaps you will declare your name?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That I will never do,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;no
+one in England knows it but myself, and I will not declare it, even
+in a dingle; as for the rest, <i>Sono un Prete Cattolico</i> <i>Appostolico</i>
+- that is all that many a one of us can say for himself, and it assuredly
+means a great deal.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We will now proceed to business,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+must be aware that we English are generally considered a self-interested
+people.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And with considerable justice,&rdquo; said the man in black,
+drinking.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, you are a person of acute perception, and
+I will presently make it evident to you that it would be to your interest
+to join with us.&nbsp; You are at present, evidently, in very needy
+circumstances, and are lost, not only to yourself, but to the world;
+but should you enlist with us, I could find you an occupation not only
+agreeable, but one in which your talents would have free scope.&nbsp;
+I would introduce you in the various grand houses here in England, to
+which I have myself admission, as a surprising young gentleman of infinite
+learning, who by dint of study has discovered that the Roman is the
+only true faith.&nbsp; I tell you confidently that our popish females
+would make a saint, nay, a God of you; they are fools enough for anything.&nbsp;
+There is one person in particular with whom I would wish to make you
+acquainted, in the hope that you would be able to help me to perform
+good service to the holy see.&nbsp; He is a gouty old fellow, of some
+learning, residing in an old hall, near the great western seaport, and
+is one of the very few amongst the English Catholics possessing a grain
+of sense.&nbsp; I think you could help us to govern him, for he is not
+unfrequently disposed to be restive, asks us strange questions - occasionally
+threatens us with his crutch; and behaves so that we are often afraid
+that we shall lose him, or, rather, his property, which he has bequeathed
+to us, and which is enormous.&nbsp; I am sure that you could help us
+to deal with him; sometimes with your humour, sometimes with your learning,
+and perhaps occasionally with your fists.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And in what manner would you provide for my companion?&rdquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We would place her at once,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;in
+the house of two highly respectable Catholic ladies in this neighbourhood,
+where she would be treated with every care and consideration till her
+conversion should be accomplished in a regular manner; we would then
+remove her to a female monastic establishment, where, after undergoing
+a year&rsquo;s probation, during which time she would be instructed
+in every elegant accomplishment, she should take the veil.&nbsp; Her
+advancement would speedily follow, for, with such a face and figure,
+she would make a capital lady abbess, especially in Italy, to which
+country she would probably be sent; ladies of her hair and complexion
+- to say nothing of her height - being a curiosity in the south.&nbsp;
+With a little care and management she could soon obtain a vast reputation
+for sanctity; and who knows but after her death she might become a glorified
+saint - he! he!&nbsp; Sister Maria Theresa, for that is the name I propose
+you should bear.&nbsp; Holy Mother Maria Theresa - glorified and celestial
+saint, I have the honour of drinking to your health,&rdquo; and the
+man in black drank.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Belle,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;what have you to say to the
+gentleman&rsquo;s proposal?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That if he goes on in this way I will break his glass against
+his mouth.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You have heard the lady&rsquo;s answer,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;and shall not press
+the matter.&nbsp; I can&rsquo;t help, however, repeating that she would
+make a capital lady abbess; she would keep the nuns in order, I warrant
+her; no easy matter!&nbsp; Break the glass against my mouth - he! he!&nbsp;
+How she would send the holy utensils flying at the nuns&rsquo; heads
+occasionally, and just the person to wring the nose of Satan, should
+he venture to appear one night in her cell in the shape of a handsome
+black man.&nbsp; No offence, madam, no offence, pray retain your seat,&rdquo;
+said he, observing that Belle had started up; &ldquo;I mean no offence.&nbsp;
+Well, if you will not consent to be an abbess, perhaps you will consent
+to follow this young Zingaro, and to co-operate with him and us.&nbsp;
+I am a priest, madam, and can join you both in an instant, <i>connubio</i>
+<i>stabili</i>, as I suppose the knot has not been tied already.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Hold your mumping gibberish,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;and leave
+the dingle this moment, for though &lsquo;tis free to every one, you
+have no right to insult me in it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray be pacified,&rdquo; said I to Belle, getting up, and placing
+myself between her and the man in black, &ldquo;he will presently leave,
+take my word for it - there, sit down again,&rdquo; said I, as I led
+her to her seat; then, resuming my own, I said to the man in black:
+&ldquo;I advise you to leave the dingle as soon as possible.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I should wish to have your answer to my proposal first,&rdquo;
+said he.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, then, here you shall have it: I will not entertain your
+proposal; I detest your schemes: they are both wicked and foolish.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Wicked,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;have they not -
+he! he! - the furtherance of religion in view?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A religion,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;in which you yourself do not
+believe, and which you contemn.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Whether I believe in it or not,&rdquo; said the man in black,
+&ldquo;it is adapted for the generality of the human race; so I will
+forward it, and advise you to do the same.&nbsp; It was nearly extirpated
+in these regions, but it is springing up again, owing to circumstances.&nbsp;
+Radicalism is a good friend to us; all the liberals laud up our system
+out of hatred to the Established Church, though our system is ten times
+less liberal than the Church of England.&nbsp; Some of them have really
+come over to us.&nbsp; I myself confess a baronet who presided over
+the first radical meeting ever held in England - he was an atheist when
+he came over to us, in the hope of mortifying his own church - but he
+is now - ho! ho! - a real Catholic devotee - quite afraid of my threats;
+I make him frequently scourge himself before me.&nbsp; Well, Radicalism
+does us good service, especially amongst the lower classes, for Radicalism
+chiefly flourishes amongst them; for though a baronet or two may be
+found amongst the radicals, and perhaps as many lords - fellows who
+have been discarded by their own order for clownishness, or something
+they have done - it incontestably flourishes best among the lower orders.&nbsp;
+Then the love of what is foreign is a great friend to us; this love
+is chiefly confined to the middle and upper classes.&nbsp; Some admire
+the French, and imitate them; others must needs be Spaniards, dress
+themselves up in a zamarra, stick a cigar in their mouth, and say, &lsquo;Carajo.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Others would pass for Germans; he! he! the idea of any one wishing to
+pass for a German! but what has done us more service than anything else
+in these regions - I mean amidst the middle classes - has been the novel,
+the Scotch novel.&nbsp; The good folks, since they have read the novels,
+have become Jacobites; and, because all the Jacobs were Papists, the
+good folks must become Papists also, or, at least, papistically inclined.&nbsp;
+The very Scotch Presbyterians, since they have read the novels, are
+become all but Papists; I speak advisedly, having lately been amongst
+them.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s a trumpery bit of a half papist sect, called
+the Scotch Episcopalian Church, which lay dormant and nearly forgotten
+for upwards of a hundred years, which has of late got wonderfully into
+fashion in Scotland, because, forsooth, some of the long-haired gentry
+of the novels were said to belong to it, such as Montrose and Dundee;
+and to this the Presbyterians are going over in throngs, traducing and
+vilifying their own forefathers, or denying them altogether, and calling
+themselves descendants of - ho! ho! ho! - Scottish Cavaliers!!!&nbsp;
+I have heard them myself repeating snatches of Jacobite ditties about
+&lsquo;Bonnie Dundee,&rsquo; and -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Come, fill up my cup, and fill up my can,<br>
+And saddle my horse, and call up my man.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+There&rsquo;s stuff for you!&nbsp; Not that I object to the first part
+of the ditty.&nbsp; It is natural enough that a Scotchman should cry,
+&lsquo;Come, fill up my cup!&rsquo; more especially if he&rsquo;s drinking
+at another person&rsquo;s expense - all Scotchmen being fond of liquor
+at free cost: but &lsquo;Saddle his horse!!!&rsquo; - for what purpose,
+I would ask?&nbsp; Where is the use of saddling a horse, unless you
+can ride him? and where was there ever a Scotchman who could ride?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of course you have not a drop of Scotch blood in your veins,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;otherwise you would never have uttered that last sentence.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be too sure of that,&rdquo; said the man in black;
+&ldquo;you know little of Popery if you imagine that it cannot extinguish
+love of country, even in a Scotchman.&nbsp; A thorough-going Papist
+- and who more thorough-going than myself? - cares nothing for his country;
+and why should he? he belongs to a system, and not to a country.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One thing,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;connected with you, I cannot
+understand; you call yourself a thorough-going Papist, yet are continually
+saying the most pungent things against Popery, and turning to unbounded
+ridicule those who show any inclination to embrace it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Rome is a very sensible old body,&rdquo; said the man in black,
+&ldquo;and little cares what her children say, provided they do her
+bidding.&nbsp; She knows several things, and amongst others, that no
+servants work so hard and faithfully as those who curse their masters
+at every stroke they do.&nbsp; She was not fool enough to be angry with
+the Miquelets of Alba, who renounced her, and called her &lsquo;puta&rsquo;
+all the time they were cutting the throats of the Netherlanders.&nbsp;
+Now, if she allowed her faithful soldiers the latitude of renouncing
+her, and calling her &lsquo;puta&rsquo; in the market-place, think not
+she is so unreasonable as to object to her faithful priests occasionally
+calling her &lsquo;puta&rsquo; in the dingle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;suppose some one were to tell the
+world some of the disorderly things which her priests say in the dingle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He would have the fate of Cassandra,&rdquo; said the man in black;
+&ldquo;no one would believe him - yes, the priests would: but they would
+make no sign of belief.&nbsp; They believe in the Alcoran des Cordeliers
+- that is, those who have read it; but they make no sign.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A pretty system,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;which extinguishes love
+of country and of everything noble, and brings the minds of its ministers
+to a parity with those of devils, who delight in nothing but mischief.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The system,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;is a grand one,
+with unbounded vitality.&nbsp; Compare it with your Protestantism, and
+you will see the difference.&nbsp; Popery is ever at work, whilst Protestantism
+is supine.&nbsp; A pretty church, indeed, the Protestant!&nbsp; Why,
+it can&rsquo;t even work a miracle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can your church work miracles?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That was the very question,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;which
+the ancient British clergy asked of Austin Monk, after they had been
+fools enough to acknowledge their own inability.&nbsp; &lsquo;We don&rsquo;t
+pretend to work miracles; do you?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh! dear me, yes,&rsquo;
+said Austin; &lsquo;we find no difficulty in the matter.&nbsp; We can
+raise the dead, we can make the blind see; and to convince you, I will
+give sight to the blind.&nbsp; Here is this blind Saxon, whom you cannot
+cure, but on whose eyes I will manifest my power, in order to show the
+difference between the true and the false church;&rsquo; and forthwith,
+with the assistance of a handkerchief and a little hot water, he opened
+the eyes of the barbarian.&nbsp; So we manage matters!&nbsp; A pretty
+church, that old British church, which could not work miracles - quite
+as helpless as the modern one.&nbsp; The fools! was birdlime so scarce
+a thing amongst them? - and were the properties of warm water so unknown
+to them, that they could not close a pair of eyes and open them?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a pity,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that the British clergy
+at that interview with Austin, did not bring forward a blind Welshman,
+and ask the monk to operate upon him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Clearly,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;that&rsquo;s what
+they ought to have done; but they were fools without a single resource.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Here he took a sip at his glass.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But they did not believe in the miracle?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what did their not believing avail them?&rdquo; said the
+man in black.&nbsp; &ldquo;Austin remained master of the field, and
+they went away holding their heads down, and muttering to themselves.&nbsp;
+What a fine subject for a painting would be Austin&rsquo;s opening the
+eyes of the Saxon barbarian, and the discomfiture of the British clergy!&nbsp;
+I wonder it has not been painted! - he! he!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I suppose your church still performs miracles occasionally!&rdquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It does,&rdquo; said the man in black.&nbsp; &ldquo;The Rev.
+- has lately been performing miracles in Ireland, destroying devils
+that had got possession of people; he has been eminently successful.&nbsp;
+In two instances he not only destroyed the devils, but the lives of
+the people possessed - he! he!&nbsp; Oh! there is so much energy in
+our system; we are always at work, whilst Protestantism is supine.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You must not imagine,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that all Protestants
+are supine; some of them appear to be filled with unbounded zeal.&nbsp;
+They deal, it is true, not in lying miracles, but they propagate God&rsquo;s
+Word.&nbsp; I remember only a few months ago, having occasion for a
+Bible, going to an establishment, the object of which was to send Bibles
+all over the world.&nbsp; The supporters of that establishment could
+have no self-interested views; for I was supplied by them with a noble-sized
+Bible at a price so small as to preclude the idea that it could bring
+any profit to the vendors.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The countenance of the man in black slightly fell.&nbsp; &ldquo;I know
+the people to whom you allude,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;indeed, unknown
+to them, I have frequently been to see them, and observed their ways.&nbsp;
+I tell you frankly that there is not a set of people in this kingdom
+who have caused our church so much trouble and uneasiness.&nbsp; I should
+rather say that they alone cause us any; for as for the rest, what with
+their drowsiness, their plethora, their folly and their vanity, they
+are doing us anything but mischief.&nbsp; These fellows are a pestilent
+set of heretics, whom we would gladly see burnt; they are, with the
+most untiring perseverance, and in spite of divers minatory declarations
+of the holy father, scattering their books abroad through all Europe,
+and have caused many people in Catholic countries to think that hitherto
+their priesthood have endeavoured, as much as possible, to keep them
+blinded.&nbsp; There is one fellow amongst them for whom we entertain
+a particular aversion; a big, burly parson, with the face of a lion,
+the voice of a buffalo, and a fist like a sledge-hammer.&nbsp; The last
+time I was there, I observed that his eye was upon me, and I did not
+like the glance he gave me at all; I observed him clench his fist, and
+I took my departure as fast as I conveniently could.&nbsp; Whether he
+suspected who I was, I know not; but I did not like his look at all,
+and do not intend to go again.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, then,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you confess that you have redoubtable
+enemies to your plans in these regions, and that even amongst the ecclesiastics
+there are some widely different from those of the plethoric and Platitude
+schools?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is but too true,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;and
+if the rest of your church were like them we should quickly bid adieu
+to all hope of converting these regions, but we are thankful to be able
+to say that such folks are not numerous; there are, moreover, causes
+at work quite sufficient to undermine even their zeal.&nbsp; Their sons
+return at the vacations, from Oxford and Cambridge, puppies, full of
+the nonsense which they have imbibed from Platitude professors; and
+this nonsense they retail at home, where it fails not to make some impression,
+whilst the daughters scream - I beg their pardons - warble about Scotland&rsquo;s
+Montrose and Bonny Dundee, and all the Jacobs; so we have no doubt that
+their papas&rsquo; zeal about the propagation of such a vulgar book
+as the Bible will in a very little time be terribly diminished.&nbsp;
+Old Rome will win, so you had better join her.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+And the man in black drained the last drop in his glass.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;will I become the slave of Rome.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She will allow you latitude,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;do
+but serve her, and she will allow you to call her &lsquo;puta&rsquo;
+at a decent time and place, her popes occasionally call her &lsquo;puta.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+A pope has been known to start from his bed at midnight and rush out
+into the corridor, and call out &lsquo;puta&rsquo; three times in a
+voice which pierced the Vatican; that pope was - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Alexander the Sixth, I dare say,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;the greatest
+monster that ever existed, though the worthiest head which the pope
+system ever had - so his conscience was not always still.&nbsp; I thought
+it had been seared with a brand of iron.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I did not allude to him, but to a much more modern pope,&rdquo;
+said the man in black; &ldquo;it is true he brought the word, which
+is Spanish, from Spain, his native country, to Rome.&nbsp; He was very
+fond of calling the church by that name, and other popes have taken
+it up.&nbsp; She will allow you to call her by it, if you belong to
+her.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shall call her so,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;without belonging
+to her, or asking her permission.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She will allow you to treat her as such, if you belong to her,&rdquo;
+said the man in black; &ldquo;there is a chapel in Rome, where there
+is a wondrously fair statue - the son of a cardinal - I mean his nephew
+- once - Well, she did not cut off his head, but slightly boxed his
+cheek and bade him go.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have read all about that in &lsquo;Keysler&rsquo;s Travels,&rsquo;&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;do you tell her that I would not touch her with a pair
+of tongs, unless to seize her nose.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She is fond of lucre,&rdquo; said the man in black; &ldquo;but
+does not grudge a faithful priest a little private perquisite,&rdquo;
+and he took out a very handsome gold repeater.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Are you not afraid,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;to flash that watch
+before the eyes of a poor tinker in a dingle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not before the eyes of one like you,&rdquo; said the man in black.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is getting late,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I care not for perquisites.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So you will not join us?&rdquo; said the man in black.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You have had my answer,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If I belong to Rome,&rdquo; said the man in black, &ldquo;why
+should not you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I may be a poor tinker,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;but I may never
+have undergone what you have.&nbsp; You remember, perhaps, the fable
+of the fox who had lost his tail?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The man in black winced, but almost immediately recovering himself,
+he said, &ldquo;Well, we can do without you, we are sure of winning.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is not the part of wise people,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;to make
+sure of the battle before it is fought: there&rsquo;s the landlord of
+the public-house, who made sure that his cocks would win, yet the cocks
+lost the main, and the landlord is little better than a bankrupt.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;People very different from the landlord,&rdquo; said the man
+in black, &ldquo;both in intellect and station, think we shall surely
+win; there are clever machinators among us who have no doubt of our
+success.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I will set the landlord aside, and
+will adduce one who was in every point a very different person from
+the landlord, both in understanding and station; he was very fond of
+laying schemes, and, indeed, many of them turned out successful.&nbsp;
+His last and darling one, however, miscarried, notwithstanding that
+by his calculations he had persuaded himself that there was no possibility
+of its failing - the person that I allude to was old Fraser - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Who?&rdquo; said the man in black, giving a start, and letting
+his glass fall.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Old Fraser, of Lovat,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;the prince of all
+conspirators and machinators; he made sure of placing the Pretender
+on the throne of these realms.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can bring into the field
+so many men,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;my son-in-law Cluny, so many, and
+likewise my cousin, and my good friend;&rsquo; then speaking of those
+on whom the government reckoned for support, he would say, &lsquo;So
+and so are lukewarm, this person is ruled by his wife, who is with us,
+the clergy are anything but hostile to us, and as for the soldiers and
+sailors, half are disaffected to King George, and the rest cowards.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Yet when things came to a trial, this person whom he had calculated
+upon to join the Pretender did not stir from his home, another joined
+the hostile ranks, the presumed cowards turned out heroes, and those
+whom he thought heroes ran away like lusty fellows at Culloden; in a
+word, he found himself utterly mistaken, and in nothing more than in
+himself; he thought he was a hero, and proved himself nothing more than
+an old fox; he got up a hollow tree, didn&rsquo;t he, just like a fox?<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;L&rsquo;opere sue non furon leonine, ma di volpe.&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The man in black sat silent for a considerable time, and at length answered
+in rather a faltering voice, &ldquo;I was not prepared for this; you
+have frequently surprised me by your knowledge of things which I should
+never have expected any person of your appearance to be acquainted with,
+but that you should be aware of my name is a circumstance utterly incomprehensible
+to me.&nbsp; I had imagined that no person in England was acquainted
+with it; indeed, I don&rsquo;t see how any person should be, I have
+revealed it to no one, not being particularly proud of it.&nbsp; Yes,
+I acknowledge that my name is Fraser, and that I am of the blood of
+that family or clan, of which the rector of our college once said, that
+he was firmly of opinion that every individual member was either rogue
+or fool.&nbsp; I was born at Madrid, of pure, <i>oim&egrave;</i>, Fraser
+blood.&nbsp; My parents, at an early age, took me to -, where they shortly
+died, not, however, before they had placed me in the service of a cardinal,
+with whom I continued for some years, and who, when he had no further
+occasion for me, sent me to the college, in the left-hand cloister of
+which, as you enter, rest the bones of Sir John -; there, in studying
+logic and humane letters, I lost whatever of humanity I had retained
+when discarded by the cardinal.&nbsp; Let me not, however, forget two
+points, - I am a Fraser, it is true, but not a Flannagan; I may bear
+the vilest name of Britain, but not of Ireland; I was bred up at the
+English house, and there is at - a house for the education of bogtrotters;
+I was not bred up at that; beneath the lowest gulf, there is one yet
+lower; whatever my blood may be, it is at least not Irish; whatever
+my education may have been, I was not bred at the Irish seminary - on
+those accounts I am thankful - yes, <i>per</i> <i>dio</i>!&nbsp; I am
+thankful.&nbsp; After some years at college - but why should I tell
+you my history? you know it already perfectly well, probably much better
+than myself.&nbsp; I am now a missionary priest, labouring in heretic
+England, like Parsons and Garnet of old, save and except that, unlike
+them, I run no danger, for the times are changed.&nbsp; As I told you
+before, I shall cleave to Rome - I must; <i>no</i> <i>hay remedio</i>,
+as they say at Madrid, and I will do my best to further her holy plans
+- he! he! - but I confess I begin to doubt of their being successful
+here - you put me out; old Fraser, of Lovat!&nbsp; I have heard my father
+talk of him; he had a gold-headed cane, with which he once knocked my
+grandfather down - he was an astute one, but, as you say, mistaken,
+particularly in himself.&nbsp; I have read his life by Arbuthnot, it
+is in the library of our college.&nbsp; Farewell!&nbsp; I shall come
+no more to this dingle - to come would be of no utility; I shall go
+and labour elsewhere, though - how you came to know my name, is a fact
+quite inexplicable - farewell! to you both.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+He then arose; and without further salutation departed from the dingle,
+in which I never saw him again.&nbsp; &ldquo;How, in the name of wonder,
+came you to know that man&rsquo;s name?&rdquo; said Belle, after he
+had been gone some time.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I, Belle?&nbsp; I knew nothing of the fellow&rsquo;s name, I
+assure you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But you mentioned his name.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If I did, it was merely casually, by way of illustration.&nbsp;
+I was saying how frequently cunning people were mistaken in their calculations,
+and I adduced the case of old Fraser, of Lovat, as one in point; I brought
+forward his name, because I was well acquainted with his history, from
+having compiled and inserted it in a wonderful work, which I edited
+some months ago, entitled &lsquo;Newgate Lives and Trials,&rsquo; but
+without the slightest idea that it was the name of him who was sitting
+with us; he, however, thought that I was aware of his name.&nbsp; Belle!
+Belle! for a long time I doubted the truth of Scripture, owing to certain
+conceited individuals, but now I begin to believe firmly; what wonderful
+texts are in Scripture, Belle; &lsquo;The wicked trembleth where - where
+- &rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;They were afraid where no fear was; thou hast put them
+to confusion, because God hath despised them,&rsquo;&rdquo; said Belle;
+&ldquo;I have frequently read it before the clergyman in the great house
+of Long Melford.&nbsp; But if you did not know the man&rsquo;s name,
+why let him go away supposing that you did?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Oh, if he was fool enough to make such a mistake, I was not going
+to undeceive him - no, no!&nbsp; Let the enemies of old England make
+the most of all their blunders and mistakes, they will have no help
+from me; but enough of the fellow, Belle; let us now have tea, and after
+that - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No Armenian,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;but I want to ask a question:
+pray are all people of that man&rsquo;s name either rogues or fools?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is impossible for me to say, Belle, this person being the
+only one of the name I have ever personally known.&nbsp; I suppose there
+are good and bad, clever and foolish, amongst them, as amongst all large
+bodies of people; however, after the tribe had been governed for upwards
+of thirty years, by such a person as old Fraser, it were no wonder if
+the greater part had become either rogues or fools: he was a ruthless
+tyrant, Belle, over his own people, and by his cruelty and rapaciousness
+must either have stunned them into an apathy approaching to idiotcy,
+or made them artful knaves in their own defence.&nbsp; The qualities
+of parents are generally transmitted to their descendants - the progeny
+of trained pointers are almost sure to point, even without being taught:
+if, therefore, all Frasers are either rogues or fools, as this person
+seems to insinuate, it is little to be wondered at, their parents or
+grandparents having been in the training-school of old Fraser!&nbsp;
+But enough of the old tyrant and his slaves.&nbsp; Belle, prepare tea
+this moment, or dread my anger.&nbsp; I have not a gold-headed cane
+like old Fraser of Lovat, but I have, what some people would dread much
+more, an Armenian rune-stick.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER V<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Fresh Arrivals - Pitching the Tent - Certificated Wife - High-flying
+Notions.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On the following morning, as I was about to leave my tent, I heard the
+voice of Belle at the door, exclaiming, &ldquo;Sleepest thou, or wakest
+thou?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I was never more awake in my life,&rdquo;
+said I, going out.&nbsp; &ldquo;What is the matter?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He
+of the horse-shoe,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;Jasper, of whom I have heard
+you talk, is above there on the field with all his people; I went out
+about a quarter of an hour ago to fill the kettle at the spring, and
+saw them arriving.&nbsp; &ldquo;It is well,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;have
+you any objection to asking him and his wife to breakfast?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You can do as you please,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;I have cups
+enough, and have no objection to their company.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;We
+are the first occupiers of the ground,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and, being
+so, should consider ourselves in the light of hosts, and do our best
+to practise the duties of hospitality.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How fond
+you are of using that word,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;if you wish to
+invite the man and his wife, do so, without more ado; remember, however,
+that I have not cups enough, nor indeed tea enough, for the whole company.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Thereupon hurrying up the ascent, I presently found myself outside the
+dingle.&nbsp; It was as usual a brilliant morning, the dewy blades of
+the rye-grass which covered the plain sparkled brightly in the beams
+of the sun, which had probably been about two hours above the horizon.&nbsp;
+A rather numerous body of my ancient friends and allies occupied the
+ground in the vicinity of the mouth of the dingle.&nbsp; About five
+yards on the right I perceived Mr. Petulengro busily employed in erecting
+his tent; he held in his hand an iron bar, sharp at the bottom, with
+a kind of arm projecting from the top for the purpose of supporting
+a kettle or cauldron over the fire, and which is called in the Romanian
+language &ldquo;Kekauviskoe saster.&rdquo;&nbsp; With the sharp end
+of this Mr. Petulengro was making holes in the earth, at about twenty
+inches distant from each other, into which he inserted certain long
+rods with a considerable bend towards the top, which constituted no
+less than the timber of the tent, and the supporters of the canvas.&nbsp;
+Mrs. Petulengro, and a female with a crutch in her hand, whom I recognised
+as Mrs. Chikno, sat near him on the ground, whilst two or three children,
+from six to ten years old, who composed the young family of Mr. and
+Mrs. Petulengro, were playing about.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Here we are, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, as he drove
+the sharp end of the bar into the ground; &ldquo;here we are, and plenty
+of us - Bute dosta Romany chals.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am glad to see you all,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and particularly
+you, madam,&rdquo; said I, making a bow to Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;and
+you also, madam,&rdquo; taking off my hat to Mrs. Chikno.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Good-day to you, sir,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;you
+look, as usual, charmingly, and speak so, too; you have not forgot your
+manners.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is not all gold that glitters,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;However, good-morrow to you, young rye.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not see Tawno,&rdquo; said I, looking around; &ldquo;where
+is he?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Where, indeed!&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno; &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t
+know; he who countenances him in the roving line can best answer.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He will be here anon,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;he has
+merely ridden down a by-road to show a farmer a two-year-old colt; she
+heard me give him directions, but she can&rsquo;t be satisfied.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t indeed,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And why not, sister?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Because I place no confidence in your words, brother; as I said
+before, you countenances him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I know nothing of your private concerns;
+I am come on an errand.&nbsp; Isopel Berners, down in the dell there,
+requests the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro&rsquo;s company at
+breakfast.&nbsp; She will be happy also to see you, madam,&rdquo; said
+I, addressing Mrs. Chikno.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Is that young female your wife, young man?&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My wife?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, young man; your wife, your lawful certificated wife?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;she is not my wife.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then I will not visit with her,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno; &ldquo;I
+countenance nothing in the roving line.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do you mean by the roving line?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do I mean by the roving line?&nbsp; Why, by it I mean such
+conduct as is not tatcheno.&nbsp; When ryes and rawnies live together
+in dingles, without being certificated, I call such behaviour being
+tolerably deep in the roving line, everything savouring of which I am
+determined not to sanctify.&nbsp; I have suffered too much by my own
+certificated husband&rsquo;s outbreaks in that line to afford anything
+of the kind the slightest shadow of countenance.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is hard that people may not live in dingles together without
+being suspected of doing wrong,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So it is,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, interposing; &ldquo;and,
+to tell you the truth, I am altogether surprised at the illiberality
+of my sister&rsquo;s remarks.&nbsp; I have often heard say, that it
+is in good company - and I have kept good company in my time - that
+suspicion is king&rsquo;s evidence of a narrow and uncultivated mind;
+on which account I am suspicious of nobody, not even of my own husband,
+whom some people would think I have a right to be suspicious of, seeing
+that on his account I once refused a lord; but ask him whether I am
+suspicious of him, and whether I seek to keep him close tied to my apron-string;
+he will tell you nothing of the kind; but that, on the contrary, I always
+allows him an agreeable latitude, permitting him to go where he pleases,
+and to converse with any one to whose manner of speaking he may take
+a fancy.&nbsp; But I have had the advantage of keeping good company,
+and therefore - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Meklis,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno, &ldquo;pray drop all that, sister;
+I believe I have kept as good company as yourself; and with respect
+to that offer with which you frequently fatigue those who keeps company
+with you, I believe, after all, it was something in the roving and uncertificated
+line.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In whatever line it was,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, &ldquo;the
+offer was a good one.&nbsp; The young duke - for he was not only a lord,
+but a duke too - offered to keep me a fine carriage, and to make me
+his second wife; for it is true that he had another who was old and
+stout, though mighty rich, and highly good-natured; so much so, indeed,
+that the young lord assured me that she would have no manner of objection
+to the arrangement; more especially if I would consent to live in the
+same house with her, being fond of young and cheerful society.&nbsp;
+So you see - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, yes,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno, &ldquo;I see, what I before
+thought, that it was altogether in the uncertificated line.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Meklis,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;I use your own word,
+madam, which is Romany: for my own part, I am not fond of using Romany
+words, unless I can hope to pass them off for French, which I cannot
+in the present company.&nbsp; I heartily wish that there was no such
+language, and do my best to keep it away from my children, lest the
+frequent use of it should altogether confirm them in low and vulgar
+habits.&nbsp; I have four children, madam, but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I suppose by talking of your four children you wish to check
+me for having none,&rdquo; said Mrs. Chikno, bursting into tears; &ldquo;if
+I have no children, sister, it is no fault of mine, it is - but why
+do I call you sister?&rdquo; said she, angrily; &ldquo;you are no sister
+of mine, you are a grasni, a regular mare - a pretty sister, indeed,
+ashamed of your own language.&nbsp; I remember well that by your high-flying
+notions you drove your own mother - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We will drop it,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;I do not
+wish to raise my voice, and to make myself ridiculous.&nbsp; Young gentleman,&rdquo;
+said she, &ldquo;pray present my compliments to Miss Isopel Berners,
+and inform her that I am very sorry that I cannot accept her polite
+invitation.&nbsp; I am just arrived, and have some slight domestic matters
+to see to - amongst others, to wash my children&rsquo;s faces; but that
+in the course of the forenoon, when I have attended to what I have to
+do, and have dressed myself, I hope to do myself the honour of paying
+her a regular visit; you will tell her that, with my compliments.&nbsp;
+With respect to my husband he can answer for himself, as I, not being
+of a jealous disposition, never interferes with his matters.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And tell Miss Berners,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;that
+I shall be happy to wait upon her in company with my wife as soon as
+we are regularly settled: at present I have much on my hands, having
+not only to pitch my own tent, but this here jealous woman&rsquo;s,
+whose husband is absent on my business.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Thereupon I returned to the dingle, and, without saying anything about
+Mrs. Chikno&rsquo;s observations, communicated to Isopel the messages
+of Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro; Isopel made no other reply than by replacing
+in her coffer two additional cups and saucers, which, in expectation
+of company, she had placed upon the board.&nbsp; The kettle was by this
+time boiling.&nbsp; We sat down, and, as we breakfasted, I gave Isopel
+Berners another lesson in the Armenian language.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Promised Visit - Roman Fashion - Wizard and Witch - Catching at
+Words - The Two Females - Dressing of Hair - The New Roads - Belle&rsquo;s
+Altered Appearance - Herself Again.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+About mid-day Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro came to the dingle to pay the
+promised visit.&nbsp; Belle, at the time of their arrival, was in her
+tent, but I was at the fire-place, engaged in hammering part of the
+outer-tire, or defence, which had come off from one of the wheels of
+my vehicle.&nbsp; On perceiving them I forthwith went to receive them.&nbsp;
+Mr. Petulengro was dressed in Roman fashion, with a somewhat smartly-cut
+sporting-coat, the buttons of which were half-crowns - and a waistcoat,
+scarlet and black, the buttons of which were spaded half-guineas; his
+breeches were of a stuff half velveteen, half corduroy, the cords exceedingly
+broad.&nbsp; He had leggings of buff cloth, furred at the bottom; and
+upon his feet were highlows.&nbsp; Under his left arm was a long black
+whalebone riding-whip, with a red lash, and an immense silver knob.&nbsp;
+Upon his head was a hat with a high peak, somewhat of the kind which
+the Spaniards call <i>calan&eacute;</i>, so much in favour with the
+bravos of Seville and Madrid.&nbsp; Now, when I have added that Mr.
+Petulengro had on a very fine white holland shirt, I think I have described
+his array.&nbsp; Mrs. Petulengro - I beg pardon for not having spoken
+of her first - was also arrayed very much in the Roman fashion.&nbsp;
+Her hair, which was exceedingly black and lustrous, fell in braids on
+either side of her head.&nbsp; In her ears were rings, with long drops
+of gold.&nbsp; Round her neck was a string of what seemed very much
+like very large pearls, somewhat tarnished, however, and apparently
+of considerable antiquity.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here we are, brother,&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;here we are, come to see you - wizard and
+witch, witch and wizard:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&lsquo;There&rsquo;s a chovahanee, and a chovahano,<br>
+The nav se len is Petulengro.&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Hold your tongue, sir,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;you
+make me ashamed of you with your vulgar ditties.&nbsp; We are come a
+visiting now, and everything low should be left behind.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;True,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;why bring what&rsquo;s
+low to the dingle, which is low enough already?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What, are you a catcher at words?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+thought that catching at words had been confined to the pothouse farmers
+and village witty bodies.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All fools,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, &ldquo;catch at words,
+and very naturally, as by so doing they hope to prevent the possibility
+of rational conversation.&nbsp; Catching at words confined to pothouse
+farmers, and village witty bodies!&nbsp; No, not to Jasper Petulengro.&nbsp;
+Listen for an hour or two to the discourse of a set they call newspaper
+editors, and if you don&rsquo;t go out and eat grass, as a dog does
+when he is sick, I am no female woman.&nbsp; The young lord whose hand
+I refused when I took up with wise Jasper, once brought two of them
+to my mother&rsquo;s tan, when hankering after my company; they did
+nothing but carp at each other&rsquo;s words, and a pretty hand they
+made of it.&nbsp; Ill-favoured dogs they were; and their attempts at
+what they called wit almost as unfortunate as their countenances.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;madam, we will drop all catchings
+and carpings for the present.&nbsp; Pray take your seat on this stool,
+whilst I go and announce to Miss Isopel Berners your arrival.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Thereupon I went to Belle&rsquo;s habitation, and informed her that
+Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro had paid us a visit of ceremony, and were awaiting
+her at the fire-place.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pray go and tell them that I am
+busy,&rdquo; said Belle, who was engaged with her needle.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+do not feel disposed to take part in any such nonsense.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I shall do no such thing,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and I insist
+upon your coming forthwith, and showing proper courtesy to your visitors.&nbsp;
+If you do not, their feelings will be hurt, and you are aware that I
+cannot bear that people&rsquo;s feelings should be outraged.&nbsp; Come
+this moment, or - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Or what?&rdquo; said Belle, half
+smiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;I was about to say something in Armenian,&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Belle, laying down her work,
+&ldquo;I will come.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Stay,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;your
+hair is hanging about your ears, and your dress is in disorder; you
+had better stay a minute or two to prepare yourself to appear before
+your visitors, who have come in their very best attire.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;I will make no alteration in my
+appearance; you told me to come this moment, and you shall be obeyed.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+So Belle and I advanced towards our guests.&nbsp; As we drew nigh Mr.
+Petulengro took off his hat, and made a profound obeisance to Belle,
+whilst Mrs. Petulengro rose from the stool, and made a profound curtsey.&nbsp;
+Belle, who had flung her hair back over her shoulders, returned their
+salutations by bending her head, and after slightly glancing at Mr.
+Petulengro, fixed her large blue eyes full upon his wife.&nbsp; Both
+these females were very handsome - but how unlike!&nbsp; Belle fair,
+with blue eyes and flaxen hair; Mrs. Petulengro with olive complexion,
+eyes black, and hair dark - as dark as could be.&nbsp; Belle, in demeanour
+calm and proud; the gypsy graceful, but full of movement and agitation.&nbsp;
+And then how different were those two in stature!&nbsp; The head of
+the Romany rawnie scarcely ascended to the breast of Isopel Berners.&nbsp;
+I could see that Mrs. Petulengro gazed on Belle with unmixed admiration;
+so did her husband.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the latter, &ldquo;one
+thing I will say, which is, that there is only one on earth worthy to
+stand up in front of this she, and that is the beauty of the world,
+as far as man flesh is concerned, Tawno Chikno; what a pity he did not
+come down!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tawno Chikno,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, flaring up; &ldquo;a
+pretty fellow he to stand up in front of this gentlewoman, a pity he
+didn&rsquo;t come, quotha? not at all, the fellow is a sneak, afraid
+of his wife.&nbsp; He stand up against this rawnie! why, the look she
+has given me would knock the fellow down.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is easier to knock him down with a look than with a fist,&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;that is, if the look comes from a woman:
+not that I am disposed to doubt that this female gentlewoman is able
+to knock him down either one way or the other.&nbsp; I have heard of
+her often enough, and have seen her once or twice, though not so near
+as now.&nbsp; Well, ma&rsquo;am, my wife and I are come to pay our respects
+to you; we are both glad to find that you have left off keeping company
+with Flaming Bosville, and have taken up with my pal; he is not very
+handsome, but a better - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I take up with your pal, as you call him! you had better mind
+what you say,&rdquo; said Isopel Berners, &ldquo;I take up with nobody.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I merely mean taking up your quarters with him,&rdquo; said Mr.
+Petulengro; &ldquo;and I was only about to say a better fellow-lodger
+you cannot have, or a more instructive, especially if you have a desire
+to be inoculated with tongues, as he calls them.&nbsp; I wonder whether
+you and he have had any tongue-work already.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Have you and your wife anything particular to say? if you have
+nothing but this kind of conversation I must leave you, as I am going
+to make a journey this afternoon, and should be getting ready.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You must excuse my husband, madam,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro,
+&ldquo;he is not overburdened with understanding, and has said but one
+word of sense since he has been here, which was that we came to pay
+our respects to you.&nbsp; We have dressed ourselves in our best Roman
+way, in order to do honour to you; perhaps you do not like it; if so,
+I am sorry.&nbsp; I have no French clothes, madam; if I had any, madam,
+I would have come in them, in order to do you more honour.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I like to see you much better as you are,&rdquo; said Belle;
+&ldquo;people should keep to their own fashions, and yours is very pretty.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am glad you are pleased to think it so, madam; it has been
+admired in the great city; it created what they call a sensation; and
+some of the great ladies, the court ladies, imitated it, else I should
+not appear in it so often as I am accustomed; for I am not very fond
+of what is Roman, having an imagination that what is Roman is ungenteel;
+in fact, I once heard the wife of a rich citizen say that gypsies were
+vulgar creatures.&nbsp; I should have taken her saying very much to
+heart, but for her improper pronunciation; she could not pronounce her
+words, madam, which we gypsies, as they call us, usually can, so I thought
+she was no very high purchase.&nbsp; You are very beautiful, madam,
+though you are not dressed as I could wish to see you, and your hair
+is hanging down in sad confusion; allow me to assist you in arranging
+your hair, madam; I will dress it for you in our fashion; I would fain
+see how your hair would look in our poor gypsy fashion; pray allow me,
+madam?&rdquo; and she took Belle by the hand.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I really can do no such thing,&rdquo; said Belle, withdrawing
+her hand; &ldquo;I thank you for coming to see me, but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do allow me to officiate upon your hair, madam,&rdquo; said Mrs.
+Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;I should esteem your allowing me a great mark
+of condescension.&nbsp; You are very beautiful, madam, and I think you
+doubly so, because you are so fair; I have a great esteem for persons
+with fair complexions and hair; I have a less regard for people with
+dark hair and complexions, madam.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then why did you turn off the lord, and take up with me?&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;that same lord was fair enough all about
+him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;People do when they are young and silly what they sometimes repent
+of when they are of riper years and understandings.&nbsp; I sometimes
+think that had I not been something of a simpleton, I might at this
+time be a great court lady.&nbsp; Now, madam,&rdquo; said she, again
+taking Belle by the hand, &ldquo;do oblige me by allowing me to plait
+your hair a little?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have really a good mind to be angry with you,&rdquo; said Belle,
+giving Mrs. Petulengro a peculiar glance.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do allow her to arrange your hair,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;she
+means no harm, and wishes to do you honour; do oblige her and me too,
+for I should like to see how your hair would look dressed in her fashion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You hear what the young rye says?&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I am sure you will oblige the young rye, if not myself.&nbsp;
+Many people would be willing to oblige the young rye, if he would but
+ask them; but he is not in the habit of asking favours.&nbsp; He has
+a nose of his own, which he keeps tolerably exalted; he does not think
+small-beer of himself, madam; and all the time I have been with him,
+I never heard him ask a favour before; therefore, madam, I am sure you
+will oblige him.&nbsp; My sister Ursula would be very willing to oblige
+him in many things, but he will not ask for anything, except for such
+a favour as a word, which is a poor favour after all.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t
+mean for her word; perhaps he will some day ask you for your word.&nbsp;
+If so - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, here you are, after railing at me for catching at words,
+catching at a word yourself,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Hold your tongue, sir,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t
+interrupt me in my discourse; if I caught at a word now, I am not in
+the habit of doing so.&nbsp; I am no conceited body; no newspaper Neddy;
+no pothouse witty person.&nbsp; I was about to say, madam, that if the
+young rye asks you at any time for your word, you will do as you deem
+convenient; but I am sure you will oblige him by allowing me to braid
+your hair.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shall not do it to oblige him,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;the
+young rye, as you call him, is nothing to me.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, then, to oblige me,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;do
+allow me to become your poor tire-woman.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is great nonsense,&rdquo; said Belle, reddening; &ldquo;however,
+as you came to see me, and ask the matter as a particular favour to
+yourself - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thank you, madam,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, leading Belle
+to the stool; &ldquo;please to sit down here.&nbsp; Thank you; your
+hair is very beautiful, madam,&rdquo; she continued, as she proceeded
+to braid Belle&rsquo;s hair; &ldquo;so is your countenance.&nbsp; Should
+you ever go to the great city, among the grand folks, you would make
+a sensation, madam.&nbsp; I have made one myself, who am dark; the chi
+she is kauley, which last word signifies black, which I am not, though
+rather dark.&nbsp; There is no colour like white, madam; it&rsquo;s
+so lasting, so genteel.&nbsp; Gentility will carry the day, madam, even
+with the young rye.&nbsp; He will ask words of the black lass, but beg
+the word of the fair.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+In the meantime Mr. Petulengro and myself entered into conversation.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Any news stirring, Mr. Petulengro?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Have
+you heard anything of the great religious movements?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Plenty,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;all the religious
+people, more especially the Evangelicals - those that go about distributing
+tracts - are very angry about the fight between Gentleman Cooper and
+White-headed Bob, which they say ought not to have been permitted to
+take place; and then they are trying all they can to prevent the fight
+between the lion and the dogs, which they say is a disgrace to a Christian
+country.&nbsp; Now I can&rsquo;t say that I have any quarrel with the
+religious party and the Evangelicals; they are always civil to me and
+mine, and frequently give us tracts, as they call them, which neither
+I nor mine can read; but I cannot say that I approve of any movements,
+religious or not, which have in aim to put down all life and manly sport
+in this here country.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Anything else?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;People are becoming vastly sharp,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro;
+&ldquo;and I am told that all the old-fashioned good-tempered constables
+are going to be set aside, and a paid body of men to be established,
+who are not to permit a tramper or vagabond on the roads of England;
+- and talking of roads, puts me in mind of a strange story I heard two
+nights ago, whilst drinking some beer at a public-house in company with
+my cousin Sylvester.&nbsp; I had asked Tawno to go, but his wife would
+not let him.&nbsp; Just opposite me, smoking their pipes, were a couple
+of men, something like engineers, and they were talking of a wonderful
+invention which was to make a wonderful alteration in England; inasmuch
+as it would set aside all the old roads, which in a little time would
+be ploughed up, and sowed with corn, and cause all England to be laid
+down with iron roads, on which people would go thundering along in vehicles,
+pushed forward by fire and smoke.&nbsp; Now, brother, when I heard this,
+I did not feel very comfortable; for I thought to myself, what a queer
+place such a road would be to pitch one&rsquo;s tent upon, and how impossible
+it would be for one&rsquo;s cattle to find a bite of grass upon it;
+and I thought likewise of the danger to which one&rsquo;s family would
+be exposed in being run over and severely scorched by these same flying
+fiery vehicles; so I made bold to say, that I hoped such an invention
+would never be countenanced, because it was likely to do a great deal
+of harm.&nbsp; Whereupon, one of the men, giving me a glance, said,
+without taking the pipe out of his mouth, that for his part, he sincerely
+hoped that it would take effect; and if it did no other good than stopping
+the rambles of gypsies, and other like scamps, it ought to be encouraged.&nbsp;
+Well, brother, feeling myself insulted, I put my hand into my pocket,
+in order to pull out money, intending to challenge him to fight for
+a five-shilling stake, but merely found sixpence, having left all my
+other money at the tent; which sixpence was just sufficient to pay for
+the beer which Sylvester and myself were drinking, of whom I couldn&rsquo;t
+hope to borrow anything - &lsquo;poor as Sylvester&rsquo; being a by-word
+amongst us.&nbsp; So, not being able to back myself, I held my peace,
+and let the Gorgio have it all his own way, who, after turning up his
+nose at me, went on discoursing about the said invention, saying what
+a fund of profit it would be to those who knew how to make use of it,
+and should have the laying down of the new roads, and the shoeing of
+England with iron.&nbsp; And after he had said this, and much more of
+the same kind, which I cannot remember, he and his companion got up
+and walked away; and presently I and Sylvester got up and walked to
+our camp; and there I lay down in my tent by the side of my wife, where
+I had an ugly dream of having camped upon an iron road; my tent being
+overturned by a flying vehicle; my wife&rsquo;s leg injured; and all
+my affairs put into great confusion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Now, madam,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, &ldquo;I have braided
+your hair in our fashion: you look very beautiful, madam; more beautiful,
+if possible, than before.&rdquo;&nbsp; Belle now rose, and came forward
+with her tire-woman.&nbsp; Mr. Petulengro was loud in his applause,
+but I said nothing, for I did not think Belle was improved in appearance
+by having submitted to the ministry of Mrs. Petulengro&rsquo;s hand.&nbsp;
+Nature never intended Belle to appear as a gypsy; she had made her too
+proud and serious.&nbsp; A more proper part for her was that of a heroine,
+a queenly heroine, - that of Theresa of Hungary, for example; or, better
+still, that of Brynhilda the Valkyrie, the beloved of Sigurd, the serpent-killer,
+who incurred the curse of Odin, because, in the tumult of spears, she
+sided with the young king, and doomed the old warrior to die, to whom
+Odin had promised victory.<br>
+<br>
+Belle looked at me for a moment in silence; then turning to Mrs. Petulengro,
+she said, &ldquo;You have had your will with me; are you satisfied?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Quite so, madam,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro, &ldquo;and I hope
+you will be so too, as soon as you have looked in the glass.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I have looked in one already,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;and the
+glass does not flatter.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You mean the face of the
+young rye,&rdquo; said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;never mind him, madam;
+the young rye, though he knows a thing or two, is not a university,
+nor a person of universal wisdom.&nbsp; I assure you, that you never
+looked so well before; and I hope that, from this moment, you will wear
+your hair in this way.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And who is to braid it in
+this way?&rdquo; said Belle, smiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;I, madam,&rdquo;
+said Mrs. Petulengro; &ldquo;I will braid it for you every morning,
+if you will but be persuaded to join us.&nbsp; Do so, madam, and I think,
+if you did, the young rye would do so too.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;The young
+rye is nothing to me, nor I to him,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;we have
+stayed some time together; but our paths will soon be apart.&nbsp; Now,
+farewell, for I am about to take a journey.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And
+you will go out with your hair as I have braided it,&rdquo; said Mrs.
+Petulengro; &ldquo;if you do, everybody will be in love with you.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;hitherto I have allowed you to
+do what you please, but henceforth I shall have my own way.&nbsp; Come,
+come,&rdquo; said she, observing that the gypsy was about to speak,
+&ldquo;we have had enough of nonsense; whenever I leave this hollow,
+it will be wearing my hair in my own fashion.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Come,
+wife,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;we will no longer intrude upon
+the rye and rawnie; there is such a thing as being troublesome.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Thereupon Mr. Petulengro and his wife took their leave, with many salutations.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Then you are going?&rdquo; said I, when Belle and I were left
+alone.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;I am going on a journey;
+my affairs compel me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;But you will return again?&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;I shall return once
+more.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Once more,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;what do you
+mean by once more?&nbsp; The Petulengros will soon be gone, and will
+you abandon me in this place?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You were alone here,&rdquo;
+said Belle, &ldquo;before I came, and I suppose, found it agreeable,
+or you would not have stayed in it.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;that was before I knew you; but having lived with you
+here, I should be very loth to live here without you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo;
+said Belle; &ldquo;I did not know that I was of so much consequence
+to you.&nbsp; Well, the day is wearing away - I must go and harness
+Traveller to the cart.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I will do that,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;or anything else you may wish me.&nbsp; Go and prepare yourself;
+I will see after Traveller and the cart.&rdquo;&nbsp; Belle departed
+to her tent, and I set about performing the task I had undertaken.&nbsp;
+In about half-an-hour Belle again made her appearance - she was dressed
+neatly and plainly.&nbsp; Her hair was no longer in the Roman fashion,
+in which Pakomovna had plaited it, but was secured by a comb; she held
+a bonnet in her hand.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is there anything else I can do for
+you?&rdquo; I demanded.&nbsp; &ldquo;There are two or three bundles
+by my tent, which you can put into the cart,&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp;
+I put the bundles into the cart, and then led Traveller and the cart
+up the winding path to the mouth of the dingle, near which was Mr. Petulengro&rsquo;s
+encampment.&nbsp; Belle followed.&nbsp; At the top, I delivered the
+reins into her hands; we looked at each other stedfastly for some time.&nbsp;
+Belle then departed, and I returned to the dingle, where, seating myself
+on my stone, I remained for upwards of an hour in thought.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Festival - The Gypsy Song - Piramus of Rome - The Scotchman - Gypsy
+Names.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On the following day there was much feasting amongst the Romany chals
+of Mr. Petulengro&rsquo;s party.&nbsp; Throughout the forenoon the Romany
+chies did scarcely anything but cook flesh, and the flesh which they
+cooked was swine&rsquo;s flesh.&nbsp; About two o&rsquo;clock, the chals
+dividing themselves into various parties, sat down and partook of the
+fare, which was partly roasted, partly sodden.&nbsp; I dined that day
+with Mr. Petulengro and his wife and family, Ursula, Mr. and Mrs. Chikno,
+and Sylvester and his two children.&nbsp; Sylvester, it will be as well
+to say, was a widower, and had consequently no one to cook his victuals
+for him, supposing he had any, which was not always the case, Sylvester&rsquo;s
+affairs being seldom in a prosperous state.&nbsp; He was noted for his
+bad success in trafficking, notwithstanding the many hints which he
+received from Jasper, under whose protection he had placed himself,
+even as Tawno Chikno had done, who himself, as the reader has heard
+on a former occasion, was anything but a wealthy subject, though he
+was at all times better off than Sylvester, the Lazarus of the Romany
+tribe.<br>
+<br>
+All our party ate with a good appetite, except myself, who, feeling
+rather melancholy that day, had little desire to eat.&nbsp; I did not,
+like the others, partake of the pork, but got my dinner entirely off
+the body of a squirrel which had been shot the day before by a chal
+of the name of Piramus, who, besides being a good shot, was celebrated
+for his skill in playing on the fiddle.&nbsp; During the dinner a horn
+filled with ale passed frequently around; I drank of it more than once,
+and felt inspirited by the draughts.&nbsp; The repast concluded, Sylvester
+and his children departed to their tent, and Mr. Petulengro, Tawno,
+and myself, getting up, went and lay down under a shady hedge, where
+Mr. Petulengro, lighting his pipe, began to smoke, and where Tawno presently
+fell asleep.&nbsp; I was about to fall asleep also, when I heard the
+sound of music and song.&nbsp; Piramus was playing on the fiddle, whilst
+Mrs. Chikno, who had a voice of her own, was singing in tones sharp
+enough, but of great power, a gypsy song:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+POISONING THE PORKER<br>
+BY MRS. CHIKNO<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+To mande shoon ye Romany chals<br>
+Who besh in the pus about the yag,<br>
+I&rsquo;ll pen how we drab the baulo,<br>
+I&rsquo;ll pen how we drab the baulo.<br>
+<br>
+We jaws to the drab-engro ker,<br>
+Trin horsworth there of drab we lels,<br>
+And when to the swety back we wels<br>
+We pens we&rsquo;ll drab the baulo,<br>
+We&rsquo;ll have a drab at a baulo.<br>
+<br>
+And then we kairs the drab opr&eacute;,<br>
+And then we jaws to the farming ker,<br>
+To mang a beti habben,<br>
+A beti poggado habben.<br>
+<br>
+A rinkeno baulo there we dick,<br>
+And then we pens in Romano jib;<br>
+Wust lis odoi opr&eacute; ye chick,<br>
+And the baulo he will lel lis,<br>
+The baulo he will lel lis.<br>
+<br>
+Coliko, coliko saulo we<br>
+Apopli to the farming ker<br>
+Will wel and mang him mullo,<br>
+Will wel and mang his truppo.<br>
+<br>
+And so we kairs, and so we kairs;<br>
+The baulo in the rarde mers;<br>
+We mang him on the saulo,<br>
+And rig to the tan the baulo.<br>
+<br>
+And then we toves the wendror well<br>
+Till sore the wendror iuziou se,<br>
+Till kekkeno drab&rsquo;s adrey lis,<br>
+Till drab there&rsquo;s kek adrey lis.<br>
+<br>
+And then his truppo well we hatch,<br>
+Kin levinor at the kitchema,<br>
+And have a kosko habben,<br>
+A kosko Romano habben.<br>
+<br>
+The boshom engro kils, he kils,<br>
+The tawnie juva gils, she gils<br>
+A puro Romano gillie,<br>
+Now shoon the Romano gillie.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Which song I had translated in the following manner, in my younger days,
+for a lady&rsquo;s album:<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Listen to me ye Romanlads, who are seated in the straw about the fire,
+and I will tell how we poison the porker, I will tell how we poison
+the porker.<br>
+<br>
+We go to the house of the poison-monger, where we buy three pennies&rsquo;
+worth of bane, and when we return to our people we say, we will poison
+the porker; we will try and poison the porker.<br>
+<br>
+We then make up the poison, and then we take our way to the house of
+the farmer, as if to beg a bit of victuals, a little broken victuals.<br>
+<br>
+We see a jolly porker, and then we say in Roman language, &ldquo;Fling
+the bane yonder amongst the dirt, and the porker soon will find it,
+the porker soon will find it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Early on the morrow, we will return to the farm-house, and beg the dead
+porker, the body of the dead porker.<br>
+<br>
+And so we do, even so we do; the porker dieth during the night; on the
+morrow we beg the porker, and carry to the tent the porker.<br>
+<br>
+And then we wash the inside well, till all the inside is perfectly clean,
+till there&rsquo;s no bane within it, not a poison grain within it.<br>
+<br>
+And then we roast the body well, send for ale to the alehouse, and have
+a merry banquet, a merry Roman banquet.<br>
+<br>
+The fellow with the fiddle plays, he plays; the little lassie sings,
+she sings an ancient Roman ditty; now hear the Roman ditty.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+SONG OF THE BROKEN CHASTITY<br>
+BY URSULA<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Penn&rsquo;d the Romany chi k&eacute; laki dye<br>
+&ldquo;Miry dearie dye mi shom cambri!&rdquo;<br>
+&ldquo;And coin kerdo tute cambri,<br>
+Miry dearie chi, miry Romany chi?&rdquo;<br>
+&ldquo;O miry dye a boro rye,<br>
+A bovalo rye, a gorgiko rye,<br>
+Sos kistur pr&eacute; a pellengo grye,<br>
+&lsquo;Twas yov sos kerdo man cambri.&rdquo;<br>
+&ldquo;Tu tawnie vassavie lubbeny,<br>
+Tu chal from miry tan abri;<br>
+Had a Romany cwal kair&rsquo;d tute cambri,<br>
+Then I had penn&rsquo;d ke tute chie,<br>
+But tu shan a vassavie lubbeny<br>
+With gorgikie rat to be cambri.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;There&rsquo;s some kernel in those songs, brother,&rdquo; said
+Mr. Petulengro, when the songs and music were over.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;they are certainly very remarkable
+songs.&nbsp; I say, Jasper, I hope you have not been drabbing baulor
+lately.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And suppose we have, brother, what then?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, it is a very dangerous practice, to say nothing of the wickedness
+of it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Necessity has no law, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That is true,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I have always said so, but
+you are not necessitous, and should not drab baulor.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And who told you we had been drabbing baulor?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, you have had a banquet of pork, and after the banquet, Mrs.
+Chikno sang a song about drabbing baulor, so I naturally thought you
+might have lately been engaged in such a thing.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Brother, you occasionally utter a word or two of common sense.&nbsp;
+It was natural for you to suppose, after seeing that dinner of pork,
+and hearing that song, that we had been drabbing baulor; I will now
+tell you that we have not been doing so.&nbsp; What have you to say
+to that?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That I am very glad of it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Had you tasted that pork, brother, you would have found that
+it was sweet and tasty, which balluva that is drabbed can hardly be
+expected to be.&nbsp; We have no reason to drab baulor at present, we
+have money and credit; but necessity has no law.&nbsp; Our forefathers
+occasionally drabbed baulor; some of our people may still do such a
+thing, but only from compulsion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and at your merry meetings you sing
+songs upon the compulsatory deeds of your people, alias, their villainous
+actions; and, after all, what would the stirring poetry of any nation
+be, but for its compulsatory deeds?&nbsp; Look at the poetry of Scotland,
+the heroic part, founded almost entirely on the villainous deeds of
+the Scotch nation; cow-stealing, for example, which is very little better
+than drabbing baulor; whilst the softer part is mostly about the slips
+of its females among the broom, so that no upholder of Scotch poetry
+could censure Ursula&rsquo;s song as indelicate, even if he understood
+it.&nbsp; What do you think, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I think, brother, as I before said, that occasionally you utter
+a word of common sense; you were talking of the Scotch, brother; what
+do you think of a Scotchman finding fault with Romany!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A Scotchman finding fault with Romany, Jasper!&nbsp; Oh dear,
+but you joke, the thing could never be.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, and at Piramus&rsquo;s fiddle; what do you think of a Scotchman
+turning up his nose at Piramus&rsquo;s fiddle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A Scotchman turning up his nose at Piramus&rsquo;s fiddle! nonsense,
+Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you know what I most dislike, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not, unless it be the constable, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is not the constable; it&rsquo;s a beggar on horseback, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do you mean by a beggar on horseback?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, a scamp, brother, raised above his proper place, who takes
+every opportunity of giving himself fine airs.&nbsp; About a week ago,
+my people and myself camped on a green by a plantation in the neighbourhood
+of a great house.&nbsp; In the evening we were making merry, the girls
+were dancing, while Piramus was playing on the fiddle a tune of his
+own composing, to which he has given his own name, Piramus of Rome,
+and which is much celebrated amongst our people, and from which I have
+been told that one of the grand gorgio composers, who once heard it,
+has taken several hints.&nbsp; So, as we were making merry, a great
+many grand people, lords and ladies, I believe, came from the great
+house, and looked on, as the girls danced to the tune of Piramus of
+Rome, and seemed much pleased; and when the girls had left off dancing,
+and Piramus playing, the ladies wanted to have their fortunes told;
+so I bade Mikailia Chikno, who can tell a fortune when she pleases better
+than any one else, tell them a fortune, and she, being in a good mind,
+told them a fortune which pleased them very much.&nbsp; So, after they
+had heard their fortunes, one of them asked if any of our women could
+sing; and I told them several could, more particularly Leviathan - you
+know Leviathan, she is not here now, but some miles distant, she is
+our best singer, Ursula coming next.&nbsp; So the lady said she should
+like to hear Leviathan sing, whereupon Leviathan sang the Gudlo pesham,
+and Piramus played the tune of the same name, which as you know, means
+the honeycomb, the song and the tune being well entitled to the name,
+being wonderfully sweet.&nbsp; Well, everybody present seemed mighty
+well pleased with the song and music, with the exception of one person,
+a carroty-haired Scotch body; how he came there I don&rsquo;t know,
+but there he was; and, coming forward, he began in Scotch as broad as
+a barn-door to find fault with the music and the song, saying, that
+he had never heard viler stuff than either.&nbsp; Well, brother, out
+of consideration for the civil gentry with whom the fellow had come,
+I held my peace for a long time, and in order to get the subject changed,
+I said to Mikailia in Romany, You have told the ladies their fortunes,
+now tell the gentlemen theirs, quick, quick, - pen lende dukkerin.&nbsp;
+Well, brother, the Scotchman, I suppose, thinking I was speaking ill
+of him, fell into a greater passion than before, and catching hold of
+the word dukkerin - &lsquo;Dukkerin,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;what&rsquo;s
+dukkerin?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Dukkerin,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;is fortune,
+a man or woman&rsquo;s destiny; don&rsquo;t you like the word?&rsquo;&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Word! d&rsquo;ye ca&rsquo; that a word? a bonnie word,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Perhaps, you&rsquo;ll tell us what it is in Scotch,&rsquo;
+said I, &lsquo;in order that we may improve our language by a Scotch
+word; a pal of mine has told me that we have taken a great many words
+from foreign lingos.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, then, if that be the case,
+fellow, I will tell you; it is e&rsquo;en &ldquo;spaeing,&rdquo;&rsquo;
+said he, very seriously.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, then,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll
+keep my own word, which is much the prettiest - spaeing! spaeing! why,
+I should be ashamed to make use of the word, it sounds so much like
+a certain other word;&rsquo; and then I made a face as if I were unwell.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Perhaps it&rsquo;s Scotch also for that?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+do ye mean by speaking in that guise to a gentleman?&rsquo; said he;
+&lsquo;you insolent vagabond, without a name or a country.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There you are mistaken,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;my country is Egypt,
+but we &lsquo;Gyptians, like you Scotch, are rather fond of travelling;
+and as for name - my name is Jasper Petulengro, perhaps you have a better;
+what is it?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Sandy Macraw.&rsquo;&nbsp; At that,
+brother, the gentlemen burst into a roar of laughter, and all the ladies
+tittered.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You were rather severe on the Scotchman, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not at all, brother, and suppose I were, he began first; I am
+the civilest man in the world, and never interfere with anybody, who
+lets me and mine alone.&nbsp; He finds fault with Romany, forsooth!
+why, L-d A&rsquo;mighty, what&rsquo;s Scotch?&nbsp; He doesn&rsquo;t
+like our songs; what are his own?&nbsp; I understand them as little
+as he mine; I have heard one or two of them, and pretty rubbish they
+seemed.&nbsp; But the best of the joke is, the fellow&rsquo;s finding
+fault with Piramus&rsquo;s fiddle - a chap from the land of bagpipes
+finding fault with Piramus&rsquo;s fiddle!&nbsp; Why, I&rsquo;ll back
+that fiddle against all the bagpipes in Scotland, and Piramus against
+all the bagpipers; for though Piramus weighs but ten stone, he shall
+flog a Scotchman of twenty.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Scotchmen are never so fat as that,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;unless
+indeed, they have been a long time pensioners of England.&nbsp; I say,
+Jasper, what remarkable names your people have!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what pretty names, brother; there&rsquo;s my own, for example,
+Jasper; then there&rsquo;s Ambrose and Sylvester; then there&rsquo;s
+Culvato, which signifies Claude; then there&rsquo;s Piramus - that&rsquo;s
+a nice name, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then there&rsquo;s your wife&rsquo;s name, Pakomovna; then there&rsquo;s
+Ursula and Morella.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then, brother, there&rsquo;s Ercilla.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ercilla! the name of the great poet of Spain, how wonderful;
+then Leviathan.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The name of a ship, brother; Leviathan was named after a ship,
+so don&rsquo;t make a wonder out of her.&nbsp; But there&rsquo;s Sanpriel
+and Synfye.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, and Clementina and Lavinia, Camillia and Lydia, Curlanda
+and Orlanda; wherever did they get those names?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Where did my wife get her necklace, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She knows best, Jasper.&nbsp; I hope - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Come, no hoping!&nbsp; She got it from her grandmother, who died
+at the age of a hundred and three, and sleeps in Coggeshall churchyard.&nbsp;
+She got it from her mother, who also died very old, and who could give
+no other account of it than that it had been in the family time out
+of mind.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Whence could they have got it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, perhaps where they got their names, brother.&nbsp; A gentleman,
+who had travelled much, once told me that he had seen the sister of
+it about the neck of an Indian queen.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Some of your names, Jasper, appear to be church names; your own,
+for example, and Ambrose, and Sylvester; perhaps you got them from the
+Papists, in the times of Popery; but where did you get such a name as
+Piramus, a name of Grecian romance?&nbsp; Then some of them appear to
+be Slavonian; for example, Mikailia and Pakomovna.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t
+know much of Slavonian; but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is Slavonian, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The family name of certain nations, the principal of which is
+the Russian, and from which the word slave is originally derived.&nbsp;
+You have heard of the Russians, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother; and seen some.&nbsp; I saw their crallis at the
+time of the peace; he was not a bad-looking man for a Russian.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;By the bye, Jasper, I&rsquo;m half inclined to think that crallis
+is a Slavish word.&nbsp; I saw something like it in a lil called &lsquo;Voltaire&rsquo;s
+Life of Charles.&rsquo;&nbsp; How you should have come by such names
+and words is to me incomprehensible.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You seem posed, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I really know very little about you, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very little indeed, brother.&nbsp; We know very little about
+ourselves; and you know nothing, save what we have told you; and we
+have now and then told you things about us which are not exactly true,
+simply to make a fool of you, brother.&nbsp; You will say that was wrong;
+perhaps it was.&nbsp; Well, Sunday will be here in a day or two, when
+we will go to church, where possibly we shall hear a sermon on the disastrous
+consequences of lying.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Church - The Aristocratical Pew - Days of Yore - The Clergyman -
+&ldquo;In What Would a Man be Profited?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+When two days had passed, Sunday came; I breakfasted by myself in the
+solitary dingle; and then, having set things a little to rights, I ascended
+to Mr. Petulengro&rsquo;s encampment.&nbsp; I could hear church-bells
+ringing around in the distance, appearing to say, &ldquo;Come to church,
+come to church,&rdquo; as clearly as it was possible for church-bells
+to say.&nbsp; I found Mr. Petulengro seated by the door of his tent,
+smoking his pipe, in rather an ungenteel undress.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+Jasper,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;are you ready to go to church? for if
+you are, I am ready to accompany you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I am not ready,
+brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;nor is my wife; the church,
+too, to which we shall go is three miles off; so it is of no use to
+think of going there this morning, as the service would be three-quarters
+over before we got there; if, however, you are disposed to go in the
+afternoon, we are your people.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thereupon I returned to
+my dingle, where I passed several hours in conning the Welsh Bible,
+which the preacher, Peter Williams, had given me.<br>
+<br>
+At last I gave over reading, took a slight refreshment, and was about
+to emerge from the dingle, when I heard the voice of Mr. Petulengro
+calling me.&nbsp; I went up again to the encampment, where I found Mr.
+Petulengro, his wife, and Tawno Chikno, ready to proceed to church.&nbsp;
+Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro were dressed in Roman fashion, though not in
+the full-blown manner in which they had paid their visit to Isopel and
+myself.&nbsp; Tawno had on a clean white slop, with a nearly new black
+beaver, with very broad rims, and the nap exceedingly long.&nbsp; As
+for myself, I was dressed in much the same manner as that in which I
+departed from London, having on, in honour of the day, a shirt perfectly
+clean, having washed one on purpose for the occasion, with my own hands,
+the day before, in the pond of tepid water in which the newts and defts
+were in the habit of taking their pleasure.&nbsp; We proceeded for upwards
+of a mile, by footpaths through meadows and corn-fields; we crossed
+various stiles; at last, passing over one, we found ourselves in a road,
+wending along which for a considerable distance, we at last came in
+sight of a church, the bells of which had been tolling distinctly in
+our ears for some time; before, however, we reached the church-yard,
+the bells had ceased their melody.&nbsp; It was surrounded by lofty
+beech-trees of brilliant green foliage.&nbsp; We entered the gate, Mrs.
+Petulengro leading the way, and proceeded to a small door near the east
+end of the church.&nbsp; As we advanced, the sound of singing within
+the church rose upon our ears.&nbsp; Arrived at the small door, Mrs.
+Petulengro opened it and entered, followed by Tawno Chikno.&nbsp; I
+myself went last of all, following Mr. Petulengro, who, before I entered,
+turned round, and, with a significant nod, advised me to take care how
+I behaved.&nbsp; The part of the church which we had entered was the
+chancel; on one side stood a number of venerable old men - probably
+the neighbouring poor - and on the other a number of poor girls belonging
+to the village school, dressed in white gowns and straw bonnets, whom
+two elegant but simply dressed young women were superintending.&nbsp;
+Every voice seemed to be united in singing a certain anthem, which,
+notwithstanding it was written neither by Tate nor Brady, contains some
+of the sublimest words which were ever put together, not the worst of
+which are those which burst on our ears as we entered:<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Every eye shall now behold Him,<br>
+Robed in dreadful majesty;<br>
+Those who set at nought and sold Him,<br>
+Pierced and nailed Him to the tree,<br>
+Deeply wailing,<br>
+Shall the true Messiah see.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Still following Mrs. Petulengro, we proceeded down the chancel and along
+the aisle; notwithstanding the singing, I could distinctly hear as we
+passed many a voice whispering, &ldquo;Here come the gypsies! here come
+the gypsies!&rdquo;&nbsp; I felt rather embarrassed, with a somewhat
+awkward doubt as to where we were to sit; none of the occupiers of the
+pews, who appeared to consist almost entirely of farmers, with their
+wives, sons, and daughters, opened a door to admit us.&nbsp; Mrs. Petulengro,
+however, appeared to feel not the least embarrassment, but tripped along
+the aisle with the greatest nonchalance.&nbsp; We passed under the pulpit,
+in which stood the clergyman in his white surplice, and reached the
+middle of the church, where we were confronted by the sexton dressed
+in long blue coat, and holding in his hand a wand.&nbsp; This functionary
+motioned towards the lower end of the church, where were certain benches,
+partly occupied by poor people and boys.&nbsp; Mrs. Petulengro, however,
+with a toss of her head, directed her course to a magnificent pew, which
+was unoccupied, which she opened and entered, followed closely by Tawno
+Chikno, Mr. Petulengro, and myself.&nbsp; The sexton did not appear
+by any means to approve of the arrangement, and as I stood next the
+door, laid his finger on my arm, as if to intimate that myself and companions
+must quit our aristocratical location.&nbsp; I said nothing, but directed
+my eyes to the clergyman, who uttered a short and expressive cough;
+the sexton looked at him for a moment, and then, bowing his head, closed
+the door - in a moment more the music ceased.&nbsp; I took up a prayer-book,
+on which was engraved an earl&rsquo;s coronet.&nbsp; The clergyman uttered,
+&ldquo;I will arise, and go to my father.&rdquo;&nbsp; England&rsquo;s
+sublime liturgy had commenced.<br>
+<br>
+Oh, what feelings came over me on finding myself again in an edifice
+devoted to the religion of my country!&nbsp; I had not been in such
+a place I cannot tell for how long - certainly not for years; and now
+I had found my way there again, it appeared as if I had fallen asleep
+in the pew of the old church of pretty D---.&nbsp; I had occasionally
+done so when a child, and had suddenly woke up.&nbsp; Yes, surely I
+had been asleep and had woke up; but no! alas, no!&nbsp; I had not been
+asleep - at least not in the old church - if I had been asleep I had
+been walking in my sleep, struggling, striving, learning, and unlearning
+in my sleep.&nbsp; Years had rolled away whilst I had been asleep -
+ripe fruit had fallen, green fruit had come on whilst I had been asleep
+- how circumstances had altered, and above all myself, whilst I had
+been asleep.&nbsp; No, I had not been asleep in the old church!&nbsp;
+I was in a pew, it is true, but not the pew of black leather, in which
+I sometimes fell asleep in days of yore, but in a strange pew; and then
+my companions, they were no longer those of days of yore.&nbsp; I was
+no longer with my respectable father and mother, and my dear brother,
+but with the gypsy cral and his wife, and the gigantic Tawno, the Antinous
+of the dusky people.&nbsp; And what was I myself?&nbsp; No longer an
+innocent child, but a moody man, bearing in my face, as I knew well,
+the marks of my strivings and strugglings, of what I had learnt and
+unlearnt; nevertheless, the general aspect of things brought to my mind
+what I had felt and seen of yore.&nbsp; There was difference enough,
+it is true, but still there was a similarity - at least I thought so
+- the church, the clergyman, and the clerk, differing in many respects
+from those of pretty D---, put me strangely in mind of them; and then
+the words! - by the bye, was it not the magic of the words which brought
+the dear enchanting past so powerfully before the mind of Lavengro?
+for the words were the same sonorous words of high import which had
+first made an impression on his childish ear in the old church of pretty
+D---.<br>
+<br>
+The liturgy was now over, during the reading of which my companions
+behaved in a most unexceptionable manner, sitting down and rising up
+when other people sat down and rose, and holding in their hands prayer-books
+which they found in the pew, into which they stared intently, though
+I observed that, with the exception of Mrs. Petulengro, who knew how
+to read a little, they held the books by the top, and not the bottom,
+as is the usual way.&nbsp; The clergyman now ascended the pulpit, arrayed
+in his black gown.&nbsp; The congregation composed themselves to attention,
+as did also my companions, who fixed their eyes upon the clergyman with
+a certain strange immovable stare, which I believe to be peculiar to
+their race.&nbsp; The clergyman gave out his text, and began to preach.&nbsp;
+He was a tall, gentlemanly man, seemingly between fifty and sixty, with
+greyish hair; his features were very handsome, but with a somewhat melancholy
+cast: the tones of his voice were rich and noble, but also with somewhat
+of melancholy in them.&nbsp; The text which he gave out was the following
+one, &ldquo;In what would a man be profited, provided he gained the
+whole world, and lost his own soul?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+And on this text the clergyman preached long and well: he did not read
+his sermon, but spoke it extempore; his doing so rather surprised and
+offended me at first; I was not used to such a style of preaching in
+a church devoted to the religion of my country.&nbsp; I compared it
+within my mind with the style of preaching used by the high-church rector
+in the old church of pretty D---, and I thought to myself it was very
+different, and being very different I did not like it, and I thought
+to myself how scandalized the people of D--- would have been had they
+heard it, and I figured to myself how indignant the high-church clerk
+would have been had any clergyman got up in the church of D--- and preached
+in such a manner.&nbsp; Did it not savour strongly of dissent, methodism,
+and similar low stuff?&nbsp; Surely it did; why, the Methodist I had
+heard preach on the heath above the old city, preached in the same manner
+- at least he preached extempore; ay, and something like the present
+clergyman; for the Methodist spoke very zealously and with great feeling,
+and so did the present clergyman; so I, of course, felt rather offended
+with the clergyman for speaking with zeal and feeling.&nbsp; However,
+long before the sermon was over I forgot the offence which I had taken,
+and listened to the sermon with much admiration, for the eloquence and
+powerful reasoning with which it abounded.<br>
+<br>
+Oh, how eloquent he was, when he talked of the inestimable value of
+a man&rsquo;s soul, which he said endured for ever, whilst his body,
+as every one knew, lasted at most for a very contemptible period of
+time; and how forcibly he reasoned on the folly of a man, who, for the
+sake of gaining the whole world - a thing, he said, which provided he
+gained he could only possess for a part of the time, during which his
+perishable body existed - should lose his soul, that is, cause that
+precious deathless portion of him to suffer indescribable misery time
+without end.<br>
+<br>
+There was one part of his sermon which struck me in a very particular
+manner: he said, &ldquo;That there were some people who gained something
+in return for their souls; if they did not get the whole world, they
+got a part of it - lands, wealth, honour, or renown; mere trifles, he
+allowed, in comparison with the value of a man&rsquo;s soul, which is
+destined either to enjoy delight, or suffer tribulation time without
+end; but which, in the eyes of the worldly, had a certain value, and
+which afforded a certain pleasure and satisfaction.&nbsp; But there
+were also others who lost their souls, and got nothing for them - neither
+lands, wealth, renown, nor consideration, who were poor outcasts, and
+despised by everybody.&nbsp; My friends,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;if
+the man is a fool who barters his soul for the whole world, what a fool
+he must be who barters his soul for nothing.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The eyes of the clergyman, as he uttered these words, wandered around
+the whole congregation; and when he had concluded them, the eyes of
+the whole congregation were turned upon my companions and myself.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Return from Church - The Cuckoo and Gypsy - Spiritual Discourse.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The service over, my companions and myself returned towards the encampment,
+by the way we came.&nbsp; Some of the humble part of the congregation
+laughed and joked at us as we passed.&nbsp; Mr. Petulengro and his wife,
+however, returned their laughs and jokes with interest.&nbsp; As for
+Tawno and myself, we said nothing: Tawno, like most handsome fellows,
+having very little to say for himself at any time; and myself, though
+not handsome, not being particularly skilful at repartee.&nbsp; Some
+boys followed us for a considerable time, making all kinds of observations
+about gypsies; but as we walked at a great pace, we gradually left them
+behind, and at last lost sight of them.&nbsp; Mrs. Petulengro and Tawno
+Chikno walked together, even as they had come; whilst Mr. Petulengro
+and myself followed at a little distance.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That was a very fine preacher we heard,&rdquo; said I to Mr.
+Petulengro, after we had crossed the stile into the fields.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very fine indeed, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;he
+is talked of, far and wide, for his sermons; folks say that there is
+scarcely another like him in the whole of England.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He looks rather melancholy, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He lost his wife several years ago, who, they say, was one of
+the most beautiful women ever seen.&nbsp; They say that it was grief
+for her loss that made him come out mighty strong as a preacher; for,
+though he was a clergyman, he was never heard of in the pulpit before
+he lost his wife; since then, the whole country has rung with the preaching
+of the clergyman of M--- as they call him.&nbsp; Those two nice young
+gentlewomen, whom you saw with the female childer, are his daughters.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You seem to know all about him, Jasper.&nbsp; Did you ever hear
+him preach before?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never, brother; but he has frequently been to our tent, and his
+daughters too, and given us tracts; for he is one of the people they
+call Evangelicals, who give folks tracts which they cannot read.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You should learn to read, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We have no time, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Are you not frequently idle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never, brother; when we are not engaged in our traffic, we are
+engaged in taking our relaxation: so we have no time to learn.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You really should make an effort.&nbsp; If you were disposed
+to learn to read, I would endeavour to assist you.&nbsp; You would be
+all the better for knowing how to read.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In what way, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, you could read the Scriptures, and, by so doing, learn your
+duty towards your fellow-creatures.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We know that already, brother; the constables and justices have
+contrived to knock that tolerably into our heads.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yet you frequently break the laws.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So, I believe, do now and then those who know how to read, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very true, Jasper; but you really ought to learn to read, as,
+by so doing, you might learn your duty towards yourselves: and your
+chief duty is to take care of your own souls; did not the preacher say,
+&lsquo;In what is a man profited, provided he gain the whole world?&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We have not much of the world, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very little indeed, Jasper.&nbsp; Did you not observe how the
+eyes of the whole congregation were turned towards our pew, when the
+preacher said, &lsquo;There are some people who lose their souls, and
+get nothing in exchange; who are outcast, despised, and miserable?&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Now was not what he said quite applicable to the gypsies?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We are not miserable, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, then, you ought to be, Jasper.&nbsp; Have you an inch of
+ground of your own?&nbsp; Are you of the least use?&nbsp; Are you not
+spoken ill of by everybody?&nbsp; What&rsquo;s a gypsy?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What&rsquo;s the bird noising yonder, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The bird! oh, that&rsquo;s the cuckoo tolling; but what has the
+cuckoo to do with the matter?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll see, brother; what&rsquo;s the cuckoo?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is it? you know as much about it as myself, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t it a kind of roguish, chaffing bird, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I believe it is, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nobody knows whence it comes, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I believe not, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very poor, brother, not a nest of its own?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So they say, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;With every person&rsquo;s bad word, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, Jasper, every person is mocking it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tolerably merry, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, tolerably merry, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of no use at all, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;None whatever, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You would be glad to get rid of the cuckoos, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, not exactly, Jasper; the cuckoo is a pleasant, funny bird,
+and its presence and voice give a great charm to the green trees and
+fields; no, I can&rsquo;t say I wish exactly to get rid of the cuckoo.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, what&rsquo;s a Romany chal?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You must answer that question yourself, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A roguish, chaffing fellow, a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t he, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of no use at all, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Just so, Jasper; I see - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Something very much like a cuckoo, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I see what you are after, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You would like to get rid of us, wouldn&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why no, not exactly.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We are no ornament to the green lanes in spring and summer time,
+are we, brother? and the voices of our chies, with their cukkerin and
+dukkerin, don&rsquo;t help to make them pleasant?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I see what you are at, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You would wish to turn the cuckoos into barn-door fowls, wouldn&rsquo;t
+you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t say I should, Jasper, whatever some people might
+wish.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And the chals and chies into radical weavers and factory wenches,
+hey, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t say that I should, Jasper.&nbsp; You are certainly
+a picturesque people, and in many respects an ornament both to town
+and country; painting and lil writing too are under great obligations
+to you.&nbsp; What pretty pictures are made out of your campings and
+groupings, and what pretty books have been written in which gypsies,
+or at least creatures intended to represent gypsies, have been the principal
+figures.&nbsp; I think if we were without you, we should begin to miss
+you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Just as you would the cuckoos, if they were all converted into
+barn-door fowls.&nbsp; I tell you what, brother; frequently, as I have
+sat under a hedge in spring or summer time, and heard the cuckoo, I
+have thought that we chals and cuckoos are alike in many respects, but
+especially in character.&nbsp; Everybody speaks ill of us both, and
+everybody is glad to see both of us again.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, Jasper, but there is some difference between men and cuckoos;
+men have souls, Jasper!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And why not cuckoos, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You should not talk so, Jasper; what you say is little short
+of blasphemy.&nbsp; How should a bird have a soul?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how should a man?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Oh, we know very well that a man has a soul.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How do you know it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We know very well.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Would you take your oath of it, brother - your bodily oath?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, I think I might, Jasper!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Did you ever see the soul, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No, I never saw it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then how could you swear to it?&nbsp; A pretty figure you would
+make in a court of justice, to swear to a thing which you never saw.&nbsp;
+Hold up your head, fellow.&nbsp; When and where did you see it?&nbsp;
+Now upon your oath, fellow, do you mean to say that this Roman stole
+the donkey&rsquo;s foal?&nbsp; Oh, there&rsquo;s no one for cross-questioning
+like Counsellor P---.&nbsp; Our people when they are in a hobble always
+like to employ him, though he is somewhat dear.&nbsp; Now, brother,
+how can you get over the &lsquo;upon your oath, fellow, will you say
+that you have a soul?&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, we will take no oaths on the subject; but you yourself
+believe in the soul.&nbsp; I have heard you say that you believe in
+dukkerin; now what is dukkerin but the soul science?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;When did I say that I believed in it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, after that fight, when you pointed to the bloody mark in
+the cloud, whilst he you wot of was galloping in the barouche to the
+old town, amidst the rain-cataracts, the thunder, and flame of heaven.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have some kind of remembrance of it, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then, again, I heard you say that the dook of Abershaw rode every
+night on horseback down the wooded hill.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I say, brother, what a wonderful memory you have!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I wish I had not, Jasper; but I can&rsquo;t help it, it is my
+misfortune.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Misfortune! well, perhaps it is; at any rate it is very ungenteel
+to have such a memory.&nbsp; I have heard my wife say that to show you
+have a long memory looks very vulgar; and that you can&rsquo;t give
+a greater proof of gentility than by forgetting a thing as soon as possible
+- more especially a promise, or an acquaintance when he happens to be
+shabby.&nbsp; Well, brother, I don&rsquo;t deny that I may have said
+that I believe in dukkerin, and in Abershaw&rsquo;s dook, which you
+say is his soul; but what I believe one moment, or say I believe, don&rsquo;t
+be certain that I shall believe the next, or say I do.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Indeed, Jasper, I heard you say on a previous occasion, on quoting
+a piece of a song, that when a man dies he is cast into the earth, and
+there&rsquo;s an end of him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I did, did I?&nbsp; Lor&rsquo; what a memory you have, brother.&nbsp;
+But you are not sure that I hold that opinion now.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Certainly not, Jasper.&nbsp; Indeed, after such a sermon as we
+have been hearing, I should be very shocked if you held such an opinion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;However, brother, don&rsquo;t be sure I do not, however shocking
+such an opinion may be to you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What an incomprehensible people you are, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We are rather so, brother; indeed, we have posed wiser heads
+than yours before now.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You seem to care for so little, and yet you rove about a distinct
+race.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I say, brother!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do you think of our women?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They have certainly very singular names, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Names!&nbsp; Lavengro!&nbsp; However, brother, if you had been
+as fond of things as of names, you would never have been a pal of ours.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do you mean, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A&rsquo;n&rsquo;t they rum animals?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They have tongues of their own, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Did you ever feel their teeth and nails, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never, Jasper, save Mrs. Herne&rsquo;s.&nbsp; I have always been
+very civil to them, so - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They let you alone.&nbsp; I say, brother, some part of the secret
+is in them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They seem rather flighty, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay, brother!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Rather fond of loose discourse!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Rather so, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can you always trust them, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We never watch them, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can they always trust you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not quite so well as we can them.&nbsp; However, we get on very
+well together, except Mikailia and her husband; but Mikailia is a cripple,
+and is married to the beauty of the world, so she may be expected to
+be jealous - though he would not part with her for a duchess, no more
+than I would part with my rawnie, nor any other chal with his.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, but would not the chi part with the chal for a duke, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My Pakomovna gave up the duke for me, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But she occasionally talks of him, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother, but Pakomovna was born on a common not far from
+the sign of the gammon.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Gammon of bacon, I suppose.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother; but gammon likewise means - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I know it does, Jasper; it means fun, ridicule, jest; it is an
+ancient Norse word, and is found in the Edda.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lor&rsquo;, brother! how learned in lils you are!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Many words of Norse are to be found in our vulgar sayings, Jasper;
+for example - in that particularly vulgar saying of ours, &lsquo;Your
+mother is up,&rsquo; there&rsquo;s a noble Norse word; mother, there,
+meaning not the female who bore us, but rage and choler, as I discovered
+by reading the Sagas, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lor&rsquo;, brother! how book-learned you be.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Indifferently so, Jasper.&nbsp; Then you think you might trust
+your wife with the duke?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I think I could, brother, or even with yourself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Myself, Jasper!&nbsp; Oh, I never troubled my head about your
+wife; but I suppose there have been love affairs between gorgios and
+Romany chies.&nbsp; Why, novels are stuffed with such matters; and then
+even one of your own songs says so - the song which Ursula was singing
+the other afternoon.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That is somewhat of an old song, brother, and is sung by the
+chies as a warning at our solemn festivals.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well! but there&rsquo;s your sister-in-law, Ursula, herself,
+Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ursula, herself, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You were talking of my having her, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, why didn&rsquo;t you have her?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Would she have had me?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of course, brother.&nbsp; You are so much of a Roman, and speak
+Romany so remarkably well.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Poor thing! she looks very innocent!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Remarkably so, brother! however, though not born on the same
+common with my wife, she knows a thing or two of Roman matters.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I should like to ask her a question or two, Jasper, in connection
+with that song.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You can do no better, brother.&nbsp; Here we are at the camp.&nbsp;
+After tea, take Ursula under a hedge, and ask her a question or two
+in connection with that song.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER X<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Sunday Evening - Ursula - Action at Law - Meridiana - Married Already.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I took tea that evening with Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro and Ursula, outside
+of their tent.&nbsp; Tawno was not present, being engaged with his wife
+in his own tabernacle; Sylvester was there, however, lolling listlessly
+upon the ground.&nbsp; As I looked upon this man, I thought him one
+of the most disagreeable fellows I had ever seen.&nbsp; His features
+were ugly, and, moreover, as dark as pepper; and, besides being dark,
+his skin was dirty.&nbsp; As for his dress, it was torn and sordid.&nbsp;
+His chest was broad, and his arms seemed powerful; but, upon the whole,
+he looked a very caitiff.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am sorry that man has lost
+his wife,&rdquo; thought I; &ldquo;for I am sure he will never get another.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+What surprises me is, that he ever found a woman disposed to unite her
+lot with his!<br>
+<br>
+After tea I got up and strolled about the field.&nbsp; My thoughts were
+upon Isopel Berners.&nbsp; I wondered where she was, and how long she
+would stay away.&nbsp; At length becoming tired and listless, I determined
+to return to the dingle, and resume the reading of the Bible at the
+place where I had left off.&nbsp; &ldquo;What better could I do,&rdquo;
+methought, &ldquo;on a Sunday evening?&rdquo;&nbsp; I was then near
+the wood which surrounded the dingle, but at that side which was farthest
+from the encampment, which stood near the entrance.&nbsp; Suddenly,
+on turning round the southern corner of the copse, which surrounded
+the dingle, I perceived Ursula seated under a thornbush.&nbsp; I thought
+I never saw her look prettier than then, dressed as she was, in her
+Sunday&rsquo;s best.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Good evening, Ursula,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I little thought
+to have the pleasure of seeing you here.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nor would you, brother,&rdquo; said Ursula, &ldquo;had not Jasper
+told me that you had been talking about me, and wanted to speak to me
+under a hedge; so, hearing that, I watched your motions, and came here
+and sat down.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I was thinking of going to my quarters in the dingle, to read
+the Bible, Ursula, but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Oh, pray then, go to your quarters, brother, and read the Miduveleskoe
+lil; you can speak to me under a hedge some other time.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I think I will sit down with you, Ursula; for, after all, reading
+godly books in dingles at eve, is rather sombre work.&nbsp; Yes, I think
+I will sit down with you;&rdquo; and I sat down by her side.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, now you have sat down with me under the hedge,
+what have you to say to me?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, I hardly know, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not know, brother; a pretty fellow you to ask young women to
+come and sit with you under hedges, and, when they come, not know what
+to say to them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Oh! ah! I remember; do you know, Ursula, that I take a great
+interest in you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thank ye, brother; kind of you, at any rate.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You must be exposed to a great many temptations, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A great many indeed, brother.&nbsp; It is hard, to see fine things,
+such as shawls, gold watches, and chains in the shops, behind the big
+glasses, and to know that they are not intended for one.&nbsp; Many&rsquo;s
+the time I have been tempted to make a dash at them; but I bethought
+myself that by so doing I should cut my hands, besides being almost
+certain of being grabbed and sent across the gull&rsquo;s bath to the
+foreign country.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you think gold and fine things temptations, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of course, brother, very great temptations; don&rsquo;t you think
+them so?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t say I do, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then more fool you, brother; but have the kindness to tell me
+what you would call a temptation?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, for example, the hope of honour and renown, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The hope of honour and renown! very good, brother; but I tell
+you one thing, that unless you have money in your pocket, and good broad-cloth
+on your back, you are not likely to obtain much honour and - what do
+you call it? amongst the gorgios, to say nothing of the Romany chals.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I should have thought, Ursula, that the Romany chals, roaming
+about the world as they do, free and independent, were above being led
+by such trifles.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you know nothing of the gypsies, brother; no people on earth
+are fonder of those trifles, as you call them, than the Romany chals,
+and more disposed to respect those who have them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then money and fine clothes would induce you to do anything,
+Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay, brother, anything.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To chore, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Like enough, brother; gypsies have been transported before now
+for choring.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To hokkawar?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay; I was telling dukkerin only yesterday, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In fact, to break the law in everything?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Who knows, brother, who knows? as I said before, gold and fine
+clothes are great temptations.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Ursula, I am sorry for it, I should never have thought
+you so depraved.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Indeed, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To think that I am seated by one who is willing to - to - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Go on, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To play the thief.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Go on, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The liar.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Go on, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The - the - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Go on, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The - the lubbeny.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The what, brother?&rdquo; said Ursula, starting from her seat.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, the lubbeny; don&rsquo;t you - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I tell you what, brother,&rdquo; said Ursula, looking somewhat
+pale, and speaking very low, &ldquo;if I had only something in my hand,
+I would do you a mischief.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, what is the matter, Ursula?&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;how have
+I offended you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How have you offended me?&nbsp; Why, didn&rsquo;t you insinivate
+just now that I was ready to play the - the - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Go on, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The - the - I&rsquo;ll not say it; but I only wish I had something
+in my hand.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If I have offended, Ursula, I am very sorry for it; any offence
+I may have given you was from want of understanding you.&nbsp; Come,
+pray be seated, I have much to question you about - to talk to you about.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Seated, not I!&nbsp; It was only just now that you gave me to
+understand that you was ashamed to be seated by me, a thief, a liar.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, did you not almost give me to understand that you were
+both, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t much care being called a thief and a liar,&rdquo;
+said Ursula; &ldquo;a person may be a liar and thief, and yet a very
+honest woman, but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I tell you what, brother, if you ever sinivate again that I could
+be the third thing, so help me duvel!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll do you a mischief.&nbsp;
+By my God I will!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Ursula, I assure you that I shall sinivate, as you call
+it, nothing of the kind about you.&nbsp; I have no doubt, from what
+you have said, that you are a very paragon of virtue - a perfect Lucretia;
+but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My name is Ursula, brother, and not Lucretia: Lucretia is not
+of our family, but one of the Bucklands; she travels about Oxfordshire;
+yet I am as good as she any day.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lucretia; how odd!&nbsp; Where could she have got that name?&nbsp;
+Well, I make no doubt, Ursula, that you are quite as good as she, and
+she as her namesake of ancient Rome; but there is a mystery in this
+same virtue, Ursula, which I cannot fathom; how a thief and a liar should
+be able, or indeed willing, to preserve her virtue is what I don&rsquo;t
+understand.&nbsp; You confess that you are very fond of gold.&nbsp;
+Now, how is it that you don&rsquo;t barter your virtue for gold sometimes?&nbsp;
+I am a philosopher, Ursula, and like to know everything.&nbsp; You must
+be every now and then exposed to great temptation, Ursula; for you are
+of a beauty calculated to captivate all hearts.&nbsp; Come, sit down
+and tell me how you are enabled to resist such a temptation as gold
+and fine clothes?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother,&rdquo; said Ursula, &ldquo;as you say you mean
+no harm, I will sit down beside you, and enter into discourse with you;
+but I will uphold that you are the coolest hand that I ever came nigh,
+and say the coolest things.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+And thereupon Ursula sat down by my side.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Ursula, we will, if you please, discourse on the subject
+of your temptations.&nbsp; I suppose that you travel very much about,
+and show yourself in all kinds of places?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In all kinds, brother; I travels, as you say, very much about,
+attends fairs and races, and enters booths and public-houses, where
+I tells fortunes, and sometimes dances and sings.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And do not people often address you in a very free manner?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Frequently, brother; and I give them tolerably free answers.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do people ever offer to make you presents?&nbsp; I mean presents
+of value, such as - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Silk handkerchiefs, shawls, and trinkets; very frequently, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what do you do, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I takes what people offers me, brother, and stows it away as
+soon as I can.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, but don&rsquo;t people expect something for their presents?&nbsp;
+I don&rsquo;t mean dukkerin, dancing, and the like; but such a moderate
+and innocent thing as a choomer, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Innocent thing, do you call it, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The world calls it so, Ursula.&nbsp; Well, do the people who
+give you the fine things never expect a choomer in return?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very frequently, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And do you ever grant it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How do you avoid it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I gets away as soon as possible, brother.&nbsp; If they follows
+me, I tries to baffle them, by means of jests and laughter; and if they
+persist, I uses bad and terrible language, of which I have plenty in
+store.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But if your terrible language has no effect?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then I screams for the constable, and if he comes not, I uses
+my teeth and nails.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And are they always sufficient?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have only had to use them twice, brother; but then I found
+them sufficient.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But suppose the person who followed you was highly agreeable,
+Ursula?&nbsp; A handsome young officer of local militia, for example,
+all dressed in Lincoln green, would you still refuse him the choomer?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We makes no difference, brother; the daughters of the gypsy-father
+makes no difference; and what&rsquo;s more, sees none.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Ursula, the world will hardly give you credit for such
+indifference.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What cares we for the world, brother! we are not of the world.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But your fathers, brothers, and uncles, give you credit, I suppose,
+Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay, brother, our fathers, brothers, and cokos gives us all
+manner of credit; for example, I am telling lies and dukkerin in a public-house
+where my batu or coko - perhaps both - are playing on the fiddle; well,
+my batu and my coko beholds me amongst the public-house crew, talking
+nonsense and hearing nonsense; but they are under no apprehension; and
+presently they sees the good-looking officer of militia, in his greens
+and Lincolns, get up and give me a wink, and I go out with him abroad,
+into the dark night perhaps; well, my batu and my coko goes on fiddling
+just as if I were six miles off asleep in the tent, and not out in the
+dark street with the local officer, with his Lincolns and his greens.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They know they can trust you, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, ay, brother; and, what&rsquo;s more, I knows I can trust
+myself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So you would merely go out to make a fool of him, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Merely go out to make a fool of him, brother, I assure you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But such proceedings really have an odd look, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Amongst gorgios, very so, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, it must be rather unpleasant to lose one&rsquo;s character
+even amongst gorgios, Ursula; and suppose the officer, out of revenge
+for being tricked and duped by you, were to say of you the thing that
+is not, were to meet you on the race-course the next day, and boast
+of receiving favours which he never had, amidst a knot of jeering militia-men,
+how would you proceed, Ursula? would you not be abashed?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;By no means, brother; I should bring my action of law against
+him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Your action at law, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother, I should give a whistle, whereupon all one&rsquo;s
+cokos and batus, and all my near and distant relations, would leave
+their fiddling, dukkerin, and horse-dealing, and come flocking about
+me.&nbsp; &lsquo;What&rsquo;s the matter, Ursula?&rsquo; says my coko.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Nothing at all,&rsquo; I replies, &lsquo;save and except that
+gorgio, in his greens and his Lincolns, says that I have played the
+- with him.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Oho, he does, Ursula,&rsquo; says my
+coko, &lsquo;try your action of law against him, my lamb,&rsquo; and
+he puts something privily into my hands; whereupon I goes close up to
+the grinning gorgio, and staring him in the face, with my head pushed
+forward, I cries out: &lsquo;You say I did what was wrong with you last
+night when I was out with you abroad?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes,&rsquo;
+says the local officer, &lsquo;I says you did,&rsquo; looking down all
+the time.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are a liar,&rsquo; says I, and forthwith
+I breaks his head with the stick which I holds behind me, and which
+my coko has conveyed privily into my hand.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And this is your action at law, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother, this is my action at club-law.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And would your breaking the fellow&rsquo;s head quite clear you
+of all suspicion in the eyes of your batus, cokos, and what not?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They would never suspect me at all, brother, because they would
+know that I would never condescend to be over-intimate with a gorgio;
+the breaking the head would be merely intended to justify Ursula in
+the eyes of the gorgios.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And would it clear you in their eyes?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Would it not, brother? when they saw the blood running down from
+the fellow&rsquo;s cracked poll on his greens and Lincolns, they would
+be quite satisfied; why, the fellow would not be able to show his face
+at fair or merry-making for a year and three-quarters.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Did you ever try it, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t say I ever did, brother, but it would do.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how did you ever learn such a method of proceeding?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, &lsquo;t is advised by gypsy liri, brother.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+part of our way of settling difficulties amongst ourselves; for example,
+if a young Roman were to say the thing which is not respecting Ursula
+and himself, Ursula would call a great meeting of the people, who would
+all sit down in a ring, the young fellow amongst them; a coko would
+then put a stick in Ursula&rsquo;s hand, who would then get up and go
+to the young fellow, and say, &lsquo;Did I play the - with you?&rsquo;
+and were he to say &lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; she would crack his head before
+the eyes of all.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;Ursula, I was bred an apprentice
+to gorgio law, and of course ought to stand up for it, whenever I conscientiously
+can, but I must say the gypsy manner of bringing an action for defamation
+is much less tedious, and far more satisfactory, than the gorgiko one.&nbsp;
+I wish you now to clear up a certain point which is rather mysterious
+to me.&nbsp; You say that for a Romany chi to do what is unseemly with
+a gorgio is quite out of the question, yet only the other day I heard
+you singing a song in which a Romany chi confesses herself to be cambri
+by a grand gorgious gentleman.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A sad let down,&rdquo; said Ursula.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;sad or not, there&rsquo;s the song
+that speaks of the thing, which you give me to understand is not.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, if the thing ever was,&rdquo; said Ursula, &ldquo;it was
+a long time ago, and perhaps, after all, not true.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then why do you sing the song?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you, brother, we sings the song now and then
+to be a warning to ourselves to have as little to do as possible in
+the way of acquaintance with the gorgios; and a warning it is; you see
+how the young woman in the song was driven out of her tent by her mother,
+with all kind of disgrace and bad language; but you don&rsquo;t know
+that she was afterwards buried alive by her cokos and pals, in an uninhabited
+place; the song doesn&rsquo;t say it, but the story says it, for there
+is a story about it, though, as I said before, it was a long time ago,
+and perhaps, after all, wasn&rsquo;t true.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But if such a thing were to happen at present, would the cokos
+and pals bury the girl alive?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t say what they would do,&rdquo; said Ursula; &ldquo;I
+suppose they are not so strict as they were long ago; at any rate, she
+would be driven from the tan, and avoided by all her family and relations
+as a gorgio&rsquo;s acquaintance; so that, perhaps, at last, she would
+be glad if they would bury her alive.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, I can conceive that there would be an objection on the
+part of the cokos and batus that a Romany chi should form an improper
+acquaintance with a gorgio, but I should think that the batus and cokos
+could hardly object to the chi&rsquo;s entering into the honourable
+estate of wedlock with a gorgio.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Ursula was silent.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Marriage is an honourable estate, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, suppose it be?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t see why a Romany chi should object to enter into
+the honourable estate of wedlock with a gorgio.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You don&rsquo;t, brother; don&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and, moreover, I am aware, notwithstanding
+your evasion, Ursula, that marriages and connections now and then occur
+between gorgios and Romany chies; the result of which is the mixed breed,
+called half and half, which is at present travelling about England,
+and to which the Flaming Tinman belongs, otherwise called Anselo Herne.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;As for the half and halfs,&rdquo; said Ursula, &ldquo;they are
+a bad set; and there is not a worse blackguard in England than Anselo
+Herne.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All that you say may be very true, Ursula, but you admit that
+there are half and halfs.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The more&rsquo;s the pity, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pity, or not, you admit the fact; but how do you account for
+it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How do I account for it? why, I will tell you, by the break up
+of a Roman family, brother - the father of a small family dies, and,
+perhaps, the mother; and the poor children are left behind; sometimes,
+they are gathered up by their relations, and sometimes, if they have
+none, by charitable Romans, who bring them up in the observance of gypsy
+law; but sometimes they are not so lucky, and falls into the company
+of gorgios, trampers, and basket-makers, who live in caravans, with
+whom they take up, and so - I hate to talk of the matter, brother; but
+so comes this race of the half and halfs.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you mean to say, Ursula, that no Romany chi, unless compelled
+by hard necessity, would have anything to do with a gorgio?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We are not over-fond of gorgios, brother, and we hates basket-makers,
+and folks that live in caravans.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;suppose a gorgio who is not a basket-maker,
+a fine, handsome gorgious gentleman, who lives in a fine house - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We are not fond of houses, brother; I never slept in a house
+in my life.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But would not plenty of money induce you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I hate houses, brother, and those who live in them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, suppose such a person were willing to resign his fine house;
+and, for love of you, to adopt gypsy law, speak Romany, and live in
+a tan, would you have nothing to say to him?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Bringing plenty of money with him, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, bringing plenty of money with him, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, suppose you produce your man; where is he?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I was merely supposing such a person, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you don&rsquo;t know of such a person, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, no, Ursula; why do you ask?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Because, brother, I was almost beginning to think that you meant
+yourself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Myself!&nbsp; Ursula; I have no fine house to resign; nor have
+I money.&nbsp; Moreover, Ursula, though I have a great regard for you,
+and though I consider you very handsome, quite as handsome, indeed,
+as Meridiana in - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Meridiana! where did you meet with her?&rdquo; said Ursula, with
+a toss of her head.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, in old Pulci&rsquo;s - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;At old Fulcher&rsquo;s! that&rsquo;s not true, brother.&nbsp;
+Meridiana is a Borzlam, and travels with her own people, and not with
+old Fulcher, who is a gorgio, and a basket-maker.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I was not speaking of old Fulcher, but Pulci, a great Italian
+writer, who lived many hundred years ago, and who, in his poem called
+&lsquo;Morgante Maggiore,&rsquo; speaks of Meridiana, the daughter of
+- &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Old Carus Borzlam,&rdquo; said Ursula; &ldquo;but if the fellow
+you mention lived so many hundred years ago, how, in the name of wonder,
+could he know anything of Meridiana?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The wonder, Ursula, is, how your people could ever have got hold
+of that name, and similar ones.&nbsp; The Meridiana of Pulci was not
+the daughter of old Carus Borzlam, but of Caradoro, a great pagan king
+of the East, who, being besieged in his capital by Manfredonio, another
+mighty pagan king, who wished to obtain possession of his daughter,
+who had refused him, was relieved in his distress by certain paladins
+of Charlemagne, with one of whom, Oliver, his daughter Meridiana fell
+in love.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said, Ursula, &ldquo;that it must have been altogether
+a different person, for I am sure that Meridiana Borzlam would never
+have fallen in love with Oliver.&nbsp; Oliver! why, that is the name
+of the curo-mengro, who lost the fight near the chong gav, the day of
+the great tempest, when I got wet through.&nbsp; No, no!&nbsp; Meridiana
+Borzlam would never have so far forgot her blood as to take up with
+Tom Oliver.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I was not talking of that Oliver, Ursula, but of Oliver, peer
+of France, and paladin of Charlemagne, with whom Meridiana, daughter
+of Caradoro, fell in love, and for whose sake she renounced her religion
+and became a Christian, and finally ingravidata, or cambri, by him:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;E nacquene un figliuol, dice la storia,<br>
+Che dette a Carlo-man poi gran vittoria;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+which means - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t want to know what it means,&rdquo; said Ursula;
+&ldquo;no good, I&rsquo;m sure.&nbsp; Well, if the Meridiana of Charles&rsquo;s
+wain&rsquo;s pal was no handsomer than Meridiana Borzlam, she was no
+great catch, brother; for though I am by no means given to vanity, I
+think myself better to look at than she, though I will say she is no
+lubbeny, and would scorn - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I make no doubt she would, Ursula, and I make no doubt that you
+are much handsomer than she, or even the Meridiana of Oliver.&nbsp;
+What I was about to say, before you interrupted me, is this, that though
+I have a great regard for you, and highly admire you, it is only in
+a brotherly way, and - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And you had nothing better to say to me,&rdquo; said Ursula,
+&ldquo;when you wanted to talk to me beneath a hedge, than that you
+liked me in a brotherly way I well, I declare - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You seem disappointed, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Disappointed, brother! not I.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You were just now saying that you disliked gorgios, so, of course,
+could only wish that I, who am a gorgio, should like you in a brotherly
+way: I wished to have a conversation with you beneath a hedge, but only
+with the view of procuring from you some information respecting the
+song which you sung the other day, and the conduct of Roman females,
+which has always struck me as being highly unaccountable; so, if you
+thought anything else - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What else should I expect from a picker-up of old words, brother?&nbsp;
+Bah! I dislike a picker-up of old words worse than a picker-up of old
+rags.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be angry, Ursula, I feel a great interest in you;
+you are very handsome, and very clever; indeed, with your beauty and
+cleverness, I only wonder that you have not long since been married.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You do, do you, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes.&nbsp; However, keep up your spirits, Ursula, you are not
+much past the prime of youth, so - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not much past the prime of youth!&nbsp; Don&rsquo;t be uncivil,
+brother, I was only twenty-two last month.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be offended, Ursula, but twenty-two is twenty-two,
+or, I should rather say, that twenty-two in a woman is more than twenty-six
+in a man.&nbsp; You are still very beautiful, but I advise you to accept
+the first offer that&rsquo;s made to you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thank you, brother, but your advice comes rather late; I accepted
+the first offer that was made me five years ago.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You married five years ago, Ursula! is it possible?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Quite possible, brother, I assure you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how came I to know nothing about it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How comes it that you don&rsquo;t know many thousand things about
+the Romans, brother?&nbsp; Do you think they tell you all their affairs?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Married, Ursula, married! well, I declare!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You seem disappointed, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Disappointed!&nbsp; Oh! no, not at all; but Jasper, only a few
+weeks ago, told me that you were not married; and, indeed, almost gave
+me to understand that you would be very glad to get a husband.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And you believed him?&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll tell you, brother, for
+your instruction, that there is not in the whole world a greater liar
+than Jasper Petulengro.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sorry to hear it, Ursula; but with respect to him you married
+- who might he be?&nbsp; A gorgio, or a Romany chal?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Gorgio, or Romany chal!&nbsp; Do you think I would ever condescend
+to a gorgio!&nbsp; It was a Camomescro, brother, a Lovell, a distant
+relation of my own.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And where is he? and what became of him!&nbsp; Have you any family?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t think I am going to tell you all my history, brother;
+and, to tell you the truth, I am tired of sitting under hedges with
+you, talking nonsense.&nbsp; I shall go to my house.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do sit a little longer, sister Ursula.&nbsp; I most heartily
+congratulate you on your marriage.&nbsp; But where is this same Lovell?&nbsp;
+I have never seen him: I wish to congratulate him too.&nbsp; You are
+quite as handsome as the Meridiana of Pulci, Ursula, ay, or the Despina
+of Riciardetto.&nbsp; Riciardetto, Ursula, is a poem written by one
+Fortiguerra, about ninety years ago, in imitation of the Morgante of
+Pulci.&nbsp; It treats of the wars of Charlemagne and his Paladins with
+various barbarous nations, who came to besiege Paris.&nbsp; Despina
+was the daughter and heiress of Scricca, King of Cafria; she was the
+beloved of Riciardetto, and was beautiful as an angel; but I make no
+doubt you are quite as handsome as she.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Brother,&rdquo; said Ursula - but the reply of Ursula I reserve
+for another chapter, the present having attained to rather an uncommon
+length, for which, however, the importance of the matter discussed is
+a sufficient apology.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Ursula&rsquo;s Tale - The Patteran - The Deep Water - Second Husband.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Brother,&rdquo; said Ursula, plucking a dandelion which grew
+at her feet, &ldquo;I have always said that a more civil and pleasant-spoken
+person than yourself can&rsquo;t be found.&nbsp; I have a great regard
+for you and your learning, and am willing to do you any pleasure in
+the way of words or conversation.&nbsp; Mine is not a very happy story,
+but as you wish to hear it, it is quite at your service.&nbsp; Launcelot
+Lovell made me an offer, as you call it, and we were married in Roman
+fashion; that is, we gave each other our right hands, and promised to
+be true to each other.&nbsp; We lived together two years, travelling
+sometimes by ourselves, sometimes with our relations; I bore him two
+children, both of which were still-born, partly, I believe, from the
+fatigue I underwent in running about the country telling dukkerin when
+I was not exactly in a state to do so, and partly from the kicks and
+blows which my husband Launcelot was in the habit of giving me every
+night, provided I came home with less than five shillings, which it
+is sometimes impossible to make in the country, provided no fair or
+merry-making is going on.&nbsp; At the end of two years my husband,
+Launcelot, whistled a horse from a farmer&rsquo;s field, and sold it
+for forty-pounds; and for that horse he was taken, put in prison, tried,
+and condemned to be sent to the other country for life.&nbsp; Two days
+before he was to be sent away, I got leave to see him in the prison,
+and in the presence of the turnkey I gave him a thin cake of gingerbread,
+in which there was a dainty saw which could cut through iron.&nbsp;
+I then took on wonderfully, turned my eyes inside out, fell down in
+a seeming fit, and was carried out of the prison.&nbsp; That same night
+my husband sawed his irons off, cut through the bars of his window,
+and dropping down a height of fifty feet, lighted on his legs, and came
+and joined me on a heath where I was camped alone.&nbsp; We were just
+getting things ready to be off, when we heard people coming, and sure
+enough they were runners after my husband, Launcelot Lovell; for his
+escape had been discovered within a quarter of an hour after he had
+got away.&nbsp; My husband, without bidding me farewell, set off at
+full speed, and they after him, but they could not take him, and so
+they came back and took me, and shook me, and threatened me, and had
+me before the poknees, who shook his head at me, and threatened me in
+order to make me discover where my husband was, but I said I did not
+know, which was true enough; not that I would have told him if I had.&nbsp;
+So at last the poknees and the runners, not being able to make anything
+out of me, were obliged to let me go, and I went in search of my husband.&nbsp;
+I wandered about with my cart for several days in the direction in which
+I saw him run off, with my eyes bent on the ground, but could see no
+marks of him; at last, coming to four cross roads, I saw my husband&rsquo;s
+patteran.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You saw your husband&rsquo;s patteran?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother.&nbsp; Do you know what patteran means?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of course, Ursula; the gypsy trail, the handful of grass which
+the gypsies strew in the roads as they travel, to give information to
+any of their companions who may be behind, as to the route they have
+taken.&nbsp; The gypsy patteran has always had a strange interest for
+me, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Like enough, brother; but what does patteran mean?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, the gypsy trail, formed as I told you before.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And you know nothing more about patteran, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nothing at all, Ursula; do you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What&rsquo;s the name for the leaf of a tree, brother?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;it&rsquo;s odd enough
+that I have asked that question of a dozen Romany chals and chies, and
+they always told me that they did not know.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No more they did, brother; there&rsquo;s only one person in England
+that knows, and that&rsquo;s myself - the name for a leaf is patteran.&nbsp;
+Now there are two that knows it - the other is yourself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me, Ursula, how very strange!&nbsp; I am much obliged to
+you.&nbsp; I think I never saw you look so pretty as you do now; but
+who told you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My mother, Mrs. Herne, told it me one day, brother, when she
+was in a good humour, which she very seldom was, as no one has a better
+right to know than yourself, as she hated you mortally: it was one day
+when you had been asking our company what was the word for a leaf, and
+nobody could tell you, that she took me aside and told me, for she was
+in a good humour, and triumphed in seeing you balked.&nbsp; She told
+me the word for leaf was patteran, which our people use now for trail,
+having forgotten the true meaning.&nbsp; She said that the trail was
+called patteran, because the gypsies of old were in the habit of making
+the marks with the leaves and branches of trees, placed in a certain
+manner.&nbsp; She said that nobody knew it but herself, who was one
+of the old sort, and begged me never to tell the word to any one but
+him I should marry; and to be particularly cautious never to let you
+know it, whom she hated.&nbsp; Well, brother, perhaps I have done wrong
+to tell you; but, as I said before, I likes you, and am always ready
+to do your pleasure in words and conversation; my mother, moreover,
+is dead and gone, and, poor thing, will never know anything about the
+matter.&nbsp; So, when I married, I told my husband about the patteran,
+and we were in the habit of making our private trails with leaves and
+branches of trees, which none of the other gypsy people did; so, when
+I saw my husband&rsquo;s patteran, I knew it at once, and I followed
+it upwards of two hundred miles towards the north; and then I came to
+a deep, awful-looking water, with an overhanging bank, and on the bank
+I found the patteran, which directed me to proceed along the bank towards
+the east, and I followed my husband&rsquo;s patteran towards the east;
+and before I had gone half a mile, I came to a place where I saw the
+bank had given way, and fallen into the deep water.&nbsp; Without paying
+much heed, I passed on, and presently came to a public-house, not far
+from the water, and I entered the public-house to get a little beer,
+and perhaps to tell a dukkerin, for I saw a great many people about
+the door; and, when I entered, I found there was what they calls an
+inquest being held upon a body in that house, and the jury had just
+risen to go and look at the body; and being a woman, and having a curiosity,
+I thought I would go with them, and so I did; and no sooner did I see
+the body, than I knew it to be my husband&rsquo;s; it was much swelled
+and altered, but I knew it partly by the clothes, and partly by a mark
+on the forehead, and I cried out, &lsquo;It is my husband&rsquo;s body,&rsquo;
+and I fell down in a fit, and the fit that time, brother, was not a
+seeming one.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;how terrible! but tell me, Ursula,
+how did your husband come by his death?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The bank, overhanging the deep water, gave way under him, brother,
+and he was drowned; for, like most of our people, he could not swim,
+or only a little.&nbsp; The body, after it had been in the water a long
+time, came up of itself, and was found floating.&nbsp; Well, brother,
+when the people of the neighbourhood found that I was the wife of the
+drowned man, they were very kind to me, and made a subscription for
+me, with which, after having seen my husband buried, I returned the
+way I had come, till I met Jasper and his people, and with them I have
+travelled ever since: I was very melancholy for a long time, I assure
+you, brother; for the death of my husband preyed very much upon my mind.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;His death was certainly a very shocking one, Ursula; but, really,
+if he had died a natural one, you could scarcely have regretted it,
+for he appears to have treated you barbarously.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Women must bear, brother; and, barring that he kicked and beat
+me, and drove me out to tell dukkerin when I could scarcely stand, he
+was not a bad husband.&nbsp; A man, by gypsy law, brother, is allowed
+to kick and beat his wife, and to bury her alive, if he thinks proper.&nbsp;
+I am a gypsy, and have nothing to say against the law.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But what has Mikailia Chikno to say about it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She is a cripple, brother, the only cripple amongst the Roman
+people: so she is allowed to do and say as she pleases.&nbsp; Moreover,
+her husband does not think fit to kick or beat her, though it is my
+opinion she would like him all the better if he were occasionally to
+do so, and threaten to bury her alive; at any rate, she would treat
+him better, and respect him more.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Your sister does not seem to stand much in awe of Jasper Petulengro,
+Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Let the matters of my sister and Jasper Petulengro alone, brother;
+you must travel in their company some time before you can understand
+them; they are a strange two, up to all kind of chaffing: but two more
+regular Romans don&rsquo;t breathe, and I&rsquo;ll tell you, for your
+instruction, that there isn&rsquo;t a better mare-breaker in England
+than Jasper Petulengro, if you can manage Miss Isopel Berners as well
+as - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Isopel Berners,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;how came you to think of
+her?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How should I but think of her, brother, living as she does with
+you in Mumper&rsquo;s dingle, and travelling about with you; you will
+have, brother, more difficulty to manage her, than Jasper has to manage
+my sister Pakomovna.&nbsp; I should have mentioned her before, only
+I wanted to know what you had to say to me; and when we got into discourse,
+I forgot her.&nbsp; I say, brother, let me tell you your dukkerin, with
+respect to her, you will never - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do let me tell you your dukkerin, brother, you will never manage
+- &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula, in connection with Isopel
+Berners.&nbsp; Moreover, it is Sunday, we will change the subject; it
+is surprising to me that, after all you have undergone, you should look
+so beautiful.&nbsp; I suppose you do not think of marrying again, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No, brother, one husband at a time is quite enough for any reasonable
+mort; especially such a good husband as I have got.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Such a good husband! why, I thought you told me your husband
+was drowned?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, brother, my first husband was.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And have you a second?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To be sure, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And who is he? in the name of wonder.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Who is he? why Sylvester, to be sure.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do assure you, Ursula, that I feel disposed to be angry with
+you; such a handsome young woman as yourself to take up with such a
+nasty pepper-faced good for nothing - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I won&rsquo;t hear my husband abused, brother; so you had better
+say no more.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, is he not the Lazarus of the gypsies? has he a penny of
+his own, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then the more his want, brother, of a clever chi like me to take
+care of him and his childer.&nbsp; I tell you what, brother, I will
+chore, if necessary, and tell dukkerin for Sylvester, if even so heavy
+as scarcely to be able to stand.&nbsp; You call him lazy; you would
+not think him lazy if you were in a ring with him: he is a proper man
+with his hands; Jasper is going to back him for twenty pounds against
+Slammocks of the Chong gav, the brother of Roarer and Bell-metal, he
+says he has no doubt that he will win.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, if you like him, I, of course, can have no objection.&nbsp;
+Have you been long married?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;About a fortnight, brother; that dinner, the other day, when
+I sang the song, was given in celebration of the wedding.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Were you married in a church, Ursula?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We were not, brother; none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys
+are ever married in a church: we took each other&rsquo;s words.&nbsp;
+Brother, I have been with you near three hours beneath this hedge.&nbsp;
+I will go to my husband.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Does he know that you are here?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He does, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And is he satisfied?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Satisfied! of course.&nbsp; Lor&rsquo;, you gorgies!&nbsp; Brother,
+I go to my husband and my house.&rdquo;&nbsp; And, thereupon, Ursula
+rose and departed.<br>
+<br>
+After waiting a little time I also arose; it was now dark, and I thought
+I could do no better than betake myself to the dingle; at the entrance
+of it I found Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, brother,&rdquo; said
+he, &ldquo;what kind of conversation have you and Ursula had beneath
+the hedge?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If you wished to hear what we were talking about, you should
+have come and sat down beside us; you knew where we were.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, brother, I did much the same, for I went and sat down behind
+you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Behind the hedge, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Behind the hedge, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And heard all our conversation.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Every word, brother; and a rum conversation it was.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis an old saying, Jasper, that listeners never hear any
+good of themselves; perhaps you heard the epithet that Ursula bestowed
+upon you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If, by epitaph, you mean that she called me a liar, I did, brother,
+and she was not much wrong, for I certainly do not always stick exactly
+to truth; you, however, have not much to complain of me.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You deceived me about Ursula, giving me to understand she was
+not married.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She was not married when I told you so, brother; that is, not
+to Sylvester; nor was I aware that she was going to marry him.&nbsp;
+I once thought you had a kind of regard for her, and I am sure she had
+as much for you as a Romany chi can have for a gorgio.&nbsp; I half
+expected to have heard you make love to her behind the hedge, but I
+begin to think you care for nothing in this world but old words and
+strange stories.&nbsp; Lor&rsquo; to take a young woman under a hedge,
+and talk to her as you did to Ursula; and yet you got everything out
+of her that you wanted, with your gammon about old Fulcher and Meridiana.&nbsp;
+You are a cunning one, brother.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;There you are mistaken, Jasper.&nbsp; I am not cunning.&nbsp;
+If people think I am, it is because, being made up of art themselves,
+simplicity of character is a puzzle to them.&nbsp; Your women are certainly
+extraordinary creatures, Jasper.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Didn&rsquo;t I say they were rum animals?&nbsp; Brother, we Romans
+shall always stick together as long as they stick fast to us.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you think they always will, Jasper?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Can&rsquo;t say, brother; nothing lasts for ever.&nbsp; Romany
+chies are Romany chies still, though not exactly what they were sixty
+years ago.&nbsp; My wife, though a rum one, is not Mrs. Herne, brother.&nbsp;
+I think she is rather fond of Frenchmen and French discourse.&nbsp;
+I tell you what, brother, if ever gypsyism breaks up, it will be owing
+to our chies having been bitten by that mad puppy they calls gentility.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Dingle at Night - The Two Sides of the Question - Roman Females
+- Filling the Kettle - The Dream - The Tall Figure.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I descended to the bottom of the dingle.&nbsp; It was nearly involved
+in obscurity.&nbsp; To dissipate the feeling of melancholy which came
+over my mind, I resolved to kindle a fire; and having heaped dry sticks
+upon my hearth, and added a billet or two, I struck a light, and soon
+produced a blaze.&nbsp; Sitting down, I fixed my eyes upon the blaze,
+and soon fell into a deep meditation.&nbsp; I thought of the events
+of the day, the scene at church, and what I had heard at church, the
+danger of losing one&rsquo;s soul, the doubts of Jasper Petulengro as
+to whether one had a soul.&nbsp; I thought over the various arguments
+which I had either heard, or which had come spontaneously to my mind,
+for or against the probability of a state of future existence.&nbsp;
+They appeared to me to be tolerably evenly balanced.&nbsp; I then thought
+that it was at all events taking the safest part to conclude that there
+was a soul.&nbsp; It would be a terrible thing, after having passed
+one&rsquo;s life in the disbelief of the existence of a soul, to wake
+up after death a soul, and to find one&rsquo;s self a lost soul.&nbsp;
+Yes, methought I would come to the conclusion that one has a soul.&nbsp;
+Choosing the safe side, however, appeared to me to be playing a rather
+dastardly part.&nbsp; I had never been an admirer of people who chose
+the safe side in everything; indeed I had always entertained a thorough
+contempt for them.&nbsp; Surely it would be showing more manhood to
+adopt the dangerous side, that of disbelief; I almost resolved to do
+so - but yet in a question of so much importance, I ought not to be
+guided by vanity.&nbsp; The question was not which was the safe, but
+the true side? yet how was I to know which was the true side?&nbsp;
+Then I thought of the Bible - which I had been reading in the morning
+- that spoke of the soul and a future state; but was the Bible true?&nbsp;
+I had heard learned and moral men say that it was true, but I had also
+heard learned and moral men say that it was not: how was I to decide?&nbsp;
+Still that balance of probabilities!&nbsp; If I could but see the way
+of truth, I would follow it, if necessary, upon hands and knees; on
+that I was determined; but I could not see it.&nbsp; Feeling my brain
+begin to turn round, I resolved to think of something else; and forthwith
+began to think of what had passed between Ursula and myself in our discourse
+beneath the hedge.<br>
+<br>
+I mused deeply on what she had told me as to the virtue of the females
+of her race.&nbsp; How singular that virtue must be which was kept pure
+and immaculate by the possessor, whilst indulging in habits of falsehood
+and dishonesty!&nbsp; I had always thought the gypsy females extraordinary
+beings.&nbsp; I had often wondered at them, their dress, their manner
+of speaking, and, not least, at their names; but, until the present
+day, I had been unacquainted with the most extraordinary point connected
+with them.&nbsp; How came they possessed of this extraordinary virtue?
+was it because they were thievish?&nbsp; I remembered that an ancient
+thief-taker, who had retired from his useful calling, and who frequently
+visited the office of my master at law, the respectable S---, who had
+the management of his property - I remembered to have heard this worthy,
+with whom I occasionally held discourse, philosophic and profound, when
+he and I chanced to be alone together in the office, say that all first-rate
+thieves were sober, and of well-regulated morals, their bodily passions
+being kept in abeyance by their love of gain; but this axiom could scarcely
+hold good with respect to these women - however thievish they might
+be, they did care for something besides gain: they cared for their husbands.&nbsp;
+If they did thieve, they merely thieved for their husbands; and though,
+perhaps, some of them were vain, they merely prized their beauty because
+it gave them favour in the eyes of their husbands.&nbsp; Whatever the
+husbands were - and Jasper had almost insinuated that the males occasionally
+allowed themselves some latitude - they appeared to be as faithful to
+their husbands as the ancient Roman matrons were to theirs.&nbsp; Roman
+matrons! and, after all, might not these be in reality Roman matrons?&nbsp;
+They called themselves Romans; might not they be the descendants of
+the old Roman matrons?&nbsp; Might not they be of the same blood as
+Lucretia?&nbsp; And were not many of their strange names - Lucretia
+amongst the rest - handed down to them from old Rome?&nbsp; It is true
+their language was not that of old Rome; it was not, however, altogether
+different from it.&nbsp; After all, the ancient Romans might be a tribe
+of these people, who settled down and founded a village with the tilts
+of carts, which, by degrees, and the influx of other people, became
+the grand city of the world.&nbsp; I liked the idea of the grand city
+of the world owing its origin to a people who had been in the habit
+of carrying their houses in their carts.&nbsp; Why, after all, should
+not the Romans of history be a branch of these Romans?&nbsp; There were
+several points of similarity between them; if Roman matrons were chaste,
+both men and women were thieves.&nbsp; Old Rome was the thief of the
+world; yet still there were difficulties to be removed before I could
+persuade myself that the old Romans and my Romans were identical; and
+in trying to remove these difficulties, I felt my brain once more beginning
+to turn, and in haste took up another subject of meditation, and that
+was the patteran, and what Ursula had told me about it.<br>
+<br>
+I had always entertained a strange interest for that sign by which in
+their wanderings the Romanese gave to those of their people who came
+behind intimation as to the direction which they took; but it now inspired
+me with greater interest than ever, - now that I had learnt that the
+proper meaning of it was the leaves of trees.&nbsp; I had, as I had
+said in my dialogue with Ursula, been very eager to learn the word for
+leaf in the Romanian language, but had never learnt it till this day;
+so patteran signified leaf of a tree; and no one at present knew that
+but myself and Ursula, who had learnt it from Mrs. Herne, the last,
+it was said, of the old stock; and then I thought what strange people
+the gypsies must have been in the old time.&nbsp; They were sufficiently
+strange at present, but they must have been far stranger of old; they
+must have been a more peculiar people - their language must have been
+more perfect - and they must have had a greater stock of strange secrets.&nbsp;
+I almost wished that I had lived some two or three hundred years ago,
+that I might have observed these people when they were yet stranger
+than at present.&nbsp; I wondered whether I could have introduced myself
+to their company at that period, whether I should have been so fortunate
+as to meet such a strange, half-malicious, half good-humoured being
+as Jasper, who would have instructed me in the language, then more deserving
+of note than at present.&nbsp; What might I not have done with that
+language, had I known it in its purity?&nbsp; Why, I might have written
+books in it; yet those who spoke it would hardly have admitted me to
+their society at that period, when they kept more to themselves.&nbsp;
+Yet I thought that I might possibly have gained their confidence, and
+have wandered about with them, and learnt their language, and all their
+strange ways, and then - and then - and a sigh rose from the depth of
+my breast; for I began to think, &ldquo;Supposing I had accomplished
+all this, what would have been the profit of it; and in what would all
+this wild gypsy dream have terminated?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Then rose another sigh, yet more profound, for I began to think, &ldquo;What
+was likely to be the profit of my present way of life; the living in
+dingles, making pony and donkey shoes, conversing with gypsy-women under
+hedges, and extracting from them their odd secrets?&rdquo;&nbsp; What
+was likely to be the profit of such a kind of life, even should it continue
+for a length of time? - a supposition not very probable, for I was earning
+nothing to support me, and the funds with which I had entered upon this
+life were gradually disappearing.&nbsp; I was living, it is true, not
+unpleasantly, enjoying the healthy air of heaven; but, upon the whole,
+was I not sadly misspending my time?&nbsp; Surely I was; and, as I looked
+back, it appeared to me that I had always been doing so.&nbsp; What
+had been the profit of the tongues which I had learnt? had they ever
+assisted me in the day of hunger?&nbsp; No, no! it appeared to me that
+I had always misspent my time, save in one instance, when by a desperate
+effort I had collected all the powers of my imagination, and written
+the &ldquo;Life of Joseph Sell;&rdquo; but even when I wrote the Life
+of Sell, was I not in a false position?&nbsp; Provided I had not misspent
+my time, would it have been necessary to make that effort, which, after
+all, had only enabled me to leave London, and wander about the country
+for a time?&nbsp; But could I, taking all circumstances into consideration,
+have done better than I had?&nbsp; With my peculiar temperament and
+ideas, could I have pursued with advantage the profession to which my
+respectable parents had endeavoured to bring me up?&nbsp; It appeared
+to me that I could not, and that the hand of necessity had guided me
+from my earliest years, until the present night, in which I found myself
+seated in the dingle, staring on the brands of the fire.&nbsp; But ceasing
+to think of the past which, as irrecoverably gone, it was useless to
+regret, even were there cause to regret it, what should I do in future?&nbsp;
+Should I write another book like the Life of Joseph Sell; take it to
+London, and offer it to a publisher?&nbsp; But when I reflected on the
+grisly sufferings which I had undergone whilst engaged in writing the
+Life of Sell, I shrank from the idea of a similar attempt; moreover,
+I doubted whether I possessed the power to write a similar work - whether
+the materials for the life of another Sell lurked within the recesses
+of my brain?&nbsp; Had I not better become in reality what I had hitherto
+been merely playing at - a tinker or a gypsy?&nbsp; But I soon saw that
+I was not fitted to become either in reality.&nbsp; It was much more
+agreeable to play the gypsy or the tinker than to become either in reality.&nbsp;
+I had seen enough of gypsying and tinkering to be convinced of that.&nbsp;
+All of a sudden the idea of tilling the soil came into my head; tilling
+the soil was a healthful and noble pursuit! but my idea of tilling the
+soil had no connection with Britain; for I could only expect to till
+the soil in Britain as a serf.&nbsp; I thought of tilling it in America,
+in which it was said there was plenty of wild, unclaimed land, of which
+any one, who chose to clear it of its trees, might take possession.&nbsp;
+I figured myself in America, in an immense forest, clearing the land
+destined, by my exertions, to become a fruitful and smiling plain.&nbsp;
+Methought I heard the crash of the huge trees as they fell beneath my
+axe; and then I bethought me that a man was intended to marry - I ought
+to marry; and if I married, where was I likely to be more happy as a
+husband and a father than in America, engaged in tilling the ground?&nbsp;
+I fancied myself in America, engaged in tilling the ground, assisted
+by an enormous progeny.&nbsp; Well, why not marry, and go and till the
+ground in America?&nbsp; I was young, and youth was the time to marry
+in, and to labour in.&nbsp; I had the use of all my faculties; my eyes,
+it is true, were rather dull from early study, and from writing the
+Life of Joseph Sell; but I could see tolerably well with them, and they
+were not bleared.&nbsp; I felt my arms, and thighs, and teeth - they
+were strong and sound enough; so now was the time to labour, to marry,
+eat strong flesh, and beget strong children - the power of doing all
+this would pass away with youth, which was terribly transitory.&nbsp;
+I bethought me that a time would come when my eyes would be bleared,
+and, perhaps, sightless; my arms and thighs strengthless and sapless;
+when my teeth would shake in my jaws, even supposing they did not drop
+out.&nbsp; No going a wooing then - no labouring - no eating strong
+flesh, and begetting lusty children then; and I bethought me how, when
+all this should be, I should bewail the days of my youth as misspent,
+provided I had not in them founded for myself a home, and begotten strong
+children to take care of me in the days when I could not take care of
+myself; and thinking of these things, I became sadder and sadder, and
+stared vacantly upon the fire till my eyes closed in a doze.<br>
+<br>
+I continued dozing over the fire, until rousing myself I perceived that
+the brands were nearly consumed, and I thought of retiring for the night.&nbsp;
+I arose, and was about to enter my tent, when a thought struck me.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Suppose,&rdquo; thought I, &ldquo;that Isopel Berners should
+return in the midst of the night, how dark and dreary would the dingle
+appear without a fire! truly, I will keep up the fire, and I will do
+more; I have no board to spread for her, but I will fill the kettle,
+and heat it, so that, if she comes, I may be able to welcome her with
+a cup of tea, for I know she loves tea.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thereupon, I piled
+more wood upon the fire, and soon succeeded in procuring a better blaze
+than before; then, taking the kettle, I set out for the spring.&nbsp;
+On arriving at the mouth of the dingle, which fronted the east, I perceived
+that Charles&rsquo;s wain was nearly opposite to it, high above in the
+heavens, by which I knew that the night was tolerably well advanced.&nbsp;
+The gypsy encampment lay before me; all was hushed and still within
+it, and its inmates appeared to be locked in slumber; as I advanced,
+however, the dogs, which were fastened outside the tents, growled and
+barked; but presently recognising me, they were again silent, some of
+them wagging their tails.&nbsp; As I drew near a particular tent, I
+heard a female voice say - &ldquo;Some one is coming!&rdquo; and, as
+I was about to pass it, the cloth which formed the door was suddenly
+lifted up, and a black head and part of a huge naked body protruded.&nbsp;
+It was the head and upper part of the giant Tawno, who, according to
+the fashion of gypsy men, lay next the door wrapped in his blanket;
+the blanket had, however, fallen off, and the starlight shone clear
+on his athletic tawny body, and was reflected from his large staring
+eyes.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is only I, Tawno,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;going to fill the
+kettle, as it is possible that Miss Berners may arrive this night.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Kos-ko,&rdquo; drawled out Tawno, and replaced the curtain.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Good, do you call it?&rdquo; said the sharp voice of his wife;
+&ldquo;there is no good in the matter! if that young chap were not living
+with the rawnee in the illegal and uncertificated line, he would not
+be getting up in the middle of the night to fill her kettles.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Passing on, I proceeded to the spring, where I filled the kettle, and
+then returned to the dingle.<br>
+<br>
+Placing the kettle upon the fire, I watched it till it began to boil;
+then removing it from the top of the brands, I placed it close beside
+the fire, and leaving it simmering, I retired to my tent; where, having
+taken off my shoes, and a few of my garments, I lay down on my palliasse,
+and was not long in falling asleep.&nbsp; I believe I slept soundly
+for some time, thinking and dreaming of nothing; suddenly, however,
+my sleep became disturbed, and the subject of the patterans began to
+occupy my brain.&nbsp; I imagined that I saw Ursula tracing her husband,
+Launcelot Lovel, by means of his patterans; I imagined that she had
+considerable difficulty in doing so; that she was occasionally interrupted
+by parish beadles and constables, who asked her whither she was travelling,
+to whom she gave various answers.&nbsp; Presently methought that, as
+she was passing by a farm-yard, two fierce and savage dogs flew at her;
+I was in great trouble, I remember, and wished to assist her, but could
+not, for though I seemed to see her, I was still at a distance: and
+now it appeared that she had escaped from the dogs, and was proceeding
+with her cart along a gravelly path which traversed a wild moor; I could
+hear the wheels grating amidst sand and gravel.&nbsp; The next moment
+I was awake, and found myself sitting up in my tent; there was a glimmer
+of light through the canvas caused by the fire; a feeling of dread came
+over me, which was perhaps natural, on starting suddenly from one&rsquo;s
+sleep in that wild lone place; I half imagined that some one was nigh
+the tent; the idea made me rather uncomfortable, and, to dissipate it,
+I lifted up the canvas of the door and peeped out, and, lo! I had a
+distinct view of a tall figure standing by the tent.&nbsp; &ldquo;Who
+is that?&rdquo; said I, whilst I felt my blood rush to my heart.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; said the voice of Isopel Berners; &ldquo;you
+little expected me, I dare say; well, sleep on, I do not wish to disturb
+you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;But I was expecting you,&rdquo; said I, recovering
+myself, &ldquo;as you may see by the fire and kettle.&nbsp; I will be
+with you in a moment.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Putting on in haste the articles of dress which I had flung off, I came
+out of the tent, and addressing myself to Isopel, who was standing beside
+her cart, I said - &ldquo;just as I was about to retire to rest I thought
+it possible that you might come to-night, and got everything in readiness
+for you.&nbsp; Now, sit down by the fire whilst I lead the donkey and
+cart to the place where you stay; I will unharness the animal, and presently
+come and join you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I need not trouble you,&rdquo;
+said Isopel; &ldquo;I will go myself and see after my things.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;We will go together,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and then return and
+have some tea.&rdquo;&nbsp; Isopel made no objection, and in about half-an-hour
+we had arranged everything at her quarters, I then hastened and prepared
+tea.&nbsp; Presently Isopel rejoined me, bringing her stool; she had
+divested herself of her bonnet, and her hair fell over her shoulders;
+she sat down, and I poured out the beverage, handing her a cup.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Have you made a long journey to-night?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;A
+very long one,&rdquo; replied Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have come nearly
+twenty miles since six o&rsquo;clock.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I believe
+I heard you coming in my sleep,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;did the dogs above
+bark at you?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Isopel, &ldquo;very
+violently; did you think of me in your sleep?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;I was thinking of Ursula and something she had told me.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;When and where was that?&rdquo; said Isopel.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yesterday
+evening,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;beneath the dingle hedge.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Then you were talking with her beneath the hedge?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I was,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but only upon gypsy matters.&nbsp;
+Do you know, Belle, that she has just been married to Sylvester, so
+that you need not think that she and I - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;She and
+you are quite at liberty to sit where you please,&rdquo; said Isopel.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;However, young man,&rdquo; she continued, dropping her tone,
+which she had slightly raised, &ldquo;I believe what you said, that
+you were merely talking about gypsy matters, and also what you were
+going to say, if it was, as I suppose, that she and you had no particular
+acquaintance.&rdquo;&nbsp; Isopel was now silent for some time.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What are you thinking of?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I was thinking,&rdquo;
+said Belle, &ldquo;how exceedingly kind it was of you to get everything
+in readiness for me, though you did not know that I should come.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I had a presentiment that you would come,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;but
+you forget that I have prepared the kettle for you before, though it
+was true that I was then certain that you would come.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+had not forgotten your doing so, young man,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;but
+I was beginning to think that you were utterly selfish, caring for nothing
+but the gratification of your own selfish whims.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+am very fond of having my own way,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but utterly
+selfish I am not, as I dare say I shall frequently prove to you.&nbsp;
+You will often find the kettle boiling when you come home.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Not heated by you,&rdquo; said Isopel, with a sigh.&nbsp; &ldquo;By
+whom else?&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;surely you are not thinking of driving
+me away?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You have as much right here as myself,&rdquo;
+said Isopel, &ldquo;as I have told you before; but I must be going myself.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;we can go together; to tell you the
+truth, I am rather tired of this place.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Our paths
+must be separate,&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Separate,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;what do you mean?&nbsp; I shan&rsquo;t let you go alone, I
+shall go with you; and you know the road is as free to me as to you;
+besides, you can&rsquo;t think of parting company with me, considering
+how much you would lose by doing so; remember that you know scarcely
+anything of the Armenian language; now, to learn Armenian from me would
+take you twenty years.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Belle faintly smiled.&nbsp; &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;take
+another cup of tea.&rdquo;&nbsp; Belle took another cup of tea, and
+yet another; we had some indifferent conversation, after which I arose
+and gave her donkey a considerable feed of corn.&nbsp; Belle thanked
+me, shook me by the hand, and then went to her own tabernacle, and I
+returned to mine.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Visit to the Landlord - His Mortifications - Hunter and his Clan - Resolution.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On the following morning, after breakfasting with Belle, who was silent
+and melancholy, I left her in the dingle, and took a stroll amongst
+the neighbouring lanes.&nbsp; After some time I thought I would pay
+a visit to the landlord of the public-house, whom I had not seen since
+the day when he communicated to me his intention of changing his religion.&nbsp;
+I therefore directed my steps to the house, and on entering it found
+the landlord standing in the kitchen.&nbsp; Just then two mean-looking
+fellows, who had been drinking at one of the tables, and who appeared
+to be the only customers in the house, got up, brushed past the landlord,
+and saying in a surly tone, we shall pay you some time or other, took
+their departure.&nbsp; &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the way they serve me now,&rdquo;
+said the landlord, with a sigh.&nbsp; &ldquo;Do you know those fellows,&rdquo;
+I demanded, &ldquo;since you let them go away in your debt?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+ &ldquo;I know nothing about them,&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;save
+that they are a couple of scamps.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Then why did you
+let them go away without paying you?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I had
+not the heart to stop them,&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;and, to
+tell you the truth, everybody serves me so now, and I suppose they are
+right, for a child could flog me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Nonsense,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;behave more like a man, and with respect to those two
+fellows run after them, I will go with you, and if they refuse to pay
+the reckoning I will help you to shake some money out of their clothes.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;but as they are gone,
+let them go on.&nbsp; What they have drank is not of much consequence.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What is the matter with you?&rdquo; said I, staring at the landlord,
+who appeared strangely altered; his features were wild and haggard,
+his formerly bluff cheeks were considerably sunken in, and his figure
+had lost much of its plumpness.&nbsp; &ldquo;Have you changed your religion
+already, and has the fellow in black commanded you to fast?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I have not changed my religion yet,&rdquo; said the landlord,
+with a kind of shudder; &ldquo;I am to change it publicly this day fortnight,
+and the idea of doing so - I do not mind telling you - preys much upon
+my mind; moreover, the noise of the thing has got abroad, and everybody
+is laughing at me, and what&rsquo;s more, coming and drinking my beer,
+and going away without paying for it, whilst I feel myself like one
+bewitched, wishing but not daring to take my own part.&nbsp; Confound
+the fellow in black, I wish I had never seen him! yet what can I do
+without him?&nbsp; The brewer swears that unless I pay him fifty pounds
+within a fortnight he&rsquo;ll send a distress warrant into the house,
+and take all I have.&nbsp; My poor niece is crying in the room above;
+and I am thinking of going into the stable and hanging myself; and perhaps
+it&rsquo;s the best thing I can do, for it&rsquo;s better to hang myself
+before selling my soul than afterwards, as I&rsquo;m sure I should,
+like Judas Iscariot, whom my poor niece, who is somewhat religiously
+inclined, has been talking to me about.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I wish I
+could assist you,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;with money, but that is quite
+out of my power.&nbsp; However, I can give you a piece of advice.&nbsp;
+Don&rsquo;t change your religion by any means; you can&rsquo;t hope
+to prosper if you do; and if the brewer chooses to deal hardly with
+you, let him.&nbsp; Everybody would respect you ten times more provided
+you allowed yourself to be turned into the roads rather than change
+your religion, than if you got fifty pounds for renouncing it.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I am half inclined to take your advice,&rdquo; said the landlord,
+&ldquo;only, to tell you the truth, I feel quite low, without any heart
+in me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Come into the bar,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and
+let us have something together - you need not be afraid of my not paying
+for what I order.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+We went into the bar-room, where the landlord and I discussed between
+us two bottles of strong ale, which he said were part of the last six
+which he had in his possession.&nbsp; At first he wished to drink sherry,
+but I begged him to do no such thing, telling him that sherry would
+do him no good under the present circumstances; nor, indeed, to the
+best of my belief, under any, it being of all wines the one for which
+I entertained the most contempt.&nbsp; The landlord allowed himself
+to be dissuaded, and, after a glass or two of ale, confessed that sherry
+was a sickly, disagreeable drink, and that he had merely been in the
+habit of taking it from an idea he had that it was genteel.&nbsp; Whilst
+quaffing our beverage, he gave me an account of the various mortifications
+to which he had of late been subject, dwelling with particular bitterness
+on the conduct of Hunter, who he said came every night and mouthed him,
+and afterwards went away without paying for what he had drank or smoked,
+in which conduct he was closely imitated by a clan of fellows who constantly
+attended him.&nbsp; After spending several hours at the public-house
+I departed, not forgetting to pay for the two bottles of ale.&nbsp;
+The landlord, before I went, shaking me by the hand, declared that he
+had now made up his mind to stick to his religion at all hazards, the
+more especially as he was convinced he should derive no good by giving
+it up.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Preparations for the Fair - The Last Lesson - The Verb Siriel.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It might be about five in the evening, when I reached the gypsy encampment.&nbsp;
+Here I found Mr. Petulengro, Tawno Chikno, Sylvester, and others in
+a great bustle, clipping and trimming certain ponies and old horses
+which they had brought with them.&nbsp; On inquiring of Jasper the reason
+of their being so engaged, he informed me that they were getting the
+horses ready for a fair, which was to be held on the morrow, at a place
+some miles distant, at which they should endeavour to dispose of them,
+adding - &ldquo;Perhaps, brother, you will go with us, provided you
+have nothing better to do?&rdquo;&nbsp; Not having any particular engagement,
+I assured him that I should have great pleasure in being of the party.&nbsp;
+It was agreed that we should start early on the following morning.&nbsp;
+Thereupon I descended into the dingle.&nbsp; Belle was sitting before
+the fire, at which the kettle was boiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;Were you waiting
+for me?&rdquo; I inquired.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;I
+thought that you would come, and I waited for you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;That
+was very kind,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Not half so kind,&rdquo;
+said she, &ldquo;as it was of you to get everything ready for me in
+the dead of last night, when there was scarcely a chance of my coming.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The tea-things were brought forward, and we sat down.&nbsp; &ldquo;Have
+you been far?&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Merely to that public-house,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;to which you directed me on the second day of our acquaintance.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Young men should not make a habit of visiting public-houses,&rdquo;
+said Belle, &ldquo;they are bad places.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;They may
+be so to some people,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I do not think the worst
+public-house in England could do me any harm.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Perhaps
+you are so bad already,&rdquo; said Belle, with a smile, &ldquo;that
+it would be impossible to spoil you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How dare you
+catch at my words?&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;come, I will make you pay for
+doing so - you shall have this evening the longest lesson in Armenian
+which I have yet inflicted upon you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You may well
+say inflicted,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;but pray spare me.&nbsp; I
+do not wish to hear anything about Armenian, especially this evening.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Why this evening?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; Belle made no answer.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I will not spare you,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;this evening I intend
+to make you conjugate an Armenian verb.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, be
+it so,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;for this evening you shall command.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;To command is hramahyel,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ram her
+ill, indeed,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;I do not wish to begin with that.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;as we have come to the verbs, we will
+begin regularly; hramahyel is a verb of the second conjugation.&nbsp;
+We will begin with the first.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;First of all tell
+me,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;what a verb is?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;A
+part of speech,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;which, according to the dictionary,
+signifies some action or passion; for example, I command you, or I hate
+you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I have given you no cause to hate me,&rdquo;
+said Belle, looking me sorrowfully in the face.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I was merely giving two examples,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and neither
+was directed at you.&nbsp; In those examples, to command and hate are
+verbs.&nbsp; Belle, in Armenian there are four conjugations of verbs;
+the first ends in al, the second in yel, the third in oul, and the fourth
+in il.&nbsp; Now, have you understood me?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am afraid, indeed, it will all end ill,&rdquo; said Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Hold your tongue,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;or you will make me lose
+my patience.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You have already made me nearly lose
+mine,&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Let us have no unprofitable interruptions,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;the conjugations of the Armenian verbs are neither so
+numerous nor so difficult as the declensions of the nouns; hear that,
+and rejoice.&nbsp; Come, we will begin with the verb hntal, a verb of
+the first conjugation, which signifies to rejoice.&nbsp; Come along;
+hntam, I rejoice; hntas, thou rejoicest; why don&rsquo;t you follow,
+Belle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sure I don&rsquo;t rejoice, whatever you may do,&rdquo;
+said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;The chief difficulty, Belle,&rdquo; said I,
+&ldquo;that I find in teaching you the Armenian grammar, proceeds from
+your applying to yourself and me every example I give.&nbsp; Rejoice,
+in this instance, is merely an example of an Armenian verb of the first
+conjugation, and has no more to do with your rejoicing than lal, which
+is, also a verb of the first conjugation, and which signifies to weep,
+would have to do with your weeping, provided I made you conjugate it.&nbsp;
+Come along; hntam, I rejoice; hntas, thou rejoicest; hnt&agrave;, he
+rejoices; hntamk we rejoice: now, repeat those words.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;they sound more like
+the language of horses than human beings.&nbsp; Do you take me for -
+?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;For what?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; Belle was silent.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Were you going to say mare?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Mare!
+mare! by the bye, do you know, Belle, that mare in old English stands
+for woman; and that when we call a female an evil mare, the strict meaning
+of the term is merely a bad woman.&nbsp; So if I were to call you a
+mare without prefixing bad, you must not be offended.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;But
+I should though,&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;I was merely attempting
+to make you acquainted with a philological fact,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;If mare, which in old English, and likewise in vulgar English,
+signifies a woman, sounds the same as mare, which in modern and polite
+English signifies a female horse, I can&rsquo;t help it.&nbsp; There
+is no such confusion of sounds in Armenian, not, at least, in the same
+instance.&nbsp; Belle, in Armenian, woman is ghin, the same word, by
+the by, as our queen, whereas mare is madagh tzi, which signifies a
+female horse; and perhaps you will permit me to add, that a hard-mouthed
+jade is, in Armenian, madagh tzi hsdierah.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t bear this much longer,&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Keep yourself quiet,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I wish to be gentle
+with you; and to convince you, we will skip hntal, and also for the
+present verbs of the first conjugation and proceed to the second.&nbsp;
+Belle, I will now select for you to conjugate the prettiest verb in
+Armenian; not only of the second, but also of all the four conjugations;
+that verb is siriel.&nbsp; Here is the present tense:- siriem, siries,
+sir&egrave;, siriemk, sir&egrave;k, sirien.&nbsp; You observe that it
+runs on just in the same manner as hntal, save and except that the e
+is substituted for a; and it will be as well to tell you that almost
+the only difference between the second, third, and fourth conjugation,
+and the first, is the substituting in the present, preterite and other
+tenses e or ou, or i for a; so you see that the Armenian verbs are by
+no means difficult.&nbsp; Come on, Belle, and say siriem.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Belle hesitated.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pray oblige me, Belle, by saying siriem!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Belle still appeared to hesitate.&nbsp; &ldquo;You must admit, Belle,
+that it is much softer than hntam.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;It is so,&rdquo;
+said Belle; &ldquo;and to oblige you I will say siriem.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Very well indeed, Belle,&rdquo; said I. &ldquo;No vartabied,
+or doctor, could have pronounced it better; and now, to show you how
+verbs act upon pronouns in Armenian, I will say siriem zkiez.&nbsp;
+Please to repeat siriem zkiez!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Siriem zkiez!&rdquo;
+said Belle; &ldquo;that last word is very hard to say.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Sorry that you think so, Belle,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now
+please to say siri&agrave; zis.&rdquo;&nbsp; Belle did so.&nbsp; &ldquo;Exceedingly
+well,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now say, yerani th&egrave; sir&egrave;ir
+zis.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yerani th&egrave; sir&egrave;ir zis,&rdquo;
+said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Capital!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;you have now
+said, I love you - love me - ah! would that you would love me!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And I have said all these things?&rdquo; said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;you have said them in Armenian.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+would have said them in no language that I understood,&rdquo; said Belle;
+&ldquo;and it was very wrong of you to take advantage of my ignorance,
+and make me say such things.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Why so?&rdquo; said
+I; &ldquo;if you said them, I said them too.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+did so,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;but I believe you were merely bantering
+and jeering.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;As I told you before, Belle,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;the chief difficulty which I find in teaching you Armenian
+proceeds from your persisting in applying to yourself and me every example
+I give.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Then you meant nothing after all,&rdquo;
+said Belle, raising her voice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Let us proceed,&rdquo; said
+I; &ldquo;sirietsi, I loved.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You never loved any
+one but yourself,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;and what&rsquo;s more -
+&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Sirietsits, I will love,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;sirietsies,
+thou wilt love.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Never one so thoroughly heartless,&rdquo;
+said Belle.&nbsp; &ldquo;I tell you what, Belle, you are becoming intolerable,
+but we will change the verb; or rather I will now proceed to tell you
+here, that some of the Armenian conjugations have their anomalies; one
+species of these I wish to bring before your notice.&nbsp; As old Villotte
+says - from whose work I first contrived to pick up the rudiments of
+Armenian - &lsquo;Est verborum transitivorum, quorum infinitivus - &rsquo;
+but I forgot, you don&rsquo;t understand Latin.&nbsp; He says there
+are certain transitive verbs, whose infinitive is in outsaniel; the
+preterite in outsi; the imperative in one; for example - parghatsout-saniem,
+I irritate - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You do, you do,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;and it will be better
+for both of us, if you leave off doing so.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You would hardly believe, Belle,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that the
+Armenian is in some respects closely connected with the Irish, but so
+it is; for example, that word parghatsout-saniem is evidently derived
+from the same root as feargaim, which, in Irish, is as much as to say
+I vex.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You do, indeed,&rdquo; said Belle, sobbing.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But how do you account for it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;O man, man!&rdquo; said Belle, bursting into tears, &ldquo;for
+what purpose do you ask a poor ignorant girl such a question, unless
+it be to vex and irritate her?&nbsp; If you wish to display your learning,
+do so to the wise and instructed, and not to me, who can scarcely read
+or write.&nbsp; Oh, leave off your nonsense; yet I know you will not
+do so, for it is the breath of your nostrils!&nbsp; I could have wished
+we should have parted in kindness, but you will not permit it.&nbsp;
+I have deserved better at your hands than such treatment.&nbsp; The
+whole time we have kept company together in this place, I have scarcely
+had one kind word from you, but the strangest - &rdquo; and here the
+voice of Belle was drowned in her sobs.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sorry to see you take on so, dear Belle,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I really have given you no cause to be so unhappy; surely teaching
+you a little Armenian was a very innocent kind of diversion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, but you went on so long, and in such a strange way, and
+made me repeat such strange examples, as you call them, that I could
+not bear it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, to tell you the truth, Belle, it&rsquo;s just my way; and
+I have dealt with you just as I would with - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A hard-mouthed jade,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;and you practising
+your horse-witchery upon her.&nbsp; I have been of an unsubdued spirit,
+I acknowledge, but I was always kind to you; and if you have made me
+cry, it&rsquo;s a poor thing to boast of.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Boast of!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;a pretty thing indeed to boast
+of; I had no idea of making you cry.&nbsp; Come, I beg your pardon;
+what more can I do?&nbsp; Come, cheer up, Belle.&nbsp; You were talking
+of parting; don&rsquo;t let us part, but depart, and that together.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Our ways lie different,&rdquo; said Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t see why they should,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Come,
+let us he off to America together.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;To America together?&rdquo; said Belle, looking full at me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;where we will settle down in some
+forest, and conjugate the verb siriel conjugally.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Conjugally?&rdquo; said Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;as man and wife in America, air yew
+ghin.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You are jesting, as usual,&rdquo; said Belle.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not I, indeed.&nbsp; Come, Belle, make up your mind, and let
+us be off to America; and leave priests, humbug, learning, and languages
+behind us.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think you are jesting,&rdquo; said Belle; &ldquo;but
+I can hardly entertain your offers; however, young man, I thank you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You had better make up your mind at once,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and
+let us be off.&nbsp; I shan&rsquo;t make a bad husband, I assure you.&nbsp;
+Perhaps you think I am not worthy of you?&nbsp; To convince you, Belle,
+that I am, I am ready to try a fall with you this moment upon the grass.&nbsp;
+Brynhilda, the valkyrie, swore that no one should ever marry her who
+could not fling her down.&nbsp; Perhaps you have done the same.&nbsp;
+The man who eventually married her, got a friend of his, who was called
+Sygurd, the serpent-killer, to wrestle with her, disguising him in his
+own armour.&nbsp; Sygurd flung her down, and won her for his friend,
+though he loved her himself.&nbsp; I shall not use a similar deceit,
+nor employ Jasper Petulengro to personate me - so get up, Belle, and
+I will do my best to fling you down.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I require no such thing of you, or anybody,&rdquo; said Belle;
+&ldquo;you are beginning to look rather wild.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I every now and then do,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;come, Belle, what
+do you say?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I will say nothing at present on the subject,&rdquo; said Belle,
+&ldquo;I must have time to consider.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Just as you please,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;to-morrow I go to a
+fair with Mr. Petulengro, perhaps you will consider whilst I am away.&nbsp;
+Come, Belle, let us have some more tea.&nbsp; I wonder whether we shall
+be able to procure tea as good as this in the American forest.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Dawn of Day - The Last Farewell - Departure for the Fair - The Fine
+Horse - Return to the Dingle - No Isopel.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was about the dawn of day when I was awakened by the voice of Mr.
+Petulengro shouting from the top of the dingle, and bidding me get up.&nbsp;
+I arose instantly, and dressed myself for the expedition to the fair.&nbsp;
+On leaving my tent, I was surprised to observe Belle, entirely dressed,
+standing close to her own little encampment.&nbsp; &ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;I little expected to find you up so early.&nbsp; I suppose
+Jasper&rsquo;s call awakened you, as it did me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+merely lay down in my things,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;and have not
+slept during the night.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And why did you not take
+off your things and go to sleep?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I did not
+undress,&rdquo; said Belle, &ldquo;because I wished to be in readiness
+to bid you farewell when you departed; and as for sleeping, I could
+not.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, God bless you!&rdquo; said I, taking
+Belle by the hand.&nbsp; Belle made no answer, and I observed that her
+hand was very cold.&nbsp; &ldquo;What is the matter with you?&rdquo;
+said I, looking her in the face.&nbsp; Belle looked at me for a moment
+in the eyes - and then cast down her own - her features were very pale.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You are really unwell,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I had better not
+go to the fair, but stay here, and take care of you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo;
+said Belle, &ldquo;pray go, I am not unwell.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Then
+go to your tent,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and do not endanger your health
+by standing abroad in the raw morning air.&nbsp; God bless you, Belle.&nbsp;
+I shall be home to-night, by which time I expect you will have made
+up your mind; if not, another lesson in Armenian, however late the hour
+be.&rdquo;&nbsp; I then wrung Belle&rsquo;s hand, and ascended to the
+plain above.<br>
+<br>
+I found the Romany party waiting for me, and everything in readiness
+for departing.&nbsp; Mr. Petulengro and Tawno Chikno were mounted on
+two old horses.&nbsp; The rest, who intended to go to the fair, amongst
+whom were two or three women, were on foot.&nbsp; On arriving at the
+extremity of the plain, I looked towards the dingle.&nbsp; Isopel Berners
+stood at the mouth, the beams of the early morning sun shone full on
+her noble face and figure.&nbsp; I waved my hand towards her.&nbsp;
+She slowly lifted up her right arm.&nbsp; I turned away, and never saw
+Isopel Berners again.<br>
+<br>
+My companions and myself proceeded on our way.&nbsp; In about two hours
+we reached the place where the fair was to be held.&nbsp; After breakfasting
+on bread and cheese and ale behind a broken stone wall, we drove our
+animals to the fair.&nbsp; The fair was a common cattle and horse fair:
+there was little merriment going on, but there was no lack of business.&nbsp;
+By about two o&rsquo;clock in the afternoon, Mr. Petulengro and his
+people had disposed of their animals at what they conceived very fair
+prices - they were all in high spirits, and Jasper proposed to adjourn
+to a public-house.&nbsp; As we were proceeding to one, a very fine horse,
+led by a jockey, made its appearance on the ground.&nbsp; Mr. Petulengro
+stopped short, and looked at it stedfastly: &ldquo;Fino covar dove odoy
+sas miro - a fine thing were that if it were but mine!&rdquo; he exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;If you covet it,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;why do you not purchase
+it?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;We low &lsquo;Gyptians never buy animals of
+that description; if we did we could never sell them, and most likely
+should be had up as horse-stealers.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Then why did
+you say just now, &lsquo;It were a fine thing if it were but yours?&rsquo;&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;We &lsquo;Gyptians always say so when we see anything
+that we admire.&nbsp; An animal like that is not intended for a little
+hare like me, but for some grand gentleman like yourself.&nbsp; I say,
+brother, do you buy that horse!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How should I buy
+the horse, you foolish person?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Buy the horse,
+brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;if you have not the money
+I can lend it you, though I be of lower Egypt.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+talk nonsense,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;however, I wish you would ask the
+man the price of it.&rdquo;&nbsp;  Mr. Petulengro, going up to the jockey,
+inquired the price of the horse - the man, looking at him scornfully,
+made no reply.&nbsp; &ldquo;Young man,&rdquo; said I, going up to the
+jockey, &ldquo;do me the favour to tell me the price of that horse,
+as I suppose it is to sell.&rdquo;&nbsp; The jockey, who was a surly-looking
+man, of about fifty, looked at me for a moment, then, after some hesitation,
+said, laconically, &ldquo;Seventy.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo;
+said I, and turned away.&nbsp; &ldquo;Buy that horse,&rdquo; said Mr.
+Petulengro, coming after me; &ldquo;the dook tells me that in less than
+three months he will be sold for twice seventy.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+will have nothing to do with him,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;besides, Jasper,
+I don&rsquo;t like his tail.&nbsp; Did you observe what a mean scrubby
+tail he has?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;What a fool you are, brother,&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;that very tail of his shows his breeding.&nbsp;
+No good bred horse ever yet carried a fine tail - &lsquo;tis your scrubby-tailed
+horses that are your out-and-outers.&nbsp; Did you ever hear of Syntax,
+brother?&nbsp; That tail of his puts me in mind of Syntax.&nbsp; Well,
+I say nothing more, have your own way - all I wonder at is, that a horse
+like him was ever brought to such a fair of dog cattle as this.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+We then made the best of our way to a public-house, where we had some
+refreshment.&nbsp; I then proposed returning to the encampment, but
+Mr. Petulengro declined, and remained drinking with his companions till
+about six o&rsquo;clock in the evening, when various jockeys from the
+fair came in.&nbsp; After some conversation a jockey proposed a game
+of cards; and in a little time, Mr. Petulengro and another gypsy sat
+down to play a game of cards with two of the jockeys.<br>
+<br>
+Though not much acquainted with cards, I soon conceived a suspicion
+that the jockeys were cheating Mr. Petulengro and his companion, I therefore
+called Mr. Petulengro aside, and gave him a hint to that effect.&nbsp;
+Mr. Petulengro, however, instead of thanking me, told me to mind my
+own bread and butter, and forthwith returned to his game.&nbsp; I continued
+watching the players for some hours.&nbsp; The gypsies lost considerably,
+and I saw clearly that the jockeys were cheating them most confoundedly.&nbsp;
+I therefore once more called Mr. Petulengro aside, and told him that
+the jockeys were cheating him, conjuring him to return to the encampment.&nbsp;
+Mr. Petulengro, who was by this time somewhat the worse for liquor,
+now fell into a passion, swore several oaths, and asking me who had
+made me a Moses over him and his brethren, told me to return to the
+encampment by myself.&nbsp; Incensed at the unworthy return which my
+well-meant words had received, I forthwith left the house, and having
+purchased a few articles of provision, I set out for the dingle alone.&nbsp;
+It was a dark night when I reached it, and descending I saw the glimmer
+of a fire from the depths of the dingle; my heart beat with fond anticipation
+of a welcome.&nbsp; &ldquo;Isopel Berners is waiting for me,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;and the first words that I shall hear from her lips is
+that she has made up her mind.&nbsp; We shall go to America, and be
+so happy together.&rdquo;&nbsp; On reaching the bottom of the dingle,
+however, I saw seated near the fire, beside which stood the kettle simmering,
+not Isopel Berners, but a gypsy girl, who told me that Miss Berners
+when she went away had charged her to keep up the fire, and have the
+kettle boiling against my arrival.&nbsp; Startled at these words, I
+inquired at what hour Isopel had left, and whither she was gone, and
+was told that she had left the dingle, with her cart, about two hours
+after I departed; but where she was gone she, the girl, did not know.&nbsp;
+I then asked whether she had left no message, and the girl replied that
+she had left none, but had merely given directions about the kettle
+and fire, putting, at the same time, six-pence into her hand.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Very strange,&rdquo; thought I; then dismissing the gypsy girl
+I sat down by the fire.&nbsp; I had no wish for tea, but sat looking
+on the embers, wondering what could be the motive of the sudden departure
+of Isopel.&nbsp; &ldquo;Does she mean to return?&rdquo; thought I to
+myself.&nbsp; &ldquo;Surely she means to return,&rdquo; Hope replied,
+&ldquo;or she would not have gone away without leaving any message&rdquo;
+- &ldquo;and yet she could scarcely mean to return,&rdquo; muttered
+Foreboding, &ldquo;or she assuredly would have left some message with
+the girl.&rdquo;&nbsp; I then thought to myself what a hard thing it
+would be, if, after having made up my mind to assume the yoke of matrimony,
+I should be disappointed of the woman of my choice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+after all,&rdquo; thought I, &ldquo;I can scarcely be disappointed;
+if such an ugly scoundrel as Sylvester had no difficulty in getting
+such a nice wife as Ursula, surely I, who am not a tenth part so ugly,
+cannot fail to obtain the hand of Isopel Berners, uncommonly fine damsel
+though she be.&nbsp; Husbands do not grow upon hedgerows; she is merely
+gone after a little business and will return to-morrow.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Comforted in some degree by these hopeful imaginings, I retired to my
+tent, and went to sleep.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Gloomy Forebodings - The Postman&rsquo;s Mother - The Letter - Bears
+and Barons - The Best of Advice.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Nothing occurred to me of any particular moment during the following
+day.&nbsp; Isopel Berners did not return; but Mr. Petulengro and his
+companions came home from the fair early in the morning.&nbsp; When
+I saw him, which was about midday, I found him with his face bruised
+and swelled.&nbsp; It appeared that, some time after I had left him,
+he himself perceived that the jockeys with whom he was playing cards
+were cheating him and his companion; a quarrel ensued, which terminated
+in a fight between Mr. Petulengro and one of the jockeys, which lasted
+some time, and in which Mr. Petulengro, though he eventually came off
+victor, was considerably beaten.&nbsp; His bruises, in conjunction with
+his pecuniary loss, which amounted to about seven pounds, were the cause
+of his being much out of humour; before night, however, he had returned
+to his usual philosophic frame of mind, and, coming up to me as I was
+walking about, apologized for his behaviour on the preceding day, and
+assured me that he was determined, from that time forward, never to
+quarrel with a friend for giving him good advice.<br>
+<br>
+Two more days passed, and still Isopel Berners did not return.&nbsp;
+Gloomy thoughts and forebodings filled my mind.&nbsp; During the day
+I wandered about the neighbouring roads in the hopes of catching an
+early glimpse of her and her returning vehicle; and at night lay awake,
+tossing about on my hard couch, listening to the rustle of every leaf,
+and occasionally thinking that I heard the sound of her wheels upon
+the distant road.&nbsp; Once at midnight, just as I was about to fall
+into unconsciousness, I suddenly started up, for I was convinced that
+I heard the sound of wheels.&nbsp; I listened most anxiously, and the
+sound of wheels striking against stones was certainly plain enough.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;She comes at last,&rdquo; thought I, and for a few moments I
+felt as if a mountain had been removed from my breast; - &ldquo;here
+she comes at last, now, how shall I receive her?&nbsp; Oh,&rdquo; thought
+I, &ldquo;I will receive her rather coolly, just as if I was not particularly
+anxious about her - that&rsquo;s the way to manage these women.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The next moment the sound became very loud, rather too loud, I thought,
+to proceed from her wheels, and then by degrees became fainter.&nbsp;
+Rushing out of my tent, I hurried up the path to the top of the dingle,
+where I heard the sound distinctly enough, but it was going from me,
+and evidently proceeded from something much larger than the cart of
+Isopel.&nbsp; I could, moreover, hear the stamping of a horse&rsquo;s
+hoof at a lumbering trot.&nbsp; Those only whose hopes have been wrought
+up to a high pitch, and then suddenly cast down, can imagine what I
+felt at that moment; and yet when I returned to my lonely tent, and
+lay down on my hard pallet, the voice of conscience told me that the
+misery I was then undergoing I had fully merited, for the unkind manner
+in which I had intended to receive her, when for a brief moment I supposed
+that she had returned.<br>
+<br>
+It was on the morning after this affair, and the fourth, if I forget
+not, from the time of Isopel&rsquo;s departure, that, as I was seated
+on my stone at the bottom of the dingle, getting my breakfast, I heard
+an unknown voice from the path above - apparently that of a person descending
+- exclaim, &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s a strange place to bring a letter to;&rdquo;
+and presently an old woman, with a belt round her middle, to which was
+attached a leathern bag, made her appearance, and stood before me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, if I ever!&rdquo; said she, as she looked about her.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My good gentlewoman,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;pray what may you
+please to want?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Gentlewoman!&rdquo; said the old
+dame, &ldquo;please to want - well, I call that speaking civilly, at
+any rate.&nbsp; It is true, civil words cost nothing; nevertheless,
+we do not always get them.&nbsp; What I please to want is to deliver
+a letter to a young man in this place; perhaps you be he?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What&rsquo;s the name on the letter?&rdquo; said I, getting up,
+and going to her.&nbsp; &ldquo;There&rsquo;s no name upon it,&rdquo;
+said she, taking a letter out of her scrip, and looking at it.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It is directed to the young man in Mumper&rsquo;s Dingle.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Then it is for me, I make no doubt,&rdquo; said I, stretching
+out my hand to take it.&nbsp; &ldquo;Please to pay me ninepence first,&rdquo;
+said the old woman.&nbsp; &ldquo;However,&rdquo; said she, after a moment&rsquo;s
+thought, &ldquo;civility is civility, and, being rather a scarce article,
+should meet with some return.&nbsp; Here&rsquo;s the letter, young man,
+and I hope you will pay for it; for if you do not I must pay the postage
+myself.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You are the postwoman, I suppose,&rdquo;
+said I, as I took the letter.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am the postman&rsquo;s
+mother,&rdquo; said the old woman; &ldquo;but as he has a wide beat,
+I help him as much as I can, and I generally carry letters to places
+like this, to which he is afraid to come himself.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+say the postage is ninepence,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;here&rsquo;s a shilling.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well, I call that honourable,&rdquo; said the old woman, taking
+the shilling, and putting it into her pocket - &ldquo;here&rsquo;s your
+change, young man,&rdquo; said she, offering me threepence.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pray
+keep that for yourself,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;you deserve it for your
+trouble.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, I call that genteel,&rdquo; said
+the old woman; &ldquo;and as one good turn deserves another, since you
+look as if you couldn&rsquo;t read, I will read your letter for you.&nbsp;
+Let&rsquo;s see it; it&rsquo;s from some young woman or other, I dare
+say.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I can
+read.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;All the better for you,&rdquo; said the old
+woman; &ldquo;your being able to read will frequently save you a penny,
+for that&rsquo;s the charge I generally make for reading letters; though,
+as you behaved so genteelly to me, I should have charged you nothing.&nbsp;
+Well, if you can read, why don&rsquo;t you open the letter, instead
+of keeping it hanging between your finger and thumb?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+am in no hurry to open it,&rdquo; said I, with a sigh.&nbsp; The old
+woman looked at me for a moment - &ldquo;Well, young man,&rdquo; said
+she, &ldquo;there are some - especially those who can read - who don&rsquo;t
+like to open their letters when anybody is by, more especially when
+they come from young women.&nbsp; Well, I won&rsquo;t intrude upon you,
+but leave you alone with your letter.&nbsp; I wish it may contain something
+pleasant.&nbsp; God bless you,&rdquo; and with these words she departed.<br>
+<br>
+I sat down on my stone, with my letter in my hand.&nbsp; I knew perfectly
+well that it could have come from no other person than Isopel Berners;
+but what did the letter contain?&nbsp; I guessed tolerably well what
+its purport was - an eternal farewell! yet I was afraid to open the
+letter, lest my expectation should be confirmed.&nbsp; There I sat with
+the letter, putting off the evil moment as long as possible.&nbsp; At
+length I glanced at the direction, which was written in a fine bold
+hand, and was directed, as the old woman had said, to the young man
+in &ldquo;Mumpers&rsquo; Dingle,&rdquo; with the addition, near -, in
+the county of -&nbsp; Suddenly the idea occurred to me, that, after
+all, the letter might not contain an eternal farewell; and that Isopel
+might have written, requesting me to join her.&nbsp; Could it be so?&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Alas! no,&rdquo; presently said Foreboding.&nbsp; At last I became
+ashamed of my weakness.&nbsp; The letter must be opened sooner or later.&nbsp;
+Why not at once?&nbsp; So as the bather who, for a considerable time,
+has stood shivering on the bank, afraid to take the decisive plunge,
+suddenly takes it, I tore open the letter almost before I was aware.&nbsp;
+I had no sooner done so than a paper fell out.&nbsp; I examined it;
+it contained a lock of bright flaxen hair.&nbsp; &ldquo;This is no good
+sign,&rdquo; said I, as I thrust the lock and paper into my bosom, and
+proceeded to read the letter, which ran as follows: -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;TO THE YOUNG MAN IN MUMPERS&rsquo; DINGLE.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;SIR, - I send these lines, with the hope and trust that they
+will find you well, even as I am myself at this moment, and in much
+better spirits, for my own are not such as I could wish they were, being
+sometimes rather hysterical and vapourish, and at other times, and most
+often, very low.&nbsp; I am at a sea-port, and am just going on shipboard;
+and when you get these I shall be on the salt waters, on my way to a
+distant country, and leaving my own behind me, which I do not expect
+ever to see again.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And now, young man, I will, in the first place, say something
+about the manner in which I quitted you.&nbsp; It must have seemed somewhat
+singular to you that I went away without taking any leave, or giving
+you the slightest hint that I was going; but I did not do so without
+considerable reflection.&nbsp; I was afraid that I should not be able
+to support a leave-taking; and as you had said that you were determined
+to go wherever I did, I thought it best not to tell you at all; for
+I did not think it advisable that you should go with me, and I wished
+to have no dispute.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In the second place, I wish to say something about an offer of
+wedlock which you made me; perhaps, young man, had you made it at the
+first period of our acquaintance, I should have accepted it, but you
+did not, and kept putting off and putting off, and behaving in a very
+strange manner, till I could stand your conduct no longer, but determined
+upon leaving you and Old England, which last step I had been long thinking
+about; so when you made your offer at last, everything was arranged
+- my cart and donkey engaged to be sold - and the greater part of my
+things disposed of.&nbsp; However, young man, when you did make it,
+I frankly tell you that I had half a mind to accept it; at last, however,
+after very much consideration, I thought it best to leave you for ever,
+because, for some time past, I had become almost convinced, that though
+with a wonderful deal of learning, and exceedingly shrewd in some things,
+you were - pray don&rsquo;t be offended - at the root mad! and though
+mad people, I have been told, sometimes make very good husbands, I was
+unwilling that your friends, if you had any, should say that Belle Berners,
+the workhouse girl, took advantage of your infirmity; for there is no
+concealing that I was born and bred up in a workhouse; notwithstanding
+that, my blood is better than your own, and as good as the best; you
+having yourself told me that my name is a noble name, and once, if I
+mistake not, that it was the same word as baron, which is the same thing
+as bear; and that to be called in old times a bear was considered a
+great compliment - the bear being a mighty strong animal, on which account
+our forefathers called all their great fighting-men barons, which is
+the same as bears.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;However, setting matters of blood and family entirely aside,
+many thanks to you, young man, from poor Belle, for the honour you did
+her in making that same offer; for, after all, it is an honour to receive
+an honourable offer, which she could see clearly yours was, with no
+floriness nor chaff in it; but, on the contrary, entire sincerity.&nbsp;
+She assures you that she shall always bear it and yourself in mind,
+whether on land or water; and as a proof of the good-will she bears
+to you, she sends you a lock of the hair which she wears on her head,
+which you were often looking at, and were pleased to call flax, which
+word she supposes you meant as a compliment, even as the old people
+meant to pass a compliment to their great folks, when they called them
+bears; though she cannot help thinking that they might have found an
+animal as strong as a bear, and somewhat less uncouth, to call their
+great folks after: even as she thinks yourself, amongst your great store
+of words, might have found something a little more genteel to call her
+hair after than flax, which, though strong and useful, is rather a coarse
+and common kind of article.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And as another proof of the good-will she bears to you, she sends
+you, along with the lock, a piece of advice, which is worth all the
+hair in the world, to say nothing of the flax.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;<i>Fear God</i>, and take your own part.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s
+Bible in that, young man: see how Moses feared God, and how he took
+his own part against everybody who meddled with him.&nbsp; And see how
+David feared God, and took his own part against all the bloody enemies
+which surrounded him - so fear God, young man, and never give in!&nbsp;
+The world can bully, and is fond, provided it sees a man in a kind of
+difficulty, of getting about him, calling him coarse names, and even
+going so far as to hustle him: but the world, like all bullies, carries
+a white feather in its tail, and no sooner sees the man taking off his
+coat, and offering to fight its best, than it scatters here and there,
+and is always civil to him afterwards.&nbsp; So when folks are disposed
+to ill-treat you, young man, say, &lsquo;Lord have mercy upon me!&rsquo;
+and then tip them to Long Melford, which, as the saying goes, there
+is nothing comparable for shortness all the world over; and these last
+words, young man, are the last you will ever have from her who is nevertheless,<br>
+<br>
+Your affectionate female servant,<br>
+<br>
+ISOPEL BERNERS.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+After reading the letter I sat for some time motionless, holding it
+in my hand.&nbsp; The daydream in which I had been a little time before
+indulging, of marrying Isopel Berners, of going with her to America,
+and having by her a large progeny, who were to assist me in felling
+trees, cultivating the soil, and who would take care of me when I was
+old, was now thoroughly dispelled.&nbsp; Isopel had deserted me, and
+was gone to America by herself, where, perhaps, she would marry some
+other person, and would bear him a progeny, who would do for him what
+in my dream I had hoped my progeny by her would do for me.&nbsp; Then
+the thought came into my head that though she was gone, I might follow
+her to America, but then I thought that if I did I might not find her;
+America was a very large place, and I did not know the port to which
+she was bound; but I could follow her to the port from which she had
+sailed, and there possibly discover the port to which she was bound;
+but I did not even know the port from which she had set out, for Isopel
+had not dated her letter from any place.&nbsp; Suddenly it occurred
+to me that the post-mark on the letter would tell me from whence it
+came, so I forthwith looked at the back of the letter, and in the post-mark
+read the name of a well-known and not very distant sea-port.&nbsp; I
+then knew with tolerable certainty the port where she had embarked,
+and I almost determined to follow her, but I almost instantly determined
+to do no such thing.&nbsp; Isopel Berners had abandoned me, and I would
+not follow her; &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; whispered Pride, &ldquo;if I
+overtook her, she would only despise me for running after her;&rdquo;
+and it also told me pretty roundly, provided I ran after her, whether
+I overtook her or not, I should heartily despise myself.&nbsp; So I
+determined not to follow Isopel Berners; I took her lock of hair, and
+looked at it, then put it in her letter, which I folded up and carefully
+stowed away, resolved to keep both for ever, but I determined not to
+follow her.&nbsp; Two or three times, however, during the day, I wavered
+in my determination, and was again and again almost tempted to follow
+her, but every succeeding time the temptation was fainter.&nbsp; In
+the evening I left the dingle, and sat down with Mr. Petulengro and
+his family by the door of his tent; Mr. Petulengro soon began talking
+of the letter which I had received in the morning.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is it
+not from Miss Berners, brother?&rdquo; said he.&nbsp; I told him it
+was.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is she coming back, brother?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Never,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;she is gone to America, and has deserted me.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I always knew that you two were never destined for each other,&rdquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &ldquo;How did you know that?&rdquo; I inquired.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;The dook told me so, brother; you are born to be a great traveller.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if I had gone with her to America,
+as I was thinking of doing, I should have been a great traveller.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You are to travel in another direction, brother,&rdquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &ldquo;I wish you would tell me all about my future wanderings,&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro,
+&ldquo;there&rsquo;s a power of clouds before my eye.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+are a poor seer, after all,&rdquo; said I; and getting up, I retired
+to my dingle and my tent, where I betook myself to my bed, and there,
+knowing the worst, and being no longer agitated by apprehension, nor
+agonized by expectation, I was soon buried in a deep slumber, the first
+which I had fallen into for several nights.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Public-house - Landlord on His Legs Again - A Blow in Season - The
+Way of the World - The Grateful Mind - The Horse&rsquo;s Neigh.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was rather late on the following morning when I awoke.&nbsp; At first
+I was almost unconscious of what had occurred on the preceding day;
+recollection, however, by degrees returned, and I felt a deep melancholy
+coming over me, but perfectly aware that no advantage could be derived
+from the indulgence of such a feeling, I sprang up, prepared my breakfast,
+which I ate with a tolerable appetite, and then left the dingle, and
+betook myself to the gypsy encampment, where I entered into discourse
+with various Romanies, both male and female.&nbsp; After some time,
+feeling myself in better spirits, I determined to pay another visit
+to the landlord of the public-house.&nbsp; From the position of his
+affairs when I had last visited him I entertained rather gloomy ideas
+with respect to his present circumstances.&nbsp; I imagined that I should
+either find him alone in his kitchen smoking a wretched pipe, or in
+company with some surly bailiff or his follower, whom his friend the
+brewer had sent into the house in order to take possession of his effects.<br>
+<br>
+Nothing more entirely differing from either of these anticipations could
+have presented itself to my view than what I saw about one o&rsquo;clock
+in the afternoon, when I entered the house.&nbsp; I had come, though
+somewhat in want of consolation myself, to offer any consolation which
+was at my command to my acquaintance Catchpole, and perhaps like many
+other people who go to a house with &ldquo;drops of compassion trembling
+on their eyelids,&rdquo; I felt rather disappointed at finding that
+no compassion was necessary.&nbsp; The house was thronged with company,
+and cries for ale and porter, hot brandy and water, cold gin and water,
+were numerous; moreover, no desire to receive and not to pay for the
+landlord&rsquo;s liquids was manifested - on the contrary, everybody
+seemed disposed to play the most honourable part: &ldquo;Landlord, here&rsquo;s
+the money for this glass of brandy and water - do me the favour to take
+it; all right, remember I have paid you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Landlord,
+here&rsquo;s the money for the pint of half-and-half-fourpence halfpenny,
+ain&rsquo;t it? - here&rsquo;s sixpence; keep the change - confound
+the change!&rdquo;&nbsp; The landlord, assisted by his niece, bustled
+about; his brow erect, his cheeks plumped out, and all his features
+exhibiting a kind of surly satisfaction.&nbsp; Wherever he moved, marks
+of the most cordial amity were shown him, hands were thrust out to grasp
+his, nor were looks of respect, admiration, nay, almost of adoration,
+wanting.&nbsp; I observed one fellow, as the landlord advanced, take
+the pipe out of his mouth, and gaze upon him with a kind of grin of
+wonder, probably much the same as his ancestor, the Saxon lout of old,
+put on when he saw his idol Thur, dressed in a new kirtle.&nbsp; To
+avoid the press, I got into a corner, where on a couple of chairs sat
+two respectable-looking individuals, whether farmers or sow-gelders,
+I know not, but highly respectable-looking, who were discoursing about
+the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Such another,&rdquo; said one, &ldquo;you
+will not find in a summer&rsquo;s day.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No, nor in
+the whole of England,&rdquo; said the other.&nbsp; &ldquo;Tom of Hopton,&rdquo;
+said the first: &ldquo;ah!&nbsp; Tom of Hopton,&rdquo; echoed the other;
+&ldquo;the man who could beat Tom of Hopton could beat the world.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I glory in him,&rdquo; said the first.&nbsp; &ldquo;So do I,&rdquo;
+said the second, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll back him against the world.&nbsp;
+Let me hear any one say anything against him, and if I don&rsquo;t -
+&rdquo; then, looking at me, he added, &ldquo;have you anything to say
+against him, young man?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Not a word,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;save that he regularly puts me out.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He&rsquo;ll
+put any one out,&rdquo; said the man, &ldquo;any one out of conceit
+with himself;&rdquo; then, lifting a mug to his mouth, he added, with
+a hiccough, &ldquo;I drink his health.&rdquo;&nbsp; Presently the landlord,
+as he moved about, observing me, stopped short: &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said
+he, &ldquo;are you here?&nbsp; I am glad to see you, come this way.&nbsp;
+Stand back,&rdquo; said he to his company, as I followed him to the
+bar, &ldquo;stand back for me and this gentleman.&rdquo;&nbsp; Two or
+three young fellows were in the bar, seemingly sporting yokels, drinking
+sherry and smoking.&nbsp; &ldquo;Come, gentlemen,&rdquo; said the landlord,
+&ldquo;clear the bar, I must have a clear bar for me and my friend here.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Landlord, what will you take,&rdquo; said one, &ldquo;a glass
+of sherry?&nbsp; I know you like it.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;- sherry and
+you too,&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;I want neither sherry nor
+yourself; didn&rsquo;t you hear what I told you?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;All
+right, old fellow,&rdquo; said the other, shaking the landlord by the
+hand, &ldquo;all right, don&rsquo;t wish to intrude - but I suppose
+when you and your friend have done, I may come in again;&rdquo; then,
+with a &ldquo;sarvant, sir,&rdquo; to me, he took himself into the kitchen,
+followed by the rest of the sporting yokels.<br>
+<br>
+Thereupon the landlord, taking a bottle of ale from a basket, uncorked
+it, and pouring the contents into two large glasses, handed me one,
+and motioning me to sit down, placed himself by me; then, emptying his
+own glass at a draught, he gave a kind of grunt of satisfaction, and
+fixing his eyes upon the opposite side of the bar, remained motionless,
+without saying a word, buried apparently in important cogitations.&nbsp;
+With respect to myself, I swallowed my ale more leisurely, and was about
+to address my friend, when his niece, coming into the bar, said that
+more and more customers were arriving, and how she should supply their
+wants she did not know, unless her uncle would get and help her.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The customers!&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;let the scoundrels
+wait till you have time to serve them, or till I have leisure to see
+after them.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;The kitchen won&rsquo;t contain half
+of them,&rdquo; said his niece.&nbsp; &ldquo;Then let them sit out abroad,&rdquo;
+said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;But there are not benches enough, uncle,&rdquo;
+said the niece.&nbsp; &ldquo;Then let them stand or sit on the ground,&rdquo;
+said the uncle, &ldquo;what care I; I&rsquo;ll let them know that the
+man who beat Tom of Hopton stands as well again on his legs as ever.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Then opening a side door which led from the bar into the back yard,
+he beckoned me to follow him.&nbsp; &ldquo;You treat your customers
+in rather a cavalier manner,&rdquo; said I, when we were alone together
+in the yard.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t I?&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;and I&rsquo;ll
+treat them more so yet; now I have got the whiphand of the rascals I
+intend to keep it.&nbsp; I dare say you are a bit surprised with regard
+to the change which has come over things since you were last here.&nbsp;
+I&rsquo;ll tell you how it happened.&nbsp; You remember in what a desperate
+condition you found me, thinking of changing my religion, selling my
+soul to the man in black, and then going and hanging myself like Pontius
+Pilate; and I dare say you can&rsquo;t have forgotten how you gave me
+good advice, made me drink ale, and give up sherry.&nbsp; Well, after
+you were gone, I felt all the better for your talk, and what you had
+made me drink, and it was a mercy that I did feel better; for my niece
+was gone out, poor thing, and I was left alone in the house, without
+a soul to look at, or to keep me from doing myself a mischief in case
+I was so inclined.&nbsp; Well, things wore on in this way till it grew
+dusk, when in came that blackguard Hunter with his train to drink at
+my expense, and to insult me as usual; there were more than a dozen
+of them, and a pretty set they looked.&nbsp; Well, they ordered about
+in a very free and easy manner for upwards of an hour and a half, occasionally
+sneering and jeering at me, as they had been in the habit of doing for
+some time past; so, as I said before, things wore on, and other customers
+came in, who, though they did not belong to Hunter&rsquo;s gang, also
+passed off their jokes upon me; for, as you perhaps know, we English
+are a set of low hounds, who will always take part with the many by
+way of making ourselves safe, and currying favour with the stronger
+side.&nbsp; I said little or nothing, for my spirits had again become
+very low, and I was verily scared and afraid.&nbsp; All of a sudden
+I thought of the ale which I had drank in the morning, and of the good
+it did me then, so I went into the bar, opened another bottle, took
+a glass, and felt better; so I took another, and feeling better still,
+I went back into the kitchen, just as Hunter and his crew were about
+leaving.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr. Hunter,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you and your
+people will please to pay me for what you have had?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+do you mean by my people?&rsquo; said he, with an oath.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ah,
+what do you mean by calling us his people?&rsquo; said the clan.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;We are nobody&rsquo;s people;&rsquo; and then there was a pretty
+load of abuse, and threatening to serve me out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,&rsquo;
+said I, &lsquo;I was perhaps wrong to call them your people, and beg
+your pardon and theirs.&nbsp; And now you will please to pay me for
+what you have had yourself, and afterwards I can settle with them.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I shall pay you when I think fit,&rsquo; said Hunter.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes,&rsquo;
+said the rest, &lsquo;and so shall we.&nbsp; We shall pay you when we
+think fit.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I tell you what,&rsquo; said Hunter,
+&lsquo;I conceives I do such an old fool as you an honour when I comes
+into his house and drinks his beer, and goes away without paying for
+it;&rsquo; and then there was a roar of laughter from everybody, and
+almost all said the same thing.&nbsp; &lsquo;Now do you please to pay
+me, Mr. Hunter?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Pay you!&rsquo; said Hunter;
+&lsquo;pay you!&nbsp; Yes, here&rsquo;s the pay;&rsquo; and thereupon
+he held out his thumb, twirling it round till it just touched my nose.&nbsp;
+I can&rsquo;t tell you what I felt that moment; a kind of madhouse thrill
+came upon me, and all I know is, that I bent back as far as I could,
+then lunging out, struck him under the ear, sending him reeling two
+or three yards, when he fell on the floor.&nbsp; I wish you had but
+seen how my company looked at me and at each other.&nbsp; One or two
+of the clan went to raise Hunter, and get him to fight, but it was no
+go; though he was not killed, he had had enough for that evening.&nbsp;
+Oh, I wish you had seen my customers; those who did not belong to the
+clan, but who had taken part with them, and helped to jeer and flout
+me, now came and shook me by the hand, wishing me joy, and saying as,
+how &lsquo;I was a brave fellow, and had served the bully right!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+As for the clan, they all said Hunter was bound to do me justice; so
+they made him pay me what he owed for himself, and the reckoning of
+those among them who said they had no money.&nbsp; Two or three of them
+then led him away, while the rest stayed behind, and flattered me, and
+worshipped me, and called Hunter all kinds of dogs&rsquo; names.&nbsp;
+What do you think of that?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;it makes good what I read in a letter
+which I received yesterday.&nbsp; It is just the way of the world.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A&rsquo;n&rsquo;t it,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+that a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t all; let me go on.&nbsp; Good fortune never yet
+came alone.&nbsp; In about an hour comes home my poor niece, almost
+in high sterricks with joy, smiling and sobbing.&nbsp; She had been
+to the clergyman of M---, the great preacher, to whose church she was
+in the habit of going, and to whose daughters she was well known; and
+to him she told a lamentable tale about my distresses, and about the
+snares which had been laid for my soul; and so well did she plead my
+cause, and so strong did the young ladies back all she said, that the
+good clergyman promised to stand my friend, and to lend me sufficient
+money to satisfy the brewer, and to get my soul out of the snares of
+the man in black; and sure enough the next morning the two young ladies
+brought me the fifty pounds, which I forthwith carried to the brewer,
+who was monstrously civil, saying that he hoped any little misunderstanding
+we had had would not prevent our being good friends in future.&nbsp;
+That a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t all; the people of the neighbouring county hearing
+as if by art witchcraft that I had licked Hunter, and was on good terms
+with the brewer, forthwith began to come in crowds to look at me, pay
+me homage, and be my customers.&nbsp; Moreover, fifty scoundrels who
+owed me money, and would have seen me starve rather than help me as
+long as they considered me a down pin, remembered their debts, and came
+and paid me more than they owed.&nbsp; That a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t all; the
+brewer being about to establish a stage-coach and three, to run across
+the country, says it shall stop and change horses at my house, and the
+passengers breakfast and sup as it goes and returns.&nbsp; He wishes
+me - whom he calls the best man in England - to give his son lessons
+in boxing, which he says he considers a fine manly English art, and
+a great defence against Popery - notwithstanding that only a month ago,
+when he considered me a down pin, he was in the habit of railing against
+it as a blackguard practice, and against me as a blackguard for following
+it; so I am going to commence with young hopeful to-morrow.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I really cannot help congratulating you on your good fortune,&rdquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t all,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;This
+very morning the folks of our parish made me churchwarden, which they
+would no more have done a month ago, when they considered me a down
+pin, than they - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Mercy upon us!&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if fortune pours in upon
+you in this manner, who knows but that within a year they may make you
+a justice of the peace?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Who knows, indeed!&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+I will prove myself worthy of my good luck by showing the grateful mind
+- not to those who would be kind to me now, but to those who were, when
+the days were rather gloomy.&nbsp; My customers shall have abundance
+of rough language, but I&rsquo;ll knock any one down who says anything
+against the clergyman who lent me the fifty pounds, or against the Church
+of England, of which he is parson and I am churchwarden.&nbsp; I am
+also ready to do anything in reason for him who paid me for the ale
+he drank, when I shouldn&rsquo;t have had the heart to collar him for
+the money had he refused to pay; who never jeered or flouted me like
+the rest of my customers when I was a down pin - and though he refused
+to fight cross <i>for</i> me was never cross <i>with</i> me, but listened
+to all I had to say, and gave me all kinds of good advice.&nbsp; Now
+who do you think I mean by this last? why, who but yourself - who on
+earth but yourself?&nbsp; The parson is a good man and a great preacher,
+and I&rsquo;ll knock anybody down who says to the contrary; and I mention
+him first, because why; he&rsquo;s a gentleman, and you a tinker.&nbsp;
+But I am by no means sure you are not the best friend of the two; for
+I doubt, do you see, whether I should have had the fifty pounds but
+for you.&nbsp; You persuaded me to give up that silly drink they call
+sherry, and drink ale; and what was it but drinking ale which gave me
+courage to knock down that fellow Hunter - and knocking him down was,
+I verily believe, the turning point of my disorder.&nbsp; God don&rsquo;t
+love them who won&rsquo;t strike out for themselves; and as far as I
+can calculate with respect to time, it was just the moment after I had
+knocked down Hunter, that the parson consented to lend me the money,
+and everything began to grow civil to me.&nbsp; So, dash my buttons
+if I show the ungrateful mind to you!&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t offer to knock
+anybody down for you, because why - I dare say you can knock a body
+down yourself; but I&rsquo;ll offer something more to the purpose; as
+my business is wonderfully on the increase, I shall want somebody to
+help me in serving my customers, and keeping them in order.&nbsp; If
+you choose to come and serve for your board, and what they&rsquo;ll
+give you, give me your fist; or if you like ten shillings a week better
+than their sixpences and ha&rsquo;pence, only say so - though, to be
+open with you, I believe you would make twice ten shillings out of them
+- the sneaking, fawning, curry-favouring humbugs!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am much obliged to you,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for your handsome
+offer, which, however, I am obliged to decline.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why so?&rdquo; said the landlord.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am not fit for service,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;moreover, I am
+about to leave this part of the country.&rdquo;&nbsp; As I spoke a horse
+neighed in the stable.&nbsp; &ldquo;What horse is that?&rdquo; said
+I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It belongs to a cousin of mine, who put it into my hands yesterday
+in the hopes that I might get rid of it for him, though he would no
+more have done so a week ago, when he considered me a down pin, than
+he would have given the horse away.&nbsp; Are you fond of horses?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Very much,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then come and look at it.&rdquo;&nbsp; He led me into the stable,
+where, in a stall, stood a noble-looking animal.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I saw this horse at - fair.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Like enough,&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;he was there and
+was offered for seventy pounds, but didn&rsquo;t find a bidder at any
+price.&nbsp; What do you think of him?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He&rsquo;s a splendid creature.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am no judge of horses,&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;but
+I am told he&rsquo;s a first-rate trotter, good leaper, and has some
+of the blood of Syntax.&nbsp; What does all that signify? - the game
+is against his master, who is a down pin, is thinking of emigrating,
+and wants money confoundedly.&nbsp; He asked seventy pounds at the fair;
+but, between ourselves, he would be glad to take fifty here.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I almost wish,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that I were a rich squire.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You would buy him then,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; Here
+he mused for some time, with a very profound look.&nbsp; &ldquo;It would
+be a rum thing,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;if, some time or other, that
+horse should come into your hands.&nbsp; Didn&rsquo;t you hear how he
+neighed when you talked about leaving the country?&nbsp; My granny was
+a wise woman, and was up to all kinds of signs and wonders, sounds and
+noises, the interpretation of the language of birds and animals, crowing
+and lowing, neighing and braying.&nbsp; If she had been here, she would
+have said at once that that horse was fated to carry you away.&nbsp;
+On that point, however, I can say nothing, for under fifty pounds no
+one can have him.&nbsp; Are you taking that money out of your pocket
+to pay me for the ale?&nbsp; That won&rsquo;t do; nothing to pay; I
+invited you this time.&nbsp; Now if you are going, you had best get
+into the road through the yard-gate.&nbsp; I won&rsquo;t trouble you
+to make your way through the kitchen and my fine-weather company - confound
+them!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Mr.&nbsp; Petulengro&rsquo;s Device - The Leathern Purse - Consent to
+Purchase a Horse.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+As I returned along the road I met Mr. Petulengro and one of his companions,
+who told me that they were bound for the public-house; whereupon I informed
+Jasper how I had seen in the stable the horse which we had admired at
+the fair.&nbsp; &ldquo;I shouldn&rsquo;t wonder if you buy that horse
+after all, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; With a smile at
+the absurdity of such a supposition, I left him and his companion, and
+betook myself to the dingle.&nbsp; In the evening I received a visit
+from Mr. Petulengro, who forthwith commenced talking about the horse,
+which he had again seen, the landlord having shown it to him on learning
+that he was a friend of mine.&nbsp; He told me that the horse pleased
+him more than ever, he having examined his points with more accuracy
+than he had an opportunity of doing on the first occasion, concluding
+by pressing me to buy him.&nbsp; I begged him to desist from such foolish
+importunity, assuring him that I had never so much money in all my life
+as would enable me to purchase the horse.&nbsp; Whilst this discourse
+was going on, Mr. Petulengro and myself were standing together in the
+midst of the dingle.&nbsp; Suddenly he began to move round me - in a
+very singular manner, making strange motions with his hands, and frightful
+contortions with his features, till I became alarmed, and asked him
+whether he had not lost his senses?&nbsp; Whereupon, ceasing his movements
+and contortions, he assured me that he had not, but had merely been
+seized with a slight dizziness, and then once more returned to the subject
+of the horse.&nbsp; Feeling myself very angry, I told him that if he
+continued persecuting me in that manner, I should be obliged to quarrel
+with him; adding, that I believed his only motive for asking me to buy
+the animal was to insult my poverty.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pretty poverty,&rdquo;
+said he, &ldquo;with fifty pounds in your pocket; however, I have heard
+say that it is always the custom of your rich people to talk of their
+poverty, more especially when they wish to avoid laying out money.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Surprised at his saying that I had fifty pounds in my pocket, I asked
+him what he meant; whereupon he told me that he was very sure that I
+had fifty pounds in my pocket, offering to lay me five shillings to
+that effect.&nbsp; &ldquo;Done!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I have scarcely
+more than the fifth part of what you say.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I know
+better, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;if you only pull
+out what you have in the pocket of your slop, I am sure you will have
+lost your wager.&rdquo;&nbsp; Putting my hand into the pocket, I felt
+something which I had never felt there before, and pulling it out, perceived
+that it was a clumsy leathern purse, which I found on opening contained
+four ten-pound-notes, and several pieces of gold.&nbsp; &ldquo;Didn&rsquo;t
+I tell you so, brother?&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now,
+in the first place, please to pay me the five shillings you have lost.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;This is only a foolish piece of pleasantry,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;you
+put it into my pocket whilst you were moving about me, making faces
+like a distracted person.&nbsp; Here, take your purse back.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I?&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;not I, indeed I don&rsquo;t
+think I am such a fool.&nbsp; I have won my wager, so pay me the five
+shillings, brother.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Do drop this folly,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;and take your purse;&rdquo; and I flung it on the ground.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;you were talking
+of quarrelling with me just now.&nbsp; I tell you now one thing, which
+is, that if you do not take back the purse I will quarrel with you;
+and it shall be for good and all.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll drop your acquaintance,
+no longer call you my pal, and not even say sarshan to you when I meet
+you by the roadside.&nbsp; Hir mi diblis I never will.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+I saw by Jasper&rsquo;s look and tone that he was in earnest, and, as
+I had really a regard for the strange being, I scarcely knew what to
+do.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now, be persuaded, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro,
+taking up the purse, and handing it to me; &ldquo;be persuaded; put
+the purse into your pocket, and buy the horse.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;if I did so, would you acknowledge the horse to be yours,
+and receive the money again as soon as I should be able to repay you?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I would, brother, I would,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;return me the
+money as soon as you please, provided you buy the horse.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What motive have you for wishing me to buy that horse?&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;He&rsquo;s to be sold for fifty pounds,&rdquo;
+said Jasper, &ldquo;and is worth four times that sum; though, like many
+a splendid bargain, he is now going a begging; buy him, and I&rsquo;m
+confident that, in a little time, a grand gentleman of your appearance
+may have anything he asks for him, and found a fortune by his means.&nbsp;
+Moreover, brother, I want to dispose of this fifty pounds in a safe
+manner.&nbsp; If you don&rsquo;t take it, I shall fool it away in no
+time, perhaps at card-playing, for you saw how I was cheated by those
+blackguard jockeys the other day - we gyptians don&rsquo;t know how
+to take care of money: our best plan when we have got a handful of guineas
+is to make buttons with them; but I have plenty of golden buttons, and
+don&rsquo;t wish to be troubled with more, so you can do me no greater
+favour than vesting the money in this speculation, by which my mind
+will be relieved of considerable care and trouble for some time at least.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Perceiving that I still hesitated, he said, &ldquo;Perhaps, brother,
+you think I did not come honestly by the money: by the honestest manner
+in the world, for it is the money I earnt by fighting in the ring: I
+did not steal it, brother, nor did I get it by disposing of spavined
+donkeys, or glandered ponies - nor is it, brother, the profits of my
+wife&rsquo;s witchcraft and dukkerin.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you had better employ it in your traffic.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I have plenty of money for my traffic, independent of this capital,&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro; &ldquo;ay, brother, and enough besides to back
+the husband of my wife&rsquo;s sister, Sylvester, against Slammocks
+of the Chong gav for twenty pounds, which I am thinking of doing.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;after all, the horse may have found
+another purchaser by this time.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Not he,&rdquo; said
+Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;there is nobody in this neighbourhood to purchase
+a horse like that, unless it be your lordship - so take the money, brother,&rdquo;
+and he thrust the purse into my hand.&nbsp; Allowing myself to be persuaded,
+I kept possession of the purse.&nbsp; &ldquo;Are you satisfied now?&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;By no means, brother,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro,
+&ldquo;you will please to pay me the five shillings which you lost to
+me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;the fifty pounds
+which I found in my pocket were not mine, but put in by yourself.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s nothing to do with the matter, brother,&rdquo; said
+Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;I betted you five shillings that you had fifty
+pounds in your pocket, which sum you had: I did not say that they were
+your own, but merely that you had fifty pounds; you will therefore pay
+me, brother, or I shall not consider you an honourable man.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Not wishing to have any dispute about such a matter, I took five shillings
+out of my under pocket, and gave them to him.&nbsp; Mr. Petulengro took
+the money with great glee, observing - &ldquo;These five shillings I
+will take to the public-house forthwith, and spend in drinking with
+four of my brethren, and doing so will give me an opportunity of telling
+the landlord that I have found a customer for his horse, and that you
+are the man.&nbsp; It will be as well to secure the horse as soon as
+possible; for though the dook tells me that the horse is intended for
+you, I have now and then found that the dock is, like myself, somewhat
+given to lying.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+He then departed, and I remained alone in the dingle.&nbsp; I thought
+at first that I had committed a great piece of folly in consenting to
+purchase this horse; I might find no desirable purchaser for him, until
+the money in my possession should be totally exhausted, and then I might
+be compelled to sell him for half the price I had given for him, or
+be even glad to find a person who would receive him at a gift; I should
+then remain sans horse, and indebted to Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; Nevertheless,
+it was possible that I might sell the horse very advantageously, and
+by so doing obtain a fund sufficient to enable me to execute some grand
+enterprise or other.&nbsp; My present way of life afforded no prospect
+of support, whereas the purchase of the horse did afford a possibility
+of bettering my condition, so, after all, had I not done right in consenting
+to purchase the horse? the purchase was to be made with another person&rsquo;s
+property, it is true, and I did not exactly like the idea of speculating
+with another person&rsquo;s property, but Mr. Petulengro had thrust
+his money upon me, and if I lost his money, he could have no one but
+himself to blame; so I persuaded myself that I had, upon the whole,
+done right, and having come to that persuasion, I soon began to enjoy
+the idea of finding myself on horseback again, and figured to myself
+all kinds of strange adventures which I should meet with on the roads
+before the horse and I should part company.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Trying the Horse - The Feats of Tawno - Man with the Red Waist-coat
+- Disposal of Property.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I saw nothing more of Mr. Petulengro that evening - on the morrow, however,
+he came and informed me that he had secured the horse for me, and that
+I was to go and pay for it at noon.&nbsp; At the hour appointed, therefore,
+I went with Mr. Petulengro and Tawno to the public, where, as before,
+there was a crowd of company.&nbsp; The landlord received us in the
+bar with marks of much satisfaction and esteem, made us sit down, and
+treated us with some excellent mild draught ale.&nbsp; &ldquo;Who do
+you think has been here this morning?&rdquo; he said to me, &ldquo;why,
+that fellow in black, who came to carry me off to a house of Popish
+devotion, where I was to pass seven days and nights in meditation, as
+I think he called it, before I publicly renounced the religion of my
+country.&nbsp; I read him a pretty lecture, calling him several unhandsome
+names, and asking him what he meant by attempting to seduce a church-warden
+of the Church of England.&nbsp; I tell you what, he ran some danger;
+for some of my customers, learning his errand, laid hold on him, and
+were about to toss him in a blanket, and then duck him in the horse-pond.&nbsp;
+I, however, interfered, and said, &lsquo;that what he came about was
+between me and him, and that it was no business of theirs.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+To tell you the truth, I felt pity for the poor devil, more especially
+when I considered that they merely sided against him because they thought
+him the weakest, and that they would have wanted to serve me in the
+same manner had they considered me a down pin; so I rescued him from
+their hands, told him not to be afraid, for that nobody should touch
+him, and offered to treat him to some cold gin and water with a lump
+of sugar in it; and on his refusing, told him that he had better make
+himself scarce, which he did, and I hope I shall never see him again.&nbsp;
+So I suppose you are come for the horse; mercy upon us! who would have
+thought you would have become the purchaser?&nbsp; The horse, however,
+seemed to know it by his neighing.&nbsp; How did you ever come by the
+money? however, that&rsquo;s no matter of mine.&nbsp; I suppose you
+are strongly backed by certain friends you have.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I informed the landlord that he was right in supposing that I came for
+the horse, but that, before I paid for him, I should wish to prove his
+capabilities.&nbsp; &ldquo;With all my heart,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You shall mount him this moment.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then going into
+the stable, he saddled and bridled the horse, and presently brought
+him out before the door.&nbsp; I mounted him, Mr. Petulengro putting
+a heavy whip into my hand, and saying a few words to me in his own mysterious
+language.&nbsp; &ldquo;The horse wants no whip,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Hold your tongue, daddy,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;My
+pal knows quite well what to do with the whip, he&rsquo;s not going
+to beat the horse with it.&rdquo;&nbsp; About four hundred yards from
+the house there was a hill, to the foot of which the road ran almost
+on a perfect level; towards the foot of this hill I trotted the horse,
+who set off at a long, swift pace, seemingly at the rate of about sixteen
+miles an hour.&nbsp; On reaching the foot of the hill, I wheeled the
+animal round, and trotted him towards the house - the horse sped faster
+than before.&nbsp; Ere he had advanced a hundred yards, I took off my
+hat, in obedience to the advice which Mr. Petulengro had given me, in
+his own language, and holding it over the horse&rsquo;s head commenced
+drumming on the crown with the knob of the whip; the horse gave a slight
+start, but instantly recovering himself, continued his trot till he
+arrived at the door of the public-house, amidst the acclamations of
+the company, who had all rushed out of the house to be spectators of
+what was going on. &ldquo;I see now what you wanted the whip for,&rdquo;
+said the landlord, &ldquo;and sure enough, that drumming on your hat
+was no bad way of learning whether the horse was quiet or not.&nbsp;
+Well, did you ever see a more quiet horse, or a better trotter?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My cob shall trot against him,&rdquo; said a fellow, dressed
+in velveteen, mounted on a low powerful-looking animal.&nbsp; &ldquo;My
+cob shall trot against him to the hill and back again - come on!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+We both started; the cob kept up gallantly against the horse for about
+half way to the hill, when he began to lose ground; at the foot of the
+hill he was about fifteen yards behind.&nbsp; Whereupon I turned slowly
+and waited for him.&nbsp; We then set off towards the house, but now
+the cob had no chance, being at least twenty yards behind when I reached
+the door.&nbsp; This running of the horse, the wild uncouth forms around
+me, and the ale and beer which were being guzzled from pots and flagons,
+put me wonderfully in mind of the ancient horse-races of the heathen
+north.&nbsp; I almost imagined myself Gunnar of Hlitharend at the race
+of -<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Are you satisfied?&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Didn&rsquo;t
+you tell me that he could leap?&rdquo; I demanded.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am
+told he can,&rdquo; said the landlord; &ldquo;but I can&rsquo;t consent
+that he should be tried in that way, as he might be damaged.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s right!&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t
+trust my pal to leap that horse, he&rsquo;ll merely fling him down,
+and break his neck and his own.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s a better man than
+he close by; let him get on his back and leap him.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+mean yourself, I suppose,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+I call that talking modestly, and nothing becomes a young man more than
+modesty.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;It a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t I, daddy,&rdquo; said
+Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s the man,&rdquo; said he, pointing
+to Tawno.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s the horse-leaper of the world!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You mean the horse-back breaker,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;That big fellow would break down my cousin&rsquo;s horse.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Why, he weighs only sixteen stone,&rdquo; said Mr. Petulengro.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And his sixteen stone, with his way of handling a horse, does
+not press so much as any other one&rsquo;s thirteen.&nbsp; Only let
+him get on the horse&rsquo;s back, and you&rsquo;ll see what he can
+do!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;it won&rsquo;t
+do.&rdquo; Whereupon Mr. Petulengro became very much excited; and pulling
+out a handful of money, said, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you what, I&rsquo;ll
+forfeit these guineas, if my black pal there does the horse any kind
+of damage; duck me in the horse-pond if I don&rsquo;t.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;for the sport of the thing
+I consent, so let your white pal get down, and our black pal mount as
+soon as he pleases.&rdquo;&nbsp; I felt rather mortified at Mr. Petulengro&rsquo;s
+interference; and showed no disposition to quit my seat; whereupon he
+came up to me and said, &ldquo;Now, brother, do get out of the saddle
+- you are no bad hand at trotting, I am willing to acknowledge that;
+but at leaping a horse there is no one like Tawno.&nbsp; Let every dog
+be praised for his own gift.&nbsp; You have been showing off in your
+line for the last half-hour; now do give Tawno a chance of exhibiting
+a little; poor fellow, he hasn&rsquo;t often a chance of exhibiting,
+as his wife keeps him so much out of sight.&rdquo;&nbsp; Not wishing
+to appear desirous of engrossing the public attention, and feeling rather
+desirous to see how Tawno, of whose exploits in leaping horses I had
+frequently heard, would acquit himself in the affair, I at length dismounted,
+and Tawno, at a bound, leaped into the saddle, where he really looked
+like Gunnar of Hlitharend, save and except the complexion of Gunnar
+was florid, whereas that of Tawno was of nearly Mulatto darkness; and
+that all Tawno&rsquo;s features were cast in the Grecian model, whereas
+Gunnar had a snub nose.&nbsp; &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a leaping-bar behind
+the house,&rdquo; said the landlord.&nbsp; &ldquo;Leaping-bar!&rdquo;
+said Mr. Petulengro, scornfully.&nbsp; &ldquo;Do you think my black
+pal ever rides at a leaping-bar?&nbsp; No more than a windle-straw.&nbsp;
+Leap over that meadow-wall, Tawno.&rdquo;&nbsp; Just past the house,
+in the direction in which I had been trotting, was a wall about four
+feet high, beyond which was a small meadow.&nbsp; Tawno rode the horse
+gently up to the wall, permitted him to look over, then backed him for
+about ten yards, and pressing his calves against the horse&rsquo;s sides,
+he loosed the rein, and the horse launching forward, took the leap in
+gallant style.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well done, man and horse!&rdquo; said Mr.
+Petulengro, &ldquo;now come back, Tawno.&rdquo;&nbsp; The leap from
+the side of the meadow was, however, somewhat higher; and the horse,
+when pushed at it, at first turned away; whereupon Tawno backed him
+to a greater distance, pushed the horse to a full gallop, giving a wild
+cry; whereupon the horse again took the wall, slightly grazing one of
+his legs against it.&nbsp; &ldquo;A near thing,&rdquo; said the landlord;
+&ldquo;but a good leap.&nbsp; Now, no more leaping, so long as I have
+control over the animal.&rdquo;&nbsp; The horse was then led back to
+the stable; and the landlord, myself and companions going into the bar,
+I paid down the money for the horse.<br>
+<br>
+Scarcely was the bargain concluded, when two or three of the company
+began to envy me the possession of the horse, and forcing their way
+into the bar, with much noise and clamour, said that the horse had been
+sold too cheap.&nbsp; One fellow, in particular, with a red waistcoat,
+the son of a wealthy farmer, said that if he had but known that the
+horse had been so good a one, he would have bought it at the first price
+asked for it, which he was now willing to pay, that is to-morrow, supposing
+- &ldquo;supposing your father will let you have the money,&rdquo; said
+the landlord, &ldquo;which, after all, might not be the case; but, however
+that may be, it is too late now.&nbsp; I think myself the horse has
+been sold for too little money, but if so all the better for the young
+man, who came forward when no other body did with his money in his hand.&nbsp;
+There, take yourselves out of my bar,&rdquo; he said to the fellows;
+&ldquo;and a pretty scoundrel you,&rdquo; said he to the man of the
+red waistcoat, &ldquo;to say the horse has been sold too cheap; why,
+it was only yesterday you said he was good for nothing, and were passing
+all kinds of jokes at him.&nbsp; Take yourself out of my bar, I say,
+you and all of you,&rdquo; and he turned the fellows out.&nbsp; I then
+asked the landlord whether he would permit the horse to remain in the
+stable for a short time, provided I paid for his entertainment; and
+on his willingly consenting, I treated my friends with ale, and then
+returned with them to the encampment.<br>
+<br>
+That evening I informed Mr. Petulengro and his party that on the morrow
+I intended to mount my horse, and leave that part of the country in
+quest of adventures; inquiring of Jasper where, in the event of my selling
+the horse advantageously, I might meet with him, and repay the money
+I had borrowed of him; whereupon Mr. Petulengro informed me that in
+about ten weeks I might find him at a certain place at the Chong gav.&nbsp;
+I then stated that as I could not well carry with me the property which
+I possessed in the dingle, which after all was of no considerable value,
+I had resolved to bestow the said property, namely, the pony, tent,
+tinker-tools, etc., on Ursula and her husband, partly because they were
+poor, and partly on account of the great kindness which I bore to Ursula,
+from whom I had, on various occasions, experienced all manner of civility,
+particularly in regard to crabbed words.&nbsp; On hearing this intelligence,
+Ursula returned many thanks to her gentle brother, as she called me,
+and Sylvester was so overjoyed that, casting aside his usual phlegm,
+he said I was the best friend he had ever had in the world, and in testimony
+of his gratitude swore that he would permit his wife to give me a choomer
+in the presence of the whole company, which offer, however, met with
+a very mortifying reception, the company frowning disapprobation, Ursula
+protesting against anything of the kind, and I myself showing no forwardness
+to avail myself of it, having inherited from nature a considerable fund
+of modesty, to which was added no slight store acquired in the course
+of my Irish education.&nbsp; I passed that night alone in the dingle
+in a very melancholy manner, with little or no sleep, thinking of Isopel
+Berners; and in the morning when I quitted it I shed several tears,
+as I reflected that I should probably never again see the spot where
+I had passed so many hours in her company.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Farewell to the Romans - The Landlord and His Niece - Set Out as a Traveller.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On reaching the plain above, I found my Romany friends breakfasting,
+and on being asked by Mr. Petulengro to join them, I accepted the invitation.&nbsp;
+No sooner was breakfast over than I informed Ursula and her husband
+that they would find the property, which I had promised them, in the
+dingle, commanding the little pony Ambrol to their best care.&nbsp;
+I took leave of the whole company, which was itself about to break up
+camp and to depart in the direction of London, and made the best of
+my way to the public-house.&nbsp; I had a small bundle in my hand, and
+was dressed in the same manner as when I departed from London, having
+left my waggoner&rsquo;s slop with the other effects in the dingle.&nbsp;
+On arriving at the public-house, I informed the landlord that I was
+come for my horse, inquiring, at the same time, whether he could not
+accommodate me with a bridle and saddle.&nbsp; He told me that the bridle
+and saddle, with which I had ridden the horse on the preceding day,
+were at my service for a trifle; that he had received them some time
+since in payment for a debt, and that he had himself no use for them.&nbsp;
+The leathers of the bridle were rather shabby, and the bit rusty, and
+the saddle was old fashioned; but I was happy to purchase them for seven
+shillings, more especially as the landlord added a small valise, which
+he said could be strapped to the saddle, and which I should find very
+convenient for carrying my things in.&nbsp; I then proceeded to the
+stable, told the horse we were bound on an expedition, and giving him
+a feed of corn, left him to discuss it, and returned to the bar-room
+to have a little farewell chat with the landlord, and at the same time
+to drink with him a farewell glass of ale.&nbsp; Whilst we were talking
+and drinking, the niece came and joined us: she was a decent, sensible
+young woman, who appeared to take a great interest in her uncle, whom
+she regarded with a singular mixture of pride and, disapprobation -
+pride for the renown which he had acquired by his feats of old, and
+disapprobation for his late imprudences.&nbsp; She said that she hoped
+that his misfortunes would be a warning to him to turn more to his God
+than he had hitherto done, and to give up cock-fighting and other low-life
+practices.&nbsp; To which the landlord replied, that with respect to
+cock-fighting he intended to give it up entirely, being determined no
+longer to risk his capital upon birds, and with respect to his religious
+duties, he should attend the church of which he was churchwarden at
+least once a quarter, adding, however, that he did not intend to become
+either canter or driveller, neither of which characters would befit
+a publican surrounded by such customers as he was, and that to the last
+day of his life he hoped to be able to make use of his fists.&nbsp;
+After a stay of about two hours I settled accounts, and having bridled
+and saddled my horse, and strapped on my valise, I mounted, shook hands
+with the landlord and his niece, and departed, notwithstanding that
+they both entreated me to tarry until the evening, it being then the
+heat of the day.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+An Adventure on the Road - The Six Flint Stone - A Rural Scene - Mead
+- The Old Man and His Bees.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I bent my course in the direction of the north, more induced by chance
+than any particular motive; all quarters of the world having about equal
+attractions for me.&nbsp; I was in high spirits at finding myself once
+more on horse-back, and trotted gaily on, until the heat of the weather
+induced me to slacken my pace, more out of pity for my horse than because
+I felt any particular inconvenience from it - heat and cold being then,
+and still, matters of great indifference to me.&nbsp; What I thought
+of I scarcely know, save and except that I have a glimmering recollection
+that I felt some desire to meet with one of those adventures which upon
+the roads of England are generally as plentiful as blackberries in autumn;
+and Fortune, who has generally been ready to gratify my inclinations,
+provided it cost her very little by so doing, was not slow in furnishing
+me with an adventure, perhaps as characteristic of the English roads
+as anything which could have happened.<br>
+<br>
+I might have travelled about six miles amongst cross roads and lanes,
+when suddenly I found myself upon a broad and very dusty road which
+seemed to lead due north.&nbsp; As I wended along this I saw a man upon
+a donkey riding towards me.&nbsp; The man was commonly dressed, with
+a broad felt hat on his head, and a kind of satchel on his back; he
+seemed to be in a mighty hurry, and was every now and then belabouring
+the donkey with a cudgel.&nbsp; The donkey, however, which was a fine
+large creature of the silver-grey species, did not appear to sympathize
+at all with its rider in his desire to get on, but kept its head turned
+back as much as possible, moving from one side of the road to the other,
+and not making much forward way.&nbsp; As I passed, being naturally
+of a very polite disposition, I gave the man the sele of the day, asking
+him, at the same time, why he beat the donkey; whereupon the fellow
+eyeing me askance, told me to mind my own business, with the addition
+of something which I need not repeat.&nbsp; I had not proceeded a furlong
+before I saw seated on the dust by the wayside, close by a heap of stones,
+and with several flints before him, a respectable-looking old man, with
+a straw hat and a white smock, who was weeping bitterly.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What are you crying for, father?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Have
+you come to any hurt?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Hurt enough,&rdquo; sobbed
+the old man, &ldquo;I have just been tricked out of the best ass in
+England by a villain, who gave me nothing but these trash in return,&rdquo;
+pointing to the stones before him.&nbsp; &ldquo;I really scarcely understand
+you,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I wish you would explain yourself more clearly.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I was riding on my ass from market,&rdquo; said the old man,
+&ldquo;when I met here a fellow with a sack on his back, who, after
+staring at the ass and me a moment or two, asked me if I would sell
+her.&nbsp; I told him that I could not think of selling her, as she
+was very useful to me, and though an animal, my true companion, whom
+I loved as much as if she were my wife and daughter.&nbsp; I then attempted
+to pass on, but the fellow stood before me, begging me to sell her,
+saying that he would give me anything for her; well, seeing that he
+persisted, I said at last that if I sold her, I must have six pounds
+for her, and I said so to get rid of him, for I saw that he was a shabby
+fellow, who had probably not six shillings in the world; but I had better
+have held my tongue,&rdquo; said the old man, crying more bitterly than
+before, &ldquo;for the words were scarcely out of my mouth, when he
+said he would give me what I asked, and taking the sack from his back,
+he pulled out a steelyard, and going to the heap of stones there, he
+took up several of them and weighed them, then flinging them down before
+me, he said, &lsquo;There are six pounds, neighbour; now, get off the
+ass, and hand her over to me.&rsquo;&nbsp; Well, I sat like one dumbfoundered
+for a time, till at last I asked him what he meant?&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+do I mean?&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you old rascal, why, I mean to claim
+my purchase,&rsquo; and then he swore so awfully, that scarcely knowing
+what I did I got down, and he jumped on the animal and rode off as fast
+as he could.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I suppose he was the fellow,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;whom I just now met upon a fine gray ass, which he was
+beating with a cudgel.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I dare say he was,&rdquo;
+said the old man, &ldquo;I saw him beating her as he rode away, and
+I thought I should have died.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I never heard such
+a story,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;well, do you mean to submit to such a
+piece of roguery quietly?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh, dear,&rdquo; said
+the old man, &ldquo;what can I do?&nbsp; I am seventy-nine years of
+age; I am bad on my feet, and dar&rsquo;n&rsquo;t go after him.&rdquo;
+- &ldquo;Shall I go?&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;the fellow is a thief, and
+any one has a right to stop him.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh, if you could
+but bring her again to me,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I would bless
+you till my dying day; but have a care; I don&rsquo;t know but after
+all the law may say that she is his lawful purchase.&nbsp; I asked six
+pounds for her, and he gave me six pounds.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Six flints,
+you mean,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;no, no, the law is not quite so bad
+as that either; I know something about her, and am sure that she will
+never sanction such a quibble.&nbsp; At all events, I&rsquo;ll ride
+after the fellow.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thereupon turning my horse round, I put
+him to his very best trot; I rode nearly a mile without obtaining a
+glimpse of the fellow, and was becoming apprehensive that he had escaped
+me by turning down some by-path, two or three of which I had passed.&nbsp;
+Suddenly, however, on the road making a slight turning, I perceived
+him right before me, moving at a tolerably swift pace, having by this
+time probably overcome the resistance of the animal.&nbsp; Putting my
+horse to a full gallop, I shouted at the top of my voice, &ldquo;Get
+off that donkey, you rascal, and give her up to me, or I&rsquo;ll ride
+you down.&rdquo;&nbsp; The fellow hearing the thunder of the horse&rsquo;s
+hoofs behind him, drew up on one side of the road.&nbsp; &ldquo;What
+do you want?&rdquo; said he, as I stopped my charger, now almost covered
+with sweat and foam close beside him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Do you want to rob
+me?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;To rob you?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;No!
+but to take from you that ass, of which you have just robbed its owner.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I have robbed no man,&rdquo; said the fellow; &ldquo;I just now
+purchased it fairly of its master, and the law will give it to me; he
+asked six pounds for it, and I gave him six pounds.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Six
+stones, you mean, you rascal,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;get down, or my
+horse shall be upon you in a moment;&rdquo; then with a motion of my
+reins, I caused the horse to rear, pressing his sides with my heels
+as if I intended to make him leap.&nbsp; &ldquo;Stop,&rdquo; said the
+man, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get down, and then try if I can&rsquo;t serve
+you out.&rdquo;&nbsp; He then got down, and confronted me with his cudgel;
+he was a horrible-looking fellow, and seemed prepared for anything.&nbsp;
+Scarcely, however, had he dismounted, when the donkey jerked the bridle
+out of his hand, and probably in revenge for the usage she had received,
+gave him a pair of tremendous kicks on the hip with her hinder legs,
+which overturned him, and then scampered down the road the way she had
+come.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pretty treatment this,&rdquo; said the fellow, getting
+up without his cudgel, and holding his hand to his side, &ldquo;I wish
+I may not be lamed for life.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And if you be,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;it will merely serve you right, you rascal, for trying
+to cheat a poor old man out of his property by quibbling at words.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Rascal!&rdquo; said the fellow, &ldquo;you lie, I am no rascal;
+and as for quibbling with words - suppose I did!&nbsp; What then?&nbsp;
+All the first people does it!&nbsp; The newspapers does it! the gentlefolks
+that calls themselves the guides of the popular mind does it!&nbsp;
+I&rsquo;m no ignoramus.&nbsp; I read the newspapers, and knows what&rsquo;s
+what.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You read them to some purpose,&rdquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, if you are lamed for life, and unfitted for any
+active line - turn newspaper editor; I should say you are perfectly
+qualified, and this day&rsquo;s adventure may be the foundation of your
+fortune,&rdquo; thereupon I turned round and rode off.&nbsp; The fellow
+followed me with a torrent of abuse.&nbsp; &ldquo;Confound you,&rdquo;
+said he - yet that was not the expression either - &ldquo;I know you;
+you are one of the horse-patrol come down into the country on leave
+to see your relations.&nbsp; Confound you, you and the like of you have
+knocked my business on the head near Lunnon, and I suppose we shall
+have you shortly in the country.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;To the newspaper
+office,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and fabricate falsehoods out of flint
+stones;&rdquo; then touching the horse with my heels, I trotted off,
+and coming to the place where I had seen the old man, I found him there,
+risen from the ground, and embracing his ass.<br>
+<br>
+I told him that I was travelling down the road, and said, that if his
+way lay in the same direction as mine he could do no better than accompany
+me for some distance, lest the fellow who, for aught I knew, might be
+hovering nigh, might catch him alone, and again get his ass from him.&nbsp;
+After thanking me for my offer, which he said he would accept, he got
+upon his ass, and we proceeded together down the road.&nbsp; My new
+acquaintance said very little of his own accord; and when I asked him
+a question, answered rather incoherently.&nbsp; I heard him every now
+and then say, &ldquo;Villain!&rdquo; to himself, after which he would
+pat the donkey&rsquo;s neck, from which circumstance I concluded that
+his mind was occupied with his late adventure.&nbsp; After travelling
+about two miles, we reached a place where a drift-way on the right led
+from the great road; here my companion stopped, and on my asking him
+whether he was going any farther, he told me that the path to the right
+was the way to his home.<br>
+<br>
+I was bidding him farewell, when he hemmed once or twice, and said,
+that as he did not live far off, he hoped that I would go with him and
+taste some of his mead.&nbsp; As I had never tasted mead, of which I
+had frequently read in the compositions of the Welsh bards, and, moreover,
+felt rather thirsty from the heat of the day, I told him that I should
+have great pleasure in attending him.&nbsp; Whereupon, turning off together,
+we proceeded about half a mile, sometimes between stone walls, and at
+other times hedges, till we reached a small hamlet, through which we
+passed, and presently came to a very pretty cottage, delightfully situated
+within a garden, surrounded by a hedge of woodbines.&nbsp; Opening a
+gate at one corner of the garden he led the way to a large shed, which
+stood partly behind the cottage, which he said was his stable; thereupon
+he dismounted and led his donkey into the shed, which was without stalls,
+but had a long rack and manger.&nbsp; On one side he tied his donkey,
+after taking off her caparisons, and I followed his example, tying my
+horse at the other side with a rope halter which he gave me; he then
+asked me to come in and taste his mead, but I told him that I must attend
+to the comfort of my horse first, and forthwith, taking a wisp of straw,
+rubbed him carefully down.&nbsp; Then taking a pailful of clear water
+which stood in the shed, I allowed the horse to drink about half a pint;
+and then turning to the old man, who all the time had stood by looking
+at my proceedings, I asked him whether he had any oats?&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+have all kinds of grain,&rdquo; he replied; and, going out, he presently
+returned with two measures, one a large and the other a small one, both
+filled with oats, mixed with a few beans, and handing the large one
+to me for the horse, he emptied the other before the donkey, who, before
+she began to despatch it, turned her nose to her master&rsquo;s face,
+and fairly kissed him.&nbsp; Having given my horse his portion, I told
+the old man that I was ready to taste his mead as soon as he pleased,
+whereupon he ushered me into his cottage, where, making me sit down
+by a deal table in a neatly sanded kitchen, he produced from an old-fashioned
+closet a bottle, holding about a quart, and a couple of cups, which
+might each contain about half a pint, then opening the bottle and filling
+the cups with a brown-coloured liquor, he handed one to me, and taking
+a seat opposite to me, he lifted the other, nodded, and saying to me
+- &ldquo;Health and welcome,&rdquo; placed it to his lips and drank.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Health and thanks,&rdquo; I replied; and being very thirsty,
+emptied my cup at a draught; I had scarcely done so, however, when I
+half repented.&nbsp; The mead was deliciously sweet and mellow, but
+appeared strong as brandy; my eyes reeled in my head, and my brain became
+slightly dizzy.&nbsp; &ldquo;Mead is a strong drink,&rdquo; said the
+old man, as he looked at me, with a half smile on his countenance.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;This is at any rate,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;so strong, indeed,
+that I would not drink another cup for any consideration.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And I would not ask you,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;for,
+if you did, you would most probably be stupid all day, and wake the
+next morning with a headache.&nbsp; Mead is a good drink, but woundily
+strong, especially to those who be not used to it, as I suppose you
+are not.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Where do you get it?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I make it myself,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;from the honey
+which my bees make.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Have you many bees?&rdquo; I
+inquired.&nbsp; &ldquo;A great many,&rdquo; said the old man.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And do you keep them,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for the sake of making
+mead with their honey?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I keep them,&rdquo; he replied,
+&ldquo;partly because I am fond of them, and partly for what they bring
+me in; they make me a great deal of honey, some of which I sell, and
+with a little I make some mead to warm my poor heart with, or occasionally
+to treat a friend with like yourself.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And do you
+support yourself entirely by means of your bees?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo;
+said the old man; &ldquo;I have a little bit of ground behind my house,
+which is my principal means of support.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And do you
+live alone?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;with the
+exception of the bees and the donkey, I live quite alone.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And have you always lived alone?&rdquo;&nbsp; The old man emptied
+his cup, and his heart being warmed with the mead, he told his history,
+which was simplicity itself.&nbsp; His father was a small yeoman, who,
+at his death, had left him, his only child, the cottage, with a small
+piece of ground behind it, and on this little property he had lived
+ever since.&nbsp; About the age of twenty-five he had married an industrious
+young woman, by whom he had one daughter, who died before reaching years
+of womanhood.&nbsp; His wife, however, had survived her daughter many
+years, and had been a great comfort to him, assisting him in his rural
+occupations; but, about four years before the present period, he had
+lost her, since which time he had lived alone, making himself as comfortable
+as he could; cultivating his ground, with the help of a lad from the
+neighbouring village, attending to his bees, and occasionally riding
+his donkey to market, and hearing the word of God, which he said he
+was sorry he could not read, twice a week regularly at the parish church.&nbsp;
+Such was the old man&rsquo;s tale.<br>
+<br>
+When he had finished speaking, he led me behind his house, and showed
+me his little domain.&nbsp; It consisted of about two acres in admirable
+cultivation; a small portion of it formed a kitchen garden, while the
+rest was sown with four kinds of grain, wheat, barley, peas, and beans.&nbsp;
+The air was full of ambrosial sweets, resembling those proceeding from
+an orange grove; a place which though I had never seen at that time,
+I since have.&nbsp; In the garden was the habitation of the bees, a
+long box, supported upon three oaken stumps.&nbsp; It was full of small
+round glass windows, and appeared to be divided into a great many compartments,
+much resembling drawers placed sideways.&nbsp; He told me that, as one
+compartment was filled, the bees left it for another; so that, whenever
+he wanted honey, he could procure some without injury to the insects.&nbsp;
+Through the little round windows I could see several of the bees at
+work; hundreds were going in and out of the doors; hundreds were buzzing
+about on the flowers, the woodbines, and beans.&nbsp; As I looked around
+on the well-cultivated field, the garden, and the bees, I thought I
+had never before seen so rural and peaceful a scene.<br>
+<br>
+When we returned to the cottage we again sat down, and I asked the old
+man whether he was not afraid to live alone.&nbsp; He told me that he
+was not, for that, upon the whole, his neighbours were very kind to
+him.&nbsp; I mentioned the fellow who had swindled him of his donkey
+upon the road.&nbsp; &ldquo;That was no neighbour of mine,&rdquo; said
+the old man, &ldquo;and, perhaps, I shall never see him again, or his
+like.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a dreadful thing,&rdquo; said I,
+&ldquo;to have no other resource, when injured, than to shed tears on
+the road.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;It is so,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;but
+God saw the tears of the old, and sent a helper.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Why
+did you not help yourself?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Instead of getting
+off your ass, why did you not punch at the fellow, or at any rate use
+dreadful language, call him villain, and shout robbery?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Punch!&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;shout! what, with these
+hands, and this voice - Lord, how you run on!&nbsp; I am old, young
+chap, I am old!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;it is
+a shameful thing to cry even when old.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You think
+so now,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;because you are young and strong;
+perhaps when you are as old as I, you will not be ashamed to cry.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Upon the whole I was rather pleased with the old man, and much with
+all about him.&nbsp; As evening drew nigh, I told him that I must proceed
+on my journey; whereupon he invited me to tarry with him during the
+night, telling me that he had a nice room and bed above at my service.&nbsp;
+I, however, declined; and bidding him farewell, mounted my horse, and
+departed.&nbsp; Regaining the road, I proceeded once more in the direction
+of the north; and, after a few hours, coming to a comfortable public-house,
+I stopped, and put up for the night.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Singular Noise - Sleeping in a Meadow - The Book - Cure for Wakefulness
+- Literary Tea Party - Poor Byron.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I did not awake till rather late the next morning; and when I did, I
+felt considerable drowsiness, with a slight headache, which I was uncharitable
+enough to attribute to the mead which I had drunk on the preceding day.&nbsp;
+After feeding my horse, and breakfasting, I proceeded on my wanderings.&nbsp;
+Nothing occurred worthy of relating till mid-day was considerably past,
+when I came to a pleasant valley, between two gentle hills.&nbsp; I
+had dismounted, in order to ease my horse, and was leading him along
+by the bridle, when, on my right, behind a bank in which some umbrageous
+ashes were growing, heard a singular noise.&nbsp; I stopped short and
+listened, and presently said to myself, &ldquo;Surely this is snoring,
+perhaps that of a hedgehog.&rdquo;&nbsp; On further consideration, however,
+I was convinced that the noise which I heard, and which certainly seemed
+to be snoring, could not possibly proceed from the nostrils of so small
+an animal, but must rather come from those of a giant, so loud and sonorous
+was it.&nbsp; About two or three yards farther was a gate, partly open,
+to which I went, and peeping into the field, saw a man lying on some
+rich grass, under the shade of one of the ashes; he was snoring away
+at a great rate.&nbsp; Impelled by curiosity, I fastened the bridle
+of my horse to the gate, and went up to the man.&nbsp; He was a genteelly-dressed
+individual; rather corpulent, with dark features, and seemingly about
+forty-five.&nbsp; He lay on his back, his hat slightly over his brow,
+and at his right hand lay an open book.&nbsp; So strenuously did he
+snore that the wind from his nostrils agitated, perceptibly, a fine
+cambric frill which he wore at his bosom.&nbsp; I gazed upon him for
+some time, expecting that he might awake; but he did not, but kept on
+snoring, his breast heaving convulsively.&nbsp; At last, the noise he
+made became so terrible, that I felt alarmed for his safety, imagining
+that a fit might seize him, and he lose his life while fast asleep.&nbsp;
+I therefore exclaimed, &ldquo;Sir, sir, awake! you sleep over-much.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+But my voice failed to rouse him, and he continued snoring as before;
+whereupon I touched him slightly with my riding wand, but failing to
+wake him, I touched him again more vigorously; whereupon he opened his
+eyes, and, probably imagining himself in a dream, closed them again.&nbsp;
+But I was determined to arouse him, and cried as loud as I could, &ldquo;Sir,
+sir, pray sleep no more!&rdquo;&nbsp; He heard what I said, opened his
+eyes again, stared at me with a look of some consciousness, and, half
+raising himself upon his elbows, asked me what was the matter.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I beg your pardon,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I took the liberty
+of awaking you, because you appeared to be much disturbed in your sleep
+- I was fearful, too, that you might catch a fever from sleeping under
+a tree.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I run no risk,&rdquo; said the man, &ldquo;I
+often come and sleep here; and as for being disturbed in my sleep, I
+felt very comfortable; I wish you had not awoke me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;I beg your pardon once more.&nbsp; I assure you that
+what I did was with the best intention.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! pray
+make no further apology,&rdquo; said the individual, &ldquo;I make no
+doubt that what you did was done kindly; but there&rsquo;s an old proverb,
+to the effect, &lsquo;that you should let sleeping dogs lie,&rsquo;&rdquo;
+he added with a smile.&nbsp; Then, getting up, and stretching himself
+with a yawn, he took up his book and said, &ldquo;I have slept quite
+long enough, and it&rsquo;s quite time for me to be going home.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Excuse my curiosity,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if I inquire what
+may induce you to come and sleep in this meadow?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;To
+tell you the truth,&rdquo; answered he, &ldquo;I am a bad sleeper.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Pray pardon me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if I tell you that I never
+saw one sleep more heartily.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;If I did so,&rdquo;
+said the individual, &ldquo;I am beholden to this meadow and this book;
+but I am talking riddles, and will explain myself.&nbsp; I am the owner
+of a very pretty property, of which this valley forms part.&nbsp; Some
+years ago, however, up started a person who said the property was his;
+a lawsuit ensued, and I was on the brink of losing my all, when, most
+unexpectedly, the suit was determined in my favour.&nbsp; Owing, however,
+to the anxiety to which my mind had been subjected for several years,
+my nerves had become terribly shaken; and no sooner was the trial terminated
+than sleep forsook my pillow.&nbsp; I sometimes passed nights without
+closing an eye; I took opiates, but they rather increased than alleviated
+my malady.&nbsp; About three weeks ago a friend of mine put this book
+into my hand, and advised me to take it every day to some pleasant part
+of my estate, and try and read a page or two, assuring me, if I did,
+that I should infallibly fall asleep.&nbsp; I took his advice, and selecting
+this place, which I considered the pleasantest part of my property,
+I came, and lying down, commenced reading the book, and before finishing
+a page was in a dead slumber.&nbsp; Every day since then I have repeated
+the experiment, and every time with equal success.&nbsp; I am a single
+man, without any children; and yesterday I made my will, in which, in
+the event of my friend&rsquo;s surviving me, I have left him all my
+fortune, in gratitude for his having procured for me the most invaluable
+of all blessings - sleep.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;how very extraordinary!&nbsp;
+Do you think that your going to sleep is caused by the meadow or the
+book?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I suppose by both,&rdquo; said my new acquaintance,
+&ldquo;acting in co-operation.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;It may be so,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;the magic influence does certainly not proceed from the
+meadow alone; for since I have been here, I have not felt the slightest
+inclination to sleep.&nbsp; Does the book consist of prose or poetry?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It consists of poetry,&rdquo; said the individual.&nbsp; &ldquo;Not
+Byron&rsquo;s?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Byron&rsquo;s!&rdquo; repeated
+the individual, with a smile of contempt; &ldquo;no, no; there is nothing
+narcotic in Byron&rsquo;s poetry.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t like it.&nbsp;
+I used to read it, but it thrilled, agitated, and kept me awake.&nbsp;
+No; this is not Byron&rsquo;s poetry, but the inimitable -&lsquo;s&rdquo;
+- mentioning a name which I had never heard till then.&nbsp; &ldquo;Will
+you permit me to look at it?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;With pleasure,&rdquo;
+he answered, politely handing me the book.&nbsp; I took the volume,
+and glanced over the contents.&nbsp; It was written in blank verse,
+and appeared to abound in descriptions of scenery; there was much mention
+of mountains, valleys, streams, and waterfalls, harebells and daffodils.&nbsp;
+These descriptions were interspersed with dialogues, which, though they
+proceeded from the mouths of pedlars and rustics, were of the most edifying
+description; mostly on subjects moral or metaphysical, and couched in
+the most gentlemanly and unexceptionable language, without the slightest
+mixture of vulgarity, coarseness, or pie-bald grammar.&nbsp; Such appeared
+to me to be the contents of the book; but before I could form a very
+clear idea of them, I found myself nodding, and a surprising desire
+to sleep coming over me.&nbsp; Rousing myself, however, by a strong
+effort, I closed the book, and, returning it to the owner, inquired
+of him, &ldquo;Whether he had any motive in coming and lying down in
+the meadow, besides the wish of enjoying sleep?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;None
+whatever,&rdquo; he replied; &ldquo;indeed, I should be very glad not
+to be compelled to do so, always provided I could enjoy the blessing
+of sleep; for by lying down under trees, I may possibly catch the rheumatism,
+or be stung by serpents; and, moreover, in the rainy season and winter
+the thing will be impossible, unless I erect a tent, which will possibly
+destroy the charm.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you
+need give yourself no further trouble about coming here, as I am fully
+convinced that with this book in your hand, you may go to sleep anywhere,
+as your friend was doubtless aware, though he wished to interest your
+imagination for a time by persuading you to lie abroad; therefore, in
+future, whenever you feel disposed to sleep, try to read the book, and
+you will be sound asleep in a minute; the narcotic influence lies in
+the book, and not in the field.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I will follow your
+advice,&rdquo; said the individual; &ldquo;and this very night take
+it with me to bed; though I hope in time to be able to sleep without
+it, my nerves being already much quieted from the slumbers I have enjoyed
+in this field.&rdquo;&nbsp; He then moved towards the gate, where we
+parted; he going one way, and I and my horse the other.<br>
+<br>
+More than twenty years subsequent to this period, after much wandering
+about the world, returning to my native country, I was invited to a
+literary tea-party, where, the discourse turning upon poetry, I, in
+order to show that I was not more ignorant than my neighbours, began
+to talk about Byron, for whose writings I really entertained considerable
+admiration, though I had no particular esteem for the man himself.&nbsp;
+At first, I received no answer to what I said - the company merely surveying
+me with a kind of sleepy stare.&nbsp; At length a lady, about the age
+of forty, with a large wart on her face, observed, in a drawling tone,
+&ldquo;That she had not read Byron - at least, since her girlhood -
+and then only a few passages; but that the impression on her mind was,
+that his writings were of a highly objectionable character.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I also read a little of him in my boyhood,&rdquo; said a gentleman
+about sixty, but who evidently, from his dress and demeanour, wished
+to appear about thirty, &ldquo;but I highly disapproved of him; for,
+notwithstanding he was a nobleman, he is frequently very coarse, and
+very fond of raising emotion.&nbsp; Now emotion is what I dislike;&rdquo;
+drawling out the last syllable of the word dislike.&nbsp; &ldquo;There
+is only one poet for me - the divine - &rdquo; and then he mentioned
+a name which I had only once heard, and afterwards quite forgotten;
+the same mentioned by the snorer in the field.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ah! there
+is no one like him!&rdquo; murmured some more of the company; &ldquo;the
+poet of nature - of nature without its vulgarity.&rdquo;&nbsp; I wished
+very much to ask these people whether they were ever bad sleepers, and
+whether they had read the poet, so called, from a desire of being set
+to sleep.&nbsp; Within a few days, however, I learnt that it had of
+late become very fashionable and genteel to appear half asleep, and
+that one could exhibit no better mark of superfine breeding than by
+occasionally in company setting one&rsquo;s rhomal organ in action.&nbsp;
+I then ceased to wonder at the popularity, which I found nearly universal,
+of -&lsquo;s poetry; for, certainly in order to make one&rsquo;s self
+appear sleepy in company, or occasionally to induce sleep, nothing could
+be more efficacious than a slight prelection of his poems.&nbsp; So
+poor Byron, with his fire and emotion - to say nothing of his mouthings
+and coxcombry - was dethroned, as I prophesied he would be more than
+twenty years before, on the day of his funeral, though I had little
+idea that his humiliation would have been brought about by one, whose
+sole strength consists in setting people to sleep.&nbsp; Well, all things
+are doomed to terminate in sleep.&nbsp; Before that termination, however,
+I will venture to prophesy that people will become a little more awake
+- snoring and yawning be a little less in fashion - and poor Byron be
+once more reinstated on his throne, though his rival will always stand
+a good chance of being worshipped by those whose ruined nerves are insensible
+to the narcotic powers of opium and morphine.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Drivers and Front Outside Passengers - Fatigue of Body and Mind - Unexpected
+Greeting - My Inn - The Governor - Engagement.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I continued my journey, passing through one or two villages.&nbsp; The
+day was exceedingly hot, and the roads dusty.&nbsp; In order to cause
+my horse as little fatigue as possible, and not to chafe his back, I
+led him by the bridle, my doing which brought upon me a shower of remarks,
+jests, and would-be witticisms from the drivers and front outside passengers
+of sundry stage-coaches which passed me in one direction or the other.&nbsp;
+In this way I proceeded till considerably past noon, when I felt myself
+very fatigued, and my horse appeared no less so; and it is probable
+that the lazy and listless manner in which we were moving on, tired
+us both much more effectually than hurrying along at a swift trot would
+have done, for I have observed that when the energies of the body are
+not exerted a languor frequently comes over it.&nbsp; At length arriving
+at a very large building with an archway, near the entrance of a town,
+I sat down on what appeared to be a stepping-block, and presently experienced
+a great depression of spirits.&nbsp; I began to ask myself whither I
+was going, and what I should do with myself and the horse which I held
+by the bridle?&nbsp; It appeared to me that I was alone in the world
+with the poor animal, who looked for support to me, who knew not how
+to support myself.&nbsp; Then the image of Isopel Berners came into
+my mind, and when I thought how I had lost her for ever, and how happy
+I might have been with her in the New World had she not deserted me,
+I became yet more miserable.<br>
+<br>
+As I sat in this state of mind, I suddenly felt some one clap me on
+the shoulder, and heard a voice say, &ldquo;Ha! comrade of the dingle,
+what chance has brought you into these parts?&rdquo;&nbsp; I turned
+round, and beheld a man in the dress of a postillion, whom I instantly
+recognized as he to whom I had rendered assistance on the night of the
+storm.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;is it you?&nbsp; I am glad to see you,
+for I was feeling very lonely and melancholy.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lonely and melancholy,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;how is that?
+how can any one be lonely and melancholy with such a noble horse as
+that you hold by the bridle?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The horse,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;is one cause of my melancholy,
+for I know not in the world what to do with it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is your own?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I may call it my own, though I borrowed
+the money to purchase it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, why don&rsquo;t you sell it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is not always easy to find a purchaser for a horse like this,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;can you recommend me one?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I?&nbsp; Why no, not exactly; but you&rsquo;ll find a purchaser
+shortly - pooh! if you have no other cause for disquiet than that horse,
+cheer up, man, don&rsquo;t be cast down.&nbsp; Have you nothing else
+on your mind?&nbsp; By the bye, what&rsquo;s become of the young woman
+you were keeping company with in that queer lodging place of yours?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;She has left me,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You quarrelled, I suppose?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;we did not exactly quarrel, but we
+are parted.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; replied he, &ldquo;but you will soon come together
+again.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;we are parted for ever.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;For ever!&nbsp; Pooh! you little know how people sometimes come
+together again who think they are parted for ever.&nbsp; Here&rsquo;s
+something on that point relating to myself.&nbsp; You remember, when
+I told you my story in that dingle of yours, that I mentioned a young
+woman, my fellow-servant when I lived with the English family in Mumbo
+Jumbo&rsquo;s town, and how she and I, when our foolish governors were
+thinking of changing their religion, agreed to stand by each other,
+and be true to old Church of England, and to give our governors warning,
+provided they tried to make us renegades.&nbsp; Well, she and I parted
+soon after that, and never to meet again, yet we met the other day in
+the fields, for she lately came to live with a great family not far
+from here, and we have since agreed to marry, to take a little farm,
+for we have both a trifle of money, and live together till &lsquo;death
+us do part.&rsquo;&nbsp; So much for parting for ever!&nbsp; But what
+do I mean by keeping you broiling in the sun with your horse&rsquo;s
+bridle in your hand, and you on my own ground?&nbsp; Do you know where
+you are?&nbsp; Why, that great house is my inn, that is, it&rsquo;s
+my master&rsquo;s, the best fellow in -.&nbsp; Come along, you and your
+horse both will find a welcome at my inn.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Thereupon he led the way into a large court in which there were coaches,
+chaises, and a great many people; taking my horse from me, he led it
+into a nice cool stall, and fastened it to the rack - he then conducted
+me into a postillion&rsquo;s keeping-room, which at that time chanced
+to be empty, and he then fetched a pot of beer and sat down by me.<br>
+<br>
+After a little conversation he asked me what I intended to do, and I
+told him frankly that I did not know; whereupon he observed that, provided
+I had no objection, he had little doubt that I could be accommodated
+for some time at his inn.&nbsp; &ldquo;Our upper ostler,&rdquo; said
+he, &ldquo;died about a week ago; he was a clever fellow, and, besides
+his trade, understood reading and accounts.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; said I, interrupting him, &ldquo;I am not fitted
+for the place of ostler - moreover, I refused the place of ostler at
+a public-house, which was offered to me only a few days ago.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The postillion burst into a laugh.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ostler at a public-house,
+indeed! why, you would not compare a berth at a place like that with
+the situation of ostler at my inn, the first road-house in England!&nbsp;
+However, I was not thinking of the place of ostler for you; you are,
+as you say, not fitted for it, at any rate, not at a house like this.&nbsp;
+We have, moreover, the best under-ostler in all England - old Bill,
+with the drawback that he is rather fond of drink.&nbsp; We could make
+shift with him very well, provided we could fall in with a man of writing
+and figures, who could give an account of the hay and corn which comes
+in and goes out, and wouldn&rsquo;t object to give a look occasionally
+at the yard.&nbsp; Now it appears to me that you are just such a kind
+of man, and, if you will allow me to speak to the governor, I don&rsquo;t
+doubt that he will gladly take you, as he feels kindly disposed towards
+you from what he has heard me say concerning you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what should I do with my horse?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The horse need give you no uneasiness,&rdquo; said the postillion;
+&ldquo;I know he will be welcome here both for bed and manger, and,
+perhaps, in a little time you may find a purchaser, as a vast number
+of sporting people frequent this house.&rdquo;&nbsp; I offered two or
+three more objections, which the postillion overcame with great force
+of argument, and the pot being nearly empty, he drained it to the bottom
+drop, and then starting up, left me alone.<br>
+<br>
+In about twenty minutes he returned, accompanied by a highly intelligent-looking
+individual, dressed in blue and black, with a particularly white cravat,
+and without a hat on his head: this individual, whom I should have mistaken
+for a gentleman but for the intelligence depicted in his face, he introduced
+to me as the master of the inn.&nbsp; The master of the inn shook me
+warmly by the hand, told me that he was happy to see me in his house,
+and thanked me in the handsomest terms for the kindness I had shown
+to his servant in the affair of the thunderstorm.&nbsp; Then saying
+that he was informed I was out of employ, he assured me that he should
+be most happy to engage me to keep his hay and corn account, and as
+general superintendent of the yard, and that with respect to the horse,
+which he was told I had, he begged to inform me that I was perfectly
+at liberty to keep it at the inn upon the very best, until I could find
+a purchaser, - that with regard to wages - but he had no sooner mentioned
+wages than I cut him short, saying, that provided I stayed I should
+be most happy to serve him for bed and board, and requested that he
+would allow me until the next morning to consider of his offer; he willingly
+consented to my request, and, begging that I would call for anything
+I pleased, left me alone with the postillion.<br>
+<br>
+I passed that night until about ten o&rsquo;clock with the postillion,
+when he left me, having to drive a family about ten miles across the
+country; before his departure, however, I told him that I had determined
+to accept the offer of his governor, as he called him.&nbsp; At the
+bottom of my heart I was most happy that an offer had been made, which
+secured to myself and the animal a comfortable retreat at a moment when
+I knew not whither in the world to take myself and him.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+An Inn of Times gone by - A First-rate Publican - Hay and Corn - Old-fashioned
+Ostler - Highwaymen - Mounted Police - Grooming.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The inn, of which I had become an inhabitant, was a place of infinite
+life and bustle.&nbsp; Travellers of all descriptions, from all the
+cardinal points, were continually stopping at it; and to attend to their
+wants, and minister to their convenience, an army of servants, of one
+description or other, was kept; waiters, chambermaids, grooms, postillions,
+shoe-blacks, cooks, scullions, and what not, for there was a barber
+and hair-dresser, who had been at Paris, and talked French with a cockney
+accent; the French sounding all the better, as no accent is so melodious
+as the cockney.&nbsp; Jacks creaked in the kitchens turning round spits,
+on which large joints of meat piped and smoked before great big fires.&nbsp;
+There was running up and down stairs, and along galleries, slamming
+of doors, cries of &ldquo;Coming, sir,&rdquo; and &ldquo;Please to step
+this way, ma&rsquo;am,&rdquo; during eighteen hours of the four-and-twenty.&nbsp;
+Truly a very great place for life and bustle was this inn.&nbsp; And
+often in after life, when lonely and melancholy, I have called up the
+time I spent there, and never failed to become cheerful from the recollection.<br>
+<br>
+I found the master of the house a very kind and civil person.&nbsp;
+Before being an inn-keeper he had been in some other line of business;
+but on the death of the former proprietor of the inn had married his
+widow, who was still alive, but, being somewhat infirm, lived in a retired
+part of the house.&nbsp; I have said that he was kind and civil; he
+was, however, not one of those people who suffer themselves to be made
+fools of by anybody; he knew his customers, and had a calm, clear eye,
+which would look through a man without seeming to do so.&nbsp; The accommodation
+of his house was of the very best description; his wines were good,
+his viands equally so, and his charges not immoderate; though he very
+properly took care of himself.&nbsp; He was no vulgar inn-keeper, had
+a host of friends, and deserved them all.&nbsp; During the time I lived
+with him, he was presented by a large assemblage of his friends and
+customers with a dinner at his own house, which was very costly, and
+at which the best of wines were sported, and after the dinner with a
+piece of plate estimated at fifty guineas.&nbsp; He received the plate,
+made a neat speech of thanks, and when the bill was called for, made
+another neat speech, in which he refused to receive one farthing for
+the entertainment, ordering in at the same time two dozen more of the
+best champagne, and sitting down amidst uproarious applause, and cries
+of &ldquo;You shall be no loser by it!&rdquo;&nbsp; Nothing very wonderful
+in such conduct, some people will say; I don&rsquo;t say there is, nor
+have I any intention to endeavour to persuade the reader that the landlord
+was a Carlo Boromeo; he merely gave a quid pro quo; but it is not every
+person who will give you a quid pro quo.&nbsp; Had he been a vulgar
+publican, he would have sent in a swinging bill after receiving the
+plate; &ldquo;but then no vulgar publican would have been presented
+with plate;&rdquo; perhaps not, but many a vulgar public character has
+been presented with plate, whose admirers never received a quid pro
+quo, except in the shape of a swinging bill.<br>
+<br>
+I found my duties of distributing hay and corn, and keeping an account
+thereof, anything but disagreeable, particularly after I had acquired
+the good-will of the old ostler, who at first looked upon me with rather
+an evil eye, considering me somewhat in the light of one who had usurped
+an office which belonged to himself by the right of succession; but
+there was little gall in the old fellow, and, by speaking kindly to
+him, never giving myself any airs of assumption; but, above all, by
+frequently reading the newspapers to him - for though passionately fond
+of news and politics, he was unable to read - I soon succeeded in placing
+myself on excellent terms with him.&nbsp; A regular character was that
+old ostler; he was a Yorkshireman by birth, but had seen a great deal
+of life in the vicinity of London, to which, on the death of his parents,
+who were very poor people, he went at a very early age.&nbsp; Amongst
+other places where he had served as ostler was a small inn at Hounslow,
+much frequented by highwaymen, whose exploits he was fond of narrating,
+especially those of Jerry Abershaw, who, he said, was a capital rider;
+and on hearing his accounts of that worthy, I half regretted that the
+old fellow had not been in London, and I had not formed his acquaintance
+about the time I was thinking of writing the life of the said Abershaw,
+not doubting that with his assistance, I could have produced a book
+at least as remarkable as the life and adventures of that entirely imaginary
+personage Joseph Sell; perhaps, however, I was mistaken; and whenever
+Abershaw&rsquo;s life shall appear before the public - and my publisher
+credibly informs me that it has not yet appeared - I beg and entreat
+the public to state which it likes best, the life of Abershaw, or that
+of Sell, for which latter work I am informed that during the last few
+months there has been a prodigious demand.&nbsp; My old friend, however,
+after talking of Abershaw, would frequently add, that, good rider as
+Abershaw certainly was, he was decidedly inferior to Richard Ferguson,
+generally called Galloping Dick, who was a pal of Abershaw&rsquo;s,
+and had enjoyed a career as long, and nearly as remarkable as his own.&nbsp;
+I learned from him that both were capital customers at the Hounslow
+inn, and that he had frequently drank with them in the corn-room.&nbsp;
+He said that no man could desire more jolly or entertaining companions
+over a glass of &ldquo;summut;&rdquo; but that upon the road it was
+anything but desirable to meet them; there they were terrible, cursing
+and swearing, and thrusting the muzzles of their pistols into people&rsquo;s
+mouths; and at this part of his locution the old man winked, and said,
+in a somewhat lower voice, that upon the whole they were right in doing
+so, and that when a person had once made up his mind to become a highwayman,
+his best policy was to go the whole hog, fearing nothing, but making
+everybody afraid of him; that people never thought of resisting a savage-faced,
+foul-mouthed highwayman, and if he were taken, were afraid to bear witness
+against him, lest he should get off and cut their throats some time
+or other upon the roads; whereas people would resist being robbed by
+a sneaking, pale-visaged rascal, and would swear bodily against him
+on the first opportunity, - adding, that Abershaw and Ferguson, two
+most awful fellows, had enjoyed a long career, whereas two disbanded
+officers of the army, who wished to rob a coach like gentlemen, had
+begged the passengers&rsquo; pardon, and talked of hard necessity, had
+been set upon by the passengers themselves, amongst whom were three
+women, pulled from their horses, conducted to Maidstone, and hanged
+with as little pity as such contemptible fellows deserved.&nbsp; &ldquo;There
+is nothing like going the whole hog,&rdquo; he repeated, &ldquo;and
+if ever I had been a highwayman, I would have done so; I should have
+thought myself all the more safe; and, moreover, shouldn&rsquo;t have
+despised myself.&nbsp; To curry favour with those you are robbing, sometimes
+at the expense of your own comrades, as I have known fellows do, why,
+it is the greatest - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So it is,&rdquo; interposed my friend the postillion, who chanced
+to be present at a considerable part of the old ostler&rsquo;s discourse;
+&ldquo;it is, as you say, the greatest of humbug, and merely, after
+all, gets a fellow into trouble; but no regular bred highwayman would
+do it.&nbsp; I say, George, catch the Pope of Rome trying to curry favour
+with anybody he robs; catch old Mumbo Jumbo currying favour with the
+Archbishop of Canterbury and the Dean and Chapter, should he meet them
+in a stage-coach; it would be with him, Bricconi Abbasso, as he knocked
+their teeth out with the butt of his trombone; and the old regular-built
+ruffian would be all the safer for it, as Bill would say, as ten to
+one the Archbishop and Chapter, after such a spice of his quality, would
+be afraid to swear against him, and to hang him, even if he were in
+their power, though that would be the proper way; for, if it is the
+greatest of all humbug for a highwayman to curry favour with those he
+robs, the next greatest is to try to curry favour with a highwayman
+when you have got him, by letting him off.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Finding the old man so well acquainted with the history of highwaymen,
+and taking considerable interest in the subject, having myself edited
+a book containing the lives of many remarkable people who had figured
+on the highway, I forthwith asked him how it was that the trade of highwaymen
+had become extinct in England, as at present we never heard of any one
+following it.&nbsp; Whereupon he told me that many causes had contributed
+to bring about that result; the principal of which were the following:-
+the refusal to license houses which were known to afford shelter to
+highwaymen, which, amongst many others, had caused the inn at Hounslow
+to be closed; the inclosure of many a wild heath in the country, on
+which they were in the habit of lurking, and particularly the establishing
+in the neighbourhood of London of a well-armed mounted patrol, who rode
+the highwaymen down, and delivered them up to justice, which hanged
+them without ceremony.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And that would be the way to deal with Mumbo Jumbo and his gang,&rdquo;
+said the postillion, &ldquo;should they show their visages in these
+realms; and I hear by the newspapers that they are becoming every day
+more desperate.&nbsp; Take away the license from their public-houses,
+cut down the rookeries and shadowy old avenues in which they are fond
+of lying in wait, in order to sally out upon people as they pass in
+the roads; but, above all, establish a good mounted police to ride after
+the ruffians and drag them by the scruff of the neck to the next clink,
+where they might lie till they could be properly dealt with by law;
+instead of which, the Government are repealing the wise old laws enacted
+against such characters, giving fresh licenses every day to their public-houses,
+and saying that it would be a pity to cut down their rookeries and thickets
+because they look so very picturesque; and, in fact, giving them all
+kind of encouragement; why, if such behaviour is not enough to drive
+an honest man mad, I know not what is.&nbsp; It is of no use talking,
+I only wish the power were in my hands, and if I did not make short
+work of them, might I be a mere jackass postillion all the remainder
+of my life.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Besides acquiring from the ancient ostler a great deal of curious information
+respecting the ways and habits of the heroes of the road, with whom
+he had come in contact in the early portion of his life, I picked up
+from him many excellent hints relating to the art of grooming horses.&nbsp;
+Whilst at the inn, I frequently groomed the stage and post-horses, and
+those driven up by travellers in their gigs: I was not compelled, nor
+indeed expected, to do so; but I took pleasure in the occupation; and
+I remember at that period one of the principal objects of my ambition
+was to be a first-rate groom, and to make the skins of the creatures
+I took in hand look sleek and glossy like those of moles.&nbsp; I have
+said that I derived valuable hints from the old man, and, indeed, became
+a very tolerable groom, but there was a certain finishing touch which
+I could never learn from him, though he possessed it himself, and which
+I could never attain to by my own endeavours; though my want of success
+certainly did not proceed from want of application, for I have rubbed
+the horses down, purring and buzzing all the time, after the genuine
+ostler fashion, until the perspiration fell in heavy drops upon my shoes,
+and when I had done my best and asked the old fellow what he thought
+of my work, I could never extract from him more than a kind of grunt,
+which might be translated, &ldquo;Not so very bad, but I have seen a
+horse groomed much better,&rdquo; which leads me to suppose that a person,
+in order to be a first-rate groom, must have something in him when he
+is born which I had not, and, indeed, which many other people have not
+who pretend to be grooms.&nbsp; What does the reader think?<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Stable Hartshorn - How to Manage a Horse on a Journey - Your Best Friend.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Of one thing I am certain, that the reader must be much delighted with
+the wholesome smell of the stable, with which many of these pages are
+redolent; what a contrast to the sickly odours exhaled from those of
+some of my contemporaries, especially of those who pretend to be of
+the highly fashionable class, and who treat of reception-rooms, well
+may they be styled so, in which dukes, duchesses, earls, countesses,
+archbishops, bishops, mayors, mayoresses - not forgetting the writers
+themselves, both male and female - congregate and press upon one another;
+how cheering, how refreshing, after having been nearly knocked down
+with such an atmosphere, to come in contact with genuine stable hartshorn.&nbsp;
+Oh! the reader shall have yet more of the stable, and of that old ostler,
+for which he or she will doubtless exclaim, &ldquo;Much obliged!&rdquo;
+- and, lest I should forget to perform my promise, the reader shall
+have it now.<br>
+<br>
+I shall never forget an harangue from the mouth of the old man, which
+I listened to one warm evening as he and I sat on the threshold of the
+stable, after having attended to some of the wants of a batch of coach-horses.&nbsp;
+It related to the manner in which a gentleman should take care of his
+horse and self, whilst engaged in a journey on horseback, and was addressed
+to myself, on the supposition of my one day coming to an estate, and
+of course becoming a gentleman.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;When you are a gentleman,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;should you ever
+journey on a horse of your own, and you could not have a much better
+than the one you have here eating its fill in the box yonder - I wonder,
+by the bye, how you ever came by it - you can&rsquo;t do better than
+follow the advice I am about to give you, both with respect to your
+animal and yourself.&nbsp; Before you start, merely give your horse
+a couple of handfuls of corn and a little water, somewhat under a quart,
+and if you drink a pint of water yourself out of the pail, you will
+feel all the better during the whole day; then you may walk and trot
+your animal for about ten miles, till you come to some nice inn, where
+you may get down and see your horse led into a nice stall, telling the
+ostler not to feed him till you come.&nbsp; If the ostler happens to
+be a dog-fancier, and has an English terrier-dog like that of mine there,
+say what a nice dog it is, and praise its black and tawn; and if he
+does not happen to be a dog-fancier, ask him how he&rsquo;s getting
+on, and whether he ever knew worse times; that kind of thing will please
+the ostler, and he will let you do just what you please with your own
+horse, and when your back is turned, he&rsquo;ll say to his comrades
+what a nice gentleman you are, and how he thinks he has seen you before;
+then go and sit down to breakfast, and, before you have finished breakfast,
+get up and go and give your horse a feed of corn; chat with the ostler
+two or three minutes till your horse has taken the shine out of his
+corn, which will prevent the ostler taking any of it away when your
+back is turned, for such things are sometimes done - not that I ever
+did such a thing myself when I was at the inn at Hounslow.&nbsp; Oh,
+dear me, no!&nbsp; Then go and finish your breakfast, and when you have
+finished your breakfast and called for the newspaper, go and water your
+horse, letting him have one pailful, then give him another feed of corn,
+and enter into discourse with the ostler about bull-baiting, the prime
+minister, and the like; and when your horse has once more taken the
+shine out of his corn, go back to your room and your newspaper - and
+I hope for your sake it may be the <i>Globe</i>, for that&rsquo;s the
+best paper going - then pull the bell-rope and order in your bill, which
+you will pay without counting it up - supposing you to be a gentleman.&nbsp;
+Give the waiter sixpence, and order out your horse, and when your horse
+is out, pay for the corn, and give the ostler a shilling, then mount
+your horse and walk him gently for five miles; and whilst you are walking
+him in this manner, it may be as well to tell you to take care that
+you do not let him down and smash his knees, more especially if the
+road be a particularly good one, for it is not at a desperate hiverman
+pace, and over very bad roads, that a horse tumbles and smashes his
+knees, but on your particularly nice road, when the horse is going gently
+and lazily, and is half asleep, like the gemman on his back; well, at
+the end of the five miles, when the horse has digested his food, and
+is all right, you may begin to push your horse on, trotting him a mile
+at a heat, and then walking him a quarter of a one, that his wind may
+be not distressed; and you may go on in that way for thirty miles, never
+galloping, of course, for none but fools or hivermen ever gallop horses
+on roads; and at the end of that distance you may stop at some other
+nice inn to dinner.&nbsp; I say, when your horse is led into the stable,
+after that same thirty miles&rsquo; trotting and walking, don&rsquo;t
+let the saddle be whisked off at once, for if you do your horse will
+have such a sore back as will frighten you, but let your saddle remain
+on your horse&rsquo;s back, with the girths loosened, till after his
+next feed of corn, and be sure that he has no corn, much less water,
+till after a long hour and more; after he is fed he may be watered to
+the tune of half a pail, and then the ostler can give him a regular
+rub down; you may then sit down to dinner, and when you have dined get
+up and see to your horse as you did after breakfast, in fact, you must
+do much after the same fashion you did at t&rsquo;other inn; see to
+your horse, and by no means disoblige the ostler.&nbsp; So when you
+have seen to your horse a second time, you will sit down to your bottle
+of wine - supposing you to be a gentleman - and after you have finished
+it, and your argument about the corn-laws with any commercial gentleman
+who happens to be in the room, you may mount your horse again - not
+forgetting to do the proper thing to the waiter and ostler; you may
+mount your horse again and ride him, as you did before, for about five
+and twenty miles, at the end of which you may put up for the night after
+a very fair day&rsquo;s journey, for no gentleman - supposing he weighs
+sixteen stone, as I suppose you will by the time you become a gentleman
+- ought to ride a horse more than sixty-five miles in one day, provided
+he has any regard for his horse&rsquo;s back, or his own either.&nbsp;
+See to your horse at night, and have him well rubbed down.&nbsp; The
+next day you may ride your horse forty miles, just as you please, but
+never foolishly, and those forty miles will bring you to your journey&rsquo;s
+end, unless your journey be a plaguy long one, and if so, never ride
+your horse more than five and thirty miles a day, always, however, seeing
+him well fed, and taking more care of him than yourself; which is but
+right and reasonable, seeing as how the horse is the best animal of
+the two.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;When you are a gentleman,&rdquo; said he, after a pause, &ldquo;the
+first thing you must think about is to provide yourself with a good
+horse for your own particular riding; you will, perhaps, keep a coach
+and pair, but they will be less your own than your lady&rsquo;s, should
+you have one, and your young gentry, should you have any; or, if you
+have neither, for madam, your housekeeper, and the upper female servants;
+so you need trouble your head less about them, though, of course, you
+would not like to pay away your money for screws; but be sure you get
+a good horse for your own riding; and that you may have a good chance
+of having a good one, buy one that&rsquo;s young and has plenty of belly
+- a little more than the one has which you now have, though you are
+not yet a gentleman; you will, of course, look to his head, his withers,
+legs and other points, but never buy a horse at any price that has not
+plenty of belly; no horse that has not belly is ever a good feeder,
+and a horse that a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t a good feeder can&rsquo;t be a good
+horse; never buy a horse that is drawn up in the belly behind; a horse
+of that description can&rsquo;t feed, and can never carry sixteen stone.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So when you have got such a horse be proud of it - as I daresay
+you are of the one you have now - and wherever you go swear there a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t
+another to match it in the country, and if anybody gives you the lie,
+take him by the nose and tweak it off, just as you would do if anybody
+were to speak ill of your lady, or, for want of her, of your housekeeper.&nbsp;
+Take care of your horse, as you would of the apple of your eye - I am
+sure I would, if I were a gentleman, which I don&rsquo;t ever expect
+to be, and hardly wish, seeing as how I am sixty-nine, and am rather
+too old to ride - yes, cherish and take care of your horse as perhaps
+the best friend you have in the world; for, after all, who will carry
+you through thick and thin as your horse will? not your gentlemen friends,
+I warrant, nor your upper servants, male or female; perhaps your lady
+would, that is, if she is a whopper, and one of the right sort; the
+others would be more likely to take up mud and pelt you with it, provided
+they saw you in trouble, than to help you.&nbsp; So take care of your
+horse, and feed him every day with your own hands; give him three quarters
+of a peck of corn each day, mixed up with a little hay-chaff, and allow
+him besides one hundredweight of hay in the course of the week; some
+say that the hay should be hardland hay, because it is the wholesomest,
+but I say, let it be clover hay, because the horse likes it best; give
+him through summer and winter, once a week, a pailful of bran mash,
+cold in summer and in winter hot; ride him gently about the neighbourhood
+every day, by which means you will give exercise to yourself and horse,
+and, moreover, have the satisfaction of exhibiting yourself and your
+horse to advantage, and hearing, perhaps, the men say what a fine horse,
+and the ladies saying what a fine man: never let your groom mount your
+horse, as it is ten to one, if you do, your groom will be wishing to
+show off before company, and will fling your horse down.&nbsp; I was
+groom to a gemman before I went to the inn at Hounslow, and flung him
+a horse down worth ninety guineas, by endeavouring to show off before
+some ladies that I met on the road.&nbsp; Turn your horse out to grass
+throughout May and the first part of June, for then the grass is sweetest,
+and the flies don&rsquo;t sting so bad as they do later in summer; afterwards
+merely turn him out occasionally in the swale of the morn and the evening;
+after September the grass is good for little, lash and sour at best;
+every horse should go out to grass, if not his blood becomes full of
+greasy humours, and his wind is apt to become affected, but he ought
+to be kept as much as possible from the heat and flies, always got up
+at night, and never turned out late in the year - Lord! if I had always
+such a nice attentive person to listen to me as you are, I could go
+on talking about &lsquo;orses to the end of time.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Stage - Coachmen of England - A Bully Served Out - Broughton&rsquo;s
+Guard - The Brazen Head.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I lived on very good terms, not only with the master and the old ostler,
+but with all the domestics and hangers on at the inn; waiters, chambermaids,
+cooks, and scullions, not forgetting the &ldquo;boots,&rdquo; of which
+there were three.&nbsp; As for the postillions, I was sworn brother
+with them all, and some of them went so far as to swear that I was the
+best fellow in the world; for which high opinion entertained by them
+of me, I believe I was principally indebted to the good account their
+comrade gave of me, whom I had so hospitably received in the dingle.&nbsp;
+I repeat that I lived on good terms with all the people connected with
+the inn, and was noticed and spoken kindly to by some of the guests
+- especially by that class termed commercial travellers - all of whom
+were great friends and patronizers of the landlord, and were the principal
+promoters of the dinner, and subscribers to the gift of plate, which
+I have already spoken of, the whole fraternity striking me as the jolliest
+set of fellows imaginable, the best customers to an inn, and the most
+liberal to servants; there was one description of persons, however,
+frequenting the inn, which I did not like at all, and which I did not
+get on well with, and these people were the stage-coachmen.<br>
+<br>
+The stage-coachmen of England, at the time of which I am speaking, considered
+themselves mighty fine gentry, nay, I verily believe the most important
+personages of the realm, and their entertaining this high opinion of
+themselves can scarcely be wondered at; they were low fellows, but masters
+at driving; driving was in fashion, and sprigs of nobility used to dress
+as coachmen and imitate the slang and behaviour of the coachmen, from
+whom occasionally they would take lessons in driving as they sat beside
+them on the box, which post of honour any sprig of nobility who happened
+to take a place on a coach claimed as his unquestionable right; and
+these sprigs would smoke cigars and drink sherry with the coachmen in
+bar-rooms, and on the road; and, when bidding them farewell, would give
+them a guinea or a half-guinea, and shake them by the hand, so that
+these fellows, being low fellows, very naturally thought no small liquor
+of themselves, but would talk familiarly of their friends lords so and
+so, the honourable misters so and so, and Sir Harry and Sir Charles,
+and be wonderfully saucy to any one who was not a lord, or something
+of the kind; and this high opinion of themselves received daily augmentation
+from the servile homage paid them by the generality of the untitled
+male passengers, especially those on the fore part of the coach, who
+used to contend for the honour of sitting on the box with the coachman
+when no sprig was nigh to put in his claim.&nbsp; Oh! what servile homage
+these craven creatures did pay these same coach fellows, more especially
+after witnessing this or t&rsquo;other act of brutality practised upon
+the weak and unoffending - upon some poor friendless woman travelling
+with but little money, and perhaps a brace of hungry children with her,
+or upon some thin and half-starved man travelling on the hind part of
+the coach from London to Liverpool with only eighteen pence in his pocket
+after his fare was paid, to defray his expenses on the road; for as
+the insolence of these knights was vast, so was their rapacity enormous;
+they had been so long accustomed to have crowns and half-crowns rained
+upon them by their admirers and flatterers, that they would look at
+a shilling, for which many an honest labourer was happy to toil for
+ten hours under a broiling sun, with the utmost contempt; would blow
+upon it derisively, or fillip it into the air before they pocketed it;
+but when nothing was given them, as would occasionally happen - for
+how could they receive from those who had nothing? and nobody was bound
+to give them anything, as they had certain wages from their employers
+- then what a scene would ensue!&nbsp; Truly the brutality and rapacious
+insolence of English coachmen had reached a climax; it was time that
+these fellows should be disenchanted, and the time - thank Heaven! -
+was not far distant.&nbsp; Let the craven dastards who used to curry
+favour with them, and applaud their brutality, lament their loss now
+that they and their vehicles have disappeared from the roads; I, who
+have ever been an enemy to insolence, cruelty, and tyranny, loathe their
+memory, and, what is more, am not afraid to say so, well aware of the
+storm of vituperation, partly learnt from them, which I may expect from
+those who used to fall down and worship them.<br>
+<br>
+Amongst the coachmen who frequented the inn was one who was called &ldquo;the
+bang-up coachman.&rdquo;&nbsp; He drove to our inn, in the fore part
+of every day, one of what were called the fast coaches, and afterwards
+took back the corresponding vehicle.&nbsp; He stayed at our house about
+twenty minutes, during which time the passengers of the coach which
+he was to return with dined; those at least who were inclined for dinner,
+and could pay for it.&nbsp; He derived his sobriquet of &ldquo;the bang-up
+coachman&rdquo; partly from his being dressed in the extremity of coach
+dandyism, and partly from the peculiar insolence of his manner, and
+the unmerciful fashion in which he was in the habit of lashing on the
+poor horses committed to his charge.&nbsp; He was a large tall fellow,
+of about thirty, with a face which, had it not been bloated by excess,
+and insolence and cruelty stamped most visibly upon it, might have been
+called good-looking.&nbsp; His insolence indeed was so great, that he
+was hated by all the minor fry connected with coaches along the road
+upon which he drove, especially the ostlers, whom he was continually
+abusing or finding fault with.&nbsp; Many was the hearty curse which
+he received when his back was turned; but the generality of people were
+much afraid of him, for he was a swinging strong fellow, and had the
+reputation of being a fighter, and in one or two instances had beaten
+in a barbarous manner individuals who had quarrelled with him.<br>
+<br>
+I was nearly having a fracas with this worthy.&nbsp; One day, after
+he had been drinking sherry with a sprig, he swaggered into the yard
+where I happened to be standing; just then a waiter came by carrying
+upon a tray part of a splendid Cheshire cheese, with a knife, plate,
+and napkin.&nbsp; Stopping the waiter, the coachman cut with the knife
+a tolerably large lump out of the very middle of the cheese, stuck it
+on the end of the knife, and putting it to his mouth nibbled a slight
+piece off it, and then, tossing the rest away with disdain, flung the
+knife down upon the tray, motioning the waiter to proceed; &ldquo;I
+wish,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you may not want before you die what you
+have just flung away,&rdquo; whereupon the fellow turned furiously towards
+me; just then, however, his coach being standing at the door, there
+was a cry for coachman, so that he was forced to depart, contenting
+himself for the present with shaking his fist at me, and threatening
+to serve me out on the first opportunity; before, however, the opportunity
+occurred he himself got served out in a most unexpected manner.<br>
+<br>
+The day after this incident he drove his coach to the inn, and after
+having dismounted and received the contributions of the generality of
+the passengers, he strutted up, with a cigar in his mouth, to an individual
+who had come with him, and who had just asked me a question with respect
+to the direction of a village about three miles off, to which he was
+going.&nbsp; &ldquo;Remember the coachman,&rdquo; said the knight of
+the box to this individual, who was a thin person of about sixty, with
+a white hat, rather shabby black coat, and buff-coloured trousers, and
+who held an umbrella and a small bundle in his hand.&nbsp; &ldquo;If
+you expect me to give you anything,&rdquo; said he to the coachman,
+&ldquo;you are mistaken; I will give you nothing.&nbsp; You have been
+very insolent to me as I rode behind you on the coach, and have encouraged
+two or three trumpery fellows, who rode along with you, to cut scurvy
+jokes at my expense, and now you come to me for money; I am not so poor,
+but I could have given you a shilling had you been civil; as it is,
+I will give you nothing.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! you won&rsquo;t, won&rsquo;t
+you?&rdquo; said the coachman; &ldquo;dear me!&nbsp; I hope I shan&rsquo;t
+starve because you won&rsquo;t give me anything - a shilling I why,
+I could afford to give you twenty if I thought fit, you pauper! civil
+to you, indeed! things are come to a fine pass if I need be civil to
+you!&nbsp; Do you know who you are speaking to? why, the best lords
+in the country are proud to speak to me.&nbsp; Why, it was only the
+other day that the Marquis of - said to me - &rdquo; and then he went
+on to say what the Marquis said to him; after which, flinging down his
+cigar, he strutted up the road, swearing to himself about paupers.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You say it is three miles to -,&rdquo; said the individual to
+me; &ldquo;I think I shall light my pipe, and smoke it as I go along.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Thereupon he took out from a side-pocket a tobacco-box and short meerschaum
+pipe, and implements for striking a light, filled his pipe, lighted
+it, and commenced smoking.&nbsp; Presently the coachman drew near.&nbsp;
+I saw at once that there was mischief in his eye; the man smoking was
+standing with his back towards him, and he came so nigh to him, seemingly
+purposely, that as he passed a puff of smoke came of necessity against
+his face.&nbsp; &ldquo;What do you mean by smoking in my face?&rdquo;
+said he, striking the pipe of the elderly individual out of his mouth.&nbsp;
+The other, without manifesting much surprise, said, &ldquo;I thank you;
+and if you will wait a minute, I will give you a receipt for that favour;&rdquo;
+then gathering up his pipe, and taking off his coat and hat, he laid
+them on a stepping-block which stood near, and rubbing his hands together,
+he advanced towards the coachman in an attitude of offence, holding
+his hands crossed very near to his face.&nbsp; The coachman, who probably
+expected anything but such a movement from a person of the age and appearance
+of the individual whom he had insulted, stood for a moment motionless
+with surprise; but, recollecting himself, he pointed at him derisively
+with his finger; the next moment, however, the other was close upon
+him, had struck aside the extended hand with his left fist, and given
+him a severe blow on the nose with his right, which he immediately followed
+by a left-hand blow in the eye; then drawing his body slightly backward,
+with the velocity of lightning he struck the coachman full in the mouth,
+and the last blow was the severest of all, for it cut the coachman&rsquo;s
+lips nearly through; blows so quickly and sharply dealt I had never
+seen.&nbsp; The coachman reeled like a fir-tree in a gale, and seemed
+nearly unsensed.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ho! what&rsquo;s this? a fight! a fight!&rdquo;
+sounded from a dozen voices, and people came running from all directions
+to see what was going on.&nbsp; The coachman, coming somewhat to himself,
+disencumbered himself of his coat and hat; and, encouraged by two or
+three of his brothers of the whip, showed some symptoms of fighting,
+endeavouring to close with his foe, but the attempt was vain, for his
+foe was not to be closed with; he did not shift or dodge about, but
+warded off the blows of his opponent with the greatest sang-froid, always
+using the guard which I have already described, and putting in, in return,
+short chopping blows with the swiftness of lightning.&nbsp; In a very
+few minutes the countenance of the coachman was literally cut to pieces,
+and several of his teeth were dislodged; at length he gave in; stung
+with mortification, however, he repented, and asked for another round;
+it was granted, to his own complete demolition.&nbsp; The coachman did
+not drive his coach back that day, he did not appear on the box again
+for a week; but he never held up his head afterwards.&nbsp; Before I
+quitted the inn, he had disappeared from the road, going no one knew
+where.<br>
+<br>
+The coachman, as I have said before, was very much disliked upon the
+road, but there was an esprit de corps amongst the coachmen, and those
+who stood by did not like to see their brother chastised in such tremendous
+fashion.&nbsp; &ldquo;I never saw such a fight before,&rdquo; said one.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Fight! why, I don&rsquo;t call it a fight at all; this chap here
+ha&rsquo;n&rsquo;t got a scratch, whereas Tom is cut to pieces; it is
+all along of that guard of his; if Tom could have got within his guard
+he would have soon served the old chap out.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;So he
+would,&rdquo; said another, &ldquo;it was all owing to that guard.&nbsp;
+However, I think I see into it, and if I had not to drive this afternoon,
+I would have a turn with the old fellow and soon serve him out.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I will fight him now for a guinea,&rdquo; said the other coachman,
+half taking off his coat; observing, however, that the elderly individual
+made a motion towards him, he hitched it upon his shoulder again, and
+added, &ldquo;that is, if he had not been fighting already, but as it
+is, I am above taking an advantage, especially of such a poor old creature
+as that.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when he had said this, he looked around him,
+and there was a feeble titter of approbation from two or three of the
+craven crew, who were in the habit of currying favour with the coachmen.&nbsp;
+The elderly individual looked for a moment at these last, and then said,
+&ldquo;To such fellows as you I have nothing to say;&rdquo; then turning
+to the coachmen, &ldquo;and as for you,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;ye cowardly
+bullies, I have but one word, which is, that your reign upon the roads
+is nearly over, and that a time is coming when ye will no longer be
+wanted or employed in your present capacity, when ye will either have
+to drive dung-carts, assist as ostlers at village ale-houses, or rot
+in the workhouse.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then putting on his coat and hat, and
+taking up his bundle, not forgetting his meerschaum, and the rest of
+his smoking apparatus, he departed on his way.&nbsp; Filled with curiosity,
+I followed him.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am quite astonished that you should be able to use your hands
+in the way you have done,&rdquo; said I, as I walked with this individual
+in the direction in which he was bound.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I will tell you how I became able to do so,&rdquo; said the elderly
+individual, proceeding to fill and light his pipe as he walked along.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My father was a journeyman engraver, who lived in a very riotous
+neighbourhood in the outskirts of London.&nbsp; Wishing to give me something
+of an education, he sent me to a day-school, two or three streets distant
+from where we lived, and there, being rather a puny boy, I suffered
+much persecution from my schoolfellows, who were a very blackguard set.&nbsp;
+One day, as I was running home, with one of my tormentors pursuing me,
+old Sergeant Broughton, the retired fighting-man, seized me by the arm
+- &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;has it ever been your luck to
+be acquainted with Sergeant Broughton?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You may well call it luck,&rdquo; said the elderly individual;
+but for him I should never have been able to make my way through the
+world.&nbsp; He lived only four doors from our house; so, as I was running
+along the street, with my tyrant behind me, Sergeant Broughton seized
+me by the arm.&nbsp; &lsquo;Stop, my boy,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;I have
+frequently seen that scamp ill-treating you; now I will teach you how
+to send him home with a bloody nose; down with your bag of books; and
+now, my game chick,&rsquo; whispered he to me, placing himself between
+me and my adversary, so that he could not observe his motions; &lsquo;clench
+your fist in this manner, and hold your arms in this, and when he strikes
+at you, move them as I now show you, and he can&rsquo;t hurt you; now,
+don&rsquo;t be afraid, but go at him.&rsquo;&nbsp; I confess that I
+was somewhat afraid, but I considered myself in some degree under the
+protection of the famous Sergeant, and, clenching my fist, I went at
+my foe, using the guard which my ally recommended.&nbsp; The result
+corresponded to a certain degree with the predictions of the Sergeant;
+I gave my foe a bloody nose and a black eye, though, notwithstanding
+my recent lesson in the art of self-defence, he contrived to give me
+two or three clumsy blows.&nbsp; From that moment I was the especial
+favourite of the Sergeant, who gave me further lessons, so that in a
+little time I became a very fair boxer, beating everybody of my own
+size who attacked me.&nbsp; The old gentleman, however, made me promise
+never to be quarrelsome, nor to turn his instructions to account, except
+in self-defence.&nbsp; I have always borne in mind my promise, and have
+made it a point of conscience never to fight unless absolutely compelled.&nbsp;
+Folks may rail against boxing if they please, but being able to box
+may sometimes stand a quiet man in good stead.&nbsp; How should I have
+fared to-day, but for the instructions of Sergeant Broughton?&nbsp;
+But for them, the brutal ruffian who insulted me must have passed unpunished.&nbsp;
+He will not soon forget the lesson which I have just given him - the
+only lesson he could understand.&nbsp; What would have been the use
+of reasoning with a fellow of that description?&nbsp; Brave old Broughton!&nbsp;
+I owe him much.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And your manner of fighting,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;was the manner
+employed by Sergeant Broughton?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said my new acquaintance; &ldquo;it was the manner
+in which he beat every one who attempted to contend with him, till,
+in an evil hour, he entered the ring with Slack, without any training
+or preparation, and by a chance blow lost the battle to a man who had
+been beaten with ease by those who, in the hands of Broughton, appeared
+like so many children.&nbsp; It was the way of fighting of him who first
+taught Englishmen to box scientifically, who was the head and father
+of the fighters of what is now called the old school, the last of which
+were Johnson and Big Ben.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A wonderful man, that Big Ben,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He was so,&rdquo; said the elderly individual; &ldquo;but had
+it not been for Broughton, I question whether Ben would have ever been
+the fighter he was.&nbsp; Oh! there was no one like old Broughton; but
+for him I should at the present moment be sneaking along the road, pursued
+by the hissings and hootings of the dirty flatterers of that blackguard
+coachman.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What did you mean,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;by those words of yours,
+that the coachmen would speedily disappear from the roads?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I meant,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;that a new method of travelling
+is about to be established, which will supersede the old.&nbsp; I am
+a poor engraver, as my father was before me; but engraving is an intellectual
+trade, and by following it, I have been brought in contact with some
+of the cleverest men in England.&nbsp; It has even made me acquainted
+with the projector of the scheme, which he has told me many of the wisest
+heads of England have been dreaming of during a period of six hundred
+years, and which it seems was alluded to by a certain Brazen Head in
+the story-book of Friar Bacon, who is generally supposed to have been
+a wizard, but in reality was a great philosopher.&nbsp; Young man, in
+less than twenty years, by which time I shall be dead and gone, England
+will be surrounded with roads of metal, on which armies may travel with
+mighty velocity, and of which the walls of brass and iron by which the
+friar proposed to defend his native land are the types.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+He then, shaking me by the hand, proceeded on his way, whilst I returned
+to the inn.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Francis Ardry - His Misfortunes - Dog and Lion Fight - Great Men of
+the World.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+A few days after the circumstance which I have last commemorated, it
+chanced that, as I was standing at the door of the inn, one of the numerous
+stage-coaches which were in the habit of stopping there, drove up, and
+several passengers got down.&nbsp; I had assisted a woman with a couple
+of children to dismount, and had just delivered to her a band-box, which
+appeared to be her only property, which she had begged me to fetch down
+from the roof, when I felt a hand laid upon my shoulder, and heard a
+voice exclaim, &ldquo;Is it possible, old fellow, that I find you in
+this place?&rdquo;&nbsp; I turned round, and, wrapped in a large blue
+cloak, I beheld my good friend Francis Ardry.&nbsp; I shook him most
+warmly by the hand, and said, &ldquo;If you are surprised to see me,
+I am no less so to see you; where are you bound to?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am bound for L-; at any rate, I am booked for that sea-port,&rdquo;
+said my friend in reply.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am sorry for it,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for in that case we
+shall have to part in a quarter of an hour, the coach by which you came
+stopping no longer.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And whither are you bound?&rdquo; demanded my friend.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am stopping at present in this house, quite undetermined as
+to what to do.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then come along with me,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That I can scarcely do,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I have a horse
+in the stall which I cannot afford to ruin by racing to L--- by the
+side of your coach.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+My friend mused for a moment: &ldquo;I have no particular business at
+L---,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;I was merely going thither to pass a day
+or two, till an affair, in which I am deeply interested, at C--- shall
+come off.&nbsp; I think I shall stay with you for four-and-twenty hours
+at least; I have been rather melancholy of late, and cannot afford to
+part with a friend like you at the present moment; it is an unexpected
+piece of good fortune to have met you; and I have not been very fortunate
+of late,&rdquo; he added, sighing.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I am glad to see you once more, whether
+fortunate, or not; where is your baggage?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yon trunk is mine,&rdquo; said Francis, pointing to a trunk of
+black Russian leather upon the coach.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We will soon have it down,&rdquo; said I; and at a word which
+I gave to one of the hangers-on of the inn, the trunk was taken from
+the top of the coach.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; said I to Francis Ardry,
+&ldquo;follow me, I am a person of some authority in this house;&rdquo;
+thereupon I led Francis Ardry into the house, and a word which I said
+to a waiter forthwith installed Francis Ardry in a comfortable private
+sitting-room, and his trunk in the very best sleeping-room of our extensive
+establishment.<br>
+<br>
+It was now about one o&rsquo;clock: Francis Ardry ordered dinner for
+two, to be ready at four, and a pint of sherry to be brought forthwith,
+which I requested my friend the waiter might be the very best, and which
+in effect turned out as I requested; we sat down, and when we had drunk
+to each other&rsquo;s health, Frank requested me to make known to him
+how I had contrived to free myself from my embarrassments in London,
+what I had been about since I quitted that city, and the present posture
+of my affairs.<br>
+<br>
+I related to Francis Ardry how I had composed the Life of Joseph Sell,
+and how the sale of it to the bookseller had enabled me to quit London
+with money in my pocket, which had supported me during a long course
+of ramble in the country, into the particulars of which I, however,
+did not enter with any considerable degree of fulness.&nbsp; I summed
+up my account by saying that &ldquo;I was at present a kind of overlooker
+in the stables of the inn, had still some pounds in my purse, and, moreover,
+a capital horse in the stall.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No very agreeable posture of affairs,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry,
+looking rather seriously at me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I make no complaints,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;my prospects are
+not very bright, it is true, but sometimes I have visions both waking
+and sleeping, which, though always strange, are invariably agreeable.&nbsp;
+Last night, in my chamber near the hayloft, I dreamt that I had passed
+over an almost interminable wilderness - an enormous wall rose before
+me, the wall, methought, was the great wall of China:- strange figures
+appeared to be beckoning to me from the top of the wall; such visions
+are not exactly to be sneered at.&nbsp; Not that such phantasmagoria,&rdquo;
+said I, raising my voice, &ldquo;are to be compared for a moment with
+such desirable things as fashion, fine clothes, cheques from uncles,
+parliamentary interest, the love of splendid females.&nbsp; Ah! woman&rsquo;s
+love,&rdquo; said I, and sighed.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What&rsquo;s the matter with the fellow?&rdquo; said Francis
+Ardry.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;There is nothing like it,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Like what?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Love, divine love,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Confound love,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry, &ldquo;I hate the very
+name; I have made myself a pretty fool by it, but trust me for ever
+being at such folly again.&nbsp; In an evil hour I abandoned my former
+pursuits and amusements for it; in one morning spent at Joey&rsquo;s
+there was more real pleasure than in - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Surely,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you are not hankering after dog-fighting
+again, a sport which none but the gross and unrefined care anything
+for?&nbsp; No, one&rsquo;s thoughts should be occupied by something
+higher and more rational than dog-fighting; and what better than love
+- divine love?&nbsp; Oh, there&rsquo;s nothing like it!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray, don&rsquo;t talk nonsense,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nonsense,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;why I was repeating, to the best
+of my recollection, what I heard you say on a former occasion.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If ever I talked such stuff,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry, &ldquo;I
+was a fool; and indeed I cannot deny that I have been one: no, there&rsquo;s
+no denying that I have been a fool.&nbsp; What do you think? that false
+Annette has cruelly abandoned me.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;perhaps you have yourself to thank
+for her having done so; did you never treat her with coldness, and repay
+her marks of affectionate interest with strange fits of eccentric humour?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lord! how little you know of women,&rdquo; said Francis Ardry;
+&ldquo;had I done as you suppose, I should probably have possessed her
+at the present moment.&nbsp; I treated her in a manner diametrically
+opposite to that.&nbsp; I loaded her with presents, was always most
+assiduous to her, always at her feet, as I may say, yet she nevertheless
+abandoned me - and for whom?&nbsp; I am almost ashamed to say - for
+a fiddler.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I took a glass of wine, Francis Ardry followed my example, and then
+proceeded to detail to me the treatment which he had experienced from
+Annette, and from what he said, it appeared that her conduct to him
+had been in the highest degree reprehensible; notwithstanding he had
+indulged her in everything, she was never civil to him, but loaded him
+continually with taunts and insults, and had finally, on his being unable
+to supply her with a sum of money which she had demanded, decamped from
+the lodgings which he had taken for her, carrying with her all the presents
+which at various times he had bestowed upon her, and had put herself
+under the protection of a gentleman who played the bassoon at the Italian
+Opera, at which place it appeared that her sister had lately been engaged
+as a danseuse.&nbsp; My friend informed me that at first he had experienced
+great agony at the ingratitude of Annette, but at last had made up his
+mind to forget her, and, in order more effectually to do so, had left
+London with the intention of witnessing a fight, which was shortly coming
+off at a town in these parts, between some dogs and a lion; which combat,
+he informed me, had for some time past been looked forward to with intense
+eagerness by the gentlemen of the sporting world.<br>
+<br>
+I commended him for his resolution, at the same time advising him not
+to give up his mind entirely to dog-fighting, as he had formerly done,
+but, when the present combat should be over, to return to his rhetorical
+studies, and above all to marry some rich and handsome lady on the first
+opportunity, as, with his person and expectations, he had only to sue
+for the hand of the daughter of a marquis to be successful, telling
+him, with a sigh, that all women were not Annettes, and that, upon the
+whole, there was nothing like them.&nbsp; To which advice he answered,
+that he intended to return to rhetoric as soon as the lion fight should
+be over, but that he never intended to marry, having had enough of women;
+adding that he was glad he had no sister, as, with the feelings which
+he entertained with respect to her sex, he should be unable to treat
+her with common affection, and concluded by repeating a proverb which
+he had learnt from an Arab whom he had met at Venice, to the effect,
+that, &ldquo;one who has been stung by a snake, shivers at the sight
+of a sting.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+After a little more conversation, we strolled to the stable, where my
+horse was standing; my friend, who was a connoisseur in horseflesh,
+surveyed the animal with attention, and after inquiring where and how
+I had obtained him, asked what I intended to do with him; on my telling
+him that I was undetermined, and that I was afraid the horse was likely
+to prove a burden to me, he said, &ldquo;It is a noble animal, and if
+you mind what you are about, you may make a small fortune by him.&nbsp;
+I do not want such an animal myself, nor do I know any one who does;
+but a great horse-fair will be held shortly at a place where, it is
+true, I have never been, but of which I have heard a great deal from
+my acquaintances, where it is said a first-rate horse is always sure
+to fetch its value; that place is Horncastle, in Lincolnshire, you should
+take him thither.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Francis Ardry and myself dined together, and after dinner partook of
+a bottle of the best port which the inn afforded.&nbsp; After a few
+glasses, we had a great deal of conversation; I again brought the subject
+of marriage and love, divine love, upon the carpet, but Francis almost
+immediately begged me to drop it; and on my having the delicacy to comply,
+he reverted to dog-fighting, on which he talked well and learnedly;
+amongst other things, he said it was a princely sport of great antiquity,
+and quoted from Quintus Curtius to prove that the princes of India must
+have been of the fancy, they having, according to that author, treated
+Alexander to a fight between certain dogs and a lion.&nbsp; Becoming,
+notwithstanding my friend&rsquo;s eloquence and learning, somewhat tired
+of the subject, I began to talk about Alexander.&nbsp; Francis Ardry
+said he was one of the two great men whom the world has produced, the
+other being Napoleon; I replied that I believed Tamerlane was a greater
+man than either; but Francis Ardry knew nothing of Tamerlane, save what
+he had gathered from the play of Timour the Tartar.&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo;
+said he, &ldquo;Alexander and Napoleon are the great men of the world,
+their names are known everywhere.&nbsp; Alexander has been dead upwards
+of two thousand years, but the very English bumpkins sometimes christen
+their boys by the name of Alexander - can there be a greater evidence
+of his greatness?&nbsp; As for Napoleon, there are some parts of India
+in which his bust is worshipped.&rdquo;&nbsp; Wishing to make up a triumvirate,
+I mentioned the name of Wellington, to which Francis Ardry merely said,
+&ldquo;bah!&rdquo; and resumed the subject of dog-fighting.<br>
+<br>
+Francis Ardry remained at the inn during that day and the next, and
+then departed to the dog and lion fight; I never saw him afterwards,
+and merely heard of him once after a lapse of some years, and what I
+then heard was not exactly what I could have wished to hear.&nbsp; He
+did not make much of the advantages which he possessed, a pity, for
+how great were those advantages - person, intellect, eloquence, connection,
+riches! yet, with all these advantages, one thing highly needful seems
+to have been wanting in Francis.&nbsp; A desire, a craving, to perform
+something great and good.&nbsp; Oh! what a vast deal may be done with
+intellect, courage, riches, accompanied by the desire of ,doing something
+great and good!&nbsp; Why, a person may carry the blessings of civilization
+and religion to barbarous, yet at the same time beautiful and romantic
+lands; and what a triumph there is for him who does so! what a crown
+of glory! of far greater value than those surrounding the brows of your
+mere conquerors.&nbsp; Yet who has done so in these times?&nbsp; Not
+many; not three, not two, something seems to have been always wanting;
+there is, however, one instance, in which the various requisites have
+been united, and the crown, the most desirable in the world - at least
+which I consider to be the most desirable - achieved, and only one,
+that of Brooke of Borneo.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Mr. Platitude and the Man in Black - The Postillion&rsquo;s Adventures
+- The Lone House - A Goodly Assemblage.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It never rains, but it pours.&nbsp; I was destined to see at this inn
+more acquaintances than one.&nbsp; On the day of Francis Ardry&rsquo;s
+departure, shortly after he had taken leave of me, as I was standing
+in the corn-chamber, at a kind of writing-table or desk, fastened to
+the wall, with a book before me, in which I was making out an account
+of the corn and hay lately received and distributed, my friend the postillion
+came running in out of breath.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here they both are,&rdquo;
+he gasped out; &ldquo;pray do come and look at them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Whom do you mean?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, that red-haired Jack Priest, and that idiotic parson, Platitude;
+they have just been set down by one of the coaches, and want a postchaise
+to go across the country in; and what do you think?&nbsp; I am to have
+the driving of them.&nbsp; I have no time to lose, for I must get myself
+ready; so do come and look at them.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I hastened into the yard of the inn; two or three of the helpers of
+our establishment were employed in drawing forward a postchaise out
+of the chaise-house, which occupied one side of the yard, and which
+was spacious enough to contain nearly twenty of these vehicles, though
+it was never full, several of them being always out upon the roads,
+as the demand upon us for postchaises across the country was very great.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;There they are,&rdquo; said the postillion, softly, nodding towards
+two individuals, in one of whom I recognized the man in black, and in
+the other Mr. Platitude; &ldquo;there they are; have a good look at
+them, while I go and get ready.&rdquo;&nbsp; The man in black and Mr.
+Platitude were walking up and down the yard, Mr. Platitude was doing
+his best to make himself appear ridiculous, talking very loudly in exceedingly
+bad Italian, evidently for the purpose of attracting the notice of the
+bystanders, in which he succeeded, all the stable-boys and hangers-on
+about the yard, attracted by his vociferation, grinning at his ridiculous
+figure as he limped up and down.&nbsp; The man in black said little
+or nothing, but from the glances which he cast sideways appeared to
+be thoroughly ashamed of his companion; the worthy couple presently
+arrived close to where I was standing, and the man in black, who was
+nearest to me, perceiving me, stood still as if hesitating, but recovering
+himself in a moment, he moved on without taking any farther notice;
+Mr. Platitude exclaimed as they passed in broken lingo, &ldquo;I hope
+we shall find the holy doctors all assembled,&rdquo; and as they returned,
+&ldquo;I make no doubt that they will all be rejoiced to see me.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Not wishing to be standing an idle gazer, I went to the chaise and assisted
+in attaching the horses, which had now been brought out, to the pole.&nbsp;
+The postillion presently arrived, and finding all ready took the reins
+and mounted the box, whilst I very politely opened the door for the
+two travellers; Mr. Platitude got in first, and, without taking any
+notice of me, seated himself on the farther side.&nbsp; In got the man
+in black, and seated himself nearest to me.&nbsp; &ldquo;All is right,&rdquo;
+said I, as I shut the door, whereupon the postillion cracked his whip,
+and the chaise drove out of the yard.&nbsp; Just as I shut the door,
+however, and just as Mr. Platitude had recommenced talking in jergo,
+at the top of his voice, the man in black turned his face partly towards
+me, and gave me a wink with his left eye.<br>
+<br>
+I did not see my friend the postillion till the next morning, when he
+gave me an account of the adventures he had met with on his expedition.&nbsp;
+It appeared that he had driven the man in black and the Reverend Platitude
+across the country by roads and lanes which he had some difficulty in
+threading.&nbsp; At length, when he had reached a part of the country
+where he had never been before, the man in black pointed out to him
+a house near the corner of a wood, to which he informed him they were
+bound.&nbsp; The postillion said it was a strange-looking house, with
+a wall round it; and, upon the whole, bore something of the look of
+a madhouse.&nbsp; There was already a postchaise at the gate, from which
+three individuals had alighted - one of them the postillion said was
+a mean-looking scoundrel, with a regular petty-larceny expression in
+his countenance.&nbsp; He was dressed very much like the man in black,
+and the postillion said that he could almost have taken his Bible oath
+that they were both of the same profession.&nbsp; The other two he said
+were parsons, he could swear that, though he had never seen them before;
+there could be no mistake about them.&nbsp; Church of England parsons
+the postillion swore they were, with their black coats, white cravats,
+and airs, in which clumsiness and conceit were most funnily blended
+- Church of England parsons of the Platitude description, who had been
+in Italy, and seen the Pope, and kissed his toe, and picked up a little
+broken Italian, and come home greater fools than they went forth.&nbsp;
+It appeared that they were all acquaintances of Mr. Platitude, for when
+the postillion had alighted and let Mr. Platitude and his companion
+out of the chaise, Mr. Platitude shook the whole three by the hand,
+conversed with his two brothers in a little broken jergo, and addressed
+the petty-larceny looking individual by the title of Reverend Doctor.&nbsp;
+In the midst of these greetings, however, the postillion said the man
+in black came up to him, and proceeded to settle with him for the chaise;
+he had shaken hands with nobody, and had merely nodded to the others;
+&ldquo;and now,&rdquo; said the postillion, &ldquo;he evidently wished
+to get rid of me, fearing, probably, that I should see too much of the
+nonsense that was going on.&nbsp; It was whilst settling with me that
+he seemed to recognize me for the first time, for he stared hard at
+me, and at last asked whether I had not been in Italy; to which question,
+with a nod and a laugh, I replied that I had.&nbsp; I was then going
+to ask him about the health of the image of Holy Mary, and to say that
+I hoped it had recovered from its horsewhipping; but he interrupted
+me, paid me the money for the fare, and gave me a crown for myself,
+saying he would not detain me any longer.&nbsp; I say, partner, I am
+a poor postillion, but when he gave me the crown I had a good mind to
+fling it in his face.&nbsp; I reflected, however, that it was not mere
+gift-money, but coin which I had earned, and hardly too, so I put it
+in my pocket, and I bethought me, moreover, that, knave as I knew him
+to be, he had always treated me with civility; so I nodded to him, and
+he said something which, perhaps, he meant for Latin, but which sounded
+very much like &lsquo;vails,&rsquo; and by which he doubtless alluded
+to the money which he had given me.&nbsp; He then went into the house
+with the rest, the coach drove away which had brought the others, and
+I was about to get on the box and follow; observing, however, two more
+chaises driving up, I thought I would be in no hurry, so I just led
+my horses and chaise a little out of the way, and pretending to be occupied
+about the harness, I kept a tolerably sharp look-out at the new arrivals.&nbsp;
+Well, partner, the next vehicle that drove up was a gentleman&rsquo;s
+carriage which I knew very well, as well as those within it, who were
+a father and son, the father a good kind old gentleman, and a justice
+of the peace, therefore not very wise, as you may suppose; the son a
+puppy who has been abroad, where he contrived to forget his own language,
+though only nine months absent, and now rules the roast over his father
+and mother, whose only child he is, and by whom he is thought wondrous
+clever.&nbsp; So this foreigneering chap brings his poor old father
+to this out-of-the-way house to meet these Platitudes and petty-larceny
+villains, and perhaps would have brought his mother too, only, simple
+thing, by good fortune she happens to be laid up with the rheumatic.&nbsp;
+Well, the father and son, I beg pardon, I mean the son and father, got
+down and went in, and then after their carriage was gone, the chaise
+behind drove up, in which was a huge fat fellow, weighing twenty stone
+at least, but with something of a foreign look, and with him - who do
+you think?&nbsp; Why, a rascally Unitarian minister, that is, a fellow
+who had been such a minister, but who, some years ago leaving his own
+people, who had bred him up and sent him to their college at York, went
+over to the High Church, and is now, I suppose, going over to some other
+church, for he was talking, as he got down, wondrous fast in Latin,
+or what sounded something like Latin, to the fat fellow, who appeared
+to take things wonderfully easy, and merely grunted to the dog Latin
+which the scoundrel had learnt at the expense of the poor Unitarians
+at York.&nbsp; So they went into the house, and presently arrived another
+chaise, but ere I could make any further observations, the porter of
+the out-of-the-way house came up to me, asking what I was stopping there
+for? bidding me go away, and not pry into other people&rsquo;s business.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Pretty business,&rsquo; said I to him, &lsquo;that is being transacted
+in a place like this,&rsquo; and then I was going to say something uncivil,
+but he went to attend to the new corners, and I took myself away on
+my own business as he bade me, not, however, before observing that these
+two last were a couple of blackcoats.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The postillion then proceeded to relate how he made the best of his
+way to a small public-house, about a mile off, where he had intended
+to bait, and how he met on the way a landau and pair, belonging to a
+Scotch coxcomb whom he had known in London, about whom he related some
+curious particulars, and then continued: &ldquo;Well, after I had passed
+him and his turn-out, I drove straight to the public-house, where I
+baited my horses, and where I found some of the chaises and drivers
+who had driven the folks to the lunatic-looking mansion, and were now
+waiting to take them up again.&nbsp; Whilst my horses were eating their
+bait, I sat me down, as the weather was warm, at a table outside, and
+smoked a pipe, and drank some ale, in company with the coachman of the
+old gentleman who had gone to the house with his son, and the coachman
+then told me that the house was a Papist house, and that the present
+was a grand meeting of all the fools and rascals in the country, who
+came to bow down to images, and to concert schemes - pretty schemes
+no doubt - for overturning the religion of the country, and that for
+his part he did not approve of being concerned with such doings, and
+that he was going to give his master warning next day.&nbsp; So, as
+we were drinking and discoursing, up drove the chariot of the Scotchman,
+and down got his valet and the driver, and whilst the driver was seeing
+after the horses, the valet came and sat down at the table where the
+gentleman&rsquo;s coachman and I were drinking.&nbsp; I knew the fellow
+well, a Scotchman like his master, and just of the same kidney, with
+white kid gloves, red hair frizzled, a patch of paint on his face, and
+his hands covered with rings.&nbsp; This very fellow, I must tell you,
+was one of those most busy in endeavouring to get me turned out of the
+servants&rsquo; club in Park Lane, because I happened to serve a literary
+man; so he sat down, and in a kind of affected tone cried out, &lsquo;Landlord,
+bring me a glass of cold negus.&rsquo;&nbsp; The landlord, however,
+told him that there was no negus, but that if he pleased, he could have
+a jug of as good beer as any in the country.&nbsp; &lsquo;Confound the
+beer,&rsquo; said the valet, &lsquo;do you think that I am accustomed
+to such vulgar beverage?&rsquo;&nbsp; However, as he found there was
+nothing better to be had, he let the man bring him some beer, and when
+he had got it, soon showed that he could drink it easily enough; so,
+when he had drunk two or three draughts, he turned his eyes in a contemptuous
+manner, first, on the coachman, and then on me: I saw the scamp recollected
+me, for after staring at me and my dress for about half a minute, he
+put on a broad grin, and flinging his head back, he uttered a loud laugh.&nbsp;
+Well, I did not like this, as you may well believe, and taking the pipe
+out of my mouth, I asked him if he meant anything personal, to which
+he answered, that he had said nothing to me, and that he had a right
+to look where he pleased, and laugh when he pleased.&nbsp; Well, as
+to a certain extent he was right, as to looking and laughing; and as
+I have occasionally looked at a fool and laughed, though I was not the
+fool in this instance, I put my pipe into my mouth and said no more.&nbsp;
+This quiet and well-regulated behaviour of mine, however, the fellow
+interpreted into fear; so, after drinking a little more, he suddenly
+started up, and striding once or twice before the table, he asked me
+what I meant by that impertinent question of mine, saying that he had
+a good mind to wring my nose for my presumption.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have?&rsquo;
+said I, getting up, and laying down my pipe.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll
+now give you an opportunity.&rsquo;&nbsp; So I put myself in an attitude,
+and went up to him, saying &lsquo;I have an old score to settle with
+you, you scamp; you wanted to get me turned out of the club, didn&rsquo;t
+you?&rsquo;&nbsp; And thereupon, remembering that he had threatened
+to wring my nose, I gave him a snorter upon his own.&nbsp; I wish you
+could have seen the fellow when he felt the smart; so far from trying
+to defend himself, he turned round, and with his hand to his face, attempted
+to run away; but I was now in a regular passion, and following him up,
+got before him, and was going to pummel away at him, when he burst into
+tears, and begged me not to hurt him, saying that he was sorry if he
+had offended me, and that, if I pleased, he would go down on his knees,
+or do anything else I wanted.&nbsp; Well, when I heard him talk in this
+manner, I, of course, let him be; I could hardly help laughing at the
+figure he cut; his face all blubbered with tears, and blood and paint;
+but I did not laugh at the poor creature either, but went to the table
+and took up my pipe, and smoked and drank as if nothing had happened;
+and the fellow, after having been to the pump, came and sat down, crying,
+and trying to curry favour with me and the coachman; presently, however,
+putting on a confidential look, he began to talk of the Popish house,
+and of the doings there, and said he supposed as how we were of the
+party, and that it was all right; and then he began to talk of the Pope
+of Rome, and what a nice man he was, and what a fine thing it was to
+be of his religion, especially if folks went over to him; and how it
+advanced them in the world, and gave them consideration; and how his
+master, who had been abroad and seen the Pope, and kissed his toe, was
+going over to the Popish religion, and had persuaded him to consent
+to do so, and to forsake his own, which I think the scoundrel called
+the &lsquo;Piscopal Church of Scotland, and how many others of that
+church were going over, thinking to better their condition in life by
+so doing, and to be more thought on; and how many of the English Church
+were thinking of going over too - and that he had no doubt that it would
+all end right and comfortably.&nbsp; Well, as he was going on in this
+way, the old coachman began to spit, and getting up, flung all the beer
+that was in his jug upon the ground, and going away, ordered another
+jug of beer, and sat down at another table, saying that he would not
+drink in such company; and I too got up, and flung what beer remained
+in my jug, there wasn&rsquo;t more than a drop, in the fellow&rsquo;s
+face, saying, I would scorn to drink any more in such company; and then
+I went to my horses, put them to, paid my reckoning, and drove home.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The postillion having related his story, to which I listened with all
+due attention, mused for a moment, and then said, &ldquo;I dare say
+you remember how, some time since, when old Bill had been telling us
+how the Government a long time ago, had done away with robbing on the
+highway, by putting down the public-houses and places which the highwaymen
+frequented, and by sending a good mounted police to hunt them down,
+I said that it was a shame that the present Government did not employ
+somewhat the same means in order to stop the proceedings of Mumbo Jumbo
+and his gang now-a-days in England.&nbsp; Howsomever, since I have driven
+a fare to a Popish rendezvous, and seen something of what is going on
+there, I should conceive that the Government are justified in allowing
+the gang the free exercise of their calling.&nbsp; Anybody is welcome
+to stoop and pick up nothing, or worse than nothing, and if Mumbo Jumbo&rsquo;s
+people, after their expeditions, return to their haunts with no better
+plunder in the shape of converts than what I saw going into yonder place
+of call, I should say they are welcome to what they get; for if that&rsquo;s
+the kind of rubbish they steal out of the Church of England, or any
+other church, who in his senses but would say a good riddance, and many
+thanks for your trouble: at any rate, that is my opinion of the matter.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Deliberations with Self-Resolution - Invitation to Dinner - The Commercial
+Traveller - The Landlord&rsquo;s Offer - The Comet Wine.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was now that I had frequent deliberations with myself.&nbsp; Should
+I continue at the inn in my present position?&nbsp; I was not very much
+captivated with it; there was little poetry in keeping an account of
+the corn, hay, and straw which came in, and was given out, and I was
+fond of poetry; moreover, there was no glory at all to be expected in
+doing so, and I was fond of glory.&nbsp; Should I give up that situation,
+and remaining at the inn, become ostler under old Bill?&nbsp; There
+was more poetry in rubbing down horses than in keeping an account of
+straw, hay, and corn; there was also some prospect of glory attached
+to the situation of ostler, for the grooms and stable-boys occasionally
+talked of an ostler, a great way down the road, who had been presented
+by some sporting people, not with a silver vase, as our governor had
+been, but with a silver currycomb, in testimony of their admiration
+for his skill; but I confess that the poetry of rubbing down had become,
+as all other poetry becomes, rather prosy by frequent repetition, and
+with respect to the chance of deriving glory from the employment, I
+entertained, in the event of my determining to stay, very slight hope
+of ever attaining skill in the ostler art sufficient to induce sporting
+people to bestow upon me a silver currycomb.&nbsp; I was not half so
+good an ostler as old Bill, who had never been presented with a silver
+currycomb, and I never expected to become so, therefore what chance
+had I?&nbsp; It was true, there was a prospect of some pecuniary emolument
+to be derived by remaining in either situation.&nbsp; It was very probable
+that, provided I continued to keep an account of the hay and corn coming
+in and expended, the landlord would consent to allow me a pound a week,
+which at the end of a dozen years, provided I kept myself sober, would
+amount to a considerable sum.&nbsp; I might, on the retirement of old
+Bill, by taking his place, save up a decent sum of money, provided,
+unlike him, I kept myself sober, and laid by all the shillings and sixpences
+I got; but the prospect of laying up a decent sum of money was not of
+sufficient importance to induce me to continue either at my wooden desk,
+or in the inn-yard.&nbsp; The reader will remember what difficulty I
+had to make up my mind to become a merchant under the Armenian&rsquo;s
+auspices, even with the prospect of making two or three hundred thousand
+pounds by following the Armenian way of doing business, so it was not
+probable that I should feel disposed to be a book-keeper or ostler all
+my life with no other prospect than being able to make a tidy sum of
+money.&nbsp; If indeed, besides the prospect of making a tidy sum at
+the end of perhaps forty years&rsquo; ostlering, I had been certain
+of being presented with a silver currycomb with my name engraved upon
+it, which I might have left to my descendants, or, in default thereof,
+to the parish church destined to contain my bones, with directions that
+it might be soldered into the wall above the arch leading from the body
+of the church into the chancel - I will not say with such a certainty
+of immortality, combined with such a prospect of moderate pecuniary
+advantage, - I might not have thought it worth my while to stay, but
+I entertained no such certainty, and, taking everything into consideration,
+I determined to mount my horse and leave the inn.<br>
+<br>
+This horse had caused me for some time past no little perplexity; I
+had frequently repented of having purchased him, more especially as
+the purchase had been made with another person&rsquo;s money, and had
+more than once shown him to people who, I imagined, were likely to purchase
+him; but, though they were profuse in his praise, as people generally
+are in the praise of what they don&rsquo;t intend to purchase, they
+never made me an offer, and now that I had determined to mount on his
+back and ride away, what was I to do with him in the sequel?&nbsp; I
+could not maintain him long.&nbsp; Suddenly I bethought me of Horncastle,
+which Francis Ardry had mentioned as a place where the horse was likely
+to find a purchaser, and not having determined upon any particular place
+to which to repair, I thought that I could do no better than betake
+myself to Horncastle in the first instance, and there endeavour to dispose
+of my horse.<br>
+<br>
+On making inquiries with respect to the situation of Horncastle, and
+the time when the fair would be held, I learned that the town was situated
+in Lincolnshire, about a hundred and fifty miles from the inn at which
+I was at present sojourning, and that the fair would be held nominally
+within about a month, but that it was always requisite to be on the
+spot some days before the nominal day of the fair, as all the best horses
+were generally sold before that time, and the people who came to purchase
+gone away with what they had bought.<br>
+<br>
+The people of the inn were very sorry on being informed of my determination
+to depart.&nbsp; Old Bill told me that he had hoped as how I had intended
+to settle down there, and to take his place as ostler when he was fit
+for no more work, adding, that though I did not know much of the business,
+yet he had no doubt but that I might improve.&nbsp; My friend the postillion
+was particularly sorry, and taking me with him to the tap-room called
+for two pints of beer, to one of which he treated me; and whilst we
+were drinking told me how particularly sorry he was at the thought of
+my going, but that he hoped I should think better of the matter.&nbsp;
+On my telling him that I must go, he said that he trusted I should put
+off my departure for three weeks, in order that I might be present at
+his marriage, the banns of which were just about to be published.&nbsp;
+He said that nothing would give him greater pleasure than to see me
+dance a minuet with his wife after the marriage dinner; but I told him
+it was impossible that I should stay, my affairs imperatively calling
+me elsewhere; and that with respect to my dancing a minuet, such a thing
+was out of the question, as I had never learned to dance.&nbsp; At which
+he said that he was exceedingly sorry, and finding me determined to
+go, wished me success in all my undertakings.<br>
+<br>
+The master of the house, to whom, as in duty bound, I communicated my
+intention before I spoke of it to the servants, was, I make no doubt,
+very sorry, though he did not exactly tell me so.&nbsp; What he said
+was, that he had never expected that I should remain long there, as
+such a situation never appeared to him quite suitable to me, though
+I had been very diligent, and had given him perfect satisfaction.&nbsp;
+On his inquiring when I intended to depart, I informed him next day,
+whereupon he begged that I would defer my departure till the next day
+but one, and do him the favour of dining with him on the morrow.&nbsp;
+I informed him that I should be only too happy.<br>
+<br>
+On the following day at four o&rsquo;clock I dined with the landlord,
+in company with a commercial traveller.&nbsp; The dinner was good, though
+plain, consisting of boiled mackerel - rather a rarity in those parts
+at that time - with fennel sauce, a prime baron of roast beef after
+the mackerel, then a tart and noble Cheshire cheese; we had prime sherry
+at dinner, and whilst eating the cheese prime porter, that of Barclay,
+the only good porter in the world.&nbsp; After the cloth was removed
+we had a bottle of very good port; and whilst partaking of the port
+I had an argument with the commercial traveller on the subject of the
+corn-laws.<br>
+<br>
+The commercial traveller, having worsted me in the argument on the subject
+of the corn-laws, got up in great glee, saying that he must order his
+gig, as business must be attended to.&nbsp; Before leaving the room,
+however, he shook me patronizingly by the hand, and said something to
+the master of the house, but in so low a tone that it escaped my ear.<br>
+<br>
+No sooner had he departed than the master of the house told me that
+his friend the traveller had just said that I was a confounded sensible
+young fellow, and not at all opinionated, a sentiment in which he himself
+perfectly agreed - then hemming once or twice, he said that as I was
+going on a journey he hoped I was tolerably well provided with money,
+adding that travelling was rather expensive, especially on horseback,
+the manner in which he supposed, as I had a horse in the stable, I intended
+to travel.&nbsp; I told him that though I was not particularly well
+supplied with money, I had sufficient for the expenses of my journey,
+at the end of which I hoped to procure more.&nbsp; He then hemmed again,
+and said that since I had been at the inn I had rendered him a great
+deal of service in more ways than one, and that he should not think
+of permitting me to depart without making me some remuneration; then
+putting his hand into his waistcoat pocket, he handed me a cheque for
+ten pounds, which he had prepared beforehand, the value of which he
+said I could receive at the next town, or that, if I wished it, any
+waiter in the house would cash it for me.&nbsp; I thanked him for his
+generosity in the best terms I could select, but, handing him back the
+cheque, I told him that I could not accept it, saying, that, so far
+from his being my debtor, I believed myself to be indebted to him, as
+not only myself but my horse had been living at his house for several
+weeks.&nbsp; He replied, that as for my board at a house like his it
+amounted to nothing, and as for the little corn and hay which the horse
+had consumed it was of no consequence, and that he must insist upon
+my taking the cheque.&nbsp; But I again declined, telling him that doing
+so would be a violation of a rule which I had determined to follow,
+and which nothing but the greatest necessity would ever compel me to
+break through - never to incur obligations.&nbsp; &ldquo;But,&rdquo;
+said he, &ldquo;receiving this money will not be incurring an obligation,
+it is your due.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I do not think so,&rdquo; said I;
+&ldquo;I did not engage to serve you for money, nor will I take any
+from you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Perhaps you will take it as a loan?&rdquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo; I replied, &ldquo;I never borrow.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the landlord, smiling, &ldquo;you are different
+from all others that I am acquainted with.&nbsp; I never yet knew any
+one else who scrupled to borrow and receive obligations; why, there
+are two baronets in the neighbourhood who have borrowed money of me,
+ay, and who have never repaid what they borrowed; and there are a dozen
+squires who are under considerable obligations to me, who I dare say
+will never return them.&nbsp; Come, you need not be more scrupulous
+than your superiors - I mean in station.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Every vessel
+must stand on its own bottom,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;they take pleasure
+in receiving obligations, I take pleasure in being independent.&nbsp;
+Perhaps they are wise, and I am a fool, I know not, but one thing I
+am certain of, which is, that were I not independent I should be very
+unhappy: I should have no visions then.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Have you
+any relations?&rdquo; said the landlord, looking at me compassionately;
+&ldquo;excuse me, but I don&rsquo;t think you are exactly fit to take
+care of yourself.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;There you are mistaken,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;I can take precious good care of myself; ay, and can
+drive a precious hard bargain when I have occasion, but driving bargains
+is a widely different thing from receiving gifts.&nbsp; I am going to
+take my horse to Horncastle, and when there I shall endeavour to obtain
+his full value - ay to the last penny.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Horncastle!&rdquo; said the landlord, &ldquo;I have heard of
+that place; you mustn&rsquo;t be dreaming visions when you get there,
+or they&rsquo;ll steal the horse from under you.&nbsp; Well,&rdquo;
+said he, rising, &ldquo;I shall not press you further on the subject
+of the cheque.&nbsp; I intend, however, to put you under an obligation
+to me.&rdquo;&nbsp; He then rang the bell, and having ordered two fresh
+glasses to be brought, he went out and presently returned with a small
+pint bottle, which he uncorked with his own hand; then sitting down,
+he said, &ldquo;The wine that I bring here, is port of eighteen hundred
+and eleven, the year of the comet, the best vintage on record; the wine
+which we have been drinking,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;is good, but not
+to be compared with this, which I never sell, and which I am chary of.&nbsp;
+When you have drunk some of it, I think you will own that I have conferred
+an obligation upon you;&rdquo; he then filled the glasses, the wine
+which he poured out diffusing an aroma through the room; then motioning
+me to drink, he raised his own glass to his lips, saying, &ldquo;Come,
+friend, I drink to your success at Horncastle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Triumphal Departure - No Season like Youth - Extreme Old Age - Beautiful
+England - The Ratcatcher - A Misadventure.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I departed from the inn much in the same fashion as I had come to it,
+mounted on a splendid horse indifferently well caparisoned, with the
+small valise attached to my crupper, in which, besides the few things
+I had brought with me, was a small book of roads with a map which had
+been presented to me by the landlord.&nbsp; I must not forget to state
+that I did not ride out of the yard, but that my horse was brought to
+me at the front door by old Bill, who insisted upon doing so, and who
+refused a five-shilling piece which I offered him; and it will be as
+well to let the reader know that the landlord shook me by the hand as
+I mounted, and that the people attached to the inn, male and female
+- my friend the postillion at the head - assembled before the house
+to see me off, and gave me three cheers as I rode away.&nbsp; Perhaps
+no person ever departed from an inn with more &eacute;clat or better
+wishes; nobody looked at me askance, except two stage-coachmen who were
+loitering about, one of whom said to his companion, &ldquo;I say, Jim!
+twig his portmanteau! a regular Newmarket turn-out, by - !&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+It was in the cool of the evening of a bright day - all the days of
+that summer were bright - that I departed.&nbsp; I felt at first rather
+melancholy at finding myself again launched into the wide world, and
+leaving the friends whom I had lately made behind me; but by occasionally
+trotting the horse, and occasionally singing a song of Romanvile, I
+had dispelled the feeling of melancholy by the time I had proceeded
+three miles down the main road.&nbsp; It was at the end of these three
+miles, just opposite a milestone, that I struck into a cross road.&nbsp;
+After riding about seven miles, threading what are called, in postillion
+parlance, cross-country roads, I reached another high road, tending
+to the east, along which I proceeded for a mile or two, when coming
+to a small inn, about nine o&rsquo;clock, I halted and put up for the
+night.<br>
+<br>
+Early on the following morning I proceeded on my journey, but fearing
+to gall the horse, I no longer rode him, but led him by the bridle,
+until I came to a town at the distance of about ten miles from the place
+where I had passed the night.&nbsp; Here I stayed during the heat of
+the day, more on the horse&rsquo;s account than my own, and towards
+evening resumed my journey, leading the animal by the bridle as before;
+and in this manner I proceeded for several days, travelling on an average
+from twenty to twenty-five miles a day, always leading the animal, except
+perhaps now and then of an evening, when, if I saw a good piece of road
+before me, I would mount and put the horse into a trot, which the creature
+seemed to enjoy as much as myself, showing his satisfaction by snorting
+and neighing, whilst I gave utterance to my own exhilaration by shouts,
+or by &ldquo;the chi she is kaulo she soves pr&eacute; lakie dumo,&rdquo;
+or by something else of the same kind in Romanvile.<br>
+<br>
+On the whole, I journeyed along very pleasantly, certainly quite as
+pleasantly as I do at present, now that I am become a gentleman and
+weigh sixteen stone, though some people would say that my present manner
+of travelling is much the most preferable, riding as I now do, instead
+of leading my horse; receiving the homage of ostlers instead of their
+familiar nods; sitting down to dinner in the parlour of the best inn
+I can find, instead of passing the brightest part of the day in the
+kitchen of a village alehouse; carrying on my argument after dinner
+on the subject of the corn-laws, with the best commercial gentlemen
+on the road, instead of being glad, whilst sipping a pint of beer, to
+get into conversation with blind trampers, or maimed Abraham sailors,
+regaling themselves on half-pints at the said village hostelries.&nbsp;
+Many people will doubtless say that things have altered wonderfully
+with me for the better, and they would say right, provided I possessed
+now what I then carried about with me in my journeys - the spirit of
+youth.&nbsp; Youth is the only season for enjoyment, and the first twenty-five
+years of one&rsquo;s life are worth all the rest of the longest life
+of man, even though those five-and-twenty be spent in penury and contempt,
+and the rest in the possession of wealth, honours, respectability, ay,
+and many of them in strength and health, such as will enable one to
+ride forty miles before dinner, and over one&rsquo;s pint of port -
+for the best gentleman in the land should not drink a bottle - carry
+on one&rsquo;s argument, with gravity and decorum, with any commercial
+gentleman who, responsive to one&rsquo;s challenge, takes the part of
+humanity and common sense against &ldquo;protection&rdquo; and the lord
+of the land.<br>
+<br>
+Ah! there is nothing like youth - not that after-life is valueless.&nbsp;
+Even in extreme old age one may get on very well, provided we will but
+accept of the bounties of God.&nbsp; I met the other day an old man,
+who asked me to drink.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am not thirsty,&rdquo; said I,
+&ldquo;and will not drink with you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes, you will,&rdquo;
+said the old man, &ldquo;for I am this day one hundred years old; and
+you will never again have an opportunity of drinking the health of a
+man on his hundredth birthday.&rdquo;&nbsp; So I broke my word, and
+drank.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yours is a wonderful age,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;It
+is a long time to look back to the beginning of it,&rdquo; said the
+old man; &ldquo;yet, upon the whole, I am not sorry to have lived it
+all.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How have you passed your time?&rdquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &ldquo;As well as I could,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;always
+enjoying a good thing when it came honestly within my reach; not forgetting
+to praise God for putting it there.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I suppose you
+were fond of a glass of good ale when you were young?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo;
+said the old man, &ldquo;I was; and so, thank God, I am still.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And he drank off a glass of ale.<br>
+<br>
+On I went in my journey, traversing England from west to east - ascending
+and descending hills - crossing rivers by bridge and ferry - and passing
+over extensive plains.&nbsp; What a beautiful country is England!&nbsp;
+People run abroad to see beautiful countries, and leave their own behind
+unknown, unnoticed - their own the most beautiful!&nbsp; And then, again,
+what a country for adventures! especially to those who travel on foot,
+or on horseback.&nbsp; People run abroad in quest of adventures, and
+traverse Spain or Portugal on mule or on horseback; whereas there are
+ten times more adventures to be met with in England than in Spain, Portugal,
+or stupid Germany to boot.&nbsp; Witness the number of adventures narrated
+in the present book - a book entirely devoted to England.&nbsp; Why,
+there is not a chapter in the present book which is not full of adventures,
+with the exception of the present one, and this is not yet terminated.<br>
+<br>
+After traversing two or three counties, I reached the confines of Lincolnshire.&nbsp;
+During one particularly hot day I put up at a public-house, to which,
+in the evening, came a party of harvesters to make merry, who, finding
+me wandering about the house a stranger, invited me to partake of their
+ale; so I drank with the harvesters, who sang me songs about rural life,
+such as -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Sitting in the swale; and listening to the swindle of the flail,
+as it sounds dub-a-dub on the corn, from the neighbouring barn.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+In requital for which I treated them with a song, not of Romanvile,
+but the song of &ldquo;Sivory and the horse Grayman.&rdquo;&nbsp; I
+remained with them till it was dark, having, after sunset, entered into
+deep discourse with a celebrated ratcatcher, who communicated to me
+the secrets of his trade, saying, amongst other things, &ldquo;When
+you see the rats pouring out of their holes, and running up my hands
+and arms, it&rsquo;s not after me they comes, but after the oils I carries
+about me they comes;&rdquo; and who subsequently spoke in the most enthusiastic
+manner of his trade, saying that it was the best trade in the world,
+and most diverting, and that it was likely to last for ever; for whereas
+all other kinds of vermin were fast disappearing from England, rats
+were every day becoming more abundant.&nbsp; I had quitted this good
+company, and having mounted my horse, was making my way towards a town
+at about six miles&rsquo; distance, at a swinging trot, my thoughts
+deeply engaged on what I had gathered from the ratcatcher, when all
+on a sudden a light glared upon the horse&rsquo;s face, who purled round
+in great terror, and flung me out of the saddle, as from a sling, or
+with as much violence as the horse Grayman, in the ballad, flings Sivord
+the Snareswayne.&nbsp; I fell upon the ground - felt a kind of crashing
+about my neck - and forthwith became senseless.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+A Novel Situation - The Elderly Individual - The Surgeon - A Kind Offer
+- Chimerical Ideas - Strange Dream.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+How long I remained senseless I cannot say, for a considerable time,
+I believe; at length, opening my eyes, I found myself lying on a bed
+in a middle-sized chamber, lighted by a candle, which stood on a table
+- an elderly man stood near me, and a yet more elderly female was holding
+a phial of very pungent salts to my olfactory organ.&nbsp; I attempted
+to move, but felt very stiff - my right arm appeared nearly paralysed,
+and there was a strange dull sensation in my head.&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+had better remain still, young man,&rdquo; said the elderly individual,
+&ldquo;the surgeon will be here presently; I have sent a message for
+him to the neighbouring village.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Where am I?&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;and what has happened?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You are in
+my house,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;and you have been flung from
+a horse.&nbsp; I am sorry to say that I was the cause.&nbsp; As I was
+driving home, the lights in my gig frightened the animal.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Where is the horse?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Below, in my
+stable,&rdquo; said the elderly individual.&nbsp; &ldquo;I saw you fall,
+but knowing that on account of my age I could be of little use to you,
+I instantly hurried home, the accident did not occur more than a furlong
+off, and procuring the assistance of my lad, and two or three neighbouring
+cottagers, I returned to the spot where you were lying senseless.&nbsp;
+We raised you up, and brought you here.&nbsp; My lad then went in quest
+of the horse, who had run away as we drew nigh.&nbsp; When we saw him
+first he was standing near you; he caught him with some difficulty,
+and brought him home.&nbsp; What are you about?&rdquo; said the old
+man, as I strove to get off the bed.&nbsp; &ldquo;I want to see the
+horse,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I entreat you to be still,&rdquo;
+said the old man; &ldquo;the horse is safe, I assure you.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I am thinking about his knees,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Instead
+of thinking about your horse&rsquo;s knees,&rdquo; said the old man,
+&ldquo;be thankful that you have not broke your own neck.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You do not talk wisely,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;when a man&rsquo;s
+neck is broke, he is provided for; but when his horse&rsquo;s knees
+are broke, he is a lost jockey, that is, if he has nothing but his horse
+to depend upon.&nbsp; A pretty figure I should cut at Horncastle, mounted
+on a horse blood-raw at the knees.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh, you are going
+to Horncastle,&rdquo; said the old man, seriously, &ldquo;then I can
+sympathize with you in your anxiety about your horse, being a Lincolnshire
+man, and the son of one who bred horses.&nbsp; I will myself go down
+into the stable, and examine into the condition of your horse, so pray
+remain quiet till I return; it would certainly be a terrible thing to
+appear at Horncastle on a broken-kneed horse.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+He left the room and returned in about ten minutes, followed by another
+person.&nbsp; &ldquo;Your horse is safe,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;and
+his knees are unblemished; not a hair ruffled.&nbsp; He is a fine animal,
+and will do credit to Horncastle; but here is the surgeon come to examine
+into your own condition.&rdquo;&nbsp; The surgeon was a man about thirty-five,
+thin, and rather tall; his face was long and pale, and his hair, which
+was light, was carefully combed back as much as possible from his forehead.&nbsp;
+He was dressed very neatly, and spoke in a very precise tone.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Allow me to feel your pulse, friend?&rdquo; said he, taking me
+by the right wrist.&nbsp; I uttered a cry, for at the motion which he
+caused a thrill of agony darted through my arm.&nbsp; &ldquo;I hope
+your arm is not broke, my friend,&rdquo; said the surgeon, &ldquo;allow
+me to see; first of all, we must divest you of this cumbrous frock.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The frock was removed with some difficulty, and then the upper vestments
+of my frame, with more difficulty still.&nbsp; The surgeon felt my arm,
+moving it up and down, causing me unspeakable pain.&nbsp; &ldquo;There
+is no fracture,&rdquo; said he, at last, &ldquo;but a contusion - a
+violent contusion.&nbsp; I am told you were going to Horncastle; I am
+afraid you will be hardly able to ride your horse thither in time to
+dispose of him; however, we shall see - your arm must be bandaged, friend;
+after which I shall bleed you, and administer a composing draught.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+To be short, the surgeon did as he proposed, and when he had administered
+the composing draught, he said, &ldquo;Be of good cheer; I should not
+be surprised if you are yet in time for Horncastle.&rdquo;&nbsp; He
+then departed with the master of the house, and the woman, leaving me
+to my repose.&nbsp; I soon began to feel drowsy, and was just composing
+myself to slumber, lying on my back, as the surgeon had advised me,
+when I heard steps ascending the stairs, and in a moment more the surgeon
+entered again, followed by the master of the house.&nbsp; &ldquo;I hope
+I don&rsquo;t disturb you,&rdquo; said the former; &ldquo;my reason
+for returning is to relieve your mind from any anxiety with respect
+to your horse.&nbsp; I am by no means sure that you will be able, owing
+to your accident, to reach Horncastle in time: to quiet you, however,
+I will buy your horse for any reasonable sum.&nbsp; I have been down
+to the stable, and approve of his figure.&nbsp; What do you ask for
+him?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;This is a strange time of night,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;to come to me about purchasing my horse, and I am hardly in
+a fitting situation to be applied to about such a matter.&nbsp; What
+do you want him for?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;For my own use,&rdquo; said
+the surgeon; &ldquo;I am a professional man, and am obliged to be continually
+driving about; I cover at least one hundred and fifty miles every week.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;He will never answer your purpose,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;he is
+not a driving horse, and was never between shafts in his life; he is
+for riding, more especially for trotting, at which he has few equals.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It matters not to me whether he is for riding or driving,&rdquo;
+said the surgeon, &ldquo;sometimes I ride, sometimes drive; so, if we
+can come to terms, I will buy him, though remember it is chiefly to
+remove any anxiety from your mind about him.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;This
+is no time for bargaining,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if you wish to have
+the horse for a hundred guineas, you may; if not - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;A
+hundred guineas!&rdquo; said the surgeon, &ldquo;my good friend, you
+must surely be light-headed; allow me to feel your pulse,&rdquo; and
+he attempted to feel my left wrist.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am not light-headed,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;and I require no one to feel my pulse; but I should be
+light-headed if I were to sell my horse for less than I have demanded;
+but I have a curiosity to know what you would be willing to offer.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Thirty pounds,&rdquo; said the surgeon, &ldquo;is all I can afford
+to give; and that is a great deal for a country surgeon to offer for
+a horse.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Thirty pounds!&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;why,
+he cost me nearly double that sum.&nbsp; To tell you the truth, I am
+afraid that you want to take advantage of my situation.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Not in the least, friend,&rdquo; said the surgeon, &ldquo;not
+in the least; I only wished to set your mind at rest about your horse;
+but as you think he is worth more than I can afford to offer, take him
+to Horncastle by all means; I will do my best to cure you in time.&nbsp;
+Good night, I will see you again on the morrow.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thereupon
+he once more departed with the master of the house.&nbsp; &ldquo;A sharp
+one,&rdquo; I heard him say, with a laugh, as the door closed upon him.<br>
+<br>
+Left to myself, I again essayed to compose myself to rest, but for some
+time in vain.&nbsp; I had been terribly shaken by my fall, and had subsequently,
+owing to the incision of the surgeon&rsquo;s lancet, been deprived of
+much of the vital fluid; it is when the body is in such a state that
+the merest trifles affect and agitate the mind; no wonder, then, that
+the return of the surgeon and the master of the house for the purpose
+of inquiring whether I would sell my horse, struck me as being highly
+extraordinary, considering the hour of the night, and the situation
+in which they knew me to be.&nbsp; What could they mean by such conduct
+- did they wish to cheat me of the animal?&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, well,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;if they did, what matters, they found their match; yes,
+yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I am in their power, perhaps&rdquo; -
+but I instantly dismissed the apprehension which came into my mind,
+with a pooh, nonsense!&nbsp; In a little time, however, a far more foolish
+and chimerical idea began to disturb me - the idea of being flung from
+my horse; was I not disgraced for ever as a horseman by being flung
+from my horse?&nbsp; Assuredly, I thought; and the idea of being disgraced
+as a horseman, operating on my nervous system, caused me very acute
+misery.&nbsp; &ldquo;After all,&rdquo; said I to myself, &ldquo;it was
+perhaps the contemptible opinion which the surgeon must have formed
+of my equestrian powers, which induced him to offer to take my horse
+off my hands; he perhaps thought I was unable to manage a horse, and
+therefore in pity returned in the dead of night to offer to purchase
+the animal which had flung me;&rdquo; and then the thought that the
+surgeon had conceived a contemptible opinion of my equestrian powers,
+caused me the acutest misery, and continued tormenting me until some
+other idea (I have forgot what it was, but doubtless equally foolish)
+took possession of my mind.&nbsp; At length, brought on by the agitation
+of my spirits, there came over me the same feeling of horror that I
+had experienced of old when I was a boy, and likewise of late within
+the dingle; it was, however, not so violent as it had been on those
+occasions, and I struggled manfully against it, until by degrees it
+passed away, and then I fell asleep; and in my sleep I had an ugly dream.&nbsp;
+I dreamt that I had died of the injuries I had received from my fall,
+and that no sooner had my soul departed from my body than it entered
+that of a quadruped, even my own horse in the stable - in a word, I
+was, to all intents and purposes, my own steed; and as I stood in the
+stable chewing hay (and I remember that the hay was exceedingly tough),
+the door opened, and the surgeon who had attended me came in.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My good animal,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;as your late master has
+scarcely left enough to pay for the expenses of his funeral, and nothing
+to remunerate me for my trouble, I shall make bold to take possession
+of you.&nbsp; If your paces are good, I shall keep you for my own riding;
+if not, I shall take you to Horncastle, your original destination.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+He then bridled and saddled me, and, leading me out, mounted, and then
+trotted me up and down before the house, at the door of which the old
+man, who now appeared to be dressed in regular jockey fashion, was standing.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I like his paces well,&rdquo; said the surgeon; &ldquo;I think
+I shall take him for my own use.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And what am I to
+have for all the trouble his master caused me?&rdquo; said my late entertainer,
+on whose countenance I now observed, for the first time, a diabolical
+squint.&nbsp; &ldquo;The consciousness of having done your duty to a
+fellow-creature in succouring him in a time of distress, must be your
+reward,&rdquo; said the surgeon.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pretty gammon, truly,&rdquo;
+said my late entertainer; &ldquo;what would you say if I were to talk
+in that way to you?&nbsp; Come, unless you choose to behave jonnock,
+I shall take the bridle and lead the horse back into the stable.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the surgeon, &ldquo;we are old friends, and
+I don&rsquo;t wish to dispute with you, so I&rsquo;ll tell you what
+I will do; I will ride the animal to Horncastle, and we will share what
+he fetches like brothers.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Good,&rdquo; said the
+old man, &ldquo;but if you say that you have sold him for less than
+a hundred, I shan&rsquo;t consider you jonnock; remember what the young
+fellow said - that young fellow - &rdquo;&nbsp; I heard no more, for
+the next moment I found myself on a broad road leading, as I supposed,
+in the direction of Horncastle, the surgeon still in the saddle, and
+my legs moving at a rapid trot.&nbsp; &ldquo;Get on,&rdquo; said the
+surgeon, jerking my mouth with the bit; whereupon, full of rage, I instantly
+set off at a full gallop, determined, if possible, to dash my rider
+to the earth.&nbsp; The surgeon, however, kept his seat, and, so far
+from attempting to abate my speed, urged me on to greater efforts with
+a stout stick, which methought he held in his hand.&nbsp; In vain did
+I rear and kick, attempting to get rid of my foe; but the surgeon remained
+as saddle-fast as ever the Maugrabin sorcerer in the Arabian tale what
+time he rode the young prince transformed into a steed to his enchanted
+palace in the wilderness.&nbsp; At last, as I was still madly dashing
+on, panting and blowing, and had almost given up all hope, I saw at
+a distance before me a heap of stones by the side of the road, probably
+placed there for the purpose of repairing it; a thought appeared to
+strike me - I will shy at those stones, and, if I can&rsquo;t get rid
+of him so, resign myself to my fate.&nbsp; So I increased my speed,
+till arriving within about ten yards of the heap, I made a desperate
+start, turning half round with nearly the velocity of a mill-stone.&nbsp;
+Oh, the joy I experienced when I felt my enemy canted over my neck,
+and saw him lying senseless in the road.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have you now
+in my power,&rdquo; I said, or rather neighed, as, going up to my prostrate
+foe, I stood over him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Suppose I were to rear now, and
+let my fore feet fall upon you, what would your life be worth? that
+is, supposing you are not killed already; but lie there, I will do you
+no further harm, but trot to Horncastle without a rider, and when there
+- &rdquo; and without further reflection off I trotted in the direction
+of Horncastle, but had not gone far before my bridle, falling from my
+neck, got entangled with my off fore foot.&nbsp; I felt myself falling,
+a thrill of agony shot through me - my knees would be broken, and what
+should I do at Horncastle with a pair of broken knees?&nbsp; I struggled,
+but I could not disengage my off fore foot, and downward I fell, but
+before I had reached the ground I awoke, and found myself half out of
+bed, my bandaged arm in considerable pain, and my left hand just touching
+the floor.<br>
+<br>
+With some difficulty I readjusted myself in bed.&nbsp; It was now early
+morning, and the first rays of the sun were beginning to penetrate the
+white curtains of a window on my left, which probably looked into the
+garden, as I caught a glimpse or two of the leaves of trees through
+a small uncovered part at the side.&nbsp; For some time I felt uneasy
+and anxious, my spirits being in a strange fluttering state.&nbsp; At
+last my eyes fell upon a small row of tea-cups seemingly of china, which
+stood on a mantelpiece exactly fronting the bottom of the bed.&nbsp;
+The sight of these objects, I know not why, soothed and pacified me;
+I kept my eyes fixed upon them, as I lay on my back on the bed, with
+my head upon the pillow, till at last I fell into a calm and refreshing
+sleep.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Morning after a Fall - The Teapot - Unpretending Hospitality - The
+Chinese Student.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It might be about eight o&rsquo;clock in the morning when I was awakened
+by the entrance of the old man.&nbsp; &ldquo;How have you rested?&rdquo;
+said he, coming up to the bedside, and looking me in the face.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and I feel much better, but I am
+still very sore.&rdquo;&nbsp; I surveyed him now for the first time
+with attention.&nbsp; He was dressed in a sober-coloured suit, and was
+apparently between sixty and seventy.&nbsp; In stature he was rather
+above the middle height, but with a slight stoop; his features were
+placid, and expressive of much benevolence, but, as it appeared to me,
+with rather a melancholy cast - as I gazed upon them, I felt ashamed
+that I should ever have conceived in my brain a vision like that of
+the preceding night, in which he appeared in so disadvantageous a light.&nbsp;
+At length he said, &ldquo;It is now time for you to take some refreshment.&nbsp;
+I hear my old servant coming up with your breakfast.&rdquo;&nbsp; In
+a moment the elderly female entered with a tray, on which was some bread
+and butter, a teapot and cup.&nbsp; The cup was of common blue earthenware,
+but the pot was of china, curiously fashioned, and seemingly of great
+antiquity.&nbsp; The old man poured me out a cupful of tea, and then,
+with the assistance of the woman, raised me higher, and propped me up
+with the pillows.&nbsp; I ate and drank; when the pot was emptied of
+its liquid (it did not contain much), I raised it up with my left hand
+to inspect it.&nbsp; The sides were covered with curious characters,
+seemingly hieroglyphics.&nbsp; After surveying them for some time, I
+replaced it upon the tray.&nbsp; &ldquo;You seem fond of china,&rdquo;
+said I, to the old man, after the servant had retired with the breakfast
+things, and I had returned to my former posture; &ldquo;you have china
+on the mantelpiece, and that was a remarkable teapot out of which I
+have just been drinking.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old man fixed his eyes intently on me, and methought the expression
+of his countenance became yet more melancholy.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo;
+said he, at last, &ldquo;I am fond of china - I have reason to be fond
+of china - but for china I should - &rdquo; and here he sighed again.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You value it for the quaintness and singularity of its form,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;it appears to be less adapted for real use than our own
+pottery.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I care little about its form,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;I
+care for it simply on account of - however, why talk to you on the subject
+which can have no possible interest to you?&nbsp; I expect the surgeon
+here presently.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not like that surgeon at all,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;how
+strangely he behaved last night, coming back, when I was just falling
+asleep, to ask me if I would sell my horse.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old man smiled.&nbsp; &ldquo;He has but one failing,&rdquo; said
+he, &ldquo;an itch for horse-dealing; but for that he might be a much
+richer man than he is; he is continually buying and exchanging horses,
+and generally finds himself a loser by his bargains: but he is a worthy
+creature, and skilful in his profession - it is well for you that you
+are under his care.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old man then left me, and in about an hour returned with the surgeon,
+who examined me and reported favourably as to my case.&nbsp; He spoke
+to me with kindness and feeling, and did not introduce the subject of
+the horse.&nbsp; I asked him whether he thought I should be in time
+for the fair.&nbsp; &ldquo;I saw some people making their way thither
+to-day,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;the fair lasts three weeks, and it has
+just commenced.&nbsp; Yes, I think I may promise you that you will be
+in time for the very heat of it.&nbsp; In a few days you will be able
+to mount your saddle with your arm in a sling, but you must by no means
+appear with your arm in a sling at Horncastle, as people would think
+that your horse had flung you, and that you wanted to dispose of him
+because he was a vicious brute.&nbsp; You must, by all means, drop the
+sling before you get to Horncastle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+For three days I kept my apartment by the advice of the surgeon.&nbsp;
+I passed my time as I best could.&nbsp; Stretched on my bed, I either
+abandoned myself to reflection, or listened to the voices of the birds
+in the neighbouring garden.&nbsp; Sometimes, as I lay awake at night,
+I would endeavour to catch the tick of a clock, which methought sounded
+from some distant part of the house.<br>
+<br>
+The old man visited me twice or thrice every day to inquire into my
+state.&nbsp; His words were few on these occasions, and he did not stay
+long.&nbsp; Yet his voice and his words were kind.&nbsp; What surprised
+me most in connection with this individual was, the delicacy of conduct
+which he exhibited in not letting a word proceed from his lips which
+could testify curiosity respecting who I was, or whence I came.&nbsp;
+All he knew of me was, that I had been flung from my horse on my way
+to a fair for the purpose of disposing of the animal; and that I was
+now his guest.&nbsp; I might be a common horse-dealer for what he knew,
+yet I was treated by him with all the attention which I could have expected,
+had I been an alderman of Boston&rsquo;s heir, and known to him as such.&nbsp;
+The county in which I am now, thought I at last, must be either extraordinarily
+devoted to hospitality, or this old host of mine must be an extraordinary
+individual.&nbsp; On the evening of the fourth day, feeling tired of
+my confinement, I put my clothes on in the best manner I could, and
+left the chamber.&nbsp; Descending a flight of stairs, I reached a kind
+of quadrangle, from which branched two or three passages; one of these
+I entered, which had a door at the farther end, and one on each side;
+the one to the left standing partly open, I entered it, and found myself
+in a middle-sized room with a large window, or rather glass-door, which
+looked into a garden, and which stood open.&nbsp; There was nothing
+remarkable in this room, except a large quantity of china.&nbsp; There
+was china on the mantelpiece - china on two tables, and a small beaufet,
+which stood opposite the glass-door, was covered with china - there
+were cups, teapots, and vases of various forms, and on all of them I
+observed characters - not a teapot, not a tea-cup, not a vase of whatever
+form or size, but appeared to possess hieroglyphics on some part or
+other.&nbsp; After surveying these articles for some time with no little
+interest, I passed into the garden, in which there were small parterres
+of flowers, and two or three trees, and which, where the house did not
+abut, was bounded by a wall; turning to the right by a walk by the side
+of a house, I passed by a door - probably the one I had seen at the
+end of the passage - and arrived at another window similar to that through
+which I had come, and which also stood open; I was about to pass through
+it, when I heard the voice of my entertainer exclaiming, &ldquo;Is that
+you? pray come in.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I entered the room, which seemed to be a counterpart of the one which
+I had just left.&nbsp; It was of the same size, had the same kind of
+furniture, and appeared to be equally well stocked with china; one prominent
+article it possessed, however, which the other room did not exhibit
+- namely, a clock, which, with its pendulum moving tick-a-tick, hung
+against the wall opposite to the door, the sight of which made me conclude
+that the sound which methought I had heard in the stillness of the night
+was not an imaginary one.&nbsp; There it hung on the wall, with its
+pendulum moving tick-a-tick.&nbsp; The old gentleman was seated in an
+easy chair a little way into the room, having the glass-door on his
+right hand.&nbsp; On a table before him lay a large open volume, in
+which I observed Roman letters as well as characters.&nbsp; A few inches
+beyond the book on the table, covered all over with hieroglyphics, stood
+a china vase.&nbsp; The eyes of the old man were fixed upon it.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Sit down,&rdquo; said he, motioning me with his hand to a stool
+close by, but without taking his eyes from the vase.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t make it out,&rdquo; said he, at last, removing
+his eyes from the vase, and leaning back on the chair, &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t
+make it out.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I wish I could assist you,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Assist me,&rdquo; said the old man, looking at me with a half
+smile.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I don&rsquo;t understand Chinese.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I suppose not,&rdquo; said the old man, with another slight smile;
+&ldquo;but - but - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray proceed,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I wished to ask you,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;how you
+knew that the characters on yon piece of crockery were Chinese; or,
+indeed, that there was such a language?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I knew the crockery was china,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and naturally
+enough supposed what was written upon it to be Chinese; as for there
+being such a language - the English have a language, the French have
+a language, and why not the Chinese?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;May I ask you a question?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;As many as you like.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you know any language besides English?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I know a little of two or three.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;May I ask their names?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I know a little French.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Anything else?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, a little Welsh, and a little Haik.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is Haik?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Armenian.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am glad to see you in my house,&rdquo; said the old man, shaking
+me by the hand; &ldquo;how singular that one coming as you did should
+know Armenian!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Not more singular,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;than that one living
+in such a place as this should know Chinese.&nbsp; How came you to acquire
+it?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old man looked at me, and sighed.&nbsp; &ldquo;I beg pardon,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;for asking what is, perhaps, an impertinent question;
+I have not imitated your own delicacy; you have never asked me a question
+without first desiring permission, and here I have been days and nights
+in your house an intruder on your hospitality, and you have never so
+much as asked me who I am.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In forbearing to do that,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I merely
+obeyed the Chinese precept, &lsquo;Ask no questions of a guest;&rsquo;
+it is written on both sides of the teapot out of which you have had
+your tea.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I wish I knew Chinese,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is it a difficult
+language to acquire?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have reason to think so,&rdquo; said the old man.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+have been occupied upon it five-and-thirty years, and I am still very
+imperfectly acquainted with it; at least, I frequently find upon my
+crockery sentences the meaning of which to me is very dark, though it
+is true these sentences are mostly verses, which are, of course, more
+difficult to understand than mere prose.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Are your Chinese studies,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;confined to crockery
+literature?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Entirely,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;I read nothing else.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have heard,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that the Chinese have no
+letters, but that for every word they have a separate character - is
+it so?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;For every word they have a particular character,&rdquo; said
+the old man; &ldquo;though, to prevent confusion, they have arranged
+their words under two hundred and fourteen what we should call radicals,
+but which they call keys.&nbsp; As we arrange all our words in a dictionary
+under twenty-four letters, so do they arrange all their words, or characters,
+under two hundred and fourteen radical signs; the simplest radicals
+being the first, and the more complex the last.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Does the Chinese resemble any of the European languages in words?&rdquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am scarcely competent to inform you,&rdquo; said the old man;
+&ldquo;but I believe not.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What does that character represent?&rdquo; said I, pointing to
+one on the vase.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A knife,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;that character is one
+of the simplest radicals or keys.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what is the sound of it?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tau,&rdquo; said the old man.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tau!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;tau!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A strange word for a knife is it not?&rdquo; said the old man.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tawse!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;tawse!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is tawse?&rdquo; said the old man.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You were never at school at Edinburgh, I suppose?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never,&rdquo; said the old man.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That accounts for your not knowing the meaning of tawse,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;had you received the rudiments of a classical education
+at the High School, you would have known the meaning of tawse full well.&nbsp;
+It is a leathern thong, with which refractory urchins are recalled to
+a sense of their duty by the dominie.&nbsp; Tau - tawse - how singular!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I cannot see what the two words have in common, except a slight
+agreement in sound.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You will see the connection,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;when I inform
+you that the thong, from the middle to the bottom, is cut or slit into
+two or three parts, from which slits or cuts, unless I am very much
+mistaken, it derives its name - tawse, a thong with slits or cuts, used
+for chastising disorderly urchins at the High School, from the French
+tailler, to cut; evidently connected with the Chinese tau, a knife -
+how very extraordinary!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Convalescence - The Surgeon&rsquo;s Bill - Letter of Recommendation
+- Commencement of the Old Man&rsquo;s History.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Two days - three days passed away - and I still remained at the house
+of my hospitable entertainer; my bruised limb rapidly recovering the
+power of performing its functions.&nbsp; I passed my time agreeably
+enough, sometimes in my chamber, communing with my own thoughts; sometimes
+in the stable, attending to, and not unfrequently conversing with, my
+horse; and at meal-time - for I seldom saw him at any other - discoursing
+with the old gentleman, sometimes on the Chinese vocabulary, sometimes
+on Chinese syntax, and once or twice on English horseflesh; though on
+this latter subject, notwithstanding his descent from a race of horse-traders,
+he did not enter into with much alacrity.&nbsp; As a small requital
+for his kindness, I gave him one day, after dinner, unasked, a brief
+account of my history and pursuits.&nbsp; He listened with attention;
+and when it was concluded, thanked me for the confidence which I had
+reposed in him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Such conduct,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;deserves
+a return.&nbsp; I will tell you my own history; it is brief, but may
+perhaps not prove uninteresting to you - though the relation of it will
+give me some pain.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Pray, then, do not recite it,&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I will tell
+you, for I wish you to know it.&rdquo;&nbsp; He was about to begin,
+when he was interrupted by the arrival of the surgeon.&nbsp; The surgeon
+examined into the state of my bruised limb, and told me, what indeed
+I already well knew, that it was rapidly improving.&nbsp; &ldquo;You
+will not even require a sling,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;to ride to Horncastle.&nbsp;
+When do you propose going?&rdquo; he demanded.&nbsp; &ldquo;When do
+you think I may venture?&rdquo; I replied.&nbsp; &ldquo;I think, if
+you are a tolerably good horseman, you may mount the day after to-morrow,&rdquo;
+answered the medical man.&nbsp; &ldquo;By-the-bye, are you acquainted
+with anybody at Horncastle?&rdquo; &ldquo;With no living soul,&rdquo;
+I answered.&nbsp; &ldquo;Then you would scarcely find stable-room for
+your horse.&nbsp; But I am happy to be able to assist you.&nbsp; I have
+a friend there who keeps a small inn, and who, during the time of the
+fair, keeps a stall vacant for any quadruped I may bring, until he knows
+whether I am coming or not.&nbsp; I will give you a letter to him, and
+he will see after the accommodation of your horse.&nbsp; To-morrow I
+will pay you a farewell visit, and bring you the letter.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and do not forget to bring your
+bill.&rdquo;&nbsp; The surgeon looked at the old man, who gave him a
+peculiar nod.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said he, in reply to me, &ldquo;for
+the little service I have rendered you, I require no remuneration.&nbsp;
+You are in my friend&rsquo;s house, and he and I understand each other.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I never receive such favours,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;as you have
+rendered me, without remunerating them; therefore I shall expect your
+bill.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! just as you please,&rdquo; said the surgeon;
+and shaking me by the hand more warmly than he had hitherto done, he
+took his leave.<br>
+<br>
+On the evening of the next day, the last which I spent with my kind
+entertainer, I sat at tea with him in a little summer-house in his garden,
+partially shaded by the boughs of a large fig-tree.&nbsp; The surgeon
+had shortly before paid me his farewell visit, and had brought me the
+letter of introduction to his friend at Horncastle, and also his bill,
+which I found anything but extravagant.&nbsp; After we had each respectively
+drank the contents of two cups - and it may not be amiss here to inform
+the reader that though I took cream with my tea, as I always do when
+I can procure that addition, the old man, like most people bred up in
+the country, drank his without it - he thus addressed me:- &ldquo;I
+am, as I told you on the night of your accident, the son of a breeder
+of horses, a respectable and honest man.&nbsp; When I was about twenty
+he died, leaving me, his only child, a comfortable property, consisting
+of about two hundred acres of land and some fifteen hundred pounds in
+money.&nbsp; My mother had died about three years previously.&nbsp;
+I felt the death of my mother keenly, but that of my father less than
+was my duty; indeed, truth compels me to acknowledge that I scarcely
+regretted his death.&nbsp; The cause of this want of proper filial feeling
+was the opposition which I had experienced from him in an affair which
+deeply concerned me.&nbsp; I had formed an attachment for a young female
+in the neighbourhood, who, though poor, was of highly respectable birth,
+her father having been a curate of the Established Church.&nbsp; She
+was, at the time of which I am speaking, an orphan, having lost both
+her parents, and supported herself by keeping a small school.&nbsp;
+My attachment was returned, and we had pledged our vows, but my father,
+who could not reconcile himself to her lack of fortune, forbade our
+marriage in the most positive terms.&nbsp; He was wrong, for she was
+a fortune in herself - amiable and accomplished.&nbsp; Oh! I cannot
+tell you all she was - &rdquo; and here the old man drew his hand across
+his eyes.&nbsp; &ldquo;By the death of my father, the only obstacle
+to our happiness appeared to be removed.&nbsp; We agreed, therefore,
+that our marriage should take place within the course of a year; and
+I forthwith commenced enlarging my house and getting my affairs in order.&nbsp;
+Having been left in the easy circumstances which I have described, I
+determined to follow no business, but to pass my life in a strictly
+domestic manner, and to be very, very happy.&nbsp; Amongst other property
+derived from my father were several horses, which I disposed of in this
+neighbourhood, with the exception of two remarkably fine ones, which
+I determined to take to the next fair at Horncastle, the only place
+where I expected to be able to obtain what I considered to be their
+full value.&nbsp; At length the time arrived for the commencement of
+the fair, which was within three months of the period which my beloved
+and myself had fixed upon for the celebration of our nuptials.&nbsp;
+To the fair I went, a couple of trusty men following me with the horses.&nbsp;
+I soon found a purchaser for the animals, a portly, plausible person,
+of about forty, dressed in a blue riding coat, brown top boots, and
+leather breeches.&nbsp; There was a strange-looking urchin with him,
+attired in nearly similar fashion, with a beam in one of his eyes, who
+called him father.&nbsp; The man paid me for the purchase in bank-notes
+- three fifty-pound notes for the two horses.&nbsp; As we were about
+to take leave of each other, he suddenly produced another fifty-pound
+note, inquiring whether I could change it, complaining, at the same
+time, of the difficulty of procuring change in the fair.&nbsp; As I
+happened to have plenty of small money in my possession, and as I felt
+obliged to him for having purchased my horses at what I considered to
+be a good price, I informed him that I should be very happy to accommodate
+him; so I changed him the note, and he, having taken possession of the
+horses, went his way, and I myself returned home.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A month passed; during this time I paid away two of the notes
+which I had received at Horncastle from the dealer - one of them in
+my immediate neighbourhood, and the other at a town about fifteen miles
+distant, to which I had repaired for the purpose of purchasing some
+furniture.&nbsp; All things seemed to be going on most prosperously,
+and I felt quite happy, when one morning, as I was overlooking some
+workmen who were employed about my house, I was accosted by a constable,
+who informed me that he was sent to request my immediate appearance
+before a neighbouring bench of magistrates.&nbsp; Concluding that I
+was merely summoned on some unimportant business connected with the
+neighbourhood, I felt no surprise, and forthwith departed in company
+with the officer.&nbsp; The demeanour of the man upon the way struck
+me as somewhat singular.&nbsp; I had frequently spoken to him before,
+and had always found him civil and respectful, but he was now reserved
+and sullen, and replied to two or three questions which I put to him
+in anything but a courteous manner.&nbsp; On arriving at the place where
+the magistrates were sitting - an inn at a small town about two miles
+distant - I found a more than usual number of people assembled, who
+appeared to be conversing with considerable eagerness.&nbsp; At sight
+of me they became silent, but crowded after me as I followed the man
+into the magistrates&rsquo; room.&nbsp; There I found the tradesman
+to whom I had paid the note for the furniture at the town fifteen miles
+off in attendance, accompanied by an agent of the Bank of England; the
+former, it seems, had paid the note into a provincial bank, the proprietors
+of which, discovering it to be a forgery, had forthwith written up to
+the Bank of England, who had sent down their agent to investigate the
+matter.&nbsp; A third individual stood beside them - the person in my
+own immediate neighbourhood to whom I had paid the second note; this,
+by some means or other, before the coming down of the agent, had found
+its way to the same provincial bank, and also being pronounced a forgery,
+it had speedily been traced to the person to whom I had paid it.&nbsp;
+It was owing to the apparition of this second note that the agent had
+determined, without further inquiry, to cause me to be summoned before
+the rural tribunal.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In a few words the magistrates&rsquo; clerk gave me to understand
+the state of the case.&nbsp; I was filled with surprise and consternation.&nbsp;
+I knew myself to be perfectly innocent of any fraudulent intention,
+but at the time of which I am speaking it was a matter fraught with
+the greatest danger to be mixed up, however innocently, with the passing
+of false money.&nbsp; The law with respect to forgery was terribly severe,
+and the innocent as well as the guilty occasionally suffered.&nbsp;
+Of this I was not altogether ignorant; unfortunately, however, in my
+transactions with the stranger, the idea of false notes being offered
+to me, and my being brought into trouble by means of them, never entered
+my mind.&nbsp; Recovering myself a little, I stated that the notes in
+question were two of three notes which I had received at Horncastle,
+for a pair of horses, which it was well known I had carried thither.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thereupon, I produced from my pocket-book the third note, which
+was forthwith pronounced a forgery.&nbsp; I had scarcely produced the
+third note, when I remembered the one which I had changed for the Horncastle
+dealer, and with the remembrance came the almost certain conviction
+that it was also a forgery; I was tempted for a moment to produce it,
+and to explain the circumstance - would to God I had done so! - but
+shame at the idea of having been so wretchedly duped prevented me, and
+the opportunity was lost.&nbsp; I must confess that the agent of the
+bank behaved, upon the whole, in a very handsome manner; he said that
+as it was quite evident that I had disposed of certain horses at the
+fair, it was very probable that I might have received the notes in question
+in exchange for them, and that he was willing, as he had received a
+very excellent account of my general conduct, to press the matter no
+farther, that is, provided - &rdquo;&nbsp; And here he stopped.&nbsp;
+Thereupon, one of the three magistrates, who were present, asked me
+whether I chanced to have any more of these spurious notes in my possession.&nbsp;
+He certainly had a right to ask the question; but there was something
+peculiar in his tone-insinuating suspicion.&nbsp; It is certainly difficult
+to judge of the motives which rule a person&rsquo;s conduct, but I cannot
+help imagining that he was somewhat influenced in his behaviour on that
+occasion, which was anything but friendly, by my having refused to sell
+him the horses at a price less than that which I expected to get at
+the fair; be this as it may, the question filled me with embarrassment,
+and I bitterly repented not having at first been more explicit.&nbsp;
+Thereupon the magistrate in the same kind of tone, demanded to see my
+pocket-book.&nbsp; I knew that to demur would be useless, and produced
+it, and therewith, amongst two or three small country notes, appeared
+the fourth which I had received from the Horncastle dealer.&nbsp; The
+agent took it up and examined it with attention.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,
+is it a genuine note?&rsquo; asked the magistrate.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am
+sorry to say that it is not,&rsquo; said the agent; &lsquo;it is a forgery,
+like the other three.&rsquo;&nbsp; The magistrate shrugged his shoulders,
+as indeed did several people in the room.&nbsp; &lsquo;A regular dealer
+in forged notes,&rsquo; said a person close behind me; &lsquo;who would
+have thought it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Seeing matters begin to look so serious, I aroused myself, and
+endeavoured to speak in my own behalf, giving a candid account of the
+manner in which I became possessed of the notes; but my explanation
+did not appear to meet much credit; the magistrate, to whom I have in
+particular alluded, asked, why I had not at once stated the fact of
+my having received a fourth note; and the agent, though in a very quiet
+tone, observed that he could not help thinking it somewhat strange that
+I should have changed a note of so much value for a perfect stranger,
+even supposing that he had purchased my horses, and had paid me their
+value in hard cash; and I noticed that he laid particular emphasis on
+the last words.&nbsp; I might have observed that I was an inexperienced
+young man, who, meaning no harm myself, suspected none in others, but
+I was confused, stunned, and my tongue seemed to cleave to the roof
+of my mouth.&nbsp; The men who had taken my horses to Horncastle, and
+for whom I had sent, as they lived close at hand, now arrived, but the
+evidence which they could give was anything but conclusive in my favour;
+they had seen me in company with an individual at Horncastle, to whom,
+by my orders, they had delivered certain horses, but they had seen no
+part of the money transaction; the fellow, whether from design or not,
+having taken me aside into a retired place, where he had paid me the
+three spurious notes, and induced me to change the fourth, which throughout
+the affair was what bore most materially against me.&nbsp; How matters
+might have terminated I do not know, I might have gone to prison, and
+I might have been - just then, when I most needed a friend, and least
+expected to find one, for though amongst those present there were several
+who were my neighbours, and who had professed friendship for me, none
+of them when they saw that I needed support and encouragement, came
+forward to yield me any, but, on the contrary, appeared by their looks
+to enjoy my terror and confusion - just then a friend entered the room
+in the person of the surgeon of the neighbourhood, the father of him
+who has attended you; he was not on very intimate terms with me, but
+he had occasionally spoken to me, and had attended my father in his
+dying illness, and chancing to hear that I was in trouble, he now hastened
+to assist me.&nbsp; After a short preamble, in which he apologized to
+the bench for interfering, he begged to be informed of the state of
+the case, whereupon the matter was laid before him in all its details.&nbsp;
+He was not slow in taking a fair view of it, and spoke well and eloquently
+in my behalf - insisting on the improbability that a person of my habits
+and position would be wilfully mixed up with a transaction like that
+of which it appeared I was suspected - adding, that as he was fully
+convinced of my innocence, he was ready to enter into any surety with
+respect to my appearance at any time to answer anything which might
+be laid to my charge.&nbsp; This last observation had particular effect,
+and as he was a person universally respected, both for his skill in
+his profession and his general demeanour, people began to think that
+a person in whom he took an interest could scarcely be concerned in
+anything criminal, and though my friend the magistrate - I call him
+so ironically - made two or three demurs, it was at last agreed between
+him and his brethren of the bench, that, for the present, I should be
+merely called upon to enter into my own recognizance for the sum of
+two hundred pounds, to appear whenever it should be deemed requisite
+to enter into any further investigation of the matter.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;So I was permitted to depart from the tribunal of petty justice
+without handcuffs, and uncollared by a constable; but people looked
+coldly and suspiciously upon me.&nbsp; The first thing I did was to
+hasten to the house of my beloved, in order to inform her of every circumstance
+attending the transaction.&nbsp; I found her, but how?&nbsp; A malicious
+female individual had hurried to her with a distorted tale, to the effect
+that I had been taken up as an utterer of forged notes; that an immense
+number had been found in my possession; that I was already committed,
+and that probably I should be executed.&nbsp; My affianced one tenderly
+loved me, and her constitution was delicate; fit succeeded fit; she
+broke a blood-vessel, and I found her deluged in blood; the surgeon
+had been sent for; he came and afforded her every possible relief.&nbsp;
+I was distracted; he bade me have hope, but I observed he looked very
+grave.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;By the skill of the surgeon, the poor girl was saved in the first
+instance from the arms of death, and for a few weeks she appeared to
+be rapidly recovering; by degrees, however, she became melancholy; a
+worm preyed upon her spirit; a slow fever took possession of her frame.&nbsp;
+I subsequently learned that the same malicious female who had first
+carried to her an exaggerated account of the affair, and who was a distant
+relative of her own, frequently visited her, and did all in her power
+to excite her fears with respect to its eventual termination.&nbsp;
+Time passed on in a very wretched manner.&nbsp; Our friend the surgeon
+showing to us both every mark of kindness and attention.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It was owing to this excellent man that my innocence was eventually
+established.&nbsp; Having been called to a town on the borders of Yorkshire
+to a medical consultation, he chanced to be taking a glass of wine with
+the landlord of the inn at which he stopped, when the waiter brought
+in a note to be changed, saying &lsquo;That the Quaker gentleman, who
+had been for some days in the house, and was about to depart, had sent
+it to be changed, in order that he might pay his bill.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+The landlord took the note, and looked at it.&nbsp; &lsquo;A fifty-pound
+bill,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t like changing bills of that
+amount, lest they should prove bad ones; however, as it comes from a
+Quaker gentleman, I suppose it is all right.&rsquo;&nbsp; The mention
+of a fifty-pound note aroused the attention of my friend, and he requested
+to be permitted to look at it; he had scarcely seen it, when he was
+convinced that it was one of the same description as those which had
+brought me into trouble, as it corresponded with them in two particular
+features, which the agent of the bank had pointed out to him and others
+as evidence of their spuriousness.&nbsp; My friend, without a moment&rsquo;s
+hesitation, informed the landlord that the note was a bad one, expressing
+at the same time a great wish to see the Quaker gentleman who wanted
+to have it changed.&nbsp; &lsquo;That you can easily do,&rsquo; said
+the landlord, and forthwith conducted him into the common room, where
+he saw a respectable-looking man, dressed like a Quaker, and seemingly
+about sixty years of age.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My friend, after a short apology, showed him the note which he
+held in his hand, stating that he had no doubt it was a spurious one,
+and begged to be informed where he had taken it, adding, that a particular
+friend of his was at present in trouble, owing to his having taken similar
+notes from a stranger at Horncastle; but that he hoped that he, the
+Quaker, could give information, by means of which the guilty party,
+or parties, could be arrested.&nbsp; At the mention of Horncastle, it
+appeared to my friend that the Quaker gave a slight start.&nbsp; At
+the conclusion of this speech, however, he answered, with great tranquillity,
+that he had received it in the way of business at -, naming one of the
+principal towns in Yorkshire, from a very respectable person, whose
+name he was perfectly willing to communicate, and likewise his own,
+which he said was James, and that he was a merchant residing at Liverpool;
+that he would write to his friend at -, requesting him to make inquiries
+on the subject; that just at that moment he was in a hurry to depart,
+having some particular business at a town about ten miles off, to go
+to which he had bespoken a post-chaise of the landlord; that with respect
+to the note, it was doubtless a very disagreeable thing to have a suspicious
+one in his possession, but that it would make little difference to him,
+as he had plenty of other money, and thereupon he pulled out a purse,
+containing various other notes, and some gold, observing, &lsquo;that
+his only motive for wishing to change the other note was a desire to
+be well provided with change;&rsquo; and finally, that if they had any
+suspicion with respect to him, he was perfectly willing to leave the
+note in their possession till he should return, which he intended to
+do in about a fortnight.&nbsp; There was so much plausibility in the
+speech of the Quaker, and his appearance and behaviour were so perfectly
+respectable, that my friend felt almost ashamed of the suspicion which
+at first he had entertained of him, though, at the same time, he felt
+an unaccountable unwillingness to let the man depart without some further
+interrogation.&nbsp; The landlord, however, who did not wish to disoblige
+one who had been, and might probably be again, a profitable customer,
+declared that he was perfectly satisfied; and that he had no wish to
+detain the note, which he made no doubt the gentleman had received in
+the way of business, and that as the matter concerned him alone, he
+would leave it to him to make the necessary inquiries.&nbsp; &lsquo;Just
+as you please, friend,&rsquo; said the Quaker, pocketing the suspicious
+note, &lsquo;I will now pay my bill.&rsquo;&nbsp; Thereupon he discharged
+the bill with a five-pound note, which he begged the landlord to inspect
+carefully, and with two pieces of gold.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The landlord had just taken the money, receipted the bill, and
+was bowing to his customer, when the door opened, and a lad, dressed
+in a kind of grey livery, appeared, and informed the Quaker that the
+chaise was ready.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is that boy your servant?&rsquo; said
+the surgeon.&nbsp; &lsquo;He is, friend,&rsquo; said the Quaker.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Hast thou any reason for asking me that question?&rsquo;&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And has he been long in your service?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Several
+years,&rsquo; replied the Quaker, &lsquo;I took him into my house out
+of compassion, he being an orphan, but as the chaise is waiting, I will
+bid thee farewell.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I am afraid I must stop your
+journey for the present,&rsquo; said the surgeon; &lsquo;that boy has
+exactly the same blemish in the eye which a boy had who was in company
+with the man at Horncastle, from whom my friend received the forged
+notes, and who there passed for his son.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I know
+nothing about that,&rsquo; said the Quaker, &lsquo;but I am determined
+to be detained here no longer, after the satisfactory account which
+I have given as to the note&rsquo;s coming into my possession.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+He then attempted to leave the room, but my friend detained him, a struggle
+ensued, during which a wig which the Quaker wore fell off, whereupon
+he instantly appeared to lose some twenty years of his age.&nbsp; &lsquo;Knock
+the fellow down, father,&rsquo; said the boy, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll help
+you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And, forsooth, the pretended Quaker took the boy&rsquo;s advice,
+and knocked my friend down in a twinkling.&nbsp; The landlord, however,
+and waiter, seeing how matters stood, instantly laid hold of him; but
+there can be no doubt that he would have escaped from the whole three,
+had not certain guests who were in the house, hearing the noise, rushed
+in, and helped to secure him.&nbsp; The boy was true to his word, assisting
+him to the best of his ability, flinging himself between the legs of
+his father&rsquo;s assailants, causing several of them to stumble and
+fall.&nbsp; At length, the fellow was secured, and led before a magistrate;
+the boy, to whom he was heard to say something which nobody understood,
+and to whom, after the man&rsquo;s capture, no one paid much attention,
+was no more seen.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The rest, as far as this man was concerned, may be told in a
+few words; nothing to criminate him was found on his person, but on
+his baggage being examined, a quantity of spurious notes were discovered.&nbsp;
+Much of his hardihood now forsook him, and in the hope of saving his
+life he made some very important disclosures; amongst other things,
+he confessed that it was he who had given me the notes in exchange for
+the horses, and also the note to be changed.&nbsp; He was subsequently
+tried on two indictments, in the second of which I appeared against
+him.&nbsp; He was condemned to die; but, in consideration of the disclosures
+he had made, his sentence was commuted to perpetual transportation.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My innocence was thus perfectly established before the eyes of
+the world, and all my friends hastened to congratulate me.&nbsp; There
+was one who congratulated me more than all the rest - it was my beloved
+one, but - but - she was dying - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Here the old man drew his hand before his eyes, and remained for some
+time without speaking; at length he removed his hand, and commenced
+again with a broken voice: &ldquo;You will pardon me if I hurry over
+this part of my story, I am unable to dwell upon it.&nbsp; How dwell
+upon a period when I saw my only earthly treasure pine away gradually
+day by day, and knew that nothing could save her!&nbsp; She saw my agony,
+and did all she could to console me, saying that she was herself quite
+resigned.&nbsp; A little time before her death she expressed a wish
+that we should be united.&nbsp; I was too happy to comply with her request.&nbsp;
+We were united, I brought her to this house, where, in less than a week,
+she expired in my arms.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXIV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Old Man&rsquo;s Story continued - Misery in the Head - The Strange
+Marks - Tea-dealer from London - Difficulties of the Chinese Language.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+After another pause the old man once more resumed his narration:- &ldquo;If
+ever there was a man perfectly miserable it was myself, after the loss
+of that cherished woman.&nbsp; I sat solitary in the house, in which
+I had hoped in her company to realize the choicest earthly happiness,
+a prey to the bitterest reflections; many people visited, and endeavoured
+to console me - amongst them was the clergyman of the parish, who begged
+me to be resigned, and told me that it was good to be afflicted.&nbsp;
+I bowed my head, but I could not help thinking how easy it must be for
+those who feel no affliction, to bid others to be resigned, and to talk
+of the benefit resulting from sorrow; perhaps I should have paid more
+attention to his discourse than I did, provided he had been a person
+for whom it was possible to entertain much respect, but his own heart
+was known to be set on the things of this world.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Within a little time he had an opportunity, in his own case,
+of practising resignation, and of realizing the benefit of being afflicted.&nbsp;
+A merchant, to whom he had entrusted all his fortune, in the hope of
+a large interest, became suddenly a bankrupt, with scarcely any assets.&nbsp;
+I will not say that it was owing to this misfortune that the divine
+died in less than a month after its occurrence, but such was the fact.&nbsp;
+Amongst those who most frequently visited me was my friend the surgeon;
+he did not confine himself to the common topics of consolation, but
+endeavoured to impress upon me the necessity of rousing myself, advising
+me to occupy my mind with some pursuit, particularly recommending agriculture;
+but agriculture possessed no interest for me, nor, indeed, any pursuit
+within my reach; my hopes of happiness had been blighted, and what cared
+I for anything? so at last he thought it best to leave me to myself,
+hoping that time would bring with it consolation; and I remained solitary
+in my house, waited upon by a male and a female servant.&nbsp; Oh, what
+dreary moments I passed!&nbsp; My only amusement - and it was a sad
+one - was to look at the things which once belonged to my beloved, and
+which were new in my possession.&nbsp; Oh, how fondly would I dwell
+upon them!&nbsp; There were some books; I cared not for books, but these
+had belonged to my beloved.&nbsp; Oh, how fondly did I dwell on them!&nbsp;
+Then there was her hat and bonnet - oh, me, how fondly did I gaze upon
+them! and after looking at her things for hours, I would sit and ruminate
+on the happiness I had lost.&nbsp; How I execrated the moment I had
+gone to the fair to sell horses!&nbsp; &lsquo;Would that I had never
+been to Horncastle to sell horses!&rsquo; I would say; &lsquo;I might
+at this moment have been enjoying the company of my beloved, leading
+a happy, quiet, easy life, but for that fatal expedition;&rsquo; that
+thought worked on my brain, till my brain seemed to turn round.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One day I sat at the breakfast-table gazing vacantly around me,
+my mind was in a state of inexpressible misery; there was a whirl in
+my brain, probably like that which people feel who are rapidly going
+mad; this increased to such a degree that I felt giddiness coming upon
+me.&nbsp; To abate this feeling I no longer permitted my eyes to wander
+about, but fixed them upon an object on the table, and continued gazing
+at it for several minutes without knowing what it was; at length, the
+misery in my head was somewhat stilled, my lips moved, and I heard myself
+saying, &lsquo;What odd marks!&rsquo;&nbsp; I had fastened my eyes on
+the side of a teapot, and by keeping them fixed upon it, had become
+aware of a fact that had escaped my notice before - namely, that there
+were marks upon it.&nbsp; I kept my eyes fixed upon them, and repeated
+at intervals, &lsquo;What strange marks!&rsquo; - for I thought that
+looking upon the marks tended to abate the whirl in my head: I kept
+tracing the marks one after the other, and I observed that though they
+all bore a general resemblance to each other, they were all to a certain
+extent different.&nbsp; The smallest portion possible of curious interest
+had been awakened within me, and, at last, I asked myself, within my
+own mind, &lsquo;What motive could induce people to put such odd marks
+on their crockery? they were not pictures, they were not letters; what
+motive could people have for putting them there?&rsquo;&nbsp; At last
+I removed my eyes from the teapot, and thought for a few moments about
+the marks; presently, however, I felt the whirl returning; the marks
+became almost effaced from my mind, and I was beginning to revert to
+my miserable ruminations, when suddenly methought I heard a voice say,
+&lsquo;The marks! the marks! cling to the marks? or - &rsquo;&nbsp;
+So I fixed my eyes again upon the marks, inspecting them more attentively,
+if possible, than I had done before, and, at last, I came to the conclusion
+that they were not capricious or fanciful marks, but were arranged systematically;
+when I had gazed at them for a considerable time, I turned the teapot
+round, and on the other side I observed marks of a similar kind, which
+I soon discovered were identical with the ones I had been observing.&nbsp;
+All the marks were something alike, but all somewhat different, and
+on comparing them with each other, I was struck with the frequent occurrence
+of a mark crossing an upright line, or projecting from it, now on the
+right, now on the left side; and I said to myself, &lsquo;Why does this
+mark sometimes cross the upright line, and sometimes project?&rsquo;
+and the more I thought on the matter, the less did I feel of the misery
+in my head.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The things were at length removed, and I sat, as I had for some
+time past been wont to sit after my meals, silent and motionless; but
+in the present instance my mind was not entirely abandoned to the one
+mournful idea which had so long distressed it.&nbsp; It was, to a certain
+extent, occupied with the marks on the teapot; it is true that the mournful
+idea strove hard with the marks on the teapot for the mastery in my
+mind, and at last the painful idea drove the marks of the teapot out;
+they, however, would occasionally return and flit across my mind for
+a moment or two, and their coming was like a momentary relief from intense
+pain.&nbsp; I thought once or twice that I would have the teapot placed
+before me, that I might examine the marks at leisure, but I considered
+that it would be as well to defer the re-examination of the marks till
+the next morning; at that time I did not take tea of an evening.&nbsp;
+By deferring the examination thus, I had something to look forward to
+on the next morning.&nbsp; The day was a melancholy one, but it certainly
+was more tolerable to me than any of the others had been since the death
+of my beloved.&nbsp; As I lay awake that night I occasionally thought
+of the marks, and in my sleep methought I saw them upon the teapot vividly
+before me.&nbsp; On the morrow, I examined the marks again; how singular
+they looked!&nbsp; Surely they must mean something, and if so, what
+could they mean? and at last I thought within myself whether it would
+be possible for me to make out what they meant: that day I felt more
+relief than on the preceding one, and towards night I walked a little
+about.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In about a week&rsquo;s time I received a visit from my friend
+the surgeon; after a little discourse, he told me that he perceived
+I was better than when he had last seen me, and asked me what I had
+been about; I told him that I had been principally occupied in considering
+certain marks which I had found on a teapot, and wondering what they
+could mean; he smiled at first, but instantly assuming a serious look,
+he asked to see the teapot.&nbsp; I produced it, and after having surveyed
+the marks with attention, he observed that they were highly curious,
+and also wondered what they meant.&nbsp; &lsquo;I strongly advise you,&rsquo;
+said he, &lsquo;to attempt to make them out, and also to take moderate
+exercise, and to see after your concerns.&rsquo;&nbsp; I followed his
+advice; every morning I studied the marks on the teapot, and in the
+course of the day took moderate exercise, and attended to little domestic
+matters, as became the master of a house.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I subsequently learned that the surgeon, in advising me to study
+the marks, and endeavour to make out their meaning, merely hoped that
+by means of them my mind might by degrees be diverted from the mournful
+idea on which I had so long brooded.&nbsp; He was a man well skilled
+in his profession, but had read and thought very little on matters unconnected
+with it.&nbsp; He had no idea that the marks had any particular signification,
+or were anything else but common and fortuitous ones.&nbsp; That I became
+at all acquainted with their nature was owing to a ludicrous circumstance
+which I will now relate.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One day, chancing to be at a neighbouring town, I was struck
+with the appearance of a shop recently established.&nbsp; It had an
+immense bow-window, and every part of it, to which a brush could be
+applied, was painted in a gaudy flaming style.&nbsp; Large bowls of
+green and black tea were placed upon certain chests, which stood at
+the window.&nbsp; I stopped to look at them, such a display, whatever
+it may be at the present time, being, at the period of which I am speaking,
+quite uncommon in a country town.&nbsp; The tea, whether black or green,
+was very shining and inviting, and the bowls, of which there were three,
+standing on as many chests, were very grand and foreign looking.&nbsp;
+Two of these were white, with figures and trees painted upon them in
+blue; the other, which was the middlemost, had neither trees nor figures
+upon it, but, as I looked through the window, appeared to have on its
+sides the very same kind of marks which I had observed on the teapot
+at home; there were also marks on the tea-chests, somewhat similar,
+but much larger, and, apparently, not executed with so much care.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Best teas direct from China,&rsquo; said a voice close to my
+side; and looking round I saw a youngish man, with a frizzled head,
+flat face, and an immensely wide mouth, standing in his shirt-sleeves
+by the door.&nbsp; &lsquo;Direct from China,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;perhaps
+you will do me the favour to walk in and scent them?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+do not want any tea,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;I was only standing at the
+window examining those marks on the bowl and the chests.&nbsp; I have
+observed similar ones on a teapot at home.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Pray
+walk in, sir,&rsquo; said the young fellow, extending his mouth till
+it reached nearly from ear to ear; &lsquo;pray walk in, and I shall
+be happy to give you any information respecting the manners and customs
+of the Chinese in my power.&rsquo;&nbsp; Thereupon I followed him into
+his shop, where he began to harangue on the manners, customs, and peculiarities
+of the Chinese, especially their manner of preparing tea, not forgetting
+to tell me that the only genuine Chinese tea ever imported into England
+was to be found in his shop.&nbsp; &lsquo;With respect to those marks,&rsquo;
+said he, &lsquo;on the bowl and chests, they are nothing more nor less
+than Chinese writing expressing something, though what I can&rsquo;t
+exactly tell you.&nbsp; Allow me to sell you this pound of tea,&rsquo;
+he added, showing me a paper parcel.&nbsp; &lsquo;On the envelope there
+is a printed account of the Chinese system of writing, extracted from
+authors of the most established reputation.&nbsp; These things I print,
+principally with the hope of, in some degree, removing the worse than
+Gothic ignorance prevalent amongst natives of these parts.&nbsp; I am
+from London myself.&nbsp; With respect to all that relates to the Chinese
+real imperial tea, I assure you sir, that - &rsquo;&nbsp; Well, to make
+short of what you doubtless consider a very tiresome story, I purchased
+the tea and carried it home.&nbsp; The tea proved imperially bad, but
+the paper envelope really contained some information on the Chinese
+language and writing, amounting to about as much as you gained from
+me the other day.&nbsp; On learning that the marks on the teapot expressed
+words, I felt my interest with respect to them considerably increased,
+and returned to the task of inspecting them with greater zeal than before,
+hoping, by continually looking at them, to be able eventually to understand
+their meaning, in which hope you may easily believe I was disappointed,
+though my desire to understand what they represented continued on the
+increase.&nbsp; In this dilemma I determined to apply again to the shopkeeper
+from whom I bought the tea.&nbsp; I found him in rather low spirits,
+his shirt-sleeves were soiled, and his hair was out of curl.&nbsp; On
+my inquiring how he got on, he informed me that he intended speedily
+to leave, having received little or no encouragement, the people, in
+their Gothic ignorance, preferring to deal with an old-fashioned shopkeeper
+over the way, who, so far from possessing any acquaintance with the
+polity and institutions of the Chinese, did not, he believed, know that
+tea came from China.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are come for some more, I suppose?&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; On receiving an answer in the negative he looked somewhat
+blank, but when I added that I came to consult with him as to the means
+which I must take in order to acquire the Chinese language he brightened
+up.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must get a grammar,&rsquo; said he, rubbing his
+hands.&nbsp; &lsquo;Have you not one?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;No,&rsquo;
+he replied, &lsquo;but any bookseller can procure you one.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+As I was taking my departure, he told me that as he was about to leave
+the neighbourhood, the bowl at the window, which bore the inscription,
+besides some other pieces of porcelain of a similar description, were
+at my service, provided I chose to purchase them.&nbsp; I consented,
+and two or three days afterwards took from off his hands all the china
+in his possession which bore the inscriptions, paying what he demanded.&nbsp;
+Had I waited till the sale of his effects, which occurred within a few
+weeks, I could probably have procured it for a fifth part of the sum
+which I paid, the other pieces realizing very little.&nbsp; I did not,
+however, grudge the poor fellow what he got from me, as I considered
+myself to be somewhat in his debt for the information he had afforded
+me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;As for the rest of my story, it may be briefly told.&nbsp; I
+followed the advice of the shopkeeper, and applied to a bookseller who
+wrote to his correspondent in London.&nbsp; After a long interval, I
+was informed that if I wished to learn Chinese, I must do so through
+the medium of French, there being neither Chinese grammar nor dictionary
+in our language.&nbsp; I was at first very much disheartened.&nbsp;
+I determined, however, at last to gratify my desire of learning Chinese,
+even at the expense of learning French.&nbsp; I procured the books,
+and in order to qualify myself to turn them to account, took lessons
+in French from a little Swiss, the usher of a neighbouring boarding-school.&nbsp;
+I was very stupid in acquiring French; perseverance, however, enabled
+me to acquire a knowledge sufficient for the object I had in view.&nbsp;
+In about two years I began to study Chinese by myself, through the medium
+of the French.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and how did you get on with the study
+of the Chinese?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+And then the old man proceeded to inform me how he got on with the study
+of Chinese, enumerated all the difficulties he had had to encounter;
+dilating upon his frequent despondency of mind, and occasionally his
+utter despair of ever mastering Chinese.&nbsp; He told me that more
+than once he had determined upon giving up the study, but when the misery
+in his head forthwith returned, to escape from which he had as often
+resumed it.&nbsp; It appeared, however, that ten years elapsed before
+he was able to use ten of the two hundred and fourteen keys, which serve
+to undo the locks of Chinese writing.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And are you able at present to use the entire number?&rdquo;
+I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;I can at present use the
+whole number.&nbsp; I know the key for every particular lock, though
+I frequently find the wards unwilling to give way.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Has nothing particular occurred to you,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;during
+the time that you have been prosecuting your studies?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;During the whole time in which I have been engaged in these studies,&rdquo;
+said the old man, &ldquo;only one circumstance has occurred which requires
+any particular mention - the death of my old friend the surgeon - who
+was carried off suddenly by a fit of apoplexy.&nbsp; His death was a
+great shock to me, and for a time interrupted my studies.&nbsp; His
+son, however, who succeeded him, was very kind to me, and, in some degree,
+supplied his father&rsquo;s place; and I gradually returned to my Chinese
+locks and keys.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And in applying keys to the Chinese locks you employ your time?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;in making out the inscriptions
+on the various pieces of porcelain, which I have at different times
+procured, I pass my time.&nbsp; The first inscription which I translated
+was that on the teapot of my beloved.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how many other pieces of porcelain may you have at present
+in your possession?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;About fifteen hundred.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how did you obtain them?&rdquo; I demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Without much labour,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;in the neighbouring
+towns and villages - chiefly at auctions - of which, about twenty years
+ago, there were many in these parts.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And may I ask your reasons for confining your studies entirely
+to the crockery literature of China, when you have all the rest at your
+disposal?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The inscriptions enable me to pass my time,&rdquo; said the old
+man; &ldquo;what more would the whole literature of China do?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And from these inscriptions,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;what a book
+it is in your power to make, whenever so disposed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Translations
+from the crockery literature of China.&rsquo;&nbsp; Such a book would
+be sure to take; even glorious John himself would not disdain to publish
+it.&rdquo;&nbsp; The old man smiled.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have no desire for
+literary distinction,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;no ambition.&nbsp; My original
+wish was to pass my life in easy, quiet obscurity, with her whom I loved.&nbsp;
+I was disappointed in my wish; she was removed, who constituted my only
+felicity in this life; desolation came to my heart, and misery to my
+head.&nbsp; To escape from the latter I had recourse to Chinese.&nbsp;
+By degrees the misery left my head, but the desolation of the heart
+yet remains.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Be of good cheer,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;through the instrumentality
+of this affliction you have learnt Chinese, and, in so doing, learnt
+to practise the duties of hospitality.&nbsp; Who but a man who could
+read Runes on a teapot, would have received an unfortunate wayfarer
+as you have received me?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;let us hope that all is
+for the best.&nbsp; I am by nature indolent, and, but for this affliction,
+should, perhaps, have hardly taken the trouble to do my duty to my fellow-creatures.&nbsp;
+I am very, very indolent,&rdquo; said he, slightly glancing towards
+the clock; &ldquo;therefore let us hope that all is for the best; but,
+oh! these trials, they are very hard to bear.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Leave-taking - Spirit of the Hearth - What&rsquo;s o&rsquo;Clock?<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The next morning, having breakfasted with my old friend, I went into
+the stable to make the necessary preparations for my departure; there,
+with the assistance of a stable lad, I cleaned and caparisoned my horse,
+and then, returning into the house, I made the old female attendant
+such a present as I deemed would be some compensation for the trouble
+I had caused.&nbsp; Hearing that the old gentleman was in his study,
+I repaired to him.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am come to take leave of you,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;and to thank you for all the hospitality which I have
+received at your hands.&rdquo;&nbsp; The eyes of the old man were fixed
+steadfastly on the inscription which I had found him studying on a former
+occasion.&nbsp; &ldquo;At length,&rdquo; he murmured to himself, &ldquo;I
+have it - I think I have it;&rdquo; and then, looking at me, he said,
+&ldquo;So you are about to depart?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;my horse will be at the front door
+in a few minutes; I am glad, however, before I go, to find that you
+have mastered the inscription.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I believe I have mastered
+it; it seems to consist of some verses relating to the worship of the
+Spirit of the Hearth.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is the Spirit of the Hearth?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One of the many demons which the Chinese worship,&rdquo; said
+the old man; &ldquo;they do not worship one God, but many.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And then the old man told me a great many highly-interesting particulars
+respecting the demon worship of the Chinese.<br>
+<br>
+After the lapse of at least half an hour I said, &ldquo;I must not linger
+here any longer, however willing.&nbsp; Horncastle is distant, and I
+wish to be there to-night.&nbsp; Pray can you inform me what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old man, rising, looked towards the clock which hung on the side
+of the room at his left hand, on the farther side of the table at which
+he was seated.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am rather short-sighted,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and cannot distinguish
+the number, at that distance.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is ten o&rsquo;clock,&rdquo; said the old man; &ldquo;I believe
+somewhat past.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A quarter, perhaps?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man &ldquo;a quarter or - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Seven minutes, or ten minutes past ten.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not understand you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, to tell you the truth,&rdquo; said the old man, with a smile,
+&ldquo;there is one thing to the knowledge of which I could never exactly
+attain.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you mean to say,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that you do not know
+what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I can give a guess,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;to within
+a few minutes.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But you cannot tell the exact moment?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said the old man.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In the name of wonder,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;with that thing
+there on the wall continually ticking in your ear, how comes it that
+you do not know what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I have contented myself
+with giving a tolerably good guess; to do more would have been too great
+trouble.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But you have learnt Chinese,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;I have learnt Chinese.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I really would counsel you to learn
+to know what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock as soon as possible.&nbsp; Consider
+what a sad thing it would be to go out of the world not knowing what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; A millionth part of the trouble required to learn
+Chinese would, if employed, infallibly teach you to know what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I had a motive for learning Chinese,&rdquo; said the old man,
+&ldquo;the hope of appeasing the misery in my head.&nbsp; With respect
+to not knowing what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock, I cannot see anything particularly
+sad in the matter.&nbsp; A man may get through the world very creditably
+without knowing what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; Yet, upon the whole,
+it is no bad thing to know what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock - you, of course,
+do?&nbsp; It would be too good a joke if two people were to be together,
+one knowing Armenian and the other Chinese, and neither knowing what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll now see you off.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXVI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Arrival at Horncastle - The Inn and Ostlers - The Garret - Figure of
+a Man with a Candle.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Leaving the house of the old man who knew Chinese, but could not tell
+what was o&rsquo;clock, I wended my way to Horncastle, which I reached
+in the evening of the same day, without having met any adventure on
+the way worthy of being marked down in this very remarkable history.<br>
+<br>
+The town was a small one, seemingly ancient, and was crowded with people
+and horses.&nbsp; I proceeded, without delay, to the inn to which my
+friend the surgeon had directed me.&nbsp; &ldquo;It is of no use coming
+here,&rdquo; said two or three ostlers, as I entered the yard - &ldquo;all
+full - no room whatever;&rdquo; whilst one added in an undertone, &ldquo;That
+ere a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t a bad-looking horse.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I want
+to see the master of this inn,&rdquo; said I, as I dismounted from the
+horse.&nbsp; &ldquo;See the master,&rdquo; said an ostler - the same
+who had paid the negative kind of compliment to the horse - &ldquo;a
+likely thing, truly; my master is drinking wine with some of the grand
+gentry, and can&rsquo;t be disturbed for the sake of the like of you.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I bring a letter to him,&rdquo; said I, pulling out the surgeon&rsquo;s
+epistle.&nbsp; &ldquo;I wish you would deliver it to him,&rdquo; I added,
+offering a half-crown.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh, it&rsquo;s you, is it?&rdquo;
+said the ostler, taking the letter and the half-crown; &ldquo;my master
+will be right glad to see you; why, you ha&rsquo;n&rsquo;t been here
+for many a year; I&rsquo;ll carry the note to him at once.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And with these words he hurried into the house.&nbsp; &ldquo;That&rsquo;s
+a nice horse, young man,&rdquo; said another ostler, &ldquo;what will
+you take for it?&rdquo; to which interrogation I made no answer.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;If you wish to sell him,&rdquo; said the ostler, coming up to
+me, and winking knowingly, &ldquo;I think I and my partners might offer
+you a summut under seventy pounds;&rdquo; to which kind and half-insinuated
+offer I made no reply, save by winking in the same kind of knowing manner
+in which I observed him wink.&nbsp; &ldquo;Rather leary!&rdquo; said
+a third ostler.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, young man, perhaps you will drink
+to-night with me and my partners, when we can talk the matter over.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Before I had time to answer, the landlord, a well-dressed, good-looking
+man, made his appearance with the ostler; he bore the letter in his
+hand.&nbsp; Without glancing at me, he betook himself at once to consider
+the horse, going round him, and observing every point with the utmost
+minuteness.&nbsp; At last, having gone round the horse three times,
+he stopped beside me, and keeping his eyes on the horse, bent his head
+towards his right shoulder.&nbsp; &ldquo;That horse is worth some money,&rdquo;
+said he, turning towards me suddenly, and slightly touching me on the
+arm with the letter which he held in his hand; to which observation
+I made no reply, save by bending my head towards the right shoulder
+as I had seen him do.&nbsp; &ldquo;The young man is going to talk to
+me and my partners about it to-night,&rdquo; said the ostler who had
+expressed an opinion that he and his friends might offer me somewhat
+under seventy pounds for the animal.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pooh!&rdquo; said
+the landlord, &ldquo;the young man&rsquo; knows what he is about; in
+the meantime lead the horse to the reserved stall, and see well after
+him.&nbsp; My friend,&rdquo; said he, taking me aside after the ostler
+had led the animal away, &ldquo;recommends you to me in the strongest
+manner, on which account alone I take you and your horse in.&nbsp; I
+need not advise you not to be taken in, as I should say, by your look,
+that you are tolerably awake; but there are queer hands at Horncastle
+at this time, and those fellows of mine, you understand me - ; but I
+have a great deal to do at present, so you must excuse me.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And thereupon went into the house.<br>
+<br>
+That same evening I was engaged at least two hours in the stable, in
+rubbing the horse down, and preparing him for the exhibition which I
+intended he should make in the fair on the following day.&nbsp; The
+ostler, to whom I had given the half-crown, occasionally assisted me,
+though he was too much occupied by the horses of other guests to devote
+any length of time to the service of mine; he more than once repeated
+to me his firm conviction that himself and partners could afford to
+offer me summut for the horse; and at a later hour when, in compliance
+with his invitation, I took a glass of summut with himself and partners,
+in a little room surrounded with corn-chests, on which we sat, both
+himself and partners endeavoured to impress upon me, chiefly by means
+of nods and winks, their conviction that they could afford to give me
+summut for the horse, provided I were disposed to sell him; in return
+for which intimation, with as many nods and winks as they had all collectively
+used, I endeavoured to impress upon them my conviction that I could
+get summut handsomer in the fair than they might be disposed to offer
+me, seeing as how - which how I followed by a wink and a nod, which
+they seemed perfectly to understand, one or two of them declaring that
+if the case was so, it made a great deal of difference, and that they
+did not wish to be any hindrance to me, more particularly as it was
+quite clear I had been an ostler like themselves.<br>
+<br>
+It was late at night when I began to think of retiring to rest.&nbsp;
+On inquiring if there was any place in which I could sleep, I was informed
+that there was a bed at my service, provided I chose to sleep in a two-bedded
+room, one of the beds of which was engaged by another gentleman.&nbsp;
+I expressed my satisfaction at this arrangement, and was conducted by
+a maid-servant up many pairs of stairs to a garret, in which were two
+small beds, in one of which she gave me to understand another gentleman
+slept; he had, however, not yet retired to rest; I asked who he was,
+but the maid-servant could give me no information about him, save that
+he was a highly respectable gentleman, and a friend of her master&rsquo;s.&nbsp;
+Presently, bidding me good night, she left me with a candle; and I,
+having undressed myself and extinguished the light, went to bed.&nbsp;
+Notwithstanding the noises which sounded from every part of the house,
+I was not slow in falling asleep, being thoroughly tired.&nbsp; I know
+not how long I might have been in bed, perhaps two hours, when I was
+partially awakened by a light shining upon my face, whereupon, unclosing
+my eyes, I perceived the figure of a man, with a candle in one hand,
+staring at my face, whilst with the other hand, he held back the curtain
+of the bed.&nbsp; As I have said before, I was only partially awakened,
+my power of conception was consequently very confused; it appeared to
+me, however, that the man was dressed in a green coat; that he had curly
+brown or black hair, and that there was something peculiar in his look.&nbsp;
+Just as I was beginning to recollect myself, the curtain dropped, and
+I heard, or thought I heard, a voice say, &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t know the
+cove.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then there was a rustling like a person undressing,
+whereupon being satisfied that it was my fellow-lodger, I dropped asleep,
+but was awakened again by a kind of heavy plunge upon the other bed,
+which caused it to rock and creak, when I observed that the light had
+been extinguished, probably blown out, if I might judge from a rather
+disagreeable smell of burnt wick which remained in the room, and which
+kept me awake till I heard my companion breathing hard, when, turning
+on the other side, I was again once more speedily in the arms of slumber.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXVII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Horncastle Fair.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It had been my intention to be up and doing early on the following morning,
+but my slumbers proved so profound, that I did not wake until about
+eight; on arising, I again found myself the sole occupant of the apartment,
+my more alert companion having probably risen at a much earlier hour.&nbsp;
+Having dressed myself, I descended, and going to the stable, found my
+horse under the hands of my friend the ostler, who was carefully rubbing
+him down.&nbsp; &ldquo;There a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t a better horse in the
+fair,&rdquo; said he to me, &ldquo;and as you are one of us, and appear
+to be all right, I&rsquo;ll give you a piece of advice - don&rsquo;t
+take less than a hundred and fifty for him; if you mind your hits, you
+may get it, for I have known two hundred given in this fair for one
+no better, if so good.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;thank
+you for your advice, which I will take, and, if successful, will give
+you &lsquo;summut&rsquo; handsome.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo;
+said the ostler; &ldquo;and now let me ask whether you are up to all
+the ways of this here place?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I have never been here
+before,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I have a pair of tolerably sharp eyes
+in my head.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;That I see you have,&rdquo; said the
+ostler, &ldquo;but many a body, with as sharp a pair of eyes as yourn,
+has lost his horse in this fair, for want of having been here before,
+therefore,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you a caution or two.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Thereupon the ostler proceeded to give me at least half a dozen cautions,
+only two of which I shall relate to the reader: - the first, not to
+stop to listen to what any chance customer might have to say; and the
+last - the one on which he appeared to lay most stress - by no manner
+of means to permit a Yorkshireman to get up into the saddle, &ldquo;for,&rdquo;
+said he, &ldquo;if you do, it is three to one that he rides off with
+the horse; he can&rsquo;t help it; trust a cat amongst cream, but never
+trust a Yorkshireman on the saddle of a good horse; by-the-by,&rdquo;
+he continued, &ldquo;that saddle of yours is not a particularly good
+one, no more is the bridle.&nbsp; I tell you what, as you seem a decent
+kind of a young chap, I&rsquo;ll lend you a saddle and bridle of my
+master&rsquo;s, almost bran new; he won&rsquo;t object, I know, as you
+are a friend of his, only you must not forget your promise to come down
+with summut handsome after you have sold the animal.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+After a slight breakfast I mounted the horse, which, decked out in his
+borrowed finery, really looked better by a large sum of money than on
+any former occasion.&nbsp; Making my way out of the yard of the inn,
+I was instantly in the principal street of the town, up and down which
+an immense number of horses were being exhibited, some led, and others
+with riders.&nbsp; &ldquo;A wonderful small quantity of good horses
+in the fair this time!&rdquo; I heard a stout jockey-looking individual
+say, who was staring up the street with his side towards me.&nbsp; &ldquo;Halloo,
+young fellow!&rdquo; said he, a few moments after I had passed, &ldquo;whose
+horse is that?&nbsp; Stop!&nbsp; I want to look at him!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Though confident that he was addressing himself to me, I took no notice,
+remembering the advice of the ostler, and proceeded up the street.&nbsp;
+My horse possessed a good walking step; but walking, as the reader knows,
+was not his best pace, which was the long trot, at which I could not
+well exercise him in the street, on account of the crowd of men and
+animals; however, as he walked along, I could easily perceive that he
+attracted no slight attention amongst those who, by their jockey dress
+and general appearance, I imagined to be connoisseurs; I heard various
+calls to stop, to none of which I paid the slightest attention.&nbsp;
+In a few minutes I found myself out of the town, when, turning round
+for the purpose of returning, I found I had been followed by several
+of the connoisseur-looking individuals, whom I had observed in the fair.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Now would be the time for a display,&rdquo; thought I; and looking
+around me I observed two five-barred gates, one on each side of the
+road, and fronting each other.&nbsp; Turning my horse&rsquo;s head to
+one, I pressed my heels to his sides, loosened the reins, and gave an
+encouraging cry, whereupon the animal cleared the gate in a twinkling.&nbsp;
+Before he had advanced ten yards in the field to which the gate opened,
+I had turned him round, and again giving him cry and rein, I caused
+him to leap back again into the road, and still allowing him head, I
+made him leap the other gate; and forthwith turning him round, I caused
+him to leap once more into the road, where he stood proudly tossing
+his head, as much as to say, &ldquo;What more?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;A
+fine horse! a capital horse!&rdquo; said several of the connoisseurs.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What do you ask for him?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Too much for any
+of you to pay,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;A horse like this is intended
+for other kind of customers than any of you.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How
+do you know that?&rdquo; said one; the very same person whom I had heard
+complaining in the street of the paucity of good horses in the fair.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Come, let us know what you ask for him?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;A
+hundred and fifty pounds!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;neither more nor less.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Do you call that a great price?&rdquo; said the man.&nbsp; &ldquo;Why,
+I thought you would have asked double that amount!&nbsp; You do yourself
+injustice, young man.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Perhaps I do,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;but that&rsquo;s my affair; I do not choose to take more.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I wish you would let me get into the saddle,&rdquo; said the
+man; &ldquo;the horse knows you, and therefore shows to more advantage;
+but I should like to see how he would move under me, who am a stranger.&nbsp;
+Will you let me get into the saddle, young man?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;I will not let you get into the saddle.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; said the man.&nbsp; &ldquo;Lest you should be
+a Yorkshireman,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;and should run away with the horse.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Yorkshire?&rdquo; said the man; &ldquo;I am from Suffolk; silly
+Suffolk - so you need not be afraid of my running away with the horse.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Oh! if that&rsquo;s the case,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I should
+be afraid that the horse would run away with you; so I will by no means
+let you mount.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Will you let me look in his mouth?&rdquo;
+said the man.&nbsp; &ldquo;If you please,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;but
+I tell you, he&rsquo;s apt to bite.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He can scarcely
+be a worse bite than his master,&rdquo; said the man, looking into the
+horse&rsquo;s mouth; &ldquo;he&rsquo;s four off.&nbsp; I say, young
+man, will you warrant this horse?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said
+I; &ldquo;I never warrant horses; the horses that I ride can always
+warrant themselves.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I wish you would let me speak
+a word to you,&rdquo; said he.&nbsp; &ldquo;Just come aside.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+a nice horse,&rdquo; said he, in a half whisper, after I had ridden
+a few paces aside with him.&nbsp; &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a nice horse,&rdquo;
+said he, placing his hand upon the pommel of the saddle, and looking
+up in my face, &ldquo;and I think I can find you a customer.&nbsp; If
+you would take a hundred, I think my lord would purchase it, for he
+has sent me about the fair to look him up a horse, by which he could
+hope to make an honest penny.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;and could he not make an honest penny, and yet give me the
+price I ask?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said the go-between, &ldquo;a
+hundred and fifty pounds is as much as the animal is worth, or nearly
+so; and my lord, do you see - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I see no reason at
+all,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;why I should sell the animal for less than
+he is worth, in order that his lordship may be benefited by him; so
+that if his lordship wants to make an honest penny, he must find some
+person who would consider the disadvantage of selling him a horse for
+less than it is worth, as counterbalanced by the honour of dealing with
+a lord, which I should never do; but I can&rsquo;t be wasting my time
+here.&nbsp; I am going back to the -, where, if you, or any person,
+are desirous of purchasing the horse, you must come within the next
+half hour, or I shall probably not feel disposed to sell him at all.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Another word, young man,&rdquo; said the jockey; but without
+staying to hear what he had to say, I put the horse to his best trot,
+and re-entering the town, and threading my way as well as I could through
+the press, I returned to the yard of the inn, where, dismounting, I
+stood still, holding the horse by the bridle.<br>
+<br>
+I had been standing in this manner about five minutes, when I saw the
+jockey enter the yard, accompanied by another individual.&nbsp; They
+advanced directly towards me.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here is my lord come to look
+at the horse, young man,&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp; My lord, as the
+jockey called him, was a tall figure, of about five-and-thirty.&nbsp;
+He had on his head a hat somewhat rusty, and on his back a surtout of
+blue rather the worse for wear.&nbsp; His forehead, if not high, was
+exceedingly narrow; his eyes were brown, with a rat-like glare in them;
+the nose was rather long, and the mouth very wide; the cheek-bones high,
+and the cheeks, as to hue and consistency, exhibiting very much the
+appearance of a withered red apple; there was a gaunt expression of
+hunger in the whole countenance.&nbsp; He had scarcely glanced at the
+horse, when drawing in his cheeks, he thrust out his lips very much
+after the manner of a baboon, when he sees a piece of sugar held out
+towards him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is this horse yours?&rdquo; said he, suddenly
+turning towards me, with a kind of smirk.&nbsp; &ldquo;It&rsquo;s my
+horse,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;are you the person who wishes to make an
+honest penny by it?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;How!&rdquo; said he, drawing
+up his head with a very consequential look, and speaking with a very
+haughty tone, &ldquo;what do you mean?&rdquo;&nbsp; We looked at each
+other full in the face; after a few moments, the muscles of the mouth
+of him of the hungry look began to move violently, the face was puckered
+into innumerable wrinkles, and the eyes became half closed.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;have you ever seen me before?&nbsp; I suppose you are
+asking yourself that question.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Excuse me, sir,&rdquo;
+said he, dropping his lofty look, and speaking in a very subdued and
+civil tone, &ldquo;I have never had the honour of seeing you before,
+that is&rdquo; - said he, slightly glancing at me again, and again moving
+the muscles of his mouth, &ldquo;no, I have never seen you before,&rdquo;
+he added, making me a bow.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have never had that pleasure;
+my business with you, at present, is to inquire the lowest price you
+are willing to take for this horse.&nbsp; My agent here informs me that
+you ask one hundred and fifty pounds, which I cannot think of giving
+- the horse is a showy horse, but look, my dear sir, he has a defect
+here, and there in his near fore leg I observe something which looks
+very like a splint - yes, upon my credit,&rdquo; said he, touching the
+animal, &ldquo;he has a splint, or something which will end in one.&nbsp;
+A hundred and fifty pounds, sir! what could have induced you ever to
+ask anything like that for this animal?&nbsp; I protest that, in my
+time, I have frequently bought a better for -&nbsp; Who are you, sir?&nbsp;
+I am in treaty for this horse,&rdquo; said he to a man who had come
+up whilst he was talking, and was now looking into the horse&rsquo;s
+mouth.&nbsp; &ldquo;Who am I?&rdquo; said the man, still looking into
+the horse&rsquo;s mouth; &ldquo;who am I? his lordship asks me.&nbsp;
+Ah, I see, close on five,&rdquo; said he, releasing the horse&rsquo;s
+jaws, and looking at me.&nbsp; This new corner was a thin, wiry-made
+individual, with wiry curling brown hair; his face was dark, and wore
+an arch and somewhat roguish expression; upon one of his eyes was a
+kind of speck or beam; he might be about forty, wore a green jockey
+coat, and held in his hand a black riding whip, with a knob of silver
+wire.&nbsp; As I gazed upon his countenance, it brought powerfully to
+my mind the face which, by the light of the candle, I had seen staring
+over me on the preceding night, when lying in bed and half asleep.&nbsp;
+Close beside him, and seemingly in his company, stood an exceedingly
+tall figure, that of a youth, seemingly about one-and-twenty, dressed
+in a handsome riding dress, and wearing on his head a singular hat,
+green in colour, and with a very high peak.&nbsp; &ldquo;What do you
+ask for this horse?&rdquo; said he of the green coat, winking at me
+with the eye which had a beam in it, whilst the other shone and sparkled
+like Mrs. Colonel W-&rsquo;s Golconda diamond.&nbsp; &ldquo;Who are
+you, sir, I demand once more?&rdquo; said he of the hungry look.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Who am I? why, who should I be but Jack Dale, who buys horses
+for himself and other folk; I want one at present for this short young
+gentleman,&rdquo; said he, motioning with his finger to the gigantic
+youth.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, sir,&rdquo; said the other, &ldquo;and what
+business have you to interfere between me and any purchase I may be
+disposed to make?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, then,&rdquo; said the other,
+&ldquo;be quick and purchase the horse, or, perhaps, I may.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Do you think I am to be dictated to by a fellow of your description?&rdquo;
+said his lordship, &ldquo;begone, or - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;What do
+you ask for this horse?&rdquo; said the other to me, very coolly.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;A hundred and fifty,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;I shouldn&rsquo;t
+mind giving it to you,&rdquo; said he.&nbsp; &ldquo;You will do no such
+thing,&rdquo; said his lordship, speaking so fast that he almost stuttered.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said he to me, &ldquo;I must give you what you ask;
+Symmonds, take possession of the animal for me,&rdquo; said he to the
+other jockey who attended him.&nbsp; &ldquo;You will please to do no
+such thing without my consent,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I have not sold
+him.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I have this moment told you that I will give
+you the price you demand,&rdquo; said his lordship; &ldquo;is not that
+sufficient?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;there is a
+proper manner of doing everything - had you come forward in a manly
+and gentlemanly manner to purchase the horse, I should have been happy
+to sell him to you, but after all the fault you have found with him,
+I would not sell him to you at any price, so send your friend to find
+up another.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You behave in this manner, I suppose,&rdquo;
+said his lordship, &ldquo;because this fellow has expressed a willingness
+to come to your terms.&nbsp; I would advise you to be cautious how you
+trust the animal in his hands; I think I have seen him before, and could
+tell you - &rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;What can you tell of me?&rdquo; said
+the other, going up to him; &ldquo;except that I have been a poor dicky-boy,
+and that now I am a dealer in horses, and that my father was lagged;
+that&rsquo;s all you could tell of me, and that I don&rsquo;t mind telling
+myself: but there are two things they can&rsquo;t say of me, they can&rsquo;t
+say that I am either a coward or a screw either, except so far as one
+who gets his bread by horses may be expected to be; and they can&rsquo;t
+say of me that I ever ate up an ice which a young woman was waiting
+for, or that I ever backed out of a fight.&nbsp; Horse!&rdquo; said
+he, motioning with his finger tauntingly to the other; &ldquo;what do
+you want with a horse, except to take the bread out of the mouth of
+a poor man - to-morrow is not the battle of Waterloo, so that you don&rsquo;t
+want to back out of danger, by pretending to have hurt yourself by falling
+from the creature&rsquo;s back, my lord of the white feather - come,
+none of your fierce looks - I am not afraid of you.&rdquo;&nbsp; In
+fact, the other had assumed an expression of the deadliest malice, his
+teeth were clenched, his lips quivered, and were quite pale; the rat-like
+eyes sparkled, and he made a half spring, &agrave; la rat, towards his
+adversary, who only laughed.&nbsp; Restraining himself, however, he
+suddenly turned to his understrapper, saying, &ldquo;Symmonds, will
+you see me thus insulted? go and trounce this scoundrel; you can, I
+know.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Symmonds trounce me!&rdquo; said the other,
+going up to the person addressed, and drawing his hand contemptuously
+over his face; &ldquo;why, I beat Symmonds in this very yard in one
+round three years ago; didn&rsquo;t I, Symmonds?&rdquo; said he to the
+understrapper, who held down his head, muttering, in a surly tone, &ldquo;I
+didn&rsquo;t come here to fight; let every one take his own part.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s right, Symmonds,&rdquo; said the other, &ldquo;especially
+every one from whom there is nothing to be got.&nbsp; I would give you
+half-a-crown for all the trouble you have had, provided I were not afraid
+that my Lord Plume there would get it from you as soon as you leave
+the yard together.&nbsp; Come, take yourselves both off; there&rsquo;s
+nothing to be made here.&rdquo;&nbsp; Indeed, his lordship seemed to
+be of the same opinion, for after a further glance at the horse, a contemptuous
+look at me, and a scowl at the jockey, he turned on his heel, muttering
+something which sounded like fellows, and stalked out of the yard, followed
+by Symmonds.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And now, young man,&rdquo; said the jockey, or whatever he was,
+turning to me with an arch leer, &ldquo;I suppose I may consider myself
+as the purchaser of this here animal, for the use and behoof of this
+young gentleman?&rdquo; making a sign with his head to the tall young
+man by his side.&nbsp; &ldquo;By no means,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I am
+utterly unacquainted with either of you, and before parting with the
+horse I must be satisfied as to the respectability of the purchaser.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Oh! as to that matter,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I have plenty of
+vouchers for my respectability about me;&rdquo; and thrusting his hand
+into his bosom below his waistcoat, he drew out a large bundle of notes.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;These are the kind of things,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;which vouch
+best for a man&rsquo;s respectability.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Not always,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;indeed, sometimes these kind of things need vouchers
+for themselves.&rdquo;&nbsp; The man looked at me with a peculiar look.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Do you mean to say that these notes are not sufficient notes?&rdquo;
+said he, &ldquo;because if you do I shall take the liberty of thinking
+you are not over civil, and when I thinks a person is not over and above
+civil I sometimes takes off my coat; and when my coat is off - &rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You sometimes knock people down,&rdquo; I added; &ldquo;well,
+whether you knock me down or not, I beg leave to tell you that I am
+a stranger in this fair, and that I shall part with the horse to nobody
+who has no better guarantee for his respectability than a roll of bank-notes,
+which may be good or not for what I know, who am not a judge of such
+things.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! if you are a stranger here,&rdquo; said
+the man, &ldquo;as I believe you are, never having seen you here before
+except last night, when I think I saw you above stairs by the glimmer
+of a candle - I say, if you are a stranger, you are quite right to be
+cautious; queer things being done in this fair, as nobody knows better
+than myself,&rdquo; he added with a leer; &ldquo;but I suppose if the
+landlord of the house vouches for me and my notes, you will have no
+objection to part with the horse to me?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;None whatever,&rdquo;
+said I, &ldquo;and in the meantime the horse can return to the stable.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Thereupon I delivered the horse to my friend the ostler.<br>
+<br>
+The landlord of the house on being questioned by me as to the character
+and condition of my new acquaintance, informed me that he was a respectable
+horsedealer, and an intimate friend of his, whereupon the purchase was
+soon brought to a satisfactory conclusion.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXVIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+High Dutch.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was evening: and myself and the two acquaintances I had made in the
+fair - namely, the jockey and the tall foreigner - sat in a large upstairs
+room, which looked into a court; we had dined with several people connected
+with the fair at a long <i>table d&rsquo;h&ocirc;te</i>; they had now
+departed, and we sat at a small side-table with wine and a candle before
+us; both my companions had pipes in their mouths - the jockey a common
+pipe, and the foreigner, one, the syphon of which, made of some kind
+of wood, was at least six feet long, and the bowl of which, made of
+a white kind of substance like porcelain, and capable of holding nearly
+an ounce of tobacco, rested on the ground.&nbsp; The jockey frequently
+emptied and replenished his glass; the foreigner sometimes raised his
+to his lips, for no other purpose seemingly than to moisten them, as
+he never drained his glass.&nbsp; As for myself, though I did not smoke,
+I had a glass before me, from which I sometimes took a sip.&nbsp; The
+room, notwithstanding the window was flung open, was in general so filled
+with smoke, chiefly that which was drawn from the huge bowl of the foreigner,
+that my companions and I were frequently concealed from each other&rsquo;s
+eyes.&nbsp; The conversation, which related entirely to the events of
+the fair, was carried on by the jockey and myself, the foreigner, who
+appeared to understand the greater part of what we said, occasionally
+putting in a few observations in broken English.&nbsp; At length the
+jockey, after the other had made some ineffectual attempts to express
+something intelligibly which he wished to say, observed, &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t
+it a pity that so fine a fellow as meinheer, and so clever a fellow
+too, as I believe him to be, is not a better master of our language?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Is the gentleman a German?&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;if so, I can
+interpret for him anything he wishes to say.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The deuce you can,&rdquo; said the jockey, taking his pipe out
+of his mouth, and staring at me through the smoke.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ha! you speak German,&rdquo; vociferated the foreigner in that
+language.&nbsp; &ldquo;By Isten, I am glad of it!&nbsp; I wanted to
+say - &rdquo;&nbsp; And here he said in German what he wished to say,
+and which was of no great importance, and which I translated into English.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, if you don&rsquo;t put me out,&rdquo; said the jockey;
+&ldquo;what language is that - Dutch?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;High Dutch,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;High Dutch, and you speak High Dutch, - why, I had booked you
+for as great an ignoramus as myself, who can&rsquo;t write - no, nor
+distinguish in a book a great A from a bull&rsquo;s foot.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A person may be a very clever man,&rdquo; said I - &ldquo;no,
+not a clever man, for clever signifies clerkly, and a clever man one
+who is able to read and write, and entitled to the benefit of his clergy
+or clerkship; but a person may be a very acute person without being
+able to read or write.&nbsp; I never saw a more acute countenance than
+your own.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;No soft soap,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;for I never uses
+any.&nbsp; However, thank you for your information; I have hitherto
+thought myself a&rsquo;nition clever fellow, but from henceforth shall
+consider myself just the contrary, and only - what&rsquo;s the word?
+- confounded &lsquo;cute.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Just so,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;as you say you can speak
+High Dutch, I should like to hear you and master six foot six fire away
+at each other.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I cannot speak German,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but I can understand
+tolerably well what others say in it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Come no backing out,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;let&rsquo;s
+hear you fire away for the glory of Old England.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you are a German?&rdquo; said I, in German to the foreigner.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That will do,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;keep it up.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A German!&rdquo; said the tall foreigner.&nbsp; &ldquo;No, I
+thank God that I do not belong to the stupid sluggish Germanic race,
+but to a braver, taller, and handsomer people;&rdquo; here taking the
+pipe out of his mouth, he stood up proudly erect, so that his head nearly
+touched the ceiling of the room, then reseating himself, and again putting
+the syphon to his lips, he added, &ldquo;I am a Magyar.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What is that?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+The foreigner looked at me for a moment, somewhat contemptuously, through
+the smoke, then said, in a voice of thunder, &ldquo;A Hungarian!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What a voice the chap has when he pleases!&rdquo; interposed
+the jockey; &ldquo;what is he saying?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Merely that he is a Hungarian,&rdquo; said I; but I added, &ldquo;the
+conversation of this gentleman and myself in a language which you can&rsquo;t
+understand must be very tedious to you, we had better give it up.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Keep on with it,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;I shall go on
+listening very contentedly till I fall asleep, no bad thing to do at
+most times.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXXIX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Hungarian.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then you are a countryman of Tekeli, and of the queen who made
+the celebrated water,&rdquo; said I, speaking to the Hungarian in German,
+which I was able to do tolerably well, owing to my having translated
+the Publisher&rsquo;s philosophy into that language, always provided
+I did not attempt to say much at a time.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Ah! you have heard of Tekeli, and of L&rsquo;eau
+de la Reine d&rsquo;Hongrie.&nbsp; How is that?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I have seen a play acted, founded on the exploits
+of Tekeli, and have read Pigault Le Brun&rsquo;s beautiful romance,
+entitled the &ldquo;Barons of Felsheim,&rdquo; in which he is mentioned.&nbsp;
+As for the water, I have heard a lady, the wife of a master of mine,
+speak of it.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Was she handsome?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Very.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Did she possess the water?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I should say not; for I have heard her express
+a great curiosity about it.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Was she growing old?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Of course not; but why do you put all these questions?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Because the water is said to make people handsome,
+and above all, to restore to the aged the beauty of their youth.&nbsp;
+Well! Tekeli was my countryman, and I have the honour of having some
+of the blood of the Tekelis in my veins, but with respect to the queen,
+pardon me if I tell you that she was not an Hungarian; she was a Pole
+- Ersebet by name, daughter of Wladislaus Locticus King of Poland; she
+was the fourth spouse of Caroly the Second, King of the Magyar country,
+who married her in 1320.&nbsp; She was a great woman and celebrated
+politician, though at present chiefly known by her water.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; How came she to invent it?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; If her own account may be believed, she did
+not invent it.&nbsp; After her death, as I have read in Florentius of
+Buda, there was found a statement of the manner in which she came by
+it, written in her own hand, on a fly-leaf of her breviary, to the following
+effect:- Being afflicted with a grievous disorder at the age of seventy-two,
+she received the medicine which was called her water, from an old hermit
+whom she never saw before or afterwards; it not only cured her, but
+restored to her all her former beauty, so that the King of Poland fell
+in love with her, and made her an offer of marriage, which she refused
+for the glory of God, from whose holy angel she believed she had received
+the water.&nbsp; The receipt for making it and directions for using
+it, were also found on the fly-leaf.&nbsp; The principal component parts
+were burnt wine and rosemary, passed through an alembic; a drachm of
+it was to be taken once a week, &ldquo;etelbenn vagy italbann,&rdquo;
+in the food or the drink, early in the morning, and the cheeks were
+to be moistened with it every day.&nbsp; The effects according to the
+statement, were wonderful - and perhaps they were upon the queen; but
+whether the water has been equally efficacious on other people, is a
+point which I cannot determine.&nbsp; I should wish to see some old
+woman who has been restored to youthful beauty by the use of L&rsquo;eau
+de la Reine d&rsquo;Hongrie.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Perhaps, if you did, the old gentlewoman would
+hardly be so ingenuous as the queen.&nbsp; But who are the Hungarians
+- descendants of Attila and his people?<br>
+<br>
+The Hungarian shook his head, and gave me to understand that he did
+not believe that his nation were the descendants of Attila and his people,
+though he acknowledged that they were probably of the same race.&nbsp;
+Attila and his armies, he said, came and disappeared in a very mysterious
+manner, and that nothing could be said with positiveness about them;
+that the people now known as Magyars first made their appearance in
+Muscovy in the year 884, under the leadership of Almus, called so from
+Alom, which, in the Hungarian language, signifies a dream; his mother,
+before his birth, having dreamt that the child with which she was enceinte
+would be the father of a long succession of kings, which, in fact, was
+the case; that after beating the Russians he entered Hungary, and coming
+to a place called Ungvar, from which many people believed that modern
+Hungary derived its name, he captured it, and held in it a grand festival,
+which lasted four days, at the end of which time he resigned the leadership
+of the Magyars to his son Arpad.&nbsp; This Arpad and his Magyars utterly
+subdued Pannonia - that is, Hungary and Transylvania, wresting the government
+of it from the Sclavonian tribes who inhabited it, and settling down
+amongst them as conquerors!&nbsp; After giving me this information,
+the Hungarian exclaimed with much animation, - &ldquo;A goodly country
+that which they had entered on, consisting of a plain surrounded by
+mountains, some of which intersect it here and there, with noble rapid
+rivers, the grandest of which is the mighty Dunau; a country with tiny
+volcanoes, casting up puffs of smoke and steam, and from which hot springs
+arise, good for the sick; with many fountains, some of which are so
+pleasant to the taste as to be preferred to wine; with a generous soil
+which, warmed by a beautiful sun, is able to produce corn, grapes, and
+even the Indian weed; in fact, one of the finest countries in the world,
+which even a Spaniard would pronounce to be nearly equal to Spain.&nbsp;
+Here they rested - meditating, however, fresh conquests.&nbsp; Oh, the
+Magyars soon showed themselves a mighty people.&nbsp; Besides Hungary
+and Transylvania, they subdued Bulgaria and Bosnia, and the land of
+Tot, now called Sclavonia.&nbsp; The generals of Zoltan, the son of
+Arpad, led troops of horsemen to the banks of the Rhine.&nbsp; One of
+them, at the head of a host, besieged Constantinople.&nbsp; It was then
+that Botond engaged in combat with a Greek of gigantic stature, who
+came out of the city and challenged the two best men in the Magyar army.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am the feeblest of the Magyars,&rsquo; said Botond, &lsquo;but
+I will kill thee;&rsquo; and he performed his word, having previously
+given a proof of the feebleness of his arm by striking his battle-axe
+through the brazen gate, making a hole so big that a child of five years
+old could walk through it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Of what religion were the old Hungarians?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; They had some idea of a Supreme Being, whom
+they called Isten, which word is still used by the Magyars for God;
+but their chief devotion was directed to sorcerers and soothsayers,
+something like the Schamans of the Siberian steppes.&nbsp; They were
+converted to Christianity chiefly through the instrumentality of Istvan
+or Stephen, called after his death St. Istvan, who ascended the throne
+in the year one thousand.&nbsp; He was born in heathenesse, and his
+original name was Vojk: he was the first kiraly, or king of the Magyars.&nbsp;
+Their former leaders had been called fejedelmek, or dukes.&nbsp; The
+Magyar language has properly no term either for king or house.&nbsp;
+Kiraly is a word derived from the Sclaves; haz, or house, from the Germans,
+who first taught them to build houses, their original dwellings having
+been tilted waggons.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Many thanks for your account of the great men of
+your country.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; The great men of my country!&nbsp; I have only
+told you of the -&nbsp; Well, I acknowledge that Almus and Arpad were
+great men, but Hungary has produced many greater; I will not trouble
+you by recapitulating all, but there is one name I cannot forbear mentioning
+- but you have heard of it - even at Horncastle, the name of Hunyadi
+must be familiar.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; It may be so, though I rather doubt it; but, however
+that may be, I confess my ignorance.&nbsp; I have never, until this
+moment, heard the name of Hunyadi.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Not of Hunyadi Janos, not of Hunyadi John -
+for the genius of our language compels us to put a man&rsquo;s Christian
+name after his other; perhaps you have heard of the name of Corvinus?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Yes, I have heard the name of Corvinus.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; By my God, I am glad of it; I thought our hammer
+of destruction, our thunderbolt, whom the Greeks called Achilles, must
+be known to the people of Horncastle.&nbsp; Well, Hunyadi and Corvinus
+are the same.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Corvinus means the man of the crow, or raven.&nbsp;
+I suppose that your John, when a boy, climbed up to a crow or a raven&rsquo;s
+nest, and stole the young; a bold feat, well befitting a young hero.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; By Isten, you are an acute guesser; a robbery
+there was, but it was not Hunyadi who robbed the raven, but the raven
+who robbed Hunyadi.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; How was that?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; In this manner: Hunyadi, according to tradition,
+was the son of King Sigmond, by a peasant&rsquo;s daughter.&nbsp; The
+king saw and fell in love with her, whilst marching against the vaivode
+of Wallachia.&nbsp; He had some difficulty in persuading her to consent
+to his wishes, and she only yielded at last, on the king making her
+a solemn promise that, in the event of her becoming with child by him,
+he would handsomely provide for her and the infant.&nbsp; The king proceeded
+on his expedition; and on his returning in triumph from Wallachia, again
+saw the girl, who informed him that she was enceinte by him; the king
+was delighted with the intelligence, gave the girl money, and at the
+same time a ring, requesting her, if she brought forth a son, to bring
+the ring to Buda with the child, and present it to him.&nbsp; When her
+time was up, the peasant&rsquo;s daughter brought forth a fair son,
+who was baptized by the name of John.&nbsp; After some time the young
+woman communicated the whole affair to her elder brother, whose name
+was Gaspar, and begged him to convey her and the child to the king at
+Buda.&nbsp; The brother consented, and both set out, taking the child
+with them.&nbsp; On their way, the woman, wanting to wash her clothes,
+laid the child down, giving it the king&rsquo;s ring to play with.&nbsp;
+A raven, who saw the glittering ring, came flying, and plucking it out
+of the child&rsquo;s hand, carried it up into a tree; the child suddenly
+began to cry, and the mother, hearing it, left her washing, and running
+to the child, forthwith missed the ring, but hearing the raven croak
+in the tree, she lifted up her eyes, and saw it with the ring in its
+beak.&nbsp; The woman, in great terror, called her brother, and told
+him what had happened, adding that she durst not approach the king if
+the raven took away the ring.&nbsp; Gaspar, seizing his cross-bow and
+quiver, ran to the tree, where the raven was yet with the ring, and
+discharged an arrow at it, but, being in a great hurry, he missed it;
+with his second shot he was more lucky, for he hit the raven in the
+breast, which, together with the ring, fell to the ground.&nbsp; Taking
+up the ring, they went on their way, and shortly arrived at Buda.&nbsp;
+One day, as the king was walking after dinner in his outer hall, the
+woman appeared before him with the child, and, showing him the ring,
+said, &ldquo;Mighty lord! behold this token! and take pity upon me and
+your own son.&rdquo;&nbsp; King Sigmond took the child and kissed it,
+and, after a pause, said to the mother, &ldquo;You have done right in
+bringing me the boy; I will take care of you, and make him a nobleman.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The king was as good as his word, he provided for the mother; caused
+the boy to be instructed in knightly exercises, and made him a present
+of the town of Hunyad, in Transylvania, on which account he was afterwards
+called Hunyadi, and gave him, as an armorial sign, a raven bearing a
+ring in his beak.<br>
+<br>
+Such, oh young man of Horncastle! is the popular account of the birth
+of the great captain of Hungary, as related by Florentius of Buda.&nbsp;
+There are other accounts of his birth, which is, indeed, involved in
+much mystery, and of the reason of his being called Corvinus, but as
+this is the most pleasing, and is, upon the whole, founded on quite
+as good evidence as the others, I have selected it for recitation.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I heartily thank you; but you must tell me something
+more of Hunyadi.&nbsp; You call him your great captain; what did he
+do?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Do! what no other man of his day could have
+done.&nbsp; He broke the power of the Turk when he was coming to overwhelm
+Europe.&nbsp; From the blows inflicted by Hunyadi, the Turk never thoroughly
+recovered; he has been frequently worsted in latter times, but none
+but Hunyadi could have routed the armies of Amurath and Mahomed the
+Second.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; How was it that he had an opportunity of displaying
+his military genius?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; I can hardly tell you, but his valour soon made
+him famous; King Albert made him Ban of Szorenyi.&nbsp; He became eventually
+waivode of Transylvania, and governor of Hungary.&nbsp; His first grand
+action was the defeat of Bashaw Isack; and though himself surprised
+and routed at St. Imre, he speedily regained his prestige by defeating
+the Turks, with enormous slaughter, killing their leader, Mezerbeg;
+and subsequently, at the battle of the Iron Gates, he destroyed ninety
+thousand Turks, sent by Amurath to avenge the late disgrace.&nbsp; It
+was then that the Greeks called him Achilles.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; He was not always successful.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Who could be always successful against the early
+Turk?&nbsp; He was defeated in the battle in which King Vladislaus lost
+his life, but his victories outnumbered his defeats three-fold.&nbsp;
+His grandest victory - perhaps the grandest ever achieved by man - was
+over the terrible Mahomed the Second; who, after the taking of Constantinople
+in 1453, said, &ldquo;One God in Heaven - one king on earth;&rdquo;
+and marched to besiege Belgrade at the head of one hundred, and fifty
+thousand men; swearing by the beard of the prophet, &ldquo;That he would
+sup within it ere two months were elapsed.&rdquo;&nbsp; He brought with
+him dogs, to eat the bodies of the Christians whom he should take or
+slay; so says Florentius; hear what he also says: The Turk sat down
+before the town towards the end of June, 1454, covering the Dunau and
+Szava with ships: and on the 4th of July he began to cannonade Belgrade
+with cannons twenty-five feet long, whose roar could be heard at Szeged,
+a distance of twenty-four leagues, at which place Hunyadi had assembled
+his forces.&nbsp; Hunyadi had been able to raise only fifteen thousand
+of well-armed and disciplined men, though he had with him vast bands
+of people, who called themselves Soldiers of the Cross, but who consisted
+of inexperienced lads from school, peasants, and hermits, armed with
+swords, slings, and clubs.&nbsp; Hunyadi, undismayed by the great disparity
+between his forces and those of the Turk, advanced to relieve Belgrade,
+and encamped at Szalankemen with his army.&nbsp; There he saw at once,
+that his first step must be to attack the flotilla; he therefore privately
+informed Szilagy, his wife&rsquo;s brother, who at that time defended
+Belgrade, that it was his intention to attack the ships of the Turks
+on the 14th day of July in front, and requested his co-operation in
+the rear.&nbsp; On the 14th came on the commencement of the great battle
+of Belgrade, between Hunyadi and the Turk.&nbsp; Many days it lasted.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Describe it.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; I cannot.&nbsp; One has described it well -
+Florentius of Buda.&nbsp; I can only repeat a few of his words: - &ldquo;On
+the appointed day, Hunyadi, with two hundred vessels, attacked the Turkish
+flotilla in front, whilst Szilagy, with forty vessels, filled with the
+men of Belgrade, assailed it in the rear; striving for the same object,
+they sunk many of the Turkish vessels, captured seventy-four, burnt
+many, and utterly annihilated the whole fleet.&nbsp; After this victory,
+Hunyadi, with his army, entered Belgrade, to the great joy of the Magyars.&nbsp;
+But though the force of Mahomed upon the water was destroyed, that upon
+the land remained entire; and with this, during six days and nights,
+he attacked the city without intermission, destroying its walls in many
+parts.&nbsp; His last and most desperate assault was made on the 21st
+day of July.&nbsp; Twice did the Turks gain possession of the outer
+town, and twice was it retaken with indescribable slaughter.&nbsp; The
+next day the combat raged without ceasing till mid-day, when the Turks
+were again beaten out of the town, and pursued by the Magyars to their
+camp.&nbsp; There the combat was renewed, both sides displaying the
+greatest obstinacy, until Mahomed received a great wound over his left
+eye.&nbsp; The Turks then, turning their faces, fled, leaving behind
+them three hundred cannon in the hands of the Christians, and more than
+twenty-four thousand slain on the field of battle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; After that battle, I suppose Hunyadi enjoyed his
+triumphs in peace?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; In the deepest, for he shortly died.&nbsp; His
+great soul quitted his body, which was exhausted by almost superhuman
+exertions, on the 11th of August, 1456.&nbsp; Shortly before he died,
+according to Florentius, a comet appeared, sent, as it would seem, to
+announce his coming end.&nbsp; The whole Christian world mourned his
+loss.&nbsp; The Pope ordered the cardinals to perform a funeral ceremony
+at Rome in his honour.&nbsp; His great enemy himself grieved for him,
+and pronounced his finest eulogium.&nbsp; When Mahomed the Second heard
+of his death, he struck his head for some time against the ground without
+speaking.&nbsp; Suddenly he broke silence with these words, &ldquo;Notwithstanding
+he was my enemy, yet do I bewail his loss; since the sun has shone in
+heaven, no Prince had ever yet such a man.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; What was the name of his Prince?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Laszlo the Fifth; who, though under infinite
+obligations to Hunyadi, was anything but grateful to him; for he once
+consented to a plan which was laid to assassinate him, contrived by
+his mortal enemy Ulrik, Count of Cilejia; and after Hunyadi&rsquo;s
+death, caused his eldest son, Hunyadi Laszlo, to be executed on a false
+accusation, and imprisoned his younger son, Matyas, who, on the death
+of Laszlo, was elected by the Magyars to be their king, on the 24th
+of January, 1458.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Was this Matyas a good king?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Was Matyas Corvinus a good king?&nbsp; O young
+man of Horncastle! he was the best and greatest that ever Hungary possessed,
+and, after his father, the most renowned warrior, - some of our best
+laws were framed by him.&nbsp; It was he who organized the Hussar force,
+and it was he who took Vienna.&nbsp; Why does your Government always
+send fools to represent it at Vienna?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I really cannot say; but with respect to the Hussar
+force, is it of Hungarian origin?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Its name shows its origin.&nbsp; Huz, in Hungarian,
+is twenty and the Hussar force is so called because it is formed of
+twentieths.&nbsp; A law was issued by which it was ordered that every
+Hungarian nobleman, out of every twenty dependents, should produce a
+well-equipped horseman, and with him proceed to the field of battle.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Why did Matyas capture Venna?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Because the Emperor Frederick took part against
+him with the King of Poland, who claimed the kingdom of Hungary for
+his son, and had also assisted the Turk.&nbsp; He captured it in the
+year 1487, but did not survive his triumph long, expiring there in the
+year 1490.&nbsp; He was so veracious a man, that it was said of him,
+after his death, &ldquo;Truth died with Matyas.&rdquo;&nbsp; It might
+be added that the glory of Hungary departed with him.&nbsp; I wish to
+say nothing more connected with Hungarian history.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Another word.&nbsp; Did Matyas leave a son?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; A natural son, Hunyadi John, called so after
+the great man.&nbsp; He would have been universally acknowledged as
+King of Hungary but for the illegitimacy of his birth.&nbsp; As it was,
+Ulaszlo, the son of the King of Poland, afterwards called Ulaszlo the
+Second, who claimed Hungary as being descended from Albert, was nominated
+king by a great majority of the Magyar electors.&nbsp; Hunyadi John
+for some time disputed the throne with him; there was some bloodshed,
+but Hunyadi John eventually submitted, and became the faithful captain
+of Ulaszlo, notwithstanding that the Turk offered to assist him with
+an army of two hundred thousand men.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Go on.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; To what?&nbsp; Tch&eacute; Drak, to the Mohacs
+Veszedelem.&nbsp; Ulaszlo left a son, Lajos the Second, born without
+skin, as it is said, certainly without a head.&nbsp; He, contrary to
+the advice of all his wise counsellors, - and amongst them was Batory
+Stephen, who became eventually King of Poland - engaged, with twenty-five
+thousand men, at Mohacs, Soliman the Turk, who had an army of two hundred
+thousand.&nbsp; Drak! the Magyars were annihilated, King Lajos disappeared
+with his heavy horse and armour in a bog.&nbsp; We call that battle,
+which was fought on the 29th of August, 1526, the destruction of Mohacs,
+but it was the destruction of Hungary.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; You have twice used the word drak, what is the
+meaning of it?&nbsp; Is it Hungarian?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; No! it belongs to the mad Wallacks.&nbsp; They
+are a nation of madmen on the other side of Transylvania.&nbsp; Their
+country was formerly a fief of Hungary, like Moldavia, which is inhabited
+by the same race, who speak the same language and are equally mad.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; What language do they speak?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; A strange mixture of Latin and Sclavonian -
+they themselves being a mixed race of Romans and Sclavonians.&nbsp;
+Trajan sent certain legions to form military colonies in Dacia; and
+the present Wallacks and Moldavians are, to a certain extent, the descendants
+of the Roman soldiers, who married the women of the country.&nbsp; I
+say to a certain extent, for the Sclavonian element both in blood and
+language seems to prevail.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; And what is drak?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Dragon; which the Wallacks use for &ldquo;devil.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The term is curious, as it shows that the old Romans looked upon the
+dragon as an infernal being.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; You have been in Wallachia?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; I have, and glad I was to get out of it.&nbsp;
+I hate the mad Wallacks.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Why do you call them mad?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; They are always drinking or talking.&nbsp; I
+never saw a Wallachian eating or silent.&nbsp; They talk like madmen,
+and drink like madmen.&nbsp; In drinking they use small phials, the
+contents of which they pour down their throats.&nbsp; When I first went
+amongst them I thought the whole nation was under a course of physic,
+but the terrible jabber of their tongues soon undeceived me.&nbsp; Drak
+was the first word I heard on entering Dacia, and the last when I left
+it.&nbsp; The Moldaves, if possible, drink more, and talk more than
+the Wallachians.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; It is singular enough that the only Moldavian I
+have known could not speak.&nbsp; I suppose he was born dumb.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; A Moldavian born dumb!&nbsp; Excuse me, the
+thing is impossible, - all Moldavians are born talking!&nbsp; I have
+known a Moldavian who could not speak, but he was not born dumb.&nbsp;
+His master, an Armenian, snipped off part of his tongue at Adrianople.&nbsp;
+He drove him mad with his jabber.&nbsp; He is now in London, where his
+master has a house.&nbsp; I have letters of credit on the house: the
+clerk paid me money in London, the master was absent; the money which
+you received for the horse belonged to that house.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Another word with respect to Hungarian history.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Drak!&nbsp; I wish to say nothing more about
+Hungarian history.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; The Turk, I suppose, after Mohacs, got possession
+of Hungary?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Not exactly.&nbsp; The Turk, upon the whole,
+showed great moderation; not so the Austrian.&nbsp; Ferdinand the First
+claimed the crown of Hungary as being the cousin of Maria, widow of
+Lajos; he found too many disposed to support him.&nbsp; His claim, however,
+was resisted by Zapolya John, a Hungarian magnate, who caused himself
+to be elected king.&nbsp; Hungary was for a long time devastated by
+wars between the partisans of Zapolya and Ferdinand.&nbsp; At last Zapolya
+called in the Turk.&nbsp; Soliman behaved generously to him, and after
+his death befriended his young son, and Isabella his queen; eventually
+the Turks became masters of Transylvania and the greater part of Hungary.&nbsp;
+They were not bad masters, and had many friends in Hungary, especially
+amongst those of the reformed faith, to which I have myself the honour
+of belonging; those of the reformed faith found the Mufti more tolerant
+than the Pope.&nbsp; Many Hungarians went with the Turks to the siege
+of Vienna, whilst Tekeli and his horsemen guarded Hungary for them.&nbsp;
+A gallant enterprise that siege of Vienna, the last great effort of
+the Turk; it failed, and he speedily lost Hungary, but he did not sneak
+from Hungary like a frightened hound.&nbsp; His defence of Buda will
+not be soon forgotten, where Apty Basha, the governor, died fighting
+like a lion in the breach.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s many a Hungarian would
+prefer Stamboul to Vienna.&nbsp; Why does your Government always send
+fools to represent it at Vienna?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I have already told you that I cannot say.&nbsp;
+What became of Tekeli?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; When Hungary was lost he retired with the Turks
+into Turkey.&nbsp; Count Renoncourt, in his Memoirs, mentions having
+seen him at Adrianople.&nbsp; The Sultan, in consideration of the services
+which he had rendered to the Moslem in Hungary, made over the revenues
+of certain towns and districts for his subsistence.&nbsp; The count
+says that he always went armed to the teeth, and was always attended
+by a young female dressed in male attire, who had followed him in his
+wars, and had more than once saved his life.&nbsp; His end is wrapped
+in mystery, I - whose greatest boast, next to being a Hungarian, is
+to be of his blood - know nothing of his end.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Allow me to ask who you are?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Egy szegeny Magyar Nemes ember, a poor Hungarian
+nobleman, son of one yet poorer.&nbsp; I was born in Transylvania, not
+far to the west of good Coloscvar.&nbsp; I served some time in the Austrian
+army as a noble Hussar, but am now equerry to a great nobleman, to whom
+I am distantly related.&nbsp; In his service I have travelled far and
+wide, buying horses.&nbsp; I have been in Russia and in Turkey, and
+am now at Horncastle, where I have had the satisfaction to meet with
+you, and to buy your horse, which is, in truth, a noble brute.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; For a soldier and equerry you seem to know a great
+deal of the history of your country.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; All I know is derived from Florentius of Buda,
+whom we call Budai Ferentz.&nbsp; He was professor of Greek and Latin
+at the Reformed College of Debreczen, where I was educated; he wrote
+a work entitled &ldquo;Magyar Polgari Lexicon,&rdquo; Lives of Great
+Hungarian Citizens.&nbsp; He was dead before I was born, but I found
+his book, when I was a child, in the solitary home of my father, which
+stood on the confines of a puszta, or wilderness, and that book I used
+to devour in winter nights when the winds were whistling around the
+house.&nbsp; Oh I how my blood used to glow at the descriptions of Magyar
+valour, and likewise of Turkish; for Florentius has always done justice
+to the Turk.&nbsp; Many a passage similar to this have I got by heart;
+it is connected with a battle on the plain of Rigo, which Hunyadi lost:-
+&ldquo;The next day, which was Friday, as the two armies were drawn
+up in battle array, a Magyar hero riding forth, galloped up and down,
+challenging the Turks to single combat.&nbsp; Then came out to meet
+him the son of a renowned bashaw of Asia; rushing upon each other, both
+broke their lances, but the Magyar hero and his horse rolled over upon
+the ground, for the Turks had always the best horses.&rdquo;&nbsp; O
+young man of Horncastle! if ever you learn Hungarian - and learn it
+assuredly you will after what I have told you - read the book of Florentius
+of Buda, even if you go to Hungary to get it, for you will scarcely
+find it elsewhere, and even there with difficulty, for the book has
+been long out of print.&nbsp; It describes the actions of the great
+men of Hungary down to the middle of the sixteenth century; and besides
+being written in the purest Hungarian, has the merit of having for its
+author a professor of the Reformed College of Debreczen.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; I will go to Hungary rather than not read it.&nbsp;
+I am glad that the Turk beat the Magyar.&nbsp; When I used to read the
+ballads of Spain I always sided with the Moor against the Christian.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; It was a drawn fight after all, for the terrible
+horse of the Turk presently flung his own master, whereupon the two
+champions returned to their respective armies; but in the grand conflict
+which ensued, the Turks beat the Magyars, pursuing them till night,
+and striking them on the necks with their scymetars.&nbsp; The Turk
+is a noble fellow; I should wish to be a Turk, were I not a Magyar.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; The Turk always keeps his word, I am told.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Which the Christian very seldom does, and even
+the Hungarian does not always.&nbsp; In 1444 Ulaszlo made, at Szeged,
+peace with Amurath for ten years, which he swore with an oath to keep,
+but at the instigation of the Pope Julian he broke it, and induced his
+great captain, Hunyadi John, to share in the perjury.&nbsp; The consequence
+was the battle of Varna, of the 10th of November, in which Hunyadi was
+routed, and Ulaszlo slain.&nbsp; Did you ever hear his epitaph? it is
+both solemn and edifying:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Romulidae Cannas ego Varnam clade notavi;<br>
+Discite rnortales non temerare fidem:<br>
+Me nisi Pontifices jussissent rumpere foedus<br>
+Non ferret Scythicum Pannonis ora jugum.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Halloo!&rdquo; said the jockey, starting up from a doze in which
+he had been indulging for the last hour, his head leaning upon his breast,
+&ldquo;what is that?&nbsp; That&rsquo;s not high Dutch; I bargained
+for high Dutch, and I left you speaking high Dutch, as it sounded very
+much like the language of horses, as I have been told high Dutch does;
+but as for what you are speaking now, whatever you may call it, it sounds
+more like the language of another kind of animal.&nbsp; I suppose you
+want to insult me, because I was once a dicky-boy.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nothing of the kind,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;the gentleman was
+making a quotation in Latin.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Latin, was it?&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;that alters the
+case.&nbsp; Latin is genteel, and I have sent my eldest boy to an academy
+to learn it.&nbsp; Come, let us hear you fire away in Latin,&rdquo;
+he continued, proceeding to re-light his pipe, which, before going to
+sleep, he had laid on the table.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;If you wish to follow the discourse in Latin,&rdquo; said the
+Hungarian, in very bad English, &ldquo;I can oblige you; I learned to
+speak very good Latin in the college of Debreczen.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s more,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;than I have done in
+the colleges where I have been; in any little conversation which we
+may yet have, I wish you would use German.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the jockey, taking a whiff, &ldquo;make your
+conversation as short as possible, whether in Latin or Dutch, for, to
+tell you the truth, I am rather tired of merely playing listener.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You were saying you had been in Russia,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I
+believe the Russians are part of the Sclavonian race.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Yes, part of the great Sclavonian family; one
+of the most numerous races in the world.&nbsp; The Russians themselves
+are very numerous; would that the Magyars could boast of the fifth part
+of their number!<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; What is the number of the Magyars?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Barely four millions.&nbsp; We came a tribe
+of Tartars into Europe, and settled down amongst Sclavonians, whom we
+conquered, but who never coalesced with us.&nbsp; The Austrian at present
+plays in Pannonia the Sclavonian against us, and us against the Sclavonian;
+but the downfall of the Austrian is at hand; they, like us, are not
+a numerous people.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Who will bring about his downfall?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; The Russians.&nbsp; The Rysckie Tsar will lead
+his people forth, all the Sclavonians will join him, he will conquer
+all before him.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Are the Russians good soldiers?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; They are stubborn and unflinching to an astonishing
+degree, and their fidelity to their Tsar is quite admirable.&nbsp; See
+how the Russians behaved at Plescova, in Livonia, in the old time, against
+our great Batory Stephen; they defended the place till it was a heap
+of rubbish, and mark how they behaved after they had been made prisoners.&nbsp;
+Stephen offered them two alternatives:- to enter into his service, in
+which they would have good pay, clothing, and fair treatment; or to
+be allowed to return to Russia.&nbsp; Without the slightest hesitation
+they, to a man, chose the latter, though well aware that their beloved
+Tsar, the cruel Ivan Basilowits, would put them all to death, amidst
+tortures the most horrible, for not doing what was impossible - preserving
+the town.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; You speak Russian?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; A little.&nbsp; I was born in the vicinity of
+a Sclavonian tribe; the servants of our house were Sclavonians, and
+I early acquired something of their language, which differs not much
+from that of Russia; when in that country I quickly understood what
+was said.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Have the Russians any literature?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; Doubtless; but I am not acquainted with it,
+as I do not read their language; but I know something of their popular
+tales, to which I used to listen in their izbushkas; a principal personage
+in these is a creation quite original - called Baba Yaga.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Who is the Baba Yaga?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Hungarian</i>.&nbsp; A female phantom, who is described as hurrying
+along the puszta, or steppe, in a mortar, pounding with a pestle at
+a tremendous rate, and leaving a long trace on the ground behind her
+with her tongue, which is three yards long, and with which she seizes
+any men and horses coming in her way, swallowing them down into her
+capacious belly.&nbsp; She has several daughters, very handsome, and
+with plenty of money; happy the young Mujik who catches and marries
+one of them, for they make excellent wives.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Many thanks,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for the information you have
+afforded me: this is rather poor wine,&rdquo; I observed, as I poured
+out a glass - &ldquo;I suppose you have better wine in Hungary?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, we have better wine in Hungary.&nbsp; First of all there
+is Tokay, the most celebrated in the world, though I confess I prefer
+the wine of Eger - Tokay is too sweet.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Have you ever been at Tokay?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have,&rdquo; said the Hungarian.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What kind of place is Tokay?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A small town situated on the Tyzza, a rapid river descending
+from the north; the Tokay Mountain is just behind the town, which stands
+on the right bank.&nbsp; The top of the mountain is called Kopacs Teto,
+or the bald tip; the hill is so steep that during thunder-storms pieces
+frequently fall down upon the roofs of the houses.&nbsp; It was planted
+with vines by King Lajos, who ascended the throne in 1342.&nbsp; The
+best wine called Tokay is, however, not made at Tokay, but at Kassau,
+two leagues farther into the Carpathians, of which Tokay is a spur.&nbsp;
+If you wish to drink the best Tokay, you must go to Vienna, to which
+place all the prime is sent.&nbsp; For the third time I ask you, O young
+man of Horncastle! why does your Government always send fools to represent
+it at Vienna?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And for the third time I tell you, O son of Almus! that I cannot
+say; perhaps, however, to drink the sweet Tokay wine; fools, you know,
+always like sweet things.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Good,&rdquo; said the Hungarian; &ldquo;it must be so, and when
+I return to Hungary, I will state to my countrymen your explanation
+of a circumstance which has frequently caused them great perplexity.&nbsp;
+Oh! the English are a clever people, and have a deep meaning in all
+they do.&nbsp; What a vision of deep policy opens itself to my view!
+they do not send their fool to Vienna in order to gape at processions,
+and to bow and scrape at a base Papist court, but to drink at the great
+dinners the celebrated Tokay of Hungary, which the Hungarians, though
+they do not drink it, are very proud of, and by doing so to intimate
+the sympathy which the English entertain for their fellow religionists
+of Hungary.&nbsp; Oh! the English are a deep people.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XL<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Horncastle Welcome - Tzernebock and Bielebock.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The pipe of the Hungarian had, for some time past, exhibited considerable
+symptoms of exhaustion, little or no ruttling having been heard in the
+tube, and scarcely a particle of smoke, drawn through the syphon, having
+been emitted from the lips of the possessor.&nbsp; He now rose from
+his seat, and going to a corner of the room, placed his pipe against
+the wall, then striding up and down the room, he cracked his fingers
+several times, exclaiming, in a half-musing manner, &ldquo;Oh, the deep
+nation, which, in order to display its sympathy for Hungary, sends its
+fool to Vienna, to drink the sweet wine of Tokay!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The jockey, having looked for some time at the tall figure with evident
+approbation, winked at me with that brilliant eye of his on which there
+was no speck, saying, &ldquo;&rsquo;Did you ever see a taller fellow?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Never,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Or a finer?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That&rsquo;s another question,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;which I
+am not so willing to answer; however, as I am fond of truth, and scorn
+to flatter, I will take the liberty of saying that I have seen a finer.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A finer! where?&rdquo; said the jockey; whilst the Hungarian,
+who appeared to understand what we said, stood still, and looked full
+at me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Amongst a strange set of people,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;whom,
+if I were to name, you would, I dare say, only laugh at me.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Who be they?&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;Come, don&rsquo;t
+be ashamed; I have occasionally kept queerish company myself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The people whom we call gypsies,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;whom the
+Germans call Zigeuner, and who call themselves Romany chals.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Zigeuner!&rdquo; said the Hungarian; &ldquo;by Isten!&nbsp; I
+do know those people.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Romany chals!&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;whew!&nbsp; I begin
+to smell a rat.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What do you mean by smelling a rat?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll bet a crown,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;that you
+be the young chap what certain folks call &lsquo;the Romany Rye.&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;how came you to know that name?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Be not you he?&rdquo; said the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, I certainly have been called by that name.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I could have sworn it,&rdquo; said the jockey; then rising from
+his chair, he laid his pipe on the table, took a large hand-bell which
+stood on the side-board, and going to the door, opened it, and commenced
+ringing in a most tremendous manner on the staircase.&nbsp; The noise
+presently brought up a waiter, to whom the jockey vociferated, &ldquo;Go
+to your master, and tell him to send immediately three bottles of champagne,
+of the pink kind, mind you, which is twelve guineas a dozen;&rdquo;
+the waiter hurried away, and the jockey resumed his seat and his pipe.&nbsp;
+I sat in silent astonishment until the waiter returned with a basket
+containing the wine, which, with three long glasses, he placed on the
+table.&nbsp; The jockey then got up, and going to a large bow-window
+at the end of the room, which looked into a court-yard, peeped out;
+then saying, &ldquo;the coast is clear,&rdquo; he shut down the principal
+sash which was open for the sake of the air, and taking up a bottle
+of champagne, he placed another in the hands of the Hungarian, to whom
+he said something in private.&nbsp; The latter, who seemed to understand
+him, answered by a nod.&nbsp; The two then going to the end of the table
+fronting the window, and about eight paces from it, stood before it,
+holding the bottles by their necks; suddenly the jockey lifted up his
+arm.&nbsp; &ldquo;Surely,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;you are not mad enough
+to fling that bottle through the window?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s
+to the Romany Rye; here&rsquo;s to the sweet master,&rdquo; said the
+jockey, dashing the bottle through the pane in so neat a manner that
+scarcely a particle of glass fell into the room.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Eljen edes csigany ur - eljen gul eray!&rdquo; said the Hungarian,
+swinging round his bottle, and discharging it at the window; but, either
+not possessing the jockey&rsquo;s accuracy of aim, or reckless of the
+consequences, he flung his bottle so, that it struck against part of
+the wooden setting of the panes, breaking along with the wood and itself
+three or four panes to pieces.&nbsp; The crash was horrid, and wine
+and particles of glass flew back into the room, to the no small danger
+of its inmates.&nbsp; &ldquo;What do you think of that?&rdquo; said
+the jockey; &ldquo;were you ever so honoured before?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Honoured!&rdquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;God preserve me in future from such honour;&rdquo;
+and I put my finger to my cheek, which was slightly hurt by a particle
+of the glass.&nbsp; &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the way we of the cofrady honour
+great men at Horncastle,&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;What,
+you are hurt! never mind; all the better; your scratch shows that you
+are the body the compliment was paid to.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And what
+are you going to do with the other bottle?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Do
+with it!&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;why, drink it, cosily and comfortably,
+whilst holding a little quiet talk.&nbsp; The Romany Rye at Horncastle,
+what an idea!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what will the master of the house say to all this damage
+which you have caused him!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What will your master say, William?&rdquo; said the jockey to
+the waiter, who had witnessed the singular scene just described without
+exhibiting the slightest mark of surprise.&nbsp; William smiled, and
+slightly shrugging his shoulders, replied, &ldquo;Very little, I dare
+say, sir; this a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t the first time your honour has done
+a thing of this kind.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Nor will it be the first time
+that I shall have paid for it,&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;well,
+I shall never have paid for a certain item in the bill with more pleasure
+than I shall pay for it now.&nbsp; Come, William, draw the cork, and
+let us taste the pink champagne.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The waiter drew the cork, and filled the glasses with a pinky liquor,
+which bubbled, hissed, and foamed.&nbsp; &ldquo;How do you like it?&rdquo;
+said the jockey, after I had imitated the example of my companions,
+by despatching my portion at a draught.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is wonderful wine,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I have never tasted
+champagne before, though I have frequently heard it praised; it more
+than answers my expectations; but, I confess, I should not wish to be
+obliged to drink it every day.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nor I,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;for every-day drinking
+give me a glass of old port, or - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of hard old ale,&rdquo; I interposed, &ldquo;which, according
+to my mind, is better than all the wine in the world.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well said, Romany Rye,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;just my
+own opinion; now, William, make yourself scarce.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The waiter withdrew, and I said to the jockey, &ldquo; How did you become
+acquainted with the Romany chals?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I first became acquainted with them,&rdquo; said the jockey,
+&ldquo;when I lived with old Fulcher the basketmaker, who took me up
+when I was adrift upon the world; I do not mean the present Fulcher,
+who is likewise called old Fulcher, but his father, who has been dead
+this many a year; while living with him in the caravan, I frequently
+met them in the green lanes, and of latter years I have had occasional
+dealings with them in the horse line.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And the gypsies have mentioned me to you?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Frequently,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;and not only those
+of these parts; why, there&rsquo;s scarcely a part of England in which
+I have not heard the name of the Romany Rye mentioned by these people.&nbsp;
+The power you have over them is wonderful; that is, I should have thought
+it wonderful, had they not more than once told me the cause.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what is the cause?&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for I am sure I
+do not know.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The cause is this,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;they never
+heard a bad word proceed from your mouth, and never knew you do a bad
+thing.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They are a singular people,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what a singular language they have got,&rdquo; said the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Do you know it?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Only a few words,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;they were always
+chary in teaching me any.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They were vary sherry to me too,&rdquo; said the Hungarian, speaking
+in broken English; &ldquo;I only could learn from them half-a-dozen
+words, for example, gul eray, which, in the czigany of my country, means
+sweet gentleman; or edes ur in my own Magyar.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Gudlo Rye, in the Romany of mine, means a sugar&rsquo;d gentleman,&rdquo;
+said I; &ldquo;then there are gypsies in your country?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Plenty,&rdquo; said the Hungarian, speaking German, &ldquo;and
+in Russia and Turkey too; and wherever they are found, they are alike
+in their ways and language.&nbsp; Oh, they are a strange race, and how
+little known!&nbsp; I know little of them, but enough to say, that one
+horse-load of nonsense has been written about them; there is one Valter
+Scott - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Mind what you say about him,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;he is our
+grand authority in matters of philology and history.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A pretty philologist,&rdquo; said the Hungarian, &ldquo;who makes
+the gypsies speak Roth-Welsch, the dialect of thieves; a pretty historian,
+who couples together Thor and Tzernebock.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Where does he do that?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In his conceited romance of &lsquo;Ivanhoe,&rsquo; he couples
+Thor and Tzernebock together, and calls them gods of the heathen Saxons.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;Thur or Thor was certainly a god
+of the heathen Saxons.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;True,&rdquo; said the Hungarian; &ldquo;but why couple him with
+Tzernebock?&nbsp; Tzernebock was a word which your Valter had picked
+up somewhere without knowing the meaning.&nbsp; Tzernebock was no god
+of the Saxons, but one of the gods of the Sclaves, on the southern side
+of the Baltic.&nbsp; The Sclaves had two grand gods to whom they sacrificed,
+Tzernebock and Bielebock; that is, the black and white gods, who represented
+the powers of dark and light.&nbsp; They were overturned by Waldemar,
+the Dane, the great enemy of the Sclaves; the account of whose wars
+you will find in one fine old book, written by Saxo Gramaticus, which
+I read in the library of the college of Debreczen.&nbsp; The Sclaves,
+at one time, were masters of all the southern shore of the Baltic, where
+their descendants are still to be found, though they have lost their
+language, and call themselves Germans; but the word Zernevitz near Dantzic,
+still attests that the Sclavic language was once common in those parts.&nbsp;
+Zernevitz means the thing of blackness, as Tzernebock means the god
+of blackness.&nbsp; Prussia itself merely means, in Sclavish, Lower
+Russia.&nbsp; There is scarcely a race or language in the world more
+extended than the Sclavic.&nbsp; On the other side of the Dunau you
+will find the Sclaves and their language.&nbsp; Czernavoda is Sclavic,
+and means black water; in Turkish, kara su; even as Tzernebock means
+black god; and Belgrade, or Belograd, means the white town; even as
+Bielebock, or Bielebog, means the white god.&nbsp; Oh! he is one great
+ignorant, that Valter.&nbsp; He is going, they say, to write one history
+about Napoleon.&nbsp; I do hope that in his history he will couple his
+Thor and Tzernebock together.&nbsp; By my God! it would be good diversion
+that.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Walter Scott appears to be no particular favourite of yours,&rdquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He is not,&rdquo; said the Hungarian; &ldquo;I hate him for his
+slavish principles.&nbsp; He wishes to see absolute power restored in
+this country, and Popery also - and I hate him because - what do you
+think?&nbsp; In one of his novels, published a few months ago, he has
+the insolence to insult Hungary in the presence of one of her sons.&nbsp;
+He makes his great braggart, Coeur de Lion, fling a Magyar over his
+head.&nbsp; Ha! it was well for Richard that he never felt the gripe
+of a Hungarian.&nbsp; I wish the braggart could have felt the gripe
+of me, who am &lsquo;a&rsquo; magyarok k&ouml;zt legkissebb,&rsquo;
+the least among the Magyars.&nbsp; I do hate that Scott, and all his
+vile gang of Lowlanders and Highlanders.&nbsp; The black corps, the
+fekete regiment of Matyjas Hunyadi, was worth all the Scots, high or
+low, that ever pretended to be soldiers; and would have sent them all
+headlong into the Black Sea, had they dared to confront it on its shores;
+but why be angry with an ignorant, who couples together Thor and Tzernebock?&nbsp;
+Ha! Ha!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You have read his novels?&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes, I read them now and then.&nbsp; I do not speak much English,
+but I can read it well, and I have read some of his romances, and mean
+to read his &lsquo;Napoleon,&rsquo; in the hope of finding Thor and
+Tzernebock coupled together in it, as in his high-flying &lsquo;Ivanhoe.&rsquo;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;no more Dutch, whether high
+or low.&nbsp; I am tired of it; unless we can have some English, I am
+off to bed.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I should be very glad to hear some English,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;especially
+from your mouth.&nbsp; Several things which you have mentioned, have
+awakened my curiosity.&nbsp; Suppose you give us your history?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My history?&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;A rum idea!
+however, lest conversation should lag, I&rsquo;ll give it you.&nbsp;
+First of all, however, a glass of champagne to each.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+After we had each taken a glass of champagne, the jockey commenced his
+history.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Jockey&rsquo;s Tale - Thieves&rsquo; Latin - Liberties with Coin
+- The Smasher in Prison - Old Fulcher - Every One has His Gift - Fashion
+of the English.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My grandfather was a shorter, and my father was a smasher; the
+one was scragg&rsquo;d, and the other lagg&rsquo;d.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I here interrupted the jockey by observing that his discourse was, for
+the greater part, unintelligible to me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not understand much English,&rdquo; said the Hungarian,
+who, having replenished and resumed his mighty pipe, was now smoking
+away; &ldquo;but, by Isten, I believe it is the gibberish which that
+great ignorant Valther Scott puts into the mouths of the folks he calls
+gypsies.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Something like it, I confess,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;though this
+sounds more genuine than his dialect, which he picked up out of the
+canting vocabulary at the end of the &lsquo;English Rogue,&rsquo; a
+book which, however despised, was written by a remarkable genius.&nbsp;
+What do you call the speech you were using?&rdquo; said I, addressing
+myself to the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Latin,&rdquo; said the jockey, very coolly, &ldquo;that is, that
+dialect of it which is used by the light-fingered gentry.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;He is right,&rdquo; said the Hungarian; &ldquo;it is what the
+Germans call Roth-Welsch: they call it so because there are a great
+many Latin words in it, introduced by the priests, who, at the time
+of the Reformation, being too lazy to work and too stupid to preach,
+joined the bands of thieves and robbers who prowled about the country.&nbsp;
+Italy, as you are aware, is called by the Germans Welschland, or the
+land of the Welschers; and I may add that Wallachia derives its name
+from a colony of Welschers which Trajan sent there.&nbsp; Welsch and
+Wallack being one and the same word, and tantamount to Latin.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I dare say you are right,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;but why was Italy
+termed Welschland?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; said the Hungarian.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then I think I can tell you,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;it was called
+so because the original inhabitants were a Cimbric tribe, who were called
+Gwyltiad, that is, a race of wild people, living in coverts, who were
+of the same blood, and spoke the same language as the present inhabitants
+of Wales.&nbsp; Welsh seems merely a modification of Gwyltiad.&nbsp;
+Pray continue your history,&rdquo; said I to the jockey, &ldquo;only
+please to do so in a language which we can understand, and first of
+all interpret the sentence with which you began it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I told you that my grandfather was a shorter,&rdquo; said the
+jockey, &ldquo;by which is meant a gentleman who shortens or reduces
+the current coin of these realms, for which practice he was scragged,
+that is, hung by the scrag of the neck.&nbsp; And when I said that my
+father was a smasher, I meant one who passes forged notes, thereby doing
+his best to smash the Bank of England; by being lagged, I meant he was
+laid fast, that is, had a chain put round his leg and then transported.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Your explanations are quite satisfactory,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;the
+three first words are metaphorical, and the fourth, lagged, is the old
+genuine Norse term, lagda, which signifies laid, whether in durance,
+or in bed, has nothing to do with the matter.&nbsp; What you have told
+me confirms me in an opinion which I have long entertained, that thieves&rsquo;
+Latin is a strange mysterious speech, formed of metaphorical terms,
+and words derived from the various ancient languages.&nbsp; Pray tell
+me, now, how the gentleman, your grandfather, contrived to shorten the
+coin of these realms?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You shall hear,&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;but I have one
+thing to beg of you, which is, that when I have once begun my history
+you will not interrupt me with questions, I don&rsquo;t like them, they
+stops one, and puts one out of one&rsquo;s tale, and are not wanted;
+for anything which I think can&rsquo;t be understood, I should myself
+explain, without being asked.&nbsp; My grandfather reduced or shortened
+the coin of this country by three processes.&nbsp; By aquafortis, by
+clipping, and by filing.&nbsp; Filing and clipping he employed in reducing
+all sorts of coin, whether gold or silver; but aquafortis he used merely
+in reducing gold coin, whether guineas, jacobuses, or Portugal pieces,
+otherwise called moidores, which were at one time as current as guineas.&nbsp;
+By laying a guinea in aquafortis for twelve hours, he could filch from
+it to the value of ninepence, and by letting it remain there for twenty-four
+to the value of eighteenpence, the aquafortis eating the gold away,
+and leaving it like a sediment in the vessel.&nbsp; He was generally
+satisfied with taking the value of ninepence from a guinea, of eighteenpence
+from a jacobus or moidore, or half-a-crown from a broad Spanish piece,
+whether he reduced them by aquafortis, filing, or clipping.&nbsp; From
+a five-shilling piece, which is called a bull in Latin because it is
+round like a bull&rsquo;s head, he would file or clip to the value of
+fivepence, and from lesser coin in proportion.&nbsp; He was connected
+with a numerous gang, or set, of people, who had given up their minds
+and talents entirely to shortening.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Here I interrupted the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;How singular,&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;is the fall and debasement of words; you talk of a gang, or
+set, of shorters; you are, perhaps, not aware that gang and set were,
+a thousand years ago, only connected with the great and Divine; they
+are ancient Norse words, which may be found in the heroic poems of the
+north, and in the Edda, a collection of mythologic and heroic songs.&nbsp;
+In these poems we read that such and such a king invaded Norway with
+a gang of heroes; or so and so, for example, Erik Bloodaxe, was admitted
+to the set of gods; but at present gang and set are merely applied to
+the vilest of the vile, and the lowest of the low, - we say a gang of
+thieves and shorters, or a set of authors.&nbsp; How touching is this
+debasement of words in the course of time; it puts me in mind of the
+decay of old houses and names.&nbsp; I have known a Mortimer who was
+a hedger and ditcher, a Berners who was born in a workhouse, and a descendant
+of the De Burghs, who bore the falcon, mending old kettles, and making
+horse and pony shoes in a dingle.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Odd enough,&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;but you were saying
+you knew one Berners - man or woman?&nbsp; I would ask.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A woman,&rdquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What might her Christian name be?&rdquo; said the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It is not to be mentioned lightly,&rdquo; said I, with a sigh.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shouldn&rsquo;t wonder if it were Isopel,&rdquo; said the jockey
+with an arch glance of his one brilliant eye.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It was Isopel,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;did you know Isopel Berners?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ay, and have reason to know her,&rdquo; said the jockey, putting
+his hand into his left waistcoat pocket, as if to feel for something,
+&ldquo;for she gave me what I believe few men could do - a most confounded
+whopping.&nbsp; But now, Mr. Romany Rye, I have again to tell you that
+I don&rsquo;t like to be interrupted when I&rsquo;m speaking, and to
+add that if you break in upon me a third time, you and I shall quarrel.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray proceed with your story,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;I will not
+interrupt you again.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Good!&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;Where was I?&nbsp;
+Oh, with a set of people who had given up their minds to shortening!&nbsp;
+Reducing the coin, though rather a lucrative, was a very dangerous trade.&nbsp;
+Coin filed felt rough to the touch; coin clipped could be easily detected
+by the eye; and as for coin reduced by aquafortis, it was generally
+so discoloured that, unless a great deal of pains was used to polish
+it, people were apt to stare at it in a strange manner, and to say,
+&lsquo;What have they been doing to this here gold?&rsquo;&nbsp; My
+grandfather, as I have said before, was connected with a gang of shorters,
+and sometimes shortened money, and at other times passed off what had
+been shortened by other gentry.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Passing off what had been shortened by others was his ruin; for
+once, in trying to pass off a broad piece which had been laid in aquafortis
+for four-and-twenty hours, and was very black, not having been properly
+rectified, he was stopped and searched, and other reduced coins being
+found about him, and in his lodgings, he was committed to prison, tried,
+and executed.&nbsp; He was offered his life, provided he would betray
+his comrades; but he told the big-wigs, who wanted him to do so, that
+he would see them farther first, and died at Tyburn, amidst the cheers
+of the populace, leaving my grandmother and father, to whom he had always
+been a kind husband and parent - for, setting aside the crime for which
+he suffered, he was a moral man; leaving them, I say, to bewail his
+irreparable loss.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis said that misfortune never comes alone; this is, however,
+not always the case.&nbsp; Shortly after my grandfather&rsquo;s misfortune,
+as my grandmother and her son were living in great misery in Spitalfields,
+her only relation - a brother from whom she had been estranged some
+years, on account of her marriage with my grandfather, who had been
+in an inferior station to herself - died, leaving all his property to
+her and the child.&nbsp; This property consisted of a farm of about
+a hundred acres, with its stock, and some money besides.&nbsp; My grandmother,
+who knew something of business, instantly went into the country, where
+she farmed the property for her own benefit and that of her son, to
+whom she gave an education suitable to a person in his condition, till
+he was old enough to manage the farm himself.&nbsp; Shortly after the
+young man came of age, my grandmother died, and my father, in about
+a year, married the daughter of a farmer, from whom he expected some
+little fortune, but who very much deceived him, becoming a bankrupt
+almost immediately after the marriage of his daughter, and himself and
+family going into the workhouse.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My mother, however, made my father an excellent wife; and if
+my father in the long run did not do well it was no fault of hers.&nbsp;
+My father was not a bad man by nature, he was of an easy, generous temper,
+the most unfortunate temper, by the bye, for success in this life that
+any person can be possessed of, as those who have it are almost sure
+to be made dupes of by the designing.&nbsp; But, though easy and generous,
+he was anything but a fool; he had a quick and witty tongue of his own
+when he chose to exert it, and woe be to those who insulted him openly,
+for there was not a better boxer in the whole country round.&nbsp; My
+parents were married several years before I came into the world, who
+was their first and only child.&nbsp; I may be called an unfortunate
+creature; I was born with this beam or scale on my left eye, which does
+not allow me to see with it; and though I can see tolerably sharply
+with the other, indeed more than most people can with both of theirs,
+it is a great misfortune not to have two eyes like other people.&nbsp;
+Moreover, setting aside the affair of my eye, I had a very ugly countenance;
+my mouth being slightly wrung aside, and my complexion swarthy.&nbsp;
+In fact, I looked so queer that the gossips and neighbours, when they
+first saw me, swore I was a changeling - perhaps it would have been
+well if I had never been born; for my poor father, who had been particularly
+anxious to have a son, no sooner saw me than he turned away, went to
+the neighbouring town, and did not return for two days.&nbsp; I am by
+no means certain that I was not the cause of his ruin, for till I came
+into the world he was fond of his home, and attended much to business,
+but afterwards he went frequently into company, and did not seem to
+care much about his affairs: he was, however, a kind man, and when his
+wife gave him advice never struck her, nor do I ever remember that he
+kicked me when I came in his way, or so much as cursed my ugly face,
+though it was easy to see that he didn&rsquo;t over-like me.&nbsp; When
+I was six years old I was sent to the village-school, where I was soon
+booked for a dunce, because the master found it impossible to teach
+me either to read or write.&nbsp; Before I had been at school two years,
+however, I had beaten boys four years older than myself, and could fling
+a stone with my left hand (for if I am right-eyed I am left-handed)
+higher and farther than any one in the parish.&nbsp; Moreover, no boy
+could equal me at riding, and no people ride so well or desperately
+as boys.&nbsp; I could ride a donkey - a thing far more difficult to
+ride than a horse - at full gallop over hedges and ditches, seated,
+or rather floating upon his hinder part, - so, though anything but clever,
+as this here Romany Rye would say, I was yet able to do things which
+few other people could do.&nbsp; By the time I was ten my father&rsquo;s
+affairs had got into a very desperate condition, for he had taken to
+gambling and horse-racing, and, being unsuccessful, had sold his stock,
+mortgaged his estate, and incurred very serious debts.&nbsp; The upshot
+was, that within a little time all he had was seized, himself imprisoned,
+and my mother and myself put into a cottage belonging to the parish,
+which, being very cold and damp, was the cause of her catching a fever,
+which speedily carried her off.&nbsp; I was then bound apprentice to
+a farmer, in whose service I underwent much coarse treatment, cold,
+and hunger.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;After lying in prison near two years, my father was liberated
+by an Act for the benefit of insolvent debtors; he was then lost sight
+of for some time; at last, however, he made his appearance in the neighbourhood
+dressed like a gentleman, and seemingly possessed of plenty of money.&nbsp;
+He came to see me, took me into a field, and asked me how I was getting
+on.&nbsp; I told him I was dreadfully used, and begged him to take me
+away with him; he refused, and told me to be satisfied with my condition,
+for that he could do nothing for me.&nbsp; I had a great love for my
+father, and likewise a great admiration for him on account of his character
+as a boxer, the only character which boys in general regard, so I wished
+much to be with him, independently of the dog&rsquo;s life I was leading
+where I was; I therefore said if he would not take me with him, I would
+follow him; he replied that I must do no such thing, for that if I did,
+it would be my ruin.&nbsp; I asked him what he meant, but he made no
+reply, only saying that he would go and speak to the farmer.&nbsp; Then
+taking me with him, he went to the farmer, and in a very civil manner
+said that he understood I had not been very kindly treated by him, but
+he hoped that in future I should be used better.&nbsp; The farmer answered
+in a surly tone, that I had been only too well treated, for that I was
+a worthless young scoundrel; high words ensued, and the farmer, forgetting
+the kind of man he had to deal with, checked him with my grandsire&rsquo;s
+misfortune, and said he deserved to be hanged like his father.&nbsp;
+In a moment my father knocked him down, and on his getting up, gave
+him a terrible beating, then taking me by the hand he hastened away;
+as we were going down a lane he said we were now both done for: &lsquo;I
+don&rsquo;t care a straw for that, father,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;provided
+I be with you.&rsquo;&nbsp; My father took me to the neighbouring town,
+and going into the yard of a small inn, he ordered out a pony and light
+cart which belonged to him, then paying his bill, he told me to mount
+upon the seat, and getting up drove away like lightning; we drove for
+at least six hours without stopping, till we came to a cottage by the
+side of a heath; we put the pony and cart into a shed, and went into
+the cottage, my father unlocking the door with a key which he took out
+of his pocket; there was nobody in the cottage when we arrived, but
+shortly after there came a man and a woman, and then some more people,
+and by ten o&rsquo;clock at night there were a dozen of us in the cottage.&nbsp;
+The people were companions of my father.&nbsp; My father began talking
+to them in Latin, but I did not understand much of the discourse, though
+I believe it was about myself, as their eyes were frequently turned
+to me.&nbsp; Some objections appeared to be made to what he said; however,
+all at last seemed to be settled, and we all sat down to some food.&nbsp;
+After that, all the people got up and went away, with the exception
+of the woman, who remained with my father and me.&nbsp; The next day
+my father also departed, leaving me with the woman, telling me before
+he went that she would teach me some things which it behoved me to know.&nbsp;
+I remained with her in the cottage upwards of a week; several of those
+who had been there coming and going.&nbsp; The woman, after making me
+take an oath to be faithful, told me that the people whom I had seen
+were a gang who got their livelihood by passing forged notes, and that
+my father was a principal man amongst them, adding, that I must do my
+best to assist them.&nbsp; I was a poor ignorant child at that time,
+and I made no objection, thinking that whatever my father did must be
+right; the woman then gave me some instructions in the smasher&rsquo;s
+dialect of the Latin language.&nbsp; I made great progress, because,
+for the first time in my life, I paid great attention to my lessons.&nbsp;
+At last my father returned, and, after some conversation with the woman,
+took me away in his cart.&nbsp; I shall be very short about what happened
+to my father and myself during two years.&nbsp; My father did his best
+to smash the Bank of England by passing forged notes, and I did my best
+to assist him.&nbsp; We attended races and fairs in all kinds of disguises;
+my father was a first-rate hand at a disguise, and could appear of all
+ages, from twenty to fourscore; he was, however, grabbed at last.&nbsp;
+He had said, as I have told you, that he should be my ruin, but I was
+the cause of his, and all owing to the misfortune of this here eye of
+mine.&nbsp; We came to this very place of Horncastle, where my father
+purchased two horses of a young man, paying for them with three forged
+notes, purporting to be Bank of Englanders of fifty pounds each, and
+got the young man to change another of the like amount; he at that time
+appeared as a respectable dealer, and I as his son, as I really was.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;As soon as we had got the horses, we conveyed them to one of
+the places of call belonging to our gang, of which there were several.&nbsp;
+There they were delivered into the hands of our companions, who speedily
+sold them in a distant part of the country.&nbsp; The sum which they
+fetched - for the gang kept very regular accounts - formed an important
+item on the next day of sharing, of which there were twelve in the year.&nbsp;
+The young man, whom my father had paid for the horses with his smashing
+notes, was soon in trouble about them, and ran some risk, as I heard,
+of being executed; but he bore a good character, told a plain story,
+and, above all, had friends, and was admitted to bail; to one of his
+friends he described my father and myself.&nbsp; This person happened
+to be at an inn in Yorkshire, where my father, disguised as a Quaker,
+attempted to pass a forged note.&nbsp; The note was shown to this individual,
+who pronounced it a forgery, it being exactly similar to those for which
+the young man had been in trouble, and which he had seen.&nbsp; My father,
+however, being supposed a respectable man, because he was dressed as
+a Quaker - the very reason, by the bye, why anybody who knew aught of
+the Quakers would have suspected him to be a rogue - would have been
+let go, had I not made my appearance, dressed as his footboy.&nbsp;
+The friend of the young man looked at my eye, and seized hold of my
+father, who made a desperate resistance, I assisting him, as in duty
+bound.&nbsp; Being, however, overpowered by numbers, he bade me by a
+look, and a word or two in Latin, to make myself scarce.&nbsp; Though
+my heart was fit to break, I obeyed my father, who was speedily committed.&nbsp;
+I followed him to the county town in which he was lodged, where shortly
+after I saw him tried, convicted, and condemned.&nbsp; I then, having
+made friends with the jailor&rsquo;s wife, visited him in his cell,
+where I found him very much cast down.&nbsp; He said, that my mother
+had appeared to him in a dream, and talked to him about a resurrection
+and Christ Jesus; there was a Bible before him, and he told me the chaplain
+had just been praying with him.&nbsp; He reproached himself much, saying,
+he was afraid he had been my ruin, by teaching me bad habits.&nbsp;
+I told him not to say any such thing, for that I had been the cause
+of his, owing to the misfortune of my eye.&nbsp; He begged me to give
+over all unlawful pursuits, saying, that if persisted in, they were
+sure of bringing a person to destruction.&nbsp; I advised him to try
+and make his escape, proposing, that when the turnkey came to let me
+out, he should knock him down, and fight his way out, offering to assist
+him; showing him a small saw, with which one of our companions, who
+was in the neighbourhood, had provided me, and with which he could have
+cut through his fetters in five minutes; but he told me he had no wish
+to escape, and was quite willing to die.&nbsp; I was rather hard at
+that time; I am not very soft now; and I felt rather ashamed of my father&rsquo;s
+want of what I called spirit.&nbsp; He was not executed after all; for
+the chaplain, who was connected with a great family, stood his friend,
+and got his sentence commuted, as they call it, to transportation; and
+in order to make the matter easy, he induced my father to make some
+valuable disclosures with respect to the smashers&rsquo; system.&nbsp;
+I confess that I would have been hanged before I would have done so,
+after having reaped the profit of it; that is, I think so now, seated
+comfortably in my inn, with my bottle of champagne before me.&nbsp;
+He, however, did not show himself carrion; he would not betray his companions,
+who had behaved very handsomely to him, having given the son of a lord,
+a great barrister, not a hundred-pound forged bill, but a hundred hard
+guineas, to plead his cause, and another ten, to induce him, after pleading,
+to put his hand to his breast, and say, that, upon his honour, he believed
+the prisoner at the bar to be an honest and injured man.&nbsp; No; I
+am glad to be able to say, that my father did not show himself exactly
+carrion, though I could almost have wished he had let himself -&nbsp;
+However, I am here with my bottle of champagne and the Romany Rye, and
+he was in his cell, with bread and water and the prison chaplain.&nbsp;
+He took an affectionate leave of me before he was sent away, giving
+me three out of five guineas, all the money he had left.&nbsp; He was
+a kind man, but not exactly fitted to fill my grandfather&rsquo;s shoes.&nbsp;
+I afterwards learned that he died of fever, as he was being carried
+across the sea.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;During the &lsquo;sizes I had made acquaintance with old Fulcher.&nbsp;
+I was in the town on my father&rsquo;s account, and he was there on
+his son&rsquo;s, who, having committed a small larceny, was in trouble.&nbsp;
+Young Fulcher, however, unlike my father, got off, though he did not
+give the son of a lord a hundred guineas to speak for him, and ten more
+to pledge his sacred honour for his honesty, but gave Counsellor P---
+one-and-twenty shillings to defend him, who so frightened the principal
+evidence, a plain honest farming-man, that he flatly contradicted what
+he had first said, and at last acknowledged himself to be all the rogues
+in the world, and, amongst other things, a perjured villain.&nbsp; Old
+Fulcher, before he left the town with his son, - and here it will be
+well to say that he and his son left it in a kind of triumph, the base
+drummer of a militia regiment, to whom they had given half-a-crown,
+beating his drum before them - old Fulcher, I say, asked me to go and
+visit him, telling me where, at such a time, I might find him and his
+caravan and family; offering, if I thought fit, to teach me basket-making:
+so, after my father had been sent off, I went and found up old Fulcher,
+and became his apprentice in the basket-making line.&nbsp; I stayed
+with him till the time of his death, which happened in about three months,
+travelling about with him and his family, and living in green lanes,
+where we saw gypsies and trampers, and all kinds of strange characters.&nbsp;
+Old Fulcher, besides being an industrious basket-maker, was an out-and-out
+thief, as was also his son, and, indeed, every member of his family.&nbsp;
+They used to make baskets during the day, and thieve during a great
+part of the night.&nbsp; I had not been with them twelve hours before
+old Fulcher told me that I must thieve as well as the rest.&nbsp; I
+demurred at first, for I remembered the fate of my father, and what
+he had told me about leaving off bad courses, but soon allowed myself
+to be over-persuaded; more especially as the first robbery I was asked
+to do was a fruit robbery.&nbsp; I was to go with young Fulcher, and
+steal some fine Morell cherries, which grew against a wall in a gentleman&rsquo;s
+garden; so young Fulcher and I went and stole the cherries, one half
+of which we ate, and gave the rest to the old man, who sold them to
+a fruiterer ten miles off from the place where we had stolen them.&nbsp;
+The next night old Fulcher took me out with himself.&nbsp; He was a
+great thief, though in a small way.&nbsp; He used to say, that they
+were fools, who did not always manage to keep the rope below their shoulders,
+by which he meant, that it was not advisable to commit a robbery, or
+do anything which could bring you to the gallows.&nbsp; He was all for
+petty larceny, and knew where to put his hand upon any little thing
+in England, which it was possible to steal.&nbsp; I submit it to the
+better judgment of the Romany Rye, who I see is a great hand for words
+and names, whether he ought not to have been called old Filcher, instead
+of Fulcher.&nbsp; I shan&rsquo;t give a regular account of the larcenies
+he committed during the short time I knew him, either alone by himself,
+or with me and his son.&nbsp; I shall merely relate the last.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;A melancholy gentleman, who lived a very solitary life, had a
+large carp in a shady pond in a meadow close to his house; he was exceedingly
+fond of it, and used to feed it with his own hand, the creature being
+so tame that it would put its snout out of the water to be fed when
+it was whistled to; feeding and looking at his carp were the only pleasures
+the poor melancholy gentleman possessed.&nbsp; Old Fulcher - being in
+the neighbourhood, and having an order from a fishmonger for a large
+fish, which was wanted at a great city dinner, at which His Majesty
+was to be present - swore he would steal the carp, and asked me to go
+with him.&nbsp; I had heard of the gentleman&rsquo;s fondness for his
+creature, and begged him to let it be, advising him to go and steal
+some other fish; but old Fulcher swore, and said he would have the carp,
+although its master should hang himself; I told him he might go by himself,
+but he took his son and stole the carp, which weighed seventeen pounds.&nbsp;
+Old Fulcher got thirty shillings for the carp, which I afterwards heard
+was much admired and relished by His Majesty.&nbsp; The master, however,
+of the carp, on losing his favourite, became more melancholy than ever,
+and in a little time hanged himself.&nbsp; &lsquo;What&rsquo;s sport
+for one, is death to another,&rsquo; I once heard at the village-school
+read out of a copy-book.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;This was the last larceny old Fulcher ever committed.&nbsp; He
+could keep his neck always out of the noose, but he could not always
+keep his leg out of the trap.&nbsp; A few nights after, having removed
+to a distance, he went to an osier car in order to steal some osiers
+for his basket-making, for he never bought any.&nbsp; I followed a little
+way behind.&nbsp; Old Fulcher had frequently stolen osiers out of the
+car, whilst in the neighbourhood, but during his absence the property,
+of which the car was a part, had been let to a young gentleman, a great
+hand for preserving game.&nbsp; Old Fulcher had not got far into the
+car before he put his foot into a man-trap.&nbsp; Hearing old Fulcher
+shriek, I ran up, and found him in a dreadful condition.&nbsp; Putting
+a large stick which I carried into the jaws of the trap, I contrived
+to prize them open, and get old Fulcher&rsquo;s leg out, but the leg
+was broken.&nbsp; So I ran to the caravan, and told young Fulcher of
+what had happened, and he and I helped his father home.&nbsp; A doctor
+was sent for, who said that it was necessary to take the leg off, but
+old Fulcher, being very much afraid of pain, said it should not be taken
+off, and the doctor went away, but after some days, old Fulcher becoming
+worse, ordered the doctor to be sent for, who came and took off his
+leg, but it was then too late, mortification had come on, and in a little
+time old Fulcher died.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thus perished old Fulcher; he was succeeded in his business by
+his son, young Fulcher, who, immediately after the death of his father,
+was called old Fulcher, it being our English custom to call everybody
+old, as soon as their fathers are buried; young Fulcher - I mean he
+who had been called young, but was now old Fulcher - wanted me to go
+out and commit larcenies with him; but I told him that I would have
+nothing more to do with thieving, having seen the ill effects of it,
+and that I should leave them in the morning.&nbsp; Old Fulcher begged
+me to think better of it, and his mother joined with him.&nbsp; They
+offered, if I would stay, to give me Mary Fulcher as a mort, till she
+and I were old enough to be regularly married, she being the daughter
+of the one, and the sister of the other.&nbsp; I liked the girl very
+well, for she had always been civil to me, and had a fair complexion
+and nice red hair, both of which I like, being a bit of a black myself;
+but I refused, being determined to see something more of the world than
+I could hope to do with the Fulchers, and, moreover, to live honestly,
+which I could never do along with them.&nbsp; So the next morning I
+left them: I was, as I said before, quite determined upon an honest
+livelihood, and I soon found one.&nbsp; He is a great fool who is ever
+dishonest in England.&nbsp; Any person who has any natural gift, and
+everybody has some natural gift, is sure of finding encouragement in
+this noble country of ours, provided he will but exhibit it.&nbsp; I
+had not walked more than three miles before I came to a wonderfully
+high church steeple, which stood close by the road; I looked at the
+steeple, and going to a heap of smooth pebbles which lay by the roadside,
+I took up some, and then went into the churchyard, and placing myself
+just below the tower, my right foot resting on a ledge, about two foot
+from the ground, I, with my left hand - being a left-handed person,
+do you see - flung or chucked up a stone, which, lighting on the top
+of the steeple, which was at least a hundred and fifty feet high, did
+there remain.&nbsp; After repeating this feat two or three times, I
+&lsquo;hulled&rsquo; up a stone, which went clean over the tower, and
+then one, my right foot still on the ledge, which rising at least five
+yards above the steeple, did fall down just at my feet.&nbsp; Without
+knowing it, I was showing off my gift to others besides myself, doing
+what, perhaps, not five men in England could do.&nbsp; Two men, who
+were passing by, stopped and looked at my proceedings, and when I had
+done flinging came into the churchyard, and, after paying me a compliment
+on what they had seen me do, proposed that I should join company with
+them; I asked them who they were, and they told me.&nbsp; The one was
+Hopping Ned, and the other Biting Giles.&nbsp; Both had their gifts,
+by which they got their livelihood; Ned could hop a hundred yards with
+any man in England, and Giles could lift up with his teeth any dresser
+or kitchen-table in the country, and, standing erect, hold it dangling
+in his jaws.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s many a big oak table and dresser in
+certain districts of England, which bear the marks of Giles&rsquo;s
+teeth; and I make no doubt that, a hundred or two years hence, there&rsquo;ll
+be strange stories about those marks, and that people will point them
+out as a proof that there were giants in bygone time, and that many
+a dentist will moralize on the decays which human teeth have undergone.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They wanted me to go about with them, and exhibit my gift occasionally,
+as they did theirs, promising that the money that was got by the exhibitions
+should be honestly divided.&nbsp; I consented, and we set off together,
+and that evening coming to a village, and putting up at the ale-house,
+all the grand folks of the village being there smoking their pipes,
+we contrived to introduce the subject of hopping - the upshot being
+that Ned hopped against the school-master for a pound, and beat him
+hollow; shortly after, Giles, for a wager, took up the kitchen table
+in his jaws, though he had to pay a shilling to the landlady for the
+marks he left, whose grandchildren will perhaps get money by exhibiting
+them.&nbsp; As for myself, I did nothing that day, but the next, on
+which my companions did nothing, I showed off at hulling stones against
+a cripple, the crack man for stone-throwing, of a small town, a few
+miles farther on.&nbsp; Bets were made to the tune of some pounds; I
+contrived to beat the cripple, and just contrived; for to do him justice
+I must acknowledge he was a first-rate hand at stones, though he had
+a game hip, and went sideways; his head, when he walked - if his movements
+could be called walking - not being above three feet above the ground.&nbsp;
+So we travelled, I and my companions, showing off our gifts, Giles and
+I occasionally for a gathering, but Ned never hopping, unless against
+somebody for a wager.&nbsp; We lived honestly and comfortably, making
+no little money by our natural endowments, and were known over a great
+part of England as &lsquo;Hopping Ned,&rsquo; &lsquo;Biting Giles,&rsquo;
+and &lsquo;Hull over the Head Jack,&rsquo; which was my name, it being
+the blackguard fashion of the English, do you see, to - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Here I interrupted the jockey.&nbsp; &ldquo;You may call it a blackguard
+fashion,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and I dare say it is, or it would scarcely
+be English; but it is an immensely ancient one, and is handed down to
+us from our northern ancestry, especially the Danes, who were in the
+habit of giving people surnames, or rather nicknames, from some quality
+of body or mind, but generally from some disadvantageous peculiarity
+of feature; for there is no denying that the English, Norse, or whatever
+we may please to call them, are an envious, depreciatory set of people,
+who not only give their poor comrades contemptuous names, but their
+great people also.&nbsp; They didn&rsquo;t call you the matchless Hurler,
+because, by doing so, they would have paid you a compliment, but Hull
+over the Head Jack, as much as to say that after all you were a scrub;
+so, in ancient time, instead of calling Regner the great conqueror,
+the Nation Tamer, they surnamed him Lodbrog, which signifies Rough or
+Hairy Breeks - lod or loddin signifying rough or hairy; and instead
+of complimenting Halgerdr, the wife of Gunnar of Hlitharend, the great
+champion of Iceland, upon her majestic presence, by calling her Halgerdr,
+the stately or tall; what must they do but term her Ha-brokr, or Highbreeks,
+it being the fashion in old times for Northern ladies to wear breeks,
+or breeches, which English ladies of the present day never think of
+doing; and just, as of old, they called Halgerdr Long-breeks, so this
+very day a fellow of Horncastle called, in my hearing, our noble-looking
+Hungarian friend here, Long-stockings.&nbsp; Oh, I could give you a
+hundred instances, both ancient and modern, of this unseemly propensity
+of our illustrious race, though I will only trouble you with a few more
+ancient ones; they not only nicknamed Regner, but his sons also, who
+were all kings, and distinguished men: one, whose name was Biorn, they
+nicknamed Ironsides; another, Sigurd, Snake in the Eye; another, White
+Sark, or White Shirt - I wonder they did not call him Dirty Shirt; and
+Ivarr, another, who was king of Northumberland, they called Bienlausi,
+or the Legless, because he was spindle-shanked, had no sap in his bones,
+and consequently no children.&nbsp; He was a great king, it is true,
+and very wise, nevertheless his blackguard countrymen, always averse,
+as their descendants are, to give credit to anybody, for any valuable
+quality or possession, must needs lay hold, do you see - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+But before I could say any more, the jockey, having laid down his pipe,
+rose, and having taken off his coat, advanced towards me.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+A Short-tempered Person - Gravitation - The Best Endowment - Mary Fulcher
+- Fair Dealing - Horse-witchery - Darius and his Groom - The Jockey&rsquo;s
+Tricks - The Two Characters - The Jockey&rsquo;s Song.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The jockey, having taken off his coat and advanced towards me, as I
+have stated in the preceding chapter, exclaimed, in an angry tone, &ldquo;This
+is the third time you have interrupted me in my tale, Mr. Rye; I passed
+over the two first times with a simple warning, but you will now please
+to get up and give me the satisfaction of a man.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am really sorry,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;if I have given you
+offence, but you were talking of our English habits of bestowing nicknames,
+and I could not refrain from giving a few examples tending to prove
+what a very ancient habit it is.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But you interrupted me,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;and put
+me out of my tale, which you had no right to do; and as for your examples,
+how do you know that I wasn&rsquo;t going to give some as old or older
+than yourn?&nbsp; Now stand up, and I&rsquo;ll make an example of you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;I confess it was wrong in me to interrupt
+you, and I ask your pardon.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;That won&rsquo;t do,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;asking pardon
+won&rsquo;t do.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; said I, getting up, &ldquo;if asking pardon does not
+satisfy you, you are a different man from what I considered you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+But here the Hungarian, also getting up, interposed his tall form and
+pipe between us, saying in English, scarcely intelligible, &ldquo;Let
+there be no dispute!&nbsp; As for myself, I am very much obliged to
+the young man of Horncastle for his interruption, though he has told
+me that one of his dirty townsmen called me &lsquo;Long-stocking.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+By Isten! there is more learning in what he has just said than in all
+the verdammt English histories of Thor and Tzernebock I ever read.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I care nothing for his learning,&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I consider myself as good a man as he, for all his learning;
+so stand out of the way, Mr. Sixfooteleven, or - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shall do no such thing,&rdquo; said the Hungarian.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+wonder you are not ashamed of yourself.&nbsp; You ask a young man to
+drink champagne with you, you make him dronk, he interrupt you with
+very good sense; he ask your pardon, yet you not - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;I am satisfied.&nbsp; I
+am rather a short-tempered person, but I bear no malice.&nbsp; He is,
+as you say, drinking my wine, and has perhaps taken a drop too much,
+not being used to such high liquor; but one doesn&rsquo;t like to be
+put out of one&rsquo;s tale, more especially when one was about to moralize,
+do you see, oneself, and to show off what little learning one has.&nbsp;
+However, I bears no malice.&nbsp; Here is a hand to each of you; we&rsquo;ll
+take another glass each, and think no more about it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The jockey having shaken both of our hands, and filled our glasses and
+his own with what champagne remained in the bottle, put on his coat,
+sat down, and resumed his pipe and story.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Where was I?&nbsp; Oh, roaming about the country with Hopping
+Ned and Biting Giles.&nbsp; Those were happy days, and a merry and prosperous
+life we led.&nbsp; However, nothing continues under the sun in the same
+state in which it begins, and our firm was soon destined to undergo
+a change.&nbsp; We came to a village where there was a very high church
+steeple, and in a little time my comrades induced a crowd of people
+to go and see me display my gift by flinging stones above the heads
+of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, who stood at the four corners on the
+top, carved in stone.&nbsp; The parson, seeing the crowd, came waddling
+out of his rectory to see what was going on.&nbsp; After I had flung
+up the stones, letting them fall just where I liked - and one, I remember,
+fell on the head of Mark, where I dare say it remains to the present
+day - the parson, who was one of the description of people called philosophers,
+held up his hand, and asked me to let the next stone I flung up fall
+upon it.&nbsp; He wished, do you see, to know with what weight the stone
+would fall down, and talked something about gravitation - a word which
+I could never understand to the present day, save that it turned out
+a grave matter to me.&nbsp; I, like a silly fellow myself, must needs
+consent, and, flinging the stone up to a vast height, contrived so that
+it fell into the parson&rsquo;s hand, which it cut dreadfully.&nbsp;
+The parson flew into a great rage, more particularly as everybody laughed
+at him, and, being a magistrate, ordered his clerk, who was likewise
+constable, to conduct me to prison as a rogue and vagabond, telling
+my comrades that if they did not take themselves off, he would serve
+them in the same manner.&nbsp; So Ned hopped off, and Giles ran after
+him, without making any gathering, and I was led to Bridewell, my mittimus
+following at the end of a week, the parson&rsquo;s hand not permitting
+him to write before that time.&nbsp; In the Bridewell I remained a month,
+when, being dismissed, I went in quest of my companions, whom, after
+some time, I found up, but they refused to keep my company any longer;
+telling me that I was a dangerous character, likely to bring them more
+trouble than profit; they had, moreover, filled up my place.&nbsp; Going
+into a cottage to ask for a drink of water, they saw a country fellow
+making faces to amuse his children; the faces were so wonderful that
+Hopping Ned and Biting Giles at once proposed taking him into partnership,
+and the man - who was a fellow not very fond of work - after a little
+entreaty, went away with them.&nbsp; I saw him exhibit his gift, and
+couldn&rsquo;t blame the others for preferring him to me; he was a proper
+ugly fellow at all times, but when he made faces his countenance was
+like nothing human.&nbsp; He was called Ugly Moses.&nbsp; I was so amazed
+at his faces, that though poor myself I gave him sixpence, which I have
+never grudged to this day, for I never saw anything like them.&nbsp;
+The firm throve wonderfully after he had been admitted into it.&nbsp;
+He died some little time ago, keeper of a public-house, which he had
+been enabled to take from the profits of his faces.&nbsp; A son of his,
+one of the children he was making faces to when my comrades entered
+his door, is at present a barrister, and a very rising one.&nbsp; He
+has his gift - he has not, it is true, the gift of the gab, but he has
+something better, he was born with a grin on his face, a quiet grin;
+he would not have done to grin through a collar like his father, and
+would never have been taken up by Hopping Ned and Biting Giles, but
+that grin of his caused him to be noticed by a much greater person than
+either; an attorney observing it took a liking to the lad, and prophesied
+that he would some day be heard of in the world; and in order to give
+him the first lift, took him into his office, at first to light fires
+and do such kind of work, and after a little time taught him to write,
+then promoted him to a desk, articled him afterwards, and being unmarried,
+and without children, left him what he had when he died.&nbsp; The young
+fellow, after practising at the law some time, went to the bar, where,
+in a few years, helped on by his grin, for he had nothing else to recommend
+him, he became, as I said before, a rising barrister.&nbsp; He comes
+our circuit, and I occasionally employ him, when I am obliged to go
+to law about such a thing as an unsound horse.&nbsp; He generally brings
+me through - or rather that grin of his does - and yet I don&rsquo;t
+like the fellow, confound him, but I&rsquo;m an oddity - no, the one
+I like, and whom I generally employ, is a fellow quite different, a
+bluff sturdy dog, with no grin on his face, but with a look that seems
+to say I am an honest man, and what cares I for any one?&nbsp; And an
+honest man he is, and something more.&nbsp; I have known coves with
+a better gift of the gab, though not many, but he always speaks to the
+purpose, and understands law thoroughly; and that&rsquo;s not all.&nbsp;
+When at college, for he has been at college, he carried off everything
+before him as a Latiner, and was first-rate at a game they call matthew
+mattocks.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t exactly know what it is, but I have heard
+that he who is first-rate at matthew mattocks is thought more of than
+if he were first-rate Latiner.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, the chap that I&rsquo;m talking about, not only came out
+first-rate Latiner, but first-rate at matthew mattocks too; doing, in
+fact, as I am told by those who knows, for I was never at college myself,
+what no one had ever done before.&nbsp; Well, he makes his appearance
+at our circuit, does very well, of course, but he has a somewhat high
+front, as becomes an honest man, and one who has beat every one at Latin
+and matthew mattocks; and one who can speak first-rate law and sense;
+- but see now, the cove with the grin, who has like myself never been
+at college; knows nothing of Latin, or matthew mattocks, and has no
+particular gift of the gab, has two briefs for his one, and I suppose
+very properly, for that grin of his curries favour with the juries;
+and mark me, that grin of his will enable him to beat the other in the
+long run.&nbsp; We all know what all barrister coves looks forward to
+- a seat on the hop sack.&nbsp; Well, I&rsquo;ll bet a bull to fivepence,
+that the grinner gets upon it, and the snarler doesn&rsquo;t; at any
+rate, that he gets there first.&nbsp; I calls my cove - for he is my
+cove - a snarler; because your first-rates at matthew mattocks are called
+snarlers, and for no other reason; for the chap, though with a high
+front, is a good chap, and once drank a glass of ale with me, after
+buying an animal out of my stable.&nbsp; I have often thought it a pity
+he wasn&rsquo;t born with a grin on his face like the son of Ugly <i>Moses</i>.&nbsp;
+It is true he would scarcely then have been an out and outer at Latin
+and matthew mattocks, but what need of either to a chap born with a
+grin?&nbsp; Talk of being born with a silver spoon in one&rsquo;s mouth!
+give me a cove born with a grin on his face - a much better endowment.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I will now shorten my history as much as I can, for we have talked
+as much as folks do during a whole night in the Commons&rsquo; House,
+though, of course, not with so much learning, or so much to the purpose,
+because - why?&nbsp; They are in the House of Commons, and we in a public
+room of an inn at Horncastle.&nbsp; The goodness of the ale, do ye see,
+never depending on what it is made of, oh, no! but on the fashion and
+appearance of the jug in which it is served up.&nbsp; After being turned
+out of the firm, I got my living in two or three honest ways, which
+I shall not trouble you with describing.&nbsp; I did not like any of
+them, however, as they did not exactly suit my humour; at last I found
+one which did.&nbsp; One Saturday afternoon, I chanced to be in the
+cattle-market of a place about eighty miles from here; there I won the
+favour of an old gentleman who sold dickeys.&nbsp; He had a very shabby
+squad of animals, without soul or spirit; nobody would buy them, till
+I leaped upon their hinder ends, and by merely wriggling in a particular
+manner, made them caper and bound so to people&rsquo;s liking, that
+in a few hours every one of them was sold at very sufficient prices.&nbsp;
+The old gentleman was so pleased with my skill, that he took me home
+with him, and in a very little time into partnership.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+a good thing to have a gift, but yet better to have two.&nbsp; I might
+have got a very decent livelihood by throwing stones, but I much question
+whether I should ever have attained to the position in society which
+I now occupy, but for my knowledge of animals.&nbsp; I lived very comfortably
+with the old gentleman till he died, which he did in about a fortnight
+after he had laid his old lady in the ground.&nbsp; Having no children,
+he left me what should remain after he had been buried decently, and
+the remainder was six dickeys and thirty shillings in silver.&nbsp;
+I remained in the dickey trade ten years, during which time I saved
+a hundred pounds.&nbsp; I then embarked in the horse line.&nbsp; One
+day, being in the - market on a Saturday, I saw Mary Fulcher with a
+halter round her neck, led about by a man, who offered to sell her for
+eighteen-pence.&nbsp; I took out the money forthwith and bought her;
+the man was her husband, a basket-maker, with whom she had lived several
+years without having any children; he was a drunken, quarrel-some fellow,
+and having had a dispute with her the day before, he determined to get
+rid of her, by putting a halter round her neck and leading her to the
+cattle-market, as if she were a mare, which he had, it seems, a right
+to do; - all women being considered mares by old English law, and, indeed,
+still called mares in certain counties, where genuine old English is
+still preserved.&nbsp; That same afternoon, the man who had been her
+husband, having got drunk in a public-house, with the money which he
+had received for her, quarrelled with another man, and receiving a blow
+under the ear, fell upon the floor, and died of artiflex; and in less
+than three weeks I was married to Mary Fulcher, by virtue of regular
+bans.&nbsp; I am told she was legally my property by virtue of my having
+bought her with a halter round her neck; but, to tell you the truth,
+I think everybody should live by his trade, and I didn&rsquo;t wish
+to act shabbily towards our parson, who is a good fellow, and has certainly
+a right to his fees.&nbsp; A better wife than Mary Fulcher - I mean
+Mary Dale - no one ever had; she has borne me several children, and
+has at all times shown a willingness to oblige me, and to be my faithful
+wife.&nbsp; Amongst other things, I begged her to have done with her
+family, and I believe she has never spoken to them since.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have thriven very well in business, and my name is up as being
+a person who can be depended on, when folks treats me handsomely.&nbsp;
+I always make a point when a gentleman comes to me, and says, &lsquo;Mr.
+Dale,&rsquo; or &lsquo;John,&rsquo; for I have no objection to be called
+John by a gentleman - &lsquo;I wants a good horse, and am ready to pay
+a good price&rsquo; - I always makes a point, I say, to furnish him
+with an animal worth the money; but when I sees a fellow, whether he
+calls himself gentleman or not, wishing to circumvent me, what does
+I do?&nbsp; I doesn&rsquo;t quarrel with him; not I; but, letting him
+imagine he is taking me in, I contrives to sell him a screw for thirty
+pounds, not worth thirty shillings.&nbsp; All honest respectable people
+have at present great confidence in me, and frequently commissions me
+to buy them horses at great fairs like this.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;This short young gentleman was recommended to me by a great landed
+proprietor, to whom he bore letters of recommendation from some great
+prince in his own country, who had a long time ago been entertained
+at the house of the landed proprietor, and the consequence is, that
+I brings young six foot six to Horncastle, and purchases for him the
+horse of the Romany Rye.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t do these kind things for
+nothing, it is true; that can&rsquo;t be expected; for every one must
+live by his trade; but, as I said before, when I am treated handsomely,
+I treat folks so.&nbsp; Honesty, I have discovered, as perhaps some
+other people have, is by far the best policy; though, as I also said
+before, when I&rsquo;m along with thieves, I can beat them at their
+own game.&nbsp; If I am obliged to do it, I can pass off the veriest
+screw as a flying drummedary, for even when I was a child I had found
+out by various means what may be done with animals.&nbsp; I wish now
+to ask a civil question, Mr. Romany Rye.&nbsp; Certain folks have told
+me that you are a horse witch; are you one, or are you not?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I, like yourself,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;know, to a certain extent,
+what may be done with animals.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then how would you, Mr. Romany Rye, pass off the veriest screw
+in the world for a flying drummedary?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;By putting a small live eel down his throat; as long as the eel
+remained in his stomach, the horse would appear brisk and lively in
+a surprising degree.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And how would you contrive to make a regular kicker and biter
+appear so tame and gentle, that any respectable fat old gentleman of
+sixty, who wanted an easy goer, would be glad to purchase him for fifty
+pounds?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;By pouring down his throat four pints of generous old ale, which
+would make him so happy and comfortable, that he would not have the
+heart to kick or bite anybody, for a season at least.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And where did you learn all this?&rdquo; said the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I have read about the eel in an old English book, and about the
+making drunk in a Spanish novel, and, singularly enough, I was told
+the same things by a wild blacksmith in Ireland.&nbsp; Now tell me,
+do you bewitch horses in this way?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I?&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;mercy upon us!&nbsp; I wouldn&rsquo;t
+do such things for a hatful of money.&nbsp; No, no, preserve me from
+live eels and hocussing!&nbsp; And now let me ask you, how would you
+spirit a horse out of a field?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How would I spirit a horse out of a field?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes; supposing you were down in the world, and had determined
+on taking up the horse-stealing line of business.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, I should -&nbsp; But I tell you what, friend, I see you
+are trying to pump me, and I tell you plainly that I will hear something
+from you with respect to your art, before I tell you anything more.&nbsp;
+Now how would you whisper a horse out of a field, provided you were
+down in the world, and so forth?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ah, ah, I see you are up to a game, Mr. Romany: however, I am
+a gentleman in mind, if not by birth, and I scorn to do the unhandsome
+thing to anybody who has dealt fairly towards me.&nbsp; Now you told
+me something I didn&rsquo;t know, and I&rsquo;ll tell you something
+which perhaps you do know.&nbsp; I whispers a horse out of a field in
+this way: I have a mare in my stable; well, in the early season of the
+year I goes into my stable - Well, I puts the sponge into a small bottle
+which I keeps corked.&nbsp; I takes my bottle in my hand, and goes into
+a field, suppose by night, where there is a very fine stag horse.&nbsp;
+I manage with great difficulty to get within ten yards of the horse,
+who stands staring at me just ready to run away.&nbsp; I then uncorks
+my bottle, presses my fore-finger to the sponge, and holds it out to
+the horse, the horse gives a sniff, then a start, and comes nearer.&nbsp;
+I corks up my bottle and puts it into my pocket.&nbsp; My business is
+done, for the next two hours the horse would follow me anywhere - the
+difficulty, indeed, would be to get rid of him.&nbsp; Now is that your
+way of doing business?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;My way of doing business?&nbsp; Mercy upon us!&nbsp; I wouldn&rsquo;t
+steal a horse in that way, or, indeed, in any way, for all the money
+in the world: however, let me tell you, for your comfort, that a trick
+somewhat similar is described in the history of Herodotus.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In the history of Herod&rsquo;s ass!&rdquo; said the jockey;
+&ldquo;well, if I did write a book, it should be about something more
+genteel than a dickey.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I did not say Herod&rsquo;s ass,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;but Herodotus,
+a very genteel writer, I assure you, who wrote a history about very
+genteel people, in a language no less genteel than Greek, more than
+two thousand years ago.&nbsp; There was a dispute as to who should be
+king amongst certain imperious chieftains.&nbsp; At last they agreed
+to obey him whose horse should neigh first on a certain day, in front
+of the royal palace, before the rising of the sun; for you must know
+that they did not worship the person who made the sun as we do, but
+the sun itself.&nbsp; So one of these chieftains, talking over the matter
+to his groom, and saying he wondered who would be king, the fellow said,
+&lsquo;Why you, master, or I don&rsquo;t know much about horses.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+So the day before the day of trial, what does the groom do, but take
+his master&rsquo;s horse before the palace and introduce him to a mare
+in the stable, and then lead him forth again.&nbsp; Well, early the
+next day all the chieftains on their horses appeared in front of the
+palace before the dawn of day.&nbsp; Not a horse neighed but one, and
+that was the horse of him who had consulted with his groom, who, thinking
+of the animal within the stable, gave such a neigh that all the buildings
+rang.&nbsp; His rider was forthwith elected king, and a brave king he
+was.&nbsp; So this shows what seemingly wonderful things may be brought
+about by a little preparation.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;It doth,&rdquo; said the jockey; &ldquo;what was the chap&rsquo;s
+name?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;His name - his name - Darius Hystaspes.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And the groom&rsquo;s?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And he made a good king?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;First-rate.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Only think! well, if he made a good king, what a wonderful king
+the groom would have made, through whose knowledge of &lsquo;orses he
+was put on the throne.&nbsp; And now another question, Mr. Romany Rye,
+have you particular words which have power to soothe or aggravate horses?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;You should ask me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;whether I have horses
+that can be aggravated or soothed by particular words.&nbsp; No words
+have any particular power over horses or other animals who have never
+heard them before - how, should they?&nbsp; But certain animals connect
+ideas of misery or enjoyment with particular words which they are acquainted
+with.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll give you an example.&nbsp; I knew a cob in Ireland
+that could be driven to a state of kicking madness by a particular word,
+used by a particular person, in a particular tone; but that word was
+connected with a very painful operation which had been performed upon
+him by that individual, who had frequently employed it at a certain
+period whilst the animal had been under his treatment.&nbsp; The same
+cob could be soothed in a moment by another word, used by the same individual
+in a very different kind of tone; the word was deaghblasda, or sweet
+tasted.&nbsp; Some time after the operation, whilst the cob was yet
+under his hands, the fellow - who was what the Irish call a fairy smith
+- had done all he could to soothe the creature, and had at last succeeded
+by giving it gingerbread-buttons, of which the cob became passionately
+fond.&nbsp; Invariably, however, before giving it a button, he said,
+&lsquo;Deaghblasda,&rsquo; with which word the cob by degrees associated
+an idea of unmixed enjoyment: so if he could rouse the cob to madness
+by the word which recalled the torture to its remembrance, he could
+as easily soothe it by the other word, which the cob knew would be instantly
+followed by the button, which the smith never failed to give him after
+using the word deaghblasda.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;There is nothing wonderful to be done,&rdquo; said the jockey,
+&ldquo;without a good deal of preparation, as I know myself.&nbsp; Folks
+stare and wonder at certain things which they would only laugh at if
+they knew how they were done; and to prove what I say is true, I will
+give you one or two examples.&nbsp; Can either of you lend me a handkerchief?&nbsp;
+That won&rsquo;t do,&rdquo; said he, as I presented him with a silk
+one.&nbsp; &ldquo;I wish for a delicate white handkerchief.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s
+just the kind of thing,&rdquo; said he, as the Hungarian offered him
+a fine white cambric handkerchief, beautifully worked with gold at the
+hems; &ldquo;now you shall see me set this handkerchief on fire.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t let him do so by any means,&rdquo; said the Hungarian,
+speaking to me in German, &ldquo;it is the gift of a lady whom I highly
+admire, and I would not have it burnt for the world.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He
+has no occasion to be under any apprehension,&rdquo; said the jockey,
+after I had interpreted to him what the Hungarian had said, &ldquo;I
+will restore it to him uninjured, or my name is not Jack Dale.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Then sticking the handkerchief carelessly into the left side of his
+bosom, he took the candle, which by this time had burnt very low, and
+holding his head back, he applied the flame to the handkerchief, which
+instantly seemed to catch fire.&nbsp; &ldquo;What do you think of that?&rdquo;
+said he to the Hungarian.&nbsp; &ldquo;Why, that you have ruined me,&rdquo;
+said the latter.&nbsp; &ldquo;No harm done, I assure you,&rdquo; said
+the jockey, who presently, clapping his hand on his bosom, extinguished
+the fire, and returned the handkerchief to the Hungarian, asking him
+if it was burnt.&nbsp; &ldquo;I see no burn upon it,&rdquo; said the
+Hungarian; &ldquo;but in the name of Gott, how could you set it on fire
+without burning it?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I never set it on fire at all,&rdquo;
+said the jockey; &ldquo;I set this on fire,&rdquo; showing us a piece
+of half-burnt calico.&nbsp; &ldquo;I placed this calico above it, and
+lighted not the handkerchief, but the rag.&nbsp; Now I will show you
+something else.&nbsp; I have a magic shilling in my pocket, which I
+can make run up along my arm.&nbsp; But, first of all, I would gladly
+know whether either of you can do the like.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thereupon the
+Hungarian and myself, putting our hands into our pockets, took out shillings,
+and endeavoured to make them run up our arms, but utterly failed; both
+shillings, after we had made two or three attempts, falling to the ground.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What noncomposses you both are,&rdquo; said the jockey; and placing
+a shilling on the end of the fingers of his right hand he made strange
+faces to it, drawing back his head, whereupon the shilling instantly
+began to run up his arm, occasionally hopping and jumping as if it were
+bewitched, always endeavouring to make towards the head of the jockey.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;How do I do that?&rdquo; said he, addressing himself to me.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I really do not know,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;unless it is by the
+motion of your arm.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;The motion of my nonsense,&rdquo;
+said the jockey, and, making a dreadful grimace, the shilling hopped
+upon his knee, and began to run up his thigh and to climb up his breast.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;How is that done?&rdquo; said he again.&nbsp; &ldquo;By witchcraft,
+I suppose,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;There you are right,&rdquo; said
+the jockey; &ldquo;by the witchcraft of one of Miss Berners&rsquo; hairs;
+the end of one of her long hairs is tied to that shilling by means of
+a hole in it, and the other end goes round my neck by means of a loop;
+so that, when I draw back my head, the shilling follows it.&nbsp; I
+suppose you wish to know how I got the hair,&rdquo; said he, grinning
+at me.&nbsp; &ldquo;I will tell you.&nbsp; I once, in the course of
+my ridings, saw Miss Berners beneath a hedge, combing out her long hair,
+and, being rather a modest kind of person, what must I do but get off
+my horse, tie him to a gate, go up to her, and endeavour to enter into
+conversation with her.&nbsp; After giving her the sele of the day, and
+complimenting her on her hair, I asked her to give me one of the threads;
+whereupon she gave me such a look, and, calling me fellow, told me to
+take myself off.&nbsp; &lsquo;I must have a hair first,&rsquo; said
+I, making a snatch at one.&nbsp; I believe I hurt her; but, whether
+I did or not, up she started, and, though her hair was unbound, gave
+me the only drubbing I ever had in my life.&nbsp; Lor! how, with her
+right hand, she fibbed me whilst she held me round the neck with her
+left arm; I was soon glad to beg her pardon on my knees, which she gave
+me in a moment, when she saw me in that condition, being the most placable
+creature in the world, and not only her pardon, but one of the hairs
+which I longed for, which I put through a shilling, with which I have
+on evenings after fairs, like this, frequently worked what seemed to
+those who looked on downright witchcraft, but which is nothing more
+than pleasant deception.&nbsp; And now, Mr. Romany Rye, to testify my
+regard for you, I give you the shilling and the hair.&nbsp; I think
+you have a kind of respect for Miss Berners; but whether you have or
+not, keep them as long as you can, and whenever you look at them think
+of the finest woman in England, and of John Dale, the jockey of Horncastle.&nbsp;
+I believe I have told you my history,&rdquo; said he - &ldquo;no, not
+quite; there is one circumstance I had passed over.&nbsp; I told you
+that I have thriven very well in business, and so I have, upon the whole;
+at any rate, I find myself comfortably off now.&nbsp; I have horses,
+money, and owe nobody a groat; at any rate, nothing but what I could
+pay to-morrow.&nbsp; Yet I have had my dreary day, ay, after I had obtained
+what I call a station in the world.&nbsp; All of a sudden, about five
+years ago, everything seemed to go wrong with me - horses became sick
+or died, people who owed me money broke or ran away, my house caught
+fire, in fact, everything went against me; and not from any mismanagement
+of my own.&nbsp; I looked round for help, but - what do you think? -
+nobody would help me.&nbsp; Somehow or other it had got abroad that
+I was in difficulties, and everybody seemed disposed to avoid me, as
+if I had got the plague.&nbsp; Those who were always offering me help
+when I wanted none, now, when they thought me in trouble, talked of
+arresting me.&nbsp; Yes; two particular friends of mine, who had always
+been offering me their purses when my own was stuffed full, now talked
+of arresting me, though I only owed the scoundrels a hundred pounds
+each; and they would have done so, provided I had not paid them what
+I owed them; and how did I do that?&nbsp; Why, I was able to do it because
+I found a friend - and who was that friend?&nbsp; Why, a man who has
+since been hung, of whom everybody has heard, and of whom everybody
+for the next hundred years will occasionally talk.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One day, whilst in trouble, I was visited by a person I had occasionally
+met at sporting-dinners.&nbsp; He came to look after a Suffolk Punch,
+the best horse, by the bye, that anybody can purchase to drive, it being
+the only animal of the horse kind in England that will pull twice at
+a dead weight.&nbsp; I told him that I had none at that time that I
+could recommend; in fact, that every horse in my stable was sick.&nbsp;
+He then invited me to dine with him at an inn close by, and I was glad
+to go with him, in the hope of getting rid of unpleasant thoughts.&nbsp;
+After dinner, during which he talked nothing but slang, observing I
+looked very melancholy, he asked me what was the matter with me, and
+I, my heart being opened by the wine he had made me drink, told him
+my circumstances without reserve.&nbsp; With an oath or two for not
+having treated him at first like a friend, he said he would soon set
+me all right; and pulling out two hundred pounds, told me to pay him
+when I could.&nbsp; I felt as I never felt before; however, I took his
+notes, paid my sneaks, and in less than three months was right again,
+and had returned him his money.&nbsp; On paying it to him, I said that
+I had now a lunch which would just suit him, saying that I would give
+it to him - a free gift - for nothing.&nbsp; He swore at me; - telling
+me to keep my Punch, for that he was suited already.&nbsp; I begged
+him to tell me how I could requite him for his kindness, whereupon,
+with the most dreadful oath I ever heard, he bade me come and see him
+hanged when his time was come.&nbsp; I wrung his hand, and told him
+I would, and I kept my word.&nbsp; The night before the day he was hanged
+at H---, I harnessed a Suffolk Punch to my light gig, the same Punch
+which I had offered to him, which I have ever since kept, and which
+brought me and this short young man to Horncastle, and in eleven hours
+I drove that Punch one hundred and ten miles.&nbsp; I arrived at H---
+just in the nick of time.&nbsp; There was the ugly jail - the scaffold
+- and there upon it stood the only friend I ever had in the world.&nbsp;
+Driving my Punch, which was all in a foam, into the midst of the crowd,
+which made way for me as if it knew what I came for, I stood up in my
+gig, took off my hat, and shouted, &lsquo;God Almighty bless you, Jack!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+The dying man turned his pale grim face towards me - for his face was
+always somewhat grim, do you see - nodded and said, or I thought I heard
+him say, &lsquo;All right, old chap.&rsquo;&nbsp; The next moment -
+my eyes water.&nbsp; He had a high heart, got into a scrape whilst in
+the marines, lost his half-pay, took to the turf, ring, gambling, and
+at last cut the throat of a villain who had robbed him of nearly all
+he had.&nbsp; But he had good qualities, and I know for certain that
+he never did half the bad things laid to his charge; for example, he
+never bribed Tom Oliver to fight cross, as it was said he did on the
+day of the awful thunder-storm.&nbsp; Ned Flatnose fairly beat Tom Oliver,
+for though Ned was not what&rsquo;s called a good fighter, he had a
+particular blow, which if he could put in he was sure to win.&nbsp;
+His right shoulder, do you see, was two inches farther back than it
+ought to have been, and consequently his right fist generally fell short;
+but if he could swing himself round, and put in a blow with that right
+arm, he could kill or take away the senses of anybody in the world.&nbsp;
+It was by putting in that blow in his second fight with Spring that
+he beat noble Tom.&nbsp; Spring beat him like a sack in the first battle,
+but in the second Ned Painter - for that was his real name - contrived
+to put in his blow, and took the senses out of Spring; and in like manner
+he took the senses out of Tom Oliver.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, some are born to be hanged, and some are not; and many
+of those who are not hanged are much worse than those who are.&nbsp;
+Jack, with many a good quality, is hanged, whilst that fellow of a lord,
+who wanted to get the horse from you at about two-thirds of his value,
+without a single good quality in the world, is not hanged, and probably
+will remain so.&nbsp; You ask the reason why, perhaps.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll
+tell you; the lack of a certain quality called courage, which Jack possessed
+in abundance, will preserve him; from the love which he bears his own
+neck he will do nothing which can bring him to the gallows.&nbsp; In
+my rough way I&rsquo;ll draw their characters from their childhood,
+and then ask whether Jack was not the best character of the two.&nbsp;
+Jack was a rough, audacious boy, fond of fighting, going a birds&rsquo;-nesting,
+but I never heard he did anything particularly cruel save once, I believe,
+tying a canister to a butcher&rsquo;s dog&rsquo;s tail; whilst this
+fellow of a lord was by nature a savage beast, and when a boy would
+in winter pluck poor fowls naked, and set them running on the ice and
+in the snow, and was particularly fond of burning cats alive in the
+fire.&nbsp; Jack, when a lad, gets a commission on board a ship as an
+officer of horse marines, and in two or three engagements behaves quite
+up to the mark - at least of a marine; the marines having no particular
+character for courage, you know - never having run to the guns and fired
+them like madmen after the blue jackets had had more than enough.&nbsp;
+Oh, dear me, no!&nbsp; My lord gets into the valorous British army,
+where cowardice - Oh, dear me! - is a thing almost entirely unknown;
+and being on the field of Waterloo the day before the battle, falls
+off his horse, and, pretending to be hurt in the back, gets himself
+put on the sick list - a pretty excuse - hurting his back - for not
+being present at such a fight.&nbsp; Old Benbow, after part of both
+his legs had been shot away in a sea-fight, made the carpenter make
+him a cradle to hold his bloody stumps, and continued on deck, cheering
+his men till he died.&nbsp; Jack returns home, and gets into trouble,
+and having nothing to subsist by but his wits, gets his living by the
+ring and the turf, doing many an odd kind of thing, I dare say, but
+not half those laid to his charge.&nbsp; My lord does much the same
+without the excuse for doing so which Jack had, for he had plenty of
+means, is a leg, and a black, only in a more polished way, and with
+more cunning, and I may say success, having done many a rascally thing
+never laid to his charge.&nbsp; Jack at last cuts the throat of a villain
+who had cheated him of all he had in the world, and who, I am told,
+was in many points the counterpart of this screw and white feather,
+is taken up, tried, and executed; and certainly taking away a man&rsquo;s
+life is a dreadful thing; but is there nothing as bad?&nbsp; Whitefeather
+will cut no person&rsquo;s throat - I will not say who has cheated him,
+for, being a cheat himself, he will take good care that nobody cheats
+him, but he&rsquo;ll do something quite as bad; out of envy to a person
+who never injured him, and whom he hates for being more clever and respected
+than himself, he will do all he possibly can, by backbiting and every
+unfair means, to do that person a mortal injury.&nbsp; But Jack is hanged,
+and my lord it not.&nbsp; Is that right?&nbsp; My wife, Mary Fulcher
+- I beg her pardon, Mary Dale - who is a Methodist, and has heard the
+mighty preacher, Peter Williams, says some people are preserved from
+hanging by the grace of God.&nbsp; With her I differs, and says it is
+from want of courage.&nbsp; This Whitefeather, with one particle of
+Jack&rsquo;s courage, and with one tithe of his good qualities, would
+have been hanged long ago, for he has ten times Jack&rsquo;s malignity.&nbsp;
+Jack was hanged because, along with his bad qualities, he had courage
+and generosity; this fellow is not, because with all Jack&rsquo;s bad
+qualities, and many more, amongst which is cunning, he has neither courage
+nor generosity.&nbsp; Think of a fellow like that putting down two hundred
+pounds to relieve a distressed fellow-creature; why he would rob, but
+for the law and the fear it fills him with, a workhouse child of its
+breakfast, as the saying is - and has been heard to say that he would
+not trust his own father for sixpence, and he can&rsquo;t imagine why
+such a thing as credit should be ever given.&nbsp; I never heard a person
+give him a good word - stay, stay, yes!&nbsp; I once heard an old parson,
+to whom I sold a Punch, say that he had the art of receiving company
+gracefully and dismissing them without refreshment.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t
+wish to be too hard with him, and so let him make the most of that compliment.&nbsp;
+Well! he manages to get on, whilst Jack is hanged; not quite enviably,
+however; he has had his rubs, and pretty hard ones - everybody knows
+he slunk from Waterloo, and occasionally checks him with so doing; whilst
+he has been rejected by a woman - what a mortification to the low pride
+of which the scoundrel has plenty!&nbsp; There&rsquo;s a song about
+both circumstances, which may, perhaps, ring in his ears on a dying
+bed.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s a funny kind of song, set to the old tune of the
+Lord-Lieutenant or Deputy, and with it I will conclude my discourse,
+for I really think it&rsquo;s past one.&rdquo;&nbsp; The jockey then,
+with a very tolerable voice, sung the following song:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+THE JOCKEY&rsquo;S SONG.<br>
+<br>
+Now list to a ditty both funny and true! -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along -<br>
+A ditty that tells of a coward and screw,<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+Sir Plume, though not liking a bullet at all, -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along -<br>
+Had yet resolution to go to a <i>ball</i>,<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Woulez wous danser, mademoiselle?&rdquo; -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+Said she, &ldquo;Sir, to dance I should like very well,&rdquo;<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+They danc&rsquo;d to the left, and they danc&rsquo;d to the right, -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+And her troth the fair damsel bestow&rsquo;d on the knight,<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Now what shall I fetch you, mademoiselle?&rdquo; -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+Said she, &ldquo;Sir, an ice I should like very well,&rdquo;<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+But the ice, when he&rsquo;d got it, he instantly ate, -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+Although his poor partner was all in a fret,<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+He ate up the ice like a prudent young lord, -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+For he saw &lsquo;t was the very last ice on the board, -<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Now, when shall we marry?&rdquo; the gentleman cried; -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along; -<br>
+&ldquo;Sir, get you to Jordan,&rdquo; the damsel replied,<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I never will wed with the pitiful elf&rdquo; -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along -<br>
+&ldquo;Who ate up the ice which I wanted myself,&rdquo;<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;d pardon your backing from red Waterloo,&rdquo; -<br>
+Merrily moves the dance along -<br>
+&ldquo;But I never will wed with a coward and screw,&rdquo;<br>
+My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Church.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The next morning I began to think of departing; I had sewed up the money
+which I had received for the horse in a portion of my clothing, where
+I entertained no fears for its safety, with the exception of a small
+sum in notes, gold, and silver, which I carried in my pocket.&nbsp;
+Ere departing, however, I determined to stroll about and examine the
+town, and observe more particularly the humours of the fair than I had
+hitherto an opportunity of doing.&nbsp; The town, when I examined it,
+offered no object worthy of attention but its church - an edifice of
+some antiquity; under the guidance of an old man, who officiated as
+sexton, I inspected its interior attentively, occasionally conversing
+with my guide, who, however, seemed much more disposed to talk about
+horses than the church.&nbsp; &ldquo;No good horses in the fair this
+time, measter,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;none but one brought hither by
+a chap whom nobody knows, and bought by a foreigneering man, who came
+here with Jack Dale.&nbsp; The horse fetched a good swinging price,
+which is said, however, to be much less than its worth; for the horse
+is a regular clipper; not such a one, &lsquo;tis said, has been seen
+in the fair for several summers.&nbsp; Lord Whitefeather says that he
+believes the fellow who brought him to be a highwayman, and talks of
+having him taken up, but Lord Whitefeather is only in a rage because
+he could not get him for himself.&nbsp; The chap would not sell it to
+un; Lord Screw wanted to beat him down, and the chap took huff, said
+he wouldn&rsquo;t sell it to him at no price, and accepted the offer
+of the foreigneering man, or of Jack, who was his &lsquo;terpreter,
+and who scorned to higgle about such a hanimal, because Jack is a gentleman,
+though bred a dickey-boy, whilst t&rsquo;other, though bred a lord,
+is a screw and a whitefeather.&nbsp; Every one says the cove was right,
+and I says so too; I likes spirit, and if the cove were here, and in
+your place, measter, I would invite him to drink a pint of beer.&nbsp;
+Good horses are scarce now, measter, ay, and so are good men, quite
+a different set from what there were when I was young; that was the
+time for men and horses.&nbsp; Lord bless you, I know all the breeders
+about here; they are not a bad set, and they breed a very fairish set
+of horses, but they are not like what their fathers were, nor are their
+horses like their fathers&rsquo; horses.&nbsp; Now there is Mr. - the
+great breeder, a very fairish man, with very fairish horses; but, Lord
+bless you, he&rsquo;s nothing to what his father was, nor his steeds
+to his father&rsquo;s; I ought to know, for I was at the school here
+with his father, and afterwards for many a year helped him to get up
+his horses; that was when I was young, measter - those were the days.&nbsp;
+You look at that monument, measter,&rdquo; said he, as I stopped and
+looked attentively at a monument on the southern side of the church
+near the altar; &ldquo;that was put up for a rector of this church,
+who lived a long time ago, in Oliver&rsquo;s time, and was ill-treated
+and imprisoned by Oliver and his men; you will see all about it on the
+monument.&nbsp; There was a grand battle fought nigh this place, between
+Oliver&rsquo;s men and the Royal party, and the Royal party had the
+worst of it, as I&rsquo;m told they generally had; and Oliver&rsquo;s
+men came into the town, and did a great deal of damage, and ill-treated
+the people.&nbsp; I can&rsquo;t remember anything about the matter myself,
+for it happened just one hundred years before I was born, but my father
+was acquainted with an old countryman, who lived not many miles from
+here, who said he remembered perfectly well the day of the battle; that
+he was a boy at the time, and was working in a field near the place
+where the battle was fought; and heard shouting, and noise of firearms,
+and also the sound of several balls, which fell in the field near him.&nbsp;
+Come this way, measter, and I will show you some remains of that day&rsquo;s
+field.&rdquo;&nbsp; Leaving the monument, on which was inscribed an
+account of the life and sufferings of the Royalist Rector of Horncastle,
+I followed the sexton to the western end of the church, where, hanging
+against the wall, were a number of scythes stuck in the ends of poles.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Those are the weapons, measter,&rdquo; said the sexton, &ldquo;which
+the great people put into the hands of the country folks, in order that
+they might use them against Oliver&rsquo;s men; ugly weapons enough;
+however, Oliver&rsquo;s men won, and Sir Jacob Ashley and his party
+were beat.&nbsp; And a rare time Oliver and his men had of it, till
+Oliver died, when the other party got the better, not by fighting, &lsquo;tis
+said, but through a General Monk, who turned sides.&nbsp; Ah, the old
+fellow that my father knew, said he well remembered the time when General
+Monk went over and proclaimed Charles the Second.&nbsp; Bonfires were
+lighted everywhere, oxen roasted, and beer drunk by pailfuls; the country
+folks were drunk with joy, and something else; sung scurvy songs about
+Oliver to the tune of Barney Banks, and pelted his men, wherever they
+found them, with stones and dirt.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;The more ungrateful
+scoundrels they,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oliver and his men fought
+the battle of English independence against a wretched king and corrupt
+lords.&nbsp; Had I been living at the time, I should have been proud
+to be a trooper of Oliver.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You would, measter, would
+you?&nbsp; Well, I never quarrels with the opinions of people who come
+to look at the church, and certainly independence is a fine thing.&nbsp;
+I like to see a chap of an independent spirit, and if I were now to
+see the cove that refused to sell his horse to my Lord Screw and Whitefeather,
+and let Jack Dale have him, I would offer to treat him to a pint of
+beer - e&rsquo;es, I would, verily.&nbsp; Well, measter, you have now
+seen the church, and all there&rsquo;s in it worth seeing - so I&rsquo;ll
+just lock up, and go and finish digging the grave I was about when you
+came, after which I must go into the fair to see how matters are going
+on.&nbsp; Thank ye, measter,&rdquo; said he, as I put something into
+his hand; &ldquo;thank ye kindly; &lsquo;tis not every one who gives
+me a shilling now-a-days who comes to see the church, but times are
+very different from what they were when I was young; I was not sexton
+then, but something better; helped Mr. - with his horses, and got many
+a broad crown.&nbsp; Those were the days, measter, both for men and
+horses - and I say, measter, if men and horses were so much better when
+I was young than they are now, what, I wonder, must they have been in
+the time of Oliver and his men?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLIV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+An Old Acquaintance.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Leaving the church, I strolled through the fair, looking at the horses,
+listening to the chaffering of the buyers and sellers, and occasionally
+putting in a word of my own, which was not always received with much
+deference; suddenly, however, on a whisper arising that I was the young
+cove who had brought the wonderful horse to the fair which Jack Dale
+had bought for the foreigneering man, I found myself an object of the
+greatest attention; those who had before replied with stuff! and nonsense!
+to what I said, now listened with the greatest eagerness to any nonsense
+I wished to utter, and I did not fail to utter a great deal; presently,
+however, becoming disgusted with the beings about me, I forced my way,
+not very civilly, through my crowd of admirers; and passing through
+an alley and a back street, at last reached an outskirt of the fair,
+where no person appeared to know me.&nbsp; Here I stood, looking vacantly
+on what was going on, musing on the strange infatuation of my species,
+who judge of a person&rsquo;s words, not from their intrinsic merit,
+but from the opinion - generally an erroneous one - which they have
+formed of the person.&nbsp; From this reverie I was roused by certain
+words which sounded near me, uttered in a strange tone, and in a strange
+cadence - the words were, &ldquo;them that finds, wins; and them that
+can&rsquo;t find, loses.&rdquo;&nbsp; Turning my eyes in the direction
+from which the words proceeded, I saw six or seven people, apparently
+all countrymen, gathered round a person standing behind a tall white
+table of very small compass.&nbsp; &ldquo;What!&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;the
+thimble-engro of - Fair here at Horncastle.&rdquo;&nbsp; Advancing nearer,
+however, I perceived that though the present person was a thimble-engro,
+he was a very different one from my old acquaintance of - Fair.&nbsp;
+The present one was a fellow about half-a-foot taller than the other.&nbsp;
+He had a long, haggard, wild face, and was dressed in a kind of jacket,
+something like that of a soldier, with dirty hempen trousers, and with
+a foreign-looking peaked hat on his head.&nbsp; He spoke with an accent
+evidently Irish, and occasionally changed the usual thimble formule,
+&ldquo;them that finds wins, and them that can&rsquo;t - och, sure!
+- they loses;&rdquo; saying also frequently, &ldquo;your honour,&rdquo;
+instead of &ldquo;my lord.&rdquo;&nbsp; I observed, on drawing nearer,
+that he handled the pea and thimble with some awkwardness, like that
+which might be expected from a novice in the trade.&nbsp; He contrived,
+however, to win several shillings, for he did not seem to play for gold,
+from &ldquo;their honours.&rdquo;&nbsp; Awkward, as he was, he evidently
+did his best, and never flung a chance away by permitting any one to
+win.&nbsp; He had just won three shillings from a farmer, who, incensed
+at his loss, was calling him a confounded cheat, and saying that he
+would play no more, when up came my friend of the preceding day, Jack,
+the jockey.&nbsp; This worthy, after looking at the thimble-man a moment
+or two, with a peculiarly crafty glance, cried out, as he clapped down
+a shilling on the table, &ldquo;I will stand you, old fellow!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Them that finds wins; and them that can&rsquo;t - och, sure!
+- they loses,&rdquo; said the thimble-man.&nbsp; The game commenced,
+and Jack took up the thimble without finding the pea; another shilling
+was produced, and lost in the same manner; &ldquo;this is slow work,&rdquo;
+said Jack, banging down a guinea on the table; &ldquo;can you cover
+that, old fellow?&rdquo;&nbsp; The man of the thimble looked at the
+gold, and then at him who produced it, and scratched his head.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Come, cover that, or I shall be off,&rdquo; said the jockey.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Och, sure, my lord! - no, I mean your honour - no, sure, your
+lordship,&rdquo; said the other, &ldquo;if I covers it at all, it must
+be with silver, for divil a bit of gold have I by me.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+then, produce the value in silver,&rdquo; said the jockey, &ldquo;and
+do it quickly, for I can&rsquo;t be staying here all day.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+The thimble-man hesitated, looked at Jack with a dubious look, then
+at the gold, and then scratched his head.&nbsp; There was now a laugh
+amongst the surrounders, which evidently nettled the fellow, who forthwith
+thrust his hand into his pocket, and pulling out all his silver treasure,
+just contrived to place the value of the guinea on the table.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Them that finds wins, and them that can&rsquo;t find - <i>loses</i>,&rdquo;
+interrupted Jack, lifting up a thimble, out of which rolled a pea.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;There, paddy, what do you think of that?&rdquo; said he, seizing
+the heap of silver with one hand, whilst he pocketed the guinea with
+the other.&nbsp; The thimble-engro stood, for some time, like one transfixed,
+his eyes glaring wildly, now at the table, and now at his successful
+customers; at last he said, &ldquo;Arrah, sure, master! - no, I manes
+my lord - you are not going to ruin a poor boy!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Ruin
+you!&rdquo; sail the other; &ldquo;what! by winning a guinea&rsquo;s
+change? a pretty small dodger you - if you have not sufficient capital,
+why do you engage in so deep a trade as thimbling? come, will you stand
+another game?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Och, sure, master, no! the twenty
+shillings and one which you have cheated me of were all I had in the
+world.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Cheated you,&rdquo; said Jack, &ldquo;say
+that again, and I will knock you down.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Arrah! sure,
+master, you knows that the pea under the thimble was not mine; here
+is mine, master; now give me back my money.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;A likely
+thing,&rdquo; said Jack; &ldquo;no, no, I know a trick worth two or
+three of that; whether the pea was yours or mine, you will never have
+your twenty shillings and one again; and if I have ruined you, all the
+better; I&rsquo;d gladly ruin all such villains as you, who ruin poor
+men with your dirty tricks, whom you would knock down and rob on the
+road, if you had but courage; not that I mean to keep your shillings,
+with the exception of the two you cheated from me, which I&rsquo;ll
+keep.&nbsp; A scramble, boys! a scramble!&rdquo; said he, flinging up
+all the silver into the air, with the exception of the two shillings;
+and a scramble there instantly was, between the rustics who had lost
+their money and the urchins who came running up; the poor thimble-engro
+tried likewise to have his share; and though he flung himself down,
+in order to join more effectually in the scramble, he was unable to
+obtain a single sixpence; and having in his rage given some of his fellow-scramblers
+a cuff or two, he was set upon by the boys and country fellows, and
+compelled to make an inglorious retreat with his table, which had been
+flung down in the scuffle, and had one of its legs broken.&nbsp; As
+he retired, the rabble hooted, and Jack, holding up in derision the
+pea with which he had outmanoeuvred him, exclaimed, &ldquo;I always
+carry this in my pocket in order to be a match for vagabonds like you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The tumult over, Jack gone, and the rabble dispersed, I followed the
+discomfited adventurer at a distance, who, leaving the town, went slowly
+on, carrying his dilapidated piece of furniture; till coming to an old
+wall by the roadside, he placed it on the ground, and sat down, seemingly
+in deep despondency, holding his thumb to his mouth.&nbsp; Going nearly
+up to him, I stood still, whereupon he looked up, and perceiving I was
+looking steadfastly at him, he said, in an angry tone, &ldquo;Arrah!
+what for are you staring at me so?&nbsp; By my shoul, I think you are
+one of the thaives who are after robbing me.&nbsp; I think I saw you
+among them, and if I were only sure of it, I would take the liberty
+of trying to give you a big bating.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;You have had
+enough of trying to give people a beating,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;you
+had better be taking your table to some skilful carpenter to get it
+repaired.&nbsp; He will do it for sixpence.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Divil
+a sixpence did you and your thaives leave me,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;and
+if you do not take yourself off, joy, I will be breaking your ugly head
+with the foot of it.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Arrah, Murtagh!&rdquo; said
+I, &ldquo;would ye be breaking the head of your friend and scholar,
+to whom you taught the blessed tongue of Oilien nan Naomha, in exchange
+for a pack of cards?&rdquo;&nbsp; Murtagh, for he it was, gazed at me
+for a moment with a bewildered look; then, with a gleam of intelligence
+in his eye, he said, &ldquo;Shorsha! no, it can&rsquo;t be - yes, by
+my faith it is!&rdquo;&nbsp; Then, springing up, and seizing me by the
+hand, he said, &ldquo;Yes, by the powers, sure enough it is Shorsha
+agra!&nbsp; Arrah, Shorsha! where have you been this many a day?&nbsp;
+Sure, you are not one of the spalpeens who are after robbing me?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Not I,&rdquo; I replied, &ldquo;but I saw all that happened.&nbsp;
+Come, you must not take matters so to heart; cheer up; such things will
+happen in connection with the trade you have taken up.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Sorrow befall the trade, and the thief who taught it me,&rdquo;
+said Murtagh; &ldquo;and yet the trade is not a bad one, if I only knew
+more of it, and had some one to help and back me.&nbsp; Och! the idea
+of being cheated and bamboozled by that one-eyed thief in the horseman&rsquo;s
+dress.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Let bygones be bygones, Murtagh,&rdquo; said
+I; &ldquo;it is no use grieving for the past; sit down, and let us have
+a little pleasant gossip.&nbsp; Arrah, Murtagh! when I saw you sitting
+under the wall, with your thumb to your mouth, it brought to my mind
+tales which you used to tell me all about Finn-ma-Coul.&nbsp; You have
+not forgotten Finn-ma-Coul, Murtagh, and how he sucked wisdom out of
+his thumb.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Sorrow a bit have I forgot about him,
+Shorsha,&rdquo; said Murtagh, as we sat down together, &ldquo;nor what
+you yourself told me about the snake.&nbsp; Arrah, Shorsha! what ye
+told me about the snake, bates anything I ever told you about Finn.&nbsp;
+Ochone, Shorsha! perhaps you will be telling me about the snake once
+more?&nbsp; I think the tale would do me good, and I have need of comfort,
+God knows, ochone!&rdquo;&nbsp; Seeing Murtagh in such a distressed
+plight, I forthwith told him over again the tale of the snake, in precisely
+the same words as I have related it in the first part of this history.&nbsp;
+After which, I said, &ldquo;Now, Murtagh, tit for tat; ye will be telling
+me one of the old stories of Finn-ma-Coul.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Och,
+Shorsha!&nbsp; I haven&rsquo;t heart enough,&rdquo; said Murtagh.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Thank you for your tale, but it makes me weep; it brings to my
+mind Dungarvon times of old - I mean the times we were at school together.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Cheer up, man,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and let&rsquo;s have the
+story, and let it be about Ma-Coul and the salmon and his thumb.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Arrah, Shorsha!&nbsp; I can&rsquo;t.&nbsp; Well, to oblige you,
+I&rsquo;ll give it you.&nbsp; Well, you know Ma-Coul was an exposed
+child, and came floating over the salt sea in a chest which was cast
+ashore at Veintry Bay.&nbsp; In the corner of that bay was a castle,
+where dwelt a giant and his wife, very respectable and decent people,
+and this giant, taking his morning walk along the bay, came to the place
+where the child had been cast ashore in his box.&nbsp; Well, the giant
+looked at the child, and being filled with compassion for his exposed
+state, took the child up in his box, and carried him home to his castle,
+where he and his wife, being dacent respectable people, as I telled
+ye before, fostered the child and took care of him, till he became old
+enough to go out to service and gain his livelihood, when they bound
+him out apprentice to another giant, who lived in a castle up the country,
+at some distance from the bay.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;This giant, whose name was Darmod David Odeen, was not a respectable
+person at all, but a big old vagabond.&nbsp; He was twice the size of
+the other giant, who, though bigger than any man, was not a big giant;
+for, as there are great and small men, so there are great and small
+giants - I mean some are small when compared with the others.&nbsp;
+Well, Finn served this giant a considerable time, doing all kinds of
+hard and unreasonable service for him, and receiving all kinds of hard
+words, and many a hard knock and kick to boot - sorrow befall the old
+vagabond who could thus ill-treat a helpless foundling.&nbsp; It chanced
+that one day the giant caught a salmon, near a salmon-leap upon his
+estate - for, though a big ould blackguard, he was a person of considerable
+landed property, and high sheriff for the county Cork.&nbsp; Well, the
+giant brings home the salmon by the gills, and delivers it to Finn,
+telling him to roast it for the giant&rsquo;s dinner; &lsquo;but take
+care, ye young blackguard,&rsquo; he added, &lsquo;that in roasting
+it - and I expect ye to roast it well - you do not let a blister come
+upon its nice satin skin, for if ye do, I will cut the head off your
+shoulders.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,&rsquo; thinks Finn, &lsquo;this
+is a hard task; however, as I have done many hard tasks for him, I will
+try and do this too, though I was never set to do anything yet half
+so difficult.&rsquo;&nbsp; So he prepared his fire, and put his gridiron
+upon it, and lays the salmon fairly and softly upon the gridiron, and
+then he roasts it, turning it from one side to the other just in the
+nick of time, before the soft satin skin could be blistered.&nbsp; However,
+on turning it over the eleventh time - and twelve would have settled
+the business - he found he had delayed a little bit of time too long
+in turning it over, and that there was a small, tiny blister on the
+soft outer skin.&nbsp; Well, Finn was in a mighty panic, remembering
+the threats of the ould giant; however, he did not lose heart, but clapped
+his thumb upon the blister in order to smooth it down.&nbsp; Now the
+salmon, Shorsha, was nearly done, and the flesh thoroughly hot, so Finn&rsquo;s
+thumb was scalt, and he, clapping it to his mouth, sucked it, in order
+to draw out the pain, and in a moment - hubbuboo! - became imbued with
+all the wisdom of the world.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Stop, Murtagh! stop!<br>
+<br>
+<i>Murtagh</i>.&nbsp; All the witchcraft, Shorsha.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; How wonderful!<br>
+<br>
+<i>Murtagh</i>.&nbsp; Was it not, Shorsha?&nbsp; The salmon, do you
+see, was a fairy salmon.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; What a strange coincidence<br>
+<br>
+<i>Murtagh</i>.&nbsp; A what, Shorsha?<br>
+<br>
+<i>Myself</i>.&nbsp; Why, that the very same tale should be told of
+Finn-ma-Coul, which is related of Sigurd Fafnisbane.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What thief was that, Shorsha?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Thief!&nbsp; &lsquo;Tis true, he took the treasure of Fafnir.&nbsp;
+Sigurd was the hero of the North, Murtagh, even as Finn is the great
+hero of Ireland.&nbsp; He, too, according to one account, was an exposed
+child, and came floating in a casket to a wild shore, where he was suckled
+by a hind, and afterwards found and fostered by Mimir, a fairy blacksmith;
+he, too, sucked wisdom from a burn.&nbsp; According to the Edda, he
+burnt his finger whilst feeling of the heart of Fafnir, which he was
+roasting, and putting it into his mouth in order to suck out the pain,
+became imbued with all the wisdom of the world, the knowledge of the
+language of birds, and what not.&nbsp; I have heard you tell the tale
+of Finn a dozen times in the blessed days of old, but its identity with
+the tale of Sigurd never occurred to me till now.&nbsp; It is true,
+when I knew you of old, I had never read the tale of Sigurd, and have
+since almost dismissed matters of Ireland from my mind; but as soon
+as you told me again about Finn&rsquo;s burning his finger, the coincidence
+struck me.&nbsp; I say, Murtagh, the Irish owe much to the Danes - &rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Devil a bit, Shorsha, do they owe to the thaives, except many
+a bloody bating and plundering, which they never paid them back.&nbsp;
+Och, Shorsha! you, edicated in ould Ireland, to say that the Irish owes
+anything good to the plundering villains - the Siol Loughlin.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;They owe them half their traditions, Murtagh, and amongst others,
+Finn-ma-Coul and the burnt finger; and if ever I publish the Loughlin
+songs, I&rsquo;ll tell the world so.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But, Shorsha, the world will never believe ye - to say nothing
+of the Irish part of it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then the world, Murtagh - to say nothing of the Irish part of
+it - will be a fool, even as I have often thought it; the grand thing,
+Murtagh, is to be able to believe oneself, and respect oneself.&nbsp;
+How few whom the world believes believe and respect themselves.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Och, Shorsha! shall I go on with the tale of Finn?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;d rather you should not, Murtagh; I know all about it
+already.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then why did you bother me to tell it at first, Shorsha?&nbsp;
+Och, it was doing my ownself good, and making me forget my own sorrowful
+state, when ye interrupted me with your thaives of Danes!&nbsp; Och,
+Shorsha! let me tell you how Finn, by means of sucking his thumb, and
+the witchcraft he imbibed from it, contrived to pull off the arm of
+the ould wagabone, Darmod David Odeen, whilst shaking hands with him
+- for Finn could do no feat of strength without sucking his thumb, Shorsha,
+as Conan the Bald told the son of Oisin in the song which I used to
+sing ye in Dungarvon times of old;&rdquo; and here Murtagh repeated
+certain Irish words to the following effect: -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;O little the foolish words I heed<br>
+O Oisin&rsquo;s son, from thy lips which come;<br>
+No strength were in Finn for valorous deed,<br>
+Unless to the gristle he suck&rsquo;d his thumb.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Enough is as good as a feast, Murtagh, I am no longer in the
+cue for Finn.&nbsp; I would rather hear your own history.&nbsp; Now
+tell us, man, all that has happened to ye since Dungarvon times of old?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Och, Shorsha, it would be merely bringing all my sorrows back
+upon me!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, if I know all your sorrows, perhaps I shall be able to
+find a help for them.&nbsp; I owe you much, Murtagh; you taught me Irish,
+and I will do all I can to help you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why, then, Shorsha, I&rsquo;ll tell ye my history.&nbsp; Here
+goes!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Murtagh&rsquo;s Tale.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, Shorsha, about a year and a half after you left us - and
+a sorrowful hour for us it was when ye left us, losing, as we did, your
+funny stories of your snake - and the battles of your military - they
+sent me to Paris and Salamanca, in order to make a saggart of me.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pray excuse me,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;for interrupting you, but
+what kind of place is Salamanca?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Divil a bit did I ever see of it, Shorsha!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then why did ye say ye were sent there?&nbsp; Well, what kind
+of place is Paris?&nbsp; Not that I care much about Paris.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Sorrow a bit did I ever see of either them, Shorsha, for no one
+sent me to either.&nbsp; When we says at home a person is going to Paris
+and Salamanca, it manes that he is going abroad to study to be a saggart,
+whether he goes to them places or not.&nbsp; No, I never saw either
+- bad luck to them - I was shipped away from Cork up the straits to
+a place called Leghorn, from which I was sent to - to a religious house,
+where I was to be instructed in saggarting till they had made me fit
+to cut a dacent figure in Ireland.&nbsp; We had a long and tedious voyage,
+Shorsha; not so tedious, however, as it would have been had I been fool
+enough to lave your pack of cards behind me, as the thaif, my brother
+Denis, wanted to persuade me to do, in order that he might play with
+them himself.&nbsp; With the cards I managed to have many a nice game
+with the sailors, winning from them ha&rsquo;pennies and sixpences until
+the captain said I was ruining his men, and keeping them from their
+duty; and, being a heretic and a Dutchman, swore that unless I gave
+over he would tie me up to the mast and give me a round dozen.&nbsp;
+This threat obliged me to be more on my guard, though I occasionally
+contrived to get a game at night, and to win sixpennies and ha&rsquo;pennies.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;We reached Leghorn at last, and glad I was to leave the ship
+and the master, who gave me a kick as I was getting over the side, bad
+luck to the dirty heretic for kicking a son of the church, for I have
+always been a true son of the church, Shorsha, and never quarrelled
+with it unless it interfered with me in my playing at cards.&nbsp; I
+left Leghorn with certain muleteers, with whom I played at cards at
+the baiting-houses, and who speedily won from me all the ha&rsquo;pennies
+and sixpences I had won from the sailors.&nbsp; I got my money&rsquo;s
+worth, however, for I learnt from the muleteers all kind of quaint tricks
+upon the cards, which I knew nothing of before; so I did not grudge
+them what they chated me of, and when we parted we did so in kindness
+on both sides.&nbsp; On getting to - I was received into the religious
+house for Irishes.&nbsp; It was the Irish house, Shorsha, into which
+I was taken, for I do not wish ye to suppose that I was in the English
+religious house which there is in that city, in which a purty set are
+educated, and in which purty doings are going on if all tales be true.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In this Irish house I commenced my studies, learning to sing
+and to read the Latin prayers of the church.&nbsp; &lsquo;Faith, Shorsha,
+many&rsquo;s the sorrowful day I passed in that house learning the prayers
+and litanies, being half-starved, with no earthly diversion at all,
+at all; until I took the cards out of my chest and began instructing
+in card-playing the chum which I had with me in my cell; then I had
+plenty of diversion along with him during the times when I was not engaged
+in singing, and chanting, and saying the prayers of the church; there
+was, however, some drawback in playing with my chum, for though he was
+very clever in learning, divil a sixpence had he to play with, in which
+respect he was like myself, the master who taught him, who had lost
+all my money to the muleteers who taught me the tricks upon the cards;
+by degrees, however, it began to be noised about the religious house
+that Murtagh, from Hibrodary, <a name="citation1"></a><a href="#footnote1">{1}</a>
+had a pack of cards with which he played with his chum in the cell;
+whereupon other scholars of the religious house came to me, some to
+be taught and others to play, so with some I played, and others I taught,
+but neither to those who could play, or to those who could not, did
+I teach the elegant tricks which I learnt from the muleteers.&nbsp;
+Well, the scholars came to me for the sake of the cards, and the porter
+and cook of the religious house, who could both play very well, came
+also; at last I became tired of playing for nothing, so I borrowed a
+few bits of silver from the cook, and played against the porter, and
+by means of my tricks I won money from the porter, and then I paid the
+cook the bits of silver which I had borrowed of him; and played with
+him, and won a little of his money, which I let him win back again,
+as I had lived long enough in a religious house to know that it is dangerous
+to take money from the cook.&nbsp; In a little time, Shorsha, there
+was scarcely anything going on in the house but card-playing; the almoner
+played with me, and so did the sub-rector, and I won money from both;
+not too much, however, lest they should tell the rector, who had the
+character of a very austere man, and of being a bit of a saint; however,
+the thief of a porter, whose money I had won, informed the rector of
+what was going on, and one day the rector sent for me into his private
+apartment, and gave me so long and pious a lecture upon the heinous
+sin of card-playing, that I thought I should sink into the ground; after
+about half-an-hour&rsquo;s inveighing against card-playing, he began
+to soften his tone, and with a long sigh told me that at one time of
+his life he had been a young man himself, and had occasionally used
+the cards; he then began to ask me some questions about card-playing,
+which questions I afterwards found were to pump from me what I knew
+about the science.&nbsp; After a time he asked me whether I had got
+my cards with me, and on my telling him I had, he expressed a wish to
+see them, whereupon I took the pack out of my pocket, and showed it
+to him; he looked at it very attentively, and at last, giving another
+deep sigh, he said, that though he was nearly weaned from the vanities
+of the world, he had still an inclination to see whether he had entirely
+lost the little skill which at one time he possessed.&nbsp; When I heard
+him speak in this manner, I told him that if his reverence was inclined
+for a game of cards, I should be very happy to play one with him; scarcely
+had I uttered these words than he gave a third sigh, and looked so very
+much like a saint that I was afraid he was going to excommunicate me.&nbsp;
+Nothing of the kind, however, for presently he gets up and locks the
+door, then sitting down at the table, he motioned me to do the same,
+which I did, and in five minutes we were playing at cards, his reverence
+and myself.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I soon found that his reverence knew quite as much about card-playing
+as I did.&nbsp; Divil a trick was there connected with cards that his
+reverence did not seem awake to.&nbsp; As, however, we were not playing
+for money, this circumstance did not give me much uneasiness; so we
+played game after game for two hours, when his reverence, having business,
+told me I might go, so I took up my cards, make my obedience, and left
+him.&nbsp; The next day I had other games with him, and so on for a
+very long time, still playing for nothing.&nbsp; At last his reverence
+grew tired of playing for nothing, and proposed that we should play
+for money.&nbsp; Now, I had no desire to play with his reverence for
+money, as I knew that doing so would bring on a quarrel.&nbsp; As long
+as we were playing for nothing, I could afford to let his reverence
+use what tricks he pleased; but if we played for money, I couldn&rsquo;t
+do so.&nbsp; If he played his tricks, I must play mine, and use every
+advantage to save my money; and there was one I possessed which his
+reverence did not.&nbsp; The cards being my own, I had put some delicate
+little marks on the trump cards, just at the edges, so that when I dealt,
+by means of a little sleight of hand, I could deal myself any trump
+card I pleased.&nbsp; But I wished, as I said before, to have no dealings
+for money with his reverence, knowing that he was master in the house,
+and that he could lead me a dog of a life if I offended him, either
+by winning his money, or not letting him win mine.&nbsp; So I told him
+I had no money to play with, but the ould thief knew better; he knew
+that I was every day winning money from the scholars, and the sub-rector,
+and the other people of the house, and the ould thaif had determined
+to let me go on in that way winning money, and then by means of his
+tricks, which he thought I dare not resent, to win from me all my earnings
+- in a word, Shorsha, to let me fill myself like a sponge, and then
+squeeze me for his own advantage.&nbsp; So he made me play with him,
+and in less than three days came on the quarrel; his reverence chated
+me, and I chated his reverence; the ould thaif knew every trick that
+I knew, and one or two more; but in daling out the cards I nicked his
+reverence; scarcely a trump did I ever give him, Shorsha, and won his
+money purty freely.&nbsp; Och, it was a purty quarrel!&nbsp; All the
+delicate names in the &lsquo;Newgate Calendar,&rsquo; if ye ever heard
+of such a book; all the hang-dog names in the Newgate histories, and
+the lives of Irish rogues, did we call each other - his reverence and
+I!&nbsp; Suddenly, however, putting out his hand, he seized the cards,
+saying, &lsquo;I will examine these cards, ye cheating scoundrel! for
+I believe there are dirty marks on them, which ye have made in order
+to know the winning cards.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Give me back my pack,&rsquo;
+said I, &lsquo;or m&rsquo;anam on Dioul if I be not the death of ye!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+His reverence, however, clapped the cards into his pocket, and made
+the best of his way to the door, I hanging upon him.&nbsp; He was a
+gross, fat man, but, like most fat men, deadly strong, so he forced
+his way to the door, and, opening it, flung himself out, with me still
+holding on him like a terrier dog on a big fat pig; then he shouts for
+help, and in a little time I was secured and thrust into a lock-up room,
+where I was left to myself.&nbsp; Here was a purty alteration.&nbsp;
+Yesterday I was the idol of the religious house, thought more on than
+his reverence, every one paying me court and wurtship, and wanting to
+play cards with me, and to learn my tricks, and fed, moreover, on the
+tidbits of the table; and to-day I was in a cell, nobody coming to look
+at me but the blackguard porter who had charge of me, my cards taken
+from me, and with nothing but bread and water to live upon.&nbsp; Time
+passed dreary enough for a month, at the end of which time his reverence
+came to me, leaving the porter just outside the door in order to come
+to his help should I be violent; and then he read me a very purty lecture
+on my conduct, saying I had turned the religious house topsy-turvy,
+and corrupted the scholars, and that I was the cheat of the world, for
+that on inspecting the pack he had discovered the dirty marks which
+I had made upon the trump cards for to know them by.&nbsp; He said a
+great deal more to me, which is not worth relating, and ended by telling
+me that he intended to let me out of confinement next day, but that
+if ever I misconducted myself any more, he would clap me in again for
+the rest of my life.&nbsp; I had a good mind to call him an ould thaif,
+but the hope of getting out made me hold my tongue, and the next day
+I was let out; and need enough I had to be let out, for what with being
+alone, and living on bread and water, I was becoming frighted, or, as
+the doctors call it, narvous.&nbsp; But when I was out - oh, what a
+change I found in the religious house! no card-playing, for it had been
+forbidden to the scholars, and there was now nothing going on but reading
+and singing; divil a merry visage to be seen, but plenty of prim airs
+and graces; but the case of the scholars, though bad enough, was not
+half so bad as mine, for they could spake to each other, whereas I could
+not have a word of conversation, for the ould thaif of a rector had
+ordered them to send me to &lsquo;Coventry,&rsquo; telling them that
+I was a gambling cheat, with morals bad enough to corrupt a horse regiment;
+and whereas they were allowed to divert themselves with going out, I
+was kept reading and singing from morn till night.&nbsp; The only soul
+who was willing to exchange a word with me was the cook, and sometimes
+he and I had a little bit of discourse in a corner, and we condoled
+with each other, for he liked the change in the religious house almost
+as little as myself; but he told me that, for all the change below stairs,
+there was still card-playing on above, for that the ould thaif of a
+rector, and the sub-rector, and the almoner played at cards together,
+and that the rector won money from the others - the almoner had told
+him so - and, moreover, that the rector was the thaif of the world,
+and had once been kicked out of a club-house at Dublin for cheating
+at cards, and after that circumstance had apparently reformed and lived
+decently till the time when I came to the religious house with my pack,
+but that the sight of that had brought him back to his ould gambling.&nbsp;
+He told the cook, moreover, that the rector frequently went out at night
+to the houses of the great clergy and cheated at cards.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In this melancholy state, with respect to myself, things continued
+a long time, when suddenly there was a report that his Holiness the
+Pope intended to pay a visit to the religious house in order to examine
+into its discipline.&nbsp; When I heard this I was glad, for I determined
+after the Pope had done what he had come to do, to fall upon my knees
+before him, and make a regular complaint of the treatment I had received,
+to tell him of the cheating at cards of the rector, and to beg him to
+make the ould thaif give me back my pack again.&nbsp; So the day of
+the visit came, and his Holiness made his appearance with his attendants,
+and, having looked over the religious house, he went into the rector&rsquo;s
+room with the rector, the sub-rector, and the almoner.&nbsp; I intended
+to have waited until his Holiness came out, but finding he stayed a
+long time I thought I would e&rsquo;en go into him, so I went up to
+the door without anybody observing me - his attendants being walking
+about the corridor - and opening it I slipped in, and there what do
+you think I saw?&nbsp; Why, his Holiness the Pope, and his reverence
+the rector, and the sub-rector, and the almoner seated at cards; and
+the ould thaif of a rector was dealing out the cards which ye had given
+me, Shorsha, to his Holiness the Pope, the sub-rector, the almoner,
+and himself.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+In this part of his history I interrupted Murtagh, saying that I was
+afraid he was telling untruths, and that it was highly improbable that
+the Pope would leave the Vatican to play cards with Irish at their religious
+house, and that I was sure, if on his, Murtagh&rsquo;s authority, I
+were to tell the world so, the world would never believe it.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Then the world, Shorsha, would be a fool, even as you were just
+now saying you had frequently believed it to be; the grand thing, Shorsha,
+is to be able to believe oneself; if ye can do that, it matters very
+little whether the world believe ye or no.&nbsp; But a purty thing for
+you and the world to stickle at the Pope&rsquo;s playing at cards at
+a religious house of Irish; och! if I were to tell you and the world,
+what the Pope has been sometimes at, at the religious house of English
+thaives, I would excuse you and the world for turning up your eyes.&nbsp;
+However, I wish to say nothing against the Pope.&nbsp; I am a son of
+the church, and if the Pope don&rsquo;t interfere with my cards, divil
+a bit will I have to say against him; but I saw the Pope playing, or
+about to play, with the pack which had been taken from me, and when
+I told the Pope, the Pope did not - Ye had better let me go on with
+my history, Shorsha; whether you or the world believe it or not, I am
+sure it is quite as true as your tale of the snake, or saying that Finn
+got his burnt finger from the thaives of Loughlin; and whatever you
+may say, I am sure the world will think so too.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I apologized to Murtagh for interrupting him, and telling him that his
+history, whether true or not, was infinitely diverting, begged him to
+continue it.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLVI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Murtagh&rsquo;s Story continued - The Priest, Exorcist, and Thimble-engro
+- How to Check a Rebellion.<br>
+<br>
+I was telling ye, Shorsha, when ye interrupted me, that I found the
+Pope, the rector, the sub-rector, and the almoner seated at the table,
+the rector with my pack of cards in his hands, about to deal out to
+the Pope and the rest, not forgetting himself, for whom he intended
+all the trump-cards, no doubt.&nbsp; No sooner did they perceive me
+than they seemed taken all aback; but the rector, suddenly starting
+up with the cards in his hand, asked me what I did there, threatening
+to have me well disciplined if I did not go about my business; &lsquo;I
+am come for my pack,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;ye ould thaif, and to tell
+his Holiness how I have been treated by ye;&rsquo; then going down on
+my knees before his Holiness, I said, &lsquo;Arrah, now, your Holiness!
+will ye not see justice done to a poor boy who has been sadly misused?&nbsp;
+The pack of cards which that old ruffian has in his hand are my cards,
+which he has taken from me, in order to chate with.&nbsp; Arrah! don&rsquo;t
+play with him, your Holiness, for he&rsquo;ll only chate ye - there
+are dirty marks upon the cards which bear the trumps, put there in order
+to know them by; and the ould thaif in daling out will give himself
+all the good cards, and chate ye of the last farthing in your pocket;
+so let them be taken from him, your Holiness, and given back to me;
+and order him to lave the room, and then, if your Holiness be for an
+honest game, don&rsquo;t think I am the boy to baulk ye.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll
+take the old ruffian&rsquo;s place, and play with ye till evening, and
+all night besides, and divil an advantage will I take of the dirty marks,
+though I know them all, having placed them on the cards myself.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I was going on in this way when the ould thaif of a rector, flinging
+down the cards, made at me as if to kick me out of the room, whereupon
+I started up and said, &lsquo;If ye are for kicking, sure two can play
+at that;&rsquo; and then I kicked at his reverence, and his reverence
+at me, and there was a regular scrimmage between us, which frightened
+the Pope, who, getting up, said some words which I did not understand,
+but which the cook afterwards told me were, &lsquo;English extravagance,
+and this is the second edition;&rsquo; for it seems that, a little time
+before, his Holiness had been frightened in St. Peter&rsquo;s Church
+by the servant of an English family, which those thaives of the English
+religious house had been endeavouring to bring over to the Catholic
+faith, and who didn&rsquo;t approve of their being converted.&nbsp;
+Och! his Holiness did us all sore injustice to call us English, and
+to confound our house with the other; for however dirty our house might
+be, our house was a clane house compared with the English house, and
+we honest people compared with those English thaives.&nbsp; Well, his
+Holiness was frighted, and the almoner ran out, and brought in his Holiness&rsquo;s
+attendants, and they laid hold of me, but I struggled hard, and said,
+&lsquo;I will not go without my pack; arrah, your Holiness! make them
+give me my pack, which Shorsha gave me in Dungarvon times of old;&rsquo;
+but my struggles were of no use.&nbsp; I was pulled away and put out
+in the ould dungeon, and his Holiness went away sore frighted, crossing
+himself much, and never returned again.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;In the old dungeon I was fastened to the wall by a chain, and
+there I was disciplined once every other day for the first three weeks,
+and then I was left to myself, and my chain, and hunger; and there I
+sat in the dungeon, sometimes screeching, sometimes hallooing, for I
+soon became frighted, having nothing in the cell to divert me.&nbsp;
+At last the cook found his way to me by stealth, and comforted me a
+little, bringing me tidbits out of the kitchen; and he visited me again
+and again - not often, however, for he dare only come when he could
+steal away the key from the custody of the thaif of a porter.&nbsp;
+I was three years in the dungeon, and should have gone mad but for the
+cook, and his words of comfort, and his tidbits, and nice books which
+he brought me out of the library, which were the &lsquo;Calendars of
+Newgate,&rsquo; and the &lsquo;Lives of Irish Rogues and Raparees,&rsquo;
+the only English books in the library.&nbsp; However, at the end of
+three years, the ould thaif of a rector, wishing to look at them books,
+missed them from the library, and made a perquisition about them, and
+the thaif of a porter said that he shouldn&rsquo;t wonder if I had them;
+saying that he had once seen me reading; and then the rector came with
+others to my cell, and took my books from me, from under my straw, and
+asked me how I came by them; and on my refusal to tell, they disciplined
+me again till the blood ran down my back; and making more perquisition
+they at last accused the cook of having carried the books to me, and
+not denying, he was given warning to leave next day, but he left that
+night, and took me away with him; for he stole the key, and came to
+me and cut my chain through, and then he and I escaped from the religious
+house through a window - the cook with a bundle, containing what things
+he had.&nbsp; No sooner had we got out than the honest cook gave me
+a little bit of money and a loaf, and told me to follow a way which
+he pointed out, which he said would lead to the sea; and then, having
+embraced me after the Italian way, he left me, and I never saw him again.&nbsp;
+So I followed the way which the cook pointed out, and in two days reached
+a seaport called Chiviter Vik, terribly foot-foundered, and there I
+met a sailor who spoke Irish, and who belonged to a vessel just ready
+to sail for France; and the sailor took me on board his vessel, and
+said I was his brother, and the captain gave me a passage to a place
+in France called Marseilles; and when I got there, the captain and sailor
+got a little money for me and a passport, and I travelled across the
+country towards a place they directed me to called Bayonne, from which
+they said I might, perhaps, get to Ireland.&nbsp; Coming, however, to
+a place called Pau, all my money being gone, I enlisted into a regiment
+called the Army of the Faith, which was going into Spain, for the King
+of Spain had been dethroned and imprisoned by his own subjects, as perhaps
+you may have heard; and the King of France, who was his cousin, was
+sending an army to help him, under the command of his own son, whom
+the English called Prince Hilt, because when he was told that he was
+appointed to the command, he clapped his hand on the hilt of his sword.&nbsp;
+So I enlisted into the regiment of the Faith, which was made up of Spaniards,
+many of them priests who had run out of Spain, and broken Germans, and
+foot-foundered Irish, like myself.&nbsp; It was said to be a blackguard
+regiment, that same regiment of the Faith; but, &lsquo;faith, I saw
+nothing blackguardly going on in it, for you would hardly reckon card-playing
+and dominoes, and pitch and toss blackguardly, and I saw nothing else
+in it.&nbsp; There was one thing in it which I disliked - the priests
+drawing their Spanish knives occasionally, when they lost their money.&nbsp;
+After we had been some time at Pau, the army of the Faith was sent across
+the mountains into Spain, as the vanguard of the French; and no sooner
+did the Spaniards see the Faith than they made a dash at it, and the
+Faith ran away, myself along with it, and got behind the French army,
+which told it to keep there, and the Faith did so, and followed the
+French army, which soon scattered the Spaniards, and in the end placed
+the king on his throne again.&nbsp; When the war was over the Faith
+was disbanded; some of the foreigners, however, amongst whom I was one,
+were put into a Guard regiment, and there I continued for more than
+a year.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;One day, being at a place called the Escurial, I took stock,
+as the tradesmen say, and found I possessed the sum of eighty dollars
+won by playing at cards, for though I could not play so well with the
+foreign cards as with the pack you gave me, Shorsha, I had yet contrived
+to win money from the priests and soldiers of the Faith.&nbsp; Finding
+myself possessed of such a capital, I determined to leave the service,
+and to make the best of my way to Ireland; so I deserted, but coming
+in an evil hour to a place they calls Torre Lodones, I found the priest
+playing at cards with his parishioners.&nbsp; The sight of the cards
+made me stop, and then, fool like, notwithstanding the treasure I had
+about me, I must wish to play, so not being able to speak their language,
+I made signs to them to let me play, and the priest and his thaives
+consented willingly; so I sat down to cards with the priest and two
+of his parishioners, and in a little time had won plenty of their money,
+but I had better never have done any such thing, for suddenly the priest
+and all his parishioners set upon me and bate me, and took from me all
+I had, and cast me out of the village more dead than alive.&nbsp; Och!
+it&rsquo;s a bad village that, and if I had known what it was I would
+have avoided it, or run straight through it, though I saw all the card-playing
+in the world going on in it.&nbsp; There is a proverb about it, as I
+was afterwards told, old as the time of the Moors, which holds good
+to the present day - it is, that in Torre Lodones there are twenty-four
+housekeepers, and twenty-five thieves, maning that all the people are
+thaives, and the clergyman to boot, who is not reckoned a housekeeper;
+and troth I found the clergyman the greatest thaif of the lot.&nbsp;
+After being cast out of that village I travelled for nearly a month,
+subsisting by begging tolerably well, for though most of the Spanish
+are thaives, they are rather charitable; but though charitable thaives
+they do not like their own being taken from them without leave being
+asked, as I found to my cost; for on my entering a garden near Seville,
+without leave, to take an orange, the labourer came running up and struck
+me to the ground with a hatchet, giving me a big wound in the arm.&nbsp;
+I fainted with loss of blood, and on reviving I found myself in a hospital
+at Seville, to which the labourer and the people of the village had
+taken me.&nbsp; I should have died of starvation in that hospital had
+not some English people heard of me and come to see me; they tended
+me with food till I was cured, and then paid my passage on board a ship
+to London, to which place the ship carried me.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And now I was in London with five shillings in my pocket - all
+I had in the world - and that did not last for long; and when it was
+gone I begged in the streets, but I did not get much by that, except
+a month&rsquo;s hard labour in the correction-house; and when I came
+out I knew not what to do, but thought I would take a walk in the country,
+for it was spring-time, and the weather was fine, so I took a walk about
+seven miles from London, and came to a place where a great fair was
+being held; and there I begged, but got nothing but a halfpenny, and
+was thinking of going farther, when I saw a man with a table, like that
+of mine, playing with thimbles, as you saw me.&nbsp; I looked at the
+play, and saw him win money, and run away, and hunted by constables
+more than once.&nbsp; I kept following the man, and at last entered
+into conversation with him; and learning from him that he was in want
+of a companion to help him, I offered to help him if he would pay me;
+he looked at me from top to toe, and did not wish at first to have anything
+to do with me, as he said my appearance was against me.&nbsp; &lsquo;Faith,
+Shorsha, he had better have looked at home, for his appearance was not
+much in his favour: he looked very much like a Jew, Shorsha.&nbsp; However,
+he at last agreed to take me to be his companion, or bonnet as he called
+it; and I was to keep a look-out, and let him know when constables were
+coming, and to spake a good word for him occasionally, whilst he was
+chating folks with his thimbles and his pea.&nbsp; So I became his bonnet,
+and assisted him in the fair, and in many other fairs beside; but I
+did not like my occupation much, or rather my master, who, though not
+a big man, was a big thaif, and an unkind one, for do all I could I
+could never give him pleasure; and he was continually calling me fool
+and bogtrotter, and twitting me because I could not learn his thaives&rsquo;
+Latin, and discourse with him in it, and comparing me with another acquaintance,
+or bit of a pal of his, whom he said he had parted with in the fair,
+and of whom he was fond of saying all kinds of wonderful things, amongst
+others, that he knew the grammar of all tongues.&nbsp; At last, wearied
+with being twitted by him with not being able to learn his thaives&rsquo;
+Greek, I proposed that I should teach him Irish, that we should spake
+it together when we had anything to say in secret.&nbsp; To that he
+consented willingly; but, och! a purty hand he made with Irish, &lsquo;faith,
+not much better than I did with his thaives&rsquo; Hebrew.&nbsp; Then
+my turn came, and I twitted him nicely with dulness, and compared him
+with a pal that I had in ould Ireland, in Dungarvon times of yore, to
+whom I teached Irish, telling him that he was the broth of a boy, and
+not only knew the grammar of all human tongues, but the dialects of
+the snakes besides; in fact, I tould him all about your own sweet self,
+Shorsha, and many a dispute and quarrel had we together about our pals,
+which was the cleverest fellow, his or mine.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Well, after having been wid him about two months, I quitted him
+without noise, taking away one of his tables, and some peas and thimbles;
+and that I did with a safe conscience, for he paid me nothing, and was
+not over free with the meat and the drink, though I must say of him
+that he was a clever fellow, and perfect master of his trade, by which
+he made a power of money, and bating his not being able to learn Irish,
+and a certain Jewish lisp which he had, a great master of his tongue,
+of which he was very proud; so much so, that he once told me that when
+he had saved a certain sum of money he meant to leave off the thimbling
+business, and enter Parliament; into which, he said, he could get at
+any time, through the interest of a friend of his, a Tory Peer - my
+Lord Whitefeather, with whom, he said, he had occasionally done business.&nbsp;
+With the table, and other things which I had taken, I commenced trade
+on my own account, having contrived to learn a few of his tricks.&nbsp;
+My only capital was the change for half-a-guinea, which he had once
+let fall, and which I picked up, which was all I could ever get from
+him: for it was impossible to stale any money from him, he was so awake,
+being up to all the tricks of thaives, having followed the diving trade,
+as he called it, for a considerable time.&nbsp; My wish was to make
+enough by my table to enable me to return with credit to ould Ireland,
+where I had no doubt of being able to get myself ordained as priest;
+and, in troth, notwithstanding I was a beginner, and without any companion
+to help me, I did tolerably well, getting my meat and drink, and increasing
+my small capital, till I came to this unlucky place of Horncastle, where
+I was utterly ruined by the thaif in the rider&rsquo;s dress.&nbsp;
+And now, Shorsha, I am after telling you my history; perhaps you will
+now be telling me something about yourself?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+I told Murtagh all about myself that I deemed necessary to relate, and
+then asked him what he intended to do; he repeated that he was utterly
+ruined, and that he had no prospect before him but starving, or making
+away with himself.&nbsp; I inquired &ldquo;How much would take him to
+Ireland, and establish him there with credit.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Five
+pounds,&rdquo; he answered, adding, &ldquo;but who in the world would
+be fool enough to tend me five pounds, unless it be yourself, Shorsha,
+who, may be, have not got it; for when you told me about yourself, you
+made no boast of the state of your affairs.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I am
+not very rich,&rdquo; I replied, &ldquo;but I think I can accommodate
+you with what you want.&nbsp; I consider myself under great obligations
+to you, Murtagh; it was you who instructed me in the language of Oilein
+nan Naomha, which has been the foundation of all my acquisitions in
+philology; without you, I should not have been what I am - Lavengro!
+which signifies a philologist.&nbsp; Here is the money, Murtagh,&rdquo;
+said I, putting my hand into my pocket, and taking out five pounds,
+&ldquo;much good may it do you.&rdquo;&nbsp; He took the money, stared
+at it, and then at me - &ldquo;And you mane to give me this, Shorsha?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It is no longer mine to give,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;it is yours.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And you give it me for the gratitude you bear me?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Yes, &ldquo; said I, &ldquo;and for Dungarvon times of old.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well, Shorsha,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you are a broth of a boy,
+and I&rsquo;ll take your benefaction - five pounds! och, Jasus!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+He then put the money in his pocket, and springing up, waved his hat
+three times, uttering some old Irish cry; then, sitting down, he took
+my hand, and said, &ldquo;Sure, Shorsha, I&rsquo;ll be going thither;
+and when I get there, it is turning over another leaf I will be; I have
+learnt a thing or two abroad; I will become a priest; that&rsquo;s the
+trade, Shorsha! and I will cry out for repale; that&rsquo;s the cry,
+Shorsha! and I&rsquo;ll be a fool no longer.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;And
+what will you do with your table?&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; &ldquo;&lsquo;Faith,
+I&rsquo;ll be taking it with me, Shorsha; and when I gets to Ireland,
+I&rsquo;ll get it mended, and I will keep it in the house which I shall
+have; and when I looks upon it, I will be thinking of all I have undergone.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You had better leave it behind you,&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;if
+you take it with you, you will, perhaps, take up the thimble trade again
+before you get to Ireland, and lose the money I am after giving you.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;No fear of that, Shorsha; never will I play on that table again,
+Shorsha, till I get it mended, which shall not be till I am a priest,
+and have a house in which to place it.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Murtagh and I then went into the town, where we had some refreshment
+together, and then parted on our several ways.&nbsp; I heard nothing
+of him for nearly a quarter of a century, when a person who knew him
+well, coming from Ireland, and staying at my humble house, told me a
+great deal about him.&nbsp; He reached Ireland in safety, soon reconciled
+himself with his Church, and was ordained a priest; in the priestly
+office he acquitted himself in a way very satisfactory, upon the whole,
+to his superiors, having, as he frequently said, learned wisdom abroad.&nbsp;
+The Popish Church never fails to turn to account any particular gift
+which its servants may possess; and discovering soon that Murtagh was
+endowed with considerable manual dexterity - proof of which he frequently
+gave at cards, and at a singular game which he occasionally played at
+thimbles - it selected him as a very fit person to play the part of
+exorcist; and accordingly he travelled through a great part of Ireland,
+casting out devils from people possessed, which he afterwards exhibited,
+sometimes in the shape of rabbits, and occasionally birds and fishes.&nbsp;
+There is a holy island in a lake in Ireland, to which the people resort
+at a particular season of the year.&nbsp; Here Murtagh frequently attended,
+and it was here that he performed a cure which will cause his name long
+to be remembered in Ireland, delivering a possessed woman of two demons,
+which he brandished aloft in his hands, in the shape of two large eels,
+and subsequently hurled into the lake, amidst the shouts of an enthusiastic
+multitude.&nbsp; Besides playing the part of an exorcist, he acted that
+of a politician with considerable success; he attached himself to the
+party of the sire of agitation - &ldquo;the man of paunch,&rdquo; and
+preached and hallooed for repeal with the loudest and best, as long
+as repeal was the cry; as soon, however, as the Whigs attained the helm
+of Government, and the greater part of the loaves and fishes - more
+politely termed the patronage of Ireland - was placed at the disposition
+of the priesthood, the tone of Murtagh, like that of the rest of his
+brother saggarts, was considerably softened; he even went so far as
+to declare that politics were not altogether consistent with sacerdotal
+duty; and resuming his exorcisms, which he had for some time abandoned,
+he went to the Isle of Holiness, and delivered a possessed woman of
+six demons in the shape of white mice.&nbsp; He, however, again resumed
+the political mantle in the year 1848, during the short period of the
+rebellion of the so-called Young Irelanders.&nbsp; The priests, though
+they apparently sided with this party, did not approve of it, as it
+was chiefly formed of ardent young men, fond of what they termed liberty,
+and by no means admirers of priestly domination, being mostly Protestants.&nbsp;
+Just before the outbreak of this rebellion, it was determined between
+the priests and the -, that this party should be rendered comparatively
+innocuous by being deprived of the sinews&rsquo; of war - in other words,
+certain sums of money which they had raised for their enterprise.&nbsp;
+Murtagh was deemed the best qualified person in Ireland to be entrusted
+with the delicate office of getting their money from them.&nbsp; Having
+received his instructions, he invited the leaders to his parsonage amongst
+the mountains, under pretence of deliberating with them about what was
+to be done.&nbsp; They arrived there just before nightfall, dressed
+in red, yellow, and green, the colours so dear to enthusiastic Irishmen;
+Murtagh received them with great apparent cordiality, and entered into
+a long discourse with them, promising them the assistance of himself
+and order, and received from them a profusion of thanks.&nbsp; After
+a time Murtagh, observing, in a jocular tone, that consulting was dull
+work, proposed a game of cards, and the leaders, though somewhat surprised,
+assenting, he went to a closet, and taking out a pack of cards, laid
+it upon the table; it was a strange dirty pack, and exhibited every
+mark of having seen very long service.&nbsp; On one of its guests making
+some remarks on the &ldquo;ancientness&rdquo; of its appearance, Murtagh
+observed that there was a very wonderful history attached to that pack;
+it had been presented to him, he said, by a young gentleman, a disciple
+of his, to whom, in Dungarvon times of yore, he had taught the Irish
+language, and of whom he related some very extraordinary things; he
+added that he, Murtagh, had taken it to -, where it had once the happiness
+of being in the hands of the Holy Father; by a great misfortune, he
+did not say what, he had lost possession of it, and had returned without
+it, but had some time since recovered it; a nephew of his, who was being
+educated at - for a priest, having found it in a nook of the college,
+and sent it to him.<br>
+<br>
+Murtagh and the leaders then played various games with this pack, more
+especially one called by the initiated &ldquo;blind hockey,&rdquo; the
+result being that at the end of about two hours the leaders found they
+had lost one-half of their funds; they now looked serious, and talked
+of leaving the house, but Murtagh begging them to stay to supper, they
+consented.&nbsp; After supper, at which the guests drank rather freely,
+Murtagh said that, as he had not the least wish to win their money,
+he intended to give them their revenge; he would not play at cards with
+them, he added, but at a funny game of thimbles, at which they would
+be sure of winning back their own; then going out, he brought in a table,
+tall and narrow, on which placing certain thimbles and a pea, he proposed
+that they should stake whatever they pleased on the almost certainty
+of finding the pea under the thimbles.&nbsp; The leaders, after some
+hesitation, consented, and were at first eminently successful, winning
+back the greater part of what they had lost; after some time, however,
+Fortune, or rather Murtagh, turned against them, and then, instead of
+leaving off, they doubled and trebled their stakes, and continued doing
+so until they had lost nearly the whole of their funds.&nbsp; Quite
+furious, they now swore that Murtagh had cheated them, and insisted
+on having their property restored to them.&nbsp; Murtagh, without a
+word of reply, went to the door, and shouting into the passage something
+in Irish, the room was instantly filled with bogtrotters, each at least
+six feet high, with a stout shillelah in his hand.&nbsp; Murtagh then
+turning to his guests, asked them what they meant by insulting an anointed
+priest; telling them that it was not for the likes of them to avenge
+the wrongs of Ireland.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have been clane mistaken in the
+whole of ye,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I supposed ye Irish, but have found,
+to my sorrow, that ye are nothing of the kind; purty fellows to pretend
+to be Irish, when there is not a word of Irish on the tongue of any
+of ye, divil a ha&rsquo;porth; the illigant young gentleman to whom
+I taught Irish, in Dungarvon times of old, though not born in Ireland,
+has more Irish in him than any ten of ye.&nbsp; He is the boy to avenge
+the wrongs of Ireland, if ever foreigner is to do it.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then
+saying something to the bogtrotters, they instantly cleared the room
+of the young Irelanders, who retired sadly disconcerted; nevertheless,
+being very silly young fellows, they hoisted the standard of rebellion;
+few, however, joining them, partly because they had no money, and partly
+because the priests abused them with might and main, their rebellion
+ended in a lamentable manner; themselves being seized and tried, and
+though convicted, not deemed of sufficient importance to be sent to
+the scaffold, where they might have had the satisfaction of saying -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+My visitor, after saying that of the money won, Murtagh retained a considerable
+portion, that a part went to the hierarchy for what were called church
+purposes, and that the - took the remainder, which it employed in establishing
+a newspaper, in which the private characters of the worthiest and most
+loyal Protestants in Ireland were traduced and vilified, concluded his
+account by observing, that it was the common belief that Murtagh, having
+by his services, ecclesiastical and political, acquired the confidence
+of the priesthood and favour of the Government, would, on the first
+vacancy, be appointed to the high office of Popish Primate of Ireland.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XLVII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Departure from Horncastle - Recruiting Sergeant - Kauloes and Lolloes.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Leaving Horncastle I bent my steps in the direction of the east.&nbsp;
+I walked at a brisk rate, and late in the evening reached a large town,
+situate at the entrance of an extensive firth, or arm of the sea, which
+prevented my farther progress eastward.&nbsp; Sleeping that night in
+the suburbs of the town, I departed early next morning in the direction
+of the south.&nbsp; A walk of about twenty miles brought me to another
+large town, situated on a river, where I again turned towards the east.&nbsp;
+At the end of the town I was accosted by a fiery-faced individual, somewhat
+under the middle size, dressed as a recruiting sergeant.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Young man,&rdquo; said the recruiting sergeant, &ldquo;you are
+just the kind of person to serve the Honourable East India Company.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I had rather the Honourable Company should serve me,&rdquo; said
+I.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Of course, young man.&nbsp; Well, the Honourable East India Company
+shall serve you - that&rsquo;s reasonable.&nbsp; Here, take this shilling;
+&lsquo;tis service-money.&nbsp; The Honourable Company engages to serve
+you, and you the Honourable Company; both parties shall be thus served;
+that&rsquo;s just and reasonable.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what must I do for the Company?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Only go to India; that&rsquo;s all.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And what should I do in India?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Fight, my brave boy! fight, my youthful hero!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;What kind of country is India?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The finest country in the world!&nbsp; Rivers, bigger than the
+Ouse.&nbsp; Hills, higher than anything near Spalding!&nbsp; Trees -
+you never saw such trees!&nbsp; Fruits - you never saw such fruits!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;And the people - what kind of folk are they?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Pah!&nbsp; Kauloes - blacks - a set of rascals not worth regarding.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Kauloes!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;blacks!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the recruiting sergeant; &ldquo;and they call
+us lolloes, which, in their beastly gibberish, means red.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lolloes!&rdquo; said I; &ldquo;reds!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the recruiting sergeant, &ldquo;kauloes and
+lolloes; and all the lolloes have to do is to kick and cut down the
+kauloes, and take from them their rupees, which mean silver money.&nbsp;
+Why do you stare so?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;this is the very language of Mr. Petulengro.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Mr. Pet-?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;and Tawno Chikno.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tawno Chik-?&nbsp; I say, young fellow, I don&rsquo;t like your
+way of speaking; no, nor your way of looking.&nbsp; You are mad, sir;
+you are mad; and what&rsquo;s this?&nbsp; Why, your hair is grey!&nbsp;
+You won&rsquo;t do for the Honourable Company - they like red.&nbsp;
+I&rsquo;m glad I didn&rsquo;t give you the shilling.&nbsp; Good day
+to you.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I shouldn&rsquo;t wonder,&rdquo; said I, as I proceeded rapidly
+along a broad causeway, in the direction of the east, &ldquo;if Mr.
+Petulengro and Tawno Chikno came originally from India.&nbsp; I think
+I&rsquo;ll go there.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+APPENDIX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER I<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+A Word for Lavengro.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Lavengro is the history up to a certain period of one of rather a peculiar
+mind and system of nerves, with an exterior shy and cold, under which
+lurk much curiosity, especially with regard to what is wild and extraordinary,
+a considerable quantity of energy and industry, and an unconquerable
+love of independence.&nbsp; It narrates his earliest dreams and feelings,
+dwells with minuteness on the ways, words, and characters of his father,
+mother, and brother, lingers on the occasional resting-places of his
+wandering half military childhood, describes the gradual hardening of
+his bodily frame by robust exercises, his successive struggles, after
+his family and himself have settled down in a small local capital, to
+obtain knowledge of every kind, but more particularly philological lore;
+his visits to the tent of the Romany chal, and the parlour of the Anglo-German
+philosopher; the effect produced upon his character by his flinging
+himself into contact with people all widely differing from each other,
+but all extraordinary; his reluctance to settle down to the ordinary
+pursuits of life; his struggles after moral truth; his glimpses of God
+and the obscuration of the Divine Being, to his mind&rsquo;s eye; and
+his being cast upon the world of London by the death of his father,
+at the age of nineteen.&nbsp; In the world within a world, the world
+of London, it shows him playing his part for some time as he best can,
+in the capacity of a writer for reviews and magazines, and describes
+what he saw and underwent whilst labouring in that capacity; it represents
+him, however, as never forgetting that he is the son of a brave but
+poor gentleman, and that if he is a hack author, he is likewise a scholar.&nbsp;
+It shows him doing no dishonourable jobs, and proves that if he occasionally
+associates with low characters, he does so chiefly to gratify the curiosity
+of a scholar.&nbsp; In his conversations with the apple-woman of London
+Bridge, the scholar is ever apparent, so again in his acquaintance with
+the man of the table, for the book is no raker up of the uncleanness
+of London, and if it gives what at first sight appears refuse, it invariably
+shows that a pearl of some kind, generally a philological one, is contained
+amongst it; it shows its hero always accompanied by his love of independence,
+scorning in the greatest poverty to receive favours from anybody, and
+describes him finally rescuing himself from peculiarly miserable circumstances
+by writing a book, an original book, within a week, even as Johnson
+is said to have written his &ldquo;Rasselas,&rdquo; and Beckford his
+&ldquo;Vathek,&rdquo; and tells how, leaving London, he betakes himself
+to the roads and fields.<br>
+<br>
+In the country it shows him leading a life of roving adventure, becoming
+tinker, gypsy, postillion, ostler; associating with various kinds of
+people, chiefly of the lower classes, whose ways and habits are described;
+but, though leading this erratic life, we gather from the book that
+his habits are neither vulgar nor vicious, that he still follows to
+a certain extent his favourite pursuits, hunting after strange characters,
+or analysing strange words and names.&nbsp; At the conclusion of the
+last chapter, which terminates the first part of the history, it hints
+that he is about to quit his native land on a grand philological expedition.<br>
+<br>
+Those who read this book with attention - and the author begs to observe
+that it would be of little utility to read it hurriedly - may derive
+much information with respect to matters of philology and literature;
+it will be found treating of most of the principal languages from Ireland
+to China, and of the literature which they contain; and it is particularly
+minute with regard to the ways, manners, and speech of the English section
+of the most extraordinary and mysterious clan or tribe of people to
+be found in the whole world - the children of Roma.&nbsp; But it contains
+matters of much more importance than anything in connection with philology,
+and the literature and manners of nations.&nbsp; Perhaps no work was
+ever offered to the public in which the kindness and providence of God
+have been set forth by more striking examples, or the machinations of
+priestcraft been more truly and lucidly exposed, or the dangers which
+result to a nation when it abandons itself to effeminacy, and a rage
+for what is novel and fashionable, than the present.<br>
+<br>
+With respect to the kindness and providence of God, are they not exemplified
+in the case of the old apple-woman and her son?&nbsp; These are beings
+in many points bad, but with warm affections, who, after an agonizing
+separation, are restored to each other, but not until the hearts of
+both are changed and purified by the influence of affliction.&nbsp;
+Are they not exemplified in the case of the rich gentleman, who touches
+objects in order to avert the evil chance?&nbsp; This being has great
+gifts and many amiable qualifies, but does not everybody see that his
+besetting sin is selfishness?&nbsp; He fixes his mind on certain objects,
+and takes inordinate interest in them, because they are his own, and
+those very objects, through the providence of God, which is kindness
+in disguise, become snakes and scorpions to whip him.&nbsp; Tired of
+various pursuits, he at last becomes an author, and publishes a book,
+which is very much admired, and which he loves with his usual inordinate
+affection; the book, consequently, becomes a viper to him, and at last
+he flings it aside and begins another; the book, however, is not flung
+aside by the world, who are benefited by it, deriving pleasure and knowledge
+from it: so the man who merely wrote to gratify self, has already done
+good to others, and got himself an honourable name.&nbsp; But God will
+not allow that man to put that book under his head and use it as a pillow:
+the book has become a viper to him, he has banished it, and is about
+another, which he finishes and gives to the world; it is a better book
+than the first, and every one is delighted with it; but it proves to
+the writer a scorpion, because he loves it with inordinate affection;
+but it was good for the world that he produced this book, which stung
+him as a scorpion.&nbsp; Yes; and good for himself, for the labour of
+writing it amused him, and perhaps prevented him from dying of apoplexy;
+but the book is banished, and another is begun, and herein, again, is
+the providence of God manifested; the man has the power of producing
+still, and God determines that he shall give to the world what remains
+in his brain, which he would not do, had he been satisfied with the
+second work; he would have gone to sleep upon that as he would upon
+the first, for the man is selfish and lazy.&nbsp; In his account of
+what he suffered during the composition of this work, his besetting
+sin of selfishness is manifest enough; the work on which he is engaged
+occupies his every thought, it is his idol, his deity, it shall be all
+his own, he won&rsquo;t borrow a thought from any one else, and he is
+so afraid lest, when he publishes it, that it should be thought that
+he had borrowed from any one, that he is continually touching objects,
+his nervous system, owing to his extreme selfishness, having become
+partly deranged.&nbsp; He is left touching, in order to banish the evil
+chance from his book, his deity.&nbsp; No more of his history is given;
+but does the reader think that God will permit that man to go to sleep
+on his third book, however extraordinary it may be?&nbsp; Assuredly
+not.&nbsp; God will not permit that man to rest till he has cured him
+to a certain extent of his selfishness, which has, however, hitherto
+been very useful to the world.<br>
+<br>
+Then, again, in the tale of Peter Williams, is not the hand of Providence
+to be seen?&nbsp; This person commits a sin in his childhood, utters
+words of blasphemy, the remembrance of which, in after life, preying
+upon his imagination, unfits him for quiet pursuits, to which he seems
+to have been naturally inclined; but for the remembrance of that sin,
+he would have been Peter Williams the quiet and respectable Welsh farmer,
+somewhat fond of reading the ancient literature of his country in winter
+evenings, after his work was done.&nbsp; God, however, was aware that
+there was something in Peter Williams to entitle him to assume a higher
+calling; he therefore permits this sin, which, though a childish affair,
+was yet a sin, and committed deliberately, to prey upon his mind till
+he becomes at last an instrument in the hand of God, a humble Paul,
+the great preacher, Peter Williams, who, though he considers himself
+a reprobate and a castaway, instead of having recourse to drinking in
+mad desperation, as many do who consider themselves reprobates, goes
+about Wales and England preaching the word of God, dilating on his power
+and majesty, and visiting the sick and afflicted, until God sees fit
+to restore to him his peace of mind; which he does not do, however,
+until that mind is in a proper condition to receive peace, till it has
+been purified by the pain of the one idea which has so long been permitted
+to riot in his brain; which pain, however, an angel, in the shape of
+a gentle faithful wife, had occasionally alleviated; for God is merciful
+even in the blows which He bestoweth, and will not permit any one to
+be tempted beyond the measure which he can support.&nbsp; And here it
+will be as well for the reader to ponder upon the means by which the
+Welsh preacher is relieved from his mental misery: he is not relieved
+by a text from the Bible, by the words of consolation and wisdom addressed
+to him by his angel-minded wife, nor by the preaching of one yet more
+eloquent than himself; but by a quotation made by Lavengro from the
+life of Mary Flanders, cut-purse and prostitute, which life Lavengro
+had been in the habit of reading at the stall of his old friend the
+apple-woman, on London Bridge, who had herself been very much addicted
+to the perusal of it, though without any profit whatever.&nbsp; Should
+the reader be dissatisfied with the manner in which Peter Williams is
+made to find relief, the author would wish to answer, that the Almighty
+frequently accomplishes his purposes by means which appear very singular
+to the eyes of men, and at the same time to observe that the manner
+in which that relief is obtained, is calculated to read a lesson to
+the proud, fanciful, and squeamish, who are ever in a fidget lest they
+should be thought to mix with low society, or to bestow a moment&rsquo;s
+attention on publications which are not what is called of a perfectly
+unobjectionable character.&nbsp; Had not Lavengro formed the acquaintance
+of the apple-woman on London Bridge, he would not have had an opportunity
+of reading the life of Mary Flanders; and, consequently, of storing
+in a memory, which never forgets anything, a passage which contained
+a balm for the agonized mind of poor Peter Williams.&nbsp; The best
+medicines are not always found in the finest shops.&nbsp; Suppose, for
+example, if, instead of going to London Bridge to read, he had gone
+to Albemarle Street, and had received from the proprietors of the literary
+establishment in that very fashionable street, permission to read the
+publications on the tables of the saloons there, does the reader think
+he would have met any balm in those publications for the case of Peter
+Williams? does the reader suppose that he would have found Mary Flanders
+there?&nbsp; He would certainly have found that highly unobjectionable
+publication, &ldquo;Rasselas,&rdquo; and the &ldquo;Spectator,&rdquo;
+or &ldquo;Lives of Royal and Illustrious Personages,&rdquo; but, of
+a surety, no Mary Flanders; so when Lavengro met with Peter Williams,
+he would have been unprovided with a balm to cure his ulcerated mind,
+and have parted from him in a way not quite so satisfactory as the manner
+in which he took his leave of him; for it is certain that he might have
+read &ldquo;Rasselas,&rdquo; and all other unexceptionable works to
+be found in the library of Albemarle Street, over and over again, before
+he would have found any cure in them for the case of Peter Williams.&nbsp;
+Therefore the author requests the reader to drop any squeamish nonsense
+he may wish to utter about Mary Flanders, and the manner in which Peter
+Williams was cured.<br>
+<br>
+And now with respect to the old man who knew Chinese, but could not
+tell what was o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; This individual was a man whose natural
+powers would have been utterly buried and lost beneath a mountain of
+sloth and laziness, had not God determined otherwise.&nbsp; He had in
+his early years chalked out for himself a plan of life in which he had
+his own ease and self-indulgence solely in view; he had no particular
+bad passions to gratify, he only wished to live a happy quiet life,
+just as if the business of this mighty world could be carried on by
+innocent people fond of ease or quiet, or that Providence would permit
+innocent quiet drones to occupy any portion of the earth and to cumber
+it.&nbsp; God had at any rate decreed that this man should not cumber
+it as a drone.&nbsp; He brings a certain affliction upon him, the agony
+of which produces that terrible whirling of the brain which, unless
+it is stopped in time, produces madness; he suffers indescribable misery
+for a period, until one morning his attention is arrested, and his curiosity
+is aroused, by certain Chinese letters on a teapot; his curiosity increases
+more and more, and, of course, in proportion as his curiosity is increased
+with respect to the Chinese marks, the misery in his brain, produced
+by his mental affliction, decreases.&nbsp; He sets about learning Chinese,
+and after the lapse of many years, during which his mind subsides into
+a certain state of tranquillity, he acquires sufficient knowledge of
+Chinese to be able to translate with ease the inscriptions to be found
+on its singular crockery.&nbsp; Yes, the laziest of human beings, through
+the Providence of God, a being too of rather inferior capacity, acquires
+the written part of a language so difficult that, as Lavengro said on
+a former occasion, none but the cleverest people in Europe, the French,
+are able to acquire it.&nbsp; But God did not intend that man should
+merely acquire Chinese.&nbsp; He intended that he should be of use to
+his species, and by the instrumentality of the first Chinese inscription
+which he translates, the one which first arrested his curiosity, he
+is taught the duty of hospitality; yes, by means of an inscription in
+the language of a people, who have scarcely an idea of hospitality themselves,
+God causes the slothful man to play a useful and beneficent part in
+the world, relieving distressed wanderers, and, amongst others, Lavengro
+himself.&nbsp; But a striking indication of the man&rsquo;s surprising
+sloth is still apparent in what he omits to do; he has learnt Chinese,
+the most difficult of languages, and he practises acts of hospitality,
+because he believes himself enjoined to do so by the Chinese inscription,
+but he cannot tell the hour of the day by the clock within his house;
+he can get on, he thinks, very well without being able to do so; therefore
+from this one omission, it is easy to come to a conclusion as to what
+a sluggard&rsquo;s part the man would have played in life, but for the
+dispensation of Providence; nothing but extreme agony could have induced
+such a man to do anything useful.&nbsp; He still continues, with all
+he has acquired, with all his usefulness, and with all his innocence
+of character, without any proper sense of religion, though he has attained
+a rather advanced age.&nbsp; If it be observed, that this want of religion
+is a great defect in the story, the author begs leave to observe that
+he cannot help it.&nbsp; Lavengro relates the lives of people so far
+as they were placed before him, but no further.&nbsp; It was certainly
+a great defect in so good a man to be without religion; it was likewise
+a great defect in so learned a man not to be able to tell what was o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp;
+It is probable that God, in his loving kindness, will not permit that
+man to go out of the world without religion; who knows but some powerful
+minister of the church full of zeal for the glory of God, will illume
+that man&rsquo;s dark mind; perhaps some clergyman will come to the
+parish who will visit him and teach him his duty to his God.&nbsp; Yes,
+it is very probable that such a man, before he dies, will have been
+made to love his God; whether he will ever learn to know what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock is another matter.&nbsp; It is probable that he will go
+out of the world without knowing what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; It
+is not so necessary to be able to tell the time of day by the clock
+as to know one&rsquo;s God through His inspired word; a man cannot get
+to heaven without religion, but a man can get there very comfortably
+without knowing what&rsquo;s o&rsquo;clock.<br>
+<br>
+But, above all, the care and providence of God are manifested in the
+case of Lavengro himself, by the manner in which he is enabled to make
+his way in the world up to a certain period, without falling a prey
+either to vice or poverty.&nbsp; In his history, there is a wonderful
+illustration of part of the text, quoted by his mother, &ldquo;I have
+been young, but now am old, yet never saw I the righteous forsaken,
+or his seed begging his bread.&rdquo;&nbsp; He is the son of good and
+honourable parents, but at the critical period of life, that of entering
+into the world, he finds himself without any earthly friend to help
+him, yet he manages to make his way; he does not become a Captain in
+the Life Guards, it is true, nor does he get into Parliament, nor does
+the last volume conclude in the most satisfactory and unobjectionable
+manner, by his marrying a dowager countess, as that wise man Addison
+did, or by his settling down as a great country gentleman, perfectly
+happy and contented, like the very moral Roderick Random, or the equally
+estimable Peregrine Pickle; he is hack author, gypsy, tinker, and postillion,
+yet, upon the whole, he seems to be quite as happy as the younger sons
+of most earls, to have as high feelings of honour; and when the reader
+loses sight of him, he has money in his pocket honestly acquired, to
+enable him to commence a journey quite as laudable as those which the
+younger sons of earls generally undertake.&nbsp; Surely all this is
+a manifestation of the kindness and providence of God: and yet he is
+not a religious person; up to the time when the reader loses sight of
+him, he is decidedly not a religious person; he has glimpses, it is
+true, of that God who does not forsake him, but he prays very seldom,
+is not fond of going to church; and, though he admires Tate and Brady&rsquo;s
+version of the Psalms, his admiration is rather caused by the beautiful
+poetry which that version contains than the religion; yet his tale is
+not finished - like the tale of the gentleman who touched objects, and
+that of the old man who knew Chinese without knowing what was o&rsquo;clock;
+perhaps, like them, he is destined to become religious, and to have,
+instead of occasional glimpses, frequent and distinct views of his God;
+yet, though he may become religious, it is hardly to be expected that
+he will become a very precise and straightlaced person; it is probable
+that he will retain, with his scholarship, something of his gypsyism,
+his predilection for the hammer and tongs, and perhaps some inclination
+to put on certain gloves, not white kid, with any friend who may be
+inclined for a little old English diversion, and a readiness to take
+a glass of ale, with plenty of malt in it, and as little hop as may
+well be - ale at least two years old - with the aforesaid friend, when
+the diversion is over; for, as it is the belief of the writer that a
+person may get to heaven very comfortably without knowing what&rsquo;s
+o&rsquo;clock, so it is his belief that he will not be refused admission
+there, because to the last he has been fond of healthy and invigorating
+exercises, and felt a willingness to partake of any of the good things
+which it pleases the Almighty to put within the reach of his children
+during their sojourn upon earth.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER II<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On Priestcraft.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The writer will now say a few words about priestcraft, and the machinations
+of Rome, and will afterwards say something about himself, and his motives
+for writing against them.<br>
+<br>
+With respect to Rome, and her machinations, much valuable information
+can be obtained from particular parts of Lavengro, and its sequel.&nbsp;
+Shortly before the time when the hero of the book is launched into the
+world, the Popish agitation in England had commenced.&nbsp; The Popish
+propaganda had determined to make a grand attempt on England; Popish
+priests were scattered over the land, doing the best they could to make
+converts to the old superstition.&nbsp; With the plans of Rome, and
+her hopes, and the reasons on which those hopes are grounded, the hero
+of the book becomes acquainted, during an expedition which he makes
+into the country, from certain conversations which he holds with a priest
+in a dingle, in which the hero had taken up his residence; he likewise
+learns from the same person much of the secret history of the Roman
+See, and many matters connected with the origin and progress of the
+Popish superstition.&nbsp; The individual with whom he holds these conversations
+is a learned, intelligent, but highly-unprincipled person, of a character
+however very common amongst the priests of Rome, who in general are
+people void of all religion, and who, notwithstanding they are tied
+to Rome by a band which they have neither the power nor wish to break,
+turn her and her practices, over their cups with their confidential
+associates, to a ridicule only exceeded by that to which they turn those
+who become the dupes of their mistress and themselves.<br>
+<br>
+It is now necessary that the writer should say something with respect
+to himself, and his motives for waging war against Rome.&nbsp; First
+of all, with respect to himself, he wishes to state, that to the very
+last moment of his life, he will do and say all that in his power may
+be to hold up to contempt and execration the priestcraft and practices
+of Rome; there is, perhaps, no person better acquainted than himself,
+not even among the choicest spirits of the priesthood, with the origin
+and history of Popery.&nbsp; From what he saw and heard of Popery in
+England, at a very early period of his life, his curiosity was aroused,
+and he spared himself no trouble, either by travel or study, to make
+himself well acquainted with it in all its phases, the result being
+a hatred of it, which he hopes and trusts he shall retain till the moment
+when his spirit quits the body.&nbsp; Popery is the great lie of the
+world; a source from which more misery and social degradation have flowed
+upon the human race, than from all the other sources from which those
+evils come.&nbsp; It is the oldest of all superstitions; and though
+in Europe it assumes the name of Christianity, it existed and flourished
+amidst the Himalayan hills at least two thousand years before the real
+Christ was born in Bethlehem of Judea; in a word, it is Buddhism; and
+let those who may be disposed to doubt this assertion, compare the Popery
+of Rome, and the superstitious practices of its followers, with the
+doings of the priests who surround the grand Lama; and the mouthings,
+bellowing, turnings round, and, above all, the penances of the followers
+of Buddh with those of Roman devotees.&nbsp; But he is not going to
+dwell here on this point; it is dwelt upon at tolerable length in the
+text, and has likewise been handled with extraordinary power by the
+pen of the gifted but irreligious Volney; moreover, the <i>&eacute;lite</i>
+of the Roman priesthood are perfectly well aware that their system is
+nothing but Buddhism under a slight disguise, and the European world
+in general has entertained for some time past an inkling of the fact.<br>
+<br>
+And now a few words with respect to the motives of the writer for expressing
+a hatred for Rome.<br>
+<br>
+This expressed abhorrence of the author for Rome might be entitled to
+little regard, provided it were possible to attribute it to any self-interested
+motive.&nbsp; There have been professed enemies of Rome, or of this
+or that system; but their professed enmity may frequently be traced
+to some cause which does them little credit; but the writer of these
+lines has no motive, and can have no motive, for his enmity to Rome,
+save the abhorrence of an honest heart for what is false, base, and
+cruel.&nbsp; A certain clergyman wrote with much heat against the Papists
+in the time of - who was known to favour the Papists, but was not expected
+to continue long in office, and whose supposed successor, the person,
+indeed, who did succeed him, was thought to be hostile to the Papists.&nbsp;
+This divine, who obtained a rich benefice from the successor of - who
+during -&lsquo;s time had always opposed him in everything he proposed
+to do, and who, of course, during that time affected to be very inimical
+to Popery - this divine might well be suspected of having a motive equally
+creditable for writing against the Papists, as that which induced him
+to write for them, as soon as his patron, who eventually did something
+more for him, had espoused their cause; but what motive, save an honest
+one, can the present writer have, for expressing an abhorrence of Popery?&nbsp;
+He is no clergyman, and consequently can expect neither benefices nor
+bishoprics, supposing it were the fashion of the present, or likely
+to be the fashion of any future administration, to reward clergymen
+with benefices or bishoprics, who, in the defence of the religion of
+their country write, or shall write, against Popery, and not to reward
+those who write, or shall write, in favour of it, and all its nonsense
+and abominations.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But if not a clergyman, he is the servant of a certain society,
+which has the overthrow of Popery in view, and therefore,&rdquo; etc.&nbsp;
+This assertion, which has been frequently made, is incorrect, even as
+those who have made it probably knew it to be.&nbsp; He is the servant
+of no society whatever.&nbsp; He eats his own bread, and is one of the
+very few men in England who are independent in every sense of the word.<br>
+<br>
+It is true he went to Spain with the colours of that society on his
+hat - oh! the blood glows in his veins! oh! the marrow awakes in his
+old bones when he thinks of what he accomplished in Spain in the cause
+of religion and civilization with the colours of that society in his
+hat, and its weapon in his hand, even the sword of the word of God;
+how with that weapon he hewed left and right, making the priests fly
+before him, and run away squeaking: &ldquo;Vaya! que demonio es este!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Ay, and when he thinks of the plenty of Bible swords which he left behind
+him, destined to prove, and which have already proved, pretty calthrops
+in the heels of Popery.&nbsp; &ldquo;Halloo! Batuschca,&rdquo; he exclaimed
+the other night, on reading an article in a newspaper; &ldquo;what do
+you think of the present doings in Spain?&nbsp; Your old friend the
+zingaro, the gitano who rode about Spain, to say nothing of Galicia,
+with the Greek Buchini behind him as his squire, had a hand in bringing
+them about; there are many brave Spaniards connected with the present
+movement who took Bibles from his hands, and read them and profited
+by them, learning from the inspired page the duties of one man towards
+another, and the real value of a priesthood and their head, who set
+at nought the word of God, and think only of their own temporal interests;
+ay, and who learned Gitano - their own Gitano - from the lips of the
+London Calor&oacute;, and also songs in the said Gitano, very fit to
+dumbfounder your semi-Buddhist priests when they attempt to bewilder
+people&rsquo;s minds with their school-logic and pseudo-ecclesiastical
+nonsense, songs such as -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Un Erajai<br>
+Sinaba chibando un sermon - .&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+- But with that society he has long since ceased to have any connection;
+he bade it adieu with feelings of love and admiration more than fourteen
+years ago; so, in continuing to assault Popery, no hopes of interest
+founded on that society can sway his mind - interest! who, with worldly
+interest in view, would ever have anything to do with that society?&nbsp;
+It is poor and supported, like its founder Christ, by poor people; and
+so far from having political influence, it is in such disfavour, and
+has ever been, with the dastardly great, to whom the government of England
+has for many years past been confided, that they having borne its colours
+only for a month would be sufficient to exclude any man, whatever his
+talents, his learning, or his courage may be, from the slightest chance
+of being permitted to serve his country either for fee, or without.&nbsp;
+A fellow who unites in himself the bankrupt trader, the broken author,
+or rather book-maker, and the laughed-down single speech spouter of
+the House of Commons, may look forward, always supposing that at one
+time he has been a foaming radical, to the government of an important
+colony.&nbsp; Ay, an ancient fox who has lost his tail may, provided
+he has a score of radical friends, who will swear that he can bark Chinese,
+though Chinese is not barked but sung, be forced upon a Chinese colony,
+though it is well known that to have lost one&rsquo;s tail is considered
+by the Chinese in general as an irreparable infamy, whilst to have been
+once connected with a certain society, to which, to its honour be it
+said, all the radical party are vehemently hostile, would be quite sufficient
+to keep any one not only from a government, but something much less,
+even though he could translate the rhymed &ldquo;Sessions of Hariri,&rdquo;
+and were versed, still retaining his tail, in the two languages in which
+Kien-Loung wrote his Eulogium on Moukden, that piece which, translated
+by Amyot, the learned Jesuit, won the applause of the celebrated Voltaire.<br>
+<br>
+No! were the author influenced by hopes of fee or reward, he would,
+instead of writing against Popery, write for it; all the trumpery titled
+- he will not call them great again - would then be for him, and their
+masters the radicals, with their hosts of newspapers, would be for him,
+more especially if he would commence maligning the society whose colours
+he had once on his hat - a society which, as the priest says in the
+text, is one of the very few Protestant institutions for which the Popish
+Church entertains any fear, and consequently respect, as it respects
+nothing which it does not fear.&nbsp; The writer said that certain &ldquo;rulers&rdquo;
+would never forgive him for having been connected with that society;
+he went perhaps too far in saying &ldquo;never.&rdquo;&nbsp; It is probable
+that they would take him into favour on one condition, which is, that
+he should turn his pen and his voice against that society; such a mark
+&ldquo;of a better way of thinking&rdquo; would perhaps induce them
+to give him a government, nearly as good as that which they gave to
+a certain ancient radical fox at the intercession of his radical friends
+(who were bound to keep him from the pauper&rsquo;s kennel), after he
+had promised to foam, bark, and snarl at corruption no more; he might
+even entertain hopes of succeeding, nay, of superseding, the ancient
+creature in his government; but even were he as badly off as he is well
+off, he would do no such thing.&nbsp; He would rather exist on crusts
+and water; he has often done so, and been happy; nay, he would rather
+starve than be a rogue - for even the feeling of starvation is happiness
+compared with what he feels who knows himself to be a rogue, provided
+he has any feeling at all.&nbsp; What is the use of a mitre or knighthood
+to a man who has betrayed his principles?&nbsp; What is the use of a
+gilt collar, nay, even of a pair of scarlet breeches, to a fox who has
+lost his tail?&nbsp; Oh! the horror which haunts the mind of a fox who
+has lost his tail; and with reason, for his very mate loathes him, and
+more especially if, like himself, she has lost her brush.&nbsp; Oh!
+the horror which haunts the mind of the two-legged rogue who has parted
+with his principles, or those which he professed - for what?&nbsp; We&rsquo;ll
+suppose a government.&nbsp; What&rsquo;s the use of a government, if
+the next day after you have received it, you are obliged for very shame
+to scurry off to it with the hoot of every honest man sounding in your
+ears?<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Lightly liar leaped and away ran.&rdquo;<br>
+PIERS PLOWMAN.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+But bigotry, it has been said, makes the author write against Popery;
+and thorough-going bigotry, indeed, will make a person say or do anything.&nbsp;
+But the writer is a very pretty bigot truly!&nbsp; Where will the public
+find traces of bigotry in anything he has written?&nbsp; He has written
+against Rome with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his soul,
+and with all his strength; but as a person may be quite honest, and
+speak and write against Rome, in like manner he may speak and write
+against her, and be quite free from bigotry; though it is impossible
+for any one but a bigot or a bad man to write or speak in her praise;
+her doctrines, actions, and machinations being what they are.<br>
+<br>
+Bigotry!&nbsp; The author was born, and has always continued in the
+wrong church for bigotry, the quiet, unpretending Church of England;
+a church which, had it been a bigoted church, and not long suffering
+almost to a fault, might with its opportunities, as the priest says
+in the text, have stood in a very different position from that which
+it occupies at present.&nbsp; No! let those who are in search of bigotry,
+seek for it in a church very different from the inoffensive Church of
+England, which never encourages cruelty or calumny.&nbsp; Let them seek
+for it amongst the members of the Church of Rome, and more especially
+amongst those who have renegaded to it.&nbsp; There is nothing, however
+false and horrible, which a pervert to Rome will not say for his church,
+and which his priests will not encourage him in saying; and there is
+nothing, however horrible - the more horrible indeed and revolting to
+human nature, the more eager he would be to do it - which he will not
+do for it, and which his priests will not encourage him in doing.<br>
+<br>
+Of the readiness which converts to Popery exhibit to sacrifice all the
+ties of blood and affection on the shrine of their newly-adopted religion,
+there is a curious illustration in the work of Luigi Pulci.&nbsp; This
+man, who was born at Florence in the year 1432, and who was deeply versed
+in the Bible, composed a poem, called the &ldquo;Morgante Maggiore,&rdquo;
+which he recited at the table of Lorenzo de Medici, the great patron
+of Italian genius.&nbsp; It is a mock-heroic and religious poem, in
+which the legends of knight-errantry, and of the Popish Church, are
+turned to unbounded ridicule.&nbsp; The pretended hero of it is a converted
+giant, called Morgante; though his adventures do not occupy the twentieth
+part of the poem, the principal personages being Charlemagne, Orlando,
+and his cousin Rinaldo of Montalban.&nbsp; Morgante has two brothers,
+both of them giants, and in the first canto of the poem, Morgante is
+represented with his brothers as carrying on a feud with the abbot and
+monks of a certain convent, built upon the confines of heathenesse;
+the giants being in the habit of flinging down stones, or rather huge
+rocks, on the convent.&nbsp; Orlando, however, who is banished from
+the court of Charlemagne, arriving at the convent, undertakes to destroy
+them, and, accordingly, kills Passamonte and Alabastro, and converts
+Morgante, whose mind had been previously softened by a vision, in which
+the &ldquo;Blessed Virgin&rdquo; figures.&nbsp; No sooner is he converted
+than, as a sign of his penitence, what does he do, but hastens and cuts
+off the hands of his two brothers, saying -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Io vo&rsquo; tagliar le mani a tutti quanti<br>
+E porterolle a que&rsquo; monaci santi.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+And he does cut off the hands of his brethren, and carries them to the
+abbot, who blesses him for so doing.&nbsp; Pulci here is holding up
+to ridicule and execration the horrid butchery or betrayal of friends
+by popish converts, and the encouragement they receive from the priest.&nbsp;
+No sooner is a person converted to Popery, than his principal thought
+is how he can bring the hands and feet of his brethren, however harmless
+they may be, and different from the giants, to the &ldquo;holy priests,&rdquo;
+who, if he manages to do so, never fail to praise him, saying to the
+miserable wretch, as the abbot said to Morgante:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Tu sarai or perfetto e vero amico<br>
+A Cristo, quanto tu gli eri nemico.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Can the English public deny the justice of Pulci&rsquo;s illustration,
+after something which it has lately witnessed?&nbsp; Has it not seen
+equivalents for the hands and feet of brothers carried by popish perverts
+to the &ldquo;holy priests,&rdquo; and has it not seen the manner in
+which the offering has been received?&nbsp; Let those who are in quest
+of bigotry seek for it among the perverts to Rome, and not amongst those
+who, born in the pale of the Church of England, have always continued
+in it.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER III<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On Foreign Nonsense.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+With respect to the third point, various lessons which the book reads
+to the nation at large, and which it would be well for the nation to
+ponder and profit by.<br>
+<br>
+There are many species of nonsense to which the nation is much addicted,
+and of which the perusal of Lavengro ought to give them a wholesome
+shame.&nbsp; First of all, with respect to the foreign nonsense so prevalent
+now in England.&nbsp; The hero is a scholar; but, though possessed of
+a great many tongues, he affects to be neither Frenchman, nor German,
+nor this or that foreigner; he is one who loves his country, and the
+language and literature of his country, and speaks up for each and all
+when there is occasion to do so.&nbsp; Now what is the case with nine
+out of ten amongst those of the English who study foreign languages?&nbsp;
+No sooner have they picked up a smattering of this or that speech than
+they begin to abuse their own country, and everything connected with
+it, more especially its language.&nbsp; This is particularly the case
+with those who call themselves German students.&nbsp; It is said, and
+the writer believes with truth, that when a woman falls in love with
+a particularly ugly fellow, she squeezes him with ten times more zest
+than she would a handsome one, if captivated by him.&nbsp; So it is
+with these German students; no sooner have they taken German in hand
+than there is nothing like German.&nbsp; Oh, the dear delightful German!&nbsp;
+How proud I am that it is now my own, and that its divine literature
+is within my reach!&nbsp; And all this whilst mumbling the most uncouth
+speech, and crunching the most crabbed literature in Europe.&nbsp; The
+writer is not an exclusive admirer of everything English; he does not
+advise his country people never to go abroad, never to study foreign
+languages, and he does not wish to persuade them that there is nothing
+beautiful or valuable in foreign literature; he only wishes that they
+would not make themselves fools with respect to foreign people, foreign
+languages or reading; that if they chance to have been in Spain, and
+have picked up a little Spanish, they would not affect the airs of Spaniards;
+that if males they would not make Tomfools of themselves by sticking
+cigars into their mouths, dressing themselves in zamarras, and saying,
+carajo! <a name="citation2"></a><a href="#footnote2">{2}</a> and if
+females that they would not make zanies of themselves by sticking cigars
+into their mouths, flinging mantillas over their heads, and by saying
+carai, and perhaps carajo too; or if they have been in France or Italy,
+and have picked up a little French or Italian, they would not affect
+to be French or Italians; and particularly, after having been a month
+or two in Germany, or picked up a little German in England, they would
+not make themselves foolish about everything German, as the Anglo-German
+in the book does - a real character, the founder of the Anglo-German
+school in England, and the cleverest Englishman who ever talked or wrote
+encomiastic nonsense about Germany and the Germans.&nbsp; Of all infatuations
+connected with what is foreign, the infatuation about everything that
+is German, to a certain extent prevalent in England, is assuredly the
+most ridiculous.&nbsp; One can find something like a palliation for
+people making themselves somewhat foolish about particular languages,
+literatures, and people.&nbsp; The Spanish certainly is a noble language,
+and there is something wild and captivating in the Spanish character,
+and its literature contains the grand book of the world.&nbsp; French
+is a manly language.&nbsp; The French are the great martial people in
+the world; and French literature is admirable in many respects.&nbsp;
+Italian is a sweet language, and of beautiful simplicity - its literature
+perhaps the first in the world.&nbsp; The Italians! - wonderful men
+have sprung up in Italy.&nbsp; Italy is not merely famous for painters,
+poets, musicians, singers, and linguists - the greatest linguist the
+world ever saw, the late Cardinal Mezzofanti, was an Italian; but it
+is celebrated for men - men emphatically speaking: Columbus was an Italian,
+Alexander Farnese was an Italian, so was the mightiest of the mighty,
+Napoleon Bonaparte; - but the German language, German literature, and
+the Germans!&nbsp; The writer has already stated his opinion with respect
+to German; he does not speak from ignorance or prejudice; he has heard
+German spoken, and many other languages.&nbsp; German literature!&nbsp;
+He does not speak from ignorance, he has read that and many a literature,
+and he repeats -&nbsp; However, he acknowledges that there is one fine
+poem in the German language, that poem is the &ldquo;Oberon;&rdquo;
+a poem, by the bye, ignored by the Germans - a speaking fact - and of
+course, by the Anglo-Germanists.&nbsp; The Germans! he has been amongst
+them, and amongst many other nations, and confesses that his opinion
+of the Germans, as men, is a very low one.&nbsp; Germany, it is true,
+has produced one very great man, the monk who fought the Pope, and nearly
+knocked him down; but this man his countrymen - a telling fact - affect
+to despise, and, of course, the Anglo-Germanists: the father of Anglo-Germanism
+was very fond of inveighing against Luther.<br>
+<br>
+The madness, or rather foolery, of the English for foreign customs,
+dresses, and languages, is not an affair of to-day, or yesterday - it
+is of very ancient date, and was very properly exposed nearly three
+centuries ago by one Andrew Borde, who under the picture of a &ldquo;Naked
+man, with a pair of shears in one hand, and a roll of cloth in the other,&rdquo;
+<a name="citation3"></a><a href="#footnote3">{3}</a> inserted the following
+lines along with others:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;I am an Englishman, and naked I stand here,<br>
+Musing in my mind what garment I shall weare;<br>
+For now I will weare this, and now I will weare that,<br>
+Now I will weare, I cannot tell what.<br>
+All new fashions be pleasant to mee,<br>
+I will have them, whether I thrive or thee;<br>
+What do I care if all the world me fail?<br>
+I will have a garment reach to my taile;<br>
+Then am I a minion, for I wear the new guise.<br>
+The next yeare after I hope to be wise,<br>
+Not only in wearing my gorgeous array,<br>
+For I will go to learning a whole summer&rsquo;s day;<br>
+I will learn Latine, Hebrew, Greek, and French,<br>
+And I will learn Dutch, sitting on my bench.<br>
+I had no peere if to myself I were true,<br>
+Because I am not so, divers times do I rue.<br>
+Yet I lacke nothing, I have all things at will<br>
+If I were wise and would hold myself still,<br>
+And meddle with no matters but to me pertaining,<br>
+But ever to be true to God and my king.<br>
+But I have such matters rowling in my pate,<br>
+That I will and do - I cannot tell what,&rdquo; etc.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IV<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On Gentility Nonsense - Illustrations of Gentility.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+What is gentility?&nbsp; People in different stations in England - entertain
+different ideas of what is genteel, <a name="citation4"></a><a href="#footnote4">{4}</a>
+but it must be something gorgeous, glittering, or tawdry, to be considered
+genteel by any of them.&nbsp; The beau-ideal of the English aristocracy,
+of course with some exceptions, is some young fellow with an imperial
+title, a military personage of course, for what is military is so particularly
+genteel, with flaming epaulets, a cocked hat and plume, a prancing charger,
+and a band of fellows called generals and colonels, with flaming epaulets,
+cocked hats and plumes, and prancing chargers vapouring behind him.&nbsp;
+It was but lately that the daughter of an English marquis was heard
+to say, that the sole remaining wish of her heart - she had known misfortunes,
+and was not far from fifty - was to be introduced to - whom?&nbsp; The
+Emperor of Austria!&nbsp; The sole remaining wish of the heart of one
+who ought to have been thinking of the grave and judgment, was to be
+introduced to the miscreant who had caused the blood of noble Hungarian
+females to be whipped out of their shoulders, for no other crime than
+devotion to their country, and its tall and heroic sons.&nbsp; The middle
+classes - of course there are some exceptions - admire the aristocracy,
+and consider them pinks, the aristocracy who admire the Emperor of Austria,
+and adored the Emperor of Russia, till he became old, ugly, and unfortunate,
+when their adoration instantly terminated; for what is more ungenteel
+than age, ugliness, and misfortune!&nbsp; The beau-ideal with those
+of the lower classes, with peasants and mechanics, is some flourishing
+railroad contractor: look, for example, how they worship Mr. Flamson.&nbsp;
+This person makes his grand d&eacute;b&ucirc;t in the year &lsquo;thirty-nine,
+at a public meeting in the principal room of a country inn.&nbsp; He
+has come into the neighbourhood with the character of a man worth a
+million pounds, who is to make everybody&rsquo;s fortune; at this time,
+however, he is not worth a shilling of his own, though he flashes about
+dexterously three or four thousand pounds, part of which sum he has
+obtained by specious pretences, and part from certain individuals who
+are his confederates.&nbsp; But in the year &lsquo;forty-nine, he is
+really in possession of the fortune which he and his agents pretended
+to be worth ten years before - he is worth a million pounds.&nbsp; By
+what means has he come by them?&nbsp; By railroad contracts, for which
+he takes care to be paid in hard cash before he attempts to perform
+them, and to carry out which he makes use of the sweat and blood of
+wretches who, since their organization, have introduced crimes and language
+into England to which it was previously almost a stranger - by purchasing,
+with paper, shares by hundreds in the schemes to execute which he contracts,
+and which are his own devising; which shares he sells as soon as they
+are at a high premium, to which they are speedily forced by means of
+paragraphs, inserted by himself and agents, in newspapers devoted to
+his interest, utterly reckless of the terrible depreciation to which
+they are almost instantly subjected.&nbsp; But he is worth a million
+pounds, there can be no doubt of the fact - he has not made people&rsquo;s
+fortunes, at least those whose fortunes it was said he would make; he
+has made them away; but his own he has made, emphatically made it; he
+is worth a million pounds.&nbsp; Hurrah for the millionnaire!&nbsp;
+The clown who views the pandemonium of red brick which he has built
+on the estate which he has purchased in the neighbourhood of the place
+of his grand d&eacute;b&ucirc;t, in which every species of architecture,
+Greek, Indian, and Chinese, is employed in caricature - who hears of
+the grand entertainment he gives at Christmas in the principal dining-room,
+the hundred wax-candles, the waggon-load of plate, and the ocean of
+wine which form parts of it, and above all the two ostrich poults, one
+at the head, and the other at the foot of the table, exclaims, &ldquo;Well!
+if he a&rsquo;n&rsquo;t bang up, I don&rsquo;t know who be; why he beats
+my lord hollow!&rdquo;&nbsp; The mechanic of the borough town, who sees
+him dashing through the streets in an open landau, drawn by four milk-white
+horses, amidst his attendant out-riders; his wife, a monster of a woman,
+by his side, stout as the wife of Tamerlane, who weighed twenty stone,
+and bedizened out like her whose person shone with the jewels of plundered
+Persia, stares with silent wonder, and at last exclaims &ldquo;That&rsquo;s
+the man for my vote!&rdquo;&nbsp; You tell the clown that the man of
+the mansion has contributed enormously to corrupt the rural innocence
+of England; you point to an incipient branch railroad, from around which
+the accents of Gomorrah are sounding, and beg him to listen for a moment,
+and then close his ears.&nbsp; Hodge scratches his head and says, &ldquo;Well,
+I have nothing to say to that; all I know is, that he is bang up, and
+I wish I were he;&rdquo; perhaps he will add - a Hodge has been known
+to add - &ldquo;He has been kind enough to put my son on that very railroad;
+&lsquo;tis true the company is somewhat queer, and the work rather killing,
+but he gets there half-a-crown a day, whereas from the farmers he would
+only get eighteen-pence.&rdquo;&nbsp; You remind the mechanic that the
+man in the landau has been the ruin of thousands and you mention people
+whom he himself knows, people in various grades of life, widows and
+orphans amongst them, whose little all has been dissipated, and whom
+he has reduced to beggary by inducing them to become sharers in his
+delusive schemes.&nbsp; But the mechanic says, &ldquo;Well, the more
+fools they to let themselves be robbed.&nbsp; But I don&rsquo;t call
+that kind of thing robbery, I merely call it out-witting; and everybody
+in this free country has a right to outwit others if he can.&nbsp; What
+a turn-out he has!&rdquo;&nbsp; One was once heard to add, &ldquo;I
+never saw a more genteel-looking man in all my life except one, and
+that was a gentleman&rsquo;s walley, who was much like him.&nbsp; It
+is true that he is rather under-sized, but then madam, you know, makes
+up for all.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER V<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Subject of Gentility continued.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+In the last chapter have been exhibited specimens of gentility, so considered
+by different classes; by one class power, youth, and epaulets are considered
+the ne plus ultra of gentility; by another class pride, stateliness,
+and title; by another, wealth and flaming tawdriness.&nbsp; But what
+constitutes a gentleman?&nbsp; It is easy to say at once what constitutes
+a gentleman, and there are no distinctions in what is gentlemanly, <a name="citation5"></a><a href="#footnote5">{5}</a>
+as there are in what is genteel.&nbsp; The characteristics of a gentleman
+are high feeling - a determination never to take a cowardly advantage
+of another - a liberal education - absence of narrow views - generosity
+and courage, propriety of behaviour.&nbsp; Now a person may be genteel
+according to one or another of the three standards described above,
+and not possess one of the characteristics of a gentleman.&nbsp; Is
+the emperor a gentleman, with spatters of blood on his clothes, scourged
+from the backs of noble Hungarian women?&nbsp; Are the aristocracy gentlefolks,
+who admire him?&nbsp; Is Mr. Flamson a gentleman, although he has a
+million pounds?&nbsp; No! cowardly miscreants, admirers of cowardly
+miscreants, and people who make a million pounds by means compared with
+which those employed to make fortunes by the getters up of the South
+Sea Bubble might be called honest dealing, are decidedly not gentlefolks.&nbsp;
+Now as it is clearly demonstrable that a person may be perfectly genteel
+according to some standard or other, and yet be no gentleman, so it
+is demonstrable that a person may have no pretensions to gentility,
+and yet be a gentleman.&nbsp; For example, there is Lavengro!&nbsp;
+Would the admirers of the emperor, or the admirers of those who admire
+the emperor, or the admirers of Mr. Flamson, call him genteel? and gentility
+with them is everything!&nbsp; Assuredly they would not; and assuredly
+they would consider him respectively as a being to be shunned, despised,
+or hooted.&nbsp; Genteel!&nbsp; Why at one time he is a hack author
+- writes reviewals for eighteenpence a page - edits a Newgate chronicle.&nbsp;
+At another he wanders the country with a face grimy from occasionally
+mending kettles; and there is no evidence that his clothes are not seedy
+and torn, and his shoes down at the heel; but by what process of reasoning
+will they prove that he is no gentleman?&nbsp; Is he not learned?&nbsp;
+Has he not generosity and courage?&nbsp; Whilst a hack author, does
+he pawn the books entrusted to him to review?&nbsp; Does he break his
+word to his publisher?&nbsp; Does he write begging letters?&nbsp; Does
+he get clothes or lodgings without paying for them?&nbsp; Again, whilst
+a wanderer, does he insult helpless women on the road with loose proposals
+or ribald discourse?&nbsp; Does he take what is not his own from the
+hedges?&nbsp; Does he play on the fiddle, or make faces in public-houses,
+in order to obtain pence or beer? or does he call for liquor, swallow
+it, and then say to a widowed landlady, &ldquo;Mistress, I have no brass?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+In a word, what vice and crime does he perpetrate - what low acts does
+he commit?&nbsp; Therefore, with his endowments, who will venture to
+say that he is no gentleman? - unless it be an admirer of Mr. Flamson
+- a clown - who will, perhaps, shout - &ldquo;I say he is no gentleman;
+for who can be a gentleman who keeps no gig?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The indifference exhibited by Lavengro for what is merely genteel, compared
+with his solicitude never to infringe the strict laws of honour, should
+read a salutary lesson.&nbsp; The generality of his countrymen are far
+more careful not to transgress the customs of what they call gentility,
+than to violate the laws of honour or morality.&nbsp; They will shrink
+from carrying their own carpet-bag, and from speaking to a person in
+seedy raiment, whilst to matters of much higher importance they are
+shamelessly indifferent.&nbsp; Not so Lavengro; he will do anything
+that he deems convenient, or which strikes his fancy, provided it does
+not outrage decency, or is unallied to profligacy; is not ashamed to
+speak to a beggar in rags, and will associate with anybody, provided
+he can gratify a laudable curiosity.&nbsp; He has no abstract love for
+what is low, or what the world calls low.&nbsp; He sees that many things
+which the world looks down upon are valuable, so he prizes much which
+the world condemns; he sees that many things which the world admires
+are contemptible, so he despises much which the world does not; but
+when the world prizes what is really excellent, he does not contemn
+it, because the world regards it.&nbsp; If he learns Irish, which all
+the world scoffs at, he likewise learns Italian, which all the world
+melts at.&nbsp; If he learns Gypsy, the language of the tattered tent,
+he likewise learns Greek, the language of the college-hall.&nbsp; If
+he learns smithery, he also learns - ah! what does he learn to set against
+smithery? - the law?&nbsp; No; he does not learn the law, which, by
+the way, is not very genteel.&nbsp; Swimming?&nbsp; Yes, he learns to
+swim.&nbsp; Swimming, however, is not genteel; and the world - at least
+the genteel part of it - acts very wisely in setting its face against
+it; for to swim you must be naked, and how would many a genteel person
+look without his clothes?&nbsp; Come, he learns horsemanship; a very
+genteel accomplishment, which every genteel person would gladly possess,
+though not all genteel people do.<br>
+<br>
+Again as to associates: if he holds communion when a boy with Murtagh,
+the scarecrow of an Irish academy, he associates in after life with
+Francis Ardry, a rich and talented young Irish gentleman about town.&nbsp;
+If he accepts an invitation from Mr. Petulengro to his tent, he has
+no objection to go home with a rich genius to dinner; who then will
+say that he prizes a thing or a person because they are ungenteel?&nbsp;
+That he is not ready to take up with everything that is ungenteel he
+gives a proof, when he refuses, though on the brink of starvation, to
+become bonnet to the thimble-man, an office, which, though profitable,
+is positively ungenteel.&nbsp; Ah! but some sticker-up for gentility
+will exclaim, &ldquo;The hero did not refuse this office from an insurmountable
+dislike to its ungentility, but merely from a feeling of principle.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Well! the writer is not fond of argument, and he will admit that such
+was the case; he admits that it was a love of principle, rather than
+an over-regard for gentility, which prevented the hero from accepting,
+when on the brink of starvation, an ungenteel though lucrative office,
+an office which, the writer begs leave to observe, many a person with
+a great regard for gentility, and no particular regard for principle,
+would in a similar strait have accepted; for when did a mere love for
+gentility keep a person from being a dirty scoundrel, when the alternatives
+were &ldquo;either be a dirty scoundrel or starve?&rdquo;&nbsp; One
+thing, however, is certain, which is, that Lavengro did not accept the
+office, which if a love for what is low had been his ruling passion
+he certainly would have done; consequently, he refuses to do one thing
+which no genteel person would willingly do, even as he does many things
+which every genteel person would gladly do, for example, speaks Italian,
+rides on horseback, associates with a fashionable young man, dines with
+a rich genius, et cetera.&nbsp; Yet - and it cannot be minced - he and
+gentility with regard to many things are at strange divergency; he shrinks
+from many things at which gentility placidly hums a tune, or approvingly
+simpers, and does some things at which gentility positively shrinks.&nbsp;
+He will not run into debt for clothes or lodgings, which he might do
+without any scandal to gentility; he will not receive money from Francis
+Ardry, and go to Brighton with the sister of Annette Le Noir, though
+there is nothing ungenteel in borrowing money from a friend, even when
+you never intend to repay him, and something poignantly genteel in going
+to a watering-place with a gay young Frenchwoman; but he has no objection,
+after raising twenty pounds by the sale of that extraordinary work &ldquo;Joseph
+Sell,&rdquo; to set off into the country, mend kettles under hedge-rows,
+and make pony and donkey shoes in a dingle.&nbsp; Here, perhaps, some
+plain, well-meaning person will cry - and with much apparent justice
+- how can the writer justify him in this act?&nbsp; What motive, save
+a love for what is low, could induce him to do such a thing?&nbsp; Would
+the writer have everybody who is in need of recreation go into the country,
+mend kettles under hedges, and make pony shoes in dingles?&nbsp; To
+such an observation the writer would answer, that Lavengro had an excellent
+motive in doing what he did, but that the writer is not so unreasonable
+as to wish everybody to do the same.&nbsp; It is not everybody who can
+mend kettles.&nbsp; It is not everybody who is in similar circumstances
+to those in which Lavengro was.&nbsp; Lavengro flies from London and
+hack authorship, and takes to the roads from fear of consumption; it
+is expensive to put up at inns, and even at public-houses, and Lavengro
+has not much money; so he buys a tinker&rsquo;s cart and apparatus,
+and sets up as tinker, and subsequently as blacksmith; a person living
+in a tent, or in anything else, must do something or go mad; Lavengro
+had a mind, as he himself well knew, with some slight tendency to madness,
+and had he not employed himself, he must have gone wild; so to employ
+himself he drew upon one of his resources, the only one available at
+the time.&nbsp; Authorship had nearly killed him, he was sick of reading,
+and had besides no books; but he possessed the rudiments of an art akin
+to tinkering; he knew something of smithery, having served a kind of
+apprenticeship in Ireland to a fairy smith; so he draws upon his smithery
+to enable him to acquire tinkering, he speedily acquires that craft,
+even as he had speedily acquired Welsh, owing to its connection with
+Irish, which language he possessed; and with tinkering he amuses himself
+until he lays it aside to resume smithery.&nbsp; A man who has an innocent
+resource, has quite as much right to draw upon it in need, as he has
+upon a banker in whose hands he has placed a sum; Lavengro turns to
+advantage, under particular circumstances, a certain resource which
+he has, but people who are not so forlorn as Lavengro, and have not
+served the same apprenticeship which he had, are not advised to follow
+his example.&nbsp; Surely he was better employed in plying the trades
+of tinker and smith than in having recourse to vice, in running after
+milk-maids, for example.&nbsp; Running after milk-maids is by no means
+an ungenteel rural diversion; but let any one ask some respectable casuist
+(the Bishop of London for example), whether Lavengro was not far better
+employed, when in the country, at tinkering and smithery than he would
+have been in running after all the milk-maids in Cheshire, though tinkering
+is in general considered a very ungenteel employment, and smithery little
+better, notwithstanding that an Orcadian poet, who wrote in Norse about
+eight hundred years ago, reckons the latter among nine noble arts which
+he possessed, naming it along with playing at chess, on the harp, and
+ravelling runes, or as the original has it, &ldquo;treading runes&rdquo;
+- that is, compressing them into a small compass by mingling one letter
+with another, even as the Turkish caligraphists ravel the Arabic letters,
+more especially those who write talismans.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Nine arts have I, all noble;<br>
+I play at chess so free,<br>
+At ravelling runes I&rsquo;m ready,<br>
+At books and smithery;<br>
+I&rsquo;m skilled o&rsquo;er ice at skimming<br>
+On skates, I shoot and row,<br>
+And few at harping match me,<br>
+Or minstrelsy, I trow.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+But though Lavengro takes up smithery, which, though the Orcadian ranks
+it with chess-playing and harping, is certainly somewhat of a grimy
+art, there can be no doubt that, had he been wealthy and not so forlorn
+as he was, he would have turned to many things, honourable, of course,
+in preference.&nbsp; He has no objection to ride a fine horse when he
+has the opportunity: he has his day-dream of making a fortune of two
+hundred thousand pounds by becoming a merchant and doing business after
+the Armenian fashion; and there can be no doubt that he would have been
+glad to wear fine clothes, provided he had had sufficient funds to authorize
+him in wearing them.&nbsp; For the sake of wandering the country and
+plying the hammer and tongs, he would not have refused a commission
+in the service of that illustrious monarch George the Fourth, provided
+he had thought that he could live on his pay, and not be forced to run
+in debt to tradesmen, without any hope of paying them, for clothes and
+luxuries, as many highly genteel officers in that honourable service
+were in the habit of doing.&nbsp; For the sake of tinkering, he would
+certainly not have refused a secretaryship of an embassy to Persia,
+in which he might have turned his acquaintance with Persian, Arabic,
+and the Lord only knows what other languages, to account.&nbsp; He took
+to tinkering and smithery, because no better employments were at his
+command.&nbsp; No war is waged in the book against rank, wealth, fine
+clothes, or dignified employments; it is shown, however, that a person
+may be a gentleman and a scholar without them.&nbsp; Rank, wealth, fine
+clothes, and dignified employments, are no doubt very fine things, but
+they are merely externals, they do not make a gentleman, they add external
+grace and dignity to the gentleman and scholar, but they make neither;
+and is it not better to be a gentleman without them than not a gentleman
+with them?&nbsp; Is not Lavengro, when he leaves London on foot with
+twenty pounds in his pocket, entitled to more respect than Mr. Flamson
+flaming in his coach with a million?&nbsp; And is not even the honest
+jockey at Horncastle, who offers a fair price to Lavengro for his horse,
+entitled to more than the scoundrel lord, who attempts to cheat him
+of one-fourth of its value?<br>
+<br>
+Millions, however, seem to think otherwise, by their servile adoration
+of people whom without rank, wealth, and fine clothes they would consider
+infamous, but whom possessed of rank, wealth, and glittering habiliments
+they seem to admire all the more for their profligacy and crimes.&nbsp;
+Does not a blood-spot, or a lust-spot, on the clothes of a blooming
+emperor, give a kind of zest to the genteel young god?&nbsp; Do not
+the pride, superciliousness, and selfishness of a certain aristocracy
+make it all the more regarded by its worshippers? and do not the clownish
+and gutter-blood admirers of Mr. Flamson like him all the more because
+they are conscious that he is a knave?&nbsp; If such is the case&nbsp;
+- and, alas! is it not the case? - they cannot be too frequently told
+that fine clothes, wealth, and titles adorn a person in proportion as
+he adorns them; that if worn by the magnanimous and good they are ornaments
+indeed, but if by the vile and profligate they are merely san benitos,
+and only serve to make their infamy doubly apparent; and that a person
+in seedy raiment and tattered hat, possessed of courage, kindness, and
+virtue, is entitled to more respect from those to whom his virtues are
+manifested than any cruel profligate emperor, selfish aristocrat, or
+knavish millionaire in the world.<br>
+<br>
+The writer has no intention of saying that all in England are affected
+with the absurd mania for gentility; nor is such a statement made in
+the book; it is shown therein that individuals of certain classes can
+prize a gentleman, notwithstanding seedy raiment, dusty shoes or tattered
+hat, - for example, the young Irishman, the rich genius, the postillion,
+and his employer.&nbsp; Again, when the life of the hero is given to
+the world, amidst the howl about its lowness and vulgarity, raised by
+the servile crew whom its independence of sentiment has stung, more
+than one powerful voice has been heard testifying approbation of its
+learning and the purity of its morality.&nbsp; That there is some salt
+in England, minds not swayed by mere externals, he is fully convinced;
+if he were not, he would spare himself the trouble of writing; but to
+the fact that the generality of his countrymen are basely grovelling
+before the shrine of what they are pleased to call gentility, he cannot
+shut his eyes.<br>
+<br>
+&nbsp;Oh! what a clever person that Cockney was, who, travelling in
+the Aberdeen railroad carriage, after edifying the company with his
+remarks on various subjects, gave it as his opinion that Lieutenant
+P--- would, in future, be shunned by all respectable society!&nbsp;
+And what a simple person that elderly gentleman was, who, abruptly starting,
+asked in rather an authoritative voice, &ldquo;and why should Lieutenant
+P--- be shunned by respectable society?&rdquo; and who, after entering
+into what was said to be a masterly analysis of the entire evidence
+of the case, concluded by stating, &ldquo;that having been accustomed
+to all kinds of evidence all his life, he had never known a case in
+which the accused had obtained a more complete and triumphant justification
+than Lieutenant P--- had done in the late trial.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Now the Cockney, who is said to have been a very foppish Cockney, was
+perfectly right in what he said, and therein manifested a knowledge
+of the English mind and character, and likewise of the modern English
+language, to which his catechist, who, it seems, was a distinguished
+member of the Scottish bar, could lay no pretensions.&nbsp; The Cockney
+knew what the Lord of Session knew not, that the British public is gentility
+crazy, and he knew, moreover, that gentility and respectability are
+synonymous.&nbsp; No one in England is genteel or respectable that is
+&ldquo;looked at,&rdquo; who is the victim of oppression; he may be
+pitied for a time, but when did not pity terminate in contempt?&nbsp;
+A poor, harmless young officer - but why enter into the details of the
+infamous case? they are but too well known, and if ever cruelty, pride,
+and cowardice, and things much worse than even cruelty, cowardice, and
+pride were brought to light, and, at the same time, countenanced, they
+were in that case.&nbsp; What availed the triumphant justification of
+the poor victim?&nbsp; There was at first a roar of indignation against
+his oppressors, but how long did it last?&nbsp; He had been turned out
+of the service, they remained in it with their red coats and epaulets;
+he was merely the son of a man who had rendered good service to his
+country, they were, for the most part, highly connected - they were
+in the extremest degree genteel, he quite the reverse; so the nation
+wavered, considered, thought the genteel side was the safest after all,
+and then with the cry of, &ldquo;Oh! there is nothing like gentility,&rdquo;
+ratted bodily.&nbsp; Newspaper and public turned against the victim,
+scouted him, apologized for the - what should they be called? - who
+were not only admitted into the most respectable society, but courted
+to come, the spots not merely of wine on their military clothes, giving
+them a kind of poignancy.&nbsp; But there is a God in heaven; the British
+glories are tarnished - Providence has never smiled on British arms
+since that case - oh!&nbsp; Balaklava! thy name interpreted is net of
+fishes, and well dost thou deserve that name.&nbsp; How many a scarlet
+golden fish has of late perished in the mud amidst thee, cursing the
+genteel service, and the genteel leader which brought him to such a
+doom.<br>
+<br>
+Whether the rage for gentility is most prevalent amongst the upper,
+middle, or lower classes it is difficult to say; the priest in the text
+seems to think that it is exhibited in the most decided manner in the
+middle class; it is the writer&rsquo;s opinion, however, that in no
+class is it more strongly developed than in the lower: what they call
+being well-born goes a great way amongst them, but the possession of
+money much farther, whence Mr. Flamson&rsquo;s influence over them.&nbsp;
+Their rage against, and scorn for, any person who by his courage and
+talents has advanced himself in life, and still remains poor, are indescribable;
+&ldquo;he is no better than ourselves,&rdquo; they say, &ldquo;why should
+he be above us?&rdquo; - for they have no conception that anybody has
+a right to ascendency over themselves except by birth or money.&nbsp;
+This feeling amongst the vulgar has been, to a certain extent, the bane
+of two services, naval and military.&nbsp; The writer does not make
+this assertion rashly; he observed this feeling at work in the army
+when a child, and he has good reason for believing that it was as strongly
+at work in the navy at the same time, and is still as prevalent in both.&nbsp;
+Why are not brave men raised from the ranks? is frequently the cry;
+why are not brave sailors promoted?&nbsp; The Lord help brave soldiers
+and sailors who are promoted; they have less to undergo from the high
+airs of their brother officers, and those are hard enough to endure,
+than from the insolence of the men.&nbsp; Soldiers and sailors promoted
+to command are said to be in general tyrants; in nine cases out of ten,
+when they are tyrants, they have been obliged to have recourse to extreme
+severity in order to protect themselves from the insolence and mutinous
+spirit of the men, - &ldquo;He is no better than ourselves: shoot him,
+bayonet him, or fling him overboard!&rdquo; they say of some obnoxious
+individual raised above them by his merit.&nbsp; Soldiers and sailors,
+in general, will bear any amount of tyranny from a lordly sot, or the
+son of a man who has &ldquo;plenty of brass&rdquo; - their own term
+- but will mutiny against the just orders of a skilful and brave officer
+who &ldquo;is no better than themselves.&rdquo;&nbsp; There was the
+affair of the &ldquo;Bounty,&rdquo; for example: Bligh was one of the
+best seamen that ever trod deck, and one of the bravest of men; proofs
+of his seamanship he gave by steering, amidst dreadful weather, a deeply-laden
+boat for nearly four thousand miles over an almost unknown ocean - of
+his bravery, at the fight of Copenhagen, one of the most desperate ever
+fought, of which after Nelson he was the hero: he was, moreover, not
+an unkind man; but the crew of the &ldquo;Bounty&rdquo; mutinied against
+him, and set him half naked in an open boat, with certain of his men
+who remained faithful to him, and ran away with the ship.&nbsp; Their
+principal motive for doing so was an idea, whether true or groundless
+the writer cannot say, that Bligh was &ldquo;no better than themselves;&rdquo;
+he was certainly neither a lord&rsquo;s illegitimate, nor possessed
+of twenty thousand pounds.&nbsp; The writer knows what he is writing
+about, having been acquainted in his early years with an individual
+who was turned adrift with Bligh, and who died about the year &lsquo;22,
+a lieutenant in the navy, in a provincial town in which the writer was
+brought up.&nbsp; The ringleaders in the mutiny were two scoundrels,
+Christian and Young, who had great influence with the crew, because
+they were genteelly connected.&nbsp; Bligh, after leaving the &ldquo;Bounty,&rdquo;
+had considerable difficulty in managing the men who had shared his fate,
+because they considered themselves &ldquo;as good men as he,&rdquo;
+notwithstanding, that to his conduct and seamanship they had alone to
+look, under Heaven, for salvation from the ghastly perils that surrounded
+them.&nbsp; Bligh himself, in his journal, alludes to this feeling.&nbsp;
+Once, when he and his companions landed on a desert island, one of them
+said, with a mutinous look, that he considered himself &ldquo;as good
+a man as he;&rdquo; Bligh, seizing a cutlass, called upon him to take
+another and defend himself, whereupon the man said that Bligh was going
+to kill him, and made all manner of concessions; now why did this fellow
+consider himself as good a man as Bligh?&nbsp; Was he as good a seaman?
+no, nor a tenth part as good.&nbsp; As brave a man? no, nor a tenth
+part as brave; and of these facts he was perfectly well aware, but bravery
+and seamanship stood for nothing with him, as they still stand with
+thousands of his class; Bligh was not genteel by birth or money, therefore
+Bligh was no better than himself.&nbsp; Had Bligh, before he sailed,
+got a twenty-thousand pound prize in the lottery, he would have experienced
+no insolence from this fellow, for there would have been no mutiny in
+the &ldquo;Bounty.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He is our betters,&rdquo; the
+crew would have said, &ldquo;and it is our duty to obey him.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The wonderful power of gentility in England is exemplified in nothing
+more than in what it is producing amongst Jews, Gypsies, and Quakers.&nbsp;
+It is breaking up their venerable communities.&nbsp; All the better,
+some one will say.&nbsp; Alas! alas!&nbsp; It is making the wealthy
+Jews forsake the synagogue for the opera-house, or the gentility chapel,
+in which a disciple of Mr. Platitude, in a white surplice, preaches
+a sermon at noon-day from a desk, on each side of which is a flaming
+taper.&nbsp; It is making them abandon their ancient literature, their
+&ldquo;Mischna,&rdquo; their &ldquo;Gemara,&rdquo; their &ldquo;Zohar,&rdquo;
+for gentility novels, &ldquo;The Young Duke,&rdquo; the most unexceptionably
+genteel book ever written, being the principal favourite.&nbsp; It makes
+the young Jew ashamed of the young Jewess, it makes her ashamed of the
+young Jew.&nbsp; The young Jew marries an opera-dancer, or if the dancer
+will not have him, as is frequently the case, the cast-off Miss of the
+Honourable Spencer So-and-so.&nbsp; It makes the young Jewess accept
+the honourable offer of a cashiered lieutenant of the Bengal Native
+Infantry; or, if such a person does not come forward, the dishonourable
+offer of a cornet of a regiment of crack hussars.&nbsp; It makes poor
+Jews, male and female, forsake the synagogue for the sixpenny theatre
+or penny hop; the Jew to take up with an Irish female of loose character,
+and the Jewess with a musician of the Guards, or the Tipperary servant
+of Captain Mulligan.&nbsp; With respect to the gypsies, it is making
+the women what they never were before - harlots; and the men what they
+never were before - careless fathers and husbands.&nbsp; It has made
+the daughter of Ursula the chaste take up with the base drummer of a
+wild-beast show.&nbsp; It makes Gorgiko Brown, the gypsy man, leave
+his tent and his old wife, of an evening, and thrust himself into society
+which could well dispense with him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Brother,&rdquo; said
+Mr. Petulengro to the Romany Rye, after telling him many things connected
+with the decadence of gypsyism, &ldquo;there is one Gorgiko Brown, who,
+with a face as black as a tea-kettle, wishes to be mistaken for a Christian
+tradesman; he goes into the parlour of a third-rate inn of an evening,
+calls for rum and water, and attempts to enter into conversation with
+the company about politics and business; the company flout him and give
+him the cold shoulder, or perhaps complain to the landlord, who comes
+and asks him what business he has in the parlour, telling him if he
+wants to drink to go into the tap-room, and perhaps collars him and
+kicks him out, provided he refuses to move.&rdquo;&nbsp; With respect
+to the Quakers, it makes the young people like the young Jews, crazy
+after gentility diversions, worship, marriages, or connections, and
+makes old Pease do what it makes Gorgiko Brown do, thrust himself into
+society which could well dispense with him, and out of which he is not
+kicked, because unlike the gypsy he is not poor.&nbsp; The writer would
+say much more on these points, but want of room prevents him; he must
+therefore request the reader to have patience until he can lay before
+the world a pamphlet, which he has been long meditating, to be entitled
+&ldquo;Remarks on the strikingly similar Effects which a Love for Gentility
+has produced, and is producing, amongst Jews, Gypsies, and Quakers.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The Priest in the book has much to say on the subject of this gentility-nonsense;
+no person can possibly despise it more thoroughly than that very remarkable
+individual seems to do, yet he hails its prevalence with pleasure, knowing
+the benefits which will result from it to the church of which he is
+the sneering slave.&nbsp; &ldquo;The English are mad after gentility,&rdquo;
+says he; &ldquo;well, all the better for us; their religion for a long
+time past has been a plain and simple one, and consequently by no means
+genteel; they&rsquo;ll quit it for ours, which is the perfection of
+what they admire; with which Templars, Hospitalers, mitred abbots, Gothic
+abbeys, long-drawn aisles, golden censers, incense, et cetera, are connected;
+nothing, or next to nothing, of Christ, it is true, but weighed in the
+balance against gentility, where will Christianity be? why, kicking
+against the beam - ho! ho!&rdquo;&nbsp; And in connection with the gentility-nonsense,
+he expatiates largely, and with much contempt, on a species of literature
+by which the interests of his church in England have been very much
+advanced - all genuine priests have a thorough contempt for everything
+which tends to advance the interests of their church - this literature
+is made up of pseudo Jacobitism, Charlie o&rsquo;er the waterism, or
+nonsense about Charlie o&rsquo;er the water.&nbsp; And the writer will
+now take the liberty of saying a few words about it on his own account.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On Scotch Gentility-Nonsense - Charlie o&rsquo;er the Waterism.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Of the literature just alluded to Scott was the inventor.&nbsp; It is
+founded on the fortunes and misfortunes of the Stuart family, of which
+Scott was the zealous defender and apologist, doing all that in his
+power lay to represent the members of it as noble, chivalrous, high-minded,
+unfortunate princes; though, perhaps, of all the royal families that
+ever existed upon the earth, this family was the worst.&nbsp; It was
+unfortunate enough, it is true; but it owed its misfortunes entirely
+to its crimes, viciousness, bad faith, and cowardice.&nbsp; Nothing
+will be said of it here until it made its appearance in England to occupy
+the English throne.<br>
+<br>
+The first of the family which we have to do with, James, was a dirty,
+cowardly miscreant, of whom the less said the better.&nbsp; His son,
+Charles the First, was a tyrant - exceedingly cruel and revengeful,
+but weak and dastardly; he caused a poor fellow to be hanged in London,
+who was not his subject, because he had heard that the unfortunate creature
+had once bitten his own glove at Cadiz, in Spain, at the mention of
+his name; and he permitted his own bull-dog, Strafford, to be executed
+by his own enemies, though the only crime of Strafford was, that he
+had barked furiously at those enemies, and had worried two or three
+of them, when Charles shouted, &ldquo;Fetch &lsquo;em.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+He was a bitter, but yet a despicable enemy, and the coldest and most
+worthless of friends; for though he always hoped to be able, some time
+or other, to hang his enemies, he was always ready to curry favour with
+them, more especially if he could do so at the expense of his friends.&nbsp;
+He was the haughtiest, yet meanest of mankind.&nbsp; He once caned a
+young nobleman for appearing before him in the drawing-room not dressed
+exactly according to the court etiquette; yet he condescended to flatter
+and compliment him who, from principle, was his bitterest enemy, namely,
+Harrison, when the republican colonel was conducting him as a prisoner
+to London.&nbsp; His bad faith was notorious; it was from abhorrence
+of the first public instance which he gave of his bad faith, his breaking
+his word to the Infanta of Spain, that the poor Hiberno-Spaniard bit
+his glove at Cadiz; and it was his notorious bad faith which eventually
+cost him his head; for the Republicans would gladly have spared him,
+provided they could put the slightest confidence in any promise, however
+solemn, which he might have made to them.&nbsp; Of them, it would be
+difficult to say whether they most hated or despised him.&nbsp; Religion
+he had none.&nbsp; One day he favoured Popery; the next, on hearing
+certain clamours of the people, he sent his wife&rsquo;s domestics back
+packing to France, because they were Papists.&nbsp; Papists, however,
+should make him a saint, for he was certainly the cause of the taking
+of Rochelle.<br>
+<br>
+His son, Charles the Second, though he passed his youth in the school
+of adversity, learned no other lesson from it than the following one
+- take care of yourself, and never do an action, either good or bad,
+which is likely to bring you into any great difficulty; and this maxim
+he acted up to as soon as he came to the throne.&nbsp; He was a Papist,
+but took especial care not to acknowledge his religion, at which he
+frequently scoffed, till just before his last gasp, when he knew that
+he could lose nothing, and hoped to gain everything by it.&nbsp; He
+was always in want of money, but took care not to tax the country beyond
+all endurable bounds; preferring to such a bold and dangerous course,
+to become the pensioner of Louis, to whom, in return for his gold, he
+sacrificed the honour and interests of Britain.&nbsp; He was too lazy
+and sensual to delight in playing the part of a tyrant himself; but
+he never checked tyranny in others save in one instance.&nbsp; He permitted
+beastly butchers to commit unmentionable horrors on the feeble, unarmed,
+and disunited Covenanters of Scotland, but checked them when they would
+fain have endeavoured to play the same game on the numerous united,
+dogged, and warlike Independents of England.&nbsp; To show his filial
+piety, he bade the hangman dishonour the corpses of some of his father&rsquo;s
+judges, before whom, when alive, he ran like a screaming hare; but permitted
+those who had lost their all in supporting his father&rsquo;s cause,
+to pine in misery and want.&nbsp; He would give to a painted harlot
+a thousand pounds for a loathsome embrace, and to a player or buffoon
+a hundred for a trumpery pun, but would refuse a penny to the widow
+or orphan of an old Royalist soldier.&nbsp; He was the personification
+of selfishness; and as he loved and cared for no one, so did no one
+love or care for him.&nbsp; So little had he gained the respect or affection
+of those who surrounded him, that after his body had undergone an after-death
+examination, parts of it were thrown down the sinks of the palace, to
+become eventually the prey of the swine and ducks of Westminster.<br>
+<br>
+His brother, who succeeded him, James the Second, was a Papist, but
+sufficiently honest to acknowledge his Popery, but upon the whole, he
+was a poor creature; though a tyrant, he was cowardly, had he not been
+a coward he would never have lost his throne.&nbsp; There were plenty
+of lovers of tyranny in England who would have stood by him, provided
+he would have stood by them, and would, though not Papists, have encouraged
+him in his attempt to bring back England beneath the sway of Rome, and
+perhaps would eventually have become Papists themselves; but the nation
+raising a cry against him, and his son-in-law, the Prince of Orange,
+invading the country, he forsook his friends, of whom he had a host,
+but for whom he cared little - left his throne, for which he cared a
+great deal - and Popery in England, for which he cared yet more, to
+their fate, and escaped to France, from whence, after taking a little
+heart, he repaired to Ireland, where he was speedily joined by a gallant
+army of Papists whom he basely abandoned at the Boyne, running away
+in a most lamentable condition, at the time when by showing a little
+courage he might have enabled them to conquer.&nbsp; This worthy, in
+his last will, bequeathed his heart to England - his right arm to Scotland
+- and his bowels to Ireland.&nbsp; What the English and Scotch said
+to their respective bequests is not known, but it is certain that an
+old Irish priest, supposed to have been a great-grand-uncle of the present
+Reverend Father Murtagh, on hearing of the bequest to Ireland, fell
+into a great passion, and having been brought up at &ldquo;Paris and
+Salamanca,&rdquo; expressed his indignation in the following strain:-
+&ldquo;Malditas sean tus tripas! teniamos bastante del olor de tus tripas
+al tiempo de tu nuida dela batalla del Boyne!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+His son, generally called the Old Pretender, though born in England,
+was carried in his infancy to France, where he was brought up in the
+strictest principles of Popery, which principles, however, did not prevent
+him becoming (when did they ever prevent any one?) a worthless and profligate
+scoundrel; there are some doubts as to the reality of his being a son
+of James, which doubts are probably unfounded, the grand proof of his
+legitimacy being the thorough baseness of his character.&nbsp; It was
+said of his father that he could speak well, and it may be said of him
+that he could write well, the only thing he could do which was worth
+doing, always supposing that there is any merit in being able to write.&nbsp;
+He was of a mean appearance, and, like his father, pusillanimous to
+a degree.&nbsp; The meanness of his appearance disgusted, and his pusillanimity
+discouraged the Scotch when he made his appearance amongst them in the
+year 1715, some time after the standard of rebellion had been hoisted
+by Mar.&nbsp; He only stayed a short time in Scotland, and then, seized
+with panic, retreated to France, leaving his friends to shift for themselves
+as they best could.&nbsp; He died a pensioner of the Pope.<br>
+<br>
+The son of this man, Charles Edward, of whom so much in later years
+has been said and written, was a worthless ignorant youth, and a profligate
+and illiterate old man.&nbsp; When young, the best that can be said
+of him is, that he had occasionally springs of courage, invariably at
+the wrong time and place, which merely served to lead his friends into
+inextricable difficulties.&nbsp; When old, he was loathsome and contemptible
+to both friend and foe.&nbsp; His wife loathed him, and for the most
+terrible of reasons; she did not pollute his couch, for to do that was
+impossible - he had made it so vile; but she betrayed it, inviting to
+it not only Alfieri the Filthy, but the coarsest grooms.&nbsp; Doctor
+King, the warmest and almost last adherent of his family, said, that
+there was not a vice or crime of which he was not guilty; as for his
+foes, they scorned to harm him even when in their power.&nbsp; In the
+year 1745 he came down from the Highlands of Scotland, which had long
+been a focus of rebellion.&nbsp; He was attended by certain clans of
+the Highlands, desperadoes used to free-bootery from their infancy,
+and, consequently, to the use of arms, and possessed of a certain species
+of discipline; with these he defeated at Prestonpans a body of men called
+soldiers, but who were in reality peasants and artizans, levied about
+a month before, without discipline or confidence in each other, and
+who were miserably massacred by the Highland army; he subsequently invaded
+England, nearly destitute of regular soldiers, and penetrated as far
+as Derby, from which place he retreated on learning that regular forces
+which had been hastily recalled from Flanders were coming against him,
+with the Duke of Cumberland at their head; he was pursued, and his rearguard
+overtaken and defeated by the dragoons of the duke at Clifton, from
+which place the rebels retreated in great confusion across the Eden
+into Scotland, where they commenced dancing Highland reels and strathspeys
+on the bank of the river, for joy at their escape, whilst a number of
+wretched girls, paramours of some of them, were perishing in the waters
+of the swollen river in an attempt to follow them; they themselves passed
+over by eighties and by hundreds, arm in arm, for mutual safety, without
+the loss of a man, but they left the poor paramours to shift for themselves,
+nor did any of these canny people after passing the stream dash back
+to rescue a single female life, - no, they were too well employed upon
+the bank in dancing strathspeys to the tune of &ldquo;Charlie o&rsquo;er
+the water.&rdquo;&nbsp; It was, indeed, Charlie o&rsquo;er the water,
+and canny Highlanders o&rsquo;er the water, but where were the poor
+prostitutes meantime?&nbsp; <i>In the water</i>.<br>
+<br>
+The Jacobite farce, or tragedy, was speedily brought to a close by the
+battle of Culloden; there did Charlie wish himself back again o&rsquo;er
+the water, exhibiting the most unmistakable signs of pusillanimity;
+there were the clans cut to pieces, at least those who could be brought
+to the charge, and there fell Giles Mac Bean, or as he was called in
+Gaelic, Giliosa Mac Beathan, a kind of giant, six feet four inches and
+a quarter high, &ldquo;than whom,&rdquo; as his wife said in a coronach
+she made upon him, &ldquo;no man who stood at Cuiloitr was taller&rdquo;
+- Giles Mac Bean the Major of the clan Cattan - a great drinker - a
+great fisher - a great shooter, and the champion of the Highland host.<br>
+<br>
+The last of the Stuarts was a cardinal.<br>
+<br>
+Such were the Stuarts, such their miserable history.&nbsp; They were
+dead and buried in every sense of the word until Scott resuscitated
+them - how? by the power of fine writing and by calling to his aid that
+strange divinity, gentility.&nbsp; He wrote splendid novels about the
+Stuarts, in which he represents them as unlike what they really were
+as the graceful and beautiful papillon is unlike the hideous and filthy
+worm.&nbsp; In a word, he made them genteel, and that was enough to
+give them paramount sway over the minds of the British people.&nbsp;
+The public became Stuart-mad, and everybody, specially the women, said,
+&ldquo;What a pity it was that we hadn&rsquo;t a Stuart to govern.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+All parties, Whig, Tory, or Radical, became Jacobite at heart, and admirers
+of absolute power.&nbsp; The Whigs talked about the liberty of the subject,
+and the Radicals about the rights of man still, but neither party cared
+a straw for what it talked about, and mentally swore that, as soon as
+by means of such stuff they could get places, and fill their pockets,
+they would be as Jacobite as the Jacobs themselves.&nbsp; As for Tories,
+no great change in them was necessary; everything favouring absolutism
+and slavery being congenial to them.&nbsp; So the whole nation, that
+is, the reading part of the nation, with some exceptions, for thank
+God there has always been some salt in England, went over the water
+to Charlie.&nbsp; But going over to Charlie was not enough, they must,
+or at least a considerable part of them, go over to Rome too, or have
+a hankering to do so.&nbsp; As the Priest sarcastically observes in
+the text, &ldquo;As all the Jacobs were Papists, so the good folks who
+through Scott&rsquo;s novels admire the Jacobs must be Papists too.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+An idea got about that the religion of such genteel people as the Stuarts
+must be the climax of gentility, and that idea was quite sufficient.&nbsp;
+Only let a thing, whether temporal or spiritual, be considered genteel
+in England, and if it be not followed it is strange indeed; so Scott&rsquo;s
+writings not only made the greater part of the nation Jacobite, but
+Popish.<br>
+<br>
+Here some people will exclaim - whose opinions remain sound and uncontaminated
+- what you say is perhaps true with respect to the Jacobite nonsense
+at present so prevalent being derived from Scott&rsquo;s novels, but
+the Popish nonsense, which people of the genteeler classes are so fond
+of, is derived from Oxford.&nbsp; We sent our sons to Oxford nice honest
+lads, educated in the principles of the Church of England, and at the
+end of the first term they came home puppies, talking Popish nonsense,
+which they had learned from the pedants to whose care we had entrusted
+them; ay, not only Popery but Jacobitism, which they hardly carried
+with them from home, for we never heard them talking Jacobitism before
+they had been at Oxford; but now their conversation is a farrago of
+Popish and Jacobite stuff - &ldquo;Complines and Claverse.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Now, what these honest folks say is, to a certain extent, founded on
+fact; the Popery which has overflowed the land during the last fourteen
+or fifteen years, has come immediately from Oxford, and likewise some
+of the Jacobitism, Popish and Jacobite nonsense, and little or nothing
+else, having been taught at Oxford for about that number of years.&nbsp;
+But whence did the pedants get the Popish nonsense with which they have
+corrupted youth?&nbsp; Why, from the same quarter from which they got
+the Jacobite nonsense with which they have inoculated those lads who
+were not inoculated with it before - Scott&rsquo;s novels.&nbsp; Jacobitism
+and Laudism, a kind of half Popery, had at one time been very prevalent
+at Oxford, but both had been long consigned to oblivion there, and people
+at Oxford cared as little about Laud as they did about the Pretender.&nbsp;
+Both were dead and buried there, as everywhere else, till Scott called
+them out of their graves, when the pedants of Oxford hailed both - ay,
+and the Pope, too, as soon as Scott had made the old fellow fascinating,
+through particular novels, more especially the &ldquo;Monastery&rdquo;
+and &ldquo;Abbot.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then the quiet, respectable, honourable
+Church of England would no longer do for the pedants of Oxford; they
+must belong to a more genteel church - they were ashamed at first to
+be downright Romans - so they would be Lauds.&nbsp; The pale-looking,
+but exceedingly genteel non-juring clergyman in Waverley was a Laud;
+but they soon became tired of being Lauds, for Laud&rsquo;s Church,
+gew-gawish and idolatrous as it was, was not sufficiently tinselly and
+idolatrous for them, so they must be Popes, but in a sneaking way, still
+calling themselves Church-of-England men, in order to batten on the
+bounty of the church which they were betraying, and likewise have opportunities
+of corrupting such lads as might still resort to Oxford with principles
+uncontaminated.<br>
+<br>
+So the respectable people, whose opinions are still sound, are, to a
+certain extent, right when they say that the tide of Popery, which has
+flowed over the land, has come from Oxford.&nbsp; It did come immediately
+from Oxford, but how did it get to Oxford?&nbsp; Why, from Scott&rsquo;s
+novels.&nbsp; Oh! that sermon which was the first manifestation of Oxford
+feeling, preached at Oxford some time in the year &lsquo;38 by a divine
+of a weak and confused intellect, in which Popery was mixed up with
+Jacobitism!&nbsp; The present writer remembers perfectly well, on reading
+some extracts from it at the time in a newspaper, on the top of a coach,
+exclaiming - &ldquo;Why, the simpleton has been pilfering from Walter
+Scott&rsquo;s novels!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+O Oxford pedants!&nbsp; Oxford pedants! ye whose politics and religion
+are both derived from Scott&rsquo;s novels! what a pity it is that some
+lad of honest parents, whose mind ye are endeavouring to stultify with
+your nonsense about &ldquo;Complines and Claverse,&rdquo; has not the
+spirit to start up and cry, &ldquo;Confound your gibberish!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll
+have none of it.&nbsp; Hurrah for the Church, and the principles of
+my <i>father</i>!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Same Subject continued.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Now what could have induced Scott to write novels tending to make people
+Papists and Jacobites, and in love with arbitrary power?&nbsp; Did he
+think that Christianity was a gaudy mummery?&nbsp; He did not, he could
+not, for he had read the Bible; yet was he fond of gaudy mummeries,
+fond of talking about them.&nbsp; Did he believe that the Stuarts were
+a good family, and fit to govern a country like Britain?&nbsp; He knew
+that they were a vicious, worthless crew, and that Britain was a degraded
+country as long as they swayed the sceptre; but for those facts he cared
+nothing, they governed in a way which he liked, for he had an abstract
+love of despotism, and an abhorrence of everything savouring of freedom
+and the rights of man in general.&nbsp; His favourite political picture
+was a joking, profligate, careless king, nominally absolute - the heads
+of great houses paying court to, but in reality governing, that king,
+whilst revelling with him on the plunder of a nation, and a set of crouching,
+grovelling vassals (the literal meaning of vassal is a wretch), who,
+after allowing themselves to be horsewhipped, would take a bone if flung
+to them, and be grateful; so that in love with mummery, though he knew
+what Christianity was, no wonder he admired such a church as that of
+Rome, and that which Laud set up; and by nature formed to be the holder
+of the candle to ancient worm-eaten and profligate families, no wonder
+that all his sympathies were with the Stuarts and their dissipated insolent
+party, and all his hatred directed against those who endeavoured to
+check them in their proceedings, and to raise the generality of mankind
+something above a state of vassalage, that is, wretchedness.&nbsp; Those
+who were born great, were, if he could have had his will, always to
+remain great, however worthless their characters.&nbsp; Those who were
+born low, were always to remain so, however great their talents; though,
+if that rule were carried out, where would he have been himself?<br>
+<br>
+In the book which he called the &ldquo;History of Napoleon Bonaparte,&rdquo;
+in which he plays the sycophant to all the legitimate crowned heads
+in Europe, whatever their crimes, vices, or miserable imbecilities,
+he, in his abhorrence of everything low which by its own vigour makes
+itself illustrious, calls Murat of the sabre the son of a pastry-cook,
+of a Marseilleise pastry-cook.&nbsp; It is a pity that people who give
+themselves hoity-toity airs - and the Scotch in general are wonderfully
+addicted to giving themselves hoity-toity airs, and checking people
+better than themselves with their birth <a name="citation6"></a><a href="#footnote6">{6}</a>
+and their country - it is a great pity that such people do not look
+at home-son of a pastry-cook, of a Marseilleise pastry-cook!&nbsp; Well,
+and what was Scott himself?&nbsp; Why, son of a pettifogger, of an Edinburgh
+pettifogger.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh, but Scott was descended from the old cow-stealers
+of Buccleuch, and therefore - &rdquo; descended from old cow-stealers,
+was he?&nbsp; Well, had he nothing to boast of beyond such a pedigree,
+he would have lived and died the son of a pettifogger, and been forgotten,
+and deservedly so; but he possessed talents, and by his talents rose
+like Murat, and like him will be remembered for his talents alone, and
+deservedly so.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes, but Murat was still the son of a pastry-cook,
+and though he was certainly good at the sabre, and cut his way to a
+throne, still - &rdquo;&nbsp; Lord! what fools there are in the world;
+but as no one can be thought anything of in this world without a pedigree,
+the writer will now give a pedigree for Murat, of a very different character
+from the cow-stealing one of Scott, but such a one as the proudest he
+might not disdain to claim.&nbsp; Scott was descended from the old cow-stealers
+of Buccleuch - was he?&nbsp; Good! and Murat was descended from the
+old Moors of Spain, from the Abencerages (sons of the saddle) of Granada.&nbsp;
+The name Murat is Arabic, and is the same as Murad (Le Desir&eacute;,
+or the wished-for one).&nbsp; Scott in his genteel Life of Bonaparte,
+says that &ldquo;when Murat was in Egypt, the similarity between the
+name of the celebrated Mameluke Mourad and that of Bonaparte&rsquo;s
+Meilleur Sabreur was remarked, and became the subject of jest amongst
+the comrades of the gallant Frenchman.&rdquo;&nbsp; But the writer of
+the novel of Bonaparte did not know that the names were one and the
+same.&nbsp; Now which was the best pedigree, that of the son of the
+pastry-cook, or that of the son of the pettifogger?&nbsp; Which was
+the best blood?&nbsp; Let us observe the workings of the two bloods.&nbsp;
+He who had the blood of the &ldquo;sons of the saddle&rdquo; in him,
+became the wonderful cavalier of the most wonderful host that ever went
+forth to conquest, won for himself a crown, and died the death of a
+soldier, leaving behind him a son, only inferior to himself in strength,
+in prowess, and in horsemanship.&nbsp; The descendant of the cow-stealer
+became a poet, a novel writer, the panegyrist of great folk and genteel
+people; became insolvent because, though an author, he deemed it ungenteel
+to be mixed up with the business part of the authorship; died paralytic
+and broken-hearted because he could no longer give entertainments to
+great folks, leaving behind him, amongst other children, who were never
+heard of, a son, who, through his father&rsquo;s interest, had become
+lieutenant-colonel in a genteel cavalry regiment.&nbsp; A son who was
+ashamed of his father because his father was an author; a son who -
+paugh - why ask which was the best blood?<br>
+<br>
+So, owing to his rage for gentility, Scott must needs become the apologist
+of the Stuarts and their party; but God made this man pay dearly for
+taking the part of the wicked against the good; for lauding up to the
+skies the miscreants and robbers, and calumniating the noble spirits
+of Britain, the salt of England, and his own country.&nbsp; As God had
+driven the Stuarts from their throne, and their followers from their
+estates, making them vagabonds and beggars on the face of the earth,
+taking from them all that they cared for, so did that same God, who
+knows perfectly well how and where to strike, deprive the apologist
+of that wretched crew of all that rendered life pleasant in his eyes,
+the lack of which paralysed him in body and mind, rendered him pitiable
+to others, loathsome to himself, - so much so, that he once said, &ldquo;Where
+is the beggar who would change places with me, notwithstanding all my
+fame?&rdquo;&nbsp; Ah! God knows perfectly well how to strike.&nbsp;
+He permitted him to retain all his literary fame to the very last -
+his literary fame for which he cared nothing; but what became of the
+sweetness of life, his fine house, his grand company, and his entertainments?&nbsp;
+The grand house ceased to be his; he was only permitted to live in it
+on sufferance, and whatever grandeur it might still retain, it soon
+became as desolate a looking house as any misanthrope could wish to
+see - where were the grand entertainments and the grand company? there
+are no grand entertainments where there is no money; no lords and ladies
+where there are no entertainments - and there lay the poor lodger in
+the desolate house, groaning on a bed no longer his, smitten by the
+hand of God in the part where he was most vulnerable.&nbsp; Of what
+use telling such a man to take comfort, for he had written the &ldquo;Minstrel&rdquo;
+and &ldquo;Rob Roy,&rdquo; - telling him to think of his literary fame?&nbsp;
+Literary fame, indeed! he wanted back his lost gentility:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Retain my altar,<br>
+I care nothing for it - but, oh! touch not my <i>beard</i>.&rdquo;<br>
+PORNY&rsquo;S <i>War of the Gods.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+</i>He dies, his children die too, and then comes the crowning judgment
+of God on what remains of his race and the house which he had built.&nbsp;
+He was not a Papist himself, nor did he wish any one belonging to him
+to be Popish, for he had read enough of the Bible to know that no one
+can be saved through Popery, yet had he a sneaking affection for it,
+and would at times in an underhand manner, give it a good word both
+in writing and discourse, because it was a gaudy kind of worship, and
+ignorance and vassalage prevailed so long as it flourished - but he
+certainly did not wish any of his people to become Papists, nor the
+house which he had built to become a Popish house, though the very name
+he gave it savoured of Popery; but Popery becomes fashionable through
+his novels and poems - the only one that remains of his race, a female
+grandchild, marries a person who, following the fashion, becomes a Papist,
+and makes her a Papist too.&nbsp; Money abounds with the husband, who
+buys the house, and then the house becomes the rankest Popish house
+in Britain.&nbsp; A superstitious person might almost imagine that one
+of the old Scottish Covenanters, whilst the grand house was being built
+from the profits resulting from the sale of writings favouring Popery
+and persecution, and calumniatory of Scotland&rsquo;s saints and martyrs,
+had risen from the grave, and banned Scott, his race, and his house,
+by reading a certain psalm.<br>
+<br>
+In saying what he has said about Scott, the author has not been influenced
+by any feeling of malice or ill-will, but simply by a regard for truth,
+and a desire to point out to his countrymen the harm which has resulted
+from the perusal of his works; - he is not one of those who would depreciate
+the talents of Scott - he admires his talents, both as a prose writer
+and a poet; as a poet especially he admires him, and believes him to
+have been by far the greatest, with perhaps the exception of Mickiewicz,
+who only wrote for unfortunate Poland, that Europe has given birth to
+during the last hundred years.&nbsp; As a prose writer he admires him,
+less, it is true, but his admiration for him in that capacity is very
+high, and he only laments that he prostituted his talents to the cause
+of the Stuarts and gentility.&nbsp; What book of fiction of the present
+century can you read twice, with the exception of &ldquo;Waverley&rdquo;
+and &ldquo;Rob Roy?&rdquo;&nbsp; There is &ldquo;Pelham,&rdquo; it is
+true, which the writer of these lines has seen a Jewess reading in the
+steppe of Debreczin, and which a young Prussian Baron, a great traveller,
+whom he met at Constantinople in &lsquo;44 told him he always carried
+in his valise.&nbsp; And, in conclusion, he will say, in order to show
+the opinion which he entertains of the power of Scott as a writer, that
+he did for the sceptre of the wretched Pretender what all the kings
+of Europe could not do for his body - placed it on the throne of these
+realms; and for Popery, what Popes and Cardinals strove in vain to do
+for three centuries - brought back its mummeries and nonsense into the
+temples of the British Isles.<br>
+<br>
+Scott during his lifetime had a crowd of imitators, who, whether they
+wrote history so called - poetry so called - or novels - nobody would
+call a book a novel if he could call it anything else - wrote Charlie
+o&rsquo;er the water nonsense; and now that he has been dead nearly
+a quarter of a century, there are others daily springing up who are
+striving to imitate Scott in his Charlie o&rsquo;er the water nonsense
+- for nonsense it is, even when flowing from his pen.&nbsp; They, too,
+must write Jacobite histories, Jacobite songs, and Jacobite novels,
+and much the same figure as the scoundrel menials in the comedy cut
+when personating their masters, and retailing their masters&rsquo; conversation,
+do they cut as Walter Scotts.&nbsp; In their histories, they too talk
+about the Prince and Glenfinnan, and the pibroch; and in their songs
+about &ldquo;Claverse&rdquo; and &ldquo;Bonny Dundee.&rdquo;&nbsp; But
+though they may be Scots, they are not Walter Scotts.&nbsp; But it is
+perhaps chiefly in the novel that you see the veritable hog in armour;
+the time of the novel is of course the &lsquo;15 or &lsquo;45; the hero
+a Jacobite, and connected with one or other of the enterprises of those
+periods; and the author, to show how unprejudiced he is, and what <i>original</i>
+views he takes of subjects, must needs speak up for Popery, whenever
+he has occasion to mention it; though, with all his originality, when
+he brings his hero and the vagabonds with which he is concerned before
+a barricadoed house, belonging to the Whigs, he can make them get into
+it by no other method than that which Scott makes his rioters employ
+to get into the Tolbooth, <i>burning</i> <i>down</i> the door.<br>
+<br>
+To express the more than utter foolishness of this latter Charlie o&rsquo;er
+the water nonsense, whether in rhyme or prose, there is but one word,
+and that word a Scotch word.&nbsp; Scotch, the sorriest of jargons,
+compared with which even Roth Welsch is dignified and expressive, has
+yet one word to express what would be inexpressible by any word or combination
+of words in any language, or in any other jargon in the world; and very
+properly; for as the nonsense is properly Scotch, so should the word
+be Scotch which expresses it - that word is &ldquo;fushionless,&rdquo;
+pronounced <i>fooshionless</i>; and when the writer has called the nonsense
+fooshionless - and he does call it fooshionless - he has nothing more
+to say, but leaves the nonsense to its fate.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VIII<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+On Canting Nonsense.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The writer now wishes to say something on the subject of canting nonsense,
+of which there is a great deal in England.&nbsp; There are various cants
+in England, amongst which is the religious cant.&nbsp; He is not going
+to discuss the subject of religious cant: lest, however, he should be
+misunderstood, he begs leave to repeat that he is a sincere member of
+the Church of England, in which he believes there is more religion,
+and consequently less cant, than in any other church in the world; nor
+is he going to discuss many other cants; he shall content himself with
+saying something about two - the temperance cant and the unmanly cant.&nbsp;
+Temperance canters say that &ldquo;it is unlawful to drink a glass of
+ale.&rdquo;&nbsp; Unmanly canters say that &ldquo;it is unlawful to
+use one&rsquo;s fists.&rdquo;&nbsp; The writer begs leave to tell both
+these species of canters that they do not speak words of truth.<br>
+<br>
+It is very lawful to take a cup of ale, or wine, for the purpose of
+cheering or invigorating yourself when you are faint and down-hearted;
+and likewise to give a cup of ale or wine to others when they are in
+a similar condition.&nbsp; The Holy Scripture sayeth nothing to the
+contrary, but rather encourageth people in so doing by the text, &ldquo;Wine
+maketh glad the heart of man.&rdquo;&nbsp; But it is not lawful to intoxicate
+yourself with frequent cups of ale or wine, nor to make others intoxicated,
+nor does the Holy Scripture say it is.&nbsp; The Holy Scripture no more
+says that it is lawful to intoxicate yourself or others, than it says
+that it is unlawful to take a cup of ale or wine yourself, or to give
+one to others.&nbsp; Noah is not commended in the Scripture for making
+himself drunken on the wine he brewed.&nbsp; Nor is it said that the
+Saviour, when he supplied the guests with first-rate wine at the marriage-feast,
+told them to make themselves drunk upon it.&nbsp; He is said to have
+supplied them with first-rate wine, but He doubtless left the quantity
+which each should drink to each party&rsquo;s reason and discretion.&nbsp;
+When you set a good dinner before your guests, you do not expect that
+they should gorge themselves with the victuals you set before them.&nbsp;
+Wine may be abused, and so may a leg of mutton.<br>
+<br>
+Second.&nbsp; It is lawful for any one to use his fists in his own defence,
+or in the defence of others, provided they can&rsquo;t help themselves;
+but it is not lawful to use them for purposes of tyranny or brutality.&nbsp;
+If you are attacked by a ruffian, as the elderly individual in Lavengro
+is in the inn-yard, it is quite lawful, if you can, to give him as good
+a thrashing as the elderly individual gave the brutal coachman; and
+if you see a helpless woman - perhaps your own sister - set upon by
+a drunken lord, a drunken coachman, or a drunken coalheaver, or a brute
+of any description, either drunk or sober, it is not only lawful but
+laudable, to give them, if you can, a good drubbing; but it is not lawful
+because you have a strong pair of fists, and know how to use them, to
+go swaggering through a fair, jostling against unoffending individuals;
+should you do so, you would be served quite right if you were to get
+a drubbing, more particularly if you were served out by some one less
+strong, but more skilful than yourself - even as the coachman was served
+out by a pupil of the immortal Broughton - sixty years old, it is true,
+but possessed of Broughton&rsquo;s guard and chop.&nbsp; Moses is not
+blamed in the Scripture for taking part with the oppressed, and killing
+an Egyptian persecutor.&nbsp; We are not told how Moses killed the Egyptian;
+but it is quite as creditable to Moses to suppose that he killed the
+Egyptian by giving him a buffet under the left ear, as by stabbing him
+with a knife.&nbsp; It is true that the Saviour in the New Testament
+tells His disciples to turn the left cheek to be smitten, after they
+had received a blow on the right; but He was speaking to people divinely
+inspired, or whom He intended divinely to inspire - people selected
+by God for a particular purpose.&nbsp; He likewise tells these people
+to part with various articles of raiment when asked for them, and to
+go a-travelling without money, and take no thought of the morrow.&nbsp;
+Are those exhortations carried out by very good people in the present
+day?&nbsp; Do Quakers, when smitten on the right cheek, turn the left
+to the smiter?&nbsp; When asked for their coat, do they say, &ldquo;Friend,
+take my shirt also?&rdquo;&nbsp; Has the Dean of Salisbury no purse?&nbsp;
+Does the Archbishop of Canterbury go to an inn, run up a reckoning,
+and then say to his landlady, &ldquo;Mistress, I have no coin?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Assuredly the Dean has a purse, and a tolerably well-filled one; and,
+assuredly, the Archbishop, on departing from an inn, not only settles
+his reckoning, but leaves something handsome for the servants, and does
+not say that he is forbidden by the gospel to pay for what he has eaten,
+or the trouble he has given, as a certain Spanish cavalier said he was
+forbidden by the statutes of chivalry.&nbsp; Now, to take the part of
+yourself, or the part of the oppressed, with your fists, is quite as
+lawful in the present day as it is to refuse your coat and shirt also
+to any vagabond who may ask for them, and not to refuse to pay for supper,
+bed, and breakfast, at the Feathers, or any other inn, after you have
+had the benefit of all three.<br>
+<br>
+The conduct of Lavengro with respect to drink may, upon the whole, serve
+as a model.&nbsp; He is no drunkard, nor is he fond of intoxicating
+other people; yet when the horrors are upon him he has no objection
+to go to a public-house and call for a pint of ale, nor does he shrink
+from recommending ale to others when they are faint and downcast.&nbsp;
+In one instance, it is true, he does what cannot be exactly justified;
+he encourages the Priest in the dingle, in more instances than one,
+in drinking more hollands and water than is consistent with decorum.&nbsp;
+He has a motive indeed in doing so; a desire to learn from the knave
+in his cups the plans and hopes of the Propaganda of Rome.&nbsp; Such
+conduct, however, was inconsistent with strict fair dealing and openness;
+and the author advises all those whose consciences never reproach them
+for a single unfair or covert act committed by them, to abuse him heartily
+for administering hollands and water to the Priest of Rome.&nbsp; In
+that instance the hero is certainly wrong; yet in all other cases with
+regard to drink, he is manifestly right.&nbsp; To tell people that they
+are never to drink a glass of ale or wine themselves, or to give one
+to others, is cant; and the writer has no toleration for cant of any
+description.&nbsp; Some cants are not dangerous; but the writer believes
+that a more dangerous cant than the temperance cant, or as it is generally
+called, teetotalism, is scarcely to be found.&nbsp; The writer is willing
+to believe that it originated with well meaning, though weak people;
+but there can be no doubt that it was quickly turned to account by people
+who were neither well meaning nor weak.&nbsp; Let the reader note particularly
+the purpose to which this cry has been turned in America; the land,
+indeed, par excellence, of humbug and humbug cries.&nbsp; It is there
+continually in the mouth of the most violent political party, and is
+made an instrument of almost unexampled persecution.&nbsp; The writer
+would say more on the temperance cant, both in England and America,
+but want of space prevents him.&nbsp; There is one point on which he
+cannot avoid making a few brief remarks - that is, the inconsistent
+conduct of its apostles in general.&nbsp; The teetotal apostle says,
+it is a dreadful thing to be drunk.&nbsp; So it is, teetotaller; but
+if so, why do you get drunk?&nbsp; I get drunk?&nbsp; Yes, unhappy man,
+why do you get drunk on smoke and passion?&nbsp; Why are your garments
+impregnated with the odour of the Indian weed?&nbsp; Why is there a
+pipe or a cigar always in your mouth?&nbsp; Why is your language more
+dreadful than that of a Poissarde?&nbsp; Tobacco-smoke is more deleterious
+than ale, teetotaller; bile more potent than brandy.&nbsp; You are fond
+of telling your hearers what an awful thing it is to die drunken.&nbsp;
+So it is, teetotaller.&nbsp; Then take good care that you do not die
+with smoke and passion, drunken, and with temperance language on your
+lips; that is, abuse and calumny against all those who differ from you.&nbsp;
+One word of sense you have been heard to say, which is, that spirits
+may be taken as a medicine.&nbsp; Now you are in a fever of passion,
+teetotaller; so, pray take this tumbler of brandy; take it on the homoeopathic
+principle, that heat is to be expelled by heat.&nbsp; You are in a temperance
+fury, so swallow the contents of this tumbler, and it will, perhaps,
+cure you.&nbsp; You look at the glass wistfully - you occasionally take
+a glass medicinally - and it is probable you do.&nbsp; Take one now.&nbsp;
+Consider what a dreadful thing it would be to die passion drunk; to
+appear before your Maker with intemperate language on your lips.&nbsp;
+That&rsquo;s right!&nbsp; You don&rsquo;t seem to wince at the brandy.&nbsp;
+That&rsquo;s right! - well done!&nbsp; All down in two pulls.&nbsp;
+Now you look like a reasonable being!<br>
+<br>
+If the conduct of Lavengro with retard to drink is open to little censure,
+assuredly the use which he makes of his fists is entitled to none at
+all.&nbsp; Because he has a pair of tolerably strong fists, and knows
+to a certain extent how to use them, is he a swaggerer or oppressor?&nbsp;
+To what ill account does he turn them?&nbsp; Who more quiet, gentle,
+and inoffensive than he?&nbsp; He beats off a ruffian who attacks him
+in a dingle; has a kind of friendly tuzzle with Mr. Petulengro, and
+behold the extent of his fistic exploits.<br>
+<br>
+Ay, but he associates with prize-fighters; and that very fellow, Petulengro,
+is a prize-fighter, and has fought for a stake in a ring.&nbsp; Well,
+and if he had not associated with prize-fighters, how could he have
+used his fists?&nbsp; Oh, anybody can use his fists in his own defence,
+without being taught by prize-fighters.&nbsp; Can they?&nbsp; Then why
+does not the Italian, or Spaniard, or Affghan use his fists when insulted
+or outraged, instead of having recourse to the weapons which he has
+recourse to?&nbsp; Nobody can use his fists without being taught the
+use of them by those who have themselves been taught, no more than any
+one can &ldquo;whiffle&rdquo; without being taught by a master of the
+art.&nbsp; Now let any man of the present day try to whiffle.&nbsp;
+Would not any one who wished to whiffle have to go to a master of the
+art?&nbsp; Assuredly! but where would he find one at the present day?&nbsp;
+The last of the whifflers hanged himself about a fortnight ago on a
+bell-rope in a church steeple of &ldquo;the old town,&rdquo; from pure
+grief that there was no further demand for the exhibition of his art,
+there being no demand for whiffling since the discontinuation of Guildhall
+banquets.&nbsp; Whiffling is lost.&nbsp; The old chap left his sword
+behind him; let any one take up the old chap&rsquo;s sword and try to
+whiffle.&nbsp; Now much the same hand as he would make who should take
+up the whiffler&rsquo;s sword and try to whiffle, would he who should
+try to use his fists who had never had the advantage of a master.&nbsp;
+Let no one think that men use their fists naturally in their own disputes
+- men have naturally recourse to any other thing to defend themselves
+or to offend others; they fly to the stick, to the stone, to the murderous
+and cowardly knife, or to abuse as cowardly as the knife, and occasionally
+more murderous.&nbsp; Now which is best when you hate a person, or have
+a pique against a person, to clench your fist and say &ldquo;Come on,&rdquo;
+or to have recourse to the stone, the knife, - or murderous calumny?&nbsp;
+The use of the fist is almost lost in England.&nbsp; Yet are the people
+better than they were when they knew how to use their fists?&nbsp; The
+writer believes not.&nbsp; A fisty combat is at present a great rarity,
+but the use of the knife, the noose, and of poison, to say nothing of
+calumny, are of more frequent occurrence in England than perhaps in
+any country in Europe.&nbsp; Is polite taste better than when it could
+bear the details of a fight?&nbsp; The writer believes not.&nbsp; Two
+men cannot meet in a ring to settle a dispute in a manly manner without
+some trumpery local newspaper letting loose a volley of abuse against
+&ldquo;the disgraceful exhibition,&rdquo; in which abuse it is sure
+to be sanctioned by its dainty readers; whereas some murderous horror,
+the discovery for example of the mangled remains of a woman in some
+obscure den, is greedily seized hold of by the moral journal, and dressed
+up for its readers, who luxuriate and gloat upon the ghastly dish.&nbsp;
+Now, the writer of Lavengro has no sympathy with those who would shrink
+from striking a blow, but would not shrink from the use of poison or
+calumny; and his taste has little in common with that which cannot tolerate
+the hardy details of a prize-fight, but which luxuriates on descriptions
+of the murder dens of modern England.&nbsp; But prize-fighters and pugilists
+are blackguards, a reviewer has said; and blackguards they would be
+provided they employed their skill and their prowess for purposes of
+brutality and oppression; but prize-fighters and pugilists are seldom
+friends to brutality and oppression; and which is the blackguard, the
+writer would ask, he who uses his fists to take his own part, or instructs
+others to use theirs for the same purpose, or the being who from envy
+and malice, or at the bidding of a malicious scoundrel, endeavours by
+calumny, falsehood, and misrepresentation to impede the efforts of lonely
+and unprotected genius?<br>
+<br>
+One word more about the race, all but extinct, of the people opprobriously
+called prize-fighters.&nbsp; Some of them have been as noble, kindly
+men as the world ever produced.&nbsp; Can the rolls of the English aristocracy
+exhibit names belonging to more noble, more heroic men than those who
+were called respectively Pearce, Cribb, and Spring?&nbsp; Did ever one
+of the English aristocracy contract the seeds of fatal consumption by
+rushing up the stairs of a burning edifice, even to the topmost garret,
+and rescuing a woman from seemingly inevitable destruction?&nbsp; The
+writer says no.&nbsp; A woman was rescued from the top of a burning
+house; but the man who rescued her was no aristocrat; it was Pearce,
+not Percy, who ran up the burning stairs.&nbsp; Did ever one of those
+glittering ones save a fainting female from the libidinous rage of six
+ruffians?&nbsp; The writer believes not.&nbsp; A woman was rescued from
+the libidinous fury of six monsters on - Down; but the man who rescued
+her was no aristocrat; it was Pearce not Paulet, who rescued the woman,
+and thrashed my lord&rsquo;s six gamekeepers - Pearce, whose equal never
+was, and probably never will be, found in sturdy combat.&nbsp; Are there
+any of the aristocracy of whom it can be said that they never did a
+cowardly, cruel, or mean action, and that they invariably took the part
+of the unfortunate and weak against cruelty and oppression?&nbsp; As
+much can be said of Cribb, of Spring, and the other; but where is the
+aristocrat of whom as much can be said?&nbsp; Wellington?&nbsp; Wellington
+indeed! a skilful general, and a good man of valour, it is true, but
+with that cant word of &ldquo;duty&rdquo; continually on his lips, did
+he rescue Ney from his butchers?&nbsp; Did he lend a helping hand to
+Warner?<br>
+<br>
+In conclusion, the writer would advise those of his country-folks who
+read his book to have nothing to do with the two kinds of canting nonsense
+described above, but in their progress through life to enjoy as well
+as they can, but always with moderation, the good things of this world,
+to put confidence in God, to be as independent as possible, and to take
+their own parts.&nbsp; If they are low-spirited, let them not make themselves
+foolish by putting on sackcloth, drinking water, or chewing ashes, but
+let them take wholesome exercise, and eat the most generous food they
+can get, taking up and reading occasionally, not the lives of Ignatius
+Loyola and Francis Spira, but something more agreeable; for example,
+the life and adventures of Mr. Duncan Campbell, the deaf and dumb gentleman;
+the travels of Captain Falconer in America, and the journal of John
+Randall, who went to Virginia and married an Indian wife; not forgetting,
+amidst their eating and drinking, their walks over heaths, and by the
+sea-side, and their agreeable literature, to be charitable to the poor,
+to read the Psalms and to go to church twice on a Sunday.&nbsp; In their
+dealings with people, to be courteous to everybody, as Lavengro was,
+but always independent like him; and if people meddle with them, to
+give them as good as they bring, even as he and Isopel Berners were
+in the habit of doing; and it will be as well for him to observe that
+he by no means advises women to be too womanly, but bearing the conduct
+of Isopel Berners in mind, to take their own parts, and if anybody strikes
+them, to strike again.<br>
+<br>
+Beating of women by the lords of the creation has become very prevalent
+in England since pugilism has been discountenanced.&nbsp; Now the writer
+strongly advises any woman who is struck by a ruffian to strike him
+again; or if she cannot clench her fists, and he advises all women in
+these singular times to learn to clench their fists, to go at him with
+tooth and nail, and not to be afraid of the result, for any fellow who
+is dastard enough to strike a woman, would allow himself to be beaten
+by a woman, were she to make at him in self-defence, even if, instead
+of possessing the stately height and athletic proportions of the aforesaid
+Isopel, she were as diminutive in stature, and had a hand as delicate,
+and foot as small, as a certain royal lady, who was some time ago assaulted
+by a fellow upwards of six feet high, whom the writer has no doubt she
+could have beaten had she thought proper to go at him.&nbsp; Such is
+the deliberate advice of the author to his countrymen and women - advice
+in which he believes there is nothing unscriptural or repugnant to common
+sense.<br>
+<br>
+The writer is perfectly well aware that, by the plain language which
+he has used in speaking of the various kinds of nonsense prevalent in
+England, he shall make himself a multitude of enemies; but he is not
+going to conceal the truth or to tamper with nonsense, from the fear
+of provoking hostility.&nbsp; He has a duty to perform and he will perform
+it resolutely; he is the person who carried the Bible to Spain; and
+as resolutely as he spoke in Spain against the superstitions of Spain,
+will he speak in England against the nonsense of his own native land.&nbsp;
+He is not one of those who, before they sit down to write a book, say
+to themselves, what cry shall we take up? what principles shall we advocate?
+what principles shall we abuse? before we put pen to paper we must find
+out what cry is the loudest, what principle has the most advocates,
+otherwise, after having written our book, we may find ourselves on the
+weaker side.<br>
+<br>
+A sailor of the &ldquo;Bounty,&rdquo; waked from his sleep by the noise
+of the mutiny, lay still in his hammock for some time, quite undecided
+whether to take part with the captain or to join the mutineers.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I must mind what I do,&rdquo; said he to himself, &ldquo;lest,
+in the end, I find myself on the weaker side;&rdquo; finally, on hearing
+that the mutineers were successful, he went on deck, and seeing Bligh
+pinioned to the mast, he put his fist to his nose, and otherwise insulted
+him.&nbsp; Now, there are many writers of the present day whose conduct
+is very similar to that of the sailor.&nbsp; They lie listening in their
+corners till they have ascertained which principle has most advocates;
+then, presently, they make their appearance on the deck of the world
+with their book; if truth has been victorious, then has truth the hurrah!
+but if truth is pinioned against the mast, then is their fist thrust
+against the nose of truth, and their gibe and their insult spirted in
+her face.&nbsp; The strongest party had the sailor, and the strongest
+party has almost invariably the writer of the present day.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Pseudo-Critics.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+A certain set of individuals calling themselves critics have attacked
+Lavengro with much virulence and malice.&nbsp; If what they call criticism
+had been founded on truth, the author would have had nothing to say.&nbsp;
+The book contains plenty of blemishes, some of them, by the bye, wilful
+ones, as the writer will presently show; not one of these, however,
+has been detected and pointed out; but the best passages in the book,
+indeed whatever was calculated to make the book valuable, have been
+assailed with abuse and misrepresentation.&nbsp; The duty of the true
+critic is to play the part of a leech, and not of a viper.&nbsp; Upon
+true and upon malignant criticism there is an excellent fable by the
+Spaniard Iriarte.&nbsp; The viper says to the leech, &ldquo;Why do people
+invite your bite, and flee from mine?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Because,&rdquo;
+says the leech, &ldquo;people receive health from my bite, and poison
+from yours.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;There is as much difference,&rdquo;
+says the clever Spaniard, &ldquo;between true and malignant criticism,
+as between poison and medicine.&rdquo;&nbsp; Certainly a great many
+meritorious writers have allowed themselves to be poisoned by malignant
+criticism; the writer, however, is not one of those who allow themselves
+to be poisoned by pseudo-critics; no! no! he will rather hold them up
+by their tails, and show the creatures wriggling, blood and foam streaming
+from their broken jaws.&nbsp; First of all, however, he will notice
+one of their objections.&nbsp; &ldquo;The book isn&rsquo;t true,&rdquo;
+say they.&nbsp; Now one of the principal reasons with those that have
+attacked Lavengro for their abuse of it is, that it is particularly
+true in one instance, namely, that it exposes their own nonsense, their
+love of humbug, their slavishness, their dressings, their goings out,
+their scraping and bowing to great people; it is the showing up of &ldquo;gentility-nonsense&rdquo;
+in Lavengro that has been one principal reason for raising the above
+cry; for in Lavengro is denounced the besetting folly of the English
+people, a folly which those who call themselves guardians of the public
+taste are far from being above.&nbsp; &ldquo;We can&rsquo;t abide anything
+that isn&rsquo;t true!&rdquo; they exclaim.&nbsp; Can&rsquo;t they?&nbsp;
+Then why are they so enraptured with any fiction that is adapted to
+purposes of humbug, which tends to make them satisfied with their own
+proceedings, with their own nonsense, which does not tell them to reform,
+to become more alive to their own failings, and less sensitive about
+the tyrannical goings on of the masters, and the degraded condition,
+the sufferings, and the trials of the serfs in the star Jupiter?&nbsp;
+Had Lavengro, instead of being the work of an independent mind, been
+written in order to further any of the thousand and one cants, and species
+of nonsense prevalent in England, the author would have heard much less
+about its not being true, both from public detractors and private censurers.<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;But Lavengro pretends to be an autobiography,&rdquo; say the
+critics; and here the writer begs leave to observe, that it would be
+well for people who profess to have a regard for truth, not to exhibit
+in every assertion which they make a most profligate disregard of it;
+this assertion of theirs is a falsehood, and they know it to be a falsehood.&nbsp;
+In the preface Lavengro is stated to be a dream; and the writer takes
+this opportunity of stating that he never said it was an autobiography;
+never authorized any person to say that it was one; and that he has
+in innumerable instances declared in public and private, both before
+and after the work was published, that it was not what is generally
+termed an autobiography: but a set of people who pretend to write criticisms
+on books, hating the author for various reasons, - amongst others, because,
+having the proper pride of a gentleman and a scholar, he did not, in
+the year &lsquo;43, choose to permit himself to be exhibited and made
+a zany of in London, and especially because he will neither associate
+with, nor curry favour with, them who are neither gentlemen nor scholars,
+- attack his book with abuse and calumny.&nbsp; He is, perhaps, condescending
+too much when he takes any notice of such people; as, however, the English
+public is wonderfully led by cries and shouts, and generally ready to
+take part against any person who is either unwilling or unable to defend
+himself, he deems it advisable not to be altogether quiet with those
+who assail him.&nbsp; The best way to deal with vipers is to tear out
+their teeth; and the best way to deal with pseudo-critics is to deprive
+them of their poison-bag, which is easily done by exposing their ignorance.&nbsp;
+The writer knew perfectly well the description of people with whom he
+would have to do, he therefore very quietly prepared a stratagem, by
+means of which he could at any time exhibit them, powerless and helpless,
+in his hand.&nbsp; Critics, when they review books, ought to have a
+competent knowledge of the subjects which those books discuss.<br>
+<br>
+Lavengro is a philological book, a poem if you choose to call it so.&nbsp;
+Now, what a fine triumph it would have been for those who wished to
+vilify the book and its author, provided they could have detected the
+latter tripping in his philology - they might have instantly said that
+he was an ignorant pretender to philology - they laughed at the idea
+of his taking up a viper by its tail, a trick which hundreds of country
+urchins do every September, but they were silent about the really wonderful
+part of the book, the philological matter - they thought philology was
+his stronghold, and that it would be useless to attack him there; they
+of course would give him no credit as a philologist, for anything like
+fair treatment towards him was not to be expected at their hands, but
+they were afraid to attack his philology - yet that was the point, and
+the only point in which they might have attacked him successfully; he
+was vulnerable there.&nbsp; How was this?&nbsp; Why, in order to have
+an opportunity of holding up pseudo-critics by the tails, he wilfully
+spelt various foreign words wrong - Welsh words, and even Italian words
+- did they detect these misspellings? not one of them, even as he knew
+they would not, and he now taunts them with ignorance; and the power
+of taunting them with ignorance is the punishment which he designed
+for them - a power which they might but for their ignorance have used
+against him.&nbsp; The writer besides knowing something of Italian and
+Welsh, knows a little of Armenian language and literature; but who knowing
+anything of the Armenian language, unless he had an end in view, would
+say, that the word sea in Armenian is anything like the word tide in
+English?&nbsp; The word for sea in Armenian is dzow, a word connected
+with the Tebetian word for water, and the Chinese shuy, and the Turkish
+su, signifying the same thing; but where is the resemblance between
+dzow and tide?&nbsp; Again, the word for bread in ancient Armenian is
+hats; yet the Armenian on London Bridge is made to say zhats, which
+is not the nominative of the Armenian noun for bread, but the accusative:
+now, critics, ravening against a man because he is a gentleman and a
+scholar, and has not only the power but also the courage to write original
+works, why did you not discover that weak point?&nbsp; Why, because
+you were ignorant, so here ye are held up!&nbsp; Moreover, who with
+a name commencing with Z, ever wrote fables in Armenian?&nbsp; There
+are two writers of fables in Armenian - Varthan and Koscht, and illustrious
+writers they are, one in the simple, and the other in the ornate style
+of Armenian composition, but neither of their names begins with a Z.&nbsp;
+Oh, what a precious opportunity ye lost, ye ravening crew, of convicting
+the poor, half-starved, friendless boy of the book, of ignorance or
+misrepresentation, by asking who with a name beginning with Z ever wrote
+fables in Armenian; but ye couldn&rsquo;t help yourselves, ye are duncie.&nbsp;
+We duncie!&nbsp; Ay, duncie.&nbsp; So here ye are held up by the tails,
+blood and foam streaming from your jaws.<br>
+<br>
+The writer wishes to ask here, what do you think of all this, Messieurs
+les Critiques?&nbsp; Were ye ever served so before?&nbsp; But don&rsquo;t
+you richly deserve it?&nbsp; Haven&rsquo;t you been for years past bullying
+and insulting everybody whom you deemed weak, and currying favour with
+everybody whom you thought strong?&nbsp; &ldquo;We approve of this.&nbsp;
+We disapprove of that.&nbsp; Oh, this will never do.&nbsp; These are
+fine lines!&rdquo;&nbsp; The lines perhaps some horrid sycophantic rubbish
+addressed to Wellington, or Lord So-and-so.&nbsp; To have your ignorance
+thus exposed, to be shown up in this manner, and by whom?&nbsp; A gypsy!&nbsp;
+Ay, a gypsy was the very right person to do it.&nbsp; But is it not
+galling, after all?<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Ah, but <i>we</i> don&rsquo;t understand Armenian, it cannot
+be expected that <i>we</i> should understand Armenian, or Welsh, or
+- Hey, what&rsquo;s this?&nbsp; The mighty <i>we</i> not understand
+Armenian or Welsh, or - Then why does the mighty <i>we</i> pretend to
+review a book like Lavengro?&nbsp; From the arrogance with which it
+continually delivers itself, one would think that the mighty <i>we</i>
+is omniscient; that it understands every language; is versed in every
+literature; yet the mighty <i>we</i> does not even know the word for
+bread in Armenian.&nbsp; It knows bread well enough by name in England,
+and frequently bread in England only by its name, but the truth is,
+that the mighty <i>we</i>, with all its pretension, is in general a
+very sorry creature, who, instead of saying nous disons, should rather
+say nous dis: Porny in his &ldquo;Guerre des Dieux,&rdquo; very profanely
+makes the three in one say, Je faisons; now, Lavengro, who is anything
+but profane, would suggest that critics, especially magazine and Sunday
+newspaper critics, should commence with nous dis, as the first word
+would be significant of the conceit and assumption of the critic, and
+the second of the extent of the critic&rsquo;s information.&nbsp; The
+<i>we</i> says its say, but when fawning sycophancy or vulgar abuse
+are taken from that say, what remains?&nbsp; Why a blank, a void like
+Ginnungagap.<br>
+<br>
+As the writer, of his own accord, has exposed some of the blemishes
+of his book - a task, which a competent critic ought to have done -
+he will now point out two or three of its merits, which any critic,
+not altogether blinded with ignorance might have done, or not replete
+with gall and envy would have been glad to do.&nbsp; The book has the
+merit of communicating a fact connected with physiology, which in all
+the pages of the multitude of books was never previously mentioned -
+the mysterious practice of touching objects to baffle the evil chance.&nbsp;
+The miserable detractor will, of course, instantly begin to rave about
+such a habit being common: well and good; but was it ever before described
+in print, or all connected with it dissected?&nbsp; He may then vociferate
+something about Johnson having touched:- the writer cares not whether
+Johnson, who, by the bye, during the last twenty or thirty years, owing
+to people having become ultra Tory mad from reading Scott&rsquo;s novels
+and the &ldquo;Quarterly Review,&rdquo; has been a mighty favourite,
+especially with some who were in the habit of calling him a half crazy
+old fool - touched, or whether he did or not; but he asks where did
+Johnson ever describe the feelings which induced him to perform the
+magic touch, even supposing that he did perform it?&nbsp; Again, the
+history gives an account of a certain book called the &ldquo;Sleeping
+Bard,&rdquo; the most remarkable prose work of the most difficult language
+but one, of modern Europe, - a book, for a notice of which, he believes,
+one might turn over in vain the pages of any review printed in England,
+or, indeed, elsewhere. - So here are two facts, one literary and the
+other physiological, for which any candid critic was bound to thank
+the author, even as in Romany Rye there is a fact connected with Iro
+Norman Myth, for the disclosing of which, any person who pretends to
+have a regard for literature is bound to thank him, namely, that the
+mysterious Finn or Fingal of &ldquo;Ossian&rsquo;s Poems&rdquo; is one
+and the same person as the Sigurd Fofnisbane of the Edda and the Wilkina,
+and the Siegfried Horn of the Lay of the Niebelungs.<br>
+<br>
+The writer might here conclude, and, he believes, most triumphantly;
+as, however, he is in the cue for writing, which he seldom is, he will
+for his own gratification, and for the sake of others, dropping metaphors
+about vipers and serpents, show up in particular two or three sets or
+cliques of people, who, he is happy to say, have been particularly virulent
+against him and his work, for nothing indeed could have given him greater
+mortification than their praise.<br>
+<br>
+In the first place, he wishes to dispose of certain individuals who
+call themselves men of wit and fashion - about town - who he is told
+have abused his book &ldquo;vaustly&rdquo; - their own word.&nbsp; These
+people paint their cheeks, wear white kid gloves, and dabble in literature,
+or what they conceive to be literature.&nbsp; For abuse from such people,
+the writer was prepared.&nbsp; Does any one imagine that the writer
+was not well aware, before he published his book, that, whenever he
+gave it to the world, he should be attacked by every literary coxcomb
+in England who had influence enough to procure the insertion of a scurrilous
+article in a magazine or newspaper!&nbsp; He has been in Spain, and
+has seen how invariably the mule attacks the horse; now why does the
+mule attack the horse?&nbsp; Why, because the latter carries about with
+him that which the envious hermaphrodite does not possess.<br>
+<br>
+They consider, forsooth, that his book is low - but he is not going
+to waste words about them - one or two of whom, he is told, have written
+very duncie books about Spain, and are highly enraged with him, because
+certain books which he wrote about Spain were not considered duncie.&nbsp;
+No, he is not going to waste words upon them, for verily he dislikes
+their company, and so he&rsquo;ll pass them by, and proceed to others.<br>
+<br>
+The Scotch Charlie o&rsquo;er the water people have been very loud in
+the abuse of Lavengro - this again might be expected; the sarcasms of
+the Priest about the Charlie o&rsquo;er the water nonsense of course
+stung them.&nbsp; Oh! it is one of the claims which Lavengro has to
+respect, that it is the first, if not the only work, in which that nonsense
+is, to a certain extent, exposed.&nbsp; Two or three of their remarks
+on passages of Lavengro, he will reproduce and laugh at.&nbsp; Of course
+your Charlie o&rsquo;er the water people are genteel exceedingly, and
+cannot abide anything low.&nbsp; Gypsyism they think is particularly
+low, and the use of gypsy words in literature beneath its gentility;
+so they object to gypsy words being used in Lavengro where gypsies are
+introduced speaking - &ldquo;What is Romany forsooth?&rdquo; say they.&nbsp;
+Very good!&nbsp; And what is Scotch? has not the public been nauseated
+with Scotch for the last thirty years?&nbsp; &ldquo;Ay, but Scotch is
+not&rdquo; - the writer believes he knows much better than the Scotch
+what Scotch is and what it is not; he has told them before what it is,
+a very sorry jargon.&nbsp; He will now tell them what it is not - a
+sister or an immediate daughter of the Sanscrit, which Romany is.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Ay, but the Scotch are&rdquo; - foxes, foxes, nothing else than
+foxes, even like the gypsies - the difference between the gypsy and
+Scotch fox being that the first is wild, with a mighty brush, the other
+a sneak with a gilt collar and without a tail.<br>
+<br>
+A Charlie o&rsquo;er the water person attempts to be witty, because
+the writer has said that perhaps a certain old Edinburgh High-School
+porter, of the name of Boee, was perhaps of the same blood as a certain
+Bui, a Northern Kemp who distinguished himself at the battle of Horinger
+Bay.&nbsp; A pretty matter, forsooth, to excite the ridicule of a Scotchman!&nbsp;
+Why, is there a beggar or trumpery fellow in Scotland, who does not
+pretend to be somebody, or related to somebody?&nbsp; Is not every Scotchman
+descended from some king, kemp, or cow-stealer of old, by his own account
+at least?&nbsp; Why, the writer would even go so far as to bet a trifle
+that the poor creature, who ridicules Boee&rsquo;s supposed ancestry,
+has one of his own, at least as grand and as apocryphal as old Boee&rsquo;s
+of the High School.<br>
+<br>
+The same Charlie o&rsquo;er the water person is mightily indignant that
+Lavengro should have spoken disrespectfully of William Wallace; Lavengro,
+when he speaks of that personage, being a child of about ten years old,
+and repeating merely what he had heard.&nbsp; All the Scotch, by the
+bye, for a great many years past, have been great admirers of William
+Wallace, particularly the Charlie o&rsquo;er the water people, who in
+their nonsense-verses about Charlie generally contrive to bring in the
+name of William, Willie, or Wullie Wallace.&nbsp; The writer begs leave
+to say that he by no means wishes to bear hard against William Wallace,
+but he cannot help asking why, if William, Willie, or Wullie Wallace
+was such a particularly nice person, did his brother Scots betray him
+to a certain renowned southern warrior, called Edward Longshanks, who
+caused him to be hanged and cut into four in London, and his quarters
+to be placed over the gates of certain towns?&nbsp; They got gold, it
+is true, and titles, very nice things, no doubt; but, surely, the life
+of a patriot is better than all the gold and titles in the world - at
+least Lavengro thinks so - but Lavengro has lived more with gypsies
+than Scotchmen, and gypsies do not betray their brothers.&nbsp; It would
+be some time before a gypsy would hand over his brother to the harum-beck,
+even supposing you would not only make him a king, but a justice of
+the peace, and not only give him the world, but the best farm on the
+Holkham estate; but gypsies are wild foxes, and there is certainly a
+wonderful difference between the way of thinking of the wild fox who
+retains his brush, and that of the scurvy kennel creature who has lost
+his tail.<br>
+<br>
+Ah! but thousands of Scotch, and particularly the Charlie o&rsquo;er
+the water people, will say, &ldquo;We didn&rsquo;t sell Willie Wallace,
+it was our forbears who sold Willie Wallace - If Edward Longshanks had
+asked us to sell Wullie Wallace, we would soon have shown him that -
+&rdquo;&nbsp; Lord better ye, ye poor trumpery set of creatures, ye
+would not have acted a bit better than your forefathers; remember how
+ye have ever treated the few amongst ye who, though born in the kennel,
+have shown something of the spirit of the wood.&nbsp; Many of ye are
+still alive who delivered over men, quite as honest and patriotic as
+William Wallace, into the hands of an English minister, to be chained
+and transported for merely venturing to speak and write in the cause
+of humanity, at the time when Europe was beginning to fling off the
+chains imposed by kings and priests.&nbsp; And it is not so very long
+since Burns, to whom ye are now building up obelisks rather higher than
+he deserves, was permitted by his countrymen to die in poverty and misery,
+because he would not join with them in songs of adulation to kings and
+the trumpery great.&nbsp; So say not that ye would have acted with respect
+to William Wallace one whit better than your fathers - and you in particular,
+ye children of Charlie, whom do ye write nonsense-verses about?&nbsp;
+A family of dastard despots, who did their best, during a century and
+more, to tread out the few sparks of independent feeling still glowing
+in Scotland - but enough has been said about ye.<br>
+<br>
+Amongst those who have been prodigal in abuse and defamation of Lavengro,
+have been your modern Radicals, and particularly a set of people who
+filled the country with noise against the King and Queen, Wellington,
+and the Tories, in &lsquo;32.&nbsp; About these people the writer will
+presently have occasion to say a good deal, and also of real Radicals.&nbsp;
+As, however, it may be supposed that he is one of those who delight
+to play the sycophant to kings and queens, to curry favour with Tories,
+and to bepraise Wellington, he begs leave to state that such is not
+the case.<br>
+<br>
+About kings and queens he has nothing to say; about Tories, simply that
+he believes them to be a bad set; about Wellington, however, it will
+be necessary for him to say a good deal, of mixed import, as he will
+subsequently frequently have occasion to mention him in connection with
+what he has to say about pseudo-Radicals.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER X<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Pseudo-Radicals.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+About Wellington, then, he says, that he believes him at the present
+day to be infinitely overrated.&nbsp; But there certainly was a time
+when he was shamefully underrated.&nbsp; Now what time was that?&nbsp;
+Why the time of pseudo-Radicalism, par excellence, from &lsquo;20 to
+&lsquo;32.&nbsp; Oh, the abuse that was heaped on Wellington by those
+who traded in Radical cant - your newspaper editors and review writers!
+and how he was sneered at then by your Whigs, and how faintly supported
+he was by your Tories, who were half ashamed of him; for your Tories,
+though capital fellows as followers, when you want nobody to back you,
+are the faintest creatures in the world when you cry in your agony,
+&ldquo;Come and help me!&rdquo;&nbsp; Oh, assuredly Wellington was infamously
+used at that time, especially by your traders in Radicalism, who howled
+at and hooted him; said he had every vice - was no general - was beaten
+at Waterloo - was a poltroon - moreover a poor illiterate creature,
+who could scarcely read or write; nay, a principal Radical paper said
+boldly he could not read, and devised an ingenious plan for teaching
+Wellington how to read.&nbsp; Now this was too bad; and the writer,
+being a lover of justice, frequently spoke up for Wellington, saying,
+that as for vice, he was not worse than his neighbours; that he was
+brave; that he won the fight at Waterloo, from a half-dead man, it is
+true, but that he did win it.&nbsp; Also, that he believed he had read
+&ldquo;Rules for the Manual and Platoon Exercises&rdquo; to some purpose;
+moreover, that he was sure he could write, for that he the writer had
+once written to Wellington, and had received an answer from him; nay,
+the writer once went so far as to strike a blow for Wellington; for
+the last time he used his fists was upon a Radical sub-editor, who was
+mobbing Wellington in the street, from behind a rank of grimy fellows;
+but though the writer spoke up for Wellington to a certain extent, when
+he was shamefully underrated, and once struck a blow for him when he
+was about being hustled, he is not going to join in the loathsome sycophantic
+nonsense which it has been the fashion to use with respect to Wellington
+these last twenty years.&nbsp; Now what have those years been to England!&nbsp;
+Why the years of ultra-gentility, everybody in England having gone gentility
+mad during the last twenty years, and no people more so than your pseudo-Radicals.&nbsp;
+Wellington was turned out, and your Whigs and Radicals got in, and then
+commenced the period of ultra-gentility in England.&nbsp; The Whigs
+and Radicals only hated Wellington as long as the patronage of the country
+was in his hands, none of which they were tolerably sure he would bestow
+on them; but no sooner did they get it into their own, than they forthwith
+became admirers of Wellington.&nbsp; And why?&nbsp; Because he was a
+duke, petted at Windsor and by foreign princes, and a very genteel personage.&nbsp;
+Formerly many of your Whigs and Radicals had scarcely a decent coat
+on their backs; but now the plunder of the country was at their disposal,
+and they had as good a chance of being genteel as any people.&nbsp;
+So they were willing to worship Wellington because he was very genteel,
+and could not keep the plunder of the country out of their hands.&nbsp;
+And Wellington has been worshipped, and prettily so, during the last
+fifteen or twenty years.&nbsp; He is now a noble fine-hearted creature;
+the greatest general the world ever produced; the bravest of men; and
+- and - mercy upon us! the greatest of military writers!&nbsp; Now the
+present writer will not join in such sycophancy.&nbsp; As he was not
+afraid to take the part of Wellington when he was scurvily used by all
+parties, and when it was dangerous to take his part, so he is not afraid
+to speak the naked truth about Wellington in these days, when it is
+dangerous to say anything about him but what is sycophantically laudatory.&nbsp;
+He said in &lsquo;32, that as to vice, Wellington was not worse than
+his neighbours; but he is not going to say, in &lsquo;54, that Wellington
+was a noble-hearted fellow; for he believes that a more cold-hearted
+individual never existed.&nbsp; His conduct to Warner, the poor Vaudois,
+and Marshal Ney, showed that.&nbsp; He said, in &lsquo;32, that he was
+a good general and a brave man; but he is not going, in &lsquo;54, to
+say that he was the best general, or the bravest man the world ever
+saw.&nbsp; England has produced a better general - France two or three
+- both countries many braver men.&nbsp; The son of the Norfolk clergyman
+was a brave man; Marshal Ney was a braver man.&nbsp; Oh, that battle
+of Copenhagen!&nbsp; Oh, that covering the retreat of the Grand Army!&nbsp;
+And though he said in &lsquo;32 that he could write, he is not going
+to say in &lsquo;54 that he is the best of all military writers.&nbsp;
+On the contrary, he does not hesitate to say that any Commentary of
+Julius Caesar, or any chapter in Justinus, more especially the one about
+the Parthians, is worth the ten volumes of Wellington&rsquo;s Despatches;
+though he has no doubt that, by saying so, he shall especially rouse
+the indignation of a certain newspaper, at present one of the most genteel
+journals imaginable - with a slight tendency to Liberalism, it is true,
+but perfectly genteel - which is nevertheless the very one which, in
+&lsquo;32, swore bodily that Wellington could neither read nor write,
+and devised an ingenious plan for teaching him how to read.<br>
+<br>
+Now, after the above statement, no one will venture to say, if the writer
+should be disposed to bear hard upon Radicals, that he would be influenced
+by a desire to pay court to princes, or to curry favour with Tories,
+or from being a blind admirer of the Duke of Wellington; but the writer
+is not going to declaim against Radicals, that is, real Republicans,
+or their principles; upon the whole, he is something of an admirer of
+both.&nbsp; The writer has always had as much admiration for everything
+that is real and honest as he has had contempt for the opposite.&nbsp;
+Now real Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, a much finer
+thing than Toryism, a system of common robbery, which is nevertheless
+far better than Whiggism <a name="citation7"></a><a href="#footnote7">{7}</a>
+- a compound of petty larceny, popular instruction, and receiving of
+stolen goods.&nbsp; Yes, real Republicanism is certainly a very fine
+thing, and your real Radicals and Republicans are certainly very fine
+fellows, or rather were fine fellows, for the Lord only knows where
+to find them at the present day - the writer does not.&nbsp; If he did,
+he would at any time go five miles to invite one of them to dinner,
+even supposing that he had to go to a workhouse in order to find the
+person he wished to invite.&nbsp; Amongst the real Radicals of England,
+those who flourished from the year &lsquo;16 to &lsquo;20, there were
+certainly extraordinary characters, men partially insane, perhaps, but
+honest and brave - they did not make a market of the principles which
+they professed, and never intended to do so; they believed in them,
+and were willing to risk their lives in endeavouring to carry them out.&nbsp;
+The writer wishes to speak in particular of two of these men, both of
+whom perished on the scaffold - their names were Thistlewood and Ings.&nbsp;
+Thistlewood, the best known of them, was a brave soldier, and had served
+with distinction as an officer in the French service; he was one of
+the excellent swordsmen of Europe; had fought several duels in France,
+where it is no child&rsquo;s play to fight a duel; but had never unsheathed
+his sword for single combat, but in defence of the feeble and insulted
+- he was kind and open-hearted, but of too great simplicity; he had
+once ten thousand pounds left him, all of which he lent to a friend,
+who disappeared and never returned a penny.&nbsp; Ings was an uneducated
+man, of very low stature, but amazing strength and resolution; he was
+a kind husband and father, and though a humble butcher, the name he
+bore was one of the royal names of the heathen Anglo-Saxons.&nbsp; These
+two men, along with five others, were executed, and their heads hacked
+off, for levying war against George the Fourth; the whole seven dying
+in a manner which extorted cheers from the populace; the most of then
+uttering philosophical or patriotic sayings.&nbsp; Thistlewood, who
+was, perhaps, the most calm and collected of all, just before he was
+turned off, said, &ldquo;We are now going to discover the great secret.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Ings, the moment before he was choked, was singing &ldquo;Scots wha
+ha&rsquo; wi&rsquo; Wallace bled.&rdquo;&nbsp; Now there was no humbug
+about those men, nor about many more of the same time and of the same
+principles.&nbsp; They might be deluded about Republicanism, as Algernon
+Sidney was, and as Brutus was, but they were as honest and brave as
+either Brutus or Sidney; and as willing to die for their principles.&nbsp;
+But the Radicals who succeeded them were beings of a very different
+description; they jobbed and traded in Republicanism, and either parted
+with it, or at the present day are eager to part with it for a consideration.&nbsp;
+In order to get the Whigs into power, and themselves places, they brought
+the country by their inflammatory language to the verge of a revolution,
+and were the cause that many perished on the scaffold; by their incendiary
+harangues and newspaper articles they caused the Bristol conflagration,
+for which six poor creatures were executed; they encouraged the mob
+to pillage, pull down and burn, and then rushing into garrets looked
+on.&nbsp; Thistlewood tells the mob the Tower is a second Bastile; let
+it be pulled down.&nbsp; A mob tries to pull down the Tower; but Thistlewood
+is at the head of that mob; he is not peeping from a garret on Tower
+Hill like Gulliver at Lisbon.&nbsp; Thistlewood and Ings say to twenty
+ragged individuals, Liverpool and Castlereagh are two satellites of
+despotism; it would be highly desirable to put them out of the way.&nbsp;
+And a certain number of ragged individuals are surprised in a stable
+in Cato Street, making preparations to put Castlereagh and Liverpool
+out of the way, and are fired upon with muskets by Grenadiers, and are
+hacked at with cutlasses by Bow Street runners; but the twain who encouraged
+those ragged individuals to meet in Cato Street are not far off, they
+are not on the other side of the river, in the Borough, for example,
+in some garret or obscure cellar.&nbsp; The very first to confront the
+Guards and runners are Thistlewood and Ings; Thistlewood whips his long
+thin rapier through Smithers&rsquo; lungs, and Ings makes a dash at
+Fitzclarence with his butcher&rsquo;s knife.&nbsp; Oh, there was something
+in those fellows! honesty and courage - but can as much be said for
+the inciters of the troubles of &lsquo;32?&nbsp; No; they egged on poor
+ignorant mechanics and rustics, and got them hanged for pulling down
+and burning, whilst the highest pitch to which their own daring ever
+mounted was to mob Wellington as he passed in the streets.<br>
+<br>
+Now, these people were humbugs, which Thistlewood and Ings were not.&nbsp;
+They raved and foamed against kings, queens, Wellington, the aristocracy,
+and what not, till they had got the Whigs into power, with whom they
+were in secret alliance, and with whom they afterwards openly joined
+in a system of robbery and corruption, more flagitious than the old
+Tory one, because there was more cant about it; for themselves they
+got consulships, commissionerships, and in some instances governments;
+for their sons clerkships in public offices; and there you may see those
+sons with the never-failing badge of the low scoundrel-puppy, the gilt
+chain at the waistcoat pocket; and there you may hear and see them using
+the languishing tones, and employing the airs and graces which wenches
+use and employ, who, without being in the family way, wish to make their
+keepers believe that they are in the family way.&nbsp; Assuredly great
+is the cleverness of your Radicals of &lsquo;32, in providing for themselves
+and their families.&nbsp; Yet, clever as they are, there is one thing
+they cannot do - they get governments for themselves, commissionerships
+for their brothers, clerkships for their sons, but there is one thing
+beyond their craft - they cannot get husbands for their daughters, who,
+too ugly for marriage, and with their heads filled with the nonsense
+they have imbibed from gentility-novels, go over from Socinus to the
+Pope, becoming sisters in fusty convents, or having heard a few sermons
+in Mr. Platitude&rsquo;s &ldquo;chapelle,&rdquo; seek for admission
+at the establishment of mother S---, who, after employing them for a
+time in various menial offices, and making them pluck off their eyebrows
+hair by hair, generally dismisses them on the plea of sluttishness;
+whereupon they return to their papas to eat the bread of the country,
+with the comfortable prospect of eating it still in the shape of a pension
+after their sires are dead.&nbsp; Papa (ex uno disce omnes) living as
+quietly as he can; not exactly enviably, it is true, being now and then
+seen to cast an uneasy and furtive glance behind, even as an animal
+is wont, who has lost by some mischance a very slight appendage; as
+quietly however as he can, and as dignifiedly, a great admirer of every
+genteel thing and genteel personage, the Duke in particular, whose &ldquo;Despatches,&rdquo;
+bound in red morocco, you will find on his table.&nbsp; A disliker of
+coarse expressions, and extremes of every kind, with a perfect horror
+for revolutions and attempts to revolutionize, exclaiming now and then,
+as a shriek escapes from whipped and bleeding Hungary, a groan from
+gasping Poland, and a half-stifled curse from down-trodden but scowling
+Italy, &ldquo;Confound the revolutionary canaille, why can&rsquo;t it
+be quiet!&rdquo; in a word, putting one in mind of the parvenu in the
+&ldquo;Walpurgis Nacht.&rdquo;&nbsp; The writer is no admirer of G&ouml;the,
+but the idea of that parvenu was certainly a good one.&nbsp; Yes, putting
+one in mind of the individual who says -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;Wir waren wahrlich auch nicht dumm,<br>
+Und thaten oft was wir nicht sollten;<br>
+Doch jetzo kehrt sich alles um und um,<br>
+Und eben da wir&rsquo;s fest erhalten wollten.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+We were no fools, as every one discern&rsquo;d,<br>
+And stopp&rsquo;d at nought our projects in fulfilling;<br>
+But now the world seems topsy-turvy turn&rsquo;d,<br>
+To keep it quiet just when we were willing.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Now, this class of individuals entertain a mortal hatred for Lavengro
+and its writer, and never lose an opportunity of vituperating both.&nbsp;
+It is true that such hatred is by no means surprising.&nbsp; There is
+certainly a great deal of difference between Lavengro and their own
+sons; the one thinking of independence and philology, whilst he is clinking
+away at kettles, and hammering horse-shoes in dingles; the others stuck
+up at public offices with gilt chains at their waistcoat-pockets, and
+giving themselves the airs and graces of females of a certain description.&nbsp;
+And there certainly is a great deal of difference between the author
+of Lavengro and themselves - he retaining his principles and his brush;
+they with scarlet breeches on, it is true, but without their Republicanism,
+and their tails.&nbsp; Oh, the writer can well afford to be vituperated
+by your pseudo-Radicals of &lsquo;32!<br>
+<br>
+Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his wife;
+but the matter is too rich not to require a chapter to itself.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XI<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The Old Radical.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;This very dirty man, with his very dirty face,<br>
+Would do any dirty act, which would get him a place.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his wife;
+but before he relates the manner in which they set upon him, it will
+be as well to enter upon a few particulars tending to elucidate their
+reasons for so doing.<br>
+<br>
+The writer had just entered into his eighteenth year, when he met at
+the table of a certain Anglo-Germanist an individual, apparently somewhat
+under thirty, of middle stature, a thin and weaselly figure, a sallow
+complexion, a certain obliquity of vision, and a large pair of spectacles.&nbsp;
+This person, who had lately come from abroad, and had published a volume
+of translations, had attracted some slight notice in the literary world,
+and was looked upon as a kind of lion in a small provincial capital.&nbsp;
+After dinner he argued a great deal, spoke vehemently against the church,
+and uttered the most desperate Radicalism that was perhaps ever heard,
+saying, he hoped that in a short time there would not be a king or queen
+in Europe, and inveighing bitterly against the English aristocracy,
+and against the Duke of Wellington in particular, whom he said, if he
+himself was ever president of an English republic - an event which he
+seemed to think by no means improbable - he would hang for certain infamous
+acts of profligacy and bloodshed which he had perpetrated in Spain.&nbsp;
+Being informed that the writer was something of a philologist, to which
+character the individual in question laid great pretensions, he came
+and sat down by him, and talked about languages and literature.&nbsp;
+The writer, who was only a boy, was a little frightened at first, but,
+not wishing to appear a child of absolute ignorance, he summoned what
+little learning he had, and began to blunder out something about the
+Celtic languages and literature, and asked the Lion who he conceived
+Finn-Ma-Coul to be? and whether he did not consider the &ldquo;Ode to
+the Fox,&rdquo; by Red Rhys of Eryry, to be a masterpiece of pleasantry?&nbsp;
+Receiving no answer to these questions from the Lion, who, singular
+enough, would frequently, when the writer put a question to him, look
+across the table, and flatly contradict some one who was talking to
+some other person, the writer dropped the Celtic languages and literature,
+and asked him whether he did not think it a funny thing that Temugin,
+generally called Genghis Khan, should have married the daughter of Prester
+John?&nbsp; <a name="citation8"></a><a href="#footnote8">{8}</a> The
+Lion, after giving a side-glance at the writer through his left spectacle
+glass, seemed about to reply, but was unfortunately prevented, being
+seized with an irresistible impulse to contradict a respectable doctor
+of medicine, who was engaged in conversation with the master of the
+house at the upper and farther end of the table, the writer being a
+poor ignorant lad, sitting of course at the bottom.&nbsp; The doctor,
+who had served in the Peninsula, having observed that Ferdinand the
+Seventh was not quite so bad as had been represented, the Lion vociferated
+that he was ten times worse, and that he hoped to see him and the Duke
+of Wellington hanged together.&nbsp; The doctor, who, being a Welshman,
+was somewhat of a warm temper, growing rather red, said that at any
+rate he had been informed that Ferdinand the Seventh knew sometimes
+how to behave himself like a gentleman - this brought on a long dispute,
+which terminated rather abruptly.&nbsp; The Lion having observed that
+the doctor must not talk about Spanish matters with one who had visited
+every part of Spain, the doctor bowed, and said he was right, for that
+he believed no people in general possessed such accurate information
+about countries as those who had travelled them as bagmen.&nbsp; On
+the Lion asking the doctor what he meant, the Welshman, whose under
+jaw began to move violently, replied, that he meant what he said.&nbsp;
+Here the matter ended, for the Lion, turning from him, looked at the
+writer.&nbsp; The writer, imagining that his own conversation hitherto
+had been too trivial and common-place for the Lion to consider worth
+his while to take much notice of it, determined to assume a little higher
+ground, and after repeating a few verses of the Koran, and gabbling
+a little Arabic, asked the Lion what he considered to be the difference
+between the Hegira and the Christian era, adding, that he thought the
+general computation was in error by about one year; and being a particularly
+modest person, chiefly, he believes, owing to his having been at school
+in Ireland, absolutely blushed at finding that the Lion returned not
+a word in answer.&nbsp; &ldquo;What a wonderful individual I am seated
+by,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;to whom Arabic seems a vulgar speech,
+and a question about the Hegira not worthy of an answer!&rdquo; not
+reflecting that as lions come from the Sahara, they have quite enough
+of Arabic at home, and that the question about the Hegira was rather
+mal &agrave; propos to one used to prey on the flesh of hadjis.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Now I only wish he would vouchsafe me a little of his learning,&rdquo;
+thought the boy to himself, and in this wish he was at last gratified;
+for the Lion, after asking him whether he was acquainted at all with
+the Sclavonian languages, and being informed that he was not, absolutely
+dumb-foundered him by a display of Sclavonian erudition.<br>
+<br>
+Years rolled by - the writer was a good deal about, sometimes in London,
+sometimes in the country, sometimes abroad; in London he occasionally
+met the man of the spectacles, who was always very civil to him, and,
+indeed, cultivated his acquaintance.&nbsp; The writer thought it rather
+odd that, after he himself had become acquainted with the Sclavonian
+languages and literature, the man of the spectacles talked little or
+nothing about them.&nbsp; In a little time, however, the matter ceased
+to cause him the slightest surprise, for he had discovered a key to
+the mystery.&nbsp; In the mean time the man of spectacles was busy enough;
+he speculated in commerce, failed, and paid his creditors twenty pennies
+in the pound; published translations, of which the public at length
+became heartily tired; having, indeed, got an inkling of the manner
+in which those translations were got up.&nbsp; He managed, however,
+to ride out many a storm, having one trusty sheet-anchor - Radicalism.&nbsp;
+This he turned to the best advantage - writing pamphlets and articles
+in reviews, all in the Radical interest, and for which he was paid out
+of the Radical fund; which articles and pamphlets, when Toryism seemed
+to reel on its last legs, exhibited a slight tendency to Whiggism.&nbsp;
+Nevertheless, his abhorrence of desertion of principle was so great
+in the time of the Duke of Wellington&rsquo;s administration, that when
+S--- left the Whigs and went over, he told the writer, who was about
+that time engaged with him in a literary undertaking, that the said
+S--- was a fellow with a character so infamous, that any honest man
+would rather that you spit in his face than insult his ears with the
+mention of the name of S---.<br>
+<br>
+The literary project having come to nothing, - in which, by the bye,
+the writer was to have all the labour, and his friend all the credit,
+provided any credit should accrue from it, - the writer did not see
+the latter for some years, during which time considerable political
+changes took place; the Tories were driven from, and the Whigs placed
+in, office, both events being brought about by the Radicals coalescing
+with the Whigs, over whom they possessed great influence for the services
+which they had rendered.&nbsp; When the writer next visited his friend,
+he found him very much altered; his opinions were by no means so exalted
+as they had been - he was not disposed even to be rancorous against
+the Duke of Wellington, saying that there were worse men than he, and
+giving him some credit as a general; a hankering after gentility seeming
+to pervade the whole family, father and sons, wife and daughters, all
+of whom talked about genteel diversions - gentility novels, and even
+seemed to look with favour on High Churchism, having in former years,
+to all appearance, been bigoted Dissenters.&nbsp; In a little time the
+writer went abroad; as, indeed, did his friend; not, however, like the
+writer, at his own expense, but at that of the country - the Whigs having
+given him a travelling appointment, which he held for some years, during
+which he received upwards of twelve thousand pounds of the money of
+the country, for services which will, perhaps, be found inscribed on
+certain tablets, when another Astolfo shall visit the moon.&nbsp; This
+appointment, however, he lost on the Tories resuming power - when the
+writer found him almost as Radical and patriotic as ever, just engaged
+in trying to get into Parliament, into which he got by the assistance
+of his Radical friends, who, in conjunction with the Whigs, were just
+getting up a crusade against the Tories, which they intended should
+be a conclusive one.<br>
+<br>
+A little time after the publication of &ldquo;The Bible in Spain,&rdquo;
+the Tories being still in power, this individual, full of the most disinterested
+friendship for the author, was particularly anxious that he should be
+presented with an official situation, in a certain region a great many
+miles off.&nbsp; &ldquo;You are the only person for that appointment,&rdquo;
+said he; &ldquo;you understand a great deal about the country, and are
+better acquainted with the two languages spoken there than any one in
+England.&nbsp; Now I love my country, and have, moreover, a great regard
+for you, and as I am in Parliament, and have frequent opportunities
+of speaking to the Ministry, I shall take care to tell them how desirable
+it would be to secure your services.&nbsp; It is true they are Tories,
+but I think that even Tories would give up their habitual love of jobbery
+in a case like yours, and for once show themselves disposed to be honest
+men and gentlemen; indeed, I have no doubt they will, for having so
+deservedly an infamous character, they would be glad to get themselves
+a little credit, by a presentation which could not possibly be traced
+to jobbery or favouritism.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The writer begged his friend to give himself no trouble about the matter,
+as he was not desirous of the appointment, being in tolerably easy circumstances,
+and willing to take some rest after a life of labour.&nbsp; All, however,
+that he could say was of no use, his friend indignantly observing, that
+the matter ought to be taken entirely out of his hands, and the appointment
+thrust upon him for the credit of the country.&nbsp; &ldquo;But may
+not many people be far more worthy of the appointment than myself?&rdquo;
+said the writer.&nbsp; &ldquo;Where?&rdquo; said the friendly Radical.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t get it, it will be made a job of, given to
+the son of some steward, or, perhaps, to some quack who has done dirty
+work; I tell you what, I shall ask it for you, in spite of you; I shall,
+indeed!&rdquo; and his eyes flashed with friendly and patriotic fervour
+through the large pair of spectacles which he wore.<br>
+<br>
+And, in fact, it would appear that the honest and friendly patriot put
+his threat into execution.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have spoken,&rdquo; said he,
+&ldquo;more than once to this and that individual in Parliament, and
+everybody seems to think that the appointment should be given to you.&nbsp;
+Nay, that you should be forced to accept it.&nbsp; I intend next to
+speak to Lord A--- &rdquo;&nbsp; And so he did, at least it would appear
+so.&nbsp; On the writer calling upon him one evening, about a week afterwards,
+in order to take leave of him, as the writer was about to take a long
+journey for the sake of his health, his friend no sooner saw him than
+he started up in a violent fit of agitation, and glancing about the
+room, in which there were several people, amongst others two Whig members
+of Parliament, said, &ldquo;I am glad you are come, I was just speaking
+about you.&nbsp; This,&rdquo; said he, addressing the two members, &ldquo;is
+so and so, the author of so and so, the well-known philologist; as I
+was telling you, I spoke to Lord A--- this day about him, and said that
+he ought forthwith to have the head appointment in - and what did the
+fellow say?&nbsp; Why, that there was no necessity for such an appointment
+at all, and if there were, why - and then he hummed and ha&rsquo;d.&nbsp;
+Yes,&rdquo; said he, looking at the writer, &ldquo;he did indeed.&nbsp;
+What a scandal! what an infamy!&nbsp; But I see how it will be, it will
+be a job.&nbsp; The place will be given to some son of a steward or
+to some quack, as I said before.&nbsp; Oh, these Tories!&nbsp; Well,
+if this does not make one -&nbsp; &rdquo;&nbsp; Here he stopped short,
+crunched his teeth, and looked the image of desperation.<br>
+<br>
+Seeing the poor man in this distressed condition, the writer begged
+him to be comforted, and not to take the matter so much to heart; but
+the indignant Radical took the matter very much to heart, and refused
+all comfort whatever, bouncing about the room, and, whilst his spectacles
+flashed in the light of four spermaceti candles, exclaiming, &ldquo;It
+will be a job - a Tory job!&nbsp; I see it all, I see it all, I see
+it all!&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+And a job it proved, and a very pretty job, but no Tory job.&nbsp; Shortly
+afterwards the Tories were out, and the Whigs were in.&nbsp; From that
+time the writer heard not a word about the injustice done to the country
+in not presenting him with the appointment to -; the Radical, however,
+was busy enough to obtain the appointment, not for the writer, but for
+himself, and eventually succeeded, partly through Radical influence,
+and partly through that of a certain Whig lord, for whom the Radical
+had done, on a particular occasion, work of a particular kind.&nbsp;
+So, though the place was given to a quack, and the whole affair a very
+pretty job, it was one in which the Tories had certainly no hand.<br>
+<br>
+In the meanwhile, however, the friendly Radical did not drop the writer.&nbsp;
+Oh, no!&nbsp; On various occasions he obtained from the writer all the
+information about the country in question, and was particularly anxious
+to obtain from the writer, and eventually did obtain, a copy of a work
+written in the court language of that country, edited by the writer,
+a language exceedingly difficult, which the writer, at the expense of
+a considerable portion of his eyesight, had acquired, at least as far
+as by the eyesight it could be acquired.&nbsp; What use the writer&rsquo;s
+friend made of the knowledge he had gained from him, and what use he
+made of the book, the writer can only guess; but he has little doubt
+that when the question of sending a person to - was mooted in a Parliamentary
+Committee - which it was at the instigation of the writer&rsquo;s friend
+- the Radical on being examined about the country, gave the information
+which he had obtained from the writer as his own, and flashed the book
+and its singular characters in the eyes of the Committee; and then of
+course his Radical friends would instantly say, &ldquo;This is the man!
+there is no one like him.&nbsp; See what information he possesses; and
+see that book written by himself in the court language of Serendib.&nbsp;
+This is the only man to send there.&nbsp; What a glory, what a triumph
+it would be to Britain, to send out a man so deeply versed in the mysterious
+lore of - as our illustrious countryman; a person who with his knowledge
+could beat with their own weapons the wise men of -&nbsp; Is such an
+opportunity to be lost?&nbsp; Oh, no! surely not; if it is, it will
+be an eternal disgrace to England, and the world will see that Whigs
+are no better than Tories.&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+Let no one think the writer uncharitable in these suppositions.&nbsp;
+The writer is only too well acquainted with the antecedents of the individual,
+to entertain much doubt that he would shrink from any such conduct,
+provided he thought that his temporal interest would be forwarded by
+it.&nbsp; The writer is aware of more than one instance in which he
+has passed off the literature of friendless young men for his own, after
+making them a slight pecuniary compensation and deforming what was originally
+excellent by interpolations of his own.&nbsp; This was his especial
+practice with regard to translation, of which he would fain be esteemed
+the king.&nbsp; This Radical literato is slightly acquainted with four
+or five of the easier dialects of Europe, on the strength of which knowledge
+be would fain pass for a universal linguist, publishing translations
+of pieces originally written in various difficult languages; which translations,
+however, were either made by himself from literal renderings done for
+him into French or German, or had been made from the originals into
+English, by friendless young men, and then deformed by his alterations.<br>
+<br>
+Well, the Radical got the appointment, and the writer certainly did
+not grudge it him.&nbsp; He, of course, was aware that his friend had
+behaved in a very base manner towards him, but he bore him no ill-will,
+and invariably when he heard him spoken against, which was frequently
+the case, took his part when no other person would; indeed, he could
+well afford to bear him no ill-will.&nbsp; He had never sought for the
+appointment, nor wished for it, nor, indeed, ever believed himself to
+be qualified for it.&nbsp; He was conscious, it is true, that he was
+not altogether unacquainted with the language and literature of the
+country with which the appointment was connected.&nbsp; He was likewise
+aware that he was not altogether deficient in courage and in propriety
+of behaviour.&nbsp; He knew that his appearance was not particularly
+against him; his face not being like that of a convicted pickpocket,
+nor his gait resembling that of a fox who has lost his tail; yet he
+never believed himself adapted for the appointment, being aware that
+he had no aptitude for the doing of dirty work, if called to do it,
+nor pliancy which would enable him to submit to scurvy treatment, whether
+he did dirty work or not - requisites, at the time of which he is speaking,
+indispensable in every British official; requisites, by the bye, which
+his friend the Radical possessed in a high degree; but though he bore
+no ill-will towards his friend, his friend bore anything but good-will
+towards him; for from the moment that he had obtained the appointment
+for himself, his mind was filled with the most bitter malignity against
+the writer, and naturally enough; for no one ever yet behaved in a base
+manner towards another, without forthwith conceiving a mortal hatred
+against him.&nbsp; You wrong another, know yourself to have acted basely,
+and are enraged, not against yourself - for no one hates himself - but
+against the innocent cause of your baseness; reasoning very plausibly,
+&ldquo;But for that fellow, I should never have been base; for had he
+not existed I could not have been so, at any rate against him;&rdquo;
+and this hatred is all the more bitter, when you reflect that you have
+been needlessly base.<br>
+<br>
+Whilst the Tories are in power the writer&rsquo;s friend, of his own
+accord, raves against the Tories because they do not give the writer
+a certain appointment, and makes, or says he makes, desperate exertions
+to make them do so; but no sooner are the Tories out, with whom he has
+no influence, and the Whigs in, with whom he, or rather his party, has
+influence, than he gets the place for himself, though, according to
+his own expressed opinion - an opinion with which the writer does not,
+and never did, concur - the writer was the only person competent to
+hold it.&nbsp; Now had he, without saying a word to the writer, or about
+the writer with respect to the employment, got the place for himself
+when he had an opportunity, knowing, as he very well knew, himself to
+be utterly unqualified for it, the transaction, though a piece of jobbery,
+would not have merited the title of a base transaction; as the matter
+stands, however, who can avoid calling the whole affair not only a piece
+of - come, come, out with the word - scoundrelism on the part of the
+writer&rsquo;s friend, but a most curious piece of uncalled-for scoundrelism?
+and who, with any knowledge of fallen human nature, can wonder at the
+writer&rsquo;s friend entertaining towards him a considerable portion
+of gall and malignity?<br>
+<br>
+This feeling on the part of the writer&rsquo;s friend was wonderfully
+increased by the appearance of Lavengro, many passages of which the
+Radical in his foreign appointment applied to himself and family - one
+or two of his children having gone over to Popery, the rest become members
+of Mr. Platitude&rsquo;s chapel, and the minds of all being filled with
+ultra notions of gentility.<br>
+<br>
+The writer, hearing that his old friend had returned to England, to
+apply, he believes, for an increase of salary, and for a title, called
+upon him, unwillingly, it is true, for he had no wish to see a person
+for whom, though he bore him no ill-will, he could not avoid feeling
+a considerable portion of contempt; the truth is, that his sole object
+in calling was to endeavour to get back a piece of literary property
+which his friend had obtained from him many years previously, and which,
+though he had frequently applied for it, he never could get back.&nbsp;
+Well, the writer called; he did not get his property, which, indeed,
+he had scarcely time to press for, being almost instantly attacked by
+his good friend and his wife - yes, it was then that the author was
+set upon by an old Radical and his wife - the wife, who looked the very
+image of shame and malignity, did not say much, it is true, but encouraged
+her husband in all he said.&nbsp; Both of their own accord introduced
+the subject of Lavengro.&nbsp; The Radical called the writer a grumbler,
+just as if there had ever been a greater grumbler than himself until,
+by the means above described, he had obtained a place: he said that
+the book contained a melancholy view of human nature - just as if anybody
+could look in his face without having a melancholy view of human nature.&nbsp;
+On the writer quietly observing that the book contained an exposition
+of his principles, the pseudo-Radical replied, that he cared nothing
+for his principles - which was probably true, it not being likely that
+he would care for another person&rsquo;s principles after having shown
+so thorough a disregard for his own.&nbsp; The writer said that the
+book, of course, would give offence to humbugs; the Radical then demanded
+whether he thought him a humbug? - the wretched wife was the Radical&rsquo;s
+protection, even as he knew she would be; it was on her account that
+the writer did not kick his good friend; as it was, he looked at him
+in the face and thought to himself, &ldquo;How is it possible I should
+think you a humbug, when only last night I was taking your part in a
+company in which everybody called you a humbug?&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+The Radical, probably observing something in the writer&rsquo;s eye
+which he did not like, became all on a sudden abjectly submissive, and,
+professing the highest admiration for the writer, begged him to visit
+him in his government; this the writer promised faithfully to do, and
+he takes the present opportunity of performing his promise.<br>
+<br>
+This is one of the pseudo-Radical calumniators of Lavengro and its author;
+were the writer on his deathbed he would lay his hand on his heart and
+say, that he does not believe that there is one trait of exaggeration
+in the portrait which he has drawn.&nbsp; This is one of the pseudo-Radical
+calumniators of Lavengro and its author; and this is one of the genus,
+who, after having railed against jobbery for perhaps a quarter of a
+century, at present batten on large official salaries which they do
+not earn.&nbsp; England is a great country, and her interests require
+that she should have many a well-paid official both at home and abroad;
+but will England long continue a great country if the care of her interests,
+both at home and abroad, is in many instances intrusted to beings like
+him described above, whose only recommendation for an official appointment
+was that he was deeply versed in the secrets of his party and of the
+Whigs?<br>
+<br>
+Before he concludes, the writer will take the liberty of saying of Lavengro
+that it is a book written for the express purpose of inculcating virtue,
+love of country, learning, manly pursuits, and genuine religion, for
+example, that of the Church of England, and for awakening a contempt
+for nonsense of every kind, and a hatred for priestcraft, more especially
+that of Rome.<br>
+<br>
+And in conclusion, with respect to many passages of his book in which
+he has expressed himself in terms neither measured nor mealy, he will
+beg leave to observe, in the words of a great poet, who lived a profligate
+life, it is true, but who died a sincere penitent - thanks, after God,
+to good Bishop Burnet -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;All this with indignation I have hurl&rsquo;d<br>
+At the pretending part of this proud world,<br>
+Who, swollen with selfish vanity, devise<br>
+False freedoms, formal cheats, and holy lies,<br>
+Over their fellow fools to tyrannize.&rdquo;<br>
+ROCHESTER.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Footnotes<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote1"></a><a href="#citation1">{1}</a>&nbsp; Tipperary.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote2"></a><a href="#citation2">{2}</a>&nbsp; An obscene
+oath.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote3"></a><a href="#citation3">{3}</a>&nbsp; See &ldquo;Muses&rsquo;
+Library,&rdquo; pp. 86, 87.&nbsp; London, 1738.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote4"></a><a href="#citation4">{4}</a>&nbsp; Genteel with
+them seems to be synonymous with Gentile and Gentoo; if so, the manner
+in which it has been applied for ages ceases to surprise, for genteel
+is heathenish.&nbsp; Ideas of barbaric pearl and gold, glittering armour,
+plumes, tortures, blood-shedding, and lust, should always be connected
+with it.&nbsp; Wace, in his grand Norman poem, calls the Baron genteel:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;La furent li gentil Baron,&rdquo; etc.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+And he certainly could not have applied the word better than to the
+strong Norman thief, armed cap-&agrave;-pie, without one particle of
+truth or generosity; for a person to be a pink of gentility, that is
+heathenism, should have no such feelings; and, indeed, the admirers
+of gentility seldom or never associate any such feelings with it.&nbsp;
+It was from the Norman, the worst of all robbers and miscreants, who
+built strong castles, garrisoned them with devils, and tore out poor
+wretches&rsquo; eyes, as the Saxon Chronicle says, that the English
+got their detestable word genteel.&nbsp; What could ever have made the
+English such admirers of gentility, it would be difficult to say; for,
+during three hundred years, they suffered enough by it.&nbsp; Their
+genteel Norman landlords were their scourgers, their torturers, the
+plunderers of their homes, the dishonourers of their wives, and the
+deflourers of their daughters.&nbsp; Perhaps, after all, fear is at
+the root of the English veneration for gentility.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote5"></a><a href="#citation5">{5}</a>&nbsp; Gentle and
+gentlemanly may be derived from the same root as genteel; but nothing
+can be more distinct from the mere genteel, than the ideas which enlightened
+minds associate with these words.&nbsp; Gentle and gentlemanly mean
+something kind and genial; genteel, that which is glittering or gaudy.&nbsp;
+A person can be a gentleman in rags, but nobody can be genteel.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote6"></a><a href="#citation6">{6}</a>&nbsp; The writer
+has been checked in print by the Scotch with being a Norfolk man.&nbsp;
+Surely, surely, these latter times have not been exactly the ones in
+which it was expedient for Scotchmen to check the children of any county
+in England with the place of their birth, more especially those who
+have had the honour of being born in Norfolk - times in which British
+fleets, commanded by Scotchmen, have returned laden with anything but
+laurels from foreign shores.&nbsp; It would have been well for Britain
+had she had the old Norfolk man to dispatch to the Baltic or the Black
+sea, lately, instead of Scotch admirals.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote7"></a><a href="#citation7">{7}</a>&nbsp; As the present
+work will come out in the midst of a vehement political contest, people
+may be led to suppose that the above was written expressly for the time.&nbsp;
+The writer therefore begs to state that it was written in the year 1854.&nbsp;
+He cannot help adding that he is neither Whig, Tory, nor Radical, and
+cares not a straw what party governs England, provided it is governed
+well.&nbsp; But he has no hopes of good government from the Whigs.&nbsp;
+It is true that amongst them there is one very great man, Lord Palmerston,
+who is indeed the sword and buckler, the chariots and the horses of
+the party; but it is impossible for his lordship to govern well with
+such colleagues as he has - colleagues which have been forced upon him
+by family influence, and who are continually pestering him into measures
+anything but conducive to the country&rsquo;s honour and interest.&nbsp;
+If Palmerston would govern well, he must get rid of them; but from that
+step, with all his courage and all his greatness, he will shrink.&nbsp;
+Yet how proper and easy a step it would be!&nbsp; He could easily get
+better, but scarcely worse, associates.&nbsp; They appear to have one
+object in view, and only one - jobbery.&nbsp; It was chiefly owing to
+a most flagitious piece of jobbery, which one of his lordship&rsquo;s
+principal colleagues sanctioned and promoted, that his lordship experienced
+his late parliamentary disasters.<br>
+<br>
+<a name="footnote8"></a><a href="#citation8">{8}</a>&nbsp; A fact.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE ROMANY RYE ***<br>
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