_Saturday Bed-time._
While the boys were scrubbing their rooms after breakfast this morning,
Keats sauntered in, saying he had finished his job of cleaning the
chicken-yard. I went back, found it anything but clean, and called up to
Hen, who was sweeping the back steps, "Tell Keats to come back here and
clean this yard better!" He had just passed the word along, "Hi, son,
she says for you to come back and lick your calf over!" (I am becoming
used to being "she" and "her" on all occasions) when Nucky appeared in
the back door, waving excitedly for me. Not knowing what battle, murder
or sudden death might be in progress, I flew up the walk. The boys were
all hanging out the front door. Nucky shot me through them like a
catapult, saying, "Take a look at that 'ere man,--it's Asher Hardwick,
from over in Bloody Boyne. He's kilt twenty-four in war, and nine in
peace, and wouldn't wipe his foot on Achilles!"
A gray, venerable-looking man was passing down the road on an ambling
nag. "That man wouldn't hurt a fly," I said; "you must be mistaken."
"No, I haint,--I've seed him before. Of course he wouldn't hurt nobody
less'n he was driv' to it; but the Mohuns just wouldn't give him no
peace at all till they was all kilt off,--same as the Cheevers does us."
"But how could he kill nine in peace?" I asked.
"Kilt them just accidental,--they was witless folk that never knowed
enough to keep out of his way when he was out after Mohuns. Asher he'd
feel terrible about such as that."
To-night as I related more Trojan War, there were frequent interruptions
from Nucky (who, during the stories, holds the place at my right hand
always) such as, "I can beat that with Asher Hardwick!", "Blant wouldn't
have took no such sass from Agamemnon or nobody!", and then would follow
stories which did indeed sometimes beat Greeks and Trojans.
Later, he remarked, "If Hector and Achilles and them had a-lived
now-a-days, they'd have got song-ballads made up about 'em, same as
Asher and Blant. There's four or five about Asher--"
"I know one," interrupted Absalom.
"And there's one about Blant's revengement on the Cheevers when they
laywayed him in April,--Basil Beaumont, over on Powderhorn, he made it."
"I know that, too," said Absalom.
"Achilles and Hector," I said, "did have song ballads made up about
them, the very tales I am relating to you now; and a great blind poet,
named Homer, went about singing them from palace to palace."
"Same as Basil Beaumont," said Nucky; "he don't never do a lick of
work,--folks gives him his bed and vittles just to set in the
chimley-corner and pick and sing song-ballads."
Geordie had left the room when Absalom spoke; he now returned with a
small, homemade banjo--produced, I suppose, from the mysterious locked
box he keeps there--and Absalom, tuning it, began to pick and sing an
indescribably bloody and doleful song, "The Doom of the Mohuns," which
fairly made my blood run cold. This finished, "Blant's Revengement" was
demanded and sung, the words of it being as follows:
Blant Marrs he was a fighting boy,
Most handy with his gun.
On Trigger Branch of Powderhorn
His famous deeds were done.
For thirty year' the war it raged
All o'er a strip of bottom.
Sometimes the Marrses triumphed strong,
Again, the Cheevers got 'em.
His paw lamed up, his uncles kilt,
Five year' Blant mourned his land,
Until, good-grown, beside the fence
He took his battle-stand.
Then Ben and Jeems they bit the dust
And perished in their gore,
And many Cheevers his good gun
Felt sharp, and dreaded sore.
Elhannon, Todd and Dalton then
Planned Blant for to layway
All unbeknownst, while travelling
Upon a fair spring day.
Beneath a cliff where Trigger bends
In ambush they lay low.
Oh, Blant, you better say your prayers!
Death lurks at your elbow!
Oh, Blant, I wish you was safe at home;
I think you'll never be;
I would not give a tallow-dip
For all your chance I see!
He comes, he hears a swift lock click,
And, swifter than the wind,
He turns, six barrels emptying
Before they can begin.
Elhannon nevermore will see
The sun rise o'er the peak;
And Todd and Dalt, up from their wounds,
Far, absent countries seek.
During the singing, the other boys cast envious glances in Nucky's
direction, and Philip probably voiced the sentiments of all when he
exclaimed,
"Dag gone, I wisht I had a big brother as mean as Blant!"