LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
The important interview expected at the conclusion of my last took place
sooner than I had calculated; for the very day I received the letter,
and just when my dinner was finished, the squire, or whatever he is
called, entered the room so suddenly that I almost thought I beheld an
apparition. The figure of this man is peculiarly noble and stately,
and his voice has that deep fullness of accent which implies unresisted
authority. I had risen involuntarily as he entered; we gazed on each
other for a moment in silence, which was at length broken by my visitor.
‘You have desired to see me,’ he said. ‘I am here; if you have aught
to say let me hear it; my time is too brief to be consumed in childish
dumb-show.’
‘I would ask of you,’ said I, ‘by what authority I am detained in this
place of confinement, and for what purpose?’
‘I have told you already,’ said he, ‘that my authority is sufficient,
and my power equal to it; this is all which it is necessary for you at
present to know.’
‘Every British subject has a right to know why he suffers restraint,’
I replied; ‘nor can he be deprived of liberty without a legal warrant.
Show me that by which you confine me thus.’
‘You shall see more,’ he said; ‘you shall see the magistrate by whom it
is granted, and that without a moment’s delay.’
This sudden proposal fluttered and alarmed me; I felt, nevertheless,
that I had the right cause, and resolved to plead it boldly, although
I could well have desired a little further time for preparation. He
turned, however, threw open the door of the apartment, and commanded me
to follow him. I felt some inclination, when I crossed the threshold of
my prison-chamber, to have turned and run for it; but I knew not where
to find the stairs--had reason to think the outer doors would be secured
and, to conclude, so soon as I had quitted the room to follow the proud
step of my conductor, I observed that I was dogged by Cristal Nixon, who
suddenly appeared within two paces of me, and with whose great personal
strength, independent of the assistance he might have received from
his master, I saw no chance of contending. I therefore followed,
unresistingly and in silence; along one or two passages of much greater
length than consisted with the ideas I had previously entertained of
the size of the house. At length a door was flung open, and we entered
a large, old-fashioned parlour, having coloured glass in the windows,
oaken panelling on the wall, a huge grate, in which a large faggot
or two smoked under an arched chimney-piece of stone which bore some
armorial device, whilst the walls were adorned with the usual number
of heroes in armour, with large wigs instead of helmets, and ladies in
sacques, smelling to nosegays.
Behind a long table, on which were several books, sat a smart
underbred-looking man, wearing his own hair tied in a club, and who,
from the quire of paper laid before him, and the pen which he handled
at my entrance, seemed prepared to officiate as clerk. As I wish to
describe these persons as accurately as possible, I may add, he wore a
dark-coloured coat, corduroy breeches, and spatterdashes. At the
upper end of the same table, in an ample easy-chair covered with black
leather, reposed a fat personage, about fifty years old, who either was
actually a country justice, or was well selected to represent such a
character. His leathern breeches were faultless in make, his jockey
boots spotless in the varnish, and a handsome and flourishing pair of
boot-garters, as they are called, united the one part of his garments to
the other; in fine, a richly-laced scarlet waistcoat and a purple coat
set off the neat though corpulent figure of the little man, and threw an
additional bloom upon his plethoric aspect. I suppose he had dined,
for it was two hours past noon, and he was amusing himself, and aiding
digestion, with a pipe of tobacco. There was an air of importance in his
manner which corresponded to the rural dignity of his exterior, and a
habit which he had of throwing out a number of interjectional sounds,
uttered with a strange variety of intonation running from bass up to
treble in a very extraordinary manner, or breaking off his sentences
with a whiff of his pipe, seemed adopted to give an air of thought and
mature deliberation to his opinions and decisions. Notwithstanding
all this, Alan, it might be DOOTED, as our old Professor used to say,
whether the Justice was anything more then an ass. Certainly, besides a
great deference for the legal opinion of his clerk, which might be quite
according to the order of things, he seemed to be wonderfully under the
command of his brother squire, if squire either of them were, and indeed
much more than was consistent with so much assumed consequence of his
own.
‘Ho--ha--aye--so--so--hum--humph--this is the young man, I
suppose--hum--aye--seems sickly. Young gentleman, you may sit down.’
I used the permission given, for I had been much more reduced by my
illness than I was aware of, and felt myself really fatigued, even by
the few paces I had walked, joined to the agitation I suffered.
‘And your name, young man, is--humph--aye--ha--what is it?’
‘Darsie Latimer.’
‘Right--aye--humph--very right. Darsie Latimer is the very
thing--ha--aye--where do you come from?’
‘From Scotland, sir,’ I replied.
‘A native of Scotland--a--humph--eh--how is it?’
‘I am an Englishman by birth, sir.’
‘Right--aye--yes, you are so. But pray, Mr. Darsie Latimer, have you
always been called by that name, or have you any other?--Nick, write
down his answers, Nick.’
‘As far as I remember, I never bore any other,’ was my answer.
‘How, no? well, I should not have thought so, Hey, neighbour, would
you?’
Here he looked towards the other squire, who had thrown himself into a
chair; and, with his legs stretched out before him, and his arms folded
on his bosom, seemed carelessly attending to what was going forward.
He answered the appeal of the Justice by saying, that perhaps the young
man’s memory did not go back to a very early period.
‘Ah--eh--ha--you hear the gentleman. Pray, how far may your memory be
pleased to run back to?--umph?’
‘Perhaps, sir, to the age of three years, or a little further.’
‘And will you presume to say, sir,’ said the squire, drawing himself
suddenly erect in his seat, and exerting the strength of his powerful
voice, ‘that you then bore your present name?’
I was startled at the confidence with which this question was put, and
in vain rummaged my memory for the means of replying. ‘At least,’ I
said, ‘I always remember being called Darsie; children, at that early
age, seldom get more than their Christian name.’
‘Oh, I thought so,’ he replied, and again stretched himself on his seat,
in the same lounging posture as before.
‘So you were called Darsie in your infancy,’ said the Justice;
‘and--hum--aye--when did you first take the name of Latimer?’
‘I did not take it, sir; it was given to me.’
‘I ask you,’ said the lord of the mansion, but with less severity in his
voice than formerly, ‘whether you can remember that you were ever called
Latimer, until you had that name given you in Scotland?’
‘I will be candid: I cannot recollect an instance that I was so called
when in England, but neither can I recollect when the name was first
given me; and if anything is to be founded on these queries and my
answers, I desire my early childhood may be taken into consideration.’
‘Hum--aye--yes,’ said the Justice; ‘all that requires consideration
shall be duly considered. Young man--eh--I beg to know the name of your
father and mother?’
This was galling a wound that has festered for years, and I did not
endure the question so patiently as those which preceded it; but
replied, ‘I demand, in my turn, to know if I am before an English
Justice of the Peace?’
‘His worship, Squire Foxley, of Foxley Hall, has been of the quorum
these twenty years,’ said Master Nicholas.
‘Then he ought to know, or you, sir, as his clerk, should inform him,’
said I, ‘that I am the complainer in this case, and that my complaint
ought to be heard before I am subjected to cross-examination.’
‘Humph--hoy--what, aye--there is something in that, neighbour,’ said
the poor Justice, who, blown about by every wind of doctrine, seemed
desirous to attain the sanction of his brother squire.
‘I wonder at you, Foxley,’ said his firm-minded acquaintance; ‘how can
you render the young man justice unless you know who he is?’
‘Ha--yes--egad, that’s true,’ said Mr. Justice Foxley; ‘and now--looking
into the matter more closely--there is, eh, upon the whole--nothing
at all in what he says--so, sir, you must tell your father’s name, and
surname.’
‘It is out of my power, sir; they are not known to me, since you must
needs know so much of my private affairs.’
The Justice collected a great AFFLATUS in his cheeks, which puffed them
up like those of a Dutch cherub, while his eyes seemed flying out of his
head, from the effort with which he retained his breath. He then blew
it forth with,--‘Whew!--Hoom--poof--ha!--not know your parents,
youngster?--Then I must commit you for a vagrant, I warrant you. OMNE
IGNOTUM PRO TERRIBILI, as we used to say at Appleby school; that is,
every one that is not known to the Justice; is a rogue and a vagabond.
Ha!--aye, you may sneer, sir; but I question if you would have known the
meaning of that Latin, unless I had told you.’
I acknowledged myself obliged for a new edition of the adage, and an
interpretation which I could never have reached alone and unassisted. I
then proceeded to state my case with greater confidence. The Justice
was an ass, that was clear; but if was scarcely possible he could be so
utterly ignorant as not to know what was necessary in so plain a case as
mine. I therefore informed him of the riot which had been committed on
the Scottish side of the Solway Firth, explained how I came to be placed
in my present situation, and requested of his worship to set me at
liberty. I pleaded my cause with as much earnestness as I could, casting
an eye from time to time upon the opposite party, who seemed entirely
indifferent to all the animation with which I accused him.
As for the Justice, when at length I had ceased, as really not
knowing what more to say in a case so very plain, he replied,
‘Ho--aye--aye--yes--wonderful! and so this is all the gratitude you show
to this good gentleman for the great charge and trouble he hath had with
respect to and concerning of you?’
‘He saved my life, sir, I acknowledge, on one occasion certainly, and
most probably on two; but his having done so gives him no right over my
person. I am not, however, asking for any punishment or revenge; on the
contrary, I am content to part friends with the gentleman, whose motives
I am unwilling to suppose are bad, though his actions have been, towards
me, unauthorized and violent.’
This moderation, Alan, thou wilt comprehend, was not entirely dictated
by my feelings towards the individual of whom I complained; there were
other reasons, in which regard for him had little share. It seemed,
however, as if the mildness with which I pleaded my cause had more
effect upon him than anything I had yet said. We was moved to the point
of being almost out of countenance; and took snuff repeatedly, as if to
gain time to stifle some degree of emotion.
But on Justice Foxley, on whom my eloquence was particularly designed to
make impression, the result was much less favourable. He consulted in a
whisper with Mr. Nicholas, his clerk--pshawed, hemmed, and elevated
his eyebrows, as if in scorn of my supplication. At length, having
apparently made up his mind, he leaned back in his chair, and smoked
his pipe with great energy, with a look of defiance, designed to make me
aware that all my reasoning was lost on him.
At length, when I stopped, more from lack of breath than want of
argument, he opened his oracular jaws, and made the following reply,
interrupted by his usual interjectional ejaculations, and by long
volumes of smoke:--‘Hem--aye--eh--poof. And, youngster, do you think
Matthew Foxley, who has been one of the quorum for these twenty years,
is to be come over with such trash as would hardly cheat an apple-woman?
Poof--poof--eh! Why, man--eh--dost thou not know the charge is not a
bailable matter--and that--hum--aye--the greatest man--poof--the Baron
of Graystock himself, must stand committed? and yet you pretend to have
been kidnapped by this gentleman, and robbed of property, and what not;
and--eh--poof--you would persuade me all you want is to get away from
him? I do believe--eh--that it IS all you want. Therefore, as you are
a sort of a slip-string gentleman, and--aye--hum--a kind of idle
apprentice, and something cock-brained withal, as the honest folks
of the house tell me--why, you must e’en remain under custody of your
guardian, till your coming of age, or my Lord Chancellor’s warrant,
shall give you the management of your own affairs, which, if you can
gather your brains again, you will even then not be--aye--hem--poof--in
particular haste to assume.’
The time occupied by his worship’s hums, and haws, and puffs of tobacco
smoke, together with the slow and pompous manner in which he spoke, gave
me a minute’s space to collect my ideas, dispersed as they were by the
extraordinary purport of this annunciation.
‘I cannot conceive, sir,’ I replied, ‘by what singular tenure this
person claims my obedience as a guardian; it is a barefaced imposture. I
never in my life saw him, until I came unhappily to this country, about
four weeks since.’
‘Aye, sir--we--eh--know, and are aware--that--poof--you do not like
to hear some folk’s names; and that--eh--you understand me--there are
things, and sounds, and matters, conversation about names, and suchlike,
which put you off the hooks--which I have no humour to witness.
Nevertheless, Mr. Darsie--or--poof--Mr. Darsie Latimer--or--poof,
poof--eh--aye, Mr. Darsie without the Latimer--you have acknowledged
as much to-day as assures me you will best be disposed of under the
honourable care of my friend here--all your confessions--besides that,
poof--eh--I know him to be a most responsible person--a--hay--aye--most
responsible and honourable person--Can you deny this?’
‘I know nothing of him,’ I repeated; ‘not even his name; and I have not,
as I told you, seen him in the course of my whole life, till a few weeks
since.’
‘Will you swear to that?’ said the singular man, who seemed to await the
result of this debate, secure as a rattle-snake is of the prey which
has once felt its fascination. And while he said these words in deep
undertone, he withdrew his chair a little behind that of the Justice, so
as to be unseen by him or his clerk, who sat upon the same side; while
he bent on me a frown so portentous, that no one who has witnessed the
look can forget it during the whole of his life. The furrows of the
brow above the eyes became livid and almost black, and were bent into
a semicircular, or rather elliptical form, above the junction of the
eyebrows. I had heard such a look described in an old tale of DIABLERIE,
which it was my chance to be entertained with not long since; when
this deep and gloomy contortion of the frontal muscles was not unaptly
described as forming the representation of a small horseshoe.
The tale, when told, awaked a dreadful vision of infancy, which
the withering and blighting look now fixed on me again forced on
my recollection, but with much more vivacity. Indeed, I was so much
surprised, and, I must add, terrified, at the vague ideas which were
awakened in my mind by this fearful sign, that I kept my eyes fixed on
the face in which it was exhibited, as on a frightful vision; until,
passing his handkerchief a moment across his countenance, this
mysterious man relaxed at once the look which had for me something
so appalling. ‘The young man will no longer deny that he has seen me
before,’ said he to the Justice, in a tone of complacency; ‘and I trust
he will now be reconciled to my temporary guardianship, which may end
better for him than he expects.’
‘Whatever I expect,’ I replied, summoning my scattered recollections
together, ‘I see I am neither to expect justice nor protection from this
gentleman, whose office it is to render both to the lieges. For you,
sir, how strangely you have wrought yourself into the fate of an unhappy
young man or what interest you can pretend in me, you yourself only can
explain. That I have seen you before is certain; for none can forget the
look with which you seem to have the power of blighting those upon whom
you cast it.’
The Justice seemed not very easy under this hint, ‘Ha!--aye,’ he said;
‘it is time to be going, neighbour. I have a many miles to ride, and I
care not to ride darkling in these parts. You and I, Mr. Nicholas, must
be jogging.’
The Justice fumbled with his gloves, in endeavouring to draw them on
hastily, and Mr. Nicholas bustled to get his greatcoat and whip. Their
landlord endeavoured to detain them, and spoke of supper and beds. Both,
pouring forth many thanks for his invitation, seemed as if they would
much rather not, and Mr. Justice Foxley was making a score of apologies,
with at least a hundred cautionary hems and eh-ehs, when the girl Dorcas
burst into the room, and announced a gentleman on justice business.
‘What gentleman?--and whom does he want?’
‘He is cuome post on his ten toes,’ said the wench; ‘and on justice
business to his worship loike. I’se uphald him a gentleman, for he
speaks as good Latin as the schule-measter; but, lack-a-day! he has
gotten a queer mop of a wig.’
The gentleman, thus announced and described, bounced into the room.
But I have already written as much as fills a sheet of my paper, and my
singular embarrassments press so hard on me that I have matter to fill
another from what followed the intrusion of--my dear Alan--your crazy
client--Poor Peter Peebles!