my appearance; Skelpie's heels were dangling over my head; the pronged
fork was close to my waistcoat; I stared in the face of the old man,
unable to utter a word, but sweating like a baited bull, and plainly
expressing my fears by my woebegone and pallid countenance. I expected
some dire punishment for my silence; but old Grobstock, after surveying
me for a minute, to my great surprise, burst into a loud laugh, seized
my trembling hand, and, with one vigorous effort, pulled me out of my
imprisonment. After dragging me, helpless as I was, into the house, and
placing me in a chair by the fire-side, he thrust a mug of cider and
brandy into my hand, chuckling out, “Why, zooks! chap, how vrighted thee
looks!--drink!” Here was a change!
By degrees I summoned up courage: the miller made me drink stoutly of
his good liquor; and, more than once, seized the dung-fork, and placing
himself in a threatening attitude, thrust the points of it close to my
breast, in order to make me look frightened again, and amuse him. I was
twenty times on the point of revealing the whole affair, but a single
look of Ruth's eloquent eye froze the words on my lips.
After an hour's laughter, interrupted only by gaspings for breath, and
frequent applications to the jug, my old host gave me a broad hint to
depart; and after civilly opening the door, and wishing me a hearty good
night, gave me a most grievous kick, that sent me galloping down the
hill, and betook himself to laughing as heartily as before. I never
courted young Ruth of the mill again.
My next love was the pale, down-looking, modest Ally Budd, the niece
of that boisterous old harridan, Hester Caddlefurrow; whose name was a
hushing-word to the crying urchins for many miles around; they feared
her more than Raw-head-and-bloody-bones, the wide-mouthed Bogle, or even
the great Bullyboo himself. The lads of the village generally preferred
the more hale and ruddy wenches in the vicinity; Ally was not roystering
enough for them; she had no capacity to feel and enjoy their rude
merriment, or rough frolics; and few suitors doffed the cap of courtship
at old Hetty Caddlefurrow's threshold. But Ally was, indeed, a beauty.
Her youthful companions and neighbours saw nothing extraordinary in her
calm, dove-like eye; but to me, it looked like the surface of a smooth
lake, in the still moonlight, with a delicious heaven of love smiling in
its blue depths. I met her several times, at a distance from her home,
and made her acquainted with my growing passion; but she always chilled
my ardour by a ceremonious reference to her austere and masculine aunt.
I laid these evasive receptions of my proffered affection to the credit
of her modesty, and loved her the better for them. I used to hover about
on the tops of the hills which overlooked her abode, watching for the
moment when my young dove would glide forth from the thatched cot, that
nestled among the trees beneath me, with a feverish anxiety that I never
felt on any other occasion in my life. She neither seemed to shun or
court my company; but came forth, smiling, and fearless of evil, like
the white star of the evening, in the soft summer's gloaming. The
presence of other women, with whom I have been in love, has usually
thrown me into a turbulent fever; but Ally Budd's pale, beautiful face,
soft eyes, and gentle voice, had a calm and soothing influence on my
spirit Her words fell like oil, even on the stormy tide of her aunt's
rough passions; whose ire she could quell at will, and oftentimes
saved the offending clowns in the old woman's employ from an elaborate
cuffing. In this exercise, Hester was said to excel any man in the
parish: she had a violent predilection for thwacking, or, to use her
own expression, lecturing, her domestics for every trivial offence; and
nothing but the high wages which she gave, induced the rustic labourers
to remain in her service. I was one evening sauntering round the
summit of the hill which immediately looked down upon Hester's house,
occasionally stealing a glance from the pathway into the wood towards
the rich glories of the declining sun, when a rude hand clutched me by
the collar behind, and, in a moment, pulled me backwards into an immense
wheelbarrow. The gigantic villain who had performed this daring
feat, directly placed himself between the handles of the vehicle,
and vigorously trundled it down the hill. I was seated, or rather,
self-wedged in the barrow, with my legs painfully dangling over the rim,
on each side of the wheel: the velocity, with which we descended the
steep and rugged declivity, deprived me of all power; the fellow panted
and laughed, pushing on with increased vigour, until we came in sight of
the wide-gaping door of old Hester's kitchen. His fellow-labourers, who
were seated at the porch, immediately rose at the sight of our novel
equipage.--Confound the rascal! he was a most experienced ploughman, and
deemed this a fair opportunity of shewing his great rectilinear skill,
and obtaining the applause of his fellows, by driving me at full speed
through the door-way of the house. It stood exactly at the foot of the
steepest part of the hill; and, from the tremendous rate at which we
travelled, the downfall of the whole edifice seemed inevitable! My
senses, which had partially taken leave of me in the course of
the descent, returned just as we arrived within a few yards of our
destination; I uttered one shriek, desperately closed my eyes, and gave
myself up for a buried man.
The next moment I found my body, safe and unhurt, on the hearth of
Dame Caddlefurrow's kitchen. There was the dame, seated in her bee-hive
chair, staring with surprise, impatience, and anger, at my worship in
the barrow. As soon as the clown recovered his lost breath, he proceeded
to an explanation of the cause of his introducing such an unsightly and
unknown personage as me to her goodly presence. “I ha; zeed the chap,”
quoth he, elevating the handles of his wheelbarrow to the top of his
shoulders, so as to afford the dame a full view of my person; “I ha'
zeed the chap scaures and scaures o' times, skulking about the hill,
always and vor ever just about night-vall, when 1 do goa a-voddering the
beasts; zo, thinks I, thic jockey bean't loitering about here zo often
wi' any good plan in his noddle: moorauver, I ha' zeed un, coming athirt
the vields ov a night, just avore harvest, treading down whole zheaves
o' wheat at a voot-vall:--that nettled I more nor all; zo I looked out
vor un to-night, zlipped un into the dung-barry, walked un down the
hill-zide, and drove un through the ould porch ztraight as a vurrow:--zo
here a' is, and let un gi'e a'count ov hi'zelf.”
“Ay, let un give an account of himself,” said the sturdy dame; “Who
bee'st, 'oesbert?”--To say that I was at the point of dissolution, were
needless. I began to mutter a few incoherent sentences, when one of
the fellows at the door cried out, “He's Habby Bullwrinkle, the
devil's-bird, down in the village.”
“A lawyer!” shouted Mistress Caddlefurrow, in a tone that doomed me, in
perspective, to all the horrors of the horse-pond;--“Why, thou bloated
raven! thou--”
“Zober--zober, mother,” whispered a voice behind me; and a hand, at
the same time, quietly put the enraged widow back towards her bee-hive;
“bide a bit; only bide a bit; hearken to reason.” I extricated myself
from the barrow, and looked up to see who my protecting angel could
possibly be; it was no other than Skelpie. “This gentleman's my vreind,”
continued he, looking drolly towards me; “he and I be main vond o' one
another; I zeldom goes to chat wi' a lass, but what he is near at hand;
zo--d'ye mind?--he often come wi' I to the top of the hill, and bided
there, while I just stepped down to court little Ally vor an hour or
zo; that's all:--I left un there to-night. I axed the mopus to come in,
but he's modest, main modest, vor a chap of his years.” So saying, he
resumed his seat, and tendered me the cider-mug and a spare pipe in
such a friendly and unsuspicious manner, that told me all was right in
a moment. The clowns retired, and the old dame looked on me as kindly
as her features would permit, under the impression that I was the chosen
friend of her niece's intended husband; for such, I soon discovered,
Skelpie was by her considered!--As soon as the storm in my veins had
somewhat abated, I looked around for the mild goddess of my idolatry,
the lady-like, modest, soft, silver-eyed Ally Budd.
She was drooping in a dark corner, with a check apron thrown over her
folded arms, and snoring audibly!
I could not bear to think of the heartless creature for a year after;
of course I never hovered over the abode of Dame Caddlefurrow again.
Skelpie soon deserted the cold lass for another love; and, after being
obliged to dance in her stocking-vamps, according to the custom of the
country, at the marriages of her two younger sisters, Ally was wedded
to an unlucky miser,--the most miserable character under the sun. But
to resume:--after lighting my pipe, I sat for some minutes absorbed
in reflections on my late adventure. I did not like Skelpie a whit the
better for having shielded me from the wrath of the boisterous widow; a
blow from his hand would have been much more acceptable than a favour: I
imagined that he was rioting on the idea of having vexed me, by his act
of apparent good-nature and kindness; and I construed his silence very
much in favour of this vagary of my heated imagination. Presently I
heard a noise behind old mother Caddlefurrow's chair, which resembled
the faint and irregular chuckling of a woman's half-stifled laugh; and,
anon, a tuft of hair, dark as the raven's wing, topped by a pheasant's
plume, gleamed over the head of the chair; a white brow, and a pair of
laughing black eyes, brim full of tears, followed; and in a few minutes,
Kate Skelpie, the wicked, mischievous sister of my deliverer, tumbled
out of the recess, which the dame's chair had effectually shaded. She
was a round, dumpy lass, full of tricks as a frolicsome colt, with an
impertinent cocked nose, and a pair of lips, that were continually in
waggish and most alluring motion. I had seen her before at a farmer's
merry-making, when she picked me out for a partner, and, notwithstanding
my obesity, obliged me to dance down six-and-thirty couple of giggling
girls, and roaring men;--keeping up, all the time, as grave a face as
ever sat on the shoulders of an undertaker. I pitched and leaped about
like a gambolling rhinoceros, to the infinite diversion of the company,
and my own solitary grief and dismay. Kate and I were the only persons
in the room who looked at all solid. I felt an inkling of affection for
the lass, even then,--why, I know not; and the continual crossings I
received from Skelpie, determined me to make love under his own roof,
where I should, most probably, be sure of peace and quietness in my
trysting; as Skelpie usually past the love time of the nights, about
at the abodes of the different village toasts. Here was a glorious
opportunity of improving my acquaintance with the twinkling-eyed Kate!
She was not such a poetical-looking creature as the snoring Ally Budd,
nor so tall and comely as the false daughter of Grobstock; nevertheless,
Kate Skelpie was a jocund, pretty, and captivating young lass. I courted
her, and prospered.
She had no meddling parents to interfere with us; and Skelpie was, of
course, absent from home five nights in the week. Many were the pranks
which the dear jade played me; but I did not care;--they kept my flame
alive, and her occasional kind looks and unsolicited salutes convinced
me that I held a place in her heart. In the meantime, however, I carried
on the war in another quarter. I had two nights in the week to spare,
and these I spent at a farm-house about a mile from the village, with a
slender young maiden, named Amaranth Saffem.
One Saturday evening, Skelpie overtook me as I was journeying towards
Amaranth's dwelling. He accosted me civilly; and having some serious
notions about his sister, I did not scruple to enter into conversation
with him. He had not crossed me for above a month; and Kate had informed
me, the night before, “that she should have a good bit of gold, if the
old chap at the Lands' End would but take it into his head just to die a
bit:” these were good reasons for my civility, and we discoursed on the
most fashionable village topics with great urbanity and mildness. At
length, however, we arrived at Amaranth's door; and then, for the first
time, the truth flashed upon each of our minds. We were both evidently
bent on a love-visit to the fair Saffern. Skelpie looked rather hurt,
methought, and could not help _heaving_ a short sigh. However, we both
went in, and found Amaranth alone. It was market-day; and her crippled
grandfather, with whom she dwelt, as we both well knew, was gone to, and
in all probability would remain at, the next market-town until a late
hour, according to his usual custom; otherwise, we should almost as soon
have ventured into a tiger's den, to despoil the animal of a whelp, as
pay a love-visit to the old man's granddaughter. The miller was a lamb,
compared with dame Caddlefurrow; and that lady a dove in deportment, to
old Jagger Saffern. But more of him anon.
Amaranth, it was plain, favoured me rather than Skelpie. Without vanity
be it spoken, I was, at that time, barring my obesity, which rendered me
somewhat unsightly in the eyes of the lean, rather a personable man, and
not quite forty. I was by no means particularly solicitous to gain the
young Saffem's affections, yet she clung to me in preference to Skelpie,
who did all in his power to please her. He was evidently in love, and
for the first time in his life, felt the pangs of jealousy in his
heart. I was his successful rival!--I, even I, Habakkuk Bullwrinkle, the
devil's bird, whom he had so long despised, had succeeded in warping the
affections of his Amaranth!--He bit his lip, loured and smiled by fits,
and, in vain endeavoured to conceal the state of his heart. Amaranth
seemed to rejoice in his torments; she had always been tolerably liberal
in her tokens of affection, but, on this occasion, she almost exceeded
the bounds of probability. I did not much like it at last; for I began
to think she was making a fool of me. We went on in this way for above
an hour, when the old cripple's poney suddenly clattered into the
court-yard. Skelpie started on his legs in evident alarm. There was no
way of escape, but through a back door into a little yard, which was
surrounded by a villanous high wall, so smooth, and well-built too, as
to defy even Skelpie's clambering capabilities.
We had not been a moment outside the door, before the cripple entered
the house. Skelpie was endeavouring with all his might to get over the
wall: he clung like a cat to the bare bricks; but, before he had well
reached half-way up, his foot slipped, and down he came. I was standing
disconsolately underneath him; he fell so suddenly, that I had not time
to get out of the way, and Skelpie's ponderous and hard skull struck me
full in the pit of my stomach, and sent me staggering against the back
door, which naturally gave way with the shock, and I was precipitated,
on the broad of my back, in the very middle of the floor. Luckily,
I came in contact with the table on which the candle stood, and
extinguished the light in my fall. The embers were dying on the hearth,
and Skelpie had hauled me by the legs, back into the yard, before the
cripple (who waited to reach his loaded blunderbuss before he looked
round) could catch more than a vague glimpse of my form and features.
The door swung inward, and Skelpie easily held it fast enough to prevent
the cripple from pulling it open;--at the same time carefully screening
his body behind the wall of the house, from the cripple's bullets, which
we expected to hear rattling through the door every moment. He growled
like an incensed bear, and muttered curses by wholesale on poor
Amaranth, whom we heard whining most piteously. At length, he seemed to
take a sudden resolution, chuckled audibly, and proceeded to barricade
the door with all the furniture in the room. Here was an end to all
our hopes of enfranchisement and safety. But, oh! dear me! what were
my feelings, when I heard the cripple hobbling up stairs, and trying
to open a little window which commanded the yard! We were in a sad
situation; our only choice of avoiding the lynx eyes of Jagger was by
getting into two water-butts, which stood in the yard. The windows of
the house looked into every corner, so that we could not possibly hope
to conceal ourselves behind them. In we went together, but my ill luck
still attended me; Skelpie crouched comfortably in the belly of a dry
butt, but the one, into which I floundered, was half full of water. The
chilling liquid rose to within a foot and a half of the brim, the moment
I got in, so that it was impossible for me to crouch, being actually
standing on tip-toe, neck high in water! It was a bleak night, but my
fever saved my life.
The cripple's blunderbuss, of unprecedented calibre, was thrust out of
the window, before I could well moderate my quick breathing. He looked
into every corner of the yard, but, happily, did not perceive my
miserable sconce, which was floating in the water-butt, immediately
beneath him. He descended in a few minutes, and removed the furniture
from the door, searched all round the yard, and, at length, discovering
the marks of Skelpie's shoes in the wall, concluded that we had escaped,
and went grumbling to bed. It was a long time before I would suffer
Skelpie to help me out of my hiding-place: he effected the job with
infinite difficulty, and led me, dripping like a watering-pot, through
the house.
About a week after this adventure, I discovered that Kate and Amaranth,
who were once bosom friends, had quarrelled about me, and were now as
spiteful to each other as possible. They met, one evening, at old Hetty
Caddlefurrow's, and, on comparing notes, found that I was playing
a double game. Ally Budd was present, but she said nothing. After
lavishing the usual abusive epithets on me, they began to look coldly
upon each other: from cool looks, they proceeded to vituperative
insinuations; and, before they parted, naturally came to an open
rupture. Occasionally, I suffered a little from their pouting and
touting; but, in the main, I was happy enough between them. Each tried
all her arts to win me from her rival they sometimes met, grew great
friends, vowed they would both turn their backs upon me for ever,
kissed, cried, quarrelled again, and grew more rancorous to each other
and loving to me, than before. Skelpie became an altered man. Amaranth
flouted him, abused his sister to his face, and caressed me in his
presence;--although, I believe, the hussy, if she knew her own heart,
loved the fellow all the time. Skelpie dressed smartly, discontinued
his visits to all other girls, neglected his games, and even his daily
occupations, to court Amaranth. He won the heart of the old cripple
Saffern; but the lass still turned a deaf ear to his vows:--she
was trying to vex Kate Skelpie. I was completely happy; I felt--but
wherefore should I dwell on this love contest?--Skelpie is looking over
my shoulder, and does not seem to relish the protracted detail. Suffice
it to say then, that the banns of marriage were at length published,
between Habakkuk Bull wrinkle, gentleman, and Kate Skelpie,
spinster;--that we were united in due season;--and that Skelpie, a short
time afterwards, obtained the hand of Amaranth. The angry passions of
the girls soon subsided, and they loved each other better than ever.
Skelpie became my bosom friend; I prospered in business; and the two
families have lived together for above twenty years, in concord and
happiness. The roses have faded in Amaranth's cheek, and the fire of
Kate's eye is somewhat quenched; but the relation of my own mishaps,
Skelpie's adventures, and our strange courtships, never fails to draw
back the youthful smiles of hilarity in both their matronly faces.
Heaven bless them!
[Illustration: 183]
*****
[Illustration: 184]
SECOND COURSE: THE NEIGHBOURS OF AN OLD IRISH BOY.
INTRODUCTION.
A one-armed naval Lieutenant, on half-pay, who was distantly related
to my mother's family, had the good fortune to be presented, in his
declining years, with a little cottage and a small portion of land
situate in a village on the coast of Ireland, by one of his wealthy
nephews, to whom it was unexpectedly devised by a maiden grand-aunt, who
had never seen him above once in his life. I accompanied the Lieutenant,
from Waterford, for no other reason than because I had nothing, either
better or worse, to do, when he went to take possession of his nephew's
gift; and to pay a visit, after a separation of some years, to his
old shipmate--the friend of his youth, and the companion of his
manhood--Jimmy Fitzgerald,--better known by the appellation of the Old
Irish Boy, who dwelt in a mud cabin on the skirts of the village: the
history of whose neighbours is given in the ensuing pages, as nearly as
possible in the same terms as he narrated it to my worthy relative,
the one-armed Lieutenant, and myself, in the course of the two or three
first evenings which we passed in his company.
JIMMY FITZGERALD.
Jimmy Fitzgerald and the old Lieutenant had both entered the navy in
equally humble situations, at an early age: the friends of the latter,
eventually, procured his advancement; but Fitzgerald, whose relations
were poor, never had the luck to be rated on any ship's books in a
higher station than that of an able seaman. The difference of rank
had not the effect of diminishing the respect and affection which the
Lieutenant and Fitzgerald bore towards each other: in their manhood they
were upon as familiar terms, so far as naval etiquette would permit, as
when in their boyhood they had been equals. The Lieutenant had saved
his friend's life, at the risk of his own, in the Mediterranean; and,
to judge from appearances, he was, if possible, more partial to Jimmy
Fitzgerald than the Old Irish Boy was to him. The preserver frequently
is found to display more affection towards the preserved, than the
preserved either exhibits or feels towards his preserver.