PORLOCK BAY.
High-water in Porlock Bay. The tide upon the turn--sand-pipers, great
and small, dipping, nodding, stalking to and fro, or flitting along its
margin waiting for the ebb; a gull riding smoothly outside on an
untroubled surface, calm as the soft sky overhead, that smiled lovingly
down on the Severn Sea. Landward, a strip of green and level meadows,
fringed by luxuriant woodlands, fair with the gorgeous hues of summer;
stalwart oak, towering elm, spreading walnut, stately Spanish chestnut,
hardy mountain ash, and scattered high on the steep, above dotted thorns
and spreading hazels, outposts, as it were, of delicate feathering
birches, to guard the borders of the forest and the waste; fairyland
brought here to upper earth, with all its changing phases, and variety
of splendour. The wild-bird from her nest in Horner Woods needed but a
dozen strokes of her wing to reach the open moorland that stretched and
widened ridge by ridge, and shoulder by shoulder, till its rich carpet
of heather was lost in the warm haze that came down on Dunkerry Beacon,
like a veil from the sky.
Far away towards Devon lay a land of freedom and solitude, haunt of the
bittern and the red deer, intersected by many a silent coombe and
brawling river, to expand at last on the purple slopes of Brendon, or
the wet grassy plains of Exmoor. Travelling over that interminable
distance, the sense of sight could not but weary for very gladness, and
turned well pleased to rest itself on the white cliffs of the Welsh
coast opposite, and the faint blue of the intervening waters, calm and
still, like the eyes of a girl, whose being has never yet been stirred
into passion by the storm.
Above, below, around, Porlock Bay was decked in her fairest garb. Earth,
air, and water seemed holding jubilee; but the loveliest object in
earth, air, or water was a maiden seated on a point of rock, washed by
the drowsy lap and murmur of the tide, who seemed pondering deeply yet
in simple happy thought--a maiden of comely features and gracious
presence, the sweetest lass from Bossington Point to Bideford Bay,
nimble with needle, tongue and finger, courteous, quick-witted, brave,
tender-hearted, the light of a household, the darling of a hamlet, the
toast of three counties,--and her name was Nelly Carew.
She had sat the best part of an hour without moving from her place,
therefore she could not be waiting for an expected arrival. She swung
her straw hat backwards and forwards by its broad blue ribbon, with the
regularity of a pendulum; therefore her meditations could have been of
no agitating kind, and she looked straight into the horizon, neither
upward like those who live in the future, nor downwards like those who
ponder on the past. Nevertheless, her reflections must have been of an
engrossing nature, for she started at a man's footstep on the shingle,
and the healthy colour mantled in her cheek, while she rose and put out
her hand to be grasped in that of a square-shouldered, rough-looking
personage, whose greeting, though perfectly respectful, seemed more
cordial than polite.
"Good even, Mistress Nelly," said the new comer, in a deep sonorous
voice; "and a penny for your thoughts, if I may be so bold; for thinking
you were, my pretty lass, I'll wager a bodkin, of something very nigh
your heart."
She turned her blue eyes--and Nelly Carew's blue eyes made fools of the
opposite sex at short notice--full in the speaker's face.
"Indeed, Parson," she answered, "you never spoke a truer word in the
pulpit, nor out of it. I've turned it over in my mind till I'm dazed
with thinking, and I can't get her to sit, do what I will."
"Sit!" exclaimed the other. "Where and how?"
"Why, the speckled hen to be sure!" answered Nelly, rather impatiently.
"If she addles all these as she addled the last hatch, I'll forswear
keeping fowls, that I will--it puts me past my patience. How do you
contrive with yours, Mr. Gale? though to be sure, if I was a parson,
like you, I wouldn't keep game-cocks. I couldn't have the heart to see
the poor things fight!"
Parson Gale made no attempt to justify this secular amusement. He was
one of those ecclesiastics, too common a hundred years ago, who looked
upon his preferment and his parish as a layman of the present day looks
on a sporting manor and a hunting-box. Burly, middle-aged, and athletic,
there were few men between Bodmin and Barnstaple who could vie with the
parson in tying a fly, setting a trimmer, tailing an otter, handling a
game-cock, using fists and cudgel, wrestling a fall, and on occasion
emptying a gallon of cider or a jack of double ale. Nay, he knew how to
harbour a stag, and ride the moor after him when the pack were laid on,
with the keenest sportsman of the West, and if to these accomplishments
are added no little skill in cattle doctoring, and some practical
knowledge of natural history, it is not to be supposed that the Reverend
Abner Gale found much leisure for those classical and theological
studies, to which he had never shown the slightest inclination.
"It is but their nature," said the Parson, reverting to the game-cocks,
of which he owned a choice and undefeated breed. "It comes as natural
for them to fight, as for me to drink when I'm dry, or for your old
grandfather to sit and nod over the fire. Or for yourself, Mistress
Nelly,"--here the parson hesitated and tapped his heavy riding boots
with his heavier whip,--"to bloom here in the fresh air of the Channel,
like a rose in a bow-pot. There's a many would fain gather the rose,
only they dursn't ask for fear of being denied."
The latter part of the sentence was spoken low enough for Nelly, even if
she heard it, to ignore.
"And what brought you here this afternoon?" she inquired in her frankest
tones. "It's a long ride across the moor, Parson, even for _you_, and
not much of a place when you get to it. If it had been Bridgewater now,
or Barnstaple, sure you would have seen a score of neighbours, men and
women, to tell you the news, and wind up the night with a junket or may
be a dance. But here," and Nelly burst into a merry laugh, "our only
news is that the speckled hen seems as obstinate as a mule, and Farmer
Veal brought a roan nag horse home this morning from Exeter. I daresay
you've seen it already. As to dancing, if you must needs dance, Parson
Gale, it will have to be with grandfather or me!"
"And I'd dance all night with both," he answered, "to be sure of a kind
word from one of them in the morning. Do you really care to know what
brought me here to-day, Mistress Nelly, and will you promise not to be
hard on me if I tell you the truth?"
There was something ludicrous in the contrast of his rough exterior and
timid manner while he spoke. He was a thick, square-made man, built for
strength rather than activity, with a coarse though comely face, bearing
the traces of a hard out-of-door life, not without occasional excesses
in feasting and conviviality. His short grizzled hair made him look more
than his age, but in spite of his clumsy figure, there was a lightness
in his step, an activity in his gestures, such as seldom outlasts the
turning point of forty. He was dressed in a full-skirted riding coat, an
ample waistcoat that had once been black, soiled leather breeches, and
rusty boots, garnished with a pair of well-cleaned spurs. Even on foot
and up to his ankles in shingle, the man looked like a good rider, and a
daring resolute fellow in all matters of bodily effort or peril, not
without a certain reckless good humour that often accompanies laxity of
principle and habits of self-indulgence. Many women would have seen
something attractive even now in his burly strength and manly bearing;
would have thought it worth while, perhaps, to wean him from his
game-cocks and his boon companions, to tempt him back into the paths of
sobriety, good government, and moderation. Among such reformers he would
fain have counted Nelly Carew.
"You must tell it me in the house then," said she, rising hastily, and
looking up at the sky, as if in dread of a coming shower. "It's time I
was back with grandfather to give him his posset--I left it simmering on
the hob more than an hour ago. Poor grandfather! He never complains, but
I fear he frets if I keep away from him long. It must be dull for him
sure, after the life he led once, dukes and princes and counts of the
empire and what not--why, his very snuff-box belonged to Prince Eugene;
and now he has nobody to speak to but me! Come in, Mr. Gale, and
welcome; it will freshen him up a bit to see a new face, for I think he
seems poorly this morning; you may walk straight into the parlour; you
know your way well enough--while I go and look after supper. You'll eat
a morsel with us, won't you, before your ride across the moor?"
Thus staving off any further explanation of the parson's hints, Nelly
Carew led the way to the pretty and commodious cottage she called her
home, stopping at the door to prune a broken twig from the myrtle that
flourished by the porch as luxuriously as though North Devon were the
South of France. Parson Gale, noting the trim garden, the well-ordered
flower-beds, the newly-thatched roof, and general air of cleanliness and
decency that pervaded the establishment, could not repress a strong
desire to own the treasure thus comfortably bestowed. There was the
casket. Would he ever succeed in carrying off its jewel to make the
light of his own hearth the ornament on his own breast?
It seemed but yesterday she came here a smiling little lass of nine or
ten, the darling of that worn-out soldier, whose life had commenced so
eventfully, to dribble out its remaining sands in so quiet and obscure a
retreat. Of old Carew's history he only knew thus much, that the veteran
had passed a wild unbridled youth, a stormy and reckless manhood; that
he had been tried for rebellion in '15, and risked his head, already
grey, once more in '45, escaping imprisonment and even death on both
occasions by the interposition of powerful friends and in consideration
of his services on the Continent during the war. Even John, Duke of
Marlborough, spoke out for the man he had seen at Malplaquet, holding
his own with a pike against three of the Black Musketeers, and who
carried his weapon in a cool salute to his commander the instant he had
beaten them off. But Carew never prospered, despite his dauntless
courage and undoubted military skill. Now some fatal duel, now some wild
outrage on discipline and propriety brought him into disgrace with the
authorities, and men who were unborn when he first smelt powder,
commanded regiments and brigades, while he remained a simple lieutenant,
with a slender income, a handsome person, and a reputation for daring
alone.
Such characters marry hastily and improvidently. Carew's wife died when
her first child was born, a handsome little rogue, who grew to man's
estate the very counterpart in person and disposition of his graceless
sire. He, too, married early and in defiance of prudential
considerations, gambled, drank, quarrelled with his father, and lost his
life in a duel before they had made friends. Old Carew's hair turned
grey, and his proud form began to stoop soon after his son's death, for
he loved the boy dearly, none the less perhaps because of those very
qualities he thought it right to reprove. Then he took the widow and her
little girl to live with him at a small freehold he inherited near
Porlock; but young Mistress Carew did not long survive her husband, and
the old man found himself at threescore years and ten the sole companion
of a demure little damsel not yet in her teens, whose every look, word,
and gesture reminded him cruelly of the son he had loved and lost.
These two became inseparable. The child's mother had imparted to her a
few simple accomplishments--needlework, house-keeping, a little singing,
a little music, the French language--as she had herself acquired it in a
convent abroad; above all, those womanly ways that not one woman in ten
really possesses, and that make the charm of what is called society no
less than the happiness of home.
Little Nelly was still in her black frock when, taking a Sunday walk
hand-in-hand with her grandfather, she looked up in his face, and thus
accosted him:--
"When I'm big," said she, "I'll have a little girl of my own. I shall
take her out-a-walking, and be kind to her, as you are to me. You won't
like her better than me, grandfather, will you?"
"You may be sure of that, Nelly," was his answer, while he marvelled how
this blue-eyed mite had come to be dearer to him than all his loves and
memories of the past; wishing he could have shaped his whole life
differently for her sake.
"I shall always be your little girl, grandfather," continued Nelly; "I
couldn't do without _you_, and you couldn't do without _me_, so you need
not be afraid of my ever going away to leave you--I promise--there!"
"But, if you marry, Nelly?" said he, laughing, for to his little maid
this affirmation was the most solemn form of oath.
"I shall _never_ marry," answered Nelly, with exceeding decision, "no
more shall my little girl."
And now it seemed the old warrior's turn to be dependent on the grown
woman he had loved and cherished in her childhood. It was true enough
that he fretted and pined for her if she stayed many hours out of his
sight. It was pitiable to mark how, day by day, the intellect failed in
proportion as the goodly form dwindled to decay. The old oak that had
reared its branches so sturdily was bowed and sapless now. The soldier
of Oudenarde and Malplaquet, who had sat at table with Marlborough and
Prince Eugene, was fit for little more than to doze in an easy-chair,
longing for his grandchild's home-coming, and nodding, as Parson Gale
said, feebly over the fire.
Even that worthy felt struck with something of awe and apprehension
while he looked on the wasted limbs that he had heard quoted by old
neighbours for their strength, and reflected that the time was coming
when he too would no longer be able to sit a horse or wrestle a fall.
What had he to look forward to? What resources against that day of
debility and stagnation, unless, indeed, he could prevail in his suit
with Nelly Carew? Therefore did Parson Gale exert all his powers of
conversation, hoping to render himself agreeable to the girl as she
passed in and out, furthering the preparations for their simple meal. He
drew on his memory, his mother-wit, and his invention for subjects that
might be interesting to both his companions. For old Carew he detailed
at great length the particulars of a wrestling-match, and subsequent
drinking bout, at both of which he had lately assisted in his own
parish; while to Nelly he expatiated on the convenience of his kitchen,
the coolness of his larder, the luxuries of his best parlour in the
parsonage at home; but, in spite of all his efforts, he experienced a
dim sense of failure and depression. Notwithstanding his calling, the
man was superstitious rather than religious; and when he rose to take
leave, could not forbear expressing a conviction that some great
misfortune must be impending on him or his.
"I've heard tell of men feeling just like me," said he, holding Nelly's
hand rather longer than good breeding required, "and being found next
morning stark dead on the moor. There was a woman up at my place only
last Martinmas, and she says, 'Parson,' says she, 'there's something
coming to me that's past praying for; I know as well as if I saw it. I'm
that down-hearted I don't seem to fill my bodice, and there's a din in
both my ears like the waves of a flood-tide, so as I can't scarce hear
myself speak.' It wasn't a month before her only brother got drowned off
the Lizard, and will you tell me now, Mistress Nelly, as you did once
before, that such warnings are but idle fancies and old women's fables?
I'm down-hearted too; I'm not ashamed to say so. And when it's fallen on
me, whatever it is, I should like to know who will care a pinch of snuff
what's gone with wild Abner Gale?"
"I wouldn't speak so, if I were you," answered the girl, who, having
disengaged her hand, was now standing at the cottage door to see him
mount for his homeward ride across the moor. "There are plenty of all
sorts to welcome you when you come, and wish you 'good-speed' when you
go away--you that have so many friends."
"Friends!" repeated the Parson, turning his mare's head homewards, with
a bitter smile. "The church wouldn't hold my acquaintance, but the
pulpit is large enough for my _friends_!"