appeared among the attendants of Gunther, in the character of a
subordinate vassal. Having thus arranged matters, they set out for
the far island of the sea. And here, as in many other passages, it is
noticeable with what a childlike, almost girlish delight, the old bard
expatiates on the gay dress of his mighty men. He evidently did not
live in an age when a Napoleon would have sought to make an impression
on the vulgar by "wearing the plain dress of the Institute;" nor has
he the slightest conception of the soul of poetry beating in a breast
of which the exterior vesture is the "hodden grey," or the plain plaid
of our Scotch Muse. We shall quote this one passage to serve for many
similar, with which the poem is studded:--
"So with kind dismissal away the warriors strode;
Then quick the fair queen summon'd, from bow'rs where they abode,
Thirty maids, her brother's purpose to fulfil,
Who in works of the needle were the chief for craft and skill.
Silks from far Arabia, white as driven snow,
And others from Zazamanc, green as grass doth grow,
They deck'd with stones full precious; Kriemhild the garments plann'd
And cut them to just measure, with her own lily hand.
Of the hides of foreign fishes were linings finely wrought,
Such then were seen but rarely, and choice and precious thought,
Fine silk was sewn above them, to suit the wearers well,
Now of the rich apparel hear we fresh marvels tell.
From the land of Morocco and from the Libyan coast,
The best silk and the finest is worn and valued most
By kin of mightiest princes; of such had they good store:
Well Kriemhild show'd the favour that she the wearers bore.
E'er since the chiefs were purposed the martial queen to win,
In their sight was precious the goodly ermelin.
With coal-black spots besprinkled on whiter ground than snow,
E'en now the pride of warriors at every festal show.
Many a stone full precious gleam'd from Arabian gold;
That the women were not idle, scarcely need be told.
Within seven weeks, now ready was the vesture bright,
Ready too the weapons of each death-daring knight."
With the arrival of the kingly travellers, and their reception at
Iceland, we cannot afford to detain ourselves. Suffice it to say, that,
by the aid of the secret invisible cloak (_Tarnkappe_) of Siegfried,
and his good sword Balmung, Gunther is greeted by the vanquished
Brunhild as her legitimate lord and master; and sails back with him to
Worms, where she is most hospitably and magnificently received by her
mother-in-law, dame Uta, and her now sister, the lovely Kriemhild. A
double marriage then takes place; that of King Gunther with Brunhild,
and that of Siegfried with Kriemhild; and the festivities which then
took place furnish the poet with another opportunity for exercising his
descriptive powers, and displaying the sunny joyousness of his social
nature. Herein, as in many other points, he is quite Homeric; a certain
magnificence and amplitude in the common acts of eating and drinking
being as essential to his idea of poetry as the luxuriant energy of
more lofty functions. But in the midst of this connubial hilarity, the
black spot of destiny begins perceptibly to enlarge into a threatening
cloud; and the stately Brunhild begins to show herself as possessed by
that pride which the wise man tells us was not made for man, and which,
wherever it is harboured, is not long of banishing love, confidence,
peace, and happiness from palace as from cabin. The haughty spouse of
Gunther looks with an evil eye at Siegfried, whom she had known only in
his assumed character as vassal of her husband, judging it an affront
that her sister-in-law should be given away to a mere vassal. The
respect with which the hero of Netherland is treated by her husband,
and the whole court, she cannot and will not understand. Either he is
a vassal, and then her pride is justly offended at the unequal match;
or he is not, and then Gunther had deceived her with regard to the true
character of his companion--and there must be some mystery beneath
this, which, as a true daughter of Eve, she can have no rest till she
unveils. Possessed by these feelings, she takes a course worthy of the
masculine character for which she had early been so notable. On the
marriage-night she resumes her old virgin obstinacy, and will not be
tamed:--
"'Sir knight,' said she, 'it suits not--you'd better leave me free
From all your present purpose--it must and shall not be.
A maid still will I keep me--(think well the matter o'er)
Till I am told that story.' This fretted Gunther sore."
Alas, poor Gunther! So has it ever fared with men who marry women with
beards. The embrace-less bride took a cord, which she wove strong and
tough about her wrist, and with that
"The feet and hands of Gunther she tied together all,
Then to a rail she bore him, and hung him 'gainst the wall,
And bade him not disturb her, nor breathe of love a breath;
Sure from the doughty damsel he all but met his death."
In this dilemma Siegfried with his invisible cloak was again called
in, and did strange service a second time in helping Gunther to
subjugate his refractory yoke-fellow. Brunhild then became tame, and,
like Samson, lost her wondrous strength; while Siegfried, as a sort
of memorial of this notable service, secretly abstracted and brought
with him a golden ring which the stately lady used to wear on her fine
finger, and likewise the girdle with which she had tied her lord; and
both these, in an evil hour, he gave to his wife--"a gift that mischief
wrought," as we shall presently see.
After these achievements, the horny hero retired home to the land of
his father Siegmund and his mother Siegelind; and after remaining ten
years with him, "the fair queen, his consort, bore him at last an
heir." All this time the haughty spirit of Brunhild was brooding over
the deep wrong.
"Why should the lady Kriemhild herself so proudly bear?
And yet her husband Siegfried, what but our man is he?
And late but little service has yielded for his fee."
And to clear up this matter, as well as for the sake of old kindness,
an invitation is sent by King Gunther to the heroine in Netherland,
which is accepted. Siegfried and Kriemhild, and the hoary-headed old
Siegmund, come with a great company to Worms, and are entertained
in the sumptuous fashion that, as before remarked, the material old
minstrel describes with so much zest.
"Sore toiled the chief cook, Rumolt; Oh! how his orders ran
Among his understrappers! how many a pot and pan,
How many a mighty caldron retched and rang again!
They dressed a world of dishes for all the expected train."
The high festal was kept for eleven days; but the loud merriment,
which so luxuriantly was bellowed forth to Siegfried's honour, failed
to deafen the evil whisper of pride and jealousy in the dark heart of
Brunhild.
"Then thought Queen Brunhild, 'Silent I'll no longer remain;
However to pass I bring it, Kriemhild shall explain
Wherefore so long her husband, who holds of us in fee,
Has left undone his service: this sure shall answered be.'
So still she brooded mischief, and conned her devil's lore,
Till she broke off in sorrow the feast so blythe before.
Ever at her heart lay closely what came perforce to light;
Many a land she startled with horror and affright."
The cloud thickens; and the first thunder-plump, prophetic of the
destined deluge, will immediately burst. Jealousy is a spider that
never wants flies. In the midst of the tilting and junketing, the two
queens--as queens, like other idle women, will sometimes do--began to
discourse on the merits of their respective husbands; in the course
of which conversation, the most natural thing in the world was that
Brunhild should proclaim her old cherished belief that Siegfried, as a
mere dependent vassal, could never be put into comparison with Gunther,
who was his king and superior. On this, Kriemhild, whose gentleness,
where the honour of her lord was concerned, fired into lionhood, gave
the retort with a spirit more worthy of Brunhild than herself. She
said that, to prove her equality with the wife of Gunther, she would
walk into the cathedral publicly before her; and she did so. This was
bad enough; but, following the inspiration of her womanly wrath once
roused, she divulged the fatal fact of her possession of Brunhild's
ring and girdle--expressing, at the same time, plainly her belief that
her husband Siegfried could not have come by these tokens in any way
consistent with the honour of the original possessor. Here now was a
breach between the two queens, that no human art could heal. In vain
was Siegfried appealed to by Gunther, to testify to the chastity of
Brunhild.
"'Women must be instructed,' said Siegfried the good knight,
'To leave off idle talking, and rule their tongues aright.
Keep thy fair wife in order, I'll do by mine the same;
Such overweening folly puts me indeed to shame.'"
"Hasty words have often sundered fair dames before."
The haughty princess of Iceland now perceives that she had from the
beginning been practised upon by Gunther, and that Siegfried had
performed the principal part in the plot. Against him, therefore, she
vows revenge; and, in order to accomplish his purpose, takes into her
counsels HAGAN chief of Trony, one of the most prominent characters in
the poem, and who in fact may be looked on as the hero of the second
part, after Siegfried has disappeared from the scene. This Hagan is a
person of gigantic energy and great experience, but utterly destitute
of gentleness and tenderness; all his aims are selfish, and a cold
calculating policy is his highest wisdom. Conscience he seems to have
none; and, except for a purpose, will scarcely trouble himself to
conceal his perpetration of the foulest crimes. He has the aspect of
Napoleon--as he is painted by the graphic pencil of Emerson. Like
Napoleon, he never hesitates to use falsehood to effect his ends.
Pretending extraordinary friendship for Kriemhild, he worms from
her the secret of her husband's invulnerability, or rather of his
vulnerability--like Achilles--on only one part of the body.
"Said she 'My husband's daring, and thereto stout of limb;
Of old, when on the mountain he slew the dragon grim,
In its blood he bathed him, and thence no more can feel
In his charmed person the deadly dint of steel.
Still am I ever anxious, whene'er in fight he stands,
And keen-edged darts are hailing from strong heroic bands,
Lest I by one should lose him, my own beloved mate--
Ah! how my heart is beating still for my Siegfried's fate.
So now I'll tell the secret, dear friend, alone to thee--
For thou, I doubt not, cousin, will keep thy faith with me--
Where sword may pierce my darling, and death sit on the thrust:
See, in thy truth and honour, how full, how firm my trust.
As from the dragon's death-wounds gushed out the crimson gore,
With the smoking torrent the warrior washed him o'er;
A leaf then 'twixt his shoulders fell from the linden bough--
There only steel can harm him; for that I tremble now.'"
Possessed of this secret, Hagan finds it easy to watch an opportunity
for despatching him. A hunting party is proposed; and when the hunters
are dispersed in the tangled wilds of the Wask (Vosges) forest, Hagan,
with Gunther, who was accessory, secretly draws Siegfried aside to
refresh himself, after hard sport, from the clear waters of a sylvan
well; and, while he is kneeling down, transfixes him between the
shoulders on the fatal spot with a spear. Then--
"His lively colour faded; a cloud came o'er his sight;
He could stand no longer; melted all his might;
In his paling visage the mark of death he bore:
Soon many a lovely lady sorrowed for him sore.
So the lord of Kriemhild among the flowerets fell;
From the wound fresh gushing his life's blood fast did well.
Then thus, amidst his tortures, even with his failing breath,
The false friends he upbraided who had contrived his death.
Thus spake the deadly wounded, 'Ay! cowards false as hell,
To you I still was faithful; I served you long and well;
But what boots all! for guerdon, treason and death I've won:
By your friends, vile traitors! foully have you done.
Whatever shall hereafter from your loins be born,
Shall take from such vile fathers a heritage of scorn.
On me you have wreaked malice where gratitude was due;
With shame shall you be banished by all good knights and true.'
With blood were all bedabbled the flowerets of the field,
Some time with death he struggled, as though he scorned to yield,
Even to the foe, whose weapon strikes down the loftiest head
At last, firm in the meadow, lay mighty Siegfried dead."
The death of Siegfried is the catastrophe of the first part of the
poem. Kriemhild laments the death of her peerless knight with a love
more than the love of common women, and which feeds itself on the
intense hatred of the murderer, and the inly-cherished expectation of
revenge. The hoary old Siegmund returns home in silent sorrow, for he
is too weak to offer resistance; and, to complete the matchless wrong,
the thorough-working, never-hesitating Hagan takes unjust possession
of "the Niebelungen treasure"--a famous hoard bestowed by Siegfried
on his wife--thus depriving the fair widow of the means of external
munificence, as he had formerly stopt her source of inward consolation.
Not avarice, but policy, was Hagan's motive for this, as for all his
crimes. He was never a villain without a reason.
"'A prudent man,' said Hagan, 'not for a single hour,
Would such a mass of treasure leave in a woman's power.
She'll hatch, with all this largess, to her outlandish crew,
Something that hereafter all Burgundy may rue.'"
A deep desire of revenge now takes possession of the once gentle mind
of Kriemhild; and all the milk of her affections is metamorphosed into
gall. The best things, it is proverbially said, when abused, become the
worst; and so the revenge of Kriemhild, revealed in the second part of
an essentially Christian poem, works out a catastrophe far more bloody
than the warlike wrath of the heathen Pelidan, or the well-calculated
retribution worked by the bow of the cunning Ulysses,--
"For Earth begets no monster dire
Than man's own heart more dreaded,
All-venturing woman's dreadful ire
When love to woe is wedded."
We have now finished a rapid outline of nineteen adventures of the
Niebelungen Lay; and there are thirty such divisions in the whole
poem. Our space forbids us to detail what follows with equal fullness;
but the extracts already given will have been sufficient to give the
reader a fair idea of the general character of the composition. A brief
summary of the progress of the story, till it ends in the sanguinary
retribution, may therefore content us.
For thirteen years after the death of Siegfried, Kriemhild remained
a widow. At the end of that period a knightly messenger, Sir Rudeger
of Bechelaren, came from Etzel, King of the Huns, requesting the
fair sister of King Gunther to supply the place of his queen, "Dame
Helca," lately deceased. Nursing silently the religion of sorrow,
the widow at first refused steadfastly to give ear to any message of
this description; Hagan also, with his dark far-seeing wisdom, gave
his decided negative to the proposal, knowing well that, beneath the
calm exterior of time-hallowed grief, the high-hearted queen, never
forgetting by whose hand her dear lord had fallen, still nursed the
sleepless appetite for revenge. The brothers of the king, however, his
other counsellors, and Dame Uta, urged the acceptance of the proposal,
with the hope thereby, no doubt, of compensating in some degree to the
royal widow for the injury at whose infliction they had connived. But
all this moved not Kriemhild; only the distinct pledge given by Rudeger
that he would help her, when once the sharer of King Etzel's throne, to
avenge herself of all her enemies, at length prevailed. She married a
second husband mainly to acquire the means of avenging the death of the
first. Under the protection of Margrave Rudeger therefore, and with bad
omens only from the lowering brows of Sir Hagan, the widow of Siegfried
takes her departure from Worms, and proceeding through Bavaria, and
down the Danube--after being hospitably entertained by the good bishop
Pilgrin of Passau--arrives at Vienna, where she receives a magnificent
welcome from "the wide-ruling Etzel," and his host of motley courtiers,
pranked with barbaric pomp and gold, that far outshone the brightest
splendour of the Rhine. Polacks and Wallachians, Greeks and Russians,
Thuringians and Danes, attend daily, and do knightly service in the
court of the mighty King of the Huns. The marriage feast was held
for seventeen days with all pomp and revelry; and after that the
happy monarch set out with Kriemhild for his castle at Buda. There
he dwelt "in proudest honour, feeling nor woe nor sorrow," for seven
years, during which time Kriemhild bore him a son, but only one, whom
the pious wife prevailed with her lord to have baptised after the
Christian custom. Meanwhile, in her mind she secretly harboured the
same deep-rooted determination of most unchristian revenge; and towards
the dark Hagan delay only intensified her hatred. Accordingly, that
she might find means of dealing back to him the blow which he had
inflicted on her first husband, she prevailed on Etzel to invite her
brothers, with their attendants, and especially Hagan, to come from
the far Rhine, and partake the hospitality of the Huns in the East.
This request, from motives partly of kindness, partly of curiosity,
was at once responded to by all: only, as usual, the dark Hagan stands
alone, and prophesies harm. He knew he had done a deed that could not
be pardoned; and he foresaw clearly that, in going to Vienna, he was
marching into a lion's den, whence, for him, certainly there was no
return. But, with a hardihood that never deserts him, if for no other
reason than that no one may dare to call him a coward, he goes along
with the doomed band, the only conscious among so many unconscious, who
were destined to turn the halls of Hunnish merriment into mourning, and
to change the wine of the banqueters into blood. So far, however, his
dark anticipations prevailed with his unsuspecting comrades, that they
marched in great force and well armed; so that when, after encountering
some bloody omens on the long road, they did at length encounter the
false fair welcome of the injured queen, they were prepared to sell
their lives dearly, and to die standing. No sooner arrived than they
were well advertised by the redoubted Dietrich of Bern, (Verona,) then
attached to Etzel's court, of the temper of their hostess, and of
the deathful dangers that awaited them behind the fair show of regal
hospitality. This information only steeled the high heart of Hagan
the more to meet danger in the only way that suited his temper, by an
open and disdainful defiance. He and his friend Volker, the "valiant
gleeman," who plays a distinguished part in the catastrophe of the
poem, doggedly seated themselves before the palace gate, and refused to
do homage to the Queen of the Huns in her own kingdom; and, as if to
sharpen the point of her revenge, displayed across his knees his good
broadsword, that very invincible _Balmung_ which had once owned no hand
but that of Siegfried. This display of defiance was a fitting prelude
to the terrible combat that followed. Though the knight of Trony was
the only object of Lady Kriemhild's hatred, connected as he was with
the rest of the Burgundians, it was impossible that the sword should
reach his heart without having first mowed down hundreds and thousands
of the less important subordinates. Accordingly, the sanguinary
catastrophe of the tragedy consists in this, that in order to expiate
the single sin of Hagan--proceeding as that did originally out of the
false dealing of Siegfried, and the wounded pride of Brunhild--the
whole royal family of the Burgundians or Niebelungers are prostrated
in heaps of promiscuous slaughter with their heathen foemen, the Huns.
The slaughter of the suitors, in the twenty-second book of the Odyssey,
is ferocious enough to our modern feelings; but the gigantic butchery
with which the Niebelungen Lay concludes out-purples that as far as
the red hue of Sylla's murders did the pale castigation of common
politicians. Eight books are occupied in describing the details of this
red ruin, which a woman's revenge worked; and the different scenes
are painted out with a terrific grandeur, that resembles more the
impression produced by some horrid opium dream than a human reality.
Victim after victim falls before the Titanic vastness of the Burgundian
heroes--Gunther, and Gernot, and Gieselher, the valiant gleeman Volker,
who flourishes his broadsword with a humorous ferocity, as if it were
his fiddlestick, and, above all, the dark Hagan himself:
"Well grown and well compacted was that redoubted guest;
Long were his legs and sinewy, and deep and broad his chest.
His hair, that once was sable, with grey was dashed of late,
And terrible his visage, and lordly was his gait."
Finding her first attempt at midnight assassination fail, the Queen
first commits her cause to Bloedel, the brother of Etzel; but in
an instant his head was severed from his body by the might of Sir
Dankwart. A terrible massacre ensues, during which the banqueting hall
of King Etzel is turned into a charnel-house. Then Iring, the Danish
Margrave, falls in single combat with Hagan. An infuriate rush is now
made by the Huns against the Burgundians, who had fortified themselves
in the hall; but against such men as Dankwart, Hagan, and Volker, they
avail no more than hail against the granite rock.
"Thereafter reigned deep silence, the din of war was hushed;
Through every crack and cranny the blood on all sides gushed
From that large hall of slaughter; red did the gutters run.
So much was through their prowess by those of Rhineland done."
Kriemhild then, finding all her efforts with the sword baffled, sets
fire to the hall; but, the roof being vaulted, even this application
of the terror that scared Napoleon from Moscow, did not subdue the
Promethean endurance of the Burgundians. The noble Margrave Rudeger
is at last appealed to, as bound by his promise made to Kriemhild at
Worms to prosecute the bloody work of her revenge to the last; but he
also, with five hundred of his men, falls in the bloody wrestling, and
with him his adversary Gernot, the brother of Gunther. Last of all, the
haughty defiant spirit of the unsubdued Hagan draws, though unwilling,
the redoubted Dietrich of Bern into the fight; and before his might
Hagan himself is not slain, but taken captive, that he may be reserved
to glut the private appetite of the sanguinary queen. "_Bring me here
John the Baptist's head in a charger!_" Nothing less than this will
satisfy the terrible revenge of Kriemhild. With her own hand she lifts
up the terrible sword Balmung, and, meeting Hagan face to face in the
dark prison, and charging him hot to the heart with his deadly wrongs,
severs the head from his body. Kriemhild's revenge is now complete. But
the revenge of Him who rules above required one other blow. This was
immediately executed by the aged master Hildebrand, one of Dietrich's
company. And the poem concludes, like a battle-field, many to weep for,
and only a few to weep.
"There now the dreary corpses stretched all around were seen;
There lay, hewn in pieces, the fair and noble queen.
Sir Dietrich and King Etzel, their tears began to start;
For kinsmen, and for vassals, each sorrowed in his heart.
The mighty and the noble there lay together dead;
For this had all the people dole and drearihead.
The feast of royal Etzel was thus shut up in woe.
Pain in the steps of pleasure treads ever here below."
On the singular poem, of which a brief but complete outline now
stands before us, many remarks of a critical and historical nature
might be made; but we confine ourselves to three short observations,
and with these leave the matter to the private meditations of the
reader. _First_, that the poem is not "snapt out of the air," as the
Germans say, but has a historical foundation, seems sufficiently
manifest--Etzel being plainly the famous Attila, Dietrich, Theodoric
the Goth, and counterparts to Siegfried and Gunther being producible
from the early history of the Franks.[17] Besides this, it is perfectly
plain, from the analogy of the Cid, and other popular poetry of the
narrative character, that not religious allegory--as some Germans
would have it--but actual, though confused and exaggerated history,
is the real staple of such composition. The nucleus of the story of
the Burgundian Kings, and the revenge of Kriemhild, belongs, probably,
to the century following that in which Attila was so prominent a
character. But the complete poem, in its present shape, is not later
than the thirteenth century. Its author is not known.
_Secondly_, the lay of the Niebelungen is extremely interesting, as
disproving, so far as analogy may avail to do so, the Wolfian theory
above alluded to, of the composition of the _Iliad_ out of a number of
separate ballads. Lachmann has tried the same process of disintegration
with the unknown Homer of his own country; but a sound-minded
Englishman needs but to read the poem as it has been given us, for the
first time, complete by Mr Lettsom,[18] in order to stand aghast at the
extreme trouble which learned men in Germany often give themselves, in
order to prove nonsense. "_Nihil est tam absurdum quod non scripserit
aliquis Germanorum._"
_Thirdly_, as a poetical composition, the Lay of the Niebelungen will
not bear comparison for a moment with the two great Greek works of
the same class; it is even, in our opinion, inferior to its nearest
modern counterpart, the _Cid_. The author of the _Iliad_ possessed a
soul as sunny and as fiery as those lovely island-fringed coasts that
gave him birth; and in describing battles he rushes on himself to the
charge, like some old French-eating Marshal Blucher, the incarnation
of the whirlwind of battle which he guides. Our German minstrel takes
matters more easily, and, while his pen revels in blood, sits all the
while in his easy chair, rocking himself delectably, and, like a true
German, smoking his pipe. His quiet serene breadth is very apt to
degenerate into Westphalian flats and sheer prosiness. When, again,
he would be sublime and stirring, as in the bloody catastrophe, he is
apt to overshoot the mark, and becomes horrible. His heroes are too
gigantic, and do things with a touch of their finger which no Homeric
hero would have dreamt of without the help of a god. The fancy, also,
of the old German is very barren and monotonous, as compared with the
wealthy Greek. His similes are few; he has no richness of analogy.
Nevertheless, the Niebelungen Lay remains for all Europe a very notable
poem--for all lovers of popular poetry an indispensable study. Whatever
else it wants, it has nature and health, simplicity and character about
it; and these things are always pleasurable--sometimes, where a taint
of vicious taste has crept in, your only curatives.
FOOTNOTES:
[14] _The Fall of the Niebelungers_; otherwise the Book of Kriemhild: a
translation of the _Niebelunge Nôt_, or _Niebelungen Lied_. By WILLIAM
NANSON LETTSOM. London: Williams and Norgate, 1850.
_Ueber die Iliade und das Niebelungen Lied._ Von KARL ZELL. Karlsruhe:
1843.
[15] _Das Niebelungen Lied_; in's hoch Deutsche übertragen. Von AUGUST
ZEUNE. Berlin: 1814.
[16] These Burgundians are, in the second part of the poem, also
called the _Niebelungen_, which epithet, however, in the first part,
is applied to certain distant Scandinavian vassals of Siegfried. The
origin of this name has caused much dispute amongst the learned.
[17] In the year 436, Gundicarius, king of the Burgundians, was
destroyed with his followers by the Huns; and this event is supposed
to be represented by the catastrophe of the Niebelungen.--LETTSOM,
Preface, p. 4, and ZELLE, p. 370.
[18] The translation by _Birch_, published at Berlin in 1848, follows
Lachmann's mangled text, and is otherwise very inferior to Mr Lettsom's.
ADDITIONAL CHAPTERS FROM THE HISTORY OF JOHN BULL.
CHAPTER I.
HOW DICK DEVILSDUST WENT UPON HIS TRAVELS; HOW THE JUGGLER MADE A
PACTION WITH MOSES; AND HOW HE KEPT IT.
You are, I suppose, perfectly aware of what took place before Juggling
Johnny was appointed steward of Squire Bull's household. The story is
not a pretty one; and, for the sake of those who are dead and gone, I
shall not enter into particulars. Suffice it that Johnny was installed
in the superintendence of the under-servants' room through the
influence of Dick Devilsdust, Old Hum, the superannuated Quack, Bendigo
the fighting Quaker, and a lot more of the same set, who lived in the
villages upon the Squire's property, and bore anything but goodwill to
the steady and peaceable tenants. Dick Devilsdust, in particular, was a
walking pestilence to himself. For some reason or other, which I could
never fathom, he had imbibed a most intense hatred to the military,
and never could set his eyes upon a Redcoat without being thrown into
a horrible convulsion, and bellowing like a bull at the sight of a
Kilmarnock nightcap. As he grew up, he took to writing tracts between
the intervals of weaving; and one of his first productions was an
elaborate defence of Esquire North, who was then accused of having
used harsh measures towards one of his tenantry. It is reported that
Dick sent a copy of this pamphlet to the Esquire, with his humble
compliments and so forth; but whether that be true or no, certain
it is that he never received any thanks, or so much as a stiver's
acknowledgment for having taken up cudgels against poles--an omission
which, to the present day, he remembers with peculiar bitterness.
So Dick thought it his best policy, as it really was, to turn his
attention to the state of matters at home in Bullockshatch. Dick, you
must know, dealt in a kind of cloth so utterly bad that no tenant on
the estate would allow it to approach his skin. It was stamped all over
with great flaring patterns of flamingos, parroquets, and popinjays,
such as no Christian could abide the sight of; and if you took one of
his handkerchiefs to blow your nose with, the odds are that its texture
was so flimsy that both your fingers came through. He was therefore
obliged to sell it to people living beyond the estate--Jews, Turks,
heretics or infidels, he did not care whom, so that he could turn a
penny; and some of those benighted creatures, having no other way of
covering their nakedness, were content to take his rags, and to pay him
handsomely for them. For all that, Dick was a discontented man. Did he
meet a respectable tenant of Squire Bull going soberly with his family
to church, when he, Dick, was pretending to jog to the meeting-house
with his associates, (though Obadiah refused to certify that he was by
any means a regular attender,) he would make mouths at the worthy man,
and accost him thus:--
"So, sir! going to the tithe-eating parson's, I see--much good may it
do ye. And if ye don't happen to have any particular sins this fine
morning to repent of, I may as well remind ye that the quartern loaf
is a farthing dearer than it ought to be just at the present time.
Do you know what a locust is, you clod? You're a cankerworm, you
base chawbacon!" And so on he would go reviling the honest man, who
had all the mind in the world to lay him on the broad of his back in
the mud--and would have done it too, had it been a working week-day.
Another while, Dick would send the bellman round the village, and
having called a special meeting of weavers like himself, he would
harangue them, in some fashion like the following:--
"Look'ye, my lads, I'm an independent man and a weaver, and I don't
care a brass for Squire Bull. I've got a seat in the under-servants'
room, and if I am not entitled to make a row at meal-times I don't know
who is. I'll tell you a bit of my mind--you're the worst-used set of
fellows on the face of the earth, and if you have the least atom of
pluck you won't stand it. Here are you obliged to take your flour from
the Squire's tenantry, when you might get it cheaper if you went to
the next town and bought it from Nick Frog, or Philip Baboon, or even
Esquire North; though I consider his name an abomination, and would
not give sixpence to save him from perdition. And then you have to
find meal for Dragon the house-dog, and to victual some of the under
servants; and it's no joke, I can tell you, what they eat. If you stand
this any longer, you are a set of jolterheads, and nincompoops, and
asses, and slaves, and base cowardly coistrels. Why don't you get up a
stir, rouse the villages, and alarm the tenantry a little? Rely upon
it, they will come to reason soon enough if you give them a hint or
two about the duck-pond or the pump; and for my own part, I don't mind
telling them so in the servants' hall."
And so he would go on, raving and spouting, telling everybody that
Squire Bull was a superannuated idiot, with not half the sense
of his natural bye-blow Jonathan--a chap whom Dick quoted on all
occasions--till he got a kind of reputation as an itinerant orator;
and the tag-rag-and-bobtail would come from any distance, if they were
certified that Devilsdust was to give tongue.
Now, as to the grievance that Dick complained of, there was none.
The tenantry, as you know, were obliged to pay a pretty high rent to
Squire Bull for their farms, and to keep up all sorts of watchmen
and gamekeepers, and rural police--besides a night-patrol on the
canal--not only for the general security of the estate, but for the
order of the villages, which hatched the most turbulent, mischievous,
and discontented crew that ever an estate was cursed with. When one of
these fellows in the villages fell ill, the tenantry were compelled to
pay for his nursing and cure. When any of them were out of employment,
and lounging about the market-place with their hands in their breeches'
pocket, not knowing where to turn for a job, the tenantry, out of sheer
goodness of heart, gave them a turn at ditching or draining; and though
they worked very ill they got fair wages. More than two-thirds of all
the webs they wove--for some of them were really skilful artisans, and
not mere botchers like Devilsdust--were taken by John Bull's tenantry:
they paid almost no rent to the squire--in fact, they were a great deal
too well treated, and this indulgence had turned their heads. They
wanted now to have nothing to do with the tenantry--beyond forcing them
to take the same amount of cloth as before--and to get all their meat
and bread from Frog, Baboon, North, Jonathan, and others, who lived off
the estate, and who, they thought, would be uncommonly glad to take
webs in exchange for provisions. None of these squires wanted webs,
because their own villagers would have made a precious hullabaloo if
they had introduced into their estates anything which was manufactured
on the grounds of Mr Bull; but they made believe as if they would have
no objections, at some future period, to meet the views of Devilsdust;
and in the mean time, having a good deal of land which they wished to
see properly tilled, they intimated to the villagers of Squire Bull,
that they would have no objection whatever to sell them cattle and corn
at a rate somewhat smaller than Bull's tenantry could afford.
This scheme never could have been carried into effect but for a
difference, in the servants' hall. It is of no use now raking up old
matters. Carried it was, to the great disgust of the tenantry, and
Juggling Johnny was appointed steward. To do the Juggler justice, he
was not altogether in favour of the plan. But he could hardly help
himself, as, without the assistance of Dick and his backers, he never
would have got the keys; so, being an adroit little creature, and
as clever at spinning a pirouette as an opera-dancer, he turned his
back upon himself, declared that the tenantry were labouring under
an antiquated fallacy, and that he would put all to rights in the
twinkling of a bed-post. So, much against the convictions of the
Squire, who knew him of old for as incapable a squirrel as ever cracked
a rotten nut, he sat himself down at the head of the table, and began
to talk to the servants as though he were a second edition of Mahomet
or the prophet Nixon.
And where do you think was Dick Devilsdust all this time? If you
suppose that he was not looking after his own interest, you are
consumedly mistaken. No sooner was the measure which swindled Squire
Bull's tenantry carried in the servants' hall, than he went down
to the country, called the villagers together, mounted upon an old
sugar-barrel--which was now perfectly useless--and, brandishing a
billy-roller in his hand, addressed them in the following terms:--
"Friends, Billy-roller men, and brothers! lend me your ears! The
victory is won--we have done the trick! Cottonchester and the
Mississippi are henceforward laid side by side. (Enormous cheering.)
The devil take Bull's tenantry. (Applause.) They are dolts, asses,
fools, idiots, chawbacons, and Helots. Bull himself is a blockhead,
and we must look after his affairs. We alone, and not the tenantry,
are fit to do it. (Cheering.) And I am not going to stand any nonsense
about police or house-dogs. (Vociferous applause.) We know very well
why they are kept; and I, for one, have no notion of being interfered
with. You understand me? (Cries of "We do!") Well, then, I'll tell you
what it is--the Juggler hasn't behaved to me at all handsome in this
matter. Not that I care about it one toss of a Brummagem farden; but I
think they might have paid a little more respect to the voice of the
villages. Howsom'dever, d'ye see, I don't mind the thing; only, as my
health's a little shaken as it were with doing jobs of yours, I think
a slight jaunt would do me good; and as I have been obliged to neglect
my business, at an enormous sacrifice, on your account, perhaps you
wouldn't consider it an unwarrantable liberty if I were just to send
round the hat."
So Devilsdust sent round the hat, and pocketed a lot of browns with
some stray sixpences to boot--quite enough in fact to clear him in
his projected jaunt, and something more. This subscription--being the
first--turned out so well that Bendigo the Quaker, who had been a
strong backer of Devilsdust, and, as some thought, was the cleverer
fellow of the two, tried to get up a collection on his own account;
but, I am sorry to say, made nothing of it. So Devilsdust, having
pocketed the blunt, went out to take his holiday.
How do you think he used it? He made what he called a "Practical Tour"
through the estates of Don Pedro, Don Ferdinando, Signor Macaroni,
and Sultan Koran, advertising his wares everywhere, and entreating
them to give him custom. Moreover, he lost no opportunity of abusing
his landlord, John Bull, whom he held up everywhere to contempt as
the most idiotical, prejudiced, pig-headed individual living. He said
that there was but one way of promoting universal brotherhood among
all the estates, and that was by admitting his, Dick Devilsdust's,
wares free of duty. He pledged himself that, if this were done, there
would be no more squabbles or lawsuits; and as he invariably spoke in
a dialect which no one who heard him could understand, whilst he did
not understand one word which was made in reply to his speeches, the
effect, of course, was electric. He came back, swearing that there
could be no more lawsuits, on account of his (Devilsdust's) enormous
expected consignments; and that all Bullockshatch should unite as one
man, to compel Squire Bull to dismiss every policeman, watchman, and
bumbailiff in his service. As for poor Dragon, who had long been the
terror of tramps and poachers, Dick proposed that he should be poisoned
forthwith, or at all events starved to death; but he had not the
smallest objection that his skin should be stuffed, and preserved as a
specimen of an extinct animal.
Meanwhile Juggling Johnny, the new steward, set about regulating the
affairs of the household as quietly as possible. The Juggler was not
now quite so young as he once was, and, moreover, he had taken unto
himself a wife; so that his wages became a matter of considerable
importance to him, and he had no wish to do anything which might
induce Squire Bull to give him warning. But he had difficult cards to
play. You must know that the lower servants' room was fitted with
an entirely new set, and a number of these were fellows bred in the
villages, who were ready to say ditto to every word which was uttered
by Devilsdust or Bendigo. They had no abstract affection, but, on the
contrary, an intense contempt for the Juggler, who they said--and
perhaps they had reason for it--was not worth his wages; and they
seemed to make it the pet business of their lives to keep him in hot
water. One while Hum, the quack doctor, would insist on overhauling
his accounts, and made a tremendous outcry if every remnant of candle
was not accounted for. The Juggler tried to stop his mouth by giving
his son an appointment in the scullery, but old Hum, who was a regular
Greek, would not submit to be put off in that way. Another while a
fellow would rise in the common's hall, and quietly propose that the
villagers should, thenceforward, pay no rent to the Squire. Some wanted
to have beer gratis; others complained that they were not allowed to
have their stationery for nothing. In short, there was no end to their
clamour, so that the Juggler very soon found that he had by no means
an easy seat. Then there was another section of the servants, friends
of the regular tenantry, who liked the Juggler just one degree better
than they liked Devilsdust or Bendigo. They took every opportunity of
telling him that he was playing the mischief with the whole estate;
that the rents were being paid simply out of capital or borrowed money,
instead of profits; and that, if he did not alter his whole system, and
clap on a decent embargo on the corn-carts and meat-vans of Nick Frog,
North, Jonathan, and the rest, he might wake some fine quarter-day
without finding money enough in the till to pay himself his wages.
That, however, must have been an exaggeration, for the Juggler was too
old a raven not to look ahead whenever his own interest was concerned.
The only men who really stuck to him on all occasions were such of the
servants as he could provide with places in the household, or furnish
with stray pickings on the sly; and, to do them justice, they adhered
to him like leeches. The upper servants, though they bore no great love
to Johnny, thought it best, in the mean time, to interfere as little
as possible, and to let things run their course; only this they were
determined upon, that no improper or suspected person should get into
the house without their leave.
You may possibly think that the Juggler could have no interest to break
this fundamental rule of the household, but if so, you are confoundedly
mistaken. It was an old custom in Bullockshatch, that nobody could be
admitted as a servant to the lower room unless he should produce a
certificate from the village or farm from which he came, to the effect
that he was a person of reasonably good character, and unless he swore
on the New Testament that he would serve Squire Bull faithfully. Now
it so happened that, when the Juggler went down to the largest village
on the estate to get his certificate of character, he found, very
much to his petrifaction, that Moses the old-clothesman, with three
hats upon his head, and a baize bag for cast habiliments under his
arm, had put up a candidate of his own persuasion, and was haranguing
the villagers in the market-place. Moses was, to say the least of it,
a doubtful kind of character. Besides his ostensible calling, and a
minor though undisguised traffic in oranges and sponges, he did a
little bit of underhand bill-broking and discounting at most enormous
percentages. He was suspected, moreover, of being the real owner of the
sponging-house, which was actually kept by his nephew, to which all the
unhappy lads who were not prepared to cash up when the bills became due
were carried, and fleeced out of their watches, rings, and studs, or
anything else which they had about them. It was said, moreover, that
Moses was a sweater and a slop-seller, and that he was in the habit of
kidnapping Christian tailors who had gone astray, and shutting them up
under lock and key in stifling garrets, where they were compelled to
work for him on the smallest possible allowance of cabbage, without a
slice of cucumber to flavour it. One thing there was no doubt of, that,
by some means or other, Moses had become enormously rich, so that he
was able to lend money to any of the neighbouring squires who might
require it, and it was strongly surmised that he even held bonds with
the signature of John Bull appended.
You may fancy, from this description of him, that Moses was by no means
popular; nor was he. But money will go a great way, and the truth
is, that he had so many of the villagers under his power that they
durst not say a word against him. Then, again, he had made friends
with Obadiah, to whom he talked about liberty of conscience, and so
forth; dropping, at the same time, a five-pound note on the floor,
and pretending not to notice that Obadiah's splay foot covered it
by an instantaneous instinct. So they parted on the best of terms,
Moses calling Obadiah "ma tear" as they shook hands, and Obadiah
snuffling something about "a chosen vessel." After that they thoroughly
understood one another, though Obadiah did not altogether give up
his old trick of soliciting the ladies for a subscription to convert
Moses--the proceeds whereof never reached the latter, at least under
the persuasive form of hard cash.
Great, therefore, was the astonishment of the Juggler when he found
Moses speaking in the market-place, and Obadiah cheering him with all
his might and main. He would gladly have slunk off, if he had been
allowed the opportunity of doing so; but Obadiah was too quick for him.
"Here's a dispensation!" cried our lank-haired acquaintance, the moment
he caught a glimpse of the Juggler's wrinkled mug passing round the
corner of the lane. "Here's a special vouchsafing, and a jubilation,
and a testimony--ha, hum! Make way there, you brother in the fustian
jacket! and you fellow-sinner in the moleskins, take your pipe out of
your cheek, and let pass that Saul among the people!"--and before he
knew where he was, the Juggler was hoisted on the shoulders of the
rabble, and passed on to the hustings, where he found himself placed
cheek-by-jowl with Moses and Obadiah, and every kind of money-lender
and usurer, and hypocritical frequenter of the Stocks, clustering
around him, and wringing his hand, as though they had loved him from
infancy.
"Three cheers for Juggling Johnny, the friend of liberty of
conscience!" cried one--"Huzza for the Juggler and anythingarianism!"
vociferated a second--"Down with Christendom!" roared a third--"Make
him free of the Synagogue!" suggested a fourth--"Three groans for
Martin!" shouted a fifth--"Schent per schent!" screamed a sixth; and,
finally, they all agreed upon one chorus, and rent the welkin with
acclamations for Moses and the Juggler.
You may easily conceive that the latter was anything but delighted
at this demonstration. He had a proud stomach of his own, and was
woundily disgusted to find that he was only considered as playing the
second fiddle to the old-clothesman. But nevertheless he durst not, for
the life of him, show any symptoms of vexation; so he stepped to the
front of the hustings with a grin on his face, as though he had been
fortifying himself for the task with a dram of verjuice, and began to
speechify as follows:--
"Friends, and enlightened villagers! your reception of me this day
is the proudest criterion of my life. Unaccustomed as I am to public
speaking, yet, on this occasion, when liberty of conscience is the
grand climacteric menstruum which depends upon the scale, I would be
unworthy the name of a thorough indigenous renovator if I did not
express, by all the judicious idiosyncrasy in my power, the deep
aspirations which vibrate in my unfathomed sensorial region. Yes, my
friends, it is true! liberty of conscience is liberty of conscience;
and the man who denies that proud and exalted position is, to my mind,
no better than a mere residuary instigator. As the progress of opinion
moves forward, so move its chariot wheels; sometimes unseen amidst the
roar of popular ebullition, but never the less distinctly, that the
clear calm voice of conscience illustrates the oscillations of the
heart, and marks, beyond the possibility of doubt, those unequivocal
demonstrations which control the destiny of empires. Holding such
opinions, as I have ever held them--relying upon the quantification of
the predicate which dictates irrevocably to the sublime and recondite
motion of the spheres--and appealing, moreover, to my own past
experience, and your knowledge of my consistorial qualifications, I
have little hesitation or dubiety, at the present juncture, of claiming
your senatorial suffrages to the proud position which I trust I am
redintegrated to occupy!"
At this, some few fellows at the outskirts of the crowd began to cheer;
and Johnny, taking advantage of the circumstance, made them a polite
bow, and was about to skip off without further question. But a big
bumbailiff, who was an intimate friend of Moses, stopped him at once.
"Lookye, master Juggler!" said he, "all this may be very well, and,
for my part, I've no manner of objection to make to your principles.
They might be a thought clearer, perhaps, but that's neither here nor
there. But what we want to hear from you is this--will you stand by
Moses at this pinch, and lend his friend a helping hand to get into the
servants' hall?"
It was pitiable to see how the Juggler twisted and turned. He had a
mouth's mind to say no to the whole concern; but he knew very well
that, if he did so, the villagers would have nothing to say to him.
For there were two public-houses in the market-place decorated with
flags, inscribed with such mottos as "Moses for ever!" and "Vote for
the Talmud and liberty of conscience!" and through the open windows you
could see scores of fellows within, guzzling beer and gin, and smoking
tobacco--all, as you may suppose, at the expense of the old-clothesman.
So the Juggler, seeing that he had no chance of getting a character
there, unless he made common interest with Moses, stepped up to the
latter, called him his excellent friend and beloved pitcher, and said
he hoped very soon to welcome his nominee to servants' hall.
"Only," quoth he, "you must be prepared for some of the fellows yonder
kicking up a bobbery about that idle matter of the oath. However, I
think we shall be quite able to manage that: one book is just as good
as another, and I do suppose your friend will have no objection to be
sworn on the Song of Solomon?"
So they shook hands again, and the mob shouted, and then both the
Juggler and the friend of Moses got their characters certified by
the village schoolmaster. There was talk at the time of a private
arrangement made between them, whereby Moses undertook to stand the
whole expense of the beer; but as I never saw a copy of the document, I
won't be positive as to that.
But what, think you, took place after this? One fine afternoon, when
the servants were sitting at their commons, up gets the Juggler,
and proposes that they should agree to let in his excellent friend
and colleague of the tribe of Moses, without taking the usual oath.
Whereupon a great row commenced--one English, an old servant of the
Squire, and an especial friend of Martin's, protesting that he would
not sit at the same table with an arch-heathen and unbeliever; and many
others did the same. However, Bendigo, Devilsdust, Hum and Company,
this time backed up the Juggler, and a majority of the under-servants
were for letting him in. This, however, they could not do without the
consent of the upper-servants, who very coolly told them that they
would do nothing of the sort; and that Moses and his friends, if they
refused to take the oath, might even wait at the outside of the door.
When this was communicated to Moses and his tribe, they were in a sad
taking. However, they sent word to the Juggler that they relied upon
his making another attempt; and in the mean time they got Obadiah to go
out to the lanes and bye-ways, and preach sermons in favour of Moses.
But nobody cared, in reality, one single stiver for Moses. The very
villagers, who had drunk his beer, refused to do anything further in
the matter; and the Juggler, seeing this, thought it best to hold his
tongue and imitate their example. At last Moses and his friends began
to wax furious, and to abuse the Juggler as a traitor, time-server,
slippery rogue, and so forth; and some of the more pestilent of the
under-servants went down to the village, and persuaded Moses for once
to pluck up heart, and boldly to knock at the gate in his own person,
demanding admittance. "Time enough," said they, "to boggle about the
oath when they put it to you."
So Moses, having figged himself out in a sky-blue satin vest, with
peach-coloured trousers, and a velveteen cut-away coat, and no end of
Mosaic jewellery, went up to the door, and, when the porter came to see
who was there, attempted, with the utmost effrontery, to walk in and
help himself to the table-beer. But English was too quick for him.
"Halloa, there!" he cried; "what right has that fellow to come here?
Has he taken the oath?" Whereupon Moses admitted that he had not, but
that he was perfectly ready, if the gentleman pleased, to qualify
himself upon the Apocrypha! At this up starts the Juggler, and, to the
infinite consternation of Moses, desires that he shall be shown to the
outside of the door, until this matter was discussed. This being done,
the row began afresh. Some of the servants said that Moses should be
admitted at once upon his simple affirmation; but the Juggler, who had
by this time taken a second thought on the subject, would not hear of
it. So he proposed that they should adopt a string of resolutions, to
the effect that Moses was an excellent character, and well qualified
to be a servant of the Squire's, but that neither he nor any of his
persuasion could be admitted without complying with the rules of the
household, and that the matter must just lie over. "And this, I think,"
said the Juggler, "will be a noble testimony of our respect for the
liberty of the conscience, and also in entire conformity with the
customs of the household." At this Hum and others got up in a rage,
and said--what was true enough--that it was no testimony at all, but a
wretched piece of shuffling; and that the Juggler ought to be ashamed
to show his face in decent society, considering the nature of his
previous encouragements and promises to Moses. But, nevertheless, there
the matter ended for the time; and Moses, when he was informed of the
resolution, uttered a melancholy howl of "Old clo'!" shouldered his
bag, and from that day to this has never been allowed to put his nose
within the door.
CHAPTER II.
HOW PHILIP BABOON WAS EJECTED FROM HIS ESTATE--HOW COLONEL MARTINET
BAMBOOZLED HIS TENANTRY--AND HOW THE ROW BECAME GENERAL.
But I must go back a little, and tell you what was doing in other
estates which are adjacent to the Squire's. Philip Baboon, who, as you
may remember, had succeeded in ousting his cousin Charles, who was
the natural proprietor of the estate, was as deep an old fox as ever
established himself in a badger's burrow. He contrived to marry his
sons and daughters--and a precious lot he had of them--into the best
families in the neighbourhood; and whenever a new match of this kind
was concluded, what, think you, did he, but call upon his tenantry to
come down with a handsome sum, just by way of gratuity, to set up the
young couple in the world! Nor could he plead personal poverty as an
excuse for this; for it was notorious to everybody that he was the
richest old fellow in Christendom, and regularly spent several hours
each day in his closet counting over his coin by sackfuls. In a short
while, his own people began to detest him cordially, so that at last
he could hardly go out to take an airing, without being startled by
the whiz of a bullet past his ear; and he durst not even open a letter
without precaution, lest it should be filled with fulminating powder.
When he first came into the estate, he was considered rather a hearty
old buck than otherwise; for he used to drive about in a pony phaeton,
popping into cottages about meal-time, tasting the soup-maigre, and
patting the children on the head, though he never was known to give
them as much coin as might purchase a penny trumpet. But now all that
was changed. He had grown morose and gloomy, never stirred abroad,
and maintained a large body of police for the purpose of guarding the
premises. It is quite possible that he might have kept possession to
his dying day, but for one of the most stupid acts of interference
that was ever committed by a master. It so happened that some of the
servants had agreed to dine together on a holiday, and as each man
was to pay his own shot, there could be no reasonable objection. But
what think ye did Philip Baboon? No sooner did he hear the clatter of
the dishes, than he peremptorily forbade the servants to sit down to
their meal, telling them that, if they ventured to do so, he would
have them all taken into custody. This was rather too much; so, next
morning, when Philip came out of his dressing-room, what should he
find but a huge barricade of tables, chairs, washing-tubs, and what
not, erected at the head of the principal staircase, and fifty or
sixty of the very worst fellows from the village--poachers, ragmen,
and coal-heavers--armed with pikes and cudgels, cursing, swearing, and
hurrahing like mad. And, what was worse than that, some of the regular
servants were backing them up. No sooner did they catch a glimpse of
Philip than they set up a yell which might have done credit to a colony
of Choctaws, and let drive a perfect storm of chamberpots and other
crockery at his head. Philip jumped back into his dressing-room in an
ecstasy of terror, bolted the door, threw up the window, and screamed
lustily for the police. But the police were not one whit more to be
relied upon than their neighbours, for they only nodded and laughed,
but did not budge a foot; and instead of collaring the scoundrels,
who were by this time swarming round the doors, they accosted them
as excellent friends and beloved brethren, and drank their very good
healths, and success to them, out of pots of beer which some of the
servants had supplied. When Philip Baboon saw that, he knew it was all
up with him; so, having caught up as many valuables as he could well
carry, he even stole down the back staircase, and made off, leaving his
family to shift for themselves as they best could. In fact, the fright
which he got had altogether upset his reason. He skulked about the
woods for several days, assuming all sorts of disguises, and sleeping
at night in barns; and at length crossed the ferry and landed on Squire
Bull's estate, as cold and tattered as a scarecrow.
As for Philip's house, after he left it, it became a regular bedlam.
The doors were thrown wide open, and every tatterdemalion on the estate
rushed in, whooping, hallooing, and yelling, as though they had been
at Donnybrook fair. First, they broke open Philip's cellar, and helped
themselves to his best wines and spirits; next, they went up to the
bedrooms, smoked in the beds, and committed divers other abominations
which it is not needful to detail; then, they took his best furniture,
heaved it out of the windows, and made a bonfire of it in the court.
In short, they acted for some time like regular madmen--the servants
standing by and looking on, but not daring to interfere. Indeed, it was
questionable what right they had to interfere, if they were never so
willing to do it; for the estate was now without an owner, and the mob
had sworn a most horrible oath, that no one of the blood of Charles or
Philip Baboon should again set foot within the property. However, some
of the wiser and steadier of the old servants saw plainly enough that
these disorders must be put a stop to in some way or other, and that
the house at all events must be cleared of the rabble; "otherwise,"
thought they, "it will be burned to the ground, or thoroughly gutted,
and in that case there is little chance that our boxes can escape." So
they issued an order that everybody should leave the house, thanking,
at the same time, in the most polite terms, the exceedingly respectable
gentlemen who had taken the trouble to assist them in getting rid of
old Philip. Then it was that they got a sufficient taste of the quality
of the fellows with whom they had to deal. No sooner was the order
posted up in the different rooms than it was torn down, amidst the
hooting of the mob, who swore that they were the sole proprietors of
the estate and the house, and everything in it, and that they would
not submit to be dictated to by a parcel of superannuated lackeys
and footmen. Nay, it was enough to make the hair of any respectable
tradesman turn grey on the spot to hear the language which they used.
They said that no man had a right to keep any property to himself, but
that every one was entitled by the laws of nature to help himself to
whatever he fancied. They averred that the boy of all work, who swept
out the shop of a morning and ran the errands, was entitled to demand
a half share of all his master's profits; and these damnable heresies,
they said, they were determined to enforce in future. So you may easily
conceive the taking in which all people were on the estate who had a
Sunday's suit of clothes, a stick of furniture, or, mayhap, a bag of
money.
In short, matters proceeded from bad to worse, and at last became so
intolerable that three or four of the old servants, who had contrived
to keep a garret to themselves, sent for one Budge, who had been chief
constable in Philip Baboon's time, and told him plainly that, unless
he could assist them in turning out this villanous crew, everything
must necessarily go to wreck and ruin. Budge was an old soldier, who
had seen service--a devilish determined kind of fellow when he took any
job in hand, and not at all in the habit of sticking at trifles. It was
more than whispered that, if Philip Baboon had not lost head altogether
at the first brush, but been capable of giving orders, Budge would have
stood by him; and such was his influence over the police that there is
no saying what might have been the result.
As it was, he heard them to the end without uttering a word, and then,
taking the pipe from his mouth, and knocking out the ashes on the hob,
he delivered himself in the following oracular fashion:--
"Harkye, mounseers! If so be as how you want the job done, and them
raff utterly scomfished, I'm the man that can do it. The force will
stick to me, because I sticks to the force. Moreover, they knows by
this time that there ain't no chance of their getting their pay so long
as this shindy is allowed. They're ready, and I'm ready. Only this--I
is to be allowed to do as I likes. I takes my orders from you, and them
orders is to be, that I may shoot, hang, or blow up every scoundrel who
stands in my way. Them's my terms; and the sooner you puts it down on
black and white the better!"
As there was no help for it, the servants gave Budge the order;
whereupon he stepped down to the courtyard, called the police together,
and told them that if they did not obey his directions, not one
mother's son of them would see a halfpenny of their arrears. He then
reminded them, that, if the blackguards who held possession of the
house got the upper hand, the force would inevitably be discharged, and
most of them thrown upon the parish, the poor-rates being no longer
collected. They were all ready enough to join him; but they became
readier still, when, just as he was speaking, a quantity of filth was
thrown upon them from a window above, followed by the hootings and
laughter of the drunken gang who were sotting away as usual. Budge did
not lose his opportunity; but, beckoning to his men to follow, he took
them to an adjoining cellar, where there were plenty blunderbusses and
small-arms collected, and having given each watchman twelve rounds of
ammunition and a dram, he bade them fear nothing, but proceed to clear
the premises.
It was not so easy a task as you might imagine. Many of the desperadoes
within had weapons, and were determined to use them, so that a bloody
fight took place at the staircase, where the barricades were again
thrown up. But the police, being in grim earnest, fought this time like
devils, and at last succeeded in clearing the house, and in capturing
several of the ringleaders, who were incontinently shaved in the head,
and sent off to hard labour in the hulks. In this way some sort of
order was restored; and at last, by the general voice of the tenantry,
young Nap, a nephew of the old Corsican who had once given Squire Bull
so much trouble, was made provisional head-steward of the estate, and
remains so to the present day. Budge died shortly afterwards--whether
or not from exertion in the above affair I cannot say--and the number
of the police was doubled, much, as you may suppose, to the disgust
of the malcontents, who have not yet abandoned the idea of a second
attack upon the house.
One squib suffices to set off a whole bundle; and you can have no
idea what effect these proceedings on Baboon's territory had upon
some neighbouring estates. Nick Frog's people, to be sure, both
tenantry and villagers, expressed themselves perfectly contented with
their landlord; but a very different scene occurred on the domain of
Colonel Martinet. The Colonel--who was usually considered as rather
out at elbows--had an immense notion of his own importance, and
wanted, at county meetings and elsewhere, to take the precedence of
Don Ferdinando, whose lands were twice the extent of his, besides
being incomparably in finer order. This sort of rivalry had led to
many bickerings in former years, though the two were cousins-german;
and these were heightened by the fact that, at the Quarter-Sessions,
which they both attended, some thirty small proprietors and yeomen
were entitled to vote. Ferdinando had hitherto been invariably elected
chairman, a dignity which Martinet would have given his little finger
to achieve; indeed, so much store did he set on gaining it that he kept
up an establishment far too costly for his means, and, in consequence,
took every opportunity of driving a hard bargain with his tenantry.
Not that he was illiberal--at least so he said. He was exceedingly
desirous that his tenantry should have an opportunity of inspecting the
manner in which his accounts were kept; but, somehow or other, he never
would give them that opportunity, and great were the complaints in
consequence. Privately--there is no use mincing the matter--the Colonel
was a weak creature. He had got into an unfortunate habit of issuing
orders and then recalling them, solely for the purpose of exhibiting
the extent of his puissance and power. The consequence was that you
never could depend upon him. At eleven o'clock he would summon his
servants, and deliver to them a document regularly signed and sealed,
desiring a meeting of the tenantry to be held next day, at which he
would announce to them a material remission of rent. Right or wrong,
that must be posted instantly. At one, he had changed his mind; the
meeting was to be put off, and he intended to charge them twenty per
cent additional. At three, there was a new notice, desiring them, under
penalties, to attend a Protestant place of worship. At five, out came
a placard warning them to conform to the Roman Catholic religion. And
if no more notices were given that day, the reason was that the Colonel
had gone to dinner. You may therefore comprehend the reason why his
people, when they learned what had befallen Philip Baboon, thought it a
good opportunity to do likewise, and, at all events, to demand a sight
of the books.
It so happened that, when they assembled, the Colonel was in one of his
exalted moods; and, on being informed that a large body of men were
gathering on the lawn, he immediately gave orders to the gamekeepers
to fire upon them. This they accordingly did; and you may conceive
the consternation and rage of the poor fellows, who had their faces
tattooed with snipe-shot! They retreated, but returned in an hour or
two afterwards in augmented numbers, seriously determined on mischief,
when, what think you took place? Why, the Colonel, having in the mean
time finished another bottle, came out to meet them in a full suit of
black, with crape round his hat, and weepers on his wrists, protesting
that the whole thing was a mistake--that he loved them as his
life--that they were his children, (which might have been the case with
some half-dozen of them)--and that, if any of them were going to die
from the unfortunate accident of the discharge, he, Colonel Martinet,
would be proud and happy to officiate as principal mourner! While they
stood staring like stuck pigs at this unexpected announcement, the
Colonel began an oration lauding them mightily as the best and foremost
tenantry in the universe, protesting that it was a shame and disgrace
that they were not allowed to take the wall of Ferdinando's tenants,
and hinting that it merely depended upon themselves whether they might
not get new lands for nothing.
"At all events, my lads," said he, "one thing is clear--we must have
the precedence at Quarter-Sessions. Your honour is concerned in that,
as well as mine; and I don't see why we should not have a tidy little
court of our own, chosen generally by all the tenantry, to put matters
right, and settle any trifling matters of dispute. Don't say one word
of apology for what has occurred to-night. I understand the whole
matter. Don Ferdinando is at the bottom of the whole mischief, but
we'll make him pay for it before long. Is there anything more? I think
not. Well then, gentlemen, I insist upon your having a glass of wine
all round; and, if you please, we shall drink bad luck to Ferdinando
and his tenants!"
You would hardly believe it; but the mob did actually drink the
toast, and gave a cheer for the Colonel moreover, and then went
peaceably home. But the question about the Quarter-Sessions was by
no means settled. Some men held the opinion that neither Ferdinando
nor Colonel Martinet had any right to dictate in person, but the
whole bench should be composed of persons elected by the tenantry
and villagers, independent of the landlords; and, for that purpose,
they convened a meeting at the Frankfort Arms--a sort of joint-stock
public-house, to which everybody who lived on the estates represented
at Quarter-Sessions might come and welcome--to consider what rents
should be paid, and what police maintained, and a variety of questions
which were utterly beyond their province to decide. Nor had they the
sense even to take this step without causing a new outcry, for they
summoned to their meeting men from a farm belonging to the estate of
Squire Copenhagen, and which had belonged to it since the days of Noah,
on the pretext that the flood had unrighteously separated it from their
jurisdiction at Quarter-Sessions!
No sooner were they assembled at the Frankfort Arms than they
declared the meeting to be perpetual, and voted themselves each a
handsome allowance of five shillings per diem at the expense of the
landlords; some of whom, like Martinet, paid their share of the subsidy
because they could not well help themselves, whilst others, like
Ferdinando, told the rascals who called with the subscription-book
to go to the devil. Then they set about drawing up new regulations
for the management of all the neighbouring estates, of which they now
considered themselves the actual proprietors, calling the landlords
mere trustees, and declaring that they would make them account strictly
for past intromissions. Next, they ordered out a posse of watchmen
and gamekeepers, and sent them down the river to occupy that farm of
Squire Copenhagen's of which we have spoken, with the full consent of
Martinet, who had long had an eye upon it for his own advantage. But
they reckoned for once without their host, for Copenhagen was as brave
as a lion, and determined to fight to the last drop of his blood before
an acre of his estate should be confiscated; and Esquire North, who was
a near relation of his, intimated that he should be ready at all times
to back him in his reasonable quarrel.
If I were to tell you all that took place in consequence of the
proceedings of this villanous gang at the Frankfort Arms, it would
occupy volumes. There were no bounds to the disturbances which they
created. They were drunk from morning till night, and might be seen
staggering about in dresses which made them facsimiles of the ruffians
who murdered the Babes in the Wood. They shouted, and wrangled, and
fought, and blasphemed, until no peaceable gentleman durst go near the
Frankfort Arms, lest he should be assaulted, attacked, or robbed; and
at last they grew so bad that they were indicted as a common nuisance.
Martinet, and those who had hitherto supported them, gave notice that
the supplies were stopped; and so, after a scene of rioting which
baffles all description, they were turned neck and crop out of doors,
and the Frankfort Arms was shut up. Some of the vagabonds, not knowing
what better to do, marched in a body and broke into Ferdinando's
mansion--a feat which they accomplished with the aid of the charity
boys on his foundation, for those diabolical miscreants had poisoned
the minds and perverted the principles of old and young. There they
remained for some days, plundering and ravishing; but were at last
driven out again by Ferdinando and his watchmen, who, as you may well
suppose, felt no manner of scruple whatever in knocking the ringleaders
on the head.
These, however, were only part of the disturbances which took place,
for there was more or less rioting in almost every estate in the
country; even Bullockshatch did not altogether escape, as you shall
presently hear. Indeed, many excellent people began to think that the
end of the world must be drawing nigh, for such was the beating of
drums, blowing of trumpets, springing of rattles, yelling of mobs, and
alarms of fire every night, that no amount of laudanum could insure a
quiet slumber.
CHAPTER III.
OF THE ATTEMPTED DISTURBANCES AT BULLOCKSHATCH; OF THE OUTBREAK ON THE
FARM AT THE OTHER SIDE OF THE POND; AND OF THE GRADUAL ADVANCES OF
PETER.
The news of the ejection of Philip Baboon by the tenantry and villagers
spread, as you may suppose, like wildfire all over Bullockshatch, and
was also soon conveyed to John's detached farm on the other side of
the pond. Now, although the greater part of the tenantry had little
confidence in the Juggler, and others who occupied situations in the
household, they were deeply and sincerely attached to John, and were
ready to stand by him to the last drop of their blood. And so, to do
them justice, were the vast majority of the villagers who had money in
the Savings' Bank: for, besides the fact that the Squire was a kind,
upright, and honourable master as ever breathed the breath of life,
they knew that, if anything should happen to him, they might whistle
for their principal, let alone the yearly dividends. But there was a
set of rascals, the same who for years past had been attempting to
batter down the Ten-bar Gate which was put up by old Gray and the
Juggler in the Squire's avenue, who thought this a capital opportunity
to create a fresh disturbance; so they met at a pothouse hard by,
constituted themselves into a kind of sham servants' hall, passed
resolutions to the effect that they were entitled to occupy the house,
and to have the run of the buttery; and in secret set about the
purchase of crowbars, picklocks, and other implements of burglary.
This, however, was not done so secretly but that a rumour of it reached
the ears of the Juggler, who grew as pale as death at the intelligence,
and could hardly be brought round by dint of sal-volatile and burned
feathers. When he came to himself, and had thought over the subject,
he began to see that he was in an ugly fix. None of his own friends
were fit to manage an affair of this kind, so he resolved to take what
was precisely the wisest course he could have adopted, namely, to step
across the way, and take counsel with old Arthur, who still retained
a sort of superintendence of the police. He found the gallant veteran
with spectacles on nose, reading Cæsar's _Commentaries_; and being
accommodated with a camp-stool, the Juggler even made a clean breast of
it, and laid his difficulties before him. Arthur pricked up his ears
like a horse at the sound of the hunting-horn.
"Leave this matter entirely to me, Master Juggler!" quoth he. "It
concerns the safety of the whole household; and it shan't be said that
old Arthur hung back at the last, after having served Squire Bull so
long. In the mean time, go you and enrol as many tight lads as you can
for special constables; I'll look after the police, and take care to
have Dragon the house-dog ready."
So the Juggler hopped down stairs with a heart as light as a linnet's,
for he knew that if Arthur took a job in hand it was as good as done.
And before evening a whole regiment of tight lads were sworn as special
constables. Arthur was at work all night, and, by daybreak, everything
was ready. Pattereroes were mounted on the roofs of the outhouses,
so as to command the avenue; the regular police was mustered in the
Riding-School, and Dragon's collar ready to be slipped at a moment's
notice.
The mob, however, did not venture to appear. They had summoned a great
meeting to be held on a common, from which they were to march upon
John's house; but the hearts of many failed them when they heard tell
of the preparations which were made for their reception, and they did
not appear at the place of muster. In fact, the whole thing ended in
smoke. The meeting on the common broke up. Nobody appeared at the gate
save one red-headed fellow, who came trundling a wheelbarrow before
him, which he said contained the humble petition of many well-affected
villagers; and he requested, quite meekly, that he might be allowed to
convey it to the house. No objection whatever was made to this--so the
barrow, escorted by special constables, was wheeled up the avenue, and
the petition carried into the house, and laid upon the servant's table.
When they came to examine it, however, they found what a set of rascals
the framers were. "John Bull, his mark," was subscribed at least fifty
times to the petition addressed to himself! Mrs Bull appeared to have
done little else for a fortnight than go about from booth to pothouse
for the purpose of signing her name! If there was faith in pen, ink,
and paper, Arthur had committed himself twenty times over, and so had
the Juggler, and almost every one of the servants. Then there were
names like Bloody-bones, Dirk Hatteraick, Blue-beard, and Swill-gore,
which were never borne by any Christian man, in hundreds; so that
it became apparent that it was no petition at all, but an infamous
forgery; and it was accordingly chucked under the table. And so ended
this new conspiracy at Bullockshatch.
Matters, however, looked more serious on the farm on the other side
of the pond, which had always harboured the most turbulent set of
people on the whole estate. That hoary old sinner, Peter, of whom
you shall hear more anon, had been allowed, through the stupidity,
carelessness, or good-nature of some of the former stewards, to take
such liberties there, that at last he had the consummate impudence to
assert that he, and not Squire Bull, was the Lord Paramount. He even
appointed deputies, who claimed a sort of jurisdiction; and if he did
not venture actually to uplift the rents, he hinted broadly enough
that nobody was bound in conscience to pay them to the Squire, or to
render stipend to Patrick, who acted as the Squire's chaplain in those
parts. Dan, the old Rabiator, as he was called, had been long his chief
agent in the farm; but Dan was now dead, and the man who assumed his
place was little better than a nincompoop. Nobody, in fact, could have
done Peter's business half so well as Dan. He always kept--at least
almost always--on the windy side of the law; talked wildly enough,
in all conscience, but abstained from overt acts; and knew precisely
how to avail himself of the necessities of the steward for the time
being, who was often forced to apply to him for a helping hand in cases
of strong emergency. In this way Dan was able to provide handsomely
for his family, most of whom were located in different situations
of indifferent trust in the service of Squire Bull; and he managed,
moreover, to secure a snug little income for himself, by levying a kind
of black-mail, called Daniel's pence, at all the fairs and gatherings
on the farm. But when Dan died, he left no Elisha behind him. One Byrne
tried to put on his mantle--a sorry one it was by this time--and he
insisted that all the disciples of Peter, and all others on the farm
who bore no goodwill to the Squire, were bound to follow him, on the
ground that, before the Christian era, an ancestor of his was supposed
to have possessed a corner of the farm rent-free. He had a seat in the
under servants' hall, but he refused to attend at commons, alleging
that he did not get as much as he was entitled to; and, after several
acts of foolery, he fairly crossed over to the farm, and called upon
Donnybrook and Shilelah, and the other merry lads who used to roar
in the wake of Dan, to follow him, and knock the constables of the
Squire on the head. A bigger fool than Byrne you never met with on a
summer's day. His game evidently was to have played Peter's cards,
to keep temporising whenever he could, and to have done all in his
power to advance the interests of that stealthy Jesuit. Peter would
have backed him to any extent, so long as he stood up solely for the
interests and the rights of Peter; but the moment he deserted that
principle, and advanced his own preposterous claims, he found the
back of Peter's hand turned to him with a vengeance. A sad sight it
was to see the poor fellow take to the hill-side, with a handful of
misbegotten idiots behind him, dressed in a new uniform ordered for
the occasion, and carrying pikes and rusty swords, and pokers, and
such other weapons as they could conveniently command. They had not
even victuals enough to sustain them for the first twelve hours of
their march; and whenever they knocked at the door of any of Peter's
emissaries, imploring that, for the love of the saints, he would
hand them out a bowlful of potatoes, they were greeted with a formal
commination, and told that they were accursed heretics. They tried to
storm a tollhouse or two, for the purpose of abstracting money; but
they invariably found the shutters made fast, and divers fowling-pieces
levelled at them from the windows of the upper story. At last, after
being out for four or five nights in the cold mist and rain, they came
down to a house kept by a lone widow woman, in which several of the
police were stationed, and swore that, if they were not admitted, they
would burn down the premises, and massacre every man, woman, and child
within. Possibly they never intended to do anything of the kind; for
Byrne, though a blockhead, had nothing savage about him; indeed, he was
rather soft-hearted than otherwise. He ran round the house, entreating
the police to surrender, in order to save the effusion of blood;
but they merely answered by a laugh of contempt, and a discharge of
musketry, which was supposed to have settled Byrne's business. However,
his followers, on looking about, found him squatted in the widow's
cabbage-garden, marvellously distressed in heart, and apparently
labouring under a painful visitation of the bowels. He escaped for the
moment, but a few days afterwards was seized, tried, and sentenced to
transportation. And this is the last actual outbreak which has occurred
in any portion of Squire Bull's estates.
But you must not, from this, conclude that everything was going smooth.
That infernal miscreant, Peter, had acted politicly throughout the
latter affair; not from any regard to Squire Bull, but because he knew
he could make more of him by seeming to give into his authority, than
by backing up a stupid egotistical creature like Byrne, who never had
the ghost of a chance. Now, however, when the danger was over, he,
through his emissaries, thought fit to claim prodigious credit for
the disinterested part which he had acted. One Claretson was at this
time ground-steward for the Squire on that farm, and to him the whole
retainers of Peter repaired.
"You see," they said, "what immense respect we have for the authority
of Squire Bull. Nothing would have been easier for us than to have
set up Byrne; but our consciences would not allow it; and so we have
settled what might have been an ugly business without any difficulty at
all. We don't wish to claim the slightest merit for having done so. It
was our duty, and nothing more. Merely, if you think that we deserve
well of Squire Bull, we would just mention that certain of Patrick's
people are apt to give themselves airs, and to insist upon walking
before us out of a shebeen-shop, which is neither here nor there, only
it is unpleasant, considering that many of us and our predecessors
maintain that we were in the parishes before Patrick was born. That,
we allow, may possibly be matter of dispute; but there can be no doubt
of this, that Peter is senior to Martin; and, as Patrick has always
acted as a junior brother to Martin, we venture to think that it is
a reasonable request, that Squire Bull shall hereafter acknowledge
Peter's nominees as equal in dignity to Patrick's."
It is difficult to say whether Claretson was really humbugged by this
jesuitical oration, or whether he was so far misled in judgment as to
consider their views reasonable. Certain it is that he gave them a most
civil answer; and reported the matter to the Juggler, who was then in
particularly good humour, as his character, and perhaps his place,
depended on the suppression of the riot. So he called together several
of the servants, showed them Claretson's letter, and begged them to
speak their minds freely.
"My own view is," quoth he, "that nothing can be more reasonable.
Patrick may perhaps fume and get into a huff about it, but who cares
for Patrick? He may be very glad that he is allowed to draw his
stipend, and what matters it to him whether he walks first or last?"
"And I think," said Gray--not the old Gaffer, who, as you know, brought
in Madam Reform, but his son and successor--"I think we can't do less
for Peter, considering his very handsome conduct in this business. I
am for going still further. Why not make the rule universal in all
Squire Bull's properties and estates beyond Bullockshatch? It may not
be altogether convenient to bring in Peter here, just at the present
moment; but we can think about that afterwards. Meanwhile let us
give him what he wants; and let him walk first everywhere except in
Bullockshatch."
"I, for one, am perfectly agreeable," said Timber, who, being a man of
exceedingly limited ideas, always made a point of coinciding with the
opinions of the rest.
"So be it!" quoth Protocol. "But don't you think we might even go a
step further? I find it a main inconvenience that I am not allowed
to write direct to Peter whenever I have occasion to know the last
quotations of indulgences, holy water, or pardons. Could we not arrange
among ourselves to send over some respectable gentleman, who might look
after any business of the Squire's in those parts, and occasionally
pop in in a friendly way, and take pot-luck with Peter? I own that it
would be a great accommodation to me, and I don't see how any one could
object to it."
The Juggler, however, who had recently been thinking a good deal on
that very subject, shook his head, remarking that Squire Bull had long
ago expressed his determination that none of his servants should hold
direct intercourse with Peter. "And," said he, "that is precisely
one of the points upon which he is most obstinate and fractious. If
we were openly to broach this matter to him, it might go far to lose
us our places. But I'll tell you what;--there may be a way to get
round the bush, and establish a communication with Peter, without
incurring the scandal. There's my near connection, Mat-o'-the-Mint,
who, between ourselves, is of no earthly use here beyond keeping the
keys of a certain place which shall be nameless. Suppose we send him
out nominally on a visit to Signor Macaroni, or any other squires in
the south, and give him a general roving commission? He'll like the
job vastly, I can tell you; for, of course, we shall charge his whole
expenses to the Squire; and he can take that opportunity of seeing
Peter, and arranging as to future proceedings."
No objection being made to this very convenient arrangement,
Mat-o'-the-Mint received his credentials. This individual was one of
the most lucky men alive, and seemed born specially to refute the
proverb, that service is no inheritance. It was difficult at any
time to say what he was fit for, for he rarely uttered words of more
value than--"Ay, ay! my masters! this is a fine day, as the ancient
philosopher remarked." Or, "In respect to that, my opinion is whatever
Providence may please." Notwithstanding this oracular turn of mind, he
generally contrived to have himself appointed to some snug place in
the household, where there was plenty to get and little to do; and it
is fair to add, that he never forgot any of his own relations, when he
could contrive to provide for them at the Squire's expense.
Peter, who was always alert and vigilant in doing mischief, had, at
this moment, more irons in the fire than usual. In the first place,
he was getting up a private demonstration in his own village, for the
purpose, if possible, of making himself popular with his people, who
used most cordially to detest him. Secondly, he wished to stir up the
whole tenantry of Signor Macaroni against Don Ferdinando, who had for
a long time held a considerable farm in mortgage. Thirdly, he wanted
to make all the world believe that he was an altered character since
the days when he presided at hangings, burnings, torturings, and
other devilish acts of cruelty. And, fourthly, he was most especially
anxious, in one way or another, to get speech of Squire Bull. You must
know that there was a quarrel of long standing between the two; John,
in his younger days, having been insulted and domineered over by Peter
and his emissaries, until his patience could bear it no longer; so,
one fine day, he armed himself with a horsewhip, lashed the whole gang
of them out of Bullockshatch, and swore the most solemn of possible
oaths that they should never again set foot within his property if
he could prevent it; nor would he even acknowledge that such a being
as Peter existed on the face of the earth. Peter, on the other hand,
was resolved that he should get some of his people located on John's
estate, in spite of all his opposition; and, by dint of perseverance,
he ultimately carried his point. For example, Squire Bull would observe
from his window an olive-faced fellow in black clothes and purple
stockings, with a surtout down to his heels, no shirt-collar, and a
shovel hat, pacing down the avenue, and pretending to be reading from a
small book with illuminated characters. At this apparition the Squire
would start, and sing out to the nearest of the servants--"Lookye
there now! what fellow is that? A spy of Peter's, I dare be sworn!
Have I not told you, over and over again, that not one of them shall
be quartered here?" Then the servant whom he accosted would put on
his spectacles, take a long look at the walking spider before him,
and reply quite calmly, "Bless your heart, Squire! you are clean
mistaken altogether. I know that person perfectly well. He is a highly
respectable foreigner, who has taken lodgings for a few months in the
village for the benefit of country air. He is the Bishop of Timbuctoo,
I think--or, now that I look again, I see it is the Vicar-Apostolic of
New Guinea--a most agreeable, accomplished, gentlemanly man, I assure
you." And if this did not satisfy the Squire--which it rarely did, for
he used to growl like a mastiff whenever he caught sight of one of
those gentry--the servant would put it to him whether it was the part
of a Christian and an esquire to harbour ill-will against a gentleman
who was merely residing for temporary purposes upon his estate, and
who occupied a great portion of his time in visiting the sick and in
relieving the poor? On these occasions, John had invariably the worst
of the argument; and the upshot was, that one of these temporary
residenters was presently located in every village of the estate,
and showed no symptom of moving. Very little regard had they for the
spiritual concerns of their flocks in Timbuctoo or New Guinea! But to
make up for that omission, they took immense pains with the tenantry
of Bullockshatch, building chapels in which they burned a mild kind of
consecrated incense, erecting schools wherein they taught the children
gratis, and wheedling everybody in the most amiable and conciliatory
manner possible. They even contrived to make mischief in Martin's
family, as I shall presently have occasion to tell you. As for Peter's
friends on the farm across the pond, they pretended to no disguise
at all, but broadly maintained their intention to support him at all
hazards, and to do his bidding. There were no Bishops of Timbuctoo, or
Terra-del-fuego there. So many of the tenantry were of their opinion,
that they did not care one pinch of snuff for your _præmunires_, or
other legal bugbears.
Now, what Peter wanted was to bring Bullockshatch to precisely the same
condition as the detached farm. He had got himself, as one may say,
firmly established in the lesser spot; and he was determined to move
heaven and earth, and mayhap another place, to acquire an equal footing
in the bigger one. This he could hardly hope to do, without coming
to some sort of terms with Squire Bull, through his servants, and he
had been long privately expecting to find an opportunity by means of
Protocol, who was a reckless creature, and hardly ever condescended
to give a single thought to Martin. Protocol, in fact, was a kind of
secular Peter. He was never so happy as when swimming in troubled
waters; and the main difference between them was, that Protocol cared
for nothing but excitement, whereas Peter never for a moment lost sight
of the main chance. You may conceive, therefore, with what joy the
latter received the intimation that he might expect, in a short while,
to receive a private and confidential visit from no less a person than
Mat-o'-the-Mint. Not that Mat was any great acquisition in himself;
but being a near relative of the Juggler, and also an upper servant
in Squire Bull's household, nothing could be more consonant with the
secret wishes of Peter. So he ordered three chapels to be illuminated,
and a special prayer to be chanted for the conversion of Bullockshatch;
at the mention of which name, it is recorded that some images winked
their eyes!
CHAPTER IV.
HOW MAT-O'-THE-MINT UNDERTOOK AN EXPEDITION TO THE ESTATES OF SIGNOR
MACARONI; AND WHAT FOLLOWED THEREUPON.
Mat-o'-the-Mint, then, having got his roving commission signed in due
form, and his pocket-book well stuffed with bank-notes, set out upon
his tour like an actual walking mystery. It is my opinion, up to the
present hour, that the excellent gentleman had no precise idea of
what he was expected to do; but that his general notion was that he
was bound to give advice--at least such advice as he could give--to
any one who asked him for it. No man can be expected to accomplish
impossibilities: he can merely do his best; and that Mat-o'-the-Mint
was prepared to perform quite conscientiously. It was not his fault,
if those who sent him did not make him comprehend their design; indeed
Protocol, who was a sly fox, and always left a door of escape open for
himself in case of emergency, was not likely to be too specific in his
instructions, or to commit himself irretrievably on paper.
No sooner was it noised abroad that Mat-o'-the-Mint was on his
travels, than there was a considerable stir both among the southern
squirearchy and their tenantry, who were then unfortunately at
loggerheads. Everybody who had a dispute with anybody else wanted to
know what Squire Bull thought of the matter, hoping probably that he
would not be disinclined to lend him a helping hand, and mayhap a few
pounds; for the fellows in those parts laboured under the delusion
that the Squire was made of money. So they were all anxious to get a
confidential hearing from Mat-o'-the-Mint, whom they imagined to be a
very great man indeed, and a very wise one; arguing, naturally enough,
that the Squire would not have entrusted such a mission except to a
person of consummate prudence and discretion. Little they knew of the
Juggler or Protocol, or of the way in which Squire Bull's business was
conducted! But to resume. One fine day Mat-o'-the-Mint arrived on the
estate of a gentleman, Don Vesuvius, who was an old friend of Bull's,
and was received at the boundary by the ground-steward, who, in the
very civilest possible manner, presented his master's compliments, and
requested that Master Matthew would drive straight up to the Hall,
where a handsome suite of apartments was ready for his accommodation.
Privately, and in his heart, Mat would have liked nothing better; but
he was not quite sure whether Protocol would approve of his doing so,
especially as Don Vesuvius was notoriously on bad terms with some of
his own people. So he thought it best to decline for the present.
"My compliments," quoth he, "to your master, and say to him that I am
quite sensible that he has done the proper thing in asking me to the
Hall. But you see that I am so situated that I can't very well come. My
master, the squire, has heard a good deal of what is going on in these
parts; and though, as a matter of course, he has no wish to interfere
between the Don and his tenantry, yet the fact is that, under present
circumstances, I had better put up at the inn. Say to your master that
I shall be glad to see him there, any time he may be passing; at all
events, I shall certainly make a point of writing him my opinion on
the general question, in the course of a day or so."
Now, it so happened that there were a number of lazy-looking fellows,
with knives in their belts, loitering around the drosky while
Mat-o'-the-Mint delivered this answer to the ground steward; and these
were precisely the worst of the whole crew with whom Don Vesuvius
was at feud. Who so rejoiced as they to find that Squire Bull's
confidential servant was likely to be on their side! They threw up
their hats, and brayed, and danced, and cut fandangos, to all which
Mat-o'-the-Mint replied by taking off his hat and bowing like a Chinese
mandarin. At last, in the exuberance of their joy, the crowd took the
horses out of the vehicle, and fairly dragged him to the village inn,
leaving the unhappy ground steward as disconsolate as Ariadne on Naxos.
No sooner were they arrived at the inn, than Mat asked a number of
the men to step up to his sitting-room; and having questioned them
regarding their grievances, which you may be sure they took care to
magnify to the utmost, he called for pen, ink, and paper, and sate
himself down to write a long epistle to Don Vesuvius. I can't give
you the particulars of this document, further than that it contained
an intimation that in his, Mat-o'-the-Mint's opinion, the gentleman
had been very much misled in the management of his own affairs. That
for the sake of restoring peace and tranquillity, it appeared to the
aforesaid Matthew that Don Vesuvius would do well to surrender one half
of his estate to the tenantry, without receiving any consideration
for it; and that if this arrangement, which he merely ventured to
suggest, should meet with approbation, there could be no difficulty
whatever in reducing the rents on the remaining half. As also that the
undersigned was with the highest consideration, &c. &c. Having finished
this doughty epistle, which he despatched by the boots of the inn, Mat
ordered his equipage, and drove away to another estate, as proud as
Punch, amidst the shouts of the whole idlers of the village.
You may fancy the astonishment of the honest gentleman when he read
Mat's letter. It was some time before he could believe the evidence of
his spectacles. "Good heavens!" he said, "is it possible that Squire
Bull can treat an old friend and fellow-sportsman thus? Haven't I
dozens upon dozens of letters under his own hand, guaranteeing me
possession of my whole estate, and am I now to be fobbed off in this
way, and insulted to boot by an old trencherman of whom nobody ever
heard? But I won't believe it! It must be some trick of that rascal,
Protocol, who is perpetually writing letters without authority in the
name of his master--at all events, I won't submit to be dictated to, in
the disposal of my own, by the best Squire living!"
By this time, however, the riotous portion of the tenantry were fully
possessed with the notion that Squire Bull was ready to back them up
to any extent; so they began a regular insurrection, fired at the
gamekeepers, beat the watchmen, and barricaded one of the villages,
after they had thoroughly plundered it. But they reckoned without their
host; for the tenantry on the home farm were to a man true to their
master, and having armed themselves, they crossed the canal, (in which,
by the way, some of John's barges were lying, it was thought with the
connivance of Protocol,) and gave the rascally rabble such a drubbing,
that nothing more was heard afterwards about the partition of the
property. The rioters, however, believe to this hour that they were
deceived by Squire Bull, who, they aver, had promised to support them,
and they accordingly hate him like ratsbane; neither, as you may well
conceive, is Don Vesuvius, whose property was proposed to be divided,
over and above grateful for this impudent interference with his private
affairs.