MOSES displays his inventive power in catching mutton. The storm bursts,
and the tricks of Twm and Moses are discovered. Hukin Heer informs, and
receives his reward. The house is in an uproar.
As the material of their feasting was waning, like a pleasant moon that
declines towards the latter quarter, Moses grew more and more uneasy, as
foul food or starvation was staring him in the face, night and day. As
he utterly failed to sleep, he employed the silent hours of midnight to
hatch a scheme for the procurement of future provender. “Twm,” quoth the
young schemer one morning, “you love mutton, and so do I; and as you
provided the pancakes and the pigs, as well as the fish, (a quinsey fill
the throats that swallowed them!) it is now my turn to be founder of the
feast. I will not only find the feast, but I will manage matters so
well, that Sheeny Greeg herself shall cook it for us.”
Then he related, as Morris had informed him, how in former years the
sheep had repeatedly fallen headlong from the height of Allty Craig, and
been killed, and how since those times he had made a thick hedge to keep
them from the edge of the precipice. “But we won’t be so particular
now,” said Moses, “for I mean to get up an accident for one of the sheep.
Then we may eat and be happy again; we’ll have a change this time. It
was pork before, and now we’ll have mutton.”
“With all my heart,” said Twm, “only do it all yourself, then we shall
see what you can do without my assistance.” Thus challenged, Moses felt
it as a point of humour to proceed in the affair alone.
Explanatory of what follows, it is here necessary to quote the
observation of one of our best South Wales tourists, on the subject of
the Welsh hilly sheep. “I was much struck,” says Malkin, “with the
difference between the hilly sheep and those of the vale; the former are
not only smaller, but infinitely more elegant and picturesque in figure.
They seemed to have all their wits about them, so that one would think
the race had acquired its proverbial character for silliness by feeding
on rich and artificial pastures, without having inherited it originally
in the state of nature. When we got into the lane, we met with a flock
of several hundred, which live among the rocks all the year round, only
coming down in shearing time. They had us in front, and their shepherd
and his dog in the rear. _The bounds many of them made in avoiding us_,
_were equally powerful and lofty with those of wild goats_.”
Even such was the woolly tribe, from which the insatiate Jew was now
preparing to select a victim. Ambitious of the sole credit of the
enterprise, he desired Twm to stay below and leave him to follow his own
plan. Scarcely thinking of the matter in hand, Twm took his seat on a
gate, opposite to the lofty cliff of Allty Craig Llwyd, pondering in his
mind about his distant home, the loved scenes which he had left for
these, and above all, his mother, from whom he had been so long
separated. Moses wound up the hill, and attained the top at the back of
the cliff.
With the assistance of the farm-dog he soon drove one of the finest of
the wethers into the angular nook formed by the hedge of the adjoining
wood, and that which screened from the edge of the terrific cliff. The
dog, being set on, barked and bit incessantly, while Moses shouted and
bellowed with waving arms, till, worried by stupidity at last, the sheep
bounded up, and sprang far over the hedge, and downward in the yielding
air—ignorant of the yawning gulf behind the hedge, and the snare laid for
his life! Moses set up a triumphant yell like that of a wild Indian, as
he peered over the precipice and saw the downward movements of the poor
sheep. Startled with the shout of Moses, at this moment Twm looked up,
and saw the animal describing a rainbow sweep, and turning over and over
in its descent through the air, and its ultimate fall into the quarry
beneath, where it dropped lifeless.
So little did our hero relish this cruel affair that he would scarcely
speak to Moses, when the latter expected high applause for his handywork.
But the Jew-boy, nothing daunted, ran to the farmer, whom he found
cobbling up an old plough in the yard, to save expense of paying a
wheelwright.
“Oh dear! Oh dear!” whined Moses, with the greatest appearance of
heart-touched concern, “a terrible accident has happened—one of the
sheep—the fattest and finest of the whole flock—has just sprung over the
hedge above Allty Craig, and broke its beautiful neck.” Morris threw
down the axe he was using, and looked nearly as sorry, angry, and
despondent as he felt. “Nothing but misfortunes!” cried he at last,
“nothing but misfortunes for me, wretched man that I am!” his thoughts
dwelling at that moment on the fine pig that he lately lost. “First a
fine pig, and now my finest sheep. Verily, this must be the end of the
world, such judgments could not come without reason!”
“Hadn’t we better cut his throat to save his life,” inquired Moses in the
most compassionate and tender tone that he could assume, forgetting the
slight anomaly which his suggestion presented; “and then, sir, hadn’t we
better skin him too?” continued the young slip of Judaism. “If he isn’t
bled directly, and nothing said about the accident, the women will vote
him to be buried in the same grave with the hog, considering his
beautiful mutton as no better than so much carrion. You know the women
are so shamefully dainty in such matters.”
This wily speech won the entire approbation of Morris Greeg, and patting
Moses’s shoulder, he thanked Providence that he had so faithful a
servant; adding in the same breath, “be sure you don’t cut the skin.”
This gave Twm and Moses full employment for the rest of the evening,
while Morris entered the house, and delivered the startling intelligence
to his household that he had determined to give them all a treat, and
that for this purpose he had ordered one of the finest sheep to be
slaughtered, that they might have fresh mutton.
It was just as the first dinner from this promised feast was finished, on
the day following, that Hukin Heer, that tall lanky cottager, whose dog
had been killed by Moses, under the imputation of madness, called on
Morris and Sheeny; and in a self-sufficient mysterious manner, informed
them that he had a long story to tell them. As he cast a furious look at
Moses, that worthy felt an inward conviction that his long story boded
him no good; so taking up his hat in a hurried manner, he prepared to
depart. Hukin Heer, however, told Morris, that as his tidings concerned
the whole household, and that he was a man who scorned to criminate any
one behind his back, he particularly wished that Moses and Twm should be
present, to hear all that he had to urge against them. Moses treated his
insinuations with a bold look of defiance as his insignificant features
could possibly assume, yet trembling with dread that some important
discoveries to his disadvantage were to be made.
Twm’s only amusement at that moment consisted in watching the terrified
expression upon the countenance of the young Israelite, and in mentally
commenting upon the probable consequences of Heer’s information. Now all
the family were seated round; Hukin occupying a chair that commanded the
passage, in case the culprits aimed to escape, and Sheeny with her female
brood, bursting with curiosity to hear what diableries Hukin had to
unfold.
It turned out that this unlucky cottager, on the destruction of whose
cur, by the relentless hand of Moses, fled in the utmost alarm at the
supposed damages done by him, according to the insinuations of Twm, under
the influence of canine madness. This, Hukin knew to be a fabrication,
and suspecting the rest to be so, indulged in bitter feelings of
resentment against the insignificant Jew whelp, as he called him, who on
false pretences had destroyed his poor dog. Brooding over his wrongs, he
at times revenged himself, in the early dark winter evenings, by tearing
the hedges of Morris Greeg, by which amiable pastime he repaired the
deficiency of his own fuel, and gave endless labour to those parish
apprentices to repair them.
One eventful evening he caught up the clue which furnished him with the
means of revenge. He was returning home, after despoiling the hedges,
when he heard the sound of footsteps; at once he concealed himself and
his load of faggots, and like a stealthy spy, awaited the results. While
in this position, by the imperfect light of a dull moon, he caught a full
view of Twm and Moses. Abandoning his load of wood, he dogged their
steps till they were housed in the hovel of Mike the mat-man. He then
saw the inmates enjoying the lingering remains of the pig, gloating over
it, and making sundry comments which might, to say the least, be
considered suspicious. For several nights Heer followed them, and saw
the same scene enacted; he had at last gathered a full and connected
narrative of the whole affair, and it was an intense satisfaction to have
these sweet means of revenge in his possession.
On the day previous to the present, in the full glow of triumphant
malice, he called on Mike, and informed him that his midnight feastings
were discovered. Poor Mike trembled with apprehension of the evil
consequences that might accrue to him; and in the hope of propitiating
the angry spirit of his revengeful neighbour, confessed all he knew,
which was everything, about the matter. It seemed as if the spirit of
vengeance had yielded a favourable ear to Hukin’s desires; for on this
same evening, as he lurked in the wood adjoining Allty Craig, and only
separated from it by the hedge, it was his lot to witness the last
enormity of Moses, in driving the sheep, on which they had been feeding,
over the dreadful precipice.
All these particulars, with the exception of his own part in despoiling
the hedges, he narrated before the present assembled party, with the most
enlarged minuteness, while the different members of the family were
agitated with various feelings as they listened to his exaggerated
account of the affair.
Vain would be the attempt to seek words that could do adequate justice in
describing the effects of this discovery on the countenance of the
economic Morris, and that amiable provider of short commons, his wife.
If one groaned forth her unutterable grief, the other ground his teeth;
and in the vehemence of his wrath could not help thinking that the penal
statutes required amendment—that it was an infamous interference on the
part of the law to call the sacrifice of a parish apprentice or two, in
the way of just resentment, by the hideous name of murder; while to his
thinking, it was much less criminal than clandestinely killing a pig or a
sheep, that would fetch so much more money. Almost delirious with his
troubles, he paced the house to and fro, at the frantic rate of five
miles to the hour, muttering to himself a complete summary of the evils
that had befallen him.
“Pig not mad—tickled by the sand in his ear—all eaten by the boys and the
mat-man—curse their stomachs!—sheep driven over the precipice—worth ten
shillings—Oh!—villainy unheard of—the world was innocent till now—all
former villainy child’s play to this—the latter day is coming fast—signs
like these are not given for nothing! The prophets have said”—
“What’s become of all the fine lard, you cut-throat villains?” whined
Sheeny, in the most touching accents, thinking of the _tesian vroy_, or
short cake, that was lost to her forever; while the younger lasses looked
bewildered at the prophetic passage alluded, and wondering where it was
to be found. As nobody answered her interesting inquiry, Sheeny
continued to bite her nails and drum the devil’s tattoo with the heel of
the wooden shoe; while Hukin Heer grinned like a demon at the mischief
which he had made.
Both Morris and Sheeny were at length roused from their stupor by the
inquiry of Hukin,—“Well, what be you going to do with them? I have a
couple of hairy halters in my pockets here, that I brought for the
purpose; we had better tie their hands behind them, and send them at once
in a cart to jail, where they will be hanged, drawn, and quarted, as a
warning to all rogues who take away the lives of innocent dogs,”—“and
pigs!” roared Griffith; “and sheep!” shrieked Sheeny, as a climax to the
whole.
Twm and Moses were on the alert, and in less time than it takes us to
narrate the fact, Moses threw a three-legged stool at the informer, and
that with such force that it fractured the elbow-bone of his right arm.
In an instant Hukin recovered himself, and was about to rush on the young
Jew. But Twm Shon Catty was ready, his “soul was in arms and eager for
the fray.” As Hukin advanced, Twm launched a heavy oaken stool at his
head, which laid his lank carcass on the floor, bathed in blood. The
scene was almost taking a tragic turn when Sheeny changed its spirit by
attacking Moses with a birch broom, while one of the younger was pricking
him in the breech with a toasting-fork, till he blared like a beaten
calf. In the confusion of the fray, Shaan attacked her father with a
dirty flummery ladle, that whitened and disfigured his black beard and
whiskers, as if a barber had commenced his operations, while the good man
stood open-mouthed marvelling whether these were not additional signs of
approaching doom.
Aware that these ladle-bastings were intended for himself, Twm caught
Shaan behind, and holding her elbows fast to her sides, gave her a twist
round, and inflicting a tremendous kiss on her fat blubbery lips; then
pouting with passion, he loosened his hold, and springing over the
prostrate carcass of Hukin Heer, retreated through the doorway in good
order. Moses followed, but with considerable confusion; dodging his
head, and rubbing his seat of honour in his retreat, as the visions of
birch-brooms and toasting-forks haunted him long after he was far beyond
their reach, whilst seating himself was made a painful operation, and he
mentally thought he had undergone the same punishment as he had seen
somewhere in an old print, where his satanic majesty was impaling an old
witch in that portion of her body, _for the convenience of which_,
_chairs were originally invented_.