“AUD ADAM OLLIVER.”
“Though old, he still retain’d
His manly sense and energy of mind,
Virtuous and wise he was, but not severe;
He still remembered that he once was young;
His easy presence checked no decent joy,
Him even the dissolute admired; for he
A graceful looseness, when he pleased, put on,
And, laughing, could instruct.”
_Armstrong._
The nearest neighbour to Nathan Blyth was an old farm labourer called
Adam Olliver, who for forty years and more, as man and boy, had toiled
and moiled on Gregory Houston’s farm. He had now reached an age at
which he was unequal to prolonged and heavy labour, and so he spent
his time in cutting and trimming the farmer’s hedges--his thoughtful
master giving him to understand that though his wages were to be
continued as usual, he was at full liberty to work when it pleased
him, and to rest when he chose. The old man used to ride to and from
his labour on a meek and mild old donkey, which rejoiced in the name
of Balaam, and which was never known to travel at any other pace than
a slow jog-trot, or to carry any other rider than his master. No
sooner did old Balaam become conscious that he was bestridden by any
unfamiliar biped, than he curved his neck downwards, placed his head
between his knees, elevated his hinder quarters suddenly into mid-air,
and ejected the unwelcome tenant of the saddle, and with so brief a
notice to quit, that he had generally completed an involuntary
somersault, and was landed on Mother Earth, before he knew the nature
of the indignity to which he had been subjected.
Adam was somewhat short in stature, thick-set in form and frame; his
hair was short and grizzly, and his thick iron-grey eyebrows
overarched a pair of twinkling blue eyes, full of keen insight and
kindly humour. His fustian coat and battered “Jim Crow,” like his
wrinkled and sun-browned features, were “weather-tanned, a duffil
grey,” and, like his own bending frame, were a good deal worse for
wear. A pair of old corduroy nether garments, buttoned at the knees,
with gaiters of the same material, affording a peep at the warm,
coarse-ribbed, blue worsted stockings underneath, with hobnailed boots
armed with heel and toe-plates, all helped to make up a very quaint
and favourable picture of his class--a class common enough upon the
Yorkshire farms.
Adam Olliver’s talk was the very broadest Doric of the broadest
dialect to be found amid all the phonetic fantasies of England, and
his responses to the inquiries of tourists and others, not “to the
manner born,” who asked the old hedge-cutter the way, say to Kesterton
or Hazelby, were given in what was, to all intents and purposes, high
Dutch to the bewildered listeners. They would have been left in
glorious uncertainty as to his meaning, but that Old Adam’s energetic
and oratorical action generally sufficed to speed the querist in the
right direction. He was an honest, upright, intelligent Christian, was
Adam, and an old-standing member of the little Methodist society,
which had managed to hold its own in the village of Nestleton, and
which, for want of a chapel, held its meetings in Farmer Houston’s
kitchen. All the villagers held the old man in respect, and few there
were who did not enjoy “a crack o’ talk” with the old hedger. His odd
humour, sound piety, and practical common sense, were expressed in
short, sharp, nuggety sentences, which hit the nail on the head with a
thump that drove it home without the need of a second blow. But I hope
to give Adam Olliver abundant opportunity to speak for himself, and
will say no more than that his “Aud Woman,” as he called his good wife
Judith, or Judy in Yorkshire parlance, had been the partner of his
joys and sorrows for nearly forty years, and was still a buxom body
for her age; that of his three children, Jake the eldest, was Farmer
Houston’s foreman; Pete, the second, was seeking his fortune in
America; and Hannah, a strapping good-looking lass of nineteen, was
under-housemaid at Waverdale Hall, and that all of them will ever and
anon appear in the true and impartial village annals I am here
recording.
On the evening of a fine spring day, Old Adam, having made Balaam snug
and comfortable in a little thatched, half-tumble-down outhouse which
did duty for a stable, and having despatched his frugal evening meal,
was seated on a small wooden bench outside his cottage door, enjoying
the fragrance of some tobacco which Pete had sent him, using for that
purpose a short black pipe of small dimensions, strong flavour, and
indefinite age.
“Hallo! Adam; then you are burning your idol again,” said Blithe
Natty, who had sauntered round for a little gossip.
“Hey,” said Adam, “you see he’s like a good monny idols ov another
sooat. He tak’s a plaguey deal o’ manishin’. He’s a reg’lar
salimander. Ah’ve been at him off an’ on for weel nigh fotty year, an’
he’s a teeaf ’un; bud,” said he, with a twinkle in his eye, “Ah’ll
tak’ good care ’at he ends i’ smook.”
“Ha! ha! ha!” laughed Natty, as he leaned his arms on the little
garden gate, and swung it to and fro. “I can’t tell how it is you
enjoy it so. It would soon do my business for me.”
“Why, ‘there’s neea accoontin’ for teeast,’ as t’ aud woman said when
she kissed ’er coo, bud ah reckon you’ve tried it, if t’ truth wer’
knoan; an’ y’ see, it isn’t ivverybody,” with another twinkle, “’at ez
eeather talents or passevearance te mak’ a smooker. Like monny other
clever things, its nobbut sum ’at ez t’ gift te deea ’em. There’s Jim
Raspin, noo; he’s been scrapin’ away on a fiddle for a twelvemonth,
an’ when he’s deean ’is best, he can nobbut mak’ a grumplin’ noise
like a pig iv a fit. Ah can’t deea mitch, but ah can clip a hedge an’
smook a pipe, an’ that’s better then being a Jack ov all trayds an’
maister o’ neean.”
Here the old man blew out a long cloud of curling smoke, and laying
down his short pipe by the side of him, he gave a low chuckle of
satisfaction at having come out triumphant from an attack on the only
weakness of which he could be convicted.
“Ah see,” said he, “’at you’ve getten Lucy yam ageean, an’ a feyn
smart wench she is. They say ‘feyn feathers mak’s feyn bods,’ but
she’s a bonny bod i’ grey roosset, an’ depends for her prattiness mair
on ’er feeace an’ manners then on ’er cleease.”
“Yes,” said Natty, well pleased with this genuine compliment on his
darling; “Lucy is a fine lass and a good ’un, and makes the old house,
which has been gloomy enough, as bright as sunshine.”
“God bless ’er,” said the old man, warmly; “an’ if she gets t’ grace
o’ God she’ll be prattier still. There’s neea beauty like religion,
Natty, an’ t’ robe o’ righteousness sets off a cotton goon as mitch as
silk an’ velvet.”
“Hey, that’s true enough,” said Nathan Blyth; “an’ Lucy’s all right on
that point. She isn’t a stranger to religion. She loves her Bible and
her Saviour, and her conduct is all that heart can wish.”
“Ah’s waint an’ glad to hear it,” said Adam. “Meeast o’ d’ young
lasses noo-a-days seeam to me te mind nowt but falderals an’ ribbins.
They cover their backs wi’ tinsel an’ fill their brains wi’ caff till
they leeak like moontebanks, an’ their heeads is as soft as a feather
bed.
‘Mary i’ the dairy
Wad fain be a fairy,
Wi’ wings an’ a kirtle o’ green;
Mary spoils ’er butter,
Puts t’ good wife in a flutter,
A lazy good-for-nothing quean.
Silly, silly Mary!
Bid good-bye te the fairy,
Leeak te the butter an’ the cheese;
Be quick an’ ’arn the siller.
Marry Matt the Miller,
Then live as happy as you pleease.’”
“Who’s going to marry Matt, the miller, I wonder, Adam Olliver?” said
Lucy Blyth, suddenly peeping over her father’s shoulder by the garden
gate.
“Odd’s bobs,” said the startled hedger; “‘you come all at yance,’ as
t’ man said when t’ sack o’ floor dropt on his nob. Why, Lucy, me’
lass, is it you? Ah’s waint an’ glad to see yer’ bonny feeace ageean.
Come in a minnit. Judy! Judy! Here’s somebody come ’at it’ll deea your
and een good te leeak at.”
Out came Judith Olliver, in her brown stuff gown and checked apron, a
small three-cornered plaid shawl across her shoulders, and with her
white hair neatly gathered beneath a cap of white muslin, double
frilled and tied beneath the dimpled chin--as comely and motherly an
old cottager as you could wish to see.
“Dear heart,” said Mrs. Olliver, as Lucy kissed her cheek, looking on
the bright girl in unconstrained admiration, “Can this be little Lucy
Blyth?”
At that moment a fine, tall, gentlemanly youth of some two-and-twenty
summers, paused as he passed the garden gate. Turning his open
handsome face toward the speaker, his eyes fell on the radiant beauty
of the blacksmith’s daughter; he recognised the features of his
childish “sweetheart” with a thrill of something more than wonder,
and, resuming his walk, “Master Philip” repeated again and again
Judith Olliver’s inquiry, “Can this be little Lucy Blyth?”