Last week I went over to Yarmouth and saw Squire. I was prepared, and I
think you were, to find a quaint old gentleman of the last century. Alas
for guesses at History! I found a wholesome, well-grown, florid, clear-
eyed, open-browed, man of about my own age! There was no difficulty at
all in coming to the subject at once, and tackling it. Squire is, I
think, a straight-forward, choleric, ingenuous fellow--a little
mad--cracks away at his family affairs. 'One brother is a rascal--another
a spend-thrift--his father was of an amazing size--a prodigious eater,
etc.--the family all gone to _smithers_,' etc. I liked Squire well: and
told him he must go to you; I am sure you will like him better than the
London penny-a-liners. He is rather a study: and besides he can tell you
bits of his Ancestor's journal; which will indeed make you tear your hair
for what is burned--Between two and three hundred folio pages of MSS. by
a fellow who served under Oliver; been sent on secret service by him;
dreaded him: but could not help serving him--Squire told me a few
circumstances which he had picked up in running over the Journal before
he burnt it; and which you ought to hear from himself before long.
Dreadful stories of Oliver's severity; soldiers cut down by sabre on
parade for 'violence to women'--a son shot on the spot just before his
Father's house for having tampered with Royalists--no quarter to
spies--noses and ears of Royalists slit in retaliation of a like injury
done to Roundheads;--many deeds which that ancient Squire witnessed, or
knew for certain, and which he and his successor thought severe and
_cruel_:--but I could make out nothing unjust--I am very sure _you_ would
not. The Journalist told a story of Peterboro' Cathedral like yours in
your book about Ely:--Oliver marching in as the bells were ringing to
service: bundling out canons, prebendaries, choristers, with the flat of
the sword; and then standing up to preach himself in his armour! A grand
picture. Afterwards they broke the painted windows which I should count
injudicious;--but that I sometimes feel a desire that some boys would go
and do likewise to the Pusey _votive_ windows; if you know that branch of
art.
Ancestor Squire got angry with Oliver toward the end of the Journal; on
some such account as this--Cromwell had promised him a sum of money; but
the ancestor got taken prisoner by pirate or privateer before he went to
claim the money; had to be redeemed by Oliver; and the redemption money
was subtracted from the whole sum promised by Oliver when payment-time
came. This proceeding seemed to both Squires, living and dead, shabby;
but one not belonging to the family may be permitted to think it all
fair.
On the whole, I suspect you would have used Ancestor Squire as you have
used many others who have helped you to materials of his kind; like a
sucked orange: you would have tossed him into the dirt carelessly, I
doubt; and then what would Squire minor have said? Yet he himself did
not like all his Ancestor had done; the _secret_ service, which our
Squire called '_spy-age_'; going to Holland with messages and despatches
which he was to deliver to some one who was to meet him on the quay, and
show him a gold ring; the man with the gold ring supposed to be the
Stadtholder! I tried to persuade our friend there was no great shame in
being an agent of this sort; but he said with a light rap on the table
that _he_ wouldn't do such a thing.
I have now told you something of what remains in my head after our
conference; but you must see the man. What gave us the idea of his being
old was his old-fashioned notions; he and his family have lived in
Peterboro' and such retired places these three hundred years; and amazing
as it may seem to us that any people should be ashamed that their
ancestors fought for Low Church, yet two hundred years are but as a day
in a Cathedral Close. Nothing gives one more the idea of the Sleeping
Palace than that. Esto perpetua! I mean, as long as I live at least.
When I expressed wonder to Squire that his wife's friends, or his
Peterboro' friends, should be so solicitous about the world's ever
knowing that their ancestors had received letters from Cromwell, he very
earnestly assured me that he knew some cases in which persons'
advancement in public life had been suddenly stopt by the Queen or her
ministers, when it got wind that they were related in any way to
Cromwell! I thought this a piece of dotage, as I do now; but I have
heard elsewhere of some one not being allowed to take the name of
Cromwell; I mean not very many years back; but more likely under a George
than under a Victoria.
I think Squire must be a little crazy on this score; that is, the old
dotage of a Cathedral town superstition worked up into activity by a
choleric disposition. He seems, as I told you, of the sanguine
temperament; and he mentioned a long illness during which he was not
allowed to read a book, etc., which looks like some touch of the head.
Perhaps brain fever. Perhaps no such thing, but all my fancy. He was
very civil; ordered in a bottle of Sherry and biscuits: asked me to dine,
which I could not do. And so ends my long story. But you must see him.
Yours,