Time passed on, and Belle and I lived in the dingle; when I say lived,
the reader must not imagine that we were always there. She went out upon
her pursuits, and I went out where inclination led me; but my excursions
were very short ones, and hers occasionally occupied whole days and
nights. If I am asked how we passed the time when we were together in
the dingle, I would answer that we passed the time very tolerably, all
things considered; we conversed together, and when tired of conversing I
would sometimes give Belle a lesson in Armenian; her progress was not
particularly brilliant, but upon the whole satisfactory; in about a
fortnight she had hung up 100 Haikan numerals upon the hake of her
memory. I found her conversation highly entertaining; she had seen much
of England and Wales, and had been acquainted with some of the most
remarkable characters who travelled the roads at that period; and let me
be permitted to say that many remarkable characters have travelled the
roads of England, of whom fame has never said a word. I loved to hear
her anecdotes of these people; some of whom I found had occasionally
attempted to lay violent hands either upon her person or effects, and had
invariably been humbled by her without the assistance of either justice
or constable. I could clearly see, however, that she was rather tired of
England, and wished for a change of scene; she was particularly fond of
talking of America, to which country her aspirations chiefly tended. She
had heard much of America, which had excited her imagination; for at that
time America was much talked of, on roads and in homesteads, at least so
said Belle, who had good opportunities of knowing, and most people
allowed that it was a good country for adventurous English. The people
who chiefly spoke against it, as she informed me, were soldiers disbanded
upon pensions, the sextons of village churches, and excisemen. Belle had
a craving desire to visit that country, and to wander with cart and
little animal amongst its forests; when I would occasionally object, that
she would be exposed to danger from strange and perverse customers, she
said that she had not wandered the roads of England so long and alone, to
be afraid of anything which might befall in America; and that she hoped,
with God's favour, to be able to take her own part, and to give to
perverse customers as good as they might bring. She had a dauntless
heart that same Belle. Such was the staple of Belle's conversation. As
for mine, I would endeavour to entertain her with strange dreams of
adventure, in which I figured in opaque forests, strangling wild beasts,
or discovering and plundering the hordes of dragons; and sometimes I
would narrate to her other things far more genuine--how I had tamed
savage mares, wrestled with Satan, and had dealings with ferocious
publishers. Belle had a kind heart, and would weep at the accounts I
gave her of my early wrestlings with the dark monarch. She would sigh,
too, as I recounted the many slights and degradations I had received at
the hands of ferocious publishers; but she had the curiosity of a woman;
and once, when I talked to her of the triumphs which I had achieved over
unbroken mares, she lifted up her head and questioned me as to the secret
of the virtue which I possessed over the aforesaid animals; whereupon I
sternly reprimanded, and forthwith commanded her to repeat the Armenian
numerals; and, on her demurring, I made use of words, to escape which she
was glad to comply, saying the Armenian numerals from one to a hundred,
which numerals, as a punishment for her curiosity, I made her repeat
three times, loading her with the bitterest reproaches whenever she
committed the slightest error, either in accent or pronunciation, which
reproaches she appeared to bear with the greatest patience. And now I
have given a very fair account of the manner in which Isopel Berners and
myself passed our time in the dingle.