tender-hearted Lady Lillycraft, who knew the story by heart, had led
the way in weeping, and indeed had often begun to shed tears before
they had come to the right place.
The fair Julia was a little flurried at the passage where wedding
preparations were mentioned; but the auditor most affected was the
simple Phoebe Wilkins. She had gradually dropt her work in her lap,
and sat sobbing through the latter part of the story, until towards
the end, when the happy reverse had nearly produced another scene of
hysterics. "Go, take this case to my room again, child," said Lady
Lillycraft, kindly, "and don't cry so much."
"I won't, an't please your ladyship, if I can help it;--but I'm glad
they made all up again, and were married."
By the way, the case of this lovelorn damsel begins to make some talk
in the household, especially among certain little ladies, not far in
their teens, of whom she has made confidants. She is a great favourite
with them all, but particularly so since she has confided to them her
love secrets. They enter into her concerns with all the violent zeal
and overwhelming sympathy with which little boarding-school ladies
engage in the politics of a love affair.
I have noticed them frequently clustering about her in private
conferences, or walking up and down the garden terrace under my
window, listening to some long and dolorous story of her afflictions;
of which I could now and then distinguish the ever-recurring phrases,
"says he," and "says she."
I accidentally interrupted one of these little councils of war, when
they were all huddled together under a tree, and seemed to be
earnestly considering some interesting document. The flutter at my
approach showed that there were some secrets under discussion; and I
observed the disconsolate Phoebe crumpling into her bosom either a
love-letter or an old valentine, and brushing away the tears from her
cheeks.
The girl is a good girl, of a soft melting nature, and shows her
concern at the cruelty of her lover only in tears and drooping looks;
but with the little ladies who have espoused her cause, it sparkles up
into fiery indignation: and I have noticed on Sunday many a glance
darted at the pew of the Tibbets's, enough even to melt down the
silver buttons on old Ready Money's jacket.
TRAVELLING.
A citizen, for recreation sake,
To see the country would a journey take
Some dozen mile, or very little more;
Taking his leave with friends two months before,
With drinking healths, and shaking by the hand,
As he had travail'd to some new-found land.
--_Doctor Merrie-Man_, 1609.
The Squire has lately received another shock in the saddle, and been
almost unseated by his marplot neighbour, the indefatigable Mr. Faddy,
who rides his jog-trot hobby with equal zeal; and is so bent upon
improving and reforming the neighbourhood, that the Squire thinks, in
a little while, it will be scarce worth living in. The enormity that
has thus discomposed my worthy host, is an attempt of the manufacturer
to have a line of coaches established, that shall diverge from the old
route, and pass through the neighbouring village.
I believe I have mentioned that the Hall is situated in a retired part
of the country, at a distance from any great coachroad; insomuch that
the arrival of a traveller is apt to make every one look out of the
window, and to cause some talk among the ale-drinkers at the little
inn. I was at a loss, therefore, to account for the Squire's
indignation at a measure apparently fraught with convenience and
advantage, until I found that the conveniences of travelling were
among his greatest grievances.
In fact, he rails against stage-coaches, post-chaises, and
turnpike-roads, as serious causes of the corruption of English rural
manners. They have given facilities, he says, to every humdrum citizen
to trundle his family about the kingdom, and have sent the follies and
fashions of town, whirling, in coachloads, to the remotest parts of
the island. The whole country, he says, is traversed by these flying
cargoes; every by-road is explored by enterprising tourists from
Cheapside and the Poultry, and every gentleman's park and lawns
invaded by cockney sketchers of both sexes, with portable chairs and
portfolios for drawing.
He laments over this, as destroying the charm of privacy, and
interrupting the quiet of country life; but more especially as
affecting the simplicity of the peasantry, and filling their heads
with half-city notions. A great coach-inn, he says, is enough to ruin
the manners of a whole village. It creates a horde of sots and idlers,
makes gapers and gazers and newsmongers of the common people, and
knowing jockeys of the country bumpkins.
The Squire has something of the old feudal feeling. He looks back with
regret to the "good old times" when journeys were only made on
horseback, and the extraordinary difficulties of travelling, owing to
bad roads, bad accommodations, and highway robbers, seemed to separate
each village and hamlet from the rest of the world. The lord of the
manor was then a kind of monarch in the little realm around him. He
held his court in his paternal hall, and was looked up to with almost
as much loyalty and deference as the king himself. Every neighbourhood
was a little world within itself, having its local manners and
customs, its local history and local opinions. The inhabitants were
fonder of their homes, and thought less of wandering. It was looked
upon as an expedition to travel out of sight of the parish steeple;
and a man that had been to London was a village oracle for the rest of
his life.
What a difference between the mode of travelling in those days and at
present! At that time, when a gentleman went on a distant visit, he
sallied forth like a knight-errant on an enterprise, and every family
excursion was a pageant. How splendid and fanciful must one of those
domestic cavalcades have been, where the beautiful dames were mounted
on palfreys magnificently caparisoned, with embroidered harness, all
tinkling with silver bells, attended by cavaliers richly attired on
prancing steeds, and followed by pages and serving-men, as we see them
represented in old tapestry! The gentry, as they travelled about in
those days, were like moving pictures. They delighted the eyes and
awakened the admiration of the common people, and passed before them
like superior beings; and, indeed, they were so; there was a hardy and
healthful exercise connected with this equestrian style that made them
generous and noble.
In his fondness for the old style of travelling, the Squire makes most
of his journeys on horseback, though he laments the modern deficiency
of incident on the road, from the want of fellow-wayfarers, and the
rapidity with which every one else is whirled along in coaches and
post-chaises. In the "good old times," on the contrary, a cavalier
jogged on through bog and mire, from town to town and hamlet to
hamlet, conversing with friars and franklins, and all other chance
companions of the road; beguiling the way with travellers' tales,
which then were truly wonderful, for every thing beyond one's
neighbourhood was full of marvel and romance; stopping at night at
some "hostel," where the bush over the door proclaimed good wine, or a
pretty hostess made bad wine palatable; meeting at supper with
travellers, or listening to the song or merry story of the host, who
was generally a boon companion, and presided at his own board; for,
according to old Tusser's "Innholder's Posie,"
"At meales my friend who vitleth here
And sitteth with his host,
Shall both be sure of better cheere,
And 'scape with lesser cost."
The Squire is fond, too, of stopping at those inns which may be met
with here and there in ancient houses of wood and plaster, or
calimanco houses, as they are called by antiquaries, with deep
porches, diamond-paned bow-windows, pannelled rooms, and great
fire-places. He will prefer them to more spacious and modern inns, and
would cheerfully put up with bad cheer and bad accommodations in the
gratification of his humour. They give him, he says, the feelings of
old times, insomuch that he almost expects in the dusk of the evening
to see some party of weary travellers ride up to the door with plumes
and mantles, trunk-hose, wide boots, and long rapiers.
The good Squire's remarks brought to mind a visit that I once paid to
the Tabbard Inn, famous for being the place of assemblage from whence
Chaucer's pilgrims set forth for Canterbury. It is in the borough of
Southwark, not far from London Bridge, and bears, at present, the name
of "the Talbot." It has sadly declined in dignity since the days of
Chaucer, being a mere rendezvous and packing-place of the great wagons
that travel into Kent. The court-yard, which was anciently the
mustering-place of the pilgrims previous to their departure, was now
lumbered with huge wagons. Crates, boxes, hampers, and baskets,
containing the good things of town and country, were piled about them;
while, among the straw and litter, the motherly hens scratched and
clucked, with their hungry broods at their heels. Instead of Chaucer's
motley and splendid throng, I only saw a group of wagoners and
stable-boys enjoying a circulating pot of ale; while a long-bodied dog
sat by, with head on one side, ear cocked up, and wistful gaze, as if
waiting for his turn at the tankard.
Notwithstanding this grievous declension, however, I was gratified at
perceiving that the present occupants were not unconscious of the
poetical renown of their mansion. An inscription over the gateway
proclaimed it to be the inn where Chaucer's pilgrims slept on the
night previous to their departure; and at the bottom of the yard was a
magnificent sign representing them in the act of sallying forth. I was
pleased, too, at noticing that though the present inn was
comparatively modern, yet the form of the old inn was preserved. There
were galleries round the yard, as in old times, on which opened the
chambers of the guests. To these ancient inns have antiquaries
ascribed the present forms of our theatres. Plays were originally
acted in inn-yards. The guests lolled over the galleries, which
answered to our modern dress-circle; the critical mob clustered in the
yard, instead of the pit; and the groups gazing from the
garret-windows were no bad representatives of the gods of the shilling
gallery. When, therefore, the drama grew important enough to have a
house of its own, the architects took a hint for its construction from
the yard of the ancient "hostel."
I was so well pleased at finding these remembrances of Chaucer and his
poem, that I ordered my dinner in the little parlour of the Talbot.
Whilst it was preparing, I sat at the window musing and gazing into
the court-yard, and conjuring up recollections of the scenes depicted
in such lovely colours by the poet, until, by degrees, boxes, bales
and hampers, boys, wagoners and dogs, faded from sight, and my fancy
peopled the place with the motley throng of Canterbury pilgrims. The
galleries once more swarmed with idle gazers, in the rich dresses of
Chaucer's time, and the whole cavalcade seemed to pass before me.
There was the stately knight on sober steed, who had ridden in
Christendom and heathenesse, and had "foughten for our faith at
Tramissene;"--and his son, the young squire, a lover, and a lusty
bachelor, with curled locks and gay embroidery; a bold rider, a
dancer, and a writer of verses, singing and fluting all day long, and
"fresh as the month of May;"--and his "knot-headed" yeoman; a bold
forester, in green, with horn, and baudrick, and dagger, a mighty bow
in hand, and a sheaf of peacock arrows shining beneath his belt;--and
the coy, smiling, simple nun, with her gray eyes, her small red mouth,
and fair forehead, her dainty person clad in featly cloak and
"'ypinched wimple," her choral beads about her arm, her golden brooch
with a love motto, and her pretty oath by Saint Eloy;--and the
merchant, solemn in speech and high on horse, with forked beard and
"Flaundrish bever hat;"--and the lusty monk, "full fat and in good
point," with berry brown palfrey, his hood fastened with gold pin.
wrought with a love-knot, his bald head shining like glass, and his
face glistening as though it had been anointed; and the lean, logical,
sententious clerk of Oxenforde, upon his half-starved, scholar-like
horse;--and the bowsing sompnour, with fiery cherub face, all knobbed
with pimples, an eater of garlic and onions, and drinker of "strong
wine, red as blood," that carried a cake for a buckler, and babbled
Latin in his cups; of whose brimstone visage "children were sore
aferd;"--and the buxom wife of Bath, the widow of five husbands, upon
her ambling nag, with her hat broad as a buckler, her red stockings
and sharp spurs;--and the slender, choleric reeve of Norfolk,
bestriding his good gray stot; with close-shaven beard, his hair
cropped round his ears, long, lean, calfless legs, and a rusty blade
by his side;--and the jolly Limitour, with lisping tongue and
twinkling eye, well-beloved franklins and housewives, a great promoter
of marriages among young women, known at the taverns in every town,
and by every "hosteler and gay tapstere." In short, before I was
roused from my reverie by the less poetical but more substantial
apparition of a smoking beef-steak, I had seen the whole cavalcade
issue forth from the hostel-gate, with the brawny, double-jointed,
red-haired miller, playing the bagpipes before them, and the ancient
host of the Tabbard giving them his farewell God-send to Canterbury.
When I told the Squire of the existence of this legitimate descendant
of the ancient Tabbard Inn, his eyes absolutely glistened with
delight. He determined to hunt it up the very first time he visited
London, and to eat a dinner there, and drink a cup of mine host's best
wine in memory of old Chaucer. The general, who happened to be
present, immediately begged to be of the party; for he liked to
encourage these long-established houses, as they are apt to have
choice old wines.
POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS.
Farewell rewards and fairies,
Good housewives now may say;
For now fowle sluts in dairies
Do fare as well as they;
And though they sweepe their hearths no lease
Than maids were wont to doo,
Yet who of late for cleanlinesse
Finds sixpence in her shooe?
--BISHOP CORBET.
I have mentioned the Squire's fondness for the marvellous, and his
predilection for legends and romances. His library contains a curious
collection of old works of this kind, which bear evident marks of
having been much read. In his great love for all that is antiquated,
he cherishes popular superstitions, and listens, with very grave
attention, to every tale, however strange; so that, through his
countenance, the household, and, indeed, the whole neighbourhood, is
well stocked with wonderful stories; and if ever a doubt is expressed
of any one of them, the narrator will generally observe, that "the
Squire thinks there's something in it."
The Hall of course comes in for its share, the common people having
always a propensity to furnish a great superannuated building of the
kind with supernatural inhabitants. The gloomy galleries of such old
family mansions; the stately chambers, adorned with grotesque carvings
and faded paintings; the sounds that vaguely echo about them; the
moaning of the wind; the cries of rooks and ravens from the trees and
chimney-tops; all produce a state of mind favourable to superstitious
fancies.
In one chamber of the Hall, just opposite a door which opens upon a
dusky passage, there is a full-length portrait of a warrior in armour;
when, on suddenly turning into the passage, I have caught a sight of
the portrait, thrown into strong relief by the dark pannelling against
which it hangs, I have more than once been startled, as though it were
a figure advancing towards me.
To superstitious minds, therefore, predisposed by the strange and
melancholy stories that are connected with family paintings, it needs
but little stretch of fancy, on a moonlight night, or by the
flickering light of a candle, to set the old pictures on the walls in
motion, sweeping in their robes and trains about the galleries.
To tell the truth, the Squire confesses that he used to take a
pleasure in his younger days in setting marvellous stories afloat, and
connecting them with the lonely and peculiar places of the
neighbourhood. Whenever he read any legend of a striking nature, he
endeavoured to transplant it, and give it a local habitation among the
scenes of his boyhood. Many of these stories took root, and he says he
is often amused with the odd shapes in which they will come back to
him in some old woman's narrative, after they have been circulating
for years among the peasantry, and undergoing rustic additions and
amendments. Among these may doubtless be numbered that of the
crusader's ghost, which I have mentioned in the account of my
Christmas visit; and another about the hard-riding Squire of yore; the
family Nimrod; who is sometimes heard in stormy winter nights,
galloping, with hound and horn, over a wild moor a few miles distant
from the Hall. This I apprehend to have had its origin in the famous
story of the wild huntsman, the favourite goblin in German tales;
though, by-the-by, as I was talking on the subject with Master Simon
the other evening in the dark avenue, he hinted that he had himself
once or twice heard odd sounds at night, very like a pack of hounds in
cry; and that once, as he was returning rather late from a hunting
dinner, he had seen a strange figure galloping along this same moor;
but as he was riding rather fast at the time, and in a hurry to get
home, he did not stop to ascertain what it was.
Popular superstitions are fast fading away in England, owing to the
general diffusion of knowledge, and the bustling intercourse kept up
throughout the country; still they have their strong-holds and
lingering places, and a retired neighbourhood like this is apt to be
one of them. The parson tells me that he meets with many traditional
beliefs and notions among the common people, which he has been able to
draw from them in the course of familiar conversation, though they are
rather shy of avowing them to strangers, and particularly to "the
gentry," who are apt to laugh at them. He says there are several of
his old parishioners who remember when the village had its bar-guest,
or bar-ghost--a spirit supposed to belong to a town or village, and to
predict any impending misfortune by midnight shrieks and wailings. The
last time it was heard was just before the death of Mr. Bracebridge's
father, who was much beloved throughout the neighbourhood; though
there are not wanting some obstinate unbelievers, who insisted that it
was nothing but the howling of a watch-dog. I have been greatly
delighted, however, at meeting with some traces of my old favourite,
Robin Goodfellow, though under a different appellation from any of
those by which I have heretofore heard him called. The parson assures
me that many of the peasantry believe in household goblins, called
Dubbies, which live about particular farms and houses, in the same way
that Robin Goodfellow did of old. Sometimes they haunt the barns and
outhouses, and now and then will assist the farmer wonderfully, by
getting in all his hay or corn in a single night. In general, however,
they prefer to live within doors, and are fond of keeping about the
great hearths, and basking, at night, after the family have gone to
bed, by the glowing embers. When put in particular good-humour by the
warmth of their lodgings, and the tidiness of the house-maids, they
will overcome their natural laziness, and do a vast deal of household
work before morning; churning the cream, brewing the beer, or spinning
all the good dame's flax. All this is precisely the conduct of Robin
Goodfellow, described so charmingly by Milton:
"Tells how the drudging goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly get,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flail had thresh'd the corn
That ten day-labourers could not end;
Then lays him down the lubber-fiend,
And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength,
And crop-full, out of door he flings
Ere the first cock his matin rings."
But beside these household Dubbies, there are others of a more gloomy
and unsocial nature, that keep about lonely barns at a distance from
any dwelling-house, or about ruins and old bridges. These are full of
mischievous and often malignant tricks, and are fond of playing pranks
upon benighted travellers. There is a story, among the old people, of
one that haunted a ruined mill, just by a bridge that crosses a small
stream; how that, late one night, as a traveller was passing on
horseback, the Dubbie jumped up behind him, and grasped him so close
round the body that he had no power to help himself, but expected to
be squeezed to death: luckily his heels were loose, with which he
plied the sides of his steed, and was carried, with the wonderful
instinct of a traveller's horse, straight to the village inn. Had the
inn been at any greater distance, there is no doubt but he would have
been strangled to death; as it was, the good people were a long time
in bringing him to his senses, and it was remarked that the first sign
he showed of returning consciousness was to call for a bottom of
brandy.
These mischievous Dubbies bear much resemblance in their natures and
habits to those sprites which Heywood, in his Heirarchie, calls pugs
or hobgoblins:
"------Their dwellings be
In corners of old houses least frequented
Or beneath stacks of wood, and these convented,
Make fearfull noise in butteries and in dairies;
Robin Goodfellow some, some call them fairies.
In solitarie rooms these uprores keep,
And beate at doores, to wake men from their slape,
Seeming to force lockes, be they nere so strong,
And keeping Christmasse gambols all night long.
Pots, glasses, trenchers, dishes, pannes and kettles.
They will make dance about the shelves and settles.
As if about the kitchen tost and cast,
Yet in the morning nothing found misplac't.
Others such houses to their use have fitted,
In which base murthers have been once committed.
Some have their fearful habitations taken
In desolate houses, ruin'd and forsaken."
In the account of our unfortunate hawking expedition, I mentioned an
instance of one of these sprites, supposed to haunt the ruined grange
that stands in a lonely meadow, and has a remarkable echo. The parson
informs me, also, that the belief was once very prevalent, that a
household Dubbie kept about the old farm-house of the Tibbets. It has
long been traditional, he says, that one of these good-natured goblins
is attached to the Tibbets family, and came with, them when they moved
into this part of the country; for it is one of the peculiarities of
these household sprites, that they attach themselves to the fortunes
of certain families, and follow them in all their removals.