THE STORY OF THE GOBLINS WHO STOLE A SEXTON
[Illustration]
“In an old abbey town, down in this part of the country, a long, long
while ago—so long, that the story must be a true one, because our great
grandfathers implicitly believed it—there officiated as sexton and
grave-digger in the church-yard, one Gabriel Grub. It by no means
follows that because a man is a sexton, and constantly surrounded by
emblems of mortality, therefore he should be a morose and melancholy
man; your undertakers are the merriest fellows in the world, and I once
had the honour of being on intimate terms with a mute, who in private
life, and off duty, was as comical and jocose a little fellow as ever
chirped out a devil-may-care song, without a hitch in his memory, or
drained off a good stiff glass of grog without stopping for breath. But
notwithstanding these precedents to the contrary, Gabriel Grub was an
ill-conditioned, cross-grained, surly fellow—a morose and lonely man,
who consorted with nobody but himself, and an old wicker bottle which
fitted into his large deep waistcoat pocket; and who eyed each merry
face as it passed him by, with such a deep scowl of malice and
ill-humour, as it was difficult to meet without feeling something the
worse for.
“A little before twilight one Christmas Eve, Gabriel shouldered his
spade, lighted his lantern, and betook himself towards the old
church-yard, for he had got a grave to finish by next morning, and
feeling very low he thought it might raise his spirits perhaps, if he
went on with his work at once. As he wended his way up the ancient
street, he saw the cheerful light of the blazing fires gleam through the
old casements, and heard the loud laugh and the cheerful shouts of those
who were assembled around them; he marked the bustling preparations for
next day’s good cheer, and smelt the numerous savoury odours consequent
thereupon, as they steamed up from the kitchen windows in clouds. All
this was gall and wormwood to the heart of Gabriel Grub; and as groups
of children bounded out of the houses, tripped across the road, and were
met, before they could knock at the opposite door, by half a dozen
curly-headed little rascals who crowded round them as they flocked up
stairs to spend the evening in their Christmas games, Gabriel smiled
grimly, and clutched the handle of his spade with a firmer grasp, as he
thought of measles, scarlet-fever, thrush, hooping-cough, and a good
many other sources of consolation beside.
“In this happy frame of mind, Gabriel strode along, returning a short,
sullen growl to the good-humoured greetings of such of his neighbours as
now and then passed him, until he turned into the dark lane which led to
the church-yard. Now Gabriel had been looking forward to reaching the
dark lane, because it was, generally speaking, a nice gloomy mournful
place, into which the towns-people did not much care to go, except in
broad daylight, and when the sun was shining; consequently he was not a
little indignant to hear a young urchin roaring out some jolly song
about a merry Christmas, in this very sanctuary, which had been called
Coffin Lane ever since the days of the old abbey, and the time of the
shaven-headed monks. As Gabriel walked on, and the voice drew nearer, he
found it proceeded from a small boy, who was hurrying along, to join one
of the little parties in the old street, and who, partly to keep himself
company, and partly to prepare himself for the occasion, was shouting
out the song at the highest pitch of his lungs. So Gabriel waited till
the boy came up, and then dodged him into a corner, and rapped him over
the head with his lantern five or six times, just to teach him to
modulate his voice. And as the boy hurried away with his hand to his
head, singing quite a different sort of tune, Gabriel Grub chuckled very
heartily to himself, and entered the church-yard, locking the gate
behind him.
[Illustration:
_As he wended his way up the ancient street he saw the cheerful light
of the blazing fires._
]
“He took off his coat, set down his lantern, and getting into the
unfinished grave, worked at it for an hour or so, with right good-will.
But the earth was hardened with the frost, and it was no very easy
matter to break it up, and shovel it out; and although there was a moon,
it was a very young one, and shed little light upon the grave, which was
in the shadow of the church. At any other time, these obstacles would
have made Gabriel Grub very moody and miserable, but he was so well
pleased with having stopped the small boy’s singing, that he took little
heed of the scanty progress he had made, and looked down into the grave
when he had finished work for the night, with grim satisfaction,
murmuring as he gathered up his things—
Brave lodgings for one, brave lodgings for one,
A few feet of cold earth, when life is done;
A stone at the head, a stone at the feet,
A rich, juicy meal for the worms to eat;
Rank grass over head, and damp clay around,
Brave lodgings for one, these, in holy ground!
“‘Ho! ho!’ laughed Gabriel Grub, as he sat himself down on a flat
tombstone which was a favourite resting place of his and drew forth his
wicker bottle. ‘A coffin at Christmas—a Christmas Box. Ho! ho! ho!’
“‘Ho! ho! ho!’ repeated a voice which sounded close behind him.
“Gabriel paused in some alarm, in the act of raising the wicker bottle
to his lips, and looked round. The bottom of the oldest grave about him,
was not more still and quiet, than the church-yard in the pale
moonlight. The cold hoar frost glistened on the tombstones, and sparkled
like rows of gems among the stone carvings of the old church. The snow
lay hard and crisp upon the ground, and spread over the thickly-strewn
mounds of earth, so white and smooth a cover, that it seemed as if
corpses lay there, hidden only by their winding sheets. Not the faintest
rustle broke the profound tranquillity of the solemn scene. Sound itself
appeared to be frozen up, all was so cold and still.
“‘It was the echoes,’ said Gabriel Grub, raising the bottle to his lips
again.
“‘It was _not_,’ said a deep voice.
“Gabriel started up, and stood rooted to the spot with astonishment and
terror; for his eyes rested on a form which made his blood run cold.
“Seated on an upright tombstone, close to him, was a strange unearthly
figure, whom Gabriel felt at once, was no being of this world. His long
fantastic legs which might have reached the ground, were cocked up, and
crossed after a quaint, fantastic fashion; his sinewy arms were bare,
and his hands rested on his knees. On his short round body he wore a
close covering, ornamented with small slashes; and a short cloak dangled
at his back; the collar was cut into curious peaks, which served the
goblin in lieu of ruff or neckerchief; and his shoes curled up at the
toes into long points. On his head he wore a broad-brimmed sugar loaf
hat, garnished with a single feather. The hat was covered with the white
frost, and the goblin looked as if he had sat on the same tombstone very
comfortably, for two or three hundred years. He was sitting perfectly
still; his tongue was put out, as if in derision; and he was grinning at
Gabriel Grub with such a grin as only a goblin could call up.
“‘It was _not_ the echoes,’ said the goblin.
“Gabriel Grub was paralysed, and could make no reply.
“‘What do you do here on Christmas eve?’ said the goblin, sternly.
“‘I came to dig a grave Sir,’ stammered Gabriel Grub.
[Illustration:
_Gabriel started up, and stood rooted to the spot with astonishment
and terror._
]
“‘What man wanders among graves and church-yards on such a night as
this?’ said the goblin.
“‘Gabriel Grub! Gabriel Grub!’ screamed a wild chorus of voices that
seemed to fill the church-yard. Gabriel looked fearfully round—nothing
was to be seen.
“‘What have you got in that bottle?’ said the goblin.
“‘Hollands, Sir,’ replied the sexton, trembling more than ever; for he
had bought it of the smugglers, and he thought that perhaps his
questioner might be in the excise department of the goblins.
“‘Who drinks Hollands alone, and in a church-yard, on such a night as
this?’ said the goblin.
“‘Gabriel Grub! Gabriel Grub!’ exclaimed the wild voices again.
“The goblin leered maliciously at the terrified sexton, and then raising
his voice, exclaimed—
“‘And who, then, is our fair and lawful prize?’
“To this inquiry the invisible chorus replied, in a strain that sounded
like the voices of many choristers singing to the mighty swell of the
old church organ—a strain that seemed borne to the sexton’s ears upon a
gentle wind, and to die away as its soft breath passed onward—but the
burden of the reply was still the same, ‘Gabriel Grub! Gabriel Grub!’
“The goblin grinned a broader grin than before, as he said, ‘Well,
Gabriel, what do you say to this?’
“The sexton gasped for breath.
“‘What do you think of this, Gabriel?’ said the goblin, kicking up his
feet in the air on either side the tombstone, and looking at the
turned-up points with as much complacency as if he had been
contemplating the most fashionable pair of Wellingtons in all Bond
Street.
“‘It’s—it’s—very curious, Sir,’ replied the sexton, half dead with
fright, ‘very curious, and very pretty, but I think I’ll go back and
finish my work, Sir, if you please.’
“‘Work!’ said the goblin, ‘what work?’
“‘The grave, Sir, making the grave,’ stammered the sexton.
“‘Oh, the grave, eh?’ said the goblin, ‘who makes graves at a time when
all other men are merry, and takes a pleasure in it?’
“Again the mysterious voices replied, ‘Gabriel Grub! Gabriel Grub!’
“‘I’m afraid my friends want you, Gabriel,’ said the goblin, thrusting
his tongue further into his cheek than ever—and a most astonishing
tongue it was—‘I’m afraid my friends want you, Gabriel,’ said the
goblin.
“‘Under favour, Sir,’ replied the horror-struck sexton, ‘I don’t think
they can, Sir; they don’t know me, Sir, I don’t think the gentlemen have
ever seen me, Sir.’
“‘Oh yes they have,’ replied the goblin; ‘we know the man with the sulky
face and the grim scowl, that came down the street to-night, throwing
his evil looks at the children, and grasping his burying spade the
tighter. We know the man that struck the boy in the envious malice of
his heart, because the boy could be merry, and he could not. We know
him, we know him.’
“Here the goblin gave a loud shrill laugh, that the echoes returned
twenty-fold, and throwing his legs up in the air, stood upon his head,
or rather upon the very point of his sugar-loaf hat, on the narrow edge
of the tombstone, from whence he threw a summerset with extraordinary
agility, right to the sexton’s feet, at which he planted himself in the
attitude in which tailors generally sit upon the shop-board.
“‘I—I—am afraid I must leave you, Sir,’ said the sexton, making an
effort to move.
“‘Leave us!’ said the goblin, ‘Gabriel Grub going to leave us. Ho! ho!
ho!’
[Illustration]
“As the goblin laughed, the sexton observed for one instant a brilliant
illumination within the windows of the church, as if the whole building
were lighted up; it disappeared, the organ pealed forth a lively air,
and whole troops of goblins, the very counterpart of the first one,
poured into the church-yard, and began playing at leap-frog with the
tombstones, never stopping for an instant to take breath, but overing
the highest among them, one after the other, with the most marvellous
dexterity. The first goblin was a most astonishing leaper, and none of
the others could come near him; even in the extremity of his terror the
sexton could not help observing, that while his friends were content to
leap over the common-sized gravestones, the first one took the family
vaults, iron railings and all, with as much ease as if they had been so
many street posts.
“At last the game reached to a most exciting pitch; the organ played
quicker and quicker, and the goblins leaped faster and faster, coiling
themselves up, rolling head over heels upon the ground, and bounding
over the tombstones like foot-balls. The sexton’s brain whirled round
with the rapidity of the motion he beheld, and his legs reeled beneath
him, as the spirits flew before his eyes, when the goblin king suddenly
darting towards him, laid his hand upon his collar, and sank with him
through the earth.
“When Gabriel Grub had had time to fetch his breath, which the rapidity
of his descent had for the moment taken away, he found himself in what
appeared to be a large cavern, surrounded on all sides by crowds of
goblins, ugly and grim; in the centre of the room, on an elevated seat,
was stationed his friend of the church-yard; and close beside him stood
Gabriel Grub himself, without the power of motion.
“‘Cold to-night,’ said the king of the goblins, ‘very cold. A glass of
something warm, here.’
“At this command, half a dozen officious goblins, with a perpetual smile
upon their faces, whom Gabriel Grub imagined to be courtiers, on that
account, hastily disappeared, and presently returned with a goblet of
liquid fire, which they presented to the king.
“‘Ah!’ said the goblin, whose cheeks and throat were quite transparent,
as he tossed down the flame, ‘This warms one, indeed: bring a bumper of
the same, for Mr. Grub.’
“It was in vain for the unfortunate sexton to protest that he was not in
the habit of taking anything warm at night; for one of the goblins held
him while another poured the blazing liquid down his throat, and the
whole assembly screeched with laughter as he coughed and choked, and
wiped away the tears which gushed plentifully from his eyes, after
swallowing the burning draught.
“‘And now,’ said the king, fantastically poking the taper corner of his
sugar-loaf hat into the sexton’s eye, and thereby occasioning him the
most exquisite pain—‘And now, show the man of misery and gloom a few of
the pictures from our own great storehouse.’
“As the goblin said this, a thick cloud which obscured the further end
of the cavern, rolled gradually away, and disclosed, apparently at a
great distance, a small and scantily furnished, but neat and clean
apartment. A crowd of little children were gathered round a bright fire,
clinging to their mother’s gown, and gambolling round her chair. The
mother occasionally rose, and drew aside the window-curtain as if to
look for some expected object; a frugal meal was ready spread upon the
table, and an elbow chair was placed near the fire. A knock was heard at
the door: the mother opened it, and the children crowded round her, and
clapped their hands for joy, as their father entered. He was wet and
weary, and shook the snow from his garments, as the children crowded
round him, and seizing his cloak, hat, stick, and gloves, with busy
zeal, ran with them from the room. Then as he sat down to his meal
before the fire, the children climbed about his knee, and the mother sat
by his side, and all seemed happiness and comfort.
“But a change came upon the view, almost imperceptibly. The scene was
altered to a small bed-room, where the fairest and youngest child lay
dying; the roses had fled from his cheek, and the light from his eye;
and even as the sexton looked upon him with an interest he had never
felt or known before, he died. His young brothers and sisters crowded
round his little bed, and seized his tiny hand, so cold and heavy; but
they shrunk back from its touch, and looked with awe on his infant face;
for calm and tranquil as it was, and sleeping in rest and peace as the
beautiful child seemed to be, they saw that he was dead, and they knew
that he was an angel looking down upon, and blessing them, from a bright
and happy Heaven.”
[Illustration]
Again the light cloud passed across the picture, and again the subject
changed. The father and mother were old and helpless now, and the number
of those about them was diminished more than half; but content and
cheerfulness sat on every face, and beamed in every eye, as they crowded
round the fireside, and told and listened to old stories of earlier and
bygone days. Slowly and peacefully the father sank into the grave, and,
soon after, the sharer of all his cares and troubles followed him to a
place of rest and peace. The few, who yet survived them, knelt by their
tomb, and watered the green turf which covered it with their tears; then
rose and turned away, sadly and mournfully, but not with bitter cries,
or despairing lamentations, for they knew that they should one day meet
again; and once more they mixed with the busy world, and their content
and cheerfulness were restored. The cloud settled upon the picture, and
concealed it from the sexton’s view.
“‘What do you think of _that_?’ said the goblin, turning his large face
towards Gabriel Grub.
“Gabriel murmured out something about its being very pretty, and looked
somewhat ashamed, as the goblin bent his fiery eyes upon him.
“‘_You_ a miserable man!’ said the goblin, in a tone of excessive
contempt. ‘You!’ He appeared disposed to add more, but indignation
choked his utterance, so he lifted up one of his very pliable legs, and
flourishing it above his head a little, to insure his aid, administered
a good sound kick to Gabriel Grub; immediately after which, all the
goblins in waiting crowded round the wretched sexton, and kicked him
without mercy, according to the established and invariable custom of
courtiers upon earth, who kick whom royalty kicks, and hug whom royalty
hugs.
“‘Show him some more,’ said the king of the goblins.
“At these words the cloud was again dispelled, and a rich and beautiful
landscape was disclosed to view—there is just such another to this day,
within half a mile of the old abbey town. The sun shone from out the
clear blue sky, the water sparkled beneath his rays, and the trees
looked greener, and the flowers more gay, beneath his cheering
influence. The water rippled on, with a pleasant sound, the trees
rustled in the light wind that murmured among their leaves, the birds
sang upon the boughs, and the lark carolled on high, her welcome to the
morning. Yes, it was morning, the bright, balmy morning of summer; the
minutest leaf, the smallest blade of grass, was instinct with life. The
ant crept forth to her daily toil, the butterfly fluttered and basked in
the warm rays of the sun; myriads of insects spread their transparent
wings, and revelled in their brief but happy existence. Man walked
forth, elated with the scene; and all was brightness and splendour.
“‘_You_ a miserable man!’ said the king of the goblins, in a more
contemptuous tone than before. And again the king of the goblins gave
his leg a flourish; again it descended on the shoulders of the sexton;
and again the attendant goblins imitated the example of their chief.
[Illustration:
_A rich and beautiful landscape was disclosed to view._
]
“Many a time the cloud went and came, and many a lesson it taught to
Gabriel Grub, who although his shoulders smarted with pain from the
frequent applications of the goblin’s feet thereunto, looked on with an
interest which nothing could diminish. He saw that men who worked hard,
and earned their scanty bread with lives of labour, were cheerful and
happy; and that to the most ignorant, the sweet face of nature was a
never-failing source of cheerfulness and joy. He saw those who had been
delicately nurtured, and tenderly brought up, cheerful under privations,
and superior to suffering, that would have crushed many of a rougher
grain, because they bore within their own bosoms the materials of
happiness, contentment, and peace. He saw that women, the tenderest and
most fragile of all God’s creatures, were the oftenest superior to
sorrow, adversity, and distress; and he saw that it was because they
bore in their own hearts an inexhaustible wellspring of affection and
devotedness. Above all, he saw that men like himself, who snarled at the
mirth and cheerfulness of others, were the foulest weeds on the fair
surface of the earth; and setting all the good of the world against the
evil, he came to the conclusion that it was a very decent and
respectable sort of world after all. No sooner had he formed it, than
the cloud which had closed over the last picture, seemed to settle on
his senses, and lull him to repose. One by one, the goblins faded from
his sight, and as the last one disappeared, he sunk to sleep.”
The day had broken when Gabriel Grub awoke, and found himself lying at
full length on the flat gravestone in the church-yard, with the wicker
bottle lying empty by his side, and his coat, spade, and lantern, all
well whitened by the last night’s frost, scattered on the ground. The
stone on which he had first seen the goblin seated, stood bolt upright
before him, and the grave at which he had worked, the night before, was
not far off. At first he began to doubt the reality of his adventures,
but the acute pain in his shoulders when he attempted to rise, assured
him that the kicking of the goblins was certainly not ideal. He was
staggered again, by observing no traces of footsteps in the snow on
which the goblins had played at leap-frog with the gravestones, but he
speedily accounted for this circumstance when he remembered that being
spirits, they would leave no visible impression behind them. So Gabriel
Grub got on his feet as well as he could, for the pain in his back; and
brushing the frost off his coat, put it on, and turned his face towards
the town.
But he was an altered man, and he could not bear the thought of
returning to a place where his repentance would be scoffed at, and his
reformation disbelieved. He hesitated for a few moments; and then turned
away to wander where he might, and seek his bread elsewhere.
The lantern, the spade, and the wicker bottle, were found that day in
the church-yard. There were a great many speculations about the sexton’s
fate at first, but it was speedily determined that he had been carried
away by the goblins; and there were not wanting some very credible
witnesses who had distinctly seen him whisked through the air on the
back of a chestnut horse blind of one eye, with the hind quarters of a
lion, and the tail of a bear. At length all this was devoutly believed;
and the new sexton used to exhibit to the curious for a trifling
emolument, a good-sized piece of the church weathercock which had been
accidentally kicked off by the aforesaid horse in his aërial flight, and
picked up by himself in the church-yard, a year or two afterwards.
“Unfortunately these stories were somewhat disturbed by the unlooked-for
reappearance of Gabriel Grub himself, some ten years afterwards, a
ragged, contented, rheumatic old man. He told his story to the
clergyman, and also to the mayor; and in course of time it began to be
received as a matter of history, in which form it has continued down to
this very day. The believers in the weathercock tale, having misplaced
their confidence once, were not easily prevailed upon to part with it
again, so they looked as wise as they could, shrugged their shoulders,
touched their foreheads, and murmured something about Gabriel Grub’s
having drunk all the Hollands, and then fallen asleep on the flat
tombstone; and they affected to explain what he supposed he had
witnessed in the goblin’s cavern, by saying that he had seen the world,
and grown wiser. But this opinion, which was by no means a popular one
at any time, gradually died off; and be the matter how it may, as
Gabriel Grub was afflicted with rheumatism to the end of his days, this
story has at least one moral, if it teach no better one—and that is,
that if a man turns sulky and drinks by himself at Christmas time, he
may make up his mind to be not a bit the better for it, let the spirits
be ever so good, or let them be even as many degrees beyond proof, as
those which Gabriel Grub saw, in the goblin’s cavern.”