me in this world, you dog!” and so saying, he drew a pistol and fired at
the unfortunate shaver, who fell flat on the ground, without a word. He
then turned upon Roderick, but the sound of horses’ hoofs was heard, and
a party of travellers galloped up, leaving the highwayman barely time to
ride off. One of them was the captain who had been robbed the day
before. He was not, as may already have been gathered, a valiant man.
He turned pale at the sight of Strap. “Gentlemen,” said he, “here’s
murder committed; let us alight.” The others were for pursuing the
highwayman, and the captain only escaped accompanying them by making his
horse rear and snort, and pretending the animal was frightened.
Fortunately, Strap “had received no other wound than what his fear had
inflicted”; and after having been bled at an inn half a mile away, they
were about to resume their journey, when a shouting crowd came down the
road, with the highwayman in the midst, riding horseback with his hands
tied behind him. He was being escorted to the nearest Justice of the
Peace. Halting a while for refreshment, they dismounted Mr. Rifle and
mounted guard, a circle of peasants armed with pitchforks round him.
When they at length reached the magistrate’s house, they found he was
away for the night, and so locked their prisoner in a garret, from which,
of course, he escaped.
Roderick and Strap were now free from being detained as evidence. For
two days they walked on, staying on the second night in a public-house of
a very sorry appearance in a small village. At their entrance, the
landlord, who seemed a venerable old man, with long grey hair, rose from
a table placed by a large fire in a neat paved kitchen, and, with a
cheerful countenance, accosted them with the words: “_Salvete_, _pueri_;
_ingredimini_.” It was astonishing to hear a rustic landlord talking
Latin, but Roderick, concealing his amazement, replied, “_Dissolve
frigus_, _ligna super foco large reponens_.” He had no sooner pronounced
the words than the innkeeper, running towards him, shook him by the
hands, crying, “_Fili mi dilectissime_! _unde venis_?—_a superis_, _ni
fallor_.” In short, finding them both read in the classics, he did not
know how to testify his regard sufficiently; but ordered his daughter, a
jolly, rosy-checked damsel, who was his sole domestic, to bring a bottle
of his _quadrimum_; repeating at the same time from Horace, “_Deprome
quadrimum Sabinâ_, _O Thaliarche_, _merum diota_.” This was excellent
ale of his own brewing, of which he told them he had always an _amphora_,
four years old, for the use of himself and friends.
The innkeeper proved to be a schoolmaster who was obliged, by his income
being so small, to supplement it by turning licensed victualler. He was
very inquisitive about their affairs, and, while dinner was preparing,
his talk abounded both with Latin tags and with good advice to the
inexperienced against the deceits and wickedness of the world. They
fared sumptuously on roast fowl and several bottles of quadrimum, going
to bed congratulating themselves on the landlord’s good-humour. Strap
was of opinion that they would be charged nothing for their lodging and
entertainment. “Don’t you observe,” said he, “that he has conceived a
particular affection for us; nay, even treated us with extraordinary
fare, which, to be sure, we should not of ourselves have called for?”
Roderick was not so sanguine. Rising early in the morning, and having
breakfasted with their host and his daughter on hasty-pudding and ale,
they desired to know what there was to pay.
“Biddy will let you know, gentlemen,” said the old rascal of a tapster,
“for I never mind these matters. Money-matters are beneath the concern
of one who lives on the Horatian plan: _Crescentem sequitur cura
pecuniam_.”
Meanwhile, Biddy, having consulted a slate that hung in a corner, gave
the reckoning as eight shillings and sevenpence.
“Eight shillings and sevenpence!” cried Strap; “’tis impossible! You
must be mistaken, young woman.”
“Reckon again, child,” said the father very deliberately; “perhaps you
have miscounted.”
“No, indeed, father,” replied she. “I know my business better.”
Roderick demanded to know the particulars, on which the old man got up,
muttering, “Ay, ay, let us see the particulars: that’s but reasonable”;
and, taking pen, ink, and paper, wrote:
_s._ _d._
To bread and beer, 0 6
To a fowl and sausages, 2 6
To four bottles of quadrim, 2 0
To fire and tobacco, 0 7
To lodging, 2 0
To breakfast, 1 0
8 7
As he had not the appearance of a common publican, Roderick could not
upbraid him as he deserved, simply remarking that he was sure he had not
learned from Horace to be an extortioner. To which the landlord replied
that his only aim was to live _contentus parvo_, and keep off _importuna
pauperies_.
Strap was indignant. He swore their host should either take one-third or
go without; but Roderick, seeing the daughter go out and return with two
stout fellows, with whom to frighten them, thought it politic to pay what
was asked.
It was a doleful walk they had that day. In the evening they overtook
the wagon, and it is here, and in the following scenes, that we get an
excellent description of the cheap road travel of that era.
Strap mounted first into the wagon, but retired, dismayed, at a
tremendous voice which issued from its depths, with the words, “Fire and
fury! there shall no passengers come here.” These words came from
Captain Weazel, one of the most singular characters to be found in
Smollett’s pages.
Joey, the wagoner, was not afraid of the captain, and called out, with a
sneer: “Waunds, coptain, whay woan’t you soofer the poor wagoneer to make
a penny? Coom, coom, young man, get oop, get oop; never moind the
coptain.”
“Blood and thunder! where’s my sword?” exclaimed the man of war, when the
two eventually fell, rather than climbed, into the wagon’s dark recesses,
and incidentally on to his stomach.
“What’s the matter, my dear?” asked a female voice.
“The matter?” replied the captain; “my guts are squeezed into a pancake
by that Scotchman’s hump.” The “hump,” by the way, was poor Strap’s
knapsack.
“It is our own fault,” resumed the feminine voice; “we may thank
ourselves for all the inconveniences we meet with. I thank God I never
travelled so before. I am sure, if my lady or Sir John were to know
where we are, they would not sleep this night for vexation. I wish to
God we had written for the chariot; I know we shall never be forgiven.”
“Come, come, my dear,” replied the captain, “it don’t signify fretting
now; we shall laugh it over as a frolic; I hope you will not suffer in
your health. I shall make my lord very merry with our adventures in the
diligence.”
[Picture: Travellers arriving at an Inn. After Rowlandson]
The unsophisticated lads were greatly impressed by this talk. Not so the
others. “Some people,” broke in another woman’s voice, “give themselves
a great many needless airs; better folks than any here have travelled in
wagons before now. Some of us have rode in coaches and chariots, with
three footmen behind them, without making so much fuss about it. What
then! we are now all on a footing; therefore let us be sociable and
merry. What do you say, Isaac? Is not this a good motion, you doting
rogue? Speak, old Cent. per cent.! What desperate debt are you thinking
of? What mortgage are you planning? Well, Isaac, positively you shall
never gain my favour till you turn over a new leaf, grow honest, and live
like a gentleman. In the meantime, give me a kiss, you old fool.”
The words, accompanied by hearty smack, enlivened the person to whom they
were addressed to such a degree, that he cried, in a transport, though
with a faltering voice: “Ah, you baggage! on my credit you are a waggish
girl—he, he, he!” This laugh introduced a fit of coughing which almost
suffocated the poor usurer—for such they afterwards found was the
profession of their fellow-traveller.
At their stopping-place for the night they had their first opportunity of
viewing these passengers. First came a brisk, airy girl, about twenty
years of age, with a silver-laced hat on her head instead of a cap, a
blue stuff riding-suit, trimmed with silver, very much tarnished, and a
whip in her hand. After her came, limping, an old man, with a worsted
night-cap buttoned under his chin and a broad-brimmed hat slouched over
it, an old rusty blue cloak tied about his neck, under which appeared a
brown surtout that covered a threadbare coat and waistcoat, and a dirty
flannel jacket. His eyes were hollow, bleared, and gummy; his face
shrivelled into a thousand wrinkles, his gums destitute of teeth, his
nose sharp and drooping, his chin peaked and prominent, so that when he
mumped or spoke they approached one another like a pair of nut-crackers;
he supported himself on an ivory-headed cane, and his whole figure was a
just emblem of winter, famine, and avarice.
The captain was disclosed as a little thin creature, about the age of
forty, with a long, withered visage very much resembling that of a
baboon. He wore his own hair in a queue that reached to his rump, and on
it a hat the size and cock of Antient Pistol’s. He was about five feet
and three inches in height, sixteen inches of which went to his face and
long scraggy neck; his thighs were about six inches in length; his legs,
resembling two spindles or drumsticks, two feet and a half; and his body
the remainder; so that, on the whole, he appeared like a spider or
grasshopper erect. His dress consisted of a frock of bear-skin, the
skirts about half a foot long, a hussar waistcoat, scarlet breeches
reaching half-way down his thighs, worsted stockings rolled up almost to
his groin, and shoes with wooden heels at least two inches high; he
carried a sword very nearly as long as himself in one hand, and with the
other conducted his lady, who seemed to be a woman of his own age, still
retaining some remains of good looks, but so ridiculously affected that
any one who was not a novice in the world would easily have perceived in
her deplorable vanity the second-hand airs of a lady’s woman.
This ridiculous couple were Captain and Mrs. Weazel. The travellers all
assembled in the kitchen of the inn, where, according to the custom of
the time, such impecunious wayfarers were entertained; but the captain
desired a room for himself and his wife, so that they might sup by
themselves, instead of in that communal fashion. The innkeeper, however,
did not much relish this, but would have given way to the demand,
providing the other passengers made no objection. Unhappily for the
captain’s absurd dignity, the others _did_ object; Miss Jenny, the lady
with the silver-trimmed hat, in particular, observing that “if Captain
Weazel and his lady had a mind to sup by themselves, they might wait
until the others should have done.” At this hint the captain put on a
martial frown and looked very big, without speaking; while his
yoke-fellow, with a disdainful toss of her nose, muttered something about
“creature!” which Miss Jenny overhearing, stepped up to her, saying,
“None of your names, good Mrs. Abigail. Creature! quotha—I’ll assure
you—no such creature as you, neither—no quality-coupler.” Here the
captain interposed, with a “D—n me, madam, what do you mean by that?”
“Sir, who are you?” replied Miss Jenny; “who made you a captain, you
pitiful, trencher-scraping, pimping curler? The army is come to a fine
pass when such fellows as you get commissions. What, I suppose you think
I don’t know you? You and your helpmate are well met: a cast-off
mistress and a bald valet-de-chambre are well yoked together.”
“Blood and wounds!” cried Weazel; “d’ye question the honour of my wife,
madam? No man in England durst say so much—I would flay him, carbonado
him! Fury and destruction! I would have his liver for my supper!” So
saying, he drew his sword and flourished it, to the great terror of
Strap; while Miss Jenny, snapping her fingers, told him she did not value
his resentment that!
We will pass over the Rabelaisian adventures of the night, which, amusing
enough, are too robust for these pages; and will proceed to the next
day’s journey. Before they started, Weazel had proved himself the arrant
coward and braggart which the reader has already perceived him to be;
but, notwithstanding this exposure, he entertained the company in the
wagon with accounts of his valour: how he had once knocked down a soldier
who had made game of him; had tweaked a drawer by the nose who had found
fault with his picking his teeth with a fork; and had, moreover,
challenged a cheesemonger who had had the presumption to be his rival.
For five days they travelled in this manner. On the sixth day, when they
were about to sit down to dinner, the innkeeper came and told them that
three gentlemen, just arrived, had ordered the meal to be sent to their
apartment, although told that it had been bespoken by the passengers in
the wagon,—to which information they had replied: “The passengers in the
wagon might be d—d; their betters must be served before them; they
supposed it would be no hardship on such travellers to dine on bread and
cheese for one day.”
This was a great disappointment to them all, and they laid their heads
together to remedy it, Miss Jenny observing that Captain Weazel, being a
soldier by profession, ought to protect them. The captain adroitly
excused himself by saying that he would not, for all the world, be known
to have travelled in a wagon; swearing, at the same time, that, could he
appear with honour, they should eat his sword sooner than his provision.
On this declaration, Miss Jenny, snatching his weapon, drew it and ran
immediately into the kitchen, where she threatened to put the cook to
death if he did not immediately send the victuals into their room. The
noise she made brought the three strangers down, one of whom no sooner
perceived her than he cried, “Ha! Jenny Ramper! what brought thee
hither?”
“My dear Jack Rattle,” she replied, running into his arms, “is it you?
Then Weazel may go whistle for a dinner—I shall dine with you.”
They consented with joy to this proposal; and the others were on the
point of being reduced to a very uncomfortable meal, when Joey, the
wagoner, understanding the whole affair, entered the kitchen with a
pitchfork in his hand, and swore he would be the death of any man who
should pretend to seize the victuals prepared for the wagon. On this,
the three strangers drew their swords, and, being joined by their
servants, bloodshed seemed imminent; when the landlord, interposing,
offered to part with his own dinner, for the sake of peace; which
proposal was accepted and all ended happily.
When the journey was resumed in the afternoon, Roderick chose to walk
some distance beside the wagoner, a merry, good-natured fellow, who
informed him that Miss Jenny was a common girl of the town, who, falling
in company with a recruiting officer who had carried her down in the
stage-coach from London to Newcastle, was obliged to return, as her
companion was now in prison for debt. Weazel had been a valet-de-chambre
to my Lord Fizzle while he lived separate from his lady; but on their
reconciliation she insisted on Weazel’s being turned off, as well as the
woman who had lived with him: when his lordship, to get rid of them both
with a good grace, proposed that Weazel should marry his mistress, when
he would procure a commission in the army for him.
Roderick and the wagoner both had a profound contempt for Weazel, and
resolved to put his courage to the test by alarming the passengers with
the cry of “a highwayman” as soon as a horseman should appear. It was
dusk when a man on horseback approached them. Joey gave the alarm, and a
general consternation arose; Strap leaping out of the wagon and hiding
himself behind a hedge; the usurer exclaiming dolefully and rustling
about in the straw, as though hiding something; Mrs. Weazel wringing her
hands and crying; and the captain pretending to snore.
This latter artifice did not succeed with Miss Jenny, who shook him by
the shoulder and bawled out: “’Sdeath! captain, is this a time to snore
when we are going to be robbed? Get up, for shame, and behave like a
soldier and man of honour.”
Weazel pretended to be in a great passion for being disturbed, and swore
he would have his nap out if all the highwaymen in England surrounded
him. “What are you afraid of?” continued he; at the same time trembling
with such agitation that the whole vehicle shook.
“Plague on your pitiful soul!” exclaimed Miss Jenny; “you are as arrant a
poltroon as was ever drummed out of a regiment. Stop the wagon, Joey,
and if I have rhetoric enough, the thief shall not only take your purse,
but your skin also.”
By this time the horseman had come up with them, and proved to be a
gentleman’s servant, well known to Joey, who told him the plot, and
desired him to carry it on a little further, by going up to the wagon and
questioning those within. Accordingly he approached, and in a terrible
voice demanded, “Who have we got here?” Isaac replied, in a lamentable
voice, “Here’s a poor, miserable sinner, who has got a small family to
maintain, and nothing in the world but these fifteen shillings, which, if
you rob me of, we must all starve together.”
“Who’s that sobbing in the corner?” continued the supposed highwayman.
“A poor, unfortunate woman,” answered Mrs. Weazel, “on whom, I beg you,
for Christ’s sake, to have compassion.”
“Are you maid or wife?” said he.
“Wife, to my sorrow,” said she.
“Who, or what is your husband?” continued he.
“My husband,” continued Mrs. Weazel, “is an officer in the army, and was
left sick at the last inn where we dined.”
“You must be mistaken, madam,” said he, “for I myself saw him get into
the wagon this afternoon.” Here he laid hold of one of Weazel’s legs,
and pulled him out from under his wife’s petticoats, where he had
concealed himself. The trembling captain, detected in this inglorious
situation, rubbed his eyes, and affecting to wake out of sleep, cried,
“What’s the matter?”
“What’s the matter? The matter is not much,” answered the horseman; “I
only called in to inquire after your health, and so adieu, most noble
captain.” So saying, he clapped spurs to his horse, and was out of sight
in a moment.
It was some time before Weazel could recollect himself; but at length,
reassuming his big look, he said, “’Sdeath! why did he ride away before I
had time to ask him how his lord and his lady do? Don’t you remember
Tom, my dear?” addressing his wife.
“Yes,” replied she; “I think I do remember something of the fellow; but
you know I seldom converse with people of his station.”
“Hey-day!” cried Joey; “do you know the young man, coptain?”
“Know him?” cried Weazel; “many a time has he filled a glass of Burgundy
for me at my Lord Trippett’s table.”
“And what may his neame be, coptain?” said Joey.
“His name!—his name,” replied Weazel, “is Tom Rinser.”
“Wounds!” cried Joey, “a has changed his own neame then! for I’se lay any
wager he was christened John Trotter.”
This raised a laugh against the captain, who seemed very much
disconcerted; when Isaac broke silence and said, “It was no matter who or
what he was, as he had not proved the robber they suspected. They ought
to bless God for their narrow escape.”
“Bless God!” said Weazel, “for what? Had he been a highwayman I should
have eaten his blood and body before he had robbed me or any one in this
diligence.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” cried Miss Jenny; “I believe you will eat all you kill,
indeed, captain.”
The usurer was so well pleased at the end of this adventure that he could
not refrain from being severe, and took notice that Captain Weazel seemed
to be a good Christian, for he had armed himself with patience and
resignation, instead of carnal weapons, and worked out his salvation with
fear and trembling; whereupon, amidst much laughter, Weazel threatened to
cut the Jew’s throat. The usurer, taking hold of this menace,
said:—“Gentlemen and ladies, I take you all to witness, that my life is
in danger from this bloody-minded officer: have him bound over to the
peace.” This second sneer procured another laugh against the captain,
who remained crestfallen for the rest of the journey.
XXV
THE remaining miles to Gateshead are made up of the shabby village of Low
Fell, where the road begins to rise, and the uninteresting way over the
ridge of the Fell itself. By the word “Fell,” North of England people
describe what Southerners call a hill. The common land of Gateshead
Fell, 675 acres, was enclosed under Acts of Parliament, 1809, 1822.
[Picture: Modern Newcastle: from Gateshead]
Many were the gibbets erected in the old days on Gateshead Fell. The
last was that on which swung the body of Robert Hazlett, who on this
spot, on the evening of August 6th, 1770, robbed a young lady, Miss
Margaret Benson, who was returning to Newcastle in a post-chaise from
Durham. On the same night a post-boy was relieved of his bags at the
same place. Hazlett was hanged at Durham, and his body gibbeted here,
twenty-five feet high. For some time afterwards, every day for an hour,
an old man was seen to kneel and pray at the foot of the gibbet. It was
the wretched man’s father! A beacon was fixed on the Fell in the winter
of 1803–4, on an alarm of invasion; hence this height was afterwards
known as “Beacon Hill.”
The present-day aspect of the road does not hint at anything so tragical,
and is merely commonplace, the last touch of vulgarity added by the trams
that ply along it from Gateshead.
The place-name of Gateshead seemed to John Ogilby, in his book,
_Britannia Depicta_, 1676, to require explanation, and he proceeded to
say that it was “alias Gate-Side, seated on the Banks of the Tine, by the
Saxons call’d Gates-heved, i.e. _Caprae Caput_, or Goat’s-head, perchance
from an Inn with such a sign.”
But perchance not. While the Saxon name certainly was Gatesheved, it
meant “road’s head,” either in allusion to the Roman bridge across the
river being broken down and passage being possible only by water, or else
referring to the abruptly-descending land on either side, where the road
would seem to be coming to a sudden end.
Gateshead is to Newcastle what Southwark is to London, and the Tyne which
runs between may be likened in the same way to the Thames. Comparison
from any other point of view is impossible. Gateshead is nowadays a
great deal worse than it was when Doctor Johnson called it “a dirty lane
leading to Newcastle.” It may be ranked among the half-dozen dirtiest
places on earth, and the lane which the Doctor saw has sent forth miles
of streets as bad as itself, so that the geographical distribution of
filth and squalor has in modern times become very wide. There are two
ways of entering Newcastle since the High Level Bridge across the Tyne
has supplemented what used to be the old Tyne Bridge, once, and until
fifty years ago, the only way of crossing the river except by boat. When
Stephenson flung his High Level Bridge across that stream, as yellow, if
not as historic, as the Tiber, he provided a roadway for general traffic
beneath the railway, and the old bridge lost its favour, simply for the
reason that to cross it the steeply descending West Street and Bottle
Lane had to be taken and the just as steeply ascending bank of the river
on the Newcastle side to be climbed; while by the High Level a flat road
was provided. It is true that all traffic, pedestrian and wheeled, pays
a small toll for the privilege, but it is the lesser of the two evils.
Let those who have no concern with old times take their easeful way
through the gloomy portals of the High Level Bridge, eighty-five feet
above high-water mark. But let us examine the steep and smelly street,
paved with vile granite setts and strewn with refuse, which conducts to
the Tyne Bridge, or the Swing Bridge as it is nowadays, since the old
structure was removed, the channel of the river deepened, and the
wonderful swinging portion of the remodelled bridge, 281 feet in length,
and swung open or closed by hydraulic power, constructed in 1876. With
that work went the last fragments of the Roman bridge built by Hadrian
(_Publius Aelius Hadrianus_) more than a thousand years before; a bridge
which, indeed, gave the Roman camp its name of _Pons Ælii_. His bridge,
long in ruins, was replaced in 1248 by a mediæval structure which was
destroyed by a flood in 1771.