"Hope I see you well, sir. Thanky, sir, I ain't had such a cigar since
as you give me that day. You'll often find me on this stand, sir, and
happy to drive yer at any time, either on the box or inside. But I say,
you know, sir, how about putting a feller in print? Fine game some of
our chaps made on it, because they said as they knew it all by heart.
You see I don't like to wherrit people with my old stories; but when I
can get any one to listen I du like to talk a bit. You can't form no
idea of the things as we hears and sees; and I believe it would do any
man good to drive a keb for a twelvemonth; it's both wonderful what
you'd pick up, and how you'd git picked up. Here's your poets writing
about green banks and flowers, and shepherds and shepherdesses, and love
and stuff; why I've had no end of love-making in my keb here. Young
ladies and young swells, whose pars and mars ain't agreeable like, makes
assignations and hires a keb by the hour, to be drove up and down, and
the driver often looking as innocent as you please. I don't dislike
them sorter jobs, for you see, when he says `How much, kebby?' one can
lay it on a bit, for he won't look shabby by disputing the fare before
the young lady. But, Lor' bless you, they'd pay anything just at them
times, for money seems no object--everythink's sweet, and when it rains
I think they fancies as it's all sugar and water.
"There was one old chap as I drove regular; he used to come to my stand
twice a week, and after the first time I always knew what to do. Ah! he
was a fine old chap, and had been a orficer or somethin' of that sort.
Big mustarsh, yer know, and whiskers white as snow, and a hye! Ah, his
was a hye, his were! Talk about tellin' soldiers to charge! why, they
couldn't do no other with him a lookin' at 'em; though if he hadn't been
a good sort I don't think as I could have done much in charging my
fashion, you know. It was a pleasure to see him walk--as upright as his
old gold-headed cane. Seven bob a week he was to me reg'lar, and I used
to look out for his old white head a-coming round the corner about three
o'clock in the arternoon, and then I used to drive him right off to
Kensal-green Cemetery, where he'd get down, and I always waited for him
half an hour, when out he'd come, looking as fierce and stiff as ever,
get into the keb, `Home,' he'd say, giving his stick a bit of a
flourish, just as if it were a sword; and home it was.
"About the seccun time we went, I walks permiscus up to the gatekeeper--
stiff-looking chap, too, with only one eye, and a touch o' the
k'mishionaire about him, only he hadn't got no empty sleeve hanging to
his button and didn't wear no mustarchers; but all the same, I sets him
down as having handled the musket some time, and so he had. Well, I
walks up to him slowly and 'spectfully, showin' him all the time as I
know'd as I was only a kebman, and had learned to order myself lowly and
reverently to all my betters, you know; and this iled him a bit, so as
he went easy, and we got into conversation. I draws him on by degrees;
for these gatekeepers is werry great swells in their way, as any one may
see for hisself by getting a haporth o' curds and whey at one of the
parks, and studying the inflooence of a gold band round a man's hat.
'Taint everybody as notices it, but it's wonderful how that ere yaller
metal stiffens a feller's neck. Look at flunkeys, for instance--decent
chaps enough, some on 'em, till they gets a bit o' lace on their hats,
and then they're as proud on it as a fresh-moulted cockatoo. Never wore
no lace on my hat; but shouldn't mind wearing a little more nap.
"Let's see where had I got to? Ah, I know. Most extinguished myself
with them gold-band hats. You see, I was a saying as them gatekeepers
is big swells, and wants careful handling. They're the sort of chaps
that wun would like to buy at wun's own wallyation and sell at theirs.
Payin' spec that to anybody; only I'm 'fraid as the market would soon
get choked. Well, fust thing I does is to fall werry much in love with
the flowers in his windy, and quite 'spectfully arsts the name of 'em;
when, bein' a bit of a gardener, he comes out with some thunderin' great
furrin word, as I knows jolly well he didn't know the meanin' on; and I
says, `Oh!' as if I was werry much obliged, and takes hold o' one werry
gently, and has a smell, and then thinks a great deal o' the size of the
blossoms, and so on; till, as if it was takin' a great liberty, I arsts
if he couldn't cut me just one. Jest what he wanted, yer know; and
making a terrible fuss over it, and explaining the wally of the plant,
he snips me off a bit, and I sticks it in my button-hole, while he
looked as pleased as some o' those old buffers in white weskets as puts
shillings in plates when there's a k'lection, and then thinks as they've
been patrons: for some folks do love to be arskt favours, and then comes
the grandee as they grants 'em.
"So then I goes on a fishin' and a fishin', and calls him `sir,' and
arsts his opinion of Common Garden, and so on, till at last I hooks him,
and--
"Coo-o-ome orn! What are yer up to, Nosey? Never was such a 'oss as
you for lookin' arter the main chance. That wasn't a sixpence, stoopid,
and if it was I'd a got off and picked it up without yer going down on
yer knees. Never was such a 'oss as this here, sir. He's a Paddy--come
out of a Roman Catholic country, yer know; and blest if he ain't allus a
tryin' to go down on his knees. Fancies every crossin'-sweeper he sees
is a holy father, and wants to confess, I suppose. It's a natteral
weakness of his, and it's taken all the hair off his knees. I paints
'em up a bit so as to hide the worst of it, but he's allus a tryin' it
on. Get along, do.
"Well, I hooks him, you know--the gatekeeper, I means--and arter playin'
him a bit he was as civil as you please; gets down off his stilts, and
was ready to tell me anything. So then I gets to know as my gentleman
was an old colonel as had buried a daughter there two months afore, and
had allus come twice a week ever since to have a look at the place.
`An',' says Mr Crusp--that was the gatekeeper's name--`an', as you may
find out yourself if you go, I've got geranums an' stocks, an' werbenas,
quite a show on 'em, for the old gentleman said he should like to see
some flowers there.' And just then out comes the old orficer, and I
drives off.
"Well, sir, things goes on like this here for a matter o' months, and--
"Just look at that, now. Coome orn, stoopid. Blest if ever there was
sich a 'oss. It's pounds outer my pocket; but the guv'nor don't care,
bless yer, as long as I take in my reg'lar dose every day. Jest look at
that, now; pulling up short right in the middle of the road, cos them
Jarmans was blowin' up a row. Likes music, I spose; so do I, when I can
get it good, and so does everybody, it seems to me. I was a talking to
a gentleman only t'other day, jest as I may be to you, and he says, says
he, `It's my opinion that if you give the working classes good music,
joined to good words, they wouldn't notice them rubbishing music-hall
things, as only goes down because they're tacked on to a pretty tune.'
And he's right, yer know, and he's a man as has done a good deal towards
improving the working people. Why, only see if a pretty tune comes up
if it isn't whistled and sung all over the town--ah, and the country
too--in no time; and what's more, it ain't forgotten neither. Yer see,
to like yer fine books and poetry a man wants eddication; but it comes
nateral to him to love a pretty tune. I ain't up to much, yer know, but
I can't stand the rubbish as folks goes and wags their heads to--and
what for? only because they can't get anything better. Who says common
folks don't love music! Just take 'em and show 'em the crowds arter the
soldiers' and volunteer bands, and in the parks, and then, perhaps,
they'll alter their tune; and--look at that, now, if I ain't gone right
away from the story. Shouldn't do for a speaker, I shouldn't, for it
seems to me as I'm like my old 'oss, Nosey--allus wants to turn down the
fust turning as comes. There he goes. Coo-o-me orn.
"Well, things goes on for a matter o' months, and twiste a week I
pockets my three-and-six; but I keeps thinking as it couldn't last much
longer. `So the old gentleman got tired,' says you. Right you are! He
did get tired at last, but not as you might think. He allus came same
time, and stopped same time, and then I drove him back to his own door.
Summer went by. The gals had cried the lavendy up and down the streets,
and the swells had all gone outer town to the sea-side and the furrin
waterin' places; and for long enough, whenever a decent job had come, it
had been luggage on the roof, and a bundle of sticks and umbrellys
inside, and then off to some railway station or another. Kensington
Gardings was a rainin' yaller leaves all day long, while the robins was
tunin' up their melancholy little pipes, just as if there was no one
else left to sing, and they was werry miserable becos the cold weather
was a-comin'; while there was no sing left in me, for my asthmy was a
beginning to tickle me up a bit, as it allus does in autumn time; but
still my old gentleman comes as reg'lar as clockwork.
"One afternoon, as I was sitting on my box, rather cold and chilly, for
the fog was a-comin' creepin' on earlier nor usual, I was amusin' myself
a pickin' ov a few walnuts--eight a penny, you know, without the port
wine and salt. It was a dull sort of time, when you could hear the
muffin bell a-going down the side streets; and the fires shining through
the window-blinds looked warm and cosy. I was a pickin' and growlin'
away at my nuts--for they didn't skin easy, besides being werry dry,
when who should I see a-comin' but my reg'lar fare. Up he comes along
the street, straight and stiff as a drill-sergeant, and though half a
dozen whips runs up touting for the job, he never takes no notice of
'em, and I draws up to the kerb, jumps down to let him in, and opens the
door, when he stops with one leg in the keb.
"Yer see, this wasn't a reg'lar thing, for arter the first time I allus
knew what he wanted, and we understood one another, so that it was all
done this way: jump in--set down--take up agin--set down agin--pay up--
touch yer 'at--jump on the box--and nary word spoken. Sooted him, yer
know; and it sooted me; so what more did you want? But now on this day
it was diffurnt, for, as I said afore, he stops with one leg in the keb,
and begins to speak, quite pleasant, and quiet, and civil, as a
gentleman could speak, and he says, `Kebman, I thank you for your
attention. Here's a suffrin for you. Drive on.'
"In course, I thanked him; but he didn't seem to want to be talked to,
and I drives on, thinking it was a rum start paying aforehand. Not as
I'd got anything to grumble about, for a suffrin warn't to be sneezed
at, as the sayin' is. So I drives up to the cemetery gates; sets him
down; puts the nose-bag on the mare I drove then; an' lights my pipe.
"One pipe allus used to do for me while he went in and came out; so I
used to smoke it, and then put it away. But this time he didn't come
back so soon as usual, or else, being a bit outer sorts in stummick and
pocket, I'd smoked faster; so I pulls it out and lights up agen, and a
good deal o' bother I had, I remember, for the matches was damp, and
there was I a-rubbin' one arter the other again the pipe bowl for long
enough, inside my hat.
"Well, I finished that pipe, and then another, for it seemed to me as he
was having a long stay on the strength of the suffrin. `And welcome,' I
says; for, of course, being a good sort, I wasn't going to grudge him an
hour. But it got to be more than an hour, and dusky, and foggy, and
damp; and that blessed rheumatic shoulder o' mine began a-going it
orful. It was just for all the world as though some one had made a hole
right through the blade-bone, and then, shovin' a piece of clothes-line
through, was a sawin' of it backards and furards. Then it began to rain
a little--mizzly, yer know--and the mare havin' tossed her old nose-bag
about till she couldn't get not anuther taste o' chaff, let alone a hoat
or a bean, stands hanging all together like, same as those fiery steeds
as they used to send up under a balloon, Cremorne way, years ago, and
lookin' for all the world like a hannimal cut out for the knackers.
"Last of all out comes Mr Crusp, all hot tea and buttered toast,
shining beautiful, and looking as though he'd been going on to the tune
o' four cups and three rounds. Then he begins to fasten up; and
`Ulloa!' says he, `what are you a-waitin' for?' `Colonel,' says I.
`Out long ago,' says he. `No,' says I; `he's been in more'n two hours.'
Well, he looks gallus hard at me, and then he says, `He must ha' gone
out without you seein' of him. He's give you the slip.' `Then he must
ha' come away inside that there black omblibus with plumes on it, then,'
I says, for I knowed as I must ha' seen him if he had come out; and then
I tells him about the suffrin.
"`Why didn't you say that afore,' says Crusp. `You see if he ain't been
and committed hisself, or fell a wictim to his sorrow.' And then he
turns short round, and goes puffin' along one o' the side walks; while,
knowin' as my old mare wouldn't run away to save her life, I follered.
"First we goes down a long gravel path where the 'santhemums was a
hanging their heads, and seeming as if they was a crying; but then all
the trees I could see in the dim light was covered with tears. Then
Crusp leads off across a flower garding like, all covered with graves
and stones; and somehow, stumbling along in a big old box coat, I
manages to fall right over one of 'em; but when I pulled myself together
agen, and gets up to the gatekeeper, I finds him standing aside my
reg'lar fare, who was lying down there in the wet grass with his cheek
agin a grave, and one arm stretched right over it: while in t'other was
a long lock of dark hair. His hat had rolled off, and his own long
white hair lay loose among the dead flowers and damp grass; and turning
all of a tremble, I stoops down beside him, and Crusp whispers, so quiet
and solemn, `He's gone to her!'
"For a moment or two I couldn't believe it, for there in the dusk it
seemed as though he was only crying over the restin'-place of his poor
child. I didn't like to speak, for it all seemed so strange and solemn:
there was the `drip--drip--drip' from the trees, and now and then a sad
mournful sort of sigh as the wind swept by; and I don't know how it was,
but sad times seemed to come up again and take hold of a fellow's heart;
so that dim as it all was before, it turned worse, till one could hardly
see at all, and though the rain came slowly down, it seemed right and
nateral to take off one's hat; and we both did, and then stole away on
tiptoe to fetch more help.
"That allus comes back in the autumn time, when the leaves are falling,
and the rain drips slowly down; and then, feeling quite melancholy-like,
I can see again as plain as can be that fine old man restin' his head
upon the grave, with his silver hair all spread out upon the grass, and
him taking his rest from his troubles.
"Here we are, sir,--'Tannic Gardings; and, if it's all the same to you,
I'll just give that old 'oss a feed and a rub down, while you and the
ladies look through the green'ouses. Eases his jints a bit, yer see,
and they runs werry stiff sometimes."