This being the franklin’s rule,—while his guests were feasted in the old oak parlour, at the back of the house; in the pleasant orchard, all his labourers were regaled with a hearty meal of meat and plum-porridge; and huge jacks of ale were emptied and replenished, to the health of bride and bridegroom and good master.
After due carvings of veal and bacon, unlacing of fat capons, and untrussing of great pies of fruit and other dainties, in the parlour, and after some mantling cups of wine drank to the happy pair, the old people yielded to the impatience of the young, and all adjourned to Robin’s Meadow, not, however, before they had sung, as the grace after meat, a short psalm of praise.
The meadow, in which from generations before the May-pole was raised, had a fine level sward, which Blount kept smooth as a bowling-ground for the dancers, while a part of it rose in swelling banks, shaded by trees. These, though, as yet, but in early leaf, were gaily green, and contrasted well with the many-coloured and blushing wreaths of field-flowers that wound about the May-pole, at the top of which glittered a small crown, newly gilded in honour of the wedding, and further adorned with a few of the rarest plants which the gardens of Cheddar could produce.
A pleasure it was, as they passed into the meadow, to see the happy children rolling and tumbling and racing down the steep bank, from which they now scrambled away, to make room for the franklin’s party, and for the elders of the village, who, from this grassy knoll, were wont to preside over the pastimes of this holyday. We give not this scene in detail:—the dances of the young, as, with light and elastic steps, they bounded to lively measures round the May-pole, and the nodding heads of the musicians keeping time with the dancers, and the races and gambols of the ruddy children, each reader may figure forth to his own fancy. Neither tell we of the pretty ceremonies with which the milk maids brought their cows, with horns all garlanded, into the adjoining close, and prepared and offered the delicious syllabub: our aim is only to give an outline of a village May-day of the times of which we write, and to show the good parson of the best school of that period mingling in mirth among his people. Leaving, therefore, the happy villagers to continue their sports till set of sun, we shall confine ourselves to the steps of the pastor, and complete the journal of his day.
As the chimes struck six o’clock, he quietly withdrew, and passed from the scenes of pleasure and feasting to those of sickness and of mourning. If he had regarded the former with complacent joy, he was not the less willing, nor the less prepared, to cheer the latter with those high contemplations and those tender sympathies to which, by faith, as a Christian, he could point, and which, in charity, as a man, he truly felt. Of the old, who were confined to their own thresholds, he found two or three cross and short, but most of them garrulous, and in good humour. They had got pleasant portions from the franklin, and they could tell of old May-days, and heard, with thankful nods and ready “ayes,” and strong fetchings of the breath, that were not sighs of grief, the grave good words with which he taught them how only they could die in peace.
Of his flock only one lay at the point of death, and her he visited last.
She was the miller’s daughter, and had been the May-queen of the bygone year. Sacred be such visit, in its most solemn communings! but we may paint the scene of it, and the trifles which belong to those sympathies of our humanity, that often survive the resigned hope of life.
In a tall chair, against the back of which she leaned her head, sate a pale maiden, warmly wrapped in a robe of white woollen, close to the small window of an upper chamber, on which the evening sun shone warm: curling honey-suckles did make a frame to it; and one rose, with an opening bud, peeped from the trained bush beneath. Upon a little table near her stood a fragrant branch of May in a cup of water. There were faint flushes in her transparent cheeks, and there was an unearthly brightness in her eyes—not fitful—but a calm, steady, serene ray, that, as the declining sun poured over the damsel its yellow glories, presented her to the thoughtful gazer such as she might be when treading the celestial courts above.
“And have you any other wish, my child?” said Noble, as he rose to go.
“Yes, if it be not too foolish.”
“Tell it, my dear.”
“I would like some flowers from the May-pole strewn on my winding-sheet, and a bit of rosemary from your own garden put in my hands.”
“And you shall have them,” said Noble, pressing her wan hand in his, and turning quick away.
CHAP. IV.
Night closed on Cheddar, without any other disturbance than a quarrel—loud and short as a thunder-storm—between the blacksmith and his old termagant wife, which, Roger being potent in liquor, terminated in a complete victory on his part; and thus silence, if not peace, was restored to the quarter in which he dwelt.
Moreover, at the door of the Jolly Woodcutter, the most decent ale-house in the townlet, an old soldier with one leg, who tramped the country as a ballad-singer, with a fiddle and a dancing dog, became so very uproarious that it was found absolutely necessary by the parish constable to secure his one sturdy limb in the village stocks, where, after venting a few loud and angry curses at this dignitary, and abusing the village fiddlers for not playing the grand march of the king’s beef-eaters to the right tune, he addressed himself to making as easy a sleeping posture as his wooden fetter would allow; and, being apparently very familiar with such a resting-place, soon grumbled off into snoring forgetfulness: his little four-footed companion and guard did meanwhile drag up the cloak, which he had dropped some yards from the place of his confinement, and, arranging it in a soft heap, curled itself thereon with an evident sense of comfort.
But May-day festivals—though certainly in towns, and in those parishes in the rural districts where not conducted by discreet persons, they were often fruitful in scenes of riot and licentiousness—were not, in the present instance, chargeable with either of the noisy incidents which had for a half hour frighted the village from its propriety; seeing that the disputes of Roger and his rib were of every-day occurrence, and his potations also; and as for the old soldier, his drinking bouts were regulated by the state of that narrow poke in which he deposited his uncertain gains; and his sobriety was never secure while one coin remained in it.
Our parson came forth at the first glimpse of day on the morrow, to inquire at the mill how the poor sufferer had passed the night. She was in a profound and calm sleep, and he returned thankfully home, taking the street which led by the market cross. Nobody was yet abroad; but, under the great tree in the market place, he saw the old soldier sitting up in the stocks, and looking about him very forlorn and penitential. No sooner did he perceive the good vicar approaching, than he began to plead for his freedom.
“May it please your good reverence, make them loose me. I am not a pig, that I should be thus pounded:—never said or did harm to man or Christian, save only in the way of duty, your reverence. I am but a poor old toss-pike, done up in the wars; and gain an honest livelihood with this old kit and scraper, and this dumb creature, that shall dance you jig or coranto with any city madam of them all.”
“Why, I’ll see what I can do; but you would not have been put here for nothing, friend.”
“Nothing in life, your reverence, but drinking the health of King Charles in a brimmer, last evening, that was May-day, and a court holyday all the world over; and then the wound in my old head always aches, Parson, and I say more nor I mean, and, may be, louder than your gentles talk.”
“Well, but this is a sorry way of life for an old soldier,—to go about like a vagabond. Have you no home?”
“Home, bless you! none but this old bit of a cloak.”
“What parish were you born in?”
“Ah! there it is! I was born i’ the camp, in the Low Countries. That same day that the most noble Sir Philip Sidney was killed, my mother had a fright from a shot striking the sutler’s waggon, and I came into the world a month before time.”
“And have you no friends living?”
“None in the wide world that care a split straw whether I am above ground or under, this blessed day, save, may be, this little dumb thing that’s used to me.”
“Where did you lose your leg?”
“In the lines before St. Martin, your reverence: it will be thirteen years agone, come next September; and the right-worshipful knight, Sir Joseph Burroughs, was killed by the same shot. We used to say in hospital (you know, your reverence, we were vexed, and it was some of the officers, in their cups, spoke it out of a play-book,)—
“Well, they had their wish, in a manner, a year after; and I always minded after, that Master Felton was one of them.—Poor fellow! He gave me four-pence in silver, when I hadn’t a halfpenny to buy bread in London; and that same morning I saw his Grace of Buckingham in a sedan chair in Whitehall, and I would have tossed my staff before him, in hope of a largess; but his running footmen, with their fine silver badges, shouldered me into the gutter, crying, ‘Room for his Grace! room for my Lord’s Grace!’ Well, it was little room he took or wanted that day was a month! I was very sorry for Master Felton,—and I went to see him hanged.”
“You know he was a murderer.”
“O yes, I know that; but he gave me four-pence when I was starving; and, though he was only a lieutenant, he was a better officer than Buckingham, who was all lace and velvet, satin and feathers:—a likely man to look upon, and did not want courage; but he knew no more about commanding an army than the court fool.”
“Don’t you know, friend, that you must one day die yourself; and that it is a terrible thing to die and go before God without preparation?”
The veteran gave his buff jerkin a twitch, and said, “Why, for the matter of that, Parson, you see, I am no scholar, and cannot tell a B from a bull’s foot.”
“You believe in God?”
“Why, Master, haven’t I lain half my life abroad in the open fields, with the stars shining over my head? Ah, you don’t know what grand things come into a poor fellow’s mind when he wakes in the night and sees them bright things above him.”
“Yes, but I do,” said Noble with emotion; “and it is because I do, that I ask you these things. Do you ever pray to God?”
“Why, bless you, Master, I wouldn’t trouble him about a poor chopstick like myself.”
“You know the name of Christ, friend?”
“Yes,” said the homeless wanderer, and bowed his grey head.
“And what are your thoughts of him?”
“Why that he’ll be so good as to speak a word to God Almighty for me,” was the man’s strange yet pregnant answer. It is this mixture of recklessness, ignorance, and the mysterious worship of that inner spirit, which struggles upwards after something to which the heart may reach, and where it may finally rest, that makes every human being a subject of sad yet of sublime contemplation;—a fellow, a brother, an immortal spirit, passing here below his brief time of sojourning, but born for eternity.
Our good vicar was a true messenger of peace:—we need not say more than that this and all such opportunities were gladly improved by him. He sowed beside all waters. In the present instance the old soldier was speedily released, and taken up to the parsonage, and there, in the shady porch, he had a hearty breakfast; and when the little household assembled for prayer the wondering wayfarer was brought into the hall, and heard the more excellent way very plainly set before him,—and was then suffered to depart with bread in his wallet, and a parting word of solemn warning and brotherly kindness, as he set forward on his path, carrying with him the new thought and feeling, that, though he was a ballad singer and a sot, accustomed only to revilings, he had found a man of God, who had not passed him by, but had served him, and soothed him, and cared for his soul.
Such a man and such a minister was our parson of Cheddar: he had been now resident in the parish for fifteen years. Hither he had then brought a sensible wife,—of many rare accomplishments, and of a solid piety. Three fine children then played in their garden: of these, their girl had been taken from them in her twelfth year; and their two boys, who had both attained the age of manhood, had quitted the paternal roof, and taken their respective paths in life. Cuthbert, the eldest, had been educated at Winchester College, had afterwards passed through his university course at Cambridge, and was now domiciled, as has been already seen, in the house of Sir Oliver Heywood, as a tutor.
Martin, the youngest, had been five years at Westminster School as a day scholar, under the care, during that period, of one Mr. Philips, a worshipful and wealthy gentleman, of the most honourable company of Goldsmiths, and brother to the late Sir John Philips, knight, a very eminent merchant in the Levant trade, who, having made an unsuccessful speculation, and losing his whole venture, had taken the failure of his fortunes so much to heart, that he sickened and died soon after, leaving behind him one portionless daughter. This girl, while under the roof of her uncle, who was very considerably the junior of her father in age, was seen and admired by Noble, and had soon become his welcome prize.
With this maternal uncle, Martin, at his own request, was placed, as soon as he quitted school, that he might be brought up in the same thriving business. He quickly became remarkable for his taste and skill in the art of design, and as a fine judge of precious stones, so that his uncle predicted for him great eminence and wealth in the line which he had chosen; but Martin chancing one day to wait upon Vandyck with an ornamental piece of plate which a nobleman presented to that great genius, and being questioned about the design, confessed, with some hesitation, that it was his own. Hereupon the painter broke out into praise so warm, and took such notice of the youth, that, to Martin, a painter did soon seem the highest style of man;—to be of this bright company was now the highest object of his ambition. He had a strong will; for this he rose early, and late took rest: and the bent of his inclination became so decided, and his promise of excellence so great, that his uncle, at the recommendation of Vandyck, determined to afford him the opportunity and advantage of visiting Italy, and pursuing his studies in the city of Rome. There, surrounded by the great models of the divine art to which he was devoted, daily extending his knowledge, and increasing his delight, Martin lived at once to labour and to enjoy.
But the absence of these dear boys, though necessary, was severely felt by Noble and his wife; nor, in those days, were communications by letter of regular or frequent occurrence, even at home,—and of course, from abroad, very rare and most uncertain.
The good vicar, though anxious about Martin’s residence at Rome, was not wanting in true sympathy for his pursuits; having himself a taste for the arts, which he had improved by a leisure tour through Italy (before his marriage) as tutor and guardian to a young gentleman of large possessions in Oxfordshire.
Nothing could be more retired than the life led by these childless parents at Cheddar.
It is a large village, or townlet, situate at the foot of the Mendip Hills, in Somersetshire, and lying pleasantly sheltered on the south-west side of that bleak and naked chain. The noble tower of its fine old church is richly adorned with double buttresses, pinnacles, and pierced parapets, and in the open space, which forms the centre of its few irregular streets, is an ancient hexagonal market cross, where the wayfarer may find a shelter from the hot suns of July, or from the heavy rains of winter. The neighbourhood of Cheddar is romantic: it commands a fine view, in one direction, over a rich and extensive level; and it is immediately surrounded by rich, well-watered pastures, always verdant. Within a mile of the market cross before mentioned, on the road to Wells, there is a narrow, but a stupendous pass, or chasm, by which the chain of the lofty hills of Mendip is cleft, as it were, in sunder. The road winds through the bottom of this strange defile; the cliffs rise on either side—ragged, scarped, and terrific in their aspect—presenting, in many places, a sheer fall of four hundred feet. Nothing can more sublimely impress the spirit of a lonely traveller than the passage of this wild ravine, on a day of cloud, and gloom, and rushing winds. In the sunny calm of summer, when the wild pink, springing from the crevices of the rocks, adorns the scene with something of gentleness, it is still of uncommon grandeur. Black yews project from the larger fissures: here is a narrow ledge covered with verdure; there a thick mantle of ivy clothes the summit: here the mountain ash slants forward in its fantastic growth; while yet, in many places, the craggy front is naked and dazzling as a wall of stone.
By this road, once a week, the quiet parson ambled on an old grey horse to the fair city of Wells to refresh and recreate his spirit at a private music meeting in the Close; nor did he ever omit on these occasions to pass one hour of joy and praise in its magnificent cathedral. Upon the breezy summits of the Mendip hills, which bordered this road, he spent many serene and healthful hours. His life was most even in its tenour; and the scenes around him, though daily before his eyes, were as dear to him, or more so, than when, first entering on residence, he had surveyed them with grateful rapture.
Villages, however, like kingdoms, have their revolutions; and the chronicles of them are preserved in chimney-corners with more or less of fidelity, according to the interest of the events and the worth of the characters who figured in them.
These rustic historians have a mode of reckoning very different from citizens. With prime ministers they have nought to do. Their government is nearer to them, and they have never wanted wit enough to know when that was good or evil. Over these rural communities the ruler has, from time immemorial, been the lord of the manor, or the chief franklin, or the parson of the parish. According as these personages were disposed to promote religion and happiness, or to look with indifference on vice and misery, the rustic population was contented and cheerful, (because industrious in their callings, and peaceable in their lives,) or they were sullen and profligate. Under the joint reign of Franklin Blount and Parson Noble the inhabitants of Cheddar had long dwelt together in comfort and harmony; but this is a world of change,—and many things in the aspect of public affairs, of which the villagers heard and heeded little, gave serious warning to the prescient mind of Noble, that trouble was near.
He was so beloved and respected by his people, and so regarded and confided in by the worthy franklin, that he had hitherto been able to evade, counteract, or over-rule, for the good of his flock, those strange enactments which had been from time to time so inconsiderately imposed. That which enjoined him to publish the Book of Sports on the Sabbath-day he totally disregarded. On this point he would have consented to deprivation rather than obey. Hence he became suspected, by some parsons of a very different stamp, for a puritan; and there were not wanting uncharitable surmises among these concerning the course which Master Noble would take in the hour of trial; not that those who really knew him well ever doubted of that course at all.
But while these surmises were, as regarded himself, utterly devoid of foundation, it was asserted by some of his friends at Wells, the correctness of whose judgments and the charity of whose sentiments well accorded with his own, that his son Cuthbert had imbibed, from his late associates at Cambridge, a spirit of a very dangerous nature. Cuthbert had a large philanthropy, and a resolute courage to sustain and act out those promptings of benevolence which his love of freedom was continually urging upon his mind. Virtuous in his character, sanguine in his hopes, present evils he saw, and for present remedies he panted—but he looked not far on to consequences. A notion of his state of mind may be found in the letter which follows:—
“Most dear Father,
“You tell me in your last letter, which I have read over many times with serious thought, that my mother wishes me to send her a more particular account of this place and family, that she may the better see my present courses with the eye of her mind.—I will make a trial of my pen to set these matters in some order before her—and, first, of this mansion: it is a goodly fabric of stone, built by the father of the present knight in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He, as you know, exchanged some of his full money-bags for a fair estate in land, and closed all his great and prosperous ventures in commerce by a wise retirement to the noble pleasures of a country life. A situation more pleasant than this of Milverton you may not see in all the journey through these parts. The house standeth on a fine swelling slope of verdant ground, and is well sheltered by stately trees on three sides, but to the front the prospect is open, and maketh the heart dance with gladness, it is so full of delight. Looking to the south, you see the towers of that famous castle of Guy of Warwick. This castle is seated on a rock, very high, upon the river Avon, and hath a look of strength and of great majesty; as seen against the light of the distant sky—nothing can be more grand and commanding;—also, from the middle of the good city of Warwick, the fair pinnacles of the lofty tower of St. Mary’s Church do pierce the heaven, and she standeth like a crowned queen. I do fear for her diadem, for they say that the embattled keep of ancient Guy frowneth on our lady: but, turning the eyes from these stately objects, which the intervening woods may not conceal, directly below Milverton the river flows through a fair valley of green pastures; and there cannot be, in all England, a mill more pleasant to look upon and listen to than Guy’s mill: it standeth upon the farther bank of the Avon, over which there is a foot-bridge of wood, very narrow, and long enough to reach across a small meadow, which, when the waters are out, is always flooded. Not far from this mill, to the left, and upon the same bank, is an old decayed chapel, where I have seen a rude statue of the renowned Guy, more than eight feet in length; and near to this spot, close by the side of the water, there is a cave in the rock, where, as a hermit, he ended his days. But I will say no more of these places, of which report may have reached you through the discourse of others.
“Milverton House lacks nothing of furniture that money and good taste may command. There is a profusion of very fine carved oak in the hall and in the winter-parlour. In the latter, over the fire-place, is a curious representation of the meeting of Jacob and Esau; and inscribed above are the words, ‘With my staff I passed over this Jordan, and now I am become two bands.’ And in the private chamber of Sir Oliver is another piece, in three compartments, Jacob lying down alone in the Wilderness—the Vision of the Ladder of Angels—and Jacob setting up his Pillar of Remembrance.
“I name these things rather than the rich hangings and the handsome carpets which cover some of the tables, and the ebony cabinets, and the massy plate, because I know that they would give more contentment to my pious mother than all the costliness and bravery in the king’s palace.
“In the small room appointed for me, there is a posy worked upon a sampler, hung against the wall, that runneth thus:—
“What better bed than conscience good, to pass the night with sleep;What better work than daily care, from sin thyself to keep.”And there is an engraved portrait of Luther, with the words ‘In silentio et in spe erit fortitudo vestra.’ I cannot look upon these things without being deeply reminded of those feeling lectures of piety which the lips of my dear mother have read to me from my very childhood; but, truth to say, my dear parents, I feel an angel plucking me by the sleeve, and whispering in my ear that my stay in this sweet abode will not be long. Sir Oliver and Mistress Alice and Mistress Katharine entreat me with that kind civility and favourable respect, which make my days happy, and I find Master Arthur so docile and of such lively parts that my office is never irksome.
“Nothing can be more orderly than the manner of life here; and although the good knight is most hospitable, yet, as he doth not use the exercise of hunting, and has no park, the visiters are not many. He rides daily in the forenoon, and will sometimes go to see the stag-hounds of Stoneleigh Abbey throw off, with which pack he hunted for twenty years; but his chief delight now is in the culture of his garden and orchards, and of a vineyard, which he has laid out, at a great cost, on a favourable site, one mile from the mansion. All the farms in the village of Milverton are his, and his tenants are the sons of those who held the land under his father; so that the hamlet is but one large family, of which Sir Oliver is the head.
“Mistress Katharine, his daughter, rides constantly with her father, except when she takes the diversion of hawking, or goes out after the beagles with her young cousin, Arthur, who is as high-spirited and active a youth in the field, as he is earnest and persevering in the study. To see Mistress Katharine fly a hawk is gladsome; and although I have, from boyhood, accounted that sport cruel and unfeminine, yet, when I look on that inspiring sight, I deem it so no longer; certain I am that her mind did never once connect the thought of cruelty with a usage so common. She, too, seems as eager to learn what my poor scholarship can teach her as my own pupil; and if a tutor can be happy, I am, in the privilege of reading with this noble maiden, and seeing her fine countenance lighted up with the love of wisdom and of truth.
“But this state of things is far too bright to last. When a man dareth to think differently from those around him, he will soon become an object of suspicion and prejudice. I feel that my trial in this kind will assuredly come; for Sir Oliver, with all his kindness, has so rooted a dislike to all change in the established order of things, that a word against the undue stretch of the king’s authority, against the tyranny of the starchamber, or those abuses in the state, which are manifest to her best friends, would be enough to make his countenance change towards me past recovery.
“Upon these subjects, you, my dear father, have written to me with more earnestness and fear than I should have looked for. You tell me that I see not the inevitable consequences which must follow from the acting out of those opinions and sentiments with which I am so captivated. I confess that I am an ardent friend to civil and religious liberty. I desire to see the laws administered without fear or favour; to see taxation imposed by the Commons alone, and to see purity and charity preaching from our pulpits and ministering at our altars. You must not blame me: these were the desires that you implanted, when you taught me the immutable and eternal principles of justice, and when, both by lip and in your life, you showed me how sacred was the character, and how hallowed were the duties, of an ambassador for Christ. I look for reformation in the state, and purification of the church. You, perhaps, despair of either; and therefore you dread an ill result to the patriotic and pure efforts which so many great and good men are now making. Some of the best and wisest of my college friends think with them. Of that number are my late tutor and my late chamber-fellow, with both of whom you expressed yourself so much delighted, when, during my last year of residence, you visited Cambridge. I confess, frankly, that I hold their sentiments, and entertain hopes of ultimate good to my country as sanguine as theirs. The cause of liberty must triumph.
“Your last letter gave but little hope of poor Fanny at the mill: what a fair, cheerful, good girl she was. Martin will be very sorry when he hears about her: if you remember, he was always for dancing with Fanny on May-day.
“I am glad to hear that Bessy Blount is going to be married. She will make Tom Hargood’s farm as happy a home as any in England. However, I will not talk about weddings,—the very word makes me melancholy. I am just now preparing a short masque, which we are to perform next week, in honour of Sir Oliver’s birth-day. I suppose Martin, as well as myself, has very different notions of female beauty now to any we gathered at Cheddar; though, I doubt, if we shall either of us become the happier for our knowledge. Rosy cheeks and laughing eyes are joyous and pleasant to look upon, but they seldom beget cureless heart-aches, or plant the long-lived sorrow:—all this is very idle. The love of country is the next best love to that of God, and, after that, the most rewarding.
“I suppose that you will soon have a letter from Rome: no doubt Martin is very happy among the galleries and studios of that ancient city. I often wish that I could be transported there for an hour, and see him, as he stands alone, before a master-piece of Raphael, and sighs for the very fulness of his admiration. Forget not to let me hear the earliest news of Martin. I shall think of you all on May-day at old Blount’s; but, as the good old country customs are kept up here with great spirit, shall have no leisure to grieve over my absence from Cheddar, till night restores me to the solitude of my chamber, and to that sacred companionship with you in prayer, which I ever maintain.
CHAP. V.
Early in the morning of the day after that on which the rehearsal at Milverton House was interrupted by the humiliating scene already recorded, Cuthbert sallied forth, while the first rays of the level sun were reflected back by glittering dewdrops; and brushing them with swift steps from his path, crossed the foot-bridge near Guy’s mill, and was soon lost to view in the woods upon the far side of the Avon. The mill was already at work, but he lingered not to gaze upon the rushing waters. His eye glanced at the glad scene, and his ear drank in the living sound; but the prosy old miller was at his door, and his daughter stood on the stepping stones below, watching the white breasted ducks that played in the back current, therefore, with a short “good morrow,” that waited for no reply, he passed onwards, for he was bound on an errand of mercy. Although the old body, Margery, had escaped the persecution of yesterday, there was good ground for fearing that it would be soon and more cruelly repeated, if she continued to dwell in her lonely and exposed hovel; and Cuthbert had found a poor bricklayer from Coventry, who was then employed in repairing the roof of an outhouse at Milverton, and who had witnessed the scene of the day before with a true Christian feeling, quite willing to give the old woman a lodging in the small house in the mean alley in which he dwelt, for such consideration as Cuthbert was willing to pay. With this proposal of shelter and security he sought the wood, in the bosom of which, beneath a sand-stone rock, in a forsaken pit, was poor Margery’s desolate abode. From the rude clay chimney, in the blackened thatch, curled a blue wreath of smoke: he leaned against the rock above, and called to Margery, but there was no reply. He went down and entered the hut. Upon a low stretcher on a coarsely plaited mat of straw, dressed in the same rags in which she walked abroad, she lay fast asleep, and her breathing sounded soft as that of a child,—a raven with a clipped wing and club-foot hopped upon the floor, and croaked at the intrusion; but the sound, though loud, did not awaken her. “I will not fright away a sleep so friendly,” thought Cuthbert: he went forth again, and seated himself beneath a stately oak at no great distance. In an open grassy glade not far off, in front, a few deer were feeding,—the scene around was peace and beauty,—trees, herbs, beasts of the field and fowls of the air were declaring the glory and praising the goodness of a present God. In silent rapture Cuthbert mused his praise; but adoration was succeeded by a sense of pain,—another scene, another image, interposed between the sunny objects before him and his mental vision. The stony desolation of Mount Calvary, and the black sky above, and the pale and holy forehead with its crown of thorns, came up startling and apparent, and reminded him that he was the inhabitant of a fallen world. This solemn turn being given to his thoughts, his mind reverted, with serious consideration, to the views of that party in the state which was already designated by the name of Puritans, and which had been hitherto, and but for the questions of civil liberty now widely agitated would still have been, a by-word and a reproach among the people. “It is true,” said he, “a Christian must be a mourner—he cannot be other than a mourner; but yet, are we not graciously commanded to serve the Lord with gladness? is the countenance always to be sad? is there to be no rejoicing in the light of the sun? Where is the middle ground between these two great parties in church and state? Why is not a great and overwhelming majority of moderate men found there to defend the best interests of all?” The thoughts to which he thus gave utterance would have found a response in the bosoms of thousands—indeed they were the very sentiments of his own father; only that good man knew, what Cuthbert was as yet ignorant of,—a knowledge which he was soon to purchase at the heavy price of a most bitter and heart-breaking experience. He had yet to learn that, in times of public commotion, there is no middle path, and that a party does too often take the colour of the very worst persons among those who compose it. The cant of the fanatic and the curses of the cavaliers alike disgusted him. But yet he was of an age when men will be sanguine about having the world mended according to their desired pattern; and his heart glowed with the hope that the best men of the parliament side would in the end triumph over the cold and severe intolerance of the high church party, would control the power of the crown, and would effect great and glorious things for the liberty and the happiness of England. With these sentiments he had a very difficult card to play at Milverton, for Sir Oliver was a decided enemy to the party which he secretly approved; and some of the neighbouring gentlemen, holding the same opinions with the knight, gave a much coarser expression to them. He had to hold his mouth as with a bridle in their presence. Among these persons by far the most obnoxious was Sir Charles Lambert, a gentleman of about five-and-thirty, related to Sir Oliver, and residing within a few miles, at Bolton Grange, upon a fine property, with two younger sisters left dependent on him.
He had been a great deal about the court formerly, and in his youth had been attached, for a few years, to the retinue of the late Duke of Buckingham. Not proving of a capacity for public affairs, he had been thrown back upon country life, without the true refinements of a courtier, but with all those vices and fopperies, which, in the train of Buckingham, it was not difficult to acquire. He covered with satin and musk a heart as brutal and savage as one of his own hounds,—resembling in nothing that generous and warm race of men the country gentlemen of England but in a fine person and in a passion for the chase. Nevertheless he did so conceal from Sir Oliver his true character, that he was always made welcome at Milverton. In such thoughts the mind of Cuthbert was tossed about as on a troubled sea; and from mere weariness he fell into a contemplation of the sweetness of nature, and the soft manner of her nursing, when we lie still and passive in her lap, and look upon her face. So long a time had he lingered in this green haunt, that the sun was three hours high; and the great clock of Warwick, striking seven, warned him to return home. Of the small herd in the open glade a few were still grazing,—others, and a noble hart among them, lay in perfect repose: but, suddenly, every neck was raised and turned—the ears stood erect—the nostrils distended and closed—the eyes dilated—and then, as by accord, they all stole slowly off to the rocky and difficult ground above them. He looked around, and could see nothing to alarm them; but, in the same instant, the blast of a distant hunting horn came up faint on the wind: the sound was again heard nearer; and the loud voice of dogs in concert, shrill yet deep, made the woods echo with notes that silenced every bird, and drove away all the panting creatures from their lairs. Yet was it a gallant sight—a sight to stir the blood—as within some twenty yards of the tree under which Cuthbert stood, the chase in full career swept by:—with antlers well thrown back, in its last staggering speed, came a blown stag, with a stanch hound so close upon its flank, you looked to see the fine creature torn down instantly; not far behind, two leash of dogs were hanging on its track, their mouths loud opening for prey:—with shouts of joy, and pace precipitate, the huntsmen followed,—a small but eager band on gallant steeds all foaming at the mouth, and stained with sweat. Swift as a vision of the night they passed, and from beyond a swell of ground in front a winding horn sent forth the well known mort. Cuthbert, naturally excited, ran to a knoll before him, which might command the country beyond. On the side of an open slope, at some considerable distance, he saw the last act of the death. The lifted knife, all red and reeking, was in the hand of a stranger of noble presence, by whose side stood Sir Charles Lambert. The lordly game lay stretched upon the ground, and near, with lolling tongues and panting sides, the hounds lay gasping as for life. The riders were all dismounted, and their horses, with drooping heads and their hind quarters sunk and contracted, stood stiff and motionless beside them. By the loud and exulting voices of the sportsmen you might know that the run had been severe; two or three lagging horsemen were seen coming up in their track; and by a cross path, just above the spot where the stag was killed, two foresters on foot burst down at the top of their speed, and joined the group that now more closely surrounded the noble game. The sound had brought out all the household at Milverton, from whence the slope was plainly to be seen. The boy Arthur, with some of the serving-men, ran down the pathway towards Guy’s mill, while Cuthbert could discern Sir Oliver standing out on the terrace, and Mistress Katharine by his side, with a loose white kerchief thrown over her head, to keep off the rays of the sun, which were already powerful.
The hunters now sounded the relief, and waved their caps towards Milverton; intimating, by that note and action, that they would claim the hospitality of the mansion; and then, leading their tired horses by the bridle, they proceeded thither by the mill. Cuthbert, unseen himself, watched all their motions; and when they had disappeared within the gates of Milverton, and all below and around him was again still, he turned, with a dead and jaded interest, towards the sand-pit. Upon the edge of it, near the rock, he saw the bent figure of Margery, as if in the act of listening; and as she raised her head, and observed him walking to the spot, she hastily disappeared below.
He stepped quickly after her; but the door was already barred; and when he knocked and called to her, the hoarse croak of the raven was the sole reply. He rapped more loudly,—still the same voice of ill omen replied; but as he persisted, and said words to re-assure her, the door was slowly opened, and the withered tenant of the pit appeared.
“Is it you, young master?” said Margery; “and are you alone, and is there no hunter with you?”
“There is no one with me,” he replied: “the hunters have gone over the river.”
“That’s well, that’s well, master: a hunting day, if the game takes this way, is ever an ill day with me. They that be cowards alone, are bold in merry company; and I have had a whip on my old shoulders, and the dogs hounded on me before now, if any thing crossed their sport. Three years ago, last fall, when his best hound, Bevis, was killed in the hollow yonder, nothing would serve the turn of Sir Charles but to float my poor old carcass across the river, and to weigh me against the church Bible! But he hath had many a sleepless night for that; and bold as he looks by day, the ticking of a death-watch will keep him shivering in his bed.”
“What do you mean, Margery? The folk may well think you a witch for words such as these.”
“Why, I mean,” said the old woman wilfully and spitefully, “that I never wished ill to any one, but ill came upon ’em.”
“Had I thought this of you yesterday, I should have been slow to ask any one to give you house room; but you are God’s creature, and have been crossed with ill usage; and when you find yourself beneath the roof of a Christian, safe from all enemies, your heart will melt, and you will taste God’s peace yourself, and wish it to others. I have found a good man, that lives in Croft’s Alley in Coventry, and he will give you a chamber and a chimney corner, and kind words, and a stout arm to protect you; and when we get you safe there your thoughts will be quiet.”
“Hout-tout! what talk ye about Alley and a chimney corner? haven’t I my own ingle, and my own ways, and my own company? What voice more pleasant to me than those I heard when I was young, and hear still? What’ll take better care of me than that old bird? Few there be that don’t shun to pass close by this hut; and they that come to it step swiftly back again. I was told, with a curse, that I might not live any where else, many years ago; and here I shall stop till my old bones crumble.”
“Why, mother, why, you might starve here if you were taken ill, and none to help you.”
“Well, death is but death, let it come how it will.”
“But hunger is a bad death; and besides, are you not in constant danger of being taken up, and losing your life for a witch? Why, this bird that you keep, and your words and ways, will surely bring you to the stake one of these days.”
“Let the day come, if it is to come; and as to dying of hunger, where, think you, do the foxes die? and where do the birds of the air die? Why, they that escape the hounds die in their holes; and they that the bird-bolt misses find a dying place in some nest or corner. Go your way, young master! I am no tame rabbit, to be kept in a town hutch, and tormented by children. I don’t want to be led to church, and hear the parson’s jabber about my old soul.”
“Do not utter such wickedness, unhappy woman. It were charity to think you crazed, and take you into safe keeping against your will.”
At this the old woman gave a shriek of passion, fitful as that of a thwarted child, and then, suddenly overcome by fear, fell upon her aged knees, and lifted and joined her withered hands, and implored Cuthbert, with wild earnestness, never to have her moved.
“Look you, young master, winter and summer, here I have watched and waked these many years. It’s a small matter of meal that makes my porridge;—some give it for pity, and some give it for fear. There’s no lack of rotten sticks to keep me warm: yonder spring is never dry; and it’s free I am to go and to come, and nothing here to flout or to fret me: the deer and the kine take no count of me—the pretty creatures don’t fear me; and it’s not all the world calling me witch that will make them. That place is best we think best. Oh, for the love of God, master, let me alone—let me rot where I am.”
Cuthbert’s mind was in an agony of prayer; but his tongue clave to the roof of his mouth. He would have said much; but he could speak nothing. He gave her alms; and telling her that he would do nothing against her will—nothing to make her unhappy, but that he would come and see her again—he raised her from her knees, and went upon his way homewards.
“My father would not thus have left her,” was his first thought. “He would have found some way to break into her heart. Strange world—strange thing this human life! This old solitary miserable has been wrapped in swaddling clothes, even as others—has been suckled at a human breast—has grasped, with tiny hand, a father’s finger—and been kissed, and muched; and now, she has survived all kindred—lost all defence of strength or money—hath none of wisdom, and because her back is crooked, and nose and chin have come well nigh together, she has been hunted from her kind, and dwells apart. As God is love,—and that he is I cannot doubt and live,—this is a mystery! It’s a skein so much entangled that my poor wit can not unwind it.”
Muttering to himself these wayward fancies, he hurried back to Milverton as to his heart’s home. There he could see sunlight upon the earth, and feel warm in the comfort of it. Nor in his then mood was he sorry that the guest chambers would be full: he wished a day of cheerful cups, and pleasant voices, and music. Thus absorbed, he reached the mill, and passed it as swiftly as in the morning.
“There he goes,” said the old miller, speaking to his daughter, who was spreading out some linen to bleach—“There he goes, as shy as a hare, and as fast as if he were making for his form. I never gets a bit of chat with him. He’s not much for company.”
“Why, father,” replied the girl, coming upon the pathway, “he’s a scholar, you know, and that’s the fashion of them, you know.”
“Well, it’s a bad fashion to go poking about the woods as lonesome as a stray mule; no good comes of those crazy fashions. I like an open face, and an open hand, and a free tongue.”
“Eh! he can talk fast enough, I’ll warrant me, if he had a sweetheart to talk to.”
“He talk to a sweetheart! She must be a poor silly body that would listen. There are merry men and merry hearts enough in old England for the lasses to choose from, without giving ear to such as he.”
“Well, they give him kind words at the Hall,—and they say he’s always more for good than harm; and I find him pleasant spoken enough when he comes to angle in the mill-pool.”
“There it is! I can never make him say a dozen words, black or white; now Parson Mullins will chat free for an hour on, and tosses you off a pot of ale with good words and good will. Why, he and I have smoked many a pipe together; and he’s a clerk, and a rare scholar too. He doesn’t give you ignorant stuff o’ Sundays; but Latin, and Greek, and all the best that he has learned at college. That’s the man for my money.”
“Well, father, for the matter o’ that, I like to know what folk are saying; and it might be gipsy language for all you or I are the wiser.”
“I know where you got that lesson, Miss Pert; that’s what the old Puritan pedlar said the other day,—rot him! he shall take seat on the old wive’s ducking-stool if he comes this way again.”
“I am sure he was a quiet civil man; and you have not had a better piece of linen, or a cheaper, than he sold us, this many a year.”
“Hang his linen, and him too!” rejoined the sturdy old miller. “I didn’t like the cut of his black head;” and with that he passed into the mill, and the girl went towards the dwelling.
While this dialogue was passing, Cuthbert Noble was rapidly ascending the path, which rose gently over a swelling field of luxuriant grass, to Milverton. Certainly there was much about Cuthbert to excuse the prejudice of the miller. He was of low stature, with a long visage and grave aspect; and there was a peculiar expression of his eye, which disturbed or repelled those who saw him for a first time, or who saw him not at his ease; but to those whom, upon a nearer acquaintance, he liked, his dark eye beamed with light; the expression about his mouth was humane and gentle; his voice was low, and rather tremulous before strangers; he never laughed, and seldom smiled, save with his eyes, which gave quick and lively response to whatever pleased him. Though, in his first manhood, he was not without a knowledge of life and of the human heart, for his reading had been extensive; and he had that felicity of apprehension, by which the lessons of books are most happily caught, and most easily applied to the heart’s daily wants. Moreover, he had all those graces of persuasion by which a pupil is best won upon and encouraged to climb the steep hill of fame. More happily placed he could not have been than in the family of Sir Oliver Heywood, but for one circumstance—he was too happy. A fear lay beating in his bosom. He dared not confess to himself the strange, yet deep, sentiments of admiration with which he regarded the daughter of the worthy knight. He would fain persuade himself that it was nothing but an emotion of gratitude to Mistress Katharine for that generous courtesy which would not suffer a scholar of gentle birth to want such attention and respect as she might delicately pay to him. Here, however, his wisdom was at fault. In vain had books taught him the misery of misplaced affections. He was launching out upon an unknown sea that has no shore.