Of course, when Billy returned to the drawing-room the young ladies were busy discussing the Baronet, aided by Mamma, who had gone up stairs on the sound of wheels to reconnoitre her person, and was disappointed on coming down to find she had had her trouble for nothing.
If Sir Moses had been a married man instead of a widower, without incumbrance as the saying is, fine Billy would have been more likely to have heard the truth respecting him, than he was as matters stood. As it was, the ladies had always run Sir Moses up, and did not depart from that course on the present occasion. Mrs. Yammerton, indeed, always said that he looked a great deal older than he really was, and had no objection to his being talked of for one of her daughters, and as courtships generally go by contraries, the fair lady of the glove with her light sunny hair, and lambent blue eyes, rather admired Sir Moses’ hook-nose and clear olive complexion than otherwise. His jewelry, too, had always delighted her, for he had a stock equal to that of any retired pawnbroker. So they impressed Billy very favourably with the Baronet’s pretensions, far more favourably the reader may be sure than the Recorder did the Barons of the Court of Exchequer.
DESCENDING Long Benningborough Hill on the approach from the west, the reader enters the rich vale of Hit-im and Hold-im shire, rich in agricultural productions, lavish of rural beauties, and renowned for the strength and speed of its foxes.
As a hunting country Hit-im and Hold-im shire ranks next to Featherbedfordshire, and has always been hunted by men of wealth and renown. The great Mr. Bruiser hunted it at one time, and was succeeded by the equally great Mr. Customer, who kept it for upwards of twenty years. He was succeeded by Mr. Charles Crasher, after whom came the eminent Lord Martingal, who most materially improved its even then almost perfect features by the judicious planting of gorse covers on the eastern or Droxmoor side, where woodlands are deficient.
It was during Lord Martingal’s reign that Hit-im and Hold-im shire may be said to have attained the zenith of its fame, for he was liberal in the extreme, not receiving a farthing subscription, and maintaining the Club at the Fox and Hounds Hotel at Hinton with the greatest spirit and popularity. He reigned over Hit-im and Hold-im shire for the period of a quarter of a century, his retirement being at length caused by a fall from his horse, aggravated by distress at seeing his favourite gorses Rattleford and Chivington cut up by a branch-line of the Crumpletin railway.
On his lordship’s resignation, the country underwent the degradation of passing into the hands of the well-known Captain Flasher, a gentleman who, instead of keeping hounds, as Lord Martingal had done, expected the hounds to keep him. To this end he organised a subscription—a difficult thing to realise even when men have got into the habit of paying, or perhaps promising one—but most difficult when, as in this case, they had long been accustomed to have their hunting for nothing. It is then that the beauties of a free pack are apparent. The Captain, however, nothing daunted by the difficulty, applied the screw most assiduously, causing many gentlemen to find out that they were just going to give up hunting, and others that they must go abroad to economise. This was just about the gloomy time that our friend the Major was vacillating between Boulogne and Bastille; and it so happened that Mr. Plantagenet Brown, of Pangburn Park, whose Norman-conquest family had long been pressing on the vitals of the estate, taking all out and putting nothing in, suddenly found themselves at the end of their tether. The estate had collapsed. Then came the brief summing-up of a long career of improvidence in the shape of an auctioneer’s advertisement, offering the highly valuable freehold property, comprising about two thousand five hundred acres in a ring fence, with a modern mansion replete with every requisite for a nobleman or gentleman’s seat, for sale, which, of course, brought the usual train of visitors, valuers, Paul-Pryers, and so on—some lamenting the setting, others speculating on the rising sun.
At the sale, a most repulsive, poverty-stricken looking little old Jew kept protracting the biddings when everybody else seemed done, in such a way as to cause the auctioneer to request an imparlance, in order that he might ascertain who his principal was; when the Jew, putting his dirty hands to his bearded mouth, whispered in the auctioneer’s ear, “Shir Moshes Mainchance,” whereupon the languid biddings were resumed, and the estate was ultimately knocked down to the Baronet.
Then came the ceremony of taking possession—the carriage-and-four, the flags, the band of music, the triumphal arch, the fervid address and heartfelt reply, amid the prolonged cheers of the wretched pauperised tenantry.
That mark of respect over, let us return to the hounds.
Captain Flasher did not give satisfaction, which indeed was not to be expected, considering that he wanted a subscription. No man would have given satisfaction under the circumstances, but the Captain least of all, because he brought nothing into the common stock, nothing, at least, except his impudence, of which the members of the hunt had already a sufficient supply of their own. The country was therefore declared vacant at the end of the Captain’s second season, the Guarantee Committee thinking it best to buy him off the third one, for which he had contracted to hunt it. This was just about the time that Sir Moses purchased Pangburn Park, and, of course, the country was offered to him. A passion for hunting is variously distributed, and Sir Moses had his share of it. He was more than a mere follower of hounds, for he took a pleasure in their working and management, and not knowing much about the cost, he jumped at the offer, declaring he didn’t want a farthing subscription, no, not a farthing: he wouldn’t even have a cover fund—no, not even a cover fund! He’d pay keepers, stoppers, damage, everything himself,—dom’d if he wouldn’t. Then when he got possession of the country, he declared that he found it absolutely indispensable for the promotion of sport, and the good of them all, that there should be a putting together of purses—every man ought to have a direct interest in the preservation of foxes, and, therefore, they should all pay five guineas,—just five guineas a-year to a cover fund. It wasn’t fair that he should pay all the cost—dom’d if it was. He wouldn’t stand it—dom’d if he would.
Then the next season he declared that five guineas was all moonshine—it would do nothing in the way of keeping such a country as Hit-im and Hold-im shire together—it must be ten guineas, and that would leave a great balance for him to pay. Well, ten guineas he got, and emboldened by his success, at the commencement of the next season he got a grand gathering together, at a hand-in-the-pocket hunt dinner at the Fox and Hounds Hotel at Hinton, to which he presented a case of champagne, when his health being drunk with suitable enthusiasm, he got up and made them a most elaborate speech on the pleasures and advantages of fox-hunting, which he declared was like meat, drink, washing and lodging to him, and to which he mainly attributed the very excellent health which they had just been good enough to wish him a continuance of in such complimentary terms, that he was almost overpowered by it. He was glad to see that he was not a monopoliser of the inestimable blessings of health, for, looking round the table, he thought he never saw such an assemblage of cheerful contented countenances—(applause)—and it was a great satisfaction to him to think that he in any way contributed to make them so—(renewed applause). He had been thinking since he came into the room whether it was possible to increase in any way the general stock of prosperity—(great applause)—and considering the success that had already marked his humble endeavours, he really thought that there was nothing like sticking to the same medicine, and, if possible, increasing the dose; for—(the conclusion of this sentence was lost in the general applause that followed). Having taken an inspiriting sip of wine, he thus resumed, “He now hunted the country three days a-week,” he said, “and, thanks to their generous exertions, and the very judicious arrangement they had spontaneously made of having a hunt club, he really thought it would stand four days.”—(Thunders of applause followed this announcement, causing the glasses and biscuits to dance jigs on the table. Sir Moses took a prolonged sip of wine, and silence being at length again restored, he thus resumed):—“It had always stood four in old Martingal’s time, and why shouldn’t it do so in theirs?—(applause). Look at its extent! Look at its splendid gorses! Look at its magnificent woodlands! He really thought it was second to none!” And so the company seemed to think too by the cheering that followed the announcement.
“Well then,” said Sir Moses, drawing breath for the grand effort, “there was only one thing to be considered—one leetle difficulty to be overcome—but one, which after the experience he had had of their gameness and liberality, he was sure they would easily surmount.”—(A murmur of “O-O-O’s,” with Hookey Walkers, and fingers to the nose, gradually following the speaker.)
“That leetle difficulty, he need hardly say, was their old familiar friend £ s. d.! who required occasionally to be looked in the face.”—(Ironical laughter, with sotto voce exclamations from Jack to Tom and from Sam to Harry, of—) “I say! three days are quite enough—quite enough. Don’t you think so?” With answers of “Plenty! plenty!” mingled with whispers of, “I say, this is what he calls hunting the country for nothing!”
“Well, gentlemen,” continued Sir Moses, tapping the table with his presidential hammer, to assert his monopoly of noise, “Well, gentlemen, as I said before, I have no doubt we can overcome any difficulty in the matter of money—what’s the use of money if it’s not to enjoy ourselves, and what enjoyment is there equal to fox-hunting? (applause). None! none!” exclaimed Sir Moses with emphasis.
“Well then, gentlemen, what I was going to say was this: It occurred to me this morning as I was shaving myself——”
“That you would shave us,” muttered Mr. Paul Straddler to Hicks, the flying hatter, neither of whom ever subscribed.
“—It occurred to me this morning, as I was shaving myself, that for a very little additional outlay—say four hundred a year—and what’s four hundred a-year among so many of us? we might have four days a-week, which is a great deal better than three in many respects, inasmuch as you have two distinct lots of hounds, accustomed to hunt together, instead of a jumble for one day, and both men and horses are in steadier and more regular work; and as to foxes, I needn’t say we have plenty of them, and that they will be all the better for a little more exercise.—(Applause from Sir Moses’ men, Mr. Smoothley and others). Well, then, say four hundred a-year, or, as hay and corn are dear and likely to continue so, suppose we put it at the worst, and call it five—five hundred—what’s five hundred a-year to a great prosperous agricultural and commercial country like this? Nothing! A positive bagatelle! I’d be ashamed to have it known at the ‘Corner’ that we had ever haggled about such a sum.”
“You pay it, then,” muttered Mr. Straddler.
“Catch him doing that,” growled Hicks.
Sir Moses here took another sip of sherry, and thus resumed:—
“Well, now, gentlemen, as I said before, it only occurred to me this morning as I was shaving, or I would have been better prepared with some definite proposal for your consideration, but I’ve just dotted down here, on the back of one of Grove the fishmonger’s cards (producing one from his waistcoat pocket as he spoke), the names of those who I think ought to be called upon to contribute;—and, waiter!” exclaimed he, addressing one of the lanky-haired order, who had just protruded his head in at the door to see what all the eloquence was about, “if you’ll give me one of those mutton fats,—and your master ought to be kicked for putting such things on the table, and you may tell him I said so,—I’ll just read the names over to you.” Sir Moses adjusting his gold double eye glasses on his hooked nose as the waiter obeyed his commands.
“Well, now,” said the Baronet, beginning at the top of the list, “I’ve put young Lord Polkaton down for fifty.”
“But my Lord doesn’t hunt, Sir Moses!” ejaculated Mr. Mossman, his Lordship’s land-agent, alarmed at the demand upon a very delicate purse.
“Doesn’t hunt!” retorted Sir Moses angrily. “No; but he might if he liked! If there were no hounds, how the deuce could he? It would do him far more good, let me tell him, than dancing at casinos and running after ballet girls, as he does. I’ve put him down for fifty, however,” continued Sir Moses, with a jerk of his head, “and you may tell him I’ve done so.”
“Wish you may get it,” growled Mr. Mossman, with disgust.
“Well, then,” said the Baronet, proceeding to the next name on the list, “comes old Lord Harpsichord. He’s good for fifty, too, I should say. At all events, I’ve put him down for that sum;” adding, “I’ve no notion of those great landed cormorants cutting away to the continent and shirking the obligations of country life. I hold it to be the duty of every man to subscribe to a pack of fox-hounds. In fact, I would make a subscription a first charge upon land, before poor-rate, highway-rate, or any sort of rate. I’d make it payable before the assessed taxes themselves”—(laughter and applause, very few of the company being land-owners). “Two fifties is a hundred, then,” observed Sir Moses, perking up; “and if we can screw another fifty out of old Lady Shortwhist, so much the better; at all events. I think she’ll be good for a pony; and then we come to the Baronets. First and foremost is that confounded prosy old ass, Sir George Persiflage, with his empty compliments and his fine cravats. I’ve put him down for fifty, though I don’t suppose the old sinner will pay it, though we may, perhaps, get half, which we shouldn’t do if we were not to ask for more. Well, we’ll call the supercilious old owls five-and-twenty for safety,” added Sir Moses. “Then there’s Sir Morgan Wildair; I should think we may say five-aud-twenty for him. What say you, Mr. Squeezely?” appealing to Sir Morgan’s agent at the low end of the table.
“I’ve no instructions from Sir Morgan on the subject, Sir Moses,” replied Mr. Squeezely, shaking his head.
“Oh, but he’s a young man, and you must tell him that it’s right—necessary, in fact,” replied Sir Moses. “You just pay it, and pass it through his accounts—that’s the shortest way. It’s the duty of an agent to save his principal trouble. I wouldn’t keep an agent who bothered me with all the twopenny-halfpenny transactions of the estate—dom’d if I would,” said Sir Moses, resuming his eye-glass reading.
He then went on through the names of several other parties, who he thought might be coaxed or bullied out of subscriptions, he taking this man, another taking that, and working them, as he said, on the fair means first, and foul means principle afterwards.
“Well, then, now you see, gentlemen,” said Sir Moses, pocketing his card and taking another sip of sherry prior to summing up; “it just amounts to this. Four days a-week, as I said before, is a dom’d deal better than three, and if we can get the fourth day out of these shabby screws, why so much the better; but if that can’t be done entirely, it can to a certain extent, and then it will only remain for the members of the club and the strangers—by the way, we shouldn’t forget them—it will only remain for the members of the club and the strangers to raise any slight deficiency by an increased subscription, and according to my plan of each man working his neighbour, whether the club subscription was to be increased to fifteen, or seventeen, or even to twenty pounds a-year will depend entirely upon ourselves; so you see, gentlemen, we have all a direct interest in the matter, and cannot go to work too earnestly or too strenuously; for believe me, gentlemen, there’s nothing like hunting, it promotes health and longevity, wards off the gout and sciatica, and keeps one out of the hands of those dom’d doctors, with their confounded bills—no offence to our friend Plaister, there,” alluding to a doctor of that name who was sitting about half-way down the table—“so now,” continued Sir Moses, “I think I cannot do better than conclude by proposing as a bumper toast, with all the honours, Long life and prosperity to the Hit-im and Hold-im shire hounds!”
When the forced cheering had subsided, our friend—or rather Major Yammerton’s friend—Mr. Smoothley, the gentleman who assisted at the sale of Bo-peep, arose to address the meeting amid coughs and knocks and the shuffling of feet. Mr. Smoothley coughed too, for he felt he had an uphill part to perform; but Sir Moses was a hard task-master, and held his “I. O. U.‘s” for a hundred and fifty-seven pounds. On silence being restored, Mr. Smoothley briefly glanced at the topics urged, as he said, in such a masterly manner by their excellent and popular master, to whom they all owed a deep debt of gratitude for the spirited manner in which he hunted the country, rescuing it from the degradation to which it had fallen, and restoring it to its pristine fame and prosperity—(applause from Sir Moses and his claqueurs). “With respect to the specific proposal submitted by Sir Moses, Mr. Smoothley proceeded to say, he really thought there could not be a difference of opinion on the subject—(renewed applause, with murmurs of dissent here and there). It was clearly their interest to have the country hunted four days a week, and the mode in which Sir Moses proposed accomplishing the object was worthy the talents of the greatest financier of the day—(applause)—for it placed the load on the shoulders of those who were the best able to bear it—(applause). Taking all the circumstances of the case, therefore, into consideration, he thought the very least they could do would be to pass a unanimous vote of thanks to their excellent friend for the brilliant sport he had hitherto shown them, and pledge themselves to aid to the utmost of their power in carrying out his most liberal and judicious proposal.
“Jewish enough,” whispered Mr. Straddler into the flying hatter’s ear.
And the following week’s Hit-im and Hold-im shire Herald, and also the Featherbedfordshire Gazette, contained a string of resolutions, embodying the foregoing, as unanimously passed at a full meeting of the members of the Hit-im and Hold-im shire hunt, held at the Fox and Hounds Hotel, in Ilinton, Sir Moses Mainchance, Bart., in the chair.
And each man set to work on the pocket of his neighbour with an earnestness inspired by the idea of saving his own. The result was that a very considerable sum was raised for the four days a-week, which, somehow or other, the country rarely or ever got, except in the shape of advertisements; for Sir Moses always had some excuse or other for shirking it,—either his huntsman had got drunk the day before, or his first whip had had a bad fall, or his second whip had been summoned to the small debts court, or his hounds had been fighting and several of them had got lamed, or the distemper had broken out in his stable, or something or other had happened to prevent him.
Towards Christmas, or on the eve of an evident frost, he came valiantly out, and if foiled by a sudden thaw, would indulge in all sorts of sham draws, and short days, to the great disgust of those who were not in the secret. Altogether Sir Moses Mainchance rode Hit-im and Hold-im shire as Hit-im and Hold-im shire had never been ridden before.
THE first thing that struck Sir Moses Mainchance after he became a “laird” was that he got very little interest for his money. Here he was he who had always looked down with scorn upon any thing that would not pay ten per cent., scarcely netting three by his acres. He couldn’t understand it—dom’d if he could. How could people live who had nothing but land? Certainly Mr. Plantagenet Smith had left the estate in as forlorn a condition as could well be imagined. Latterly his agent, Mr. Tom Teaser, had directed his attention solely to the extraction of rent, regardless of maintenance, to say nothing of improvements, consequently the farm buildings were dilapidated, and the land impoverished in every shape and way. Old pasture-field after old pasture-field had gradually succumbed to the plough, and the last ounce of freshness being extracted, the fields were left to lay themselves down to weeds or any thing they liked. As this sort of work never has but one ending, the time soon arrived when the rent was not raiseable. Indeed it was the inability to make “both ends meet,” as Paul Pry used to say, which caused Mr. Plantagenet Smith to retire from Burke’s landed gentry, which he did to his own advantage, land being sometimes like family plate, valuable to sell, but unprofitable to keep.
Sir Moses, flushed with his reception and the consequence he had acquired, met his tenants gallantly the first rent-day, expecting to find everything as smooth and pleasant as a London house-rent audit. Great was his surprise and disgust at the pauperised wretches he encountered, creatures that really appeared to be but little raised above the brute creation, were it not for the uncommon keenness they showed at a “catch.” First came our old friend Henerey Brown & Co., who, foiled in their attempt to establish themselves on Major Yammerton’s farm at Bonnyrigs, and also upon several other farms in different parts of the county, had at length “wheas we have considered” Mr. Teaser to some better purpose for one on the Pangburn Park Estate.
This was Doblington farm, consisting of a hundred and sixty of undrained obdurate clay, as sticky as bird-lime in wet, and as hard as iron in dry weather, and therefore requiring extra strength to take advantage of a favourable season. Now Henerey Brown & Co. had farmed, or rather starved, a light sandy soil of some two-thirds the extent of Doblington, and their half-fed pony horses and wretched implements were quite unable to cope with the intractable stubborn stuff they had selected. Perhaps we can hardly say they selected it, for it was a case of Hobson’s choice with them, and as they offered more rent than the outgoing tenant, who had farmed himself to the door, had paid, Mr. Teaser installed them in it. And now at the end of the year, (the farms being let on that beggarly pauper-encouraging system of a running half year) Henerey & Humphrey came dragging their legs to the Park with a quarter of a year’s rent between them, Henerey who was the orator undertaking to appear, Humphrey paying his respects only to the cheer. Sir Moses and Mr. Teaser were sitting in state in the side entrance-hall, surrounded by the usual paraphernalia of pens, ink, and paper, when Henerey’s short, square turnip-headed, vacant-countenanced figure loomed in the distance. Mr. Teaser trembled when he saw him, for he knew that the increased rent obtained for Henerey’s farm had been much dwelt upon by the auctioneer, and insisted upon by the vendor as conducive evidence of the improving nature of the whole estate. Teaser, like the schoolboy in the poem, now traced the day’s disaster in Henerey’s morning face. However, Teaser put a good face on the matter, saying, as Henerey came diverging up to the table, “This is Mr. Brown, Sir Moses, the new tenant of Doblington—the farm on the Hill.” he was going to add “with the bad out-buildings,” but he thought he had better keep that to himself. Humph sniffed the eager baronet, looking the new tenant over.
“Your sarvent, Sir Moses,” ducked the farmer, seating himself in the dread cash-extracting chair.
“Well, my man, and how dy’e do? I hope you’re well—How’s your wife? I hope she’s well,” continued the Baronet, watching Henerey’s protracted dive into his corduroy breeches-pockets, and his fish up of the dirty canvas money-bag. Having deliberately untied the string, Henerey, without noticing the Baronet’s polite enquiries, shook out a few local five pound notes, along with some sovereigns, shillings, and sixpence upon the table, and heaving a deep sigh, pushed them over towards Mr. Teaser. That worthy having wet his thumb at his mouth proceeded to count the dirty old notes, and finding them as he expected, even with the aid of the change, very short of the right amount, he asked Henerey if he had any bills against them?
“W-h-o-y no-a ar think not,” replied Henerey, scratching his straggling-haired head, apparently conning the matter over in his mind. “W-h-o-y, yeas, there’s the Income Tax, and there’s the lime to ‘loo off.”
“Lime!” exclaimed the Baronet, “What have I to do with lime?”
“W-h-o-y, yeas, you know you promised to ‘loo the lime,” replied Hererey, appealing to Mr. Teaser, who frowned and bit his lip at the over-true assertion.
“Never heard of such a thing!” exclaimed Sir Moses, seeing through the deceit at a glance. “Never heard of such a thing,” repeated he. “That’s the way you keep up your rents is it?” asked he: “Deceive yourselves by pretending to get more money than you do, and pay rates and taxes upon your deceit as a punishment. That ‘ill not do! dom’d if it will,” continued the Baronet, waxing warm.
“Well, but the income tax won’t bring your money up to anything like the right amount,” observed Mr. Teaser to Henerey, anxious to get rid of the lime question.
“W-h-o-y n-o-a,” replied Henerey, again scratching his pate, “but it’s as much as I can bring ye to-day.”
“To-day, man!” retorted Sir Moses, “Why, don’t you know that this is the rent-day! the day on which the entire monetary transactions on the whole estate are expected to be settled.”
Henerey—“O, w-h-o-y it ‘ill make ne odds to ye, Sir Moses.”
Sir Moses—“Ne odds to me! How do you know that?”
Henerey—(apologetically) “Oh, Sir Moses, you have plenty, Sir Moses.”
Sir Moses—“Me plenty! me plenty! I’m the poorest crittur alive!” which was true enough, only not in the sense Sir Moses intended it.
Henerey—“Why, why, Sir Moses, ar’ll bring ye some more after a bit; but ar tell ye,” appealing to Teaser, “Ye mun ‘loo for the lime.”
“The lime be hanged,” exclaimed Sir Moses. “Dy’e sp’ose I’m such a fool as to let you the land, and farm ye the land, and pay income tax on rent that I never receive? That won’t do—dom’d if it will.”
Henerey—(boiling up) “Well, but Sir Moses, wor farm’s far o’er dear.”
Sir Moses—(turning flesh-colour with fury) “O’er dear! Why, isn’t it the rent you yourself offered for it?”
Henerey—“Why, why, but we hadn’t looked her carefully over.”
“Bigger fool you,” ejaculated the Jew.
“The land’s far worse nor we took it for—some of the plough’s a shem to be seen—wor stable rains in desprate—there isn’t a dry place for a coo—the back wall of the barn’s all bulgin oot—the pigs get into wor garden for want of a gate—there isn’t a fence ‘ill turn a foal—the hars eat all wor tormots—we’re perfectly ruined wi’ rats,” and altogether Henerey opened such a battery of grievances as completely drove Sir Moses, who hated anyone to talk but himself, from his seat, and made him leave the finish of his friend to Mr. Teaser.
As the Baronet went swinging out of the room he mentally exclaimed, “Never saw such a man as that in my life—dom’d if ever I did!”
Mr. Teaser then proceeded with the wretched audit, each succeeding tenant being a repetition of the first—excuses—drawbacks—allowances for lime—money no matter to Sir Moses—and this with a whole year’s rent due, to say nothing of hopeless arrears.
“How the deuce,” as Sir Moses asked, “do people live who have nothing but land?”
When Sir Moses returned, at the end of an hour or so, he found one of the old tenants of the estate, Jacky Hindmarch, in the chair. Jacky was one of the real scratching order of farmers, and ought to be preserved at Madame Tussaud’s or the British Museum, for the information of future ages. To see him in the fields, with his crownless hat and tattered clothes, he was more like a scare-crow than a farmer; though, thanks to the influence of cheap finery, he turned out very shiney and satiney on a Sunday. Jacky had seventy acres of land,—fifty acres of arable and twenty acres of grass, which latter he complimented with an annual mowing without giving it any manure in return, thus robbing his pastures to feed his fallows,—if, indeed, he did not rob both by selling the manure off his farm altogether. Still Jacky was reckoned a cute fellow among his compatriots. He had graduated in the Insolvent Debtors’ Court to evade his former landlord’s claims, and emerged from gaol with a good stock of bad law engrafted on his innate knavery. In addition to this, Jacky, when a hind, had nearly had to hold up his hand at Quarter Sessions for stealing his master’s corn, which he effected in a very ingenious way:—The granary being above Jacky’s stable, he bored a hole through the floor, to which he affixed a stocking; and, having drawn as much corn as he required, he stopped the hole up with a plug until he wanted a fresh supply. The farmer—one Mr. Podmore—at length smelt a rat; but giving Jacky in charge rather prematurely, he failed in substantiating the accusation, when the latter, acting “under advice,” brought an action against Podmore, which ended in a compromise, Podmore having to pay Jacky twenty pounds for robbing him! This money, coupled with the savings of a virtuous young woman he presently espoused, and who had made free with the produce of her master’s dairy, enabled Jacky to take the farm off which he passed through the Insolvent Debtors’ Court, on to the Pangburn Park estate, where he was generally known by the name of Lawyer Hindmarch.
Jacky and his excellent wife attempted to farm the whole seventy acres themselves; to plough, harrow, clean, sow, reap, mow, milk, churn,—do everything, in fact; consequently they were always well in arrear with their work, and had many a fine run after the seasons. If Jacky got his turnips in by the time other people were singling theirs, he was thought to do extremely well. To see him raising the seed-furrow in the autumn, a stranger would think he was ploughing in a green crop for manure, so luxuriant were the weeds. But Jacky Hindmarch would defend his system against Mr. Mechi himself; there being no creature so obstinate or intractable as a pig-headed farmer. A landlord had better let his land to a cheesemonger, a greengrocer, a draper, anybody with energy and capital, rather than to one of these self-sufficient, dawdling nincompoops. To be sure, Jacky farmed as if each year was to be his last, but he wouldn’t have been a bit better if he had had a one-and-twenty years’ lease before him. “Take all out and put nothing in,” was his motto. This was the genius who was shuffling, and haggling, and prevaricating with Mr. Teaser when Sir Moses returned, and who now gladly skulked off: Henerey Brown not having reported very favourably of the great man’s temper.
The next to come was a woman,—a great, mountainous woman—one Mrs. Peggy Turnbull, wife of little Billy Turnbull of Lowfield Farm, who, she politely said, was not fit to be trusted from home by hisself.—Mrs. Turnbull was, though, being quite a match for any man in the country, either with her tongue or her fists. She was a great masculine knock-me-down woman, round as a sugar-barrel, with a most extravagant stomach, wholly absorbing her neck, and reaching quite up to her chin. Above the barrel was a round, swarthy, sunburnt face, lit up with a pair of keen little twinkling beady black eyes. She paused in her roll as she neared the chair, at which she now cast a contemptuous look, as much as to say, “How can I ever get into such a thing as that?”
Mr. Teaser saw her dilemma and kindly gave her the roomier one on which he was sitting—while Sir Moses inwardly prepared a little dose of politeness for her.
“Well, my good woman,” said he as soon as she got soused on to the seat. “Well, my good woman, how dy’e do? I hope you’re well. How’s your husband? I hope he’s well;” and was proceeding in a similar strain when the monster interrupted his dialogue by thumping the table with her fist, and exclaiming at the top of her voice, as she fixed her little beady black eyes full upon him—
“D’ye think we’re ganninn to get a new B-a-r-r-u-n?”
“Dom you and your b-a-r-r-n!” exclaimed the Baronet, boiling up. “Why don’t you leave those things to your husband?”
“He’s see shy!” roared the monster.
“You’re not shy, however!” replied Sir Moses, again jumping up and running away.
And thus what with one and another of them, Sir Moses was so put out, that dearly as he loved a let off for his tongue, he couldn’t bring himself to face his friends again at dinner. So the agreeable duty devolved upon Mr. Teaser, of taking the chair, and proposing in a bumper toast, with all the honours and one cheer more, the health of a landlord who, it was clear, meant to extract the uttermost farthing he could from his tenants.
And that day’s proceedings furnished ample scope for a beginning, for there was not one tenant on the estate who paid up; and Sir Moses declared that of all the absurdities he had ever heard tell of in the whole course of his life, that of paying income-tax on money he didn’t receive was the greatest. “Dom’d if it wasn’t!” said he.
In fact the estate had come to a stand still, and wanted nursing instead of further exhaustion. If it had got into the hands of an improving owner—a Major Yammerton, for instance,—there was redemption enough in the land; these scratching fellows, only exhausting the surface; and draining and subsoiling would soon have put matters right, but Sir Moses declared he wouldn’t throw good money after bad, that the rushes were meant to be there and there they should stay. If the tenants couldn’t pay their rents how could they pay any drainage interest? he asked. Altogether Sir Moses declared it shouldn’t be a case of over shoes, over boots, with him—that he wouldn’t go deeper into the mud than he was, and he heartily wished he had the price of the estate back in his pocket again, as many a man has wished, and many a one will wish again—there being nothing so ticklish to deal with as land. There is no reason though why it should be so; but we will keep our generalities for another chapter.
Sir Moses’s property went rapidly back, and soon became a sort of last refuge for the destitute, whither the ejected of all other estates congregated prior to scattering their stock, on failing to get farms in more favoured localities. As they never meant to pay, of course they all offered high rents, and then having got possession the Henerey Brown scene was enacted—the farm was “far o’er dear”—they could “make nout on’t at that rent!” nor could they have made aught on them if they had had them for nothing, seeing that their capital consisted solely of their intense stupidity. Then if Sir Moses wouldn’t reduce the rent, he might just do his “warst,” meanwhile they pillaged the land both by day and by night. The cropping of course corresponded with the tenure, and may be described as just anything they could get off the land. White crop succeeded white crop, if the weeds didn’t smother the seeds, or if any of the slovens did “try for a few turnips,” as they called it, they were sown on dry spots selected here and there, with an implement resembling a dog’s-meat man’s wheelbarrow—drawn by one ass and steered by another.
Meanwhile Mr. Teaser’s labours increased considerably, what with the constant lettings and leavings and watchings for “slopings.” There was always some one or other of the worthies on the wing, and the more paper and words Mr. Teaser employed to bind them, the more inefficient and futile he found the attempt. It soon became a regular system to do the new landlord, in furtherance of which the tenants formed themselves into a sort of mutual aid association. Then when a seizure was effected, they combined not to buy, so that the sufferer got his wretched stock back at little or no loss.
Wretched indeed, was the spectacle of a sale; worn out horses, innocent of corn; cows, on whose hips one could hang one’s hat; implements that had been “fettled oop” and “fettled oop,” until not a particle of the parent stock remained; carts and trappings that seemed ready for a bonfire; pigs, that looked as if they wanted food themselves instead of being likely to feed any one else; and poultry that all seemed troubled with the pip.
The very bailiff’s followers were shocked at the emptiness of the larders. A shank bone of salt meat dangling from the ceiling, a few eggs on a shelf, a loaf of bread in a bowl, a pound of butter in a pie-dish,—the whole thing looking as unlike the plentiful profusion of a farm-house as could well be imagined.
The arduous duties of the office, combined with the difficulty of pleasing Sir Moses, at length compelled Mr. Teaser to resign, when our “laird,” considering the nature of the services required concluded that there could be no one so fit to fulfil them as one of the “peoplish.” Accordingly he went to town, and after Consulting Levy this, and “Goodman” that, and Ephraim t’other, he at length fixed upon that promising swell, young Mr. Mordecai Nathan, of Cursitor-street, whose knowledge of the country consisted in having assisted in the provincial department of his father’s catchpoll business in the glorious days of writs and sponging-houses.
In due time down came Mordecai, ringed and brooched and chained and jewelled, and as Sir Moses was now the great man, hunting the country, associating with Lord Oilcake, and so on, he gave Mordecai a liberal salary, four-hundred a year made up in the following clerical way:
Besides, which, Sir Moses promised him ten per cent, upon all recovered arrears, which set Mordecai to work with all the enthusiastic energy of his race.
ONE of the most distinguishing features between commerce and agriculture undoubtedly is the marked indifference shown to the value of time by the small followers of the latter, compared to the respectful treatment it receives at the hands of the members of the commercial world. To look at their relative movements one would think that the farmer was the man who carried on his business under cover, instead of being the one who exposes all his capital to the weather. It is a rare thing to see a farmer—even in hay time—in a hurry. If the returns could be obtained we dare say it would be found that three-fourths of the people who are late for railway trains are farmers.
In these accelerated days, when even the very street waggon horses trot, they are the only beings whose pace has not been improved. The small farmer is just the same slowly moving dawdling creature that he was before the perfection of steam. Never punctual, never ready, never able to give a direct answer to a question; a pitchfork at their backs would fail to push some of these fellows into prosperity. They seem wholly lost to that emulative spirit which actuates the trader to endeavour to make each succeeding year leave him better than the last. A farmer will be forty years on a farm without having benefited himself, his family, his landlord, or any human being whatever. The last year’s tenancy will find him as poor as the first, with, in all probability, his land a great deal poorer. In dealing, a small farmer is never happy without a haggle. Even if he gets his own price he reproaches hiself when he returns home with not having asked a little more, and so got a wrangle. Very often, however, they outwit themselves entirely by asking so much more than a thing is really worth, that a man who knows what he is about, and has no hopes of being able to get the sun to stand still, declines entering upon an apparently endless negotiation.
See lawyer Hindmarch coming up the High Street at Halterley fair, leading his great grey colt, with his landlord Sir Moses hailing him with his usual “Well my man, how d’ye do? I hope you’re well, how much for the colt?”
The lawyer’s keen intellect—seeing that it is his landlord, with whom he is well over the left—springs a few pounds upon an already exorbitant price, and Sir Moses, who can as he says, measure the horse out to ninepence, turns round on his heel with a chuck of his chin, as much as to say, “you may go on.” Then the lawyer relenting says, “w—h—o—y, but there’ll be summit to return upon that, you know, Sir Moses, Sir.”
“I should think so,” replies the Baronet, walking away, to “Well my man—how d’ye do? I hope you’re well,” somebody else.
A sale by auction of agricultural stock illustrates our position still further, and one remarkable feature is that the smaller the sale the more unpunctual people are. They seldom get begun under a couple of hours after the advertised time, and then the dwelling, the coaxing, the wrangling, the “puttings-up” again, the ponderous attempts at wit are painful and oppressive to any one accustomed to the easy gliding celerity of town auctioneers. A conference with a farmer is worse, especially if the party is indiscreet enough to let the farmer come to him instead of his going to the farmer.
The chances, then, are, that he is saddled with a sort of old man of the sea; as a certain ambassador once was with a gowk of an Englishman, who gained an audience under a mistaken notion, and kept sitting and sitting long after his business was discussed, in spite of his Excellency’s repeated bows and intimations that he might retire.
Gowk seemed quite insensible to a hint. In vain his Excellency stood bowing and bowing—hoping to see him rise. No such luck. At length his Excellency asked him if there was anything else he could do for him?
“Why, noa.” replied Gowk drily; adding after a pause, “but you haven’t asked me to dine.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon!” replied his Excellency, “I wasn’t aware that it was in my instructions, but I’ll refer to them and see,” added he, backing out of the room.
Let us fancy old Heavyheels approaching his landlord, to ask if he thinks they are gannin to get a new barrun, or anything else he may happen to want, for these worthies have not discovered the use of the penny-post, and will trudge any distance to deliver their own messages. Having got rolled into the room, the first thing Heels does is to look out for a seat, upon which he squats like one of Major Yammerton’s hares, and from which he is about as difficult to raise. Instead of coming out with his question as a trader would, “What’s rum? what’s sugar? what’s indigo?” he fixes his unmeaning eyes on his landlord, and with a heavy aspiration, and propping his chin up with a baggy umbrella, ejaculates—“N-o-o,” just as if his landlord had sent for him instead of his having come of his own accord.
“Well!” says the landlord briskly, in hopes of getting him on.
“It’s a foine day,” observes Heavyheels, as if he had nothing whatever on his mind, and so he goes maundering and sauntering on, wasting his own and his landlord’s time, most likely ending with some such preposterous proposition as would stamp any man for a fool if it wasn’t so decidedly in old Heavyheel’s own favour.
To give them their due, they are never shy about asking, and have always a host of grievances to bait a landlord with who gives them an opportunity. Some of the women—we beg their pardon—ladies of the establishments, seem to think that a landlord rides out for the sake of being worried, and rush at him as he passes like a cur dog at a beggar.
Altogether they are a wonderful breed! It will hardly be credited hereafter, when the last of these grubbing old earthworms is extinct, that in this anxious, commercial, money-striving country, where every man is treading on his neighbour’s heels for cash, that there should ever have been a race of men who required all the coaxing and urging and patting on the back to induce them to benefit themselves that these slugs of small tenant farmers have done. And the bulk of them not a bit better for it. They say “y-e-a-s,” and go and do the reverse directly.
Fancy our friend Goodbeer, the brewer, assembling his tied Bonnifaces at a banquet consisting of all the delicacies of the season—beef, mutton, and cheese, as the sailor said—and after giving the usual loyal and patriotic toasts, introducing his calling in the urgent way some landlords do theirs—pointing out that the more swipes they sell the greater will be their profit, recommending them to water judiciously, keeping the capsicum out of sight, and, in lieu of some new implement of husbandry, telling them that a good, strong, salt Dutch cheese, is found to be a great promoter of thirst, and recommending each man to try a cheese on himself—perhaps ending by bowling one at each of them by way of a start.
But some will, perhaps, say that the interests of the landlord and tenant-farmer are identical, and that you cannot injure the latter without hurting the former.
Not more identical, we submit, than the interests of Goodbeer with the Bonnifaces; the land is let upon a calculation what each acre will produce, just as Goodbeer lets a public-house on a calculation founded on its then consumption of malt liquor; and whatever either party makes beyond that amount, either through the aid of guano, Dutch cheese, or what not, is the tenant’s. The only difference we know between them is, that Goodbeer, being a trader, will have his money to the day; while in course of time the too easy landlord’s rent has become postponed to every other person’s claim. It is, “O, it will make ne matter to you, Sir Moses,” with too many of them.
Then, if that convenient view is acquiesced in, the party submitting is called a “good landlord” (which in too many instances only means a great fool), until some other favour is refused, when the hundredth one denied obliterates the recollection of the ninety-nine conferred, and he sinks into a “rank bad un.” The best landlord, we imagine, is he who lets his land on fair terms, and keeps his tenants well up to the mark both with their farming and their payments. At present the landlords are too often a sort of sleeping partners with their tenants, sharing with them the losses of the bad years without partaking with them in the advantages of the good ones.
“Ah, it’s all dom’d well,” we fancy we hear Sir Moses Mainchance exclaim, “saying, ‘keep them up to the mark,’ but how d’ye do it? how d’ye do it? can you bind a weasel? No man’s tried harder than I have!”
We grant that it is difficult, but agriculture never had such opportunities as it has now. The thing is to get rid of the weasels, and with public companies framed for draining, building, doing everything that is required without that terrible investigation of title, no one is justified in keeping his property in an unproductive state. The fact is that no man of capital will live in a cottage, the thing therefore is to lay a certain number of these small holdings together, making one good farm of them all, with suitable buildings, and, as the saying is, let the weasels go to the wall. They will be far happier and more at home with spades or hoes in their hands, than in acting a part for which they have neither capital, courage, nor capacity. Fellows take a hundred acres who should only have five, and haven’t the wit to find out that it is cheaper to buy manure than to rent land.
This is not a question of crinoline or taste that might be advantageously left to Mrs. Pringle; but is one that concerns the very food and well being of the people, and landlords ought not to require coaxing and patting on the back to induce them to partake of the cheese that the commercial world offers them. Even if they are indifferent about benefiting themselves they should not be regardless of the interests for their country. But there are very few people who cannot spend a little more money than they have. Let them “up then and at” the drainage companies, and see what wonders they’ll accomplish with their aid!
We really believe the productive powers of the country might be quadrupled.