We need scarcely say, that our hero’s appearance at church caused no small sensation in a neighbourhood where the demand for gossip was far in excess of the supply. Indeed, we fear many fair ladies’ eyes were oftener directed to Major Yammerton’s pew than to the Reverend Mr. Tightlace in the pulpit. Wonderful were the stories and exaggerations that ensued, people always being on the running-up tack until a match is settled, after which, of course, they assume the running-down one, pitying one or other victim extremely—wouldn’t be him or her for anything—Mr. Tightlace thought any of the young ladies might do better than marry a mere fox-hunter, though we are sorry to add that the fox-hunter was far more talked of than the sermon. The general opinion seemed to be that our hero had been away preparing that dread document, the proposals for a settlement; and there seemed to be very little doubt that there would be an announcement of some sort in a day or two—especially when our friend was seen to get into the carriage after the gay petticoats, and the little Major to remount the box seat.
And when at the accustomed stable stroll our master of haryers found the gallant grey standing in the place of the bay, he was much astonished, and not a little shocked to learn the sad catastrophe that had befallen the bay.
“Well, he never heard anything like that!—dead! What, do you mean to say he absolutely died on your hands without any apparent cause?” demanded the Major; “must have been poisoned surely;” and he ran about telling everybody, and making as much to do as if the horse had still been his own. He then applied himself to finding out how Billy came by the grey, and was greatly surprised to learn that Sir Moses had given it him. “Well, that was queer,” thought he, “wouldn’t have accused him of that.” And he thought of the gift of Little Bo-peep, and wondered whether this gift was of the same order.
MONEY and matrimony! what a fine taking title! If that does not attract readers, we don’t know what will. Money and matrimony! how different, yet how essentially combined, how intimately blended! “No money, no matrimony,” might almost be written above some doors. Certainly money is an essential, but not so absorbing an essential as some people make it. Beyond the expenditure necessary for a certain establishment, a woman is seldom much the better for her husband’s inordinate wealth. We have seen the wife of a reputed millionaire no better done by than that of a country squire.
Mr. Prospero Plutus may gild his coach and his harness, and his horses too, if he likes, but all the lacker in the world will not advance him a step in society; therefore, what can he do with his surplus cash but carry it to the “reserve fund,” as some Joint-Stock Bankers pretend to do. Still there is a money-worship among us, that is not even confined to the opposite sex, but breaks out in veneration among men, just as if one man having half a million or a million pieces of gold could be of any advantage to another man, who only knows the rich man to say “How d’ye do?” to. A clever foreigner, who came to this country some years ago for the honestly avowed purpose of marrying an heiress, used to exclaim, when any one told him that another man had so many thousands a year, “Vell, my good friend, vot for that to me? I cannot go for be marry to him!” and we never hear a man recommended to another man for his wealth alone, without thinking of our foreign friend. What earthly good can Plutus’s money do us? We can safely say, we never knew a rich man who was not uncommonly well able to take care of his cash. It is your poor men who are easy about money. To tell a young lady that a young gentleman has so many thousands a year is very different; and this observation leads us to say, that people who think they do a young man a kindness by exaggerating his means or expectations, are greatly mistaken. On the contrary, they do him an injury; for, sooner or later, the lawyers know everything, and disappointment and vexation is the result.
Since our friend Warren wrote his admirable novel, “Ten Thousand a Year,” that sum has become the fashionable income for exaggerators. Nobody that has anything a year has less, though we all know how difficult a sum it is to realise, and how impossible it is to extract a five-pound note, or even a sovereign, from the pockets of people who talk of it as a mere bagatelle. This money mania has increased amazingly within the last few years, aided, no doubt, by the gigantic sums the Joint-Stock Banks have enabled penniless people to “go” for.
When Wainwright, the first of the assurance office defrauders by poison, was in prison, he said to a person who called upon him, “You see with what respect they treat me. They don’t set me to make my bed, or sweep the yard, like those fellows,” pointing to his brother prisoners; “no, they treat me like a gentleman. They think I’m in for ten thousand pounds.” Ten thousand pounds! What would ten thousand pounds be nowadays, when men speculate to the extent of a quarter or may be half a million of money? Why Wainwright would have had to clean out the whole prison on the present scale of money delinquency. A hundred thousand pounder is quite a common fellow, hardly worth speaking of. There was a time when the greediest man was contented with his plum. Now the cry is “More! more!” until some fine morning the crier is “no more” himself.
This money-craving and boasting is all bad. It deceives young men, and drives those of moderate income into the London clubs, instead of their marrying and settling quietly as their fathers did before them. They hear of nothing but thousands and tens of thousands until they almost believe in the reality, and are ashamed to encounter the confessional stool of the lawyers, albeit they may have as much as with prudence and management would make married life comfortable. Boasting and exaggeration also greatly misleads and disappoints anxious “Mammas,” all ready to believe whatever they like, causing very likely promising speculations to be abandoned in favour of what turn out great deal worse ventures. Only let a young man be disengaged, professionally and bodily, and some one or other will be sure to invest him with a fortune, or with surprising expectations from an uncle, an aunt, or other near relation. It is surprising how fond people are of fanning the flame of a match, and how they will talk about what they really know nothing, until an unfortunate youth almost appears to participate in their exaggerations. Could some of these Leviathans of fortune know the fabulous £ s. d. colours under which they have sailed, they would be wonderfully astonished at the extent of their innocent imposture. Yet they were not to blame because people said they had ten thousand a year, were richest commoners in fact. Many would then understand much unexplained politeness, and appreciate its disinterestedness at its true value. Captain Quaver would see why Mrs. Sunnybrow was to anxious that he should hear Matilda sing; Mr. Grist why Mrs. Snubwell manoeuvred to get him next Bridget at dinner; and perhaps our “Richest Commoner” why Mrs. Yammerton was so glad to see him back at the Grange.
PEOPLE who travel in the winter should remember it isn’t summer, and time themselves accordingly. Sir Moses was so anxious to see Monsieur Rougier off the premises, in order to stop any extra hospitality, that he delayed starting for Lundyfoote Castle until he saw him fairly mounted on the gift grey and out of the stable-yard; he then had the mare put to the dog-cart, and tried to make up for lost time by extra speed upon the road. But winter is an unfavourable season for expedition; if highways are improving, turnpikes are getting neglected, save in the matter of drawing the officers’ sinecure salaries, and, generally speaking, the nearer a turnpike is to a railway, the worse the turnpike is, as if to show the wonderful advantage of the former. So Sir Moses went flipping and flopping, and jipping and jerking, through Bedland and Hawksworth and Washingley-field, but scarcely reached the confines of his country when he ought to have been nearing the Castle. It was nearly four o’clock by the great gilt-lettered clock on the diminutive church in the pretty village of Tidswell, situated on the banks of the sparkling Lune, when he pulled up at the sign of the Hold-away Harriers to get his mare watered and fed. It is at these sort of places that the traveller gets the full benefit of country slowness and stupidity. Instead of the quick ostler, stepping smartly up to his horse’s head as he reins up, there is generally a hunt through the village for old Tom, or young Joe, or some worthy who is either too old or too idle to work. In this case it was old bow-legged, wiry Tom Brown, whose long experience of the road did not enable him to anticipate a person’s wants; so after a good stare at the driver, whom at first he thought was Mr. Meggison, the exciseman; then Mr. Puncheon, the brewer; and lastly, Mr. Mossman, Lord Polkaton’s ruler; he asked, with a bewildered scratch of his head, “What, de ye want her put oop?”
“Oop, yes,” replied Sir Moses; “what d’ye think I’m stopping for? Look alive; that’s a good fellow,” added he, throwing him the reins, as he prepared to descend from the vehicle.
“Oh, it’s you, Sir Moses, is it,” rejoined the now enlightened patriarch, “I didn’t know you without your red coat and cap;” so saying, he began to fumble at the harness, and, with the aid of the Baronet, presently had the mare out of the shafts. It then occurred to the old gentleman that he had forgotten the key of the stable. “A sink,” said he, with a dash of his disengaged hand, “I’ve left the key i’ the pocket o’ mar coat, down i’ Willy Wood’s shop, when ar was helpin’ to kill a pig—run, lad, doon to Willy Wood,” said he to a staring by-standing boy, “and get me mar coat,” adding to Sir Moses, as the lad slunk unwillingly away, “he’ll be back directly wi’ it.” So saying, he proceeded to lead the mare round to the stable at the back of the house.
When the coat came, then there was no pail; and when they got a pail, then the pump had gone dry; and when they got some water from the well, then the corn had to be brought from the top of the house; so, what with one delay and another, day was about done before Sir Moses got the mare out of the stable again. Night comes rapidly on in the short winter months, and as Sir Moses looked at the old-fashioned road leading over the steepest part of the opposite hill, he wished he was well on the far side of it. He then examined his lamps, and found there were no candles in them, just as he remembered that he had never been to Lundyfoote Castle on wheels, the few expeditions he had made there having been performed on horseback, by those nicks and cuts that fox-hunters are so famous at making and finding. “Ord dom it,” said he to himself, “I shall be getting benighted. Tell me,” continued he, addressing the old ostler, “do I go by Marshfield and Hengrove, or——”
“No, no, you’ve no business at noughter Marshfield nor Hengrove,” interrupted the sage; “veer way is straight oop to Crowfield-hall and Roundhill-green, then to Brackley Moor and Belton, and so on into the Sandywell-road at Langley. But if ar were you,” continued he, beginning to make confusion worse confounded, “ar would just gan through Squire Patterson’s Park here,” jerking his thumb to the left to indicate the direction in which it lay.
“Is it shorter?” demanded Sir Moses, re-ascending the vehicle.
“W-h-o-y no, it’s not shorter,” replied the man, “but it’s a better road rayther—less agin collar-like. When ye get to the new lodge ye mun mind turn to the right, and keep Whitecliffe Law to the left, and Lidney Mill to the right, you then pass Shimlow tilery, and make straight for Roundhill Green, and Brackley Moor, and then on to Belton, as ar toll’d ye afoor—ye can’t miss yeer way,” added he, thinking he could go it in the dark himself.
“Can’t I?” replied Sir Moses, drawing the reins. He then chucked the man a shilling, and touching the mare with the point of the whip, trotted across the bridge over the Lane, and was speedily brought up at a toll-bar on the far side.
It seems to be one of the ordinances of country life, that the more toll a man pays the worse road he gets, and Sir Moses had scarcely parted with his sixpence ere the sound running turnpike which tempted him past Squire Patterson’s lodge, ran out into a loose, river-stoned track, that grew worse and worse the higher he ascended the hill. In vain he hissed, and jerked, and jagged at the mare. The wheels revolved as if they were going through sea-sand. She couldn’t go any faster.
It is labour and sorrow travelling on wheels, with a light horse and a heavy load, on woolly winter roads, especially under the depressing influence of declining day—when a gorgeous sunset has no charms. It is then that the value of the hissing, hill-rounding, plain-scudding railway is appreciated. The worst line that ever was constructed, even one with goods, passengers, and minerals all mixed in one train, is fifty times better than one of these ploughing, sobbing, heart-breaking drives. So thought Sir Moses, as, whip in hand, he alighted from the vehicle to ease the mare up the steep hill, which now ran parallel with Mr. Patterson’s rather indifferent park wall.
What a commentary on consequence a drive across country affords, One sees life in all its phases—Cottage, House, Grange, “Imperial John” Hall, Park, Tower, Castle, &c. The wall, however, is the true index of the whole. Show me your wall and I’ll tell you what you have. There is the five hundred—by courtesy, thousand—a year wall, built of common stone, well embedded in mortar, extending only a few yards on either side of the lodgeless green gate. The thousand—by courtesy, fifteen hundred—a year wall, made of the same material, only the mortar ceases at the first convenient bend of the road, and the mortared round coping of the top is afterwards all that holds it together. Then there is the aspiring block and course wall, leading away with a sweep from either side of a handsome gateway, but suddenly terminating in hedges. The still further continued wall, with an abrupt juncture in split oak paling, that looks as if it had been suddenly nipped by a want-of-cash frost. We then get to the more successful all-round-the-park alike efforts of four or five thousand a-year—the still more solid masonry and ornamental work of “Ten Thousand a Year,” a Warren wall in fact, until at length we come to one so strong and so high, that none but a man on a laden wain can see over it, which of course denotes a Ducal residence, with fifty or a hundred thousand a year. In like manner, a drive across country enables a man to pick up information without the trouble of asking for it.
The board against the tree at the corner of the larch plantation, stating that “Any one trespassing on these grounds, the property of A. B. C. Sowerby, Esq., will, &c., with the utmost, &c.,” enables one to jump to the conclusion that the Westmoreland-slated roof we see peering among the eagle-winged cedars and luxuriant Scotch firs on the green slope to the left, is the residence of said Sowerby, who doesn’t like to be trespassed upon. A quick-eyed land-agent would then trace the boundaries of the Sowerby estate from the rising ground, either by the size of its trees, its natural sterility, or by the rough, gateless fences, where it adjoins the neighbouring proprietors.
Again, the sign of the Smith Arms at a wayside public-house, denotes that some member of that illustrious family either lives or has property in that immediate neighbourhood, and as everybody has a friend Smith, we naturally set about thinking whether it is our friend Smith or not. So a nobleman’s coronet surmounting his many-quartered coat-of-arms, suggests that the traveller is in the neighbourhood of magnificence; and if his appearance is at all in his favour, he will, perhaps, come in for a touch, or a demi-touch, of the hat from the passers-by, the process being almost mechanical in aristocratic parts. A board at a branch road with the words “To Lavender Lodge only,” saves one the trouble of asking the name of the place towards which we see the road bending, while a great deal of curious nomenclature may be gleaned from shop-fronts, inn-signs, and cart-shafts.
But we are leaving Sir Moses toiling up the hill alongside of his dog-cart, looking now at his watch, now at his jaded mare, now at Mr. Patterson’s fragile park wall, thinking how he would send it over with his shoulder if he came to it out hunting. The wall was at length abruptly terminated by a cross-road intersecting the hill along a favourable fall of the ground, about the middle of it, and the mare and Sir Moses mutually stopped, the former to ease herself on the piece of level ground at the junction, the latter to consider whether his course was up the hill or along the more inviting line to the left.
“Marshfield,” muttered he to himself, “is surely that way, but then that old buffer said I had no business at Marshfield. Dom the old man,” continued he, “I wish I’d never asked him anything about it, for he has completely bewildered me, and I believe I could have found my way better without.”
So saying, Sir Moses reconnoitered the scene; the balance of the fat hill in front, with the drab-coloured road going straight up the steepest part of it, the diverging lines either way; above all, the fast closing canopy around. Across the road, to the right, was a paintless, weather-beaten finger-post, and though our friend saw it had lost two of its arms, he yet thought the remaining ones might give him some information. Accordingly, he went over to consult it. Not a word, no, not a letter was legible. There were some upright marks, but what they had stood for it was impossible to decipher. Sir Moses was nonplussed. Just at this critical moment, a rumbling sound proceeded from below, and looking down the hill, a grey speck loomed in the distance, followed by a darker one a little behind. This was consoling; for those who know how soon an agricultural country becomes quiet after once the labourers go to their homes can appreciate the boon of any stirrers.
Still the carts came very slowly, and the quick falling shades of night travelled faster than they. Sir Moses stood listening anxiously to their jolting noises, thinking they would never come up. At the same time, he kept a sharp eye on the cross-road, to intercept any one passing that way. A tinker, a poacher, a mugger, the veriest scamp, would have been welcome, so long as he knew the country. No one, however, came along. It was an unfrequented line; and old Gilbert Price, who worked by the day, always retired from raking in the mud ruts on the approach of evening. So Sir Moses stood staring and listening, tapping his boot with his whip, as he watched the zig-zag course of the grey up the hill. He seemed a good puller, and to understand his work, for as yet no guiding voice had been heard. Perhaps the man was behind. As there is always a stout pull just before a resting-place, the grey now came to a pause, to collect his energies for the effort.
Sir Moses looked at his mare, and then at the carts halting below, wondering whether if he left her she would take off. Just as he determined to risk it, the grey applied himself vigorously to the collar, and with a grinding, ploughing rush, came up to where Sir Moses stood.
The cart was empty, but there was a sack-like thing, with a wide-awake hat on the top, rolling in the one behind.
“Holloo, my man!” shouted Sir Moses, with the voice of a Stentor.
The wide-awake merely nodded to the motion of the cart.
“Holloo, I say!” roared he, still louder.
An extended arm was thrown over the side of the cart, and the wide-awake again nodded as before.
“The beggar’s asleep!” muttered Sir Moses, taking the butt-end of his whip, and poking the somnambulist severely in the stomach.
A loud grunt, and with a strong smell of gin, as the monster changed his position, was all that answered the appeal.
“The brute’s drunk,” gasped Sir Moses, indignant at having wasted so much time in waiting for him.
The sober grey then made a well-rounded turn to the right, followed by the one in the rear, leaving our friend enveloped in many more shades of darkness than he was when he first designed him coming. Night had indeed about closed in, and lights began to appear in cottages and farm-houses that sparsedly dotted the hill side.
“Well, here’s a pretty go,” said Sir Moses, remounting the dogcart, and gathering up the reins; “I’ll just give the mare her choice,” continued he, touching her with the whip, and letting her go. The sensible animal took the level road to the left, and Sir Moses’s liberality was at first rewarded by an attempted trot along it, which, however, soon relaxed into a walk. The creaking, labouring vehicle shook and rolled with the concussion of the ruts.
He had got upon a piece of township road, where each surveyor shuffled through his year of office as best he could, filling up the dangerous holes in summer with great boulder stones that turned up like flitches of bacon in winter. So Sir Moses rolled and rocked in imminent danger of an upset. To add to his misfortunes, he was by no means sure but that he might have to retrace his steps: it was all chance.
There are but two ways of circumventing a hill, either by going round it or over it; and the road, after evading it for some time, at length took a sudden turn to the right, and grappled fairly with its severity. The mare applied herself sedulously to her task, apparently cheered by the increasing lights on the hill. At length she neared them, and the radiant glow of a blacksmith’s shop cheered the drooping spirit of the traveller.
“Holloo, my man!” cried Sir Moses, at length, pulling up before it.
“Holloo!” responded the spark-showering Vulcan from within.
“Is this the way to Lord Lundyfoote’s?” demanded Sir Moses, knowing the weight a nobleman’s name carries in the country.
“Lord Lundyfoote’s!” exclaimed Osmand Hall, pausing in his work; “Lord Lundyfoote’s!” repeated he; “why, where ha’ you come from?”
“Tidswell,” replied Sir Moses, cutting off the former part of the journey.
“Why, what set ye this way?” demanded the dark man, coming to the door with a red-hot horse-shoe on a spike, which was nearly all that distinguished him from the gloom of night; “ye should never ha’ coom’d this way; ye should ha’ gone by Marshfield and Hengrove.”
“Dom it, I said so!” ejaculated the Baronet, nearly stamping the bottom of his gig out with vexation. “However, never mind,” continued he, recollecting himself, “I’m here now, so tell me the best way to proceed.”
This information being at length accorded, Sir Moses proceeded; and the rest of the hill being duly surmounted, the dancing and stationary lights spreading o’er the far-stretching vale now appeared before him, with a clustering constellation, amid many minor stars scattered around, denoting the whereabouts of the castle.
It is always cheering to see the far end of a journey, distant though the haven be, and Sir Moses put on as fast as his lampless condition would allow him, trusting to his eyes and his ears for keeping on the road. Very much surprised would he have been had he retraced his steps the next morning, and seen the steep banks and yawning ditches he had suddenly saved himself from going over or into by catching at the reins or feeling either wheel running in the soft.
At length he reached the lodges of the massive variously-windowed castle, and passing gladly through them, found, on alighting at the door, that, instead of being late for dinner as he anticipated, his Lordship, who always ate a hearty lunch, was generally very easy about the matter, sometimes dining at seven, sometimes at eight, sometimes in summer even at nine o’clock. The footman, in reply to Sir Moses inquiring what time his Lordship dined, said he believed it was ordered at seven, but he didn’t know when it would be on the table.
Being an ardent politician, Lord Lundyfoote received Sir Moses with the fellow-feeling that makes us wondrous kind cordiality, and dived so energetically into his subject, as soon as he got the weather disposed of, as never to wait for an answer to his question, whether his guest would like to take anything before dinner, the consequence of which was, that our poor friend was nearly famished with waiting. In vain the library time-piece ticked, and chimed, and struck; jabber, jabber, jabber, went his voluble Lordship; in vain the deep-toned castle-clock reverberated through the walls—on, on he went, without noticing it, until the butler, in apparent despair, took the gong, and gave it such a beating just outside the door, that he could scarcely hear himself speak. Sir Moses then adroitly slipped in the question if that was the signal for dressing; to which his Lordship having yielded a reluctant “Yes,” he took a candle from the entering footman, and pioneered the Baronet up to his bedroom, amid a running commentary on the state of the country and the stability of the ministry. And when he returned he found his Lordship distributing his opinions amoung an obsequious circle of neighbours, who received all he said with the deference due to a liberal dispenser of venison; so that Sir Moses not only got his dinner in comparative peace, but warded his Lordship off the greater part of the evening.
THE two-penny post used to be thought a great luxury in London, though somehow great people were often shy of availing themselves of its advantages, indeed of taking their two-penny-posters in. “Two-penny-posters,” circulars, and ticketed shops, used to be held in about equal repugnance by some. The Dons, never thought of sending their notes or cards of invitation by the two-penny post. John Thomas used always to be trotted out for the purpose of delivery. Pre-paying a letter either by the two-penny post or the general used to be thought little short of an insult. Public opinion has undergone a great change in these matters. Not paying them is now the offence. We need scarcely expatiate on the boon of the penny post, nor on the advantage of the general diffusion of post-offices throughout the country, though we may observe, that the penny post was one of the few things that came without being long called for: indeed, so soon as it was practicable to have it, for without the almost simultaneous establishment of railways it would have been almost impossible to have introduced the system. The mail could not have carried the newspaper traffic and correspondence of the present day. The folded tablecloths of Times, the voluminous Illustrated News, the Punch’s, the huge avalanches of papers that have broken upon the country within the last twenty years. Sir Moses Mainchance, unlike many country gentlemen, always had his letters forwarded to him where-ever he went. He knew it was only the trouble of writing a line to the Post-office, saying re-direct my letters to so-and-so, to have what he wanted, and thus to keep pace with his correspondence. He was never overpowered with letters when he came home from a visit or tour, as some of our acquaintance are, thus making writing doubly repugnant to them.
The morning after his arrival at Lundyfoote Castle brought him a great influx of re-directed letters and papers. One from Mr. Heslop, asking him to meet at his house on the Friday week following, as he was going to have a party, one from Signior Quaverini, the eminent musician, offering his services for the Hunt ball: one from Mr. Isinglass, the confectioner, hoping to be allowed to supply the ices and refreshment as usual; another (the fifth), from Mr. Mossman, about the damage to Mr. Anthill’s sown grass; an envelope, enclosing the card and terms of Signior Dulcetto, an opposition musician, offering lower terras than Quaverini; a note from Mr. Paul Straddler, telling him about a horse to be bought dog cheap; and a “dead letter office” envelope, enclosing a blue ink written letter, directed to Master Anthony Thom, at the Inn-in-the-Sands Inn, Beechwood Green, stating that the party was not known at the address, reintroduces Mr. Geordey Gallon, a gentleman already known to the reader.
How this letter came to be sent to Sir Moses was as follows:—
When Mr. Geordey Gallon went upon the “Torf,” as he calls it, becoming, as he considered, the associate of Princes, Prime Ministers, and so on, he bethought him of turning respectable, and giving up the stolen-goods-carrying-trade,—a resolution that he was further confirmed in by the establishment of that troublesome obnoxious corps the Hit-im-and-Hold-im-shire Rural Police.
To this end, therefore, he gradually reduced the number of his Tippy-Tom-jaunts through the country by night, intimating to his numerous patrons that they had better suit themselves elsewhere ere he ceased travelling altogether.
Among the inconvenienced, was our old friend Mrs. Margerum, long one of his most regular customers; for it was a very rare thing for Mr. Gallon not to find a carefully stitched-up bundle in the corner of Lawyer Hindmarch’s cattle-shed, abutting on the Shillburn road as he passed in his spring cart.
To remedy this serious inconvenience, Mrs. Margerum had determined upon inducting her adopted son, Master Anthony Thom, into the about-to-be-relinquished business; and Mr. Gallon having made his last journey, the accumulation of dripping caused by our hero’s visit to Pangburn Park made it desirable to have a clearing-out as soon as possible.
To this end, therefore, she had written the letter now sent to Sir Moses; but, being a very prudent woman, with a slight smattering of law, she thought so long as she did not sign her surname at the end she was safe, and that no one could prove that it was from her. The consequence was, that Anthony Thom not having shifted his quarters as soon as intended, the letter was refused at the sign of the Sun-in-the-Sands, and by dint of postmark and contents, with perhaps a little malice prepense on the part of the Post-master, who had suffered from a dishonest housekeeper himself, it came into the hands of Sir Moses. At first our master of the hounds thought it was a begging-letter, and threw it aside accordingly; but in course of casting about for a fresh idea wherewith to propitiate Mr. Mossman about the sown grass, his eye rested upon the writing, which he glanced at, and glanced at, until somehow he thought he had seen it before. At length he took the letter up, and read what made him stare very much as he proceeded. Thus it run:—
“PANGBURN PARK, Thursday Night.
“My own ever dear Anthony Thom,
“I write to you, trusting you will receive this safe, to say that as Mr. George Gallon has discontinued travelling altogether, I must trust to you entirely to do what is necessary in futur, but you must be most careful and watchful, for these nasty Pollis fellers are about every where, and seem to think they have a right to look into every bodies basket and bundle. We live in terrible times, I’m sure, my own beloved Anthony Thom, and if it wasn’t for the hope that I may see you become a great gentleman, like Mr. George Gallon, I really think I would forswear place altogether, for no one knows the anxiety and misery of living with such a nasty, mean, covetous body as Old Nosey.”
“Old Nosey!” ejaculated Sir Moses, stopping short in his reading, and feeling his proboscis; “Old Nosey! dom it, can that mean me? Do believe it does—and it’s mother Margerum’s handwriting—dom’d if it isn’t,” continued he, holding the letter a little way off to examine and catch the character of the writing; “What does she mean by calling me a nasty, covetous body? I that hunt the country, subscribe to the Infirmary, Agricultural Society, and do everything that’s liberal and handsome. I’ll Old Nosey her!” continued he, grinding his teeth, and giving a vigorous flourish of his right fist; “I’ll Old Nosey her! I’ll turn her out of the house as soon as ever I get home, dom’d if I won’t,” said Sir Moses quivering with rage as he spoke. At length he became sufficiently composed to resume his reading—
“-No one knows the anxiety and misery of living with such a nasty, mean, covetous body as Old Nosey, who is always on the fret about expense, and thinks everybody is robbing him.”
“Oh, dom it, that means me sure enough!” exclaimed Sir Moses; “that’s on account of the row I was kicking up t’other day about the tea—declared I drank a pound a week myself. I’ll tea her!” continued he, again turning to the letter and reading,—
“-I declare I’d almost as soon live under a mistress as under such a shocking mean, covetous man.”
“Would you?” muttered Sir Moses; adding, “you shall very soon have a chance then.” The letter thus continued,—
“-The old feller will be away on Saturday and Sunday, so come afore lightning on Monday morning, say about four o’clock, and I’ll have everything ready to lower from my window.”
“Oh the deuce!” exclaimed Sir Moses, slapping his leg; “Oh the deuce! going to rob the house, I declare!”
“-To lower from my window” read he again, “for it’s not safe trusting things by the door as we used to do, now that these nasty knavish Pollis fellers are about; so now my own beloved Anthony Thom, if you will give a gentle whistle, or throw a little bit of soft dirt up at the window, where you will see a light burning, I’ll be ready for you, and you’ll be clear of the place long afore any of the lazy fellers here are up,—for a set of nastier, dirtier drunkards never were gathered together.”
“Humph!” grunted Sir Moses, “that’s a cut at Mr. Findlater.” The writer then proceeded to say,—
“—But mind my own beloved Anthony Thom, if any body questions you, say it’s a parcel of dripping, and tell them they are welcome to look in if they like, which is the readiest way of stopping them from doing so. We have had a large party here, including a young gent from that fine old Lord Ladythorne, who I would dearly like to live with, and also that nasty, jealous, covetous body Cuddy Flintoff, peeping and prying about everywhere as usual. He deserves to have a dish-clout pinned to his tail.”
“He, he, he!” chuckled Sir Moses, as he read it
“-I shall direct this letter by post to you at the sign of the Sun in the Sands, unless I can get it conveyed by a private hand. I am half in hopes Mr. Gallon may call, as there is going to be a great steeple match for an immense sum of money, £200 they say, and they will want his fine judgment to direct matters. Mr. Gallon is indeed a man of a thousand.”
“Humph!” grunted Sir Moses, adding, “we are getting behind the curtain now.” He then went on reading,—
“—Oh my own dear darling Anthony Thom! what would I give to see you a fine gentleman like Mr. George Gallon. I do hope and trust, dearest, that it may yet come to pass; but we must make money, and take care of our money when made, for a man is nothing without money. What a noble example you have before you in Mr. George Gallon! He was once no better nor you, and now he has everything like a gentleman,—a hunting horse to ride on, gold studs in his shirt, and goose for his dinner. O my own beloved Anthony Thom, if I could but see you on a white horse, with a flowered silk tie, and a cut velvet vest with bright steel buttons, flourishing a silver-mounted whip, how glad, how rejoiced it would make me. Then I shouldn’t care for the pryings and grumblings of Old Nosey, or the jealous watchings of the nasty, waspish set with which one is surrounded, for I should say my Anthony Thom will revenge and protect me, and make me comfortable at last. So now my own dearest Anthony Thom, be careful and guarded in coming about here, for I dread those nasty lurkin Pollis men more nor can I say, for I never knew suspicious people what were good for any thing themselves; and how they ever come to interduce such nasty town pests into the quiet peaceful country, I can’t for the life of me imagine; but Mr. George Gallon, who is a man of great intellect, says they are dangerous, and that is partly why he has given up travelling; so therefore my own dearest Anthony Thom be guarded, and mind put on your pee jacket and red worsted comforter, for I dread these hoar frosts, and I’ll have everything ready for my darling pet, so that you won’t be kept waiting a moment; but mind if there’s snow on the ground you don’t come for fear of the tracks. I think I have littel more to say this time, my own darling Anthony Thom, except that I am, my own dear, dear son,
“Your ever loving mother,
“Sarah.”
“B-o-o-y Jove!” exclaimed Sir Moses, sousing himself down in an easy chair beside the table at which he had been writing “b-o-y Jove, what a production! Regular robber, dom’d if she’s not. Would give something to catch Master Anthony Thom, in his red worsted comforter, with his parcel of dripping. Would see whether I’d look into it or not. And Mr. Geordey Gallon, too! The impudent fellow who pretended not to know the Frenchman. Regular plant as ever was made. Will see whether he gets his money from me. Ten punds the wretch tried to do me out of by the basest deceit that ever was heard of. Con-found them, but I’ll see if I can’t be upsides with them all though,” continued he, writhing for vengeance. And the whole of that day, and most of that night, and the whole of the following day when hunting at Harker Crag, he was thinking how he could manage it. At length, as he was going quietly home with the hounds, after only an indifferent day’s sport, a thought struck him which he proceeded to put in execution as soon as he got into the house. He wrote a note to dear Lord Repartee, saying, if it would be quite convenient to Lady Repartee and his Lordship, he would be glad to stay all night with them before hunting Filberton forest; and leaving the unfolded note on the library table to operate during the night, he wrote a second one in the morning, inquiring the character of a servant; and putting the first note into the fire, he sealed the second one, and laid it ostentatiously on the hall table for the post.
We take it we all have some ambitious feeling to gratify—all have some one whom we either wish to visit, or who we desire should visit us. We will candidly state that our ambition is to dine with the Lord Mayor. If we could but achieve that great triumph, we really think we should rest satisfied the rest of our life. We know how it would elevate us in the eyes of such men as Cuddy Flintoff and Paul Straddler, and what an advantage it would be to us in society being able to talk in a familiar way of his Lordship (Lordship with a capital L., if you please, Mr. Printer).
Thus the world proceeds on the aspiring scale, each man looking to the class a little in advance of his own.
“O knew they but their happiness, of men the happiest” are the sporting country gentlemen who live at home at ease—unvexed alike with the torments of the money-maker and the anxieties of the great, and yet sufficiently informed and refined to be the companions of either—men who see and enjoy nature in all her moods and varieties, and live unfettered with the pomp and vexation of keeping up appearances, envying no one, whoever may envy them. If once a man quits this happy rank to breast the contending billows of party in hopes of rising to the one above it, what a harvest of discord he sows for his own reaping. If a man wants to be thoroughly disgusted with human nature, let him ally himself unreservedly to a political party. He will find cozening and sneaking and selfishness in all their varieties, and patriotic false pretences in their most luxuriant growth. But we are getting in advance of our subject, our thesis being Mr. and Mrs. Wotherspoon.
Our snuffy friend Spoon was not exempt from the ambitious failings of lesser men. His great object of ambition was to get Major Yammerton to visit him—or perhaps to put it more correctly, his great object of ambition was to visit Major Yammerton. But then, unfortunately, it requires two parties to these bargains; and Mrs. Yammerton wouldn’t agree to it, not so much because old Spoon had been a butler, but because his wife (our pen splutters as it writes the objection) his wife had been a—a—housekeeper. A handsome housekeeper she was, too, when she first came into the country; so handsome, indeed, that Dicky Boggledike had made two excursions over to their neighbour, Farmer Flamstead, to see her, and had reported upon her very favourably to the noble Earl his august master.
Still Mrs. Yammerton wouldn’t visit her. In vain Mrs. Wotherspoon sent her bantams’ eggs, and guinea fowls’ eggs, and cuttings from their famous yellow rose-tree; in vain old Spoon got a worn-out horse, and invested his nether man in white cords and top boots to turn out after the harriers; in vain he walked a hound in summer, and pulled down gaps, and lifted gates off their hinges in winter—it all only produced thanks and politeness. The Yammertons and they were very good How-do-you-do? neighbours, but the true beef-and-mutton test of British friendship was wanting. The dinner is the thing that signs and seals the acquaintance.
Thus they had gone on from summer to summer, and from season to season, until hope deferred had not only made old Spoon’s heart sick, but had also seen the white cords go at the knees, causing him to retire his legs into the military-striped cinnamon-coloured tweeds in which he appears in:
In addition to muffling his legs, he had begun to mutter and talk about giving up hunting,—getting old,—last season—and so on, which made the Major think he would be losing one of the most personable of his field. This made him pause and consider how to avert the misfortune. Hunted hares he had sent him in more than regular rotation: he had liquored him repeatedly at the door; the ladies had reciprocated the eggs and the cuttings, with dahlias, and Sir Harry strawberry runners; and there really seemed very little left about the place wherewith to propitiate a refractory sportsman. At this critical juncture, a too confiding hare was reported by Cicely Bennett, farmer Merry field’s dairymaid, to have taken up her quarters among some tussuckey brambles at the north-east corner of Mr. Wotherspoon’s cow pasture—a most unusual, indeed almost unprecedented circumstance, which was communicated by Wotherspoon in person to the Major at the next meet of the hounds at Girdle Stone Green, and received with unfeigned delight by the latter.
“You don’t say so!” exclaimed he, wringing the old dandy’s hand; “you don’t say so!” repeated he, with enthusiasm, for hares were scarce, and the country good; in addition to which the Major knew all the gaps.
“I do,” replied Spoon, with a confident air, that as good as said, you may take my word for anything connected with hunting.
“Well, then, I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” rejoined the Major, poking him familiarly in the ribs with his whip, “I’ll tell you what we’ll do; we’ll have a turn at her on Tuesday—meet at your house, eh? what say you to that?”
“With all my heart,” responded the delighted Wotherspoon, adding, in the excitement of the moment, “S’pose you come to breakfast?”
“Breakfast,” gasped the Major, feeling he was caught. “Dash it, what would Mrs. Yammerton say? Breakfast!” repeated he, running the matter through his mind, the wigging of his wife, the walk of his hound, the chance of keeping the old boy to the fore if he went—go he would. “With all my heart,” replied he, dashing boldly at the oiler; for it’s of no use a man saying he’s engaged to breakfast, and the Major felt that if the worst came to the worst, it would only be to eat two, one at home, the other with Spoon.
So it was settled, much to Mr. and Mrs. Wotherspoon’s satisfaction, who were afterwards further delighted to hear that our friend Billy had returned, and would most likely be of the party. And most assiduously they applied themselves to provide for this, the great event of their lives.