""What ails you?" sais she, "to act like Old Scratch that way? You ought to be ashamed of yourself, to behave so to a woman. What on airth is there about me to frighten you so, you great onmannerly, onmarciful, coward, you. Come, scratch up, this minute."
"Well, the more she talked, the more he groaned; but the devil a word, good or bad, could she get out of him at all. With that, she stoops down, and catches up his staff, and says she, "I have as great a mind to give you a jab with this here toothpick, where your mother used to spank you, as ever I had in all my life. But if you want it, my old "c.o.o.n, you must come and get it; for if you won"t help me, I shall help myself."
"Jist at that moment, her eyes being better accustomed to the dim light of the place, she see"d a man, a sittin" at the fur eend of the room, with his back to the wall, larfin" ready to kill himself. He grinned so, he showed his corn-crackers from ear to ear. She said, he stript his teeth like a catamount, he look"d so all mouth.
"Well, that encouraged her, for there ain"t much harm in a larfin" man; it"s only them that never larf that"s fearfulsome. So sais she "My good man, will you he so kind as to lend me your arm down this awful peak, and I will reward you handsomely, you may depend."
"Well, he made no answer, nother; and thinkin" he didn"t onderstand English, she tried him in Italian, and then in broken French, and then bungled out a little German; but no, still no answer. He took no more notice of her and her mister, and senior, and mountsheer, and mynheer, than if he never heerd them t.i.tles, but jist larfed on.
"She stopped a minit, and looked at him full in the face, to see what he meant by all this ongenteel behaviour, when all of a sudden, jist as she moved one step nearer to him, she saw he was a dead man, and had been so long there, part of the flesh had dropt off or dried off his face; and it was that that made him grin that way, like a fox-trap. It was the bone-house they was in. The place where poor, benighted, snow-squalled stragglers, that perish on the mountains, are located, for their friends to come and get them, if they want "em; and if there ain"t any body that knows "em or cares for "em, why they are left there for ever, to dry into nothin" but parchment and atomy, as it"s no joke diggin" a grave in that frozen region.
"As soon as she see"d this, she never said another blessed word, but jist walked off with the livin" man"s pike, and began to poke her way down the mountain as careful as she cleverly could, dreadful tired, and awful frighted.
"Well, she hadn"t gone far, afore she heard her name echoed all round her--Happy! Happy! Happy! It seemed from the echoes agin, as if there was a hundred people a yelling it put all at once.
"Oh, very happy," said she, "very happy, indeed; guess you"d find it so if you was here. I know I should feel very happy if I was out of it, that"s all; for I believe, on my soul, this is harnted ground, and the people in it are possessed. Oh, if I was only to home, to dear Umbagog agin, no soul should ever ketch me in this outlandish place any more, _I_ know."
"Well, the sound increased and increased so, like young thunder she was e"en a"most skeared to death, and in a twitteration all over; and her knees began to shake so, she expected to go for it every minute; when a sudden turn of the path show"d her her husband and the poor squatter a sarchin" for her.
"She was so overcome with fright and joy, she could hardly speak--and it warn"t a trifle that would toggle her tongue, that"s a fact. It was some time after she arrived at the house afore she could up and tell the story onderstandable; and when she did, she had to tell it twice over, first in short hand, and then in long metre, afore she could make out the whole bill o" parcels. Indeed, she hante done tellin" it yet, and wherever she is, she works round, and works round, till she gets Europe spoke of, and then she begins, "That reminds me of a most remarkable fact. Jist after I was married to Mr. Lot, we was to the Alps."
"If ever you see her, and she begins that way, up hat and cut stick, double quick, or you"ll find the road over the Alps to Umbagog, a little the longest you"ve ever travelled, I know.
"Well, she had no sooner done than Cranbery jumps up on eend, and sais he to the guide, "Uncle," sais he, "jist come along with me, that"s a good feller, will you? We must return that good Samaritan"s" cane to him; and as he must be considerable cold there, I"ll jist warm his hide a bit for him, to make his blood sarculate. If he thinks I"ll put that treatment to my wife, Miss Lot, into my pocket, and walk off with it, he"s mistaken in the child, that"s all, Sir. He may be stubbeder than I be, Uncle, that"s a fact; but if he was twice as stubbed, I"d walk into him like a thousand of bricks. I"ll give him a taste of my breed.
Insultin" a lady is a weed we don"t suffer to grow in our fields to Umbagog. Let him be who the devil he will, log-leg or leather-breeches--green-shirt or blanket-coat--land-trotter or river-roller, I"ll let him know there is a warrant out arter him, I know."
""Why," sais the guide, "he couldn"t help himself, no how he could work it. He is a friar, or a monk, or a hermit, or a pilgrim, or somethin"
or another of that kind, for there is no eend to them, they are so many different sorts; but the breed he is of, have a vow never to look at a woman, or talk to a woman, or touch a woman, and if they do, there is a penance, as long as into the middle of next week."
""Not look at a woman?" sais Cran, "why, what sort of a guess world would this be without petticoats?--what a superfine superior tarnation fool he must be, to jine such a tee-total society as that. Mint julip I could give up, I _do_ suppose, though I had a plaguy sight sooner not do it, that"s a fact: but as for womankind, why the angeliferous little torments, there is no livin" without _them_. What do you think, stranger?"
""Sartainly," said Squatter; "but seein" that the man had a vow, why it warn"t his fault, for he couldn"t do nothin" else. Where _he_ did wrong, was _to look back_; if he hadn"t a _looked back_, he wouldn"t have sinned."
""Well, well," sais Cran, "if that"s the case, it is a hoss of another colour, that. I won"t look back nother, then. Let him he. But he is erroneous considerable."
"So you see, Minister," said Mr. Slick, "where there is nothin" to be gained, and harm done, by this retrospection, as you call it, why I think lookin" a-head is far better than--_lookin" back_."
CHAPTER XIV. CROSSING THE BORDER.
The time had now arrived when it was necessary for me to go to Scotland, for a few days. I had two very powerful reasons for this excursion:--first, because an old and valued friend of mine was there, whom I had not met for many years, and whom I could not think of leaving this country without seeing again; and secondly, because I was desirous of visiting the residence of my forefathers on the Tweed, which, although it had pa.s.sed out of their possession many years ago, was still endeared to me as their home, as the scene of the family traditions; and above all, as their burial place.
The grave is the first stage on the journey, from this to the other world. We are permitted to escort our friends so far, and no further; it is there we part for ever. It is there the human form is deposited, when mortality is changed for immortality. This burial place contains no one that I have ever seen or known; but it contains the remains of those from whom I derived my lineage and my name. I therefore naturally desired to see it.
Having communicated my intention to my two American companions, I was very much struck with the different manner in which they received the announcement.
"Come back soon, Squire," said Mr. Slick; "go and see your old friend, if you must, and go to the old campin" grounds of your folks; though the wigwam I expect has gone long ago, but don"t look at anythin" else.
I want we should visit the country together. I have an idea from what little I have seed of it, Scotland is over-rated. I guess there is a good deal of romance about their old times; and that, if we knowed all, their old lairds warn"t much better, or much richer than our Ingian chiefs; much of a muchness. Kinder sorter so, and kinder sorter not so, no great odds. Both hardy, both fierce; both as poor as Job"s Turkey, and both tarnation proud, at least, that"s my idea to a notch.
"I have often axed myself what sort of a gall that splenderiferous, "Lady of the Lake" of Scott"s was, and I kinder guess she was a red-headed Scotch heifer, with her hair filled with heather, and feather, and lint, with no shoes and stockings to her feet, and that
"Her lips apart Like monument of Grecian art"
meant that she stared with her eyes and mouth wide open, like other county galls that never see"d nothing before--a regilar screetch owl in petticoats. And I suspicion, that Mr. Rob Roy was a sort of thievin"
devil of a white Mohawk, that found it easier to steal cattle, than raise them himself; and that Loch Katrin, that they make such a touss about, is jist about equal to a good sizeable duck-pond in our country; at least, that"s my idea. For I tell you it does not do to follow arter a poet, and take all he says for gospel.
"Yes, let"s go and see Sawney in his "Ould _Reeky_." Airth and seas! if I have any nose at all, there never was a place so well named as that.
Phew! let me light a cigar to get rid of the fogo of it.
"Then let"s cross over and see "Pat at Home;" let"s look into matters and things there, and see what "Big Dan" is about, with his "a.s.sociation" and "agitation" and "repail" and "tee-totals." Let"s see whether it"s John Bull or Patlander that"s to blame, or both on "em; six of one and half-a-dozen of tother. By Gosh! Minister would talk, more sense in one day to Ireland, than has been talked there since the rebellion; for common sense is a word that don"t grow like Jacob"s ladder, in them diggins, I guess. It"s about, as stunted as Gineral Nichodemus Ott"s corn was.
"The Gineral was takin" a ride with a southerner one day over his farm to Bangor in Maine, to see his crops, fixin mill privileges and what not, and the southerner was a turning up his nose at every thing amost, proper scorney, and braggin" how things growed on his estate down south.
At last the Gineral"s ebenezer began to rise, and he got as mad as a hatter, and was intarmed to take a rise out of him.
""So," says he, "stranger," says he, "you talk about your Indgian corn, as if n.o.body else raised any but yourself. Now I"ll bet you a thousand dollars, I have corn that"s growd so wonderful, you can"t reach the top of it a standin" on your horse."
""Done," sais Southener, and "Done," sais the General, and done it was.
""Now," sais the Giniral, "stand up on your saddle like a circus rider, for the field is round that corner of the wood there." And the entire stranger stood up as stiff as a poker. "Tall corn, I guess," sais he, "if I can"t reach it, any how, for I can e"en a"most reach the top o"
them trees. I think I feel them thousand dollars of yourn, a marchin"
quick step into my pocket, four deep. Reach your corn, to be sure I will. Who the plague, ever see"d corn so tall, that a man couldn"t reach it a horseback."
""Try it," sais the Gineral, as he led him into the field, where the corn was only a foot high, the land was so monstrous, mean and so beggarly poor.
""Reach it," sais the Gineral.
""What a d.a.m.ned Yankee trick," sais the Southener. "What a take in this is, ain"t it?" and he leapt, and hopt, and jumped like a snappin"
turtle, he was so mad. Yes, common sense to Ireland, is like Indgian corn to Bangor, it ain"t overly tall growin", that"s a fact. We must see both these countries together. It is like the n.i.g.g.e.r"s pig to the West Indies "little and dam old."
"Oh, come back soon, Squire, I have a thousand things, I want to tell you, and I shall forget one half o" them, if you don"t; and besides,"
said he in an onder tone, "_he_" (nodding his head towards Mr.
Hopewell,) "will miss you shockingly. He frets horridly about his flock.
He says, ""Manc.i.p.ation and Temperance have superceded the Scriptures in the States. That formerly they preached religion there, but now they only preach about n.i.g.g.e.rs and rum." Good bye, Squire."
"You do right, Squire," said Mr. Hopewell, "to go. That which has to be done, should be done soon, for we have not always the command of our time. See your friend, for the claims of friendship are sacred; and see your family tomb-stones also, for the sight of them, will awaken a train of reflections in a mind like yours, at once melancholy and elevating; but I will not deprive you of the pleasure you will derive from first impressions, by stripping them of their novelty. You will be pleased with the Scotch; they are a frugal, industrious, moral and intellectual people. I should like to see their agriculture, I am told it is by far the best in Europe.
"But, Squire, I shall hope to see you soon, for I sometimes think duty calls me home again. Although my little flock has chosen other shepherds and quitted my fold, some of them may have seen their error, and wish to return. And ought I not to be there to receive them? It is true, I am no longer a labourer in the vineyard, but my heart is there. I should like to walk round and round the wall that encloses it, and climb up, and look into it, and talk to them that are at work there. I might give some advice that would be valuable to them. The blossoms require shelter, and the fruit requires heat, and the roots need covering in Winter. The vine too is luxuriant, and must be pruned, or it will produce nothing but wood. It demands constant care and constant labour; I had decorated the little place with flowers too, to make it attractive and pleasant.
"But, ah me! dissent will pull all these up like weeds, and throw them out; and scepticism will raise nothing but gaudy annuals. The perennials will not flourish without cultivating and enriching the ground; _their roots are in the heart_. The religion of our Church, which is the same as this of England, is a religion which inculcates love: filial love towards G.o.d; paternal love to those committed to our care; brotherly love, to our neighbour, nay, something more than is known by that term in its common acceptation, for we are instructed to love our neighbour as ourselves.
"We are directed to commence our prayer with "Our Father." How much of love, of tenderness, of forbearance, of kindness, of liberality, is embodied in that word--children: of the same father, members of the same great human family I Love is the bond of union--love dwelleth in the heart; and the heart must be cultivated, that the seeds of affection may germinate in it.
"Dissent is cold and sour; it never appeals to the affections, but it scatters denunciations, and rules by terror. Scepticism is proud and self-sufficient. It refuses to believe in mysteries and deals in rhetoric and sophistry, and flatters the vanity, by exalting human reason. My poor lost flock will see the change, and I fear, feel it too.
Besides, absence is a temporary death. Now I am gone from them, they will forget my frailties and infirmities, and dwell on what little good might have been in me, and, perhaps, yearn towards me.
"If I was to return, perhaps I could make an impression on the minds of some, and recall two or three, if not more, to a sense of duty. What a great thing that would be, wouldn"t it? And if I did, I would get our bishop to send me a pious, zealous, humble-minded, affectionate, able young man, as a successor; and I would leave my farm, and orchard, and little matters, as a glebe for the Church. And who knows but the Lord may yet rescue Slickville from the inroads of ignorant fanatics, political dissenters, and wicked infidels?