Instead of the indolent, satisfied air of the saturnalian merrymaker, the vagrant angler, or the gentleman farmer, with his comely dame who "walked in silk attire, and siller had to spare;" instead of the quiet yet glad countenances of such hunters of pleasure and eaters of eel-pie, or the more obstreperous joy of urchins let loose from school to taste some brief and perennial recreation, and mine host"s delicacies at the same time; instead of these, the little parlour presented a various and perturbed group, upon whose features neither eel-pie nor Herefordshire cider had wrought the relaxation of a holiday or the serenity of a momentary content.
The day to which we now refer was the one immediately preceding that appointed for the far-famed meeting at W----; and many of the patriots, false or real, who journeyed from a distance to attend that rendezvous, had halted at our host"s of the Jolly Angler, both as being within a convenient s.p.a.ce from the appointed spot, and as a tabernacle where promiscuous intrusion and (haply) immoderate charges were less likely to occur than at the bustling and somewhat extraordinary hotels and inns of the town of W----.
The times in which this meeting was held were those of great popular excitement and discontent; and the purport of the meeting proposed was to pet.i.tion Parliament against the continuance of the American war and the King against the continuance of his ministers.
Placards of an unusually inflammatory and imprudent nature had given great alarm to the more sober and well-disposed persons in the neighbourhood of W----; and so much fear was felt or a.s.sumed upon the occasion that a new detachment of Lord Ulswater"s regiment had been especially ordered into the town; and it was generally rumoured that the legal authorities would interfere, even by force, for the dispersion of the meeting in question. These circ.u.mstances had given the measure a degree of general and anxious interest which it would not otherwise have excited; and while everybody talked of the danger of attending the a.s.sembly, everybody resolved to thrust himself into it.
It was about the goodly hour of noon, and the persons a.s.sembled were six in number, all members of the most violent party, and generally considered by friend and foe as embracers of republican tenets. One of these, a little, oily, corpulent personage, would have appeared far too sleek and well fed for a disturber of things existing, had not a freckled, pimpled, and fiery face, a knit brow, and a small black eye of intolerable fierceness belied the steady and contented appearance of his frame and girth. This gentleman, by name Christopher Culpepper, spoke in a quick, m.u.f.fled, shuffling sort of tone, like the pace of a Welsh pony, somewhat lame, perfectly broken-winded, but an exemplary ambler for all that.
Next to him sat, with hands clasped over his knees, a thin, small man, with a countenance prematurely wrinkled and an air of great dejection.
Poor Castleton! his had been, indeed, the bitter lot of a man, honest but weak, who attaches himself, heart and soul, to a public cause which, in his life at least, is hopeless. Three other men were sitting by the open window, disputing, with the most vehement gestures, upon the character of Wilkes; and at the other window, alone, silent, and absorbed, sat a man whose appearance and features were singularly calculated to arrest and to concentrate attention. His raven hair, grizzled with the first advance of age, still preserved its strong, wiry curl and luxuriant thickness. His brows, large, bushy, and indicative of great determination, met over eyes which at that moment were fixed upon vacancy with a look of thought and calmness very unusual to their ordinary restless and rapid glances. His mouth, that great seat of character, was firmly and obstinately shut; and though, at the first observation, its downward curve and iron severity wore the appearance of unmitigated harshness, disdain, and resolve, yet a more attentive deducer of signs from features would not have been able to detect in its expression anything resembling selfishness or sensuality, and in that absence would have found sufficient to redeem the more repellent indications of mind which it betrayed.
Presently the door was opened, and the landlord, making some apology to both parties for having no other apartment unoccupied, introduced a personage whose dress and air, as well as a kind of saddle-bag, which he would not intrust to any other bearer than himself, appeared to denote him as one rather addicted to mercantile than political speculations.
Certainly he did not seem much at home among the patriotic reformers, who, having glared upon him for a single moment, renewed, without remark, their several att.i.tudes or occupations.
The stranger, after a brief pause, approached the solitary reformer whom we last described; and making a salutation, half timorous and half familiar, thus accosted him,--
"Your servant, Mr. Wolfe, your servant. I think I had the pleasure of hearing you a long time ago at the Westminster election: very eloquent you were, sir, very!"
Wolfe looked up for an instant at the face of the speaker, and, not recognizing it, turned abruptly away, threw open the window, and, leaning out, appeared desirous of escaping from all further intrusion on the part of the stranger; but that gentleman was by no means of a nature easily abashed.
"Fine day, sir, for the time of year; very fine day, indeed. October is a charming month, as my lamented friend and customer, the late Lady Waddilove, was accustomed to say. Talking of that, sir, as the winter is now approaching, do you not think it would be prudent, Mr. Wolfe, to provide yourself with an umbrella? I have an admirable one which I might dispose of: it is from the effects of the late Lady Waddilove. "Brown,"
said her ladyship, a short time before her death, "Brown, you are a good creature; but you ask too much for the Dresden vase. We have known each other a long time; you must take fourteen pounds ten shillings, and you may have that umbrella in the corner into the bargain." Mr. Wolfe, the bargain was completed, and the umbrella became mine: it may now be yours."
And so saying, Mr. Brown, depositing his saddle-bag on the ground, proceeded to unfold an umbrella of singular antiquity and form,--a very long stick, tipped with ivory, being surmounted with about a quarter of a yard of sea-green silk, somewhat discoloured by time and wear.
"It is a beautiful article, sir," said Mr. Brown, admiringly surveying it: "is it not?"
"Pshaw!" said Wolfe, impatiently, "what have I to do with your goods and chattels? Go and palm the cheatings and impositions of your pitiful trade upon some easier gull."
"Cheatings and impositions, Mr. Wolfe!" cried the slandered Brown, perfectly aghast; "I would have you to know, sir, that I have served the first families in the country, ay, and in this county too, and never had such words applied to me before. Sir, there was the late Lady Waddilove, and the respected Mrs. Minden, and her nephew the amba.s.sador, and the d.u.c.h.ess of Pugadale, and Mr. Mordaunt of Mordaunt Court, poor gentleman, though he is poor no more," and Mr. Brown proceeded to enumerate the long list of his customers.
Now, we have stated that Wolfe, though he had never known the rank of Mordaunt, was acquainted with his real name, and, as the sound caught his ear, he muttered, "Mordaunt, Mordaunt, ay, but not my former acquaintance,--not him who was called Glendower. No, no: the man cannot mean him."
"Yes, sir, but I do mean him," cried Brown, in a rage. "I do mean that Mr. Glendower, who afterwards took another name, but whose real appellation is Mr. Algernon Mordaunt of Mordaunt Court, in this county, sir."
"What description of man is he?" said Wolfe; "rather tall, slender, with an air and mien like a king"s, I was going to say, but better than a king"s, like a freeman"s?"
"Ay, ay--the same," answered Mr. Brown, sullenly; "but why should I tell you? "Cheating and imposition," indeed! I am sure my word can be of no avail to you; and I sha" n"t stay here any longer to be insulted, Mr.
Wolfe, which, I am sure, talking of freemen, no freeman ought to submit to; but as the late Lady Waddilove once very wisely said to me, "Brown, never have anything to do with those republicans: they are the worst tyrants of all." Good morning, Mr. Wolfe; gentlemen, your servant; "cheating and imposition," indeed! and Mr. Brown banged the door as he departed.
"Wolfe," said Mr. Christopher Culpepper, "who is that man?"
"I know not," answered the republican, laconically, and gazing on the ground, apparently in thought.
"He has the air of a slave," quoth the free Culpepper, and slaves cannot bear the company of freemen; therefore he did right to go, whe-w! Had we a proper and thorough and efficient reform, human nature would not be thus debased by trades and callings and barters and exchange, for all professions are injurious to the character and the dignity of man, whe-w! but, as I shall prove upon the hustings to-morrow, it is in vain to hope for any amendment in the wretched state of things until the people of these realms are fully, freely, and fairly represented, whe-w!
Gentlemen, it is past two, and we have not ordered dinner, whe-w!" (N.
B.--This e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n denotes the kind of snuffle which lent peculiar energy to the dicta of Mr. Culpepper.)
"Ring the bell, then, and summon the landlord," said, very pertinently, one of the three disputants upon the character of Wilkes.
The landlord appeared; dinner was ordered.
"Pray," said Wolfe, "has that man, Mr. Brown I think he called himself, left the inn?"
"He has, sir, for he was mightily offended at something which--"
"And," interrupted Wolfe, "how far hence does Mr. Mordaunt live?"
"About five miles on the other side of W----," answered mine host.
Wolfe rose, seized his hat, and was about to depart.
"Stay, stay," cried citizen Christopher Culpepper; "you will not leave us till after dinner?"
"I shall dine at W----," answered Wolfe, quitting the room.
"Then our reckoning will be heavier," said Culpepper. "It is not handsome in Wolfe to leave us, whe-w! Really I think that our brother in the great cause has of late relaxed in his attentions and zeal to the G.o.ddess of our devotions, whe-w!"
"It is human nature!" cried one of the three disputants upon the character of Wilkes.
"It is not human nature!" cried the second disputant, folding his arms doggedly, in preparation for a discussion.
"Contemptible human nature!" exclaimed the third disputant, soliloquizing with a supercilious expression of hateful disdain.
"Poor human nature!" murmured Castleton, looking upward with a sigh; and though we have not given to that gentleman other words than these, we think they are almost sufficient to let our readers into his character.
CHAPTER LXXIV.
Silvis, ubi pa.s.sim Palantes error certo de tramite pellit, Ille sinistrorsum, hic dextrorsum abit; unus utrique Error, sed variis illudit partibus.--HORACE.
["Wandering in those woods where error evermore forces life"s stragglers from the beaten path,--this one deflects to the left, his fellow chooses the exact contrary. The fault is all the same in each, but it excuses itself by a thousand different reasons."]
As Wolfe strode away from the inn, he muttered to himself,--
"Can it be that Mordaunt has suddenly grown rich? If so, I rejoice at it. True, that he was not for our cause, but he had the spirit and the heart which belonged to it. Had he not been bred among the prejudices of birth, or had he lived in stormier times, he might have been the foremost champion of freedom. As it is, I rather lament than condemn.
Yet I would fain see him once more. Perhaps prosperity may have altered his philosophy. But can he, indeed, be the same Mordaunt of whom that trading itinerant spoke? Can he have risen to the pernicious eminence of a landed aristocrat? Well, it is worth the journey; for if he have power in the neighbourhood, I am certain that he will exert it for our protection; and, at the worst, I shall escape from the idle words of my compatriots. Oh! if it were possible that the advocates could debase the glory of the cause, how long since should I have flinched from the hardship and the service to which my life is devoted! Self-interest; Envy, that snarls at all above it, without even the beast"s courage to bite; Folly, that knows not the substance of Freedom, but loves the glitter of its name; Fear, that falters; Crime, that seeks in licentiousness an excuse; Disappointment, only craving occasion to rail; Hatred; Sourness, boasting of zeal, but only venting the blackness of rancour and evil pa.s.sion,--all these make our adherents, and give our foes the handle and the privilege to scorn and to despise. But man chooses the object, and Fate only furnishes the tools. Happy for our posterity, that when the object is once gained, the frailty of the tools will be no more!"
Thus soliloquizing, the republican walked rapidly onwards, till a turn of the road brought before his eye the form of Mr. Brown, seated upon a little rough pony, and "whistling as he went for want of thought."
Wolfe quickened his pace, and soon overtook him.
"You must forgive me, my good man," said he, soothingly; "I meant not to impeach your honesty or your calling. Perhaps I was hasty and peevish; and, in sad earnest, I have much to tease and distract me."
"Well, sir, well," answered Mr. Brown, greatly mollified; "I am sure no Christian can be more forgiving than I am; and, since you are sorry for what you were pleased to say, let us think no more about it. But touching the umbrella, Mr. Wolfe, have you a mind for that interesting and useful relic of the late Lady Waddilove?"