Part 20

Here I am safe and sound--well in body, and in fine voice for my calling--though thousands and thousands of miles, I may say, from the old living Threap-Cum-Toddle. Little did I think to be ever giving out the Psalms across the Atlantic, or to be walking in the streets of Barbadoes, surrounded by Blackamoors, big and little; some crying after me, “There him go--look at Massa Amen!” Poor African wretches! I do hope, by my Lord Bishop’s assistance, to instruct many of them, and to teach them to have more respect for ecclesiastic dignitaries.

Through a ludicrous clerical mischance, not fit for me to mention, we have preached but once since our arrival. Oh! Jedidiah, how different from the row of comely, sleek, and ruddy plain English faces, that used to confront me in the Churchwarden’s pew, at the old service in Hants,--Mr. Perryman’s clean, shining, bald head; Mr. Truman’s respectable powdered, and Mr. Cutlet’s comely and well-combed caxon!--Here, such a set of grinning sooty faces, that if I had been in any other place, I might have fancied myself at a meeting of Master Chimney-sweeps on May-Day. You know, Jedidiah, how strange thoughts and things will haunt the mind, in spite of one’s self, at times the least appropriate:--the line that follows “The rose is red, the violet’s blue,” in the old Valentine, I am ashamed to say, came across me I know not how often. Then after service, no sitting on a tombstone for a cheerful bit of chat with a neighbour--no invitation to dinner from the worshipful Churchwardens. The jabber of these Niggers is so outlandish or unintelligible, I can hardly say I am on speaking terms with any of our parishioners, except Mr. Pompey, the Governor’s black, whose trips to England have made his English not quite so full of Greek as the others. There is one thing, however, that is so great a disappointment of my hopes and enjoyments, that I think, if I had foreseen it, I should not have come out even at the Bishop’s request. The song in the play-book says, you know, “While all Barbadoes bells do ring!”--but alas, Jedidiah, there is not a ring of bells in the whole island!--You who remember my fondness for that melodious pastime, indeed I may say my passion, for a Grandsire Peel of Triple Bob-Majors truly pulled, and the changes called by myself, as when I belonged to the Great Tom Society of Hampshire Youths,--may conceive my regret that, instead of coming here, I did not go out to Swan River--I am told they have a Peel there.

I shall write a longer letter by the Nestor, Bird, which is the next ship. This comes by the Lively, Kidd,--only to inform you that I arrived here safe and well. Pray communicate the same, with my love and duty, to my dear parents and relations, not forgetting Deborah and Darius at Porkington, and Uriah at Pigstead. The same to Mrs. Pugh, the opener,--Mr. Sexton, and the rest of my clerical friends. I have no commissions at present, except to beg that you will deliver the enclosed, which I have written at Mr. Pompey’s dictation, to his old black fellow servant, at Number 45, Portland Place. Ask for Agamemnon down the area. If an opportunity should likewise offer of mentioning in any quarter that might reach administration, the destitute state of our Barbarian steeples, and belfries, pray don’t omit; and if, in the mean time, you could send out even a set of small handbells, it might prove a parochial acquisition as well as to me,

Dear Jedidiah, Your faithful Friend and fellow Clerk, HABAKKUK CRUMPE.

P.S.--I send Pompey’s letter open, for you to read--You will see what a strange herd of black cattle I am among

[THE ENCLOSURE.]

I say, Aggy!--

You remember me?--Very well.--Runaway Pompey, somebody else. Me Governor’s Pompey. You remember? Me carry out Governor’s piccaninny a walk. Very well. Massa Amen and me write this to say the news. Barbadoes all bustle. Nigger-mans do nothing but talkee talkee. [_Pompey’s right, Jedidiah._] The Bishop is come. Missis Bishop. Miss Bishop--all the Bishops. Very well. The Bishop come in one ship, and him wigs come out in other ship. Bishop come one, two, three, weeks first. [_It’s too true, Jedidiah._] Him say no wig, no Bishop. Massa Amen, you remember, say so too. Very well. Massa Amen ask me everything about nigger-man, where him baptises in a water. [_So I did._] Me tell him in the sea, in the river, any wheres abouts. You remember. Massa Amen ask at me again, who ’ficiates. Me tell him de Cayman. [_What man, Jedidiah, could he mean?_] Very well. The day before the other day Bishop come to dinner with Governor and Governess, up at the Big House. You remember,--Missis Bishop too. Missis Bishop set him turban afire at a candle, and me put him out. [_With a kettle of scalding water, Jedidiah._] Pompey get nothing for that. Very well.

I say, Aggy,--You know your Catechism? Massa Amen ask him at me and my wife, Black Juno, sometimes You remember. Massa Amen say, you give up a Devil? very well. Then him say, you give up all work? very well. Then him say again, Black Juno, you give up your _Pompeys_ and vanities? Black Juno shake her head, and say no. Massa Amen say you must, and then my wife cry ever so much. [_It’s a fact, Jedidiah, the black female made this ridiculous mistake._]

Very well. Governor come to you in three months to see the King. Pompey too. You remember. Come for me to Blackwall. Me bring you some of Governor’s rum. Black Juno say, tell Massa Agamemnon, he must send some fashions, sometimes. You remember? Black Juno very smart. Him wish for a Bell Assembly. [_Jedidiah, so do I._] You send him out, you remember? Very well.

Massa Amen say write no more now. I say, O pray one little word more for Agamemnon’s wife. Give him good kiss from Pompey. [_Jedidiah, what a heathenish message!_] Black Diana a kiss too. You remember? Very well. No more.

FRENCH AND ENGLISH.

“Good Heaven! Why even the little children in France speak French!”--ADDISON.

I.

Never go to France Unless you know the lingo, If you do, like me, You will repent by jingo. Staring like a fool, And silent as a mummy, There I stood alone, A nation with a dummy.

II.

Chaises stand for chairs, They christen letters _Billies_, They call their mothers _mares_, And all their daughters _fillies_; Strange it was to hear, I’ll tell you what’s a good ’un, They call their leather _queer_, And half their shoes are wooden.

III.

Signs I had to make For every little notion, Limbs all going like A telegraph in motion; For wine I reel’d about, To show my meaning fully, And made a pair of horns, To ask for “beef and bully.”

IV.

Moo! I cried for milk; I got my sweet things snugger, When I kissed Jeannette, ’Twas understood for sugar. If I wanted bread, My jaws I set a-going, And asked for new-laid eggs, By clapping hands and crowing?

V.

If I wish’d a ride, I’ll tell you how I got it; On my stick astride, I made believe to trot it; Then their cash was strange, It bored me every minute, Now here’s a _hog_ to change, How many _sows_ are in it?

VI.

Never go to France, Unless you know the lingo; If you do, like me, You will repent, by jingo; Staring like a fool, And silent as a mummy, There I stood alone, A nation with a dummy!

OUR VILLAGE.

“Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain.”--GOLDSMITH.

I have a great anxiety to become a topographer, and I do not know that I can make an easier commencement of the character, than by attempting a description of our village. It will be found, as my friend the landlord over the way says, that “things are drawn _mild_.”

I live opposite the Green Man. I know that to be the sign, in spite of the picture, because I am told of the fact in large gilt letters, in three several places. The whole-length portrait of “_l’homme verd_” is rather imposing. He stands plump before you, in a sort of wrestling attitude, the legs standing distinctly apart, in a brace of decided boots, with dun tops, joined to a pair of creole-coloured leather breeches. The rest of his dress is peculiar; the coat, a two-flapper, green and brown, or, as they say at the tap, _half-and-half_; a cocked hat on the half cock; a short belt crossing the breast like a flat gas-pipe. The one hand stuck on the greeny-brown hip of my friend, in the other a gun with a barrel like an entire butt, and a butt like a brewer’s whole stock. On one side, looking up at the vanished visage of his master, is all that remains of a liver-and-white pointer--seeming now to be some old dog from India, for his white complexion is turned yellow, and his liver is more than half gone!

The inn is really a very quiet, cozy, comfortable inn, though the landlord announces a fact in larger letters, methinks, than his information warrants, viz., that he is “_Licensed to deal in Foreign Wines and Spirits_.” All innkeepers, I trust, are so licensed; there is no occasion to make so brazen a brag of this sinecure permit.

* * * * *

I had written thus far, when the tarnished gold letters of the Green Man seemed to be suddenly re-gilt; and on looking upwards, I perceived that a sort of sky-light had been opened in the clouds, giving entrance to a bright gleam of sunshine, which glowed with remarkable effect on a yellow post-chaise in the stable-yard, and brought the ducks out beautifully white from the black horse-pond. Tempted by the appearance of the weather, I put down my pen and strolled out for a quarter of an hour before dinner to inhale that air, without which, like the chameleon I cannot feed. On my return, I found, with some surprise, that my papers were a good deal discomposed; but, before I had time for much wonder, my landlady entered with one of her most obliging courtesies, and observed that she had seen me writing in the morning, and it had occurred to her by chance, that I might by possibility have been writing a description of the village. I told her that I had actually been engaged on that very subject. “If that is the case, of course, Sir, you would begin, no doubt, about the Green Man, being so close by; and I dare say, you would say something about the sign, and the Green Man with his top boots, and his gun, and his Indian liver-and-white pointer, though his white to be sure is turned yellow, and his liver is more than half gone.” “You are perfectly right, Mrs. Ledger,” I replied, “and in one part of the description, I think I have used almost your own very words.” “Well, that _is_ curious, Sir,” exclaimed Mrs. L., and physically, not arithmetically, casting up all her hands and eyes. “Moreover, what I mean to say, is this; and I only say that to save trouble. There’s a young man lodges at the Green Grocer’s over the way, who has writ an account of the village already to your hand. The people about the place call him the Poet, but, anyhow, he studies a good deal, and writes beautiful; and, as I said before, has made the whole village out of his own head. Now, it might save trouble, Sir, if you was to write it out, and I am sure I have a copy, that, as far as the loan goes, is at your service, Sir.” My curiosity induced me to take the offer; and as the poem really forestalled what I had to say of the Hamlet, I took my landlady’s advice and transcribed it,--and here it is.

OUR VILLAGE.--BY A VILLAGER.

Our village, that’s to say not Miss Mitford’s village, but our village of Bullock Smithy, Is come into by an avenue of trees, three oak pollards, two elders, and a withy; And in the middle, there’s a green of about not exceeding an acre and a half; It’s common to all, and fed off by nineteen cows, six ponies, three horses, five asses, two foals, seven pigs, and a calf! Besides a pond in the middle, as is held by a similar sort of common law lease, And contains twenty ducks, six drakes, three ganders, two dead dogs, four drown’d kittens, and twelve geese. Of course the green’s cropt very close, and does famous for bowling when the little village boys play at cricket; Only some horse, or pig, or cow, or great jackass is sure to come and stand right before the wicket. There’s fifty-five private houses, let alone barns and workshops, and pig-sties, and poultry huts, and such-like sheds; With plenty of public-houses--two Foxes, one Green Man, three Bunch of Grapes, one Crown, and six King’s Heads. The Green Man is reckon’d the best, as the only one that for love or money can raise A postillion, a blue jacket, two deplorable lame white horses, and a ramshackled “neat post-chaise.” There’s one parish church for all the people, whatsoever may be their ranks in life or their degrees, Except one very damp, small, dark, freezing-cold, little Methodist chapel of Ease; And close by the church-yard, there’s a stone-mason’s yard, that when the time is seasonable Will furnish with afflictions sore and marble urns and cherubims very low and reasonable. There’s a cage, comfortable enough; I’ve been in it with Old Jack Jeffrey and Tom Pike; For the Green Man next door will send you in ale, gin, or any thing else you like. I can’t speak of the stocks, as nothing remains of them but the upright post; But the pound is kept in repairs for the sake of Cob’s horse, as is always there almost. There’s a smithy of course, where that queer sort of a chap in his way, Old Joe Bradley, Perpetually hammers and stammers, for he stutters and shoes horses very badly. There’s a shop of all sorts, that sells every thing, kept by the widow of Mr. Task; But when you go there it’s ten to one she’s out of every thing you ask. You’ll know her house by the swarm of boys, like flies, about the old sugary cask. There are six empty houses, and not so well paper’d inside as out, For bill-stickers won’t beware, but sticks notices of sales and election placards all about. That’s the Doctor’s with a green door, where the garden pots in the windows is seen; A weakly monthly rose that don’t blow, and a dead geranium, and a tea-plant with five black leaves and one green. As for hollyoaks at the cottage doors, and honeysuckles and jasmines, you may go and whistle; But the Tailor’s front garden grow two cabbages, a dock, a ha’porth of pennyroyal, two dandelions, and a thistle. There are three small orchards--Mr. Busby’s the schoolmaster’s is the chief-- With two pear-trees that don’t bear; one plum and an apple, that every year is stripped by a thief. There’s another small day-school too, kept by the respectable Mrs. Gaby; A select establishment, for six little boys and one big, and four little girls and a baby. There’s a rectory, with pointed gables and strange odd chimneys that never smokes, For the rector don’t live on his living like other Christian sort of folks; There’s a barber’s, once a-week well filled with rough black-bearded shock-headed churls, And a window with two feminine men’s heads, and two masculine ladies in false curls; There’s a butcher’s and a carpenter’s and a plumber’s and a small green-grocer’s, and a baker, But he won’t bake on a Sunday, and there’s a sexton that’s a coal-merchant besides, and an undertaker; And a toy-shop, but not a whole one, for a village can’t compare with the London shops; One window sells drums, dolls, kites, carts, bats, Clout’s balls, and the other sells malt and hops. And Mrs. Brown, in domestic economy not to be a bit behind her betters, Lets her house to a milliner, a watchmaker, a rat-catcher, a cobbler, lives in it herself, and it’s the post-office for letters. Now I’ve gone through all the village--ay, from end to end, save and except one more house, But I haven’t come to that--and I hope I never shall--and that’s the Village Poor-House!

THE SCRAPE-BOOK.

“Luck’s all!”

Some men seem born to be lucky. Happier than kings, Fortune’s wheel has for them no revolutions. Whatever they touch turns to gold,--their path is paved with the philosopher’s stone. At games of chance they have no chance; but what is better, a certainty. They hold four suits of trumps. They get windfalls, without a breath stirring--as legacies. Prizes turn up for them in lotteries. On the turf, their horse--an outsider--always wins. They enjoy a whole season of benefits. At the very worst, in trying to drown themselves, they dive on some treasure undiscovered since the Spanish Armada; or tie their halter to a hook, that unseals a hoard in the ceiling. That’s their luck.

There is another kind of fortune, called ill-luck; so ill, that you hope it will die;--but it don’t. That’s my luck.

Other people keep scrap-books; but I, a scrape-book. It is theirs to insert bon-mots, riddles, anecdotes, caricatures, facetiæ of all kinds; mine to record mischances, failures, accidents, disappointments; in short, as the betters say, I have always a bad book. Witness a few extracts, bitter as extract of bark.

April 1st. Married on this day: in the first week of the honeymoon, stumbled over my father-in-law’s beehives! He has 252 bees; thanks to me, he is now able to check them. Some of the insects having an account against me, preferred to _settle_ on my calf. Others swarmed on my hands. My bald head seemed a perfect humming-top! Two hundred and fifty-two stings--it should be “stings--and arrows of outrageous fortune!” But that’s my luck. Rushed bee-blind into the horse-pond, and _torn out_ by Tiger, the house dog. Staggered incontinent into the pig-sty, and collared by the sow--sus. per coll. for kicking her sucklings; recommended oil for my wounds, and none but lamp ditto in the house; relieved of the stings at last--what luck! by 252 operations.

9th. Gave my adored Belinda a black eye, in the open street, aiming at a lad who attempted to snatch her reticule. Belinda’s part taken by a big rascal, as deaf as a post, who wanted to fight me “for striking a woman.” My luck again.

12th. Purchased a mare, warranted so gentle that a lady might ride her, and, indeed, no animal could be quieter, except the leather one, formerly in the Show-room, at Exeter Change. Meant for the first time to ride with Belinda to the Park--put my foot in the stirrup, and found myself on my own back instead of the mare’s. Other men are thrown by their horses, but a saddle does it for me. Well, nothing is so hard as my luck--unless it be the fourth flag or stone from the post at the north corner of Harley Street.

14th. Run down in a wherry by a coal-brig, off Greenwich, but providentially picked up by a steamer, that burst her boiler directly afterwards. Saved to be scalded!--But misfortunes with me never came single, from my very childhood. I remember when my little brothers and sisters tumbled down stairs, they always hitched halfway at the angle. _My_ luck invariably turned the corner. It could not bear to bate me a single bump.

17th. Had my eye picked out by a pavior who was _axing_ his way, he didn’t care where. Sent home in a hackney chariot that upset. Paid Jarvis a sovereign for a shilling. My luck all over!

1st of May. My flue on fire. Not a sweep to be had for love or money!--Lucky enough _for me_--the parish engine soon arrived, with all the charity school. Boys are fond of playing--and indulged their propensity by playing into my best drawing-room. Every friend I had dropped in to dinner. Nothing but Lacedemonian black broth. Others have pot-luck, but I have not even pint-luck--at least of the right sort.

8th. Found, on getting up, that the kitchen garden had been stripped by thieves, but had the luck at night to catch some one in the garden, by walking into my own trap. Afraid to call out, for fear of being shot at by the gardener, who would have hit me to a dead certainty--for such is my luck!

10th. Agricultural distress is a treat to mine. My old friend Bill--I must henceforth call him Corn-bill--has, this morning, laid his unfeeling wooden leg on my tenderest toe, like a thresher. In spite of Dibdin, I don’t believe that oak has any heart; or it would not be such a walking tread-mill!

12th. Two pieces of “my usual.” First knocked down by a mad bull. Secondly, picked up by a pick-pocket. Anybody but me would have found one honest humane man out of a whole crowd; but I am born to suffer, whether done by accident or done by design. Luckily for me and the pick-pocket, I was able to identify him, bound over to prosecute, and had the satisfaction of exporting him to Botany Bay. I suppose I performed well in a court of justice, for the next day--“_Encore un coup_!”--I had a summons to serve with a Middlesex jury, at the Old Bailey, for a fortnight.

14th. My number in the lottery has come up a capital prize. Luck at last--if I had not lost the ticket.

A TRUE STORY.

Whoe’er has seen upon the human face The yellow jaundice and the jaundice black, May form a notion of old Colonel Case With nigger Pompey waiting at his back.

Case,--as the case is, many time with folks From hot Bengal, Calcutta, or Bombay, Had tint his tint, as Scottish tongues would say, And show’d two cheeks as yellow as eggs’ yolks. Pompey, the chip of some old ebon block, In hue was like his master’s stiff cravat, And might indeed have claimed akin to _that_, Coming, as _he_ did, of an old _black stock_.

Case wore the liver’s livery that such Must wear, their past excesses to denote, Like Greenwich pensioners that take too much, And then do penance in a yellow coat. Pompey’s, a deep and permanent jet dye, A stain of nature’s staining--one of those, We call _fast_ colours--merely, I suppose, Because such colours never _go_ or _fly_. Pray mark this difference of dark and sallow, Pompey’s black husk, and the old Colonel’s yellow.

The Colonel, once a penniless beginner, From a long Indian rubber rose a winner, With plenty of pagodas in his pocket, And homeward turning his Hibernian thought, Deem’d _Wicklow_ was the very place that ought To harbour one whose _wick_ was in the socket.