Bracebridge Hall written by Washington Irving
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Washington Irving >> Bracebridge Hall
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--"Those days were never; airy dreams
Sat for the picture, and the poet's hand,
Imparting substance to an empty shade,
Imposed a gay delirium for a truth.
Grant it; I still must envy them an age
That favoured such a dream."
[Illustration: The Capture]
THE CULPRIT.
From fire, from water, and all things amiss,
Deliver the house of an honest justice.
THE WIDOW.
The serenity of the Hall has been suddenly interrupted by a very
important occurrence. In the course of this morning a posse of villagers
was seen trooping up the avenue, with boys shouting in advance. As it
drew near, we perceived Ready-Money Jack Tibbets striding along,
wielding his cudgel in one hand, and with the other grasping the collar
of a tall fellow, whom, on still nearer approach, we recognised for the
redoubtable gipsy hero, Starlight Tom. He was now, however, completely
cowed and crestfallen, and his courage seemed to have quailed in the
iron gripe of the lion-hearted Jack.
The whole gang of gipsy women and children came draggling in the rear;
some in tears, others making a violent clamour about the ears of old
Ready-Money, who, however, trudged on in silence with his prey, heeding
their abuse as little as a hawk that has pounced upon a barn-door hero
regards the outcries and cacklings of his whole feathered seraglio.
He had passed through the village on his way to the Hall, and of course
had made a great sensation in that most excitable place, where every
event is a matter of gaze and gossip. The report flew like wildfire that
Starlight Tom was in custody. The ale-drinkers forthwith abandoned the
tap-room; Slingsby's school broke loose, and master and boys swelled the
tide that came rolling at the heels of old Ready-Money and his captive.
The uproar increased as they approached the Hall; it aroused the whole
garrison of dogs, and the crew of hangers-on. The great mastiff barked
from the dog-house; the staghound, and the greyhound, and the spaniel,
issued barking from the Hall door, and my Lady Lillycraft's little dogs
ramped and barked from the parlour window. I remarked, however, that the
gipsy dogs made no reply to all these menaces and insults, but crept
close to the gang, looking round with a guilty, poaching air, and now
and then glancing up a dubious eye to their owners; which shows that the
moral dignity, even of dogs, may be ruined by bad company!
[Illustration: Conscience Makes Cowards of the Dogs]
When the throng reached the front of the house, they were brought to a
halt by a kind of advanced guard, composed of old Christy, the
gamekeeper, and two or three servants of the house, who had been brought
out by the noise. The common herd of the village fell back with
respect; the boys were driven back by Christy and his compeers; while
Ready-Money Jack maintained his ground and his hold of the prisoner, and
was surrounded by the tailor, the schoolmaster, and several other
dignitaries of the village, and by the clamorous brood of gipsies, who
were neither to be silenced nor intimidated.
By this time the whole household were brought to the doors and windows,
and the squire to the portal. An audience was demanded by Ready-Money
Jack, who had detected the prisoner in the very act of sheep-stealing on
his domains, and had borne him off to be examined before the squire, who
is in the commission of the peace.
A kind of tribunal was immediately held in the servants' hall, a large
chamber with a stone floor and a long table in the centre, at one end of
which, just under an enormous clock, was placed the squire's chair of
justice, while Master Simon took his place at the table as clerk of the
court. An attempt had been made by old Christy to keep out the gipsy
gang, but in vain; and they, with the village worthies, and the
household, half filled the hall. The old housekeeper and the butler were
in a panic at this dangerous irruption. They hurried away all the
valuable things and portable articles that were at hand, and even kept a
dragon watch on the gipsies, lest they should carry off the house clock
or the deal table.
[Illustration: The Tribunal]
Old Christy, and his faithful coadjutor, the gamekeeper, acted as
constables to guard the prisoner, triumphing in having at last got this
terrible offender in their clutches. Indeed I am inclined to think the
old man bore some peevish recollection of having been handled rather
roughly by the gipsy in the chance-medley affair of May-day.
Silence was now commanded by Master Simon; but it was difficult to be
enforced in such a motley assemblage. There was a continued snarling and
yelping of dogs, and, as fast as it was quelled in one corner, it broke
out in another. The poor gipsy curs, who, like errant thieves, could not
hold up their heads in an honest house, were worried and insulted by the
gentleman dogs of the establishment, without offering to make
resistance; the very curs of my Lady Lillycraft bullied them with
impunity.
The examination was conducted with great mildness and indulgence by the
squire, partly from the kindness of his nature, and partly, I suspect,
because his heart yearned towards the culprit, who had found great
favour in his eyes, as I have already observed, from the skill he had at
various times displayed in archery, morris-dancing, and other obsolete
accomplishments. Proofs, however, were too strong. Ready-Money Jack told
his story in a straightforward independent way, nothing daunted by the
presence in which he found himself. He had suffered from various
depredations on his sheep-fold and poultry-yard, and had at length kept
watch, and caught the delinquent in the very act of making off with a
sheep on his shoulders.
Tibbets was repeatedly interrupted, in the course of his testimony, by
the culprit's mother, a furious old beldame, with an insufferable
tongue, and who, in fact, was several times kept, with some difficulty,
from flying at him tooth and nail. The wife, too, of the prisoner, whom
I am told he does not beat above half a dozen times a week, completely
interested Lady Lillycraft in her husband's behalf, by her tears and
supplications; and several of the other gipsy women were awakening
strong sympathy among the young girls and maid-servants in the
background. The pretty, black-eyed gipsy girl, whom I have mentioned on
a former occasion as the sibyl that read the fortunes of the general,
endeavoured to wheedle that doughty warrior into their interests, and
even made some approaches to her old acquaintance, Master Simon; but was
repelled by the latter with all the dignity of office, having assumed a
look of gravity and importance suitable to the occasion.
I was a little surprised, at first, to find honest Slingsby, the
schoolmaster, rather opposed to his old crony Tibbets, and coming
forwards as a kind of advocate for the accused. It seems that he had
taken compassion on the forlorn fortunes of Starlight Tom, and had been
trying his eloquence in his favour the whole way from the village, but
without effect. During the examination of Ready-Money Jack, Slingsby had
stood like "dejected Pity at his side," seeking every now and then, by a
soft word, to soothe any exacerbation of his ire, or to qualify any
harsh expression. He now ventured to make a few observations to the
squire in palliation of the delinquent's offence; but poor Slingsby
spoke more from the heart than the head, and was evidently actuated
merely by a general sympathy for every poor devil in trouble, and a
liberal toleration for all kinds of vagabond existence.
The ladies, too, large and small, with the kindheartedness of their sex,
were zealous on the side of mercy, and interceded strenuously with the
squire; insomuch that the prisoner, finding himself unexpectedly
surrounded by active friends, once more reared his crest, and seemed
disposed for a time to put on the air of injured innocence. The squire,
however, with all his benevolence of heart, and his lurking weakness
towards the prisoner, was too conscientious to swerve from the strict
path of justice. There was abundant concurrent testimony that made the
proof of guilt incontrovertible, and Starlight Tom's mittimus was made
out accordingly.
The sympathy of the ladies was now greater than ever; they even made
some attempts to mollify the ire of Ready-Money Jack; but that sturdy
potentate had been too much incensed by the repeated incursions that had
been made into his territories by the predatory band of Starlight Tom,
and he was resolved, he said, to drive the "varmint reptiles" out of the
neighbourhood. To avoid all further importunities, as soon as the
mittimus was made out, he girded up his loins, and strode back to his
seat of empire, accompanied by his interceding friend, Slingsby, and
followed by a detachment of the gipsy gang, who hung on his rear,
assailing him with mingled prayers and execrations.
The question now was, how to dispose of the prisoner; a matter of great
moment in this peaceful establishment, where so formidable a character
as Starlight Tom was like a hawk entrapped in a dovecot. As the hubbub
and examination had occupied a considerable time, it was too late in the
day to send him to the county prison, and that of the village was sadly
out of repair from long want of occupation. Old Christy, who took great
interest in the affair, proposed that the culprit should be committed
for the night to an upper loft of a kind of tower in one of the
out-houses, where he and the gamekeeper would mount guard. After much
deliberation this measure was adopted; the premises in question were
examined and made secure, and Christy and his trusty ally, the one armed
with a fowling-piece, the other with an ancient blunderbuss, turned out
as sentries to keep watch over this donjon-keep.
[Illustration: The Guard]
Such is the momentous affair that has just taken place, and it is an
event of too great moment in this quiet little world not to turn it
completely topsy-turvy. Labour is at a stand. The house has been a
scene of confusion the whole evening. It has been beleaguered by gipsy
women, with their children on their backs, wailing and lamenting; while
the old virago of a mother has cruised up and down the lawn in front,
shaking her head and muttering to herself, or now and then breaking out
into a paroxysm of rage, brandishing her fist at the Hall, and
denouncing ill-luck upon Ready-Money Jack, and even upon the squire
himself.
Lady Lillycraft has given repeated audiences to the culprit's weeping
wife, at the Hall door; and the servant-maids have stolen out to confer
with the gipsy women under the trees. As to the little ladies of the
family, they are all outrageous at Ready-Money Jack, whom they look upon
in the light of a tyrannical giant of fairy tale. Phoebe Wilkins,
contrary to her usual nature, is the only one that is pitiless in the
affair. She thinks Mr. Tibbets quite in the right; and thinks the
gipsies deserve to be punished severely for meddling with the sheep of
the Tibbetses.
In the meantime the females of the family have evinced all the
provident kindness of the sex, ever ready to soothe and succour the
distressed, right or wrong. Lady Lillycraft has had a mattress taken to
the out-house, and comforts and delicacies of all kinds have been taken
to the prisoner; even the little girls have sent their cakes and
sweet-meats; so that, I'll warrant, the vagabond has never fared so well
in his life before. Old Christy, it is true, looks upon everything with
a wary eye; struts about with his blunderbuss with the air of a veteran
campaigner, and will hardly allow himself to be spoken to. The gipsy
women dare not come within gunshot, and every tatterdemallion of a boy
has been frightened from the park. The old fellow is determined to lodge
Starlight Tom in prison with his own hands; and hopes, he says, to see
one of the poaching crew made an example of.
I doubt, after all, whether the worthy squire is not the greatest
sufferer in the whole affair. His honourable sense of duty obliges him
to be rigid, but the overflowing kindness of his nature makes this a
grievous trial to him.
He is not accustomed to have such demands upon his justice in his truly
patriarchal domain; and it wounds his benevolent spirit, that, while
prosperity and happiness are flowing in thus bounteously upon him, he
should have to inflict misery upon a fellow-being.
He has been troubled and cast down the whole evening: took leave of the
family, on going to bed, with a sigh, instead of his usual hearty and
affectionate tone, and will, in all probability, have a far more
sleepless night than his prisoner. Indeed this unlucky affair has cast a
damp upon the whole household, as there appears to be an universal
opinion that the unlucky culprit will come to the gallows.
Morning.--The clouds of last evening are all blown over. A load has been
taken from the squire's heart, and every face is once more in smiles.
The gamekeeper made his appearance at an early hour, completely
shamefaced and crestfallen. Starlight Tom had made his escape in the
night; how he had got out of the loft no one could tell; the devil, they
think, must have assisted him. Old Christy was so mortified that he
would not show his face, but had shut himself up in his stronghold at
the dog-kennel, and would not be spoken with. What has particularly
relieved the squire is, that there is very little likelihood of the
culprit's being retaken, having gone off on one of the old gentleman's
best hunters.
[Illustration: Tailpiece]
[Illustration: A Solemn Consultation]
LOVERS' TROUBLES.
The poor soul sat singing by a sycamore tree,
Sing all a green willow;
Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee,
Sing willow, willow, willow;
Sing all a green willow must be my garland.
OLD SONG.
The fair Julia having nearly recovered from the effects of her hawking
disaster, it begins to be thought high time to appoint a day for the
wedding. As every domestic event in a venerable and aristocratic family
connection like this is a matter of moment, the fixing upon this
important day has, of course, given rise to much conference and debate.
Some slight difficulties and demurs have lately sprung up, originating
in the peculiar humours that are prevalent at the Hall. Thus, I have
overheard a very solemn consultation between Lady Lillycraft, the
parson, and Master Simon, as to whether the marriage ought not to be
postponed until the coming month.
With all the charms of the flowery month of May, there is, I find, an
ancient prejudice against it as a marrying month. An old proverb says,
"To wed in May, is to wed poverty." Now, as Lady Lillycraft is very much
given to believe in lucky and unlucky times and seasons, and indeed is
very superstitious on all points relating to the tender passion, this
old proverb seems to have taken great hold upon her mind. She recollects
two or three instances in her own knowledge of matches that took place
in this month, and proved very unfortunate. Indeed, an own cousin of
hers, who married on a May-day, lost her husband by a fall from his
horse, after they had lived happily together for twenty years.
The parson appeared to give great weight to her ladyship's objections,
and acknowledged the existence of a prejudice of the kind, not merely
confined to modern times, but prevalent likewise among the ancients. In
confirmation of this, he quoted a passage from Ovid, which had a great
effect on Lady Lillycraft, being given in a language which she did not
understand. Even Master Simon was staggered by it; for he listened with
a puzzled air, and then, shaking his head, sagaciously observed that
Ovid was certainly a very wise man.
From this sage conference I likewise gathered several other important
pieces of information relative to weddings; such as that if two were
celebrated in the same church on the same day, the first would be happy,
the second unfortunate. If, on going to church, the bridal party should
meet the funeral of a female, it was an omen that the bride would die
first; if of a male, the bridegroom. If the newly-married couple were to
dance together on their wedding-day, the wife would thenceforth rule the
roast; with many other curious and unquestionable facts of the same
nature, all which made me ponder more than ever upon the perils which
surround this happy state, and the thoughtless ignorance of mortals as
to the awful risks they run in entering upon it. I abstain, however,
from enlarging upon this topic, having no inclination to promote the
increase of bachelors.
Notwithstanding the due weight which the squire gives to traditional
saws and ancient opinions, yet I am happy to find that he makes a firm
stand for the credit of this loving month, and brings to his aid a whole
legion of poetical authorities; all which, I presume, have been
conclusive with the young couple, as I understand they are perfectly
willing to marry in May, and abide the consequences. In a few days,
therefore, the wedding is to take place, and the Hall is in a buzz of
anticipation. The housekeeper is bustling about from morning till night,
with a look full of business and importance, having a thousand
arrangements to make, the squire intending to keep open house on the
occasion; and as to the housemaids, you cannot look one of them in the
face, but the rogue begins to colour up and simper.
While, however, this leading love affair is going on with a tranquillity
quite inconsistent with the rules of romance, I cannot say that the
under-plots are equally propitious. The "opening bud of love" between
the general and Lady Lillycraft seems to have experienced some blight in
the course of this genial season. I do not think the general has ever
been able to retrieve the ground he lost when he fell asleep during the
captain's story. Indeed, Master Simon thinks his case is completely
desperate, her ladyship having determined that he is quite destitute of
sentiment.
The season has been equally unpropitious to the love-lorn Phoebe
Wilkins. I fear the reader will be impatient at having this humble amour
so often alluded to; but I confess I am apt to take a great interest in
the love troubles of simple girls of this class. Few people have an idea
of the world of care and perplexity that these poor damsels have in
managing the affairs of the heart.
We talk and write about the tender passion; we give it all the
colourings of sentiment and romance, and lay the scene of its influence
in high life; but, after all, I doubt whether its sway is not more
absolute among females of a humbler sphere. How often, could we but look
into the heart, should we find the sentiment throbbing in all its
violence, in the bosom of the poor lady's maid, rather than in that of
the brilliant beauty she is decking out for conquest; whose brain is
probably bewildered with beaux, ball-rooms, and wax-light chandeliers.
With these humble beings love is an honest, engrossing concern. They
have no ideas of settlements, establishments, equipages, and pin-money.
The heart--the heart--is all-in-all with them, poor things! There is
seldom one of them but has her love cares, and love secrets; her doubts,
and hopes, and fears, equal to those of any heroine of romance, and ten
times as sincere. And then, too, there is her secret hoard of love
documents;--the broken sixpence, the gilded brooch, the lock of hair,
the unintelligible love scrawl, all treasured up in her box of Sunday
finery, for private contemplation.
[Illustration: Love Documents]
How many crosses and trials is she exposed to from some lynx-eyed dame,
or staid old vestal of a mistress, who keeps a dragon watch over her
virtue, and scouts the lover from the door! But then how sweet are the
little love scenes, snatched at distant intervals of holiday, fondly
dwelt on through many a long day of household labour and confinement! If
in the country, it is the dance at the fair or wake, the interview in
the churchyard after service, or the evening stroll in the green lane.
If in town, it is perhaps merely a stolen moment of delicious talk
between the bars of the area, fearful every instant of being seen; and
then, how lightly will the simple creature carol all day afterwards at
her labour!
Poor baggage! after all her crosses and difficulties, when she marries,
what is it but to exchange a life of comparative ease and comfort for
one of toil and uncertainty? Perhaps, too, the lover, for whom, in the
fondness of her nature, she has committed herself to fortune's freaks,
turns out a worthless churl, the dissolute, hard-hearted husband of low
life; who, taking to the alehouse, leaves her to a cheerless home, to
labour, penury, and child-bearing.
When I see poor Phoebe going about with drooping eye, and her head
hanging "all o' one side," I cannot help calling to mind the pathetic
little picture drawn by Desdemona:--
"My mother had a maid, called Barbara;
She was in love; and he she loved proved mad
And did forsake her; she had a song of willow,
An old thing 'twas; but it expressed her fortune,
And she died singing it."
I hope, however, that a better lot is in reserve for Phoebe Wilkins, and
that she may yet "rule the roast," in the ancient empire of the
Tibbetses! She is not fit to battle with hard hearts or hard times. She
was, I am told, the pet of her poor mother, who was proud of the beauty
of her child, and brought her up more tenderly than a village girl ought
to be; and ever since she has been left an orphan, the good ladies at
the Hall have completed the softening and spoiling of her.
[Illustration: Slingsby and Phoebe]
I have recently observed her holding long conferences in the churchyard,
and up and down one of the lanes near the village, with Slingsby the
schoolmaster. I at first thought the pedagogue might be touched with the
tender malady so prevalent in these parts of late; but I did him
injustice. Honest Slingsby, it seems, was a friend and crony of her late
father, the parish clerk; and is on intimate terms with the Tibbets
family. Prompted, therefore, by his good-will towards all parties, and
secretly instigated, perhaps, by the managing dame Tibbets, he has
undertaken to talk with Phoebe upon the subject. He gives her, however,
but little encouragement. Slingsby has a formidable opinion of the
aristocratical feeling of old Ready-Money, and thinks, if Phoebe were
even to make the matter up with the son, she would find the father
totally hostile to the match. The poor damsel, therefore, is reduced
almost to despair; and Slingsby, who is too good-natured not to
sympathise in her distress, has advised her to give up all thoughts of
young Jack, and has promised as a substitute his learned coadjutor, the
prodigal son. He has even, in the fulness of his heart, offered to give
up the school-house to them, though it would leave him once more adrift
in the wide world.
[Illustration: Butler with Bride Cup]
THE WEDDING.
No more, no more, much honour aye betide
The lofty bridegroom, and the lovely bride;
That all of their succeeding days may say,
Each day appears like to a wedding day.
BRAITHWAITE.
Notwithstanding the doubts and demurs of Lady Lillycraft, and all the
grave objections that were conjured up against the month of May, yet the
Wedding has at length happily taken place. It was celebrated at the
village church in presence of a numerous company of relatives and
friends, and many of the tenantry. The squire must needs have something
of the old ceremonies observed on the occasion; so at the gate of the
churchyard, several little girls of the village, dressed in white, were
in readiness with baskets of flowers, which they strewed before the
bride; and the butler bore before her the bride-cup, a great silver
embossed bowl, one of the family reliques from the days of the hard
drinkers. This was filled with rich wine, and decorated with a branch of
rosemary, tied with gay ribands, according to ancient custom.
"Happy is the bride that the sun shines on," says the old proverb; and
it was as sunny and auspicious a morning as heart could wish. The bride
looked uncommonly beautiful; but, in fact, what woman does not look
interesting on her wedding-day? I know no sight more charming and
touching than that of a young and timid bride, in her robes of virgin
white, led up trembling to the altar. When I thus behold a lovely girl,
in the tenderness of her years, forsaking the house of her fathers and
the home of her childhood, and, with the implicit, confiding, and the
sweet self-abandonment which belong to woman, giving up all the world
for the man of her choice; when I hear her, in the good old language of
the ritual, yielding herself to him "for better for worse, for richer
for poorer, in sickness and in health; to love, honour, and obey, till
death us do part," it brings to my mind the beautiful and affecting
self-devotion of Ruth:--"Whither thou goest I will go, and where thou
lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my
God."
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