CHAPTER VII. LIFE IN THE COUNTRY.
“Here,” said Mr. Sick, “is an invitation for you and me, and minister to go and visit Sir Littleeared Bighead, down to Yorkshire. You can go if you like, and for once, p’raps it’s worth goin’ to see how these chaps first kill time, and then how time kills them in turn. Eatin’, drinkin’, sleepin’, growlin’, fowlin’, and huntin’ kills time; and gout, aperplexy, dispepsy, and blue devils kills them. They are like two fightin’ dogs, one dies of the thrashin’ he gets, and t’other dies of the wounds he got a killin’ of him. Tit for tat; what’s sarce for the goose, is sarce for the gander.
“If you want to go, Minister will go with you; but hang me if I do. The only thing is, it’ll puzzle you to get him away, if he gets down there. You never see such a crotchical old critter in your life as he is. He flies right off the handle for nothin’. He goes strayin’ away off in the fields and gullies, a browsin’ about with a hammer, crackin’ up bits of stones like walnuts, or pickin’ up old weeds, faded flowers, and what not; and stands starin’ at ‘em for ever so long, through his eye-glass, and keeps a savin’ to himself, ‘Wonderful provision of natur!’ Airth and seas! what does he mean? How long would a man live on such provision, I should like to know, as them bitter yarbs.
“Well, then, he’ll jist as soon set down and jaw away by the hour together with a dirty-faced, stupid little poodle lookin’ child, as if it was a nice spry little dog he was a trainin’ of for treein’ partridges; or talk poetry with the galls, or corn-law with the patriots, or any thing. Nothin’ comes amiss to him.
“But what provokes me, is to hear him go blartin’ all over the country about home scenes, and beautiful landscape, and rich vardure. My sakes, the vardure here is so deep, it looks like mournin’; it’s actilly dismal. Then there’s no water to give light to the pictur, and no sun to cheer it; and the hedges are all square; and the lime trees are as stiff as an old gall that was once pretty, and has grow’d proud on the memory of it.
“I don’t like their landscape a bit, there ain’t no natur in it. Oh! if you go, take him along with you, for he will put you in consait of all you see, except reform, dissent, and things o’ that kind; for he is an out and out old Tory, and thinks nothin’ can be changed here for the better, except them that don’t agree with him.
“He was a warnin’ you t’other day not to take all I said for Gospel about society here; but you’ll see who’s right and who’s wrong afore you’ve done, I know. I described to you, when you returned from Germany, Dinin’ out to London. Now I’ll give you my opinion of “Life in the Country.” And fust of all, as I was a sayin’, there is no such thing as natur’ here. Every thing is artificial; every thing of its kind alike; and every thing oninterestin’ and tiresome.
“Well, if London is dull, in the way of West Eend people, the country, I guess, is a little mucher. Life in the country is different, of course, from life in town; but still life itself is alike there, exceptin’ again class difference. That is, nobility is all alike, as far as their order goes; and country gents is alike, as far as their class goes; and the last especially, when they hante travelled none, everlastin’ flat, in their own way. Take a lord, now, and visit him to his country seat, and I’ll tell you what you will find—a sort of Washington State house place. It is either a rail old castle of the genuine kind, or a gingerbread crinkum crankum imitation of a thing that only existed in fancy, but never was seen afore—a thing that’s made modern for use, and in ancient stile for shew; or else it’s a great cold, formal, slice of a London terrace, stack on a hill in a wood.
“Well, there is lawn, park, artificial pond called a lake, deer that’s fashionablized and civilized, and as little natur in ‘em as the humans have. Kennel and hounds for parsicutin’ foxes—presarves (not what we call presarves, quinces and apple sarce, and green gages done in sugar, but preserves for breedin’ tame partridges and peasants to shoot at), H’aviaries, Hive-eries, H’yew-veris, Hot Houses, and so on; for they put an H before every word do these critters, and then tell us Yankees we don’t speak English.
“Well, when you have seen an old and a new house of these folks, you have seen all. Featurs differ a little, but face of all is so alike, that though p’raps you wouldn’t mistake one for another, yet you’d say they was all of one family. The king is their father.
“Now it may seem kinder odd to you, and I do suppose it will, but what little natur there is to England is among these upper crust nobility. Extremes meet. The most elegant critter in America is an Indgian chief. The most elegant one in England is a noble. There is natur in both. You will vow that’s a crotchet of mine, but it’s a fact; and I will tell you how it is, some other time. For I opine the most charmin’, most nateral, least artificial, kindest, and condescendenest people here are rael nobles. Younger children are the devil, half rank makes ‘em proud, and entire poverty makes ‘em sour. Strap pride on an empty puss, and it puts a most beautiful edge on, it cuts like a razor. They have to assart their dignity, tother one’s dignity don’t want no assartin’. It speaks for itself.
“I won’t enter into particulars now. I want to shew you country life; because if you don’t want to hang yourself, don’t tarry there, that’s all; go and look at ‘em, but don’t stay there. If you can’t help it no how, you can fix it, do it in three days; one to come, one to see, and one to go. If you do that, and make the fust late, and the last airly, you’ll get through it; for it won’t only make a day and a half, when sumtotalized. We’ll fancy it, that’s better than the rael thing, any time.
“So lets go to a country gentleman’s house, or “landed,” as they call ‘em, cause they are so infarnally heavy. Well, his house is either an old onconvenient up and down, crooked-laned place, bad lighted, bad warmed, and shockin’ cut up in small rooms; or a spic and span formal, new one, havin’ all or most, according to his puss, of those things, about lord’s houses, only on a smaller scale.
“Well, I’ll arrive in time for dinner, I’ll titivate myself up, and down to drawin’-room, and whose the company that’s to dine there? Why, cuss ‘em, half a dozen of these gents own the country for miles round, so they have to keep some company at the house, and the rest is neighbours.
“Now for goodness gracious sake, jist let’s see who they be! Why one or two poor parsons, that have nothin’ new in ‘em, and nothin’ new on ‘em, goodish sort of people too, only they larf a leetle, jist a leetle louder at host’s jokes, than at mine, at least, I suspicion it, ‘cause I never could see nothin’ to larf at in his jokes. One or two country nobs of brother landed gents, that look as big as if the whole of the three per cent consols was in their breeches pockets; one or two damsels, that was young once, but have confessed to bein’ old maids, drop’t the word ‘Miss,’ ‘cause it sounded ridikilous, and took the title of ‘Mrs.’ to look like widders. Two or three wivewomen of the Chinese stock, a bustin’ of their stays off a’most, and as fat as show-beef; an oldest son or two, with the eend of the silver spoon he was born with, a peepin’ out o’ the corner of his mouth, and his face as vacant as a horn lantern without a candle in it; a younger son or so jist from college, who looks as if he had an idea he’d have to airn his livin’, and whose lantern face looks as if it had had a candle in it, that had e’en amost burnt the sides out, rather thin and pale, with streaks of Latin and Greek in it; one or two everlastin’ pretty young galls, so pretty as there is nothin’ to do, you can’t hardly help bein’ spooney on ‘em.
“Matchless galls, they be too, for there is no matches for ‘em. The primur-genitur boy takes all so they have no fortin. Well, a younger son won’t do for ‘em, for he has no fortin; and t’other primo geno there, couldn’t if he would, for he wants the estate next to hisn, and has to take the gall that owns it, or he won’t get it. I pity them galls, I do upon my soul. It’s a hard fate, that, as Minster sais, in his pretty talk, to bud, unfold, bloom, wither, and die on the parent stock, and have no one to pluck the rose, and put it in his bosom, aint it?
“Dinner is ready, and you lock and lock, and march off two and two, to t’other room, and feed. Well, the dinner is like town dinner, there aint much difference, there is some; there is a difference atween a country coat, and a London coat; but still they look alike, and are intended to be as near the same as they can. The appetite is better than town folks, and there is more eatin’ and less talkin’, but the talkin’, like the eatin’, is heavy and solemcoloy.
“Now do, Mr. Poker, that’s a good soul, now do, Squire, look at the sarvants. Do you hear that feller, a blowin’ and a wheesin’ like a hoss that’s got the heaves? Well he is so fat and lazy, and murders beef and beer so, he has got the assmy, and walkin’ puts him out o’ breath—aint it beautiful! Faithful old sarvant that, so attached to the family! which means the family prog. Always to home! which means he is always eatin’ and drinkin’, and hante time to go out. So respectful! which means bowin’ is an everlastin’ sight easier, and safer too, nor talkin’ is. So honest! which means, parquisites covers all he takes. Keeps every thin’ in such good order! which means he makes the women do his work. Puts every thin’ in it’s place, he is so methodical! which means, there is no young children in the house, and old aunty always puts things back where she takes ‘em from. For she is a good bit of stuff is aunty, as thin, tough, and soople as a painter’s palate knife. Oh, Lord! how I would like to lick him with a bran new cow hide whip, round and round the park, every day, an hour afore breakfast, to improve his wind, and teach him how to mend his pace. I’d repair his old bellowses for him, I know.
“Then look at the butler, how he tordles like a Terrapin; he has got the gout, that feller, and no wonder, nother. Every decanter that comes in has jist half a bottle in it, the rest goes in tastin’, to see it aint corked. His character would suffer if a bit o’ cork floated in it. Every other bottle is corked, so he drinks that bottle, and opens another, and gives master half of it. The housekeeper pets him, calls him Mr., asks him if he has heard from Sir Philip lately, hintin’ that he is of gentle blood, only the wrong side of the blanket, and that pleases him. They are both well to do in the world. Vails count up in time, and they talk big sometimes, when alone together, and hint at warnin’ off the old knight, marryin’, and settin’ up a tripe shop, some o’ these days; don’t that hint about wedlock bring him a nice little hot supper that night, and don’t that little supper bring her a tumbler of nice mulled wine, and don’t both on ‘em look as knowin’ as a boiled codfish, and a shelled oyster, that’s all.
“He once got warned himself, did old Thomas, so said he, ‘Where do you intend to go master?’ ‘Me,’ said the old man, scratchin’ his head, and lookin’ puzzled ‘nowhere.’ ‘Oh, I thought you intend to leave, said Thomas for I don’t.’ ‘Very good that, Thomas, come I like that.’ The old knight’s got an anecdote by that, and nanny-goats aint picked up every day in the country. He tells that to every stranger, every stranger larfs, and the two parsons larf, and the old ‘Sir’ larfs so, he wakes up an old sleepin’ cough that most breaks his ribs, and Thomas is set up for a character.
“Well, arter servants is gone, and women folks made themselves scarce, we haul up closer to the table, have more room for legs, and then comes the most interestin’ part. Poor rates, quarter sessions, turnpikes, corn-laws, next assizes, rail-roads and parish matters, with a touch of the horse and dog between primo and secondo genitur, for variety. If politics turn up, you can read who host is in a gineral way with half an eye. If he is an ante-corn-lawer, then he is a manufacturer that wants to grind the poor instead of grain. He is a new man and reformer. If he goes up to the bob for corn-law, then he wants to live and let live, is of an old family, and a tory. Talk of test oaths bein’ done away with. Why Lord love you, they are in full force here yet. See what a feller swears by—that’s his test, and no mistake.
“Well, you wouldn’t guess now there was so much to talk of, would you? But hear ‘em over and over every day, the same everlastin’ round, and you would think the topics not so many arter all, I can tell you. It soon runs out, and when it does, you must wait till the next rain, for another freshet to float these heavy logs on.
“Coffee comes, and then it’s up and jine the ladies. Well, then talk is tried agin, but it’s no go; they can’t come it, and one of the good-natured fat old lady-birds goes to the piany, and sits on the music stool. Oh, Hedges! how it creaks, but it’s good stuff, I guess, it will carry double this hitch; and she sings ‘I wish I was a butterfly.’ Heavens and airth! the fust time I heard one of these hugeaceous critters come out with that queer idee, I thought I should a dropt right off of the otter man on the floor, and rolled over and over a-laughin’, it tickled me so, it makes me larf now only to think of it. Well, the wings don’t come, such big butterflies have to grub it in spite of Old Nick, and after wishin’ and wishin’ ever so long in vain, one of the young galls sits down and sings in rael right down airnest, ‘I won’t be a nun.’ Poor critter! there is some sense in that, but I guess she will be bleeged to be, for all that.
“Now eatin’ is done, talkin’ is done, and singin’ is done; so here is chamber candles, and off to bed, that is if you are a-stayin’ there. If you ain’t, ‘Mr. Weather Mutton’s carriage is ready, Sir,’ and Mr. Weather Mutton and Mrs. Weather Mutton and the entire stranger get in, and when you do, you are in for it, I can tell you. You are in for a seven mile heat at least of cross country roads, axletree deep, rain pour-in’ straight up and down like Niagara, high hedges, deep ditches full of water, dark as Egypt; ain’t room to pass nothin’ if you meet it, and don’t feel jist altogether easy about them cussed alligators and navigators, critters that work on rail-roads all day, and on houses and travellers by night.
“If you come with Mr. Weather Mutton, you seed the carriage in course. It’s an old one, a family one, and as heavy as an ox cart. The hosses are old, family hosses, everlastin’ fat, almighty lazy, and the way they travel is a caution to a snail. It’s vulgar to go fast, its only butcher’s hosses trot quick, and besides, there is no hurry—there is nothin’ to do to home. Affectionate couple! happy man! he takes his wife’s hand in his—kisses it? No, not he, but he puts his head back in the corner of the carriage, and goes to sleep, and dreams—of her? Not he indeed, but of a saddle of mutton and curren’ jelly.
“Well, if you are a-stoppin’ at Sir Littleeared Bighead’s, you escape the flight by night, and go to bed and think of homeland natur’. Next mornin’, or rather next noon, down to breakfast. Oh, it’s awfully stupid! That second nap in the mornin’ always fuddles the head, and makes it as mothery as ryled cyder grounds. Nobody looks as sweet as sugar candy quite, except them two beautiful galls and their honey lips. But them is only to look at. If you want honey, there is some on a little cut glass, dug out of a dish. But you can’t eat it, for lookin’ at the genuwine, at least I can’t, and never could. I don’t know what you can do.
“P’raps you’d like to look at the picture, it will sarve to pass away time. They are family ones. And family picture, sarve as a history. Our Mexican Indgians did all their history in picture. Let’s go round the room and look. Lawful heart! what a big “Brown ox” that is. Old “Star and Garters;” father fatted him. He was a prize ox; he eat a thousand bushel of turnips, a thousand pound of oil cake, a thousand of hay, and a thousand weight of mangel wurzel, and took a thousand days to fat, and weighed ever so many thousands too. I don’t believe it, but I don’t say so, out of manners, for I’ll take my oath he was fatted on porter, because he looks exactly like the footman on all fours. He is a walking “Brown Stout,” that feller.
“There is a hunter, come, I like hosses; but this brute was painted when at grass, and is too fat to look well, guess he was a goodish hoss in his day though. He ain’t a bad cut that’s a fact.
“Hullo! what’s this pictur? Why, this is from our side of the water, as I am a livin’ sinner, this is a New-Foundlander, this dog; yes, and he is of the true genuwine breed too, look at his broad forehead—his dew-claws—his little ears; (Sir Littleeared must have been named arter him), his long hair—his beautiful eye. He is a first chop article that; but, oh Lord, he is too shockin’ fat altogether. He is like Mother Gary’s chickens, they are all fat and feathers. A wick run through ‘em makes a candle. This critter is all hair and blubber, if he goes too near the grate, he’ll catch into a blaze and set fire to the house.
“There’s our friend the host with cap and gold tassel on, ridin’ on his back, and there’s his younger brother, (that died to Cambridge from settin’ up all night for his degree, and suppin’ on dry mathematics, and swallerin’ “Newton” whole) younger brother like, walkin’ on foot, and leadin’ the dog by the head, while the heir is a scoldin’ him for not goin’ faster.
“Then, there is an old aunty that a forten come from. She looks like a bale o’ cotton, fust screwed as tight as possible, and then corded hard. Lord, if they had only a given her a pinch of snuff, when she was full dressed and trussed, and sot her a sneezin’, she’d a blowed up, and the fortin would have come twenty years sooner.
“Yes, it’s a family pictur, indeed, they are all family picture. They are all fine animals, but over fed and under worked.
“Now it’s up and take a turn in the gardens. There is some splendid flowers on that slope. You and the galls go to look at ‘em, and jist as you get there, the grass is juicy from the everlastin’ rain, and awful slippy; up go your heels, and down goes stranger on the broad of his back, slippin’ and slidin’ and coastin’ right down the bank, slap over the light mud-earth bed, and crushin’ the flowers as flat as a pancake, and you yaller ochered all over, clean away from the scruff of your neck, down to the tip eend of your heel. The galls larf, the helps larf, and the, bed-room maid larfs; and who the plague can blame them? Old Marm don’t larf though, because she is too perlite, and besides, she’s lost her flowers, and that’s no larfin’ matter; and you don’t larf, ‘cause you feel a little the nastiest you ever did, and jist as near like a fool as to be taken for one, in the dark, that’s a fact.
“Well, you renew the outer man, and try it agin, and it’s look at the stable and hosses with Sir Host, and the dogs, and the carriages, and two American trees, and a peacock, and a guinea hen, and a gold pheasant, and a silver pheasant, and all that, and then lunch. Who the plague can eat lunch, that’s only jist breakfasted?
“So away goes lunch, and off goes you and the ‘Sir,’ a trampousin’ and a trapsein’ over the wet grass agin (I should like to know what ain’t wet in this country), and ploughed fields, and wide ditches chock full of dirty water, if you slip in, to souse you most ridikelous; and over gates that’s nailed up, and stiles that’s got no steps for fear of thoroughfare, and through underwood that’s loaded with rain-drops, away off to tother eend of the estate, to see the most beautiful field of turnips that ever was seen, only the flies eat all the plants up; and then back by another path, that’s slumpier than t’other, and twice as long, that you may see an old wall with two broke-out winders, all covered with ivy, which is called a ruin. And well named it is, too, for I tore a bran new pair of trousers, most onhandsum, a scramblin’ over the fences to see it, and ruined a pair of shoes that was all squashed out of shape by the wet and mud.
“Well, arter all this day of pleasure, it is time to rig up in your go-to-meetin’ clothes for dinner; and that is the same as yesterday, only stupider, if that’s possible; and that is Life in the Country.
“How the plague can it be otherwise than dull? If there is nothin’ to see, there can’t be nothin’ to talk about. Now the town is full of things to see. There is Babbage’s machine, and Bank Governor’s machine, and the Yankee woman’s machine, and the flyin’ machine, and all sorts of machines, and galleries, and tunnels, and mesmerisers, and theatres, and flower-shows, and cattle-shows, and beast-shows, and every kind of show, and what’s better nor all, beautiful got-up women, and men turned out in fust chop style, too.
“I don’t mean to say country women ain’t handsum here, ‘cause they be. There is no sun here; and how in natur’ can it be otherways than that they have good complexions. But it tante safe to be caged with them in a house out o’ town. Fust thing you both do, is to get spooney, makin’ eyes and company-faces at each other, and then think of matin’, like a pair of doves, and that won’t answer for the like of you and me. The fact is, Squire, if you want to see women, you musn’t go to a house in the country, nor to mere good company in town for it, tho’ there be first chop articles in both; but you must go among the big bugs the top-lofty nobility, in London; for since the days of old marm Eve, down to this instant present time, I don’t think there ever was or ever will be such splendiferous galls as is there. Lord, the fust time I seed ‘em it put me in mind of what happened to me at New Brunswick once. Governor of Maine sent me over to their Governor’s, official-like, with a state letter, and the British officers axed me to dine to their mess. Well, the English brags so like niggers, I thought I’d prove ‘em, and set ‘em off on their old trade jist for fun. So, says I, stranger captain, sais I, is all these forks and spoons, and plates and covers, and urns, and what nots, rael genuwine solid silver, the clear thing, and no mistake. ‘Sartainly,’ said he, ‘we have nothin’ but silver here.’ He did, upon my soul, just as cool, as if it was all true; well you can’t tell a military what he sais ain’t credible, or you have to fight him. It’s considered ongenteel, so I jist puts my finger on my nose, and winks, as much as to say, ‘I ain’t such a cussed fool as you take me to be, I can tell you.’
“When he seed I’d found him out, he larfed like any thing. Guess he found that was no go, for I warn’t born in the woods to be scared by an owl, that’s a fact. Well, the fust time I went to lord’s party, I thought it was another brag agin; I never see nothin’ like it. Heavens and airth, I most jumpt out o’ my skin. Where onder the sun, sais I to myself, did he rake and scrape together such super-superior galls as these. This party is a kind o’ consarvitory, he has got all the raree plants and sweetest roses in England here, and must have ransacked the whole country for ‘em. Knowin’ I was a judge of woman kind, he wants me to think they are all this way; but it’s onpossible. They are only “shew frigates” arter all; it don’t stand to reason, they can’t be all clippers. He can’t put the leake into me that way, so it tante no use tryin’. Well, the next time, I seed jist such another covey of partridges, same plumage, same step, and same breed. Well done, sais I, they are intarmed to pull the wool over my eyes, that’s a fact, but they won’t find that no easy matter, I know. Guess they must be done now, they can’t show another presarve like them agin in all Britain. What trouble they do take to brag here, don’t they? Well, to make a long story short; how do you think it eventuated, Squire? Why every party I went to, had as grand a shew as them, only some on ‘em was better, fact I assure you, it’s gospel truth; there ain’t a word of a lie in it, text to the letter. I never see nothin’ like it, since I was raised, nor dreamed nothin’ like it, and what’s more, I don’t think the world has nothin’ like it nother. It beats all natur. It takes the rag off quite. If that old Turk, Mahomed, had seed these galls, he wouldn’t a bragged about his beautiful ones in paradise so for everlastinly, I know; for these English heifers would have beat ‘em all holler, that’s a fact. For my part, I call myself a judge. I have an eye there ain’t no deceivin’. I have made it a study, and know every pint about a woman, as well as I do about a hoss; therefore, if I say so, it must be so, and no mistake. I make all allowances for the gear, and the gettin’ up, and the vampin’, and all that sort o’ flash; but toggery won’t make an ugly gall handsum, nohow you can fix it. It may lower her ugliness a leetle, but it won’t raise her beauty, if she hante got none. But I warn’t a talkin’ of nobility; I was a talkin’ of Life in the Country. But the wust of it is, when galls come on the carpet, I could talk all day; for the dear little critters, I do love ‘em, that’s a fact. Lick! it sets me crazy a’most. Well, where was we? for petticoats always puts every thing out o’ my head. Whereabouts was we?”
“You were saying that there were more things to be seen in London than in the country.”
“Exactly; now I have it. I’ve got the thread agin. So there is.
“There’s England’s Queen, and England’s Prince, and Hanover’s King, and the old Swordbelt that whopped Bony; and he is better worth seem’ than any man now livin’ on the face of the univarsal airth, let t’other one be where he will, that’s a fact. He is a great man, all through the piece, and no mistake. If there was—what do you call that word, when one man’s breath pops into ‘nother man’s body, changin’ lodgins, like?”
“Do you mean transmigration?”
“Yes; if there was such a thing as that, I should say it was old Liveoak himself, Mr. Washington, that was transmigrated into him, and that’s no mean thing to say of him, I tell you.
“Well now, there’s none o’ these things to the country; and it’s so everlastin’ stupid, it’s only a Britisher and a nigger that could live in an English country-house. A nigger don’t like movin’, and it would jist suit him, if it warn’t so awful wet and cold.
“Oh if I was President of these here United States,
I’d suck sugar candy and swing upon de gates;
And them I didn’t like, I’d strike ‘em off de docket,
And the way we’d go ahead, would be akin to Davy Crockit.
With my zippy dooden, dooden dooden, dooden dooden dey,
With my zippy dooden, dooden dooden, dooden dooden dey.
“It might do for a nigger, suckin’ sugar candy and drinkin’ mint-julep; but it won’t do for a free and enlightened citizen like me. A country house—oh goody gracious! the Lord presarve me from it, I say. If ever any soul ever catches me there agin, I’ll give ‘em leave to tell me of it, that’s all. Oh go, Squire, by all means; you will find it monstrous pleasant, I know you will. Go and spend a week there; it will make you feel up in the stirrups, I know. Pr’aps nothin’ can exceed it. It takes the rag off the bush quite. It caps all, that’s a fact, does ‘Life in the Country.’”