HOW JACK RAN MAD A SECOND TIME.
After Jack and Martin parted company, you may remember that Jack, who had turned his face northward, got into high favour with the landlord of the North Farm Estate, who, being mightily edified with his discourses and sanctimonious demeanour, and not aware of his having been mad before, or being, perchance, just as mad himself—took him in, made much of him, gave him a cottage upon his manor to live in, and built him a tabernacle in which he might hold forth when the spirit moved him. In process of time, however, it happened that North Farm and the Albion Estates came into the possession of one proprietor, Esquire Bull, in whose house Martin had always been retained as domestic chaplain—at least, ever since that desperate scuffle with Lord Peter and his crew, when he tried to land some Spanish smugglers on the coast, for the purpose of carrying off Martin, and establishing himself in Squire Bull's house in his stead. Squire Bull, who was a man of his word, and wished to leave all things on North Farm as he found them, Jack and his tabernacle included, undertook at once to pay him a reasonable salary, with the free use of his house and tabernacle to him and his heirs for ever. But knowing that on a previous occasion, (which you may recollect,[46]) Jack's melancholy had gone so far that he had hanged himself, though he was cut down just before giving up the ghost, and by dint of bloodletting and galvanism, had been revived; and also that, notwithstanding his periodical fits and hallucinations, he could beat even Peter himself, who had been his instructor, for cunning and casuistry, he took care that, before Jack was allowed to take possession under his new lease, every thing should be made square between them. So he had the terms of their indenture all written out on parchment, signed, sealed, and delivered before witnesses, and even got a private Act of Parliament carried through, for the purpose of making every thing between them more secure. And well it was for the Squire that he bethought himself of his precaution in time, as you will afterwards hear.
This union of the two entailed properties in the Bull family, brought Jack and Martin a good deal more into one anothers' company than they had formerly been; and 'twas clear, that Jack, who had now got somewhat ashamed of his threadbare raiment, and tired of his spare oatmeal diet, was mightily struck with the dignified air and comfortable look of Martin, and grudged him the frequency with which he was invited to Squire Bull's table. By degrees, he began to conform his own uncouth manner to an imitation of his. He wore a better coat, which he no longer rubbed against the wall to take the gloss from off it; he ceased to interlard all his ordinary speech with texts of Scripture; his snuffle abated audibly; he gave up his habit of extempore rhapsody, and lost, in a great measure, his aversion to Christmas tarts and plum-pudding. After a time, he might even be seen with a fishing-rod over his shoulder; then he contrived sundry improvements in gun-locks and double-barrels, for which he took out a patent, and in fact did not entirely escape the suspicion of being a poacher. He held assemblies in his house, where at times he allowed a little singing; nay, on one occasion, a son of his—for he had now a large family—was found accompanying a psalm-tune upon the (barrel) organ, and it was rumoured about the house, that Jack, though he thought it prudent to disclaim this overture, had no great objection to it. Be that as it may, it is certain, that instead of his old peaked hat and band, Jack latterly took to wearing broad-brimmed beavers, which he was seen trying to mould into a spout-like shape, much resembling a shovel. And so far had the transformation gone, that the Vicar of Fudley, meeting him one evening walking to an assembly arrayed in a court coat, with this extraordinary hat upon his head, and a pair of silver buckles in his shoes, pulled off his hat to him at a little distance, mistaking him for a near relation of Martin, if not for Martin himself.
There was no great harm you will think in all these whims, and for my own part, I believe that Jack was never so honest a fellow as he was during this time, when he was profiting by Martin's example. He kept his own place, ruling his family in a quiet and orderly way, without disturbing the peace of his neighbours: and seemed to have forgotten his old tricks of setting people by the ears, and picking quarrels with constables and justices of the peace. Howbeit, those who knew him longest and best, always said that this was too good to last: that with him these intervals of sobriety and moderation were always the prelude to a violent access of his peculiar malady, and that by-and-bye he would break out again, and that there would be the devil to pay, and no pitch hot.
It so happened that Squire Bull had a good many small village schools on his Estate of North Farm, to which the former proprietors had always been in the custom of appointing the ushers themselves; and much to Jack's annoyance, when Squire Bull succeeded, the latter had taken care in his bargain with him, to keep the right of appointment to these in his own hand. But, at the same time, he told Jack fairly, that as he had no wish to dabble in Latin, Greek, or school learning himself, he left him at full liberty to say whether those whom he appointed were fit for the situation or not—so that if they turned out to be ignoramuses, deboshed fellows, or drunken dogs, Jack had only to say so on good grounds, and they were forthwith sent adrift. Matters went on for a time very smoothly on this footing. Nay, it was even said that Jack was inclined to carry his complaisance rather far, and after a time seldom troubled himself much about the usher's qualifications, provided his credentials were all right. He might ask the young fellow, who presented John's commission, perhaps, what was the first letter of the Greek alphabet? what was Latin for beef and greens? or where Moses was when the candle was blown out?—but if the candidate answered these questions correctly, and if there were no scandal or fama clamosa against him, as Jack in his peculiar jargon expressed it, he generally shook hands with him at once, put the key of the schoolhouse in his hand, and told him civilly to walk up-stairs.
The truth was, however, that in this respect Jack had little reason to complain; for though the Squire, in the outset, may not have been very particular as to his choice, and it was said once or twice gave an ushership to an old exciseman, on account of his skill in mensuration of fluids, he had latterly become very particular, and would not hear of settling any body as schoolmaster on North Farm, who did not come to him with an excellent character, certified by two or three respectable householders at least. But, strangely enough, it was observed that just in proportion as the Squire became more considerate, Jack became more arrogant, pestilent, and troublesome. Now-a-days he was always discovering some objection to the Squire's appointments: one usher, it seemed, spoke too low, another too loud, one used an ear-trumpet, another a pair of grass-green spectacles; one had no sufficient gifts for flogging; another flogged either too high or too low—(for Jack was like the deserter, there was no pleasing him as to the mode of conducting the operation;) and, finally, another was rejected because he was unacquainted with the vernacular of Ossian—to the great injury and damage, as was alleged, of two Highland chairmen, who at an advanced period of life were completing their education in the school in question. At first Squire Bull, honest gentleman, had given in to these strange humours on the part of Jack, believing that this new-born zeal on his part was in the main conscientious, though he could not help thinking it at times sufficiently whimsical and preposterous. He had even gone so far, occasionally, as to send Jack a list of those to whom he proposed giving the usherships, accompanied with a polite note, in some such terms as these, "Squire Bull presents his respects, and begs his good friend Jack will read over the enclosed list, and take the trouble of choosing for himself;" a request with which Jack was always ready to comply. And, further, as Jack had always a great hankering after little-goes and penny subscriptions of every kind, and was eternally trumpeting forth some new nostrum or scheme of this kind, as he used to call it, the Squire had been prevailed upon to purchase from him a good many tickets for these schemes from time to time, for which he always paid in hard cash, though I have never heard that any of them turned up prizes, except it may have been to Jack himself.
Jack, as we have said, grew bolder as the Squire became more complying, thinking that, in the matter of these appointments, as he had once got his hand in, it would be his own fault if he could not contrive to wriggle in his whole body. It so happened, too, that just about the very time that one of John's usherships became vacant, one of those atrabilious and hypochondriac fits came over Jack, with which, as we have said, he was periodically afflicted, and which, though they certainly unsettled his brain a little, only served, as in the case of other lunatics, to render him, during the paroxysm, more cunning, inventive, and mischievous. After moving about in a moping way for a day or two—mumbling in corners, and pretending to fall on his knees, in his old fashion, in the midst of the street, he suddenly got up, flung his broad-brimmed beaver into the kennel, trampled his wig in the dirt, so as to expose his large ears as of old, ran home, pulled his rusty black doublet out of the chest where it had lain for years, squeezing it on as he best could—for he had got somewhat corpulent in the mean time—and thus transfigured, he set out to consult the village attorney, with whom it was observed he remained closeted for several hours, turning over Burns' Justice, and perusing an office-copy of his indenture with the Squire—a planetary conjunction from which those who were astrologically given boded no good.
What passed between these worthies on this occasion—whether the attorney really persuaded Jack that, if he set about it, he would undertake to find him a flaw in his contract with Squire Bull, which would enable him to take the matter of the usherships into his own hand, and to do as he pleased; or whether Jack—as he seemed afterwards to admit in private—believed nothing of what the attorney told him, but was resolved to take advantage of the Squire's good-nature, and to run all risks as to the result, 'tis hard to say. Certain it was, however, that Jack posted down at once from the attorney's chamber to the village school, which happened to be then vacant, and gathering the elder boys about him, he told them he had reason to believe the Squire was about to send them another usher, very different from the last, who was a mortal enemy to marbles, pitch-and-toss, chuck-farthing, ginger-bread, and half holydays; with a corresponding liking to long tasks and short commons; that the use of the cane would be regularly taught, along with that of the globes, accompanied with cuts and other practical demonstrations; that the only chance of escaping this visitation was to take a bold line, and show face to the usher at once, since otherwise the chance was, that at no distant period they might be obliged to do the very reverse.
Jack further reasoned the matter with the boys learnedly, somewhat in this fashion—"That as no one could have so strong an interest in the matter, so no one could be so good a judge of the qualifications of the schoolmaster as the schoolboy; that the close and intimate relation between these parties was of the nature of a mutual contract, in the formation of which both had an equal right to be consulted; so that, without mutual consent, or, as it were, a harmonious call by the boys, there could be no valid ushership, but a mere usurpation of the power of the tawse, and unwarrantable administration of the birchen twig; that, further, this latter power involved a fundamental feature, in which they could not but feel they had all a deep interest—and which, he might say, lay at the bottom of the whole question; that he himself perfectly remembered that, in former days, the schoolboys had always exercised this privilege, which he held to be equally salutary and constitutional; and that he would, at his leisure, show them a private memorandum-book of his own, in which, though he had hitherto said nothing about it, he had found an entry to that effect made some thirty years before. In short, he told them, if they did not wish to be rode over rough-shod, they must stand up boldly for themselves, and try to get all the schools in the neighbourhood to join them, if necessary, in a regular barring-out, or general procession, in which they were to appear with flags and banners, bearing such inscriptions as the following: "Pro aris et focis"—"Liberty is like the air we breathe," &c. &c., and, lastly, in large gilt capitals—"No usher to be intruded into any school contrary to the will of the scholars in schoolroom assembled." And, in short, that this process was to be repeated until they succeeded in getting quit of Squire Bull's usher, and getting an usher who would flog them with all the forbearance and reserve with which Sancho chastised his own flesh while engaged in the process of disenchanting Dulcinea del Toboso. At the same time, with that cunning which was natural to him, Jack took care to let the scholars know that his name was not to be mentioned in the transaction; and that, if they were asked any questions, they must be prepared to say, nay, to swear, for that matter, that they objected to John's usher from no personal dislike to the man himself, and without having received fee or reward, in the shape of apples, lollypops, gingerbread, barley-sugar, or sweetmeats whatever—or sixpences, groats, pence, halfpence, or other current coin of the realm.
It will be readily imagined that this oration of Jack, pronounced as it was with some of his old unction, and accompanied with that miraculous and subtle twist of the tongue which we have described in a former chapter,[47] produced exactly the effect upon his audience which might be expected. The boys were delighted—tossed up their caps—gave Jack three cheers, and told him if he stood by them they would stand by him, and that they were much mistaken if they did not contrive to make the schoolhouse too hot for any usher whom Squire Bull might think fit to send them.
It happened not long after, as Jack had anticipated, that one morning a young man called upon with a letter from the Squire, intimating that he had named him to the vacant ushership; and requesting Jack to examine into his qualifications as usual. Jack begged him to be seated, and (having privately sent a message to the schoolboys) continued to entertain him with enquiries as to John's health and the state of the weather, till he heard, by the noise in the court, that the boys had arrived. In they marched accordingly, armed with horn-books, primers, slates, rulers, Gunter's-scales, and copy-books, taking up their station near the writing-desk. The young usher-elect, though he thought this a whimsical exhibition, supposed that the urchins had been brought there only to do honour to his examination, and accordingly begged Jack, as he was in a hurry, to proceed. "Fair and softly, young man," said Jack, in his blandest tones; "we must first see what these intelligent young gentlemen have got to say to that. Tom, my fine fellow, here is a gentleman sent by Squire Bull to be your usher. What do you say to him?" "I don't like him," said Tom. "May I venture to ask why?" said the usher, putting in a word. "Don't like him," repeated Tom. "Don't like him neither," said Dick. "And no mistake," added Peter, with a grin, which immediately circulated round the school. "It is quite impossible," said Jack, "under existing circumstances, that the matter can proceed any further; it is plain the school can never be edified by such an usher. But, stop, that there may be no misconception on the subject. Here you, Smith—do you really mean to say, on soul and conscience, you don't think this respectable gentleman can do you any good?" Of course, Smith stated that his mind was quite made up on the subject. "Come here, Jenkins," said Jack, beckoning to another boy; "tell the truth now—honour bright, remember. Has any body given or promised you any apples, parliament, or other sweetmeat unknown, to induce you to vote against the usher?" Jenkins, who had just wiped his lips of the last remains of a gingerbread cake, which somehow or other had dropped into his pocket by accident, protested, on his honour, that he was quite above such a thing, and was, in fact, actuated purely by a conscientious zeal for the cause of flogging all over the world. "The scruples of these intelligent and ingenuous youths," said John, turning to the usher, "must, in conscience, receive effect; the law, as laid down in my copy of Squire Bull's own contract, is this—'That noe ushere be yntruded intoe anie schoole against ye wille of ye schooleboys in schoole-roome assembled.' So, with your permission, we will adjourn the consideration of the case till the Greek Calends, or latter Lammas, if that be more convenient." And, so saying, he left John's letter lying on the table, and shut the schoolroom door in the face of the astonished usher.
Squire Bull, as may be imagined, was not a little astonished and mortified at hearing from the usher, who returned looking foolish and chop-fallen, of this outbreak on the part of Jack, for whom he had really begun to conceive a sort of sneaking kindness; but knowing of old his fantastical and melancholic turn, he attributed this sally rather to the state of his bowels, which at all times he exceedingly neglected, and which, being puffed up with flatulency and indigestion to an extraordinary degree, not unfrequently acted upon his brain—generating therein strange conceits and dangerous hallucinations—than to any settled intention on Jack's part to pick a quarrel with him or evade performance of the conditions of their indenture, so long as he was not under the influence of hypochondria. And having this notion as to Jack's motives, and knowing nothing of the private confab at the village lawyer's, he could not help believing that, by a brisk course of purgatives and an antiphlogistic treatment—and without resorting to a strait-waistcoat, which many who knew Jack's pranks at once recommended him to adopt—he might be cured of those acrid and intoxicating vapours, which, ascending into the brain, led him into such extravagant vagaries. "I'faith," said the Squire, "since the poor man has taken this mad fancy into his head as to the terms of his bargain, the best way to restore him to his senses is to bring the matter, as he himself seemed to desire it, before the Justices of the Peace at once: 'Tis a hundred to one but he will have come to his senses long before they have come to a decision; at all events, unless he is madder than I take him to be, when he finds how plain the terms of the indenture are, he will surely submit with a good grace.'"
So thought the Squire; and, accordingly, by his direction, the usher-elect brought his case before the Justices at their next sittings, who forthwith summoned Jack before them to know why he refused performance of his contract with the Squire. Jack came on the day appointed, attended by the attorney—though for that matter he might have safely left him behind, being fully as much master of all equivocation or chicanery as if he had never handled anything but quills and quirks from his youth upward. This, indeed, was probably the effect of his old training in Peter's family, for whose hairsplitting distinctions and Jesuistical casuistries, notwithstanding his dislike to the man himself, he had a certain admiration, founded on a secret affinity of nature. Indeed it was wonderful to observe how, with all Jack's hatred to Peter, real or pretended, he took after him in so many points—insomuch that at times, their look, voice, manner, and way of thinking, were so closely alike, that those who knew them best might very well have mistaken them for each other. The usher having produced the Squire's copy of the indenture, pointed out the clause by which Jack became bound to examine and admit to the schools on North Farm any qualified usher whom the Squire might send—as the condition on which he was to retain his right to the tabernacle and his own mansion upon the Farm—at the same time showing Jack's seal and signature at the bottom of the deed. Jack, being called upon by the justices to show cause, pulled out of his pocket an old memorandum-book—very greasy, musty, and ill-flavoured—and which, from the quantity of dust and cobwebs with which it was overlaid, had obviously been lying on the shelf for half a century at least. This he placed in the hands of his friend Snacks the attorney, pointing out to him a page or two which he had marked with his thumb nail, as appropriate to the matter in hand. And there, to be sure, was to be found, among a quantity of other nostrums, recipes, cooking receipts, prescriptions, and omnium-gatherums of all kinds, an entry to this effect:—"That no ushere be yntruded intoe anie schoole against ye wille of ye schooleboys in schoole-roome assembled." Whereupon the attorney maintained, that, as this memorandum-book of Jack's was plainly of older date than the indenture, and had evidently been seen by the Squire at or prior to the time of signing, as appeared from some of the entries which it contained being incorporated in the deed, it must be presumed, that its whole contents, though not to be found in the indenture per expressum, or totidem verbis, were yet included therein implicitly, or in a latent form, inasmuch as they were not per expressum excluded therefrom;—this being, as you will recollect, precisely the argument which Jack had borrowed from Peter, when the latter construed their father's will in the question as to the lawfulness of their wearing shoulder-knots; and very much of the same kind with that celebrated thesis which Peter afterwards maintained in the matter of the brown loaf. And though he was obliged to admit (what indeed from the very look of the book he could not well dispute) that no such rule had ever been known or acted upon—and on the contrary that Jack, until this last occasion, had always admitted the Squire's ushers without objection whatsoever; yet he contended vehemently, that now that his conscience was awakened on the subject, the past must be laid out of view; and that the old memorandum-book, as part and parcel of the indenture itself, must receive effect; and farther, that whether he, Jack, was right or wrong in this matter, the Justices had no right to interfere with them.
But the Justices, on looking into this antiquated document, found that, besides this notandum, the memorandum-book contained a number of other entries of a very extraordinary kind—such, for instance, as that Martin was no better than he should be, and ought to be put down speedily: that Squire Bull had no more right to nominate ushers than he had to be Khan of Tartary: that that right belonged exclusively to Jack himself, or to the schoolboys under Jack's control and direction: that Jack was to have the sole right of laying down rules for his own government, and of enforcing them against himself by the necessary compulsitors, if the case should arise; thus, that Jack should have full powers to censure, fine, punish, flog, flay, banish, imprison, or set himself in the stocks as often as he should think fit; but that whether Jack did right or wrong, in any given case, Jack was himself to be the sole judge, and neither Squire Bull nor any of his Justices of the Peace was to have one word to say to him or his proceedings in the matter: on the contrary, that any such interference on their part, was to be regarded as a high grievance and misdemeanour on their part, for which Jack was to be entitled at the least to read them a lecture from the writing-desk, and shut the schoolroom door in their own or their children's face.
There were many other whimsical and extravagant things contained in this private note-book, so much so, that it was evident no man in his senses could ever have intended to make them part of his bargain with Jack. But the matter was put beyond a doubt by the usher producing the original draft of the indenture, on which some of these crotchets, including this fancy about the right of the schoolboys to reject the usher if they did not like him, had been interlined in Jack's hand: but all of which the Squire, on revising the deed, had scored out with his own pen, adding in the margin, opposite to the very passage, the words, in italics—"See him damned first.—J.B." And as it could not be disputed that Jack and the Squire ultimately subscribed the deed, omitting all this nonsense—the Justices had no hesitation in holding, that Jack's private memorandum-book, even if he had always carried it in his breeches pocket, and quoted it on all occasions, instead of leaving it—as it was plain he had done—for many a long year, in some forgotten corner of his trunk or lumber-room, could no more affect the construction of the indenture between himself and Squire, or afford him any defence against performance of his part of that indenture, than if he had founded on the statutes of Prester John, on the laws of Hum-Bug, Fee-Faw-Fum, or any other Emperor of China for the time being. And so, after hearing very deliberately all that the attorney for Jack had to say to the contrary, they decided that Jack must forthwith proceed to examine the usher, and give him possession, if qualified, of the schoolhouse and other appurtenances; or else make up his mind to a thundering action of damages if he did not.
The Justices thought that Jack, on hearing the case fairly stated, and their opinion given against him, with a long string of cases in point, would yield, and give the usher possession in the usual way; but no: no sooner was the sentence written out than Jack entered an appeal to the Quarter-sessions. There the whole matter was heard over again, at great length, before a full bench; but after Jack and his attorney had spoken till they were tired, the Quarter-sessions, without a moment's hesitation, confirmed the sentence of the Justices, with costs.
Jack, who had blustered exceedingly as to his chances of bamboozling the Quarter-sessions, and quashing the sentence of the Justices, looked certainly not a little discomfited at the result of his appeal. For some days after, he was observed to walk about looking gloomy and disheartened, and was heard to say to some of his family, that he began to think matters had really gone too far between him and his good friend the Squire, to whom he owed his bread; that, on second thoughts, he would give up the point about intruding ushers on the schools, and see whether the Squire might not be prevailed on to arrange matters on an amicable footing; and that he would take an opportunity, the next time he had an assembly at his house, of consulting his friends on the subject. And had Jack stuck to this resolution, there is little doubt that, by some device or other, he would have gained all he wanted; for the Squire, being an easy, good-natured man, and wishing really to do his duty in the matter of the ushership, would probably, if Jack had yielded in this instance with a good grace, have probably allowed him in the end to have things very much his own way. But to the surprise of everybody, the next time Jack had a party of friends with him, he rose up, and putting on that peculiarly sanctimonious expression which his countenance generally assumed when he had a mind to confuse and mystify his auditors by a string of enigmas and Jesuitical reservations, made a long, unintelligible, and inconsistent harangue, the drift of which no one could well understand, except that it bore that "both the Justices and the Quarter-sessions were a set of ignoramuses who could not understand a word of Jack's contract, and knew nothing of black-letter whatever; but that, nevertheless, as they had decided against him, he, as a loyal subject, must and would submit;—not, however, that he had the least idea of taking the Squire's usher, or any other usher whatsoever, on trials, contrary to the schoolboys' wishes; that, he begged to say, he would never hear of:—still he would obey the law by laying no claim himself to the usher's salary, nor interfering with the usher's drawing it; and yet that he could not exactly answer for others not doing so;"—Jack knowing all the time, that, claim as he might, he himself had no more right to the salary than to the throne of the Celestial Empire; while, on the other hand, by locking up the schoolroom, and keeping the key in his pocket, he had rendered it impossible for the poor wight of an usher to recover one penny of it—the legal condition of his doing so being his actual possession of the schoolhouse itself, of which Jack, by this last manœuvre, had contrived to deprive him. But, as if to finish the matter, and to prove the knavish spirit in which this protestation was made, he instantly got a private friend and relative of his own, with whom the whole scheme had been arranged beforehand, to come forward and bring an action on the case, in which the latter claimed the whole fund which would have belonged to the unlucky usher—in terms, as he said, of some old arrangement made by the Squire's predecessor as to school-salaries during vacancy; to be applied, as the writ very coolly stated it, "for behoof of Jack's destitute widow, in the event of his decease, and of his numerous and indigent family."
Many of Jack's own family, who were present on this occasion, remonstrated with him on the subject, foreseeing that if he went on as he had begun and threatened to proceed, he must soon come to a rupture with the Squire, which could end in nothing else than his being turned out of house and hall, and thrown adrift upon the wide world, without a penny in his pocket. But the majority—who were puffed up with more than Jack's own madness and had a notion that by sheer boldness and bullying on their part, the Squire would, after a time, be sure to give way, encouraged Jack to go on at all hazards, and not to retract a hair's breadth in his demands. And Jack, who had now become mischievously crazed on the subject, and began to be as arrogant and conceited of his own power and authority, as ever my Lord Peter had been in his proudest and most pestilential days, was not slow to follow their advice.
'Twas of no consequence that a friend of the Squire's, who had known Jack long, and had really a great kindness towards him, tried to bring about an arrangement between him and the Squire upon very handsome terms. He had a meeting with Jack;—at which he talked the matter over in a friendly way—telling him that though the Squire must reserve in his own hands the nomination of his own ushers, he had always been perfectly willing to listen to reason in any objections that might be taken to them; only some reason he must have, were it only that Jack could not abide the sight of a red-nosed usher:—let that reason, such as it was, be put on paper, and he would consider of it; and if, from any peculiar idiosyncracy in Jack's temperament and constitution, he found that his antipathy to red noses was unsuperable, probably he would not insist on filling up the vacancy with a nose of that colour. Jack, who was always more rational when alone than when he had got the attorney and the more frantic members of his family at his elbow, acknowledged, as he well might, that all this seemed very reasonable; and that he really thought that on these terms the Squire and he would have little difficulty in coming to an agreement. So they parted, leaving the Squire's friend under the impression that all was right, and that he had only to get an agreement to that effect drawn out, signed and sealed by the parties.
Next morning, however, he received a letter by the penny-post, written no doubt in Jack's hand, but obviously dictated by the attorney, in these terms:—
"Honoured Sir—Lest there should be any misconception between us as to our yesterday's conversation, I have put into writing the substance of what was agreed on between us, which I understand to be this: that there shall be no let or impediment to the Squire's full and absolute right of naming an usher in all cases of vacancy; that I shall have an equally full right to object to the said usher for any reasons that may be satisfactory to myself, and thereupon to exclude him from the school; leaving it to the Squire, if he pleases, to send another, whom I shall have the right of handling in the same fashion, with this further proviso, that if the Squire does not fill up the office to my satisfaction within half-a-year, I shall be entitled to take the appointment into my own hands. I need hardly add that no Justices of the Peace are to take cognizance of anything done by me in the matter, be it good, bad, or indifferent. Hoping that this statement of our mutual views will be found correct and satisfactory—I remain, your humble servant,
"JACK."
The moment the Squire's friend perused this missive, he saw plainly that all hope of bringing Jack to his senses was at an end; and that under the advice of evil counsellors, lunatic friends, and lewd fellows of the baser sort, Jack would shortly bring himself and his family to utter ruin.
And now, as might be expected, Jack's disorder, which had hitherto been comparatively of the calm and melancholy kind, broke out into the most violent and phrenetic exhibitions. He sometimes raved incoherently, for hours together, against the Squire; often, in the midst of his speeches, he was assailed with epileptic fits, during which he displayed the strangest contortions and most laughable gestures; he threw entirely aside the decent coat he had worn for some time back, and habitually attired himself in the old and threadbare raiment, which he had worn after he and Martin had been so unceremoniously sent to the right-about by Lord Peter, and even ran about the streets with his band tied round his peaked beaver, bearing thereon the motto—"Nemo me impune lacessit." If his madness had only led him to make a spectacle and laughing-stock of himself, by these wild vagaries and mountebank exhibitions, all had been well, but this did not satisfy Jack; his old disposition for a riot had returned, and a riot, right or wrong, he was determined to have. So he set to work to frighten the women of the village with stories, as to the monsters whom the Squire would send among them as ushers, who would do nothing but teach their children drinking, chuck-farthing, and cock-fighting; to the schoolboys themselves, talked of the length, breadth, and thickness, of the usher's birch, which he assured them was dipped in vinegar every evening, in order to afford a more agreeable stimulus to the part affected; he plied them with halfpence and strong beer; exhorted them to insurrections and barrings-out; taught them how to mock at any usher who would not submit to be Jack's humble servant; and by gibes and scurril ballads, which he would publish in the newspapers, try to make his life a burden to him. He also instructed them how best to stick darts into his wig, cover his back with spittle, fill his pockets with crackers, burn assafœtida in the fire, extinguish the candles with fulminating powder, or blow up the writing-desk by a train of combustibles. Above all, he counselled the urchins to stand firm the next time that John sent an usher down to that quarter, and vehemently to protest for the doctrine of election as to their own usher, and reprobation as to the Squire's; assuring them, that provided they took his advice, and followed the plan which he would afterwards impart to them in confidence at the proper time, he could almost take it upon himself to say, that in a short time, no tyrannical usher, or cast-off tutor of the Squire, should venture to show his face, with or without tawse or ferule, within the boundaries of North Farm.
It was not long before an opportunity offered of putting these precious schemes in practice; for shortly afterwards, the old usher of a school on the northermost boundary of the North Farm estates having died, the ushership became vacant, and John, as usual, appointed a successor in his room. Being warned this time by what had taken place on the last occasion, the Squire took care to apply beforehand to the Justices of the Peace—got a peremptory mandamus from them, directing Jack to proceed forthwith, and, after the usual trials, to put the usher in possession of the schoolhouse by legal form, and without re-regard to any protest or interruption from any or all of the schoolboys put together. So down the usher proceeded, accompanied by a posse of constables and policemen of various divisions, till they arrived at the schoolhouse, which lay adjacent to the churchyard, and then demanded admittance. It happened that in this quarter resided some of Jack's family, who, as we have already mentioned, differed from him entirely, thinking him totally wrong in the contest with the Squire and being completely satisfied that all his glosses upon his contract were either miserable quibbles or mere hallucinations, and that it was his duty, so long as he ate John's bread, and slept under John's roof, to perform fairly the obligations he had come under:—and so, on reading the Justices' warrant, which required them, on pain of being set in the stocks, and forfeiture of two shillings and sixpence of penalty, besides costs, to give immediate possession to the Squire's usher, they at once resolved to obey, called for the key of the schoolhouse, and proceeded to the door, accompanied by the usher and the authorities, for the purpose of complying with the warrant and admitting the usher as in times past. But on arriving there, never was there witnessed such a scene of confusion. The churchyard was crowded with ragamuffins of every kind, from all the neighbouring parishes; scarcely was there a sot or deboshed fellow within the district who had not either come himself or found a substitute; gipsies, beggarwomen, and thimbleriggers were thick as blackberries; while Jack himself—who, upon hearing of what was going forward, had come down by the night coach with all expedition—was standing on a tombstone near the doorway, and holding forth to the whole bevy of rascals whom he had assembled about him. It was evident from his tones and gestures that Jack had been exciting the mob in every possible way; but as the justices and the constables drew near, he changed the form of his countenance, pulled a psalm-book out of his pocket, and, with much sanctity and appearance of calmness, gave out the tune; in which the miscellaneous assemblage around him joined, with similar unction and devotion. When the procession reached the door, they found the whole inside of the schoolhouse already packed with urchins and blackguards of all kinds, who, having previously gained admission by the window, had forcibly barricaded the door against the constables, being assisted in the defence thereof by the mob without, who formed a double line, and kept hustling the poor usher and the constables from side to side, helping themselves to a purse or two in passing, and calling out at the same time, "take care of pickpockets"—occasionally amusing themselves also by playfully smashing the beaver of some of the justices of the peace over their face, to the tune of "all round my hat," sung in chorus, on the Mainzerian system, amidst peals of laughter.
Meantime Jack was skipping up and down upon the tombstone, calling out to his myrmidons—"Good friends! Sweet friends! Let me not stir your spirits up to mutiny. Though that cairn of granite stones lies very handy and inviting, I pray you refrain from it. Touch it not. I humbly entreat my friend with the dirty shirt not to break the sconce of the respectable gentleman whom I have in my eye, with that shillelah of his—though I must admit that he is labouring under strong and just provocation." "For mercy's sake, my dear sir!" he would exclaim to a third—"don't push my respected friend the justice into yonder puddle—the one which lies so convenient on your right hand there; though, to be sure, the ground is slippery, and the thing might happen, in a manner without any one's being able to prevent it." And so on he went, taking care to say nothing for which the justices could afterwards venture to commit him to Bridewell; but, in truth, stirring up the rabble to the utmost, by nods, looks, winks, and covert speeches, intended to convey exactly the opposite meaning from what the words bore.
At last by main force, and after a hard scuffle, the constables contrived to force the schoolhouse door open, and so to make way for the justices, the usher, and those of Jack's family who, as we have seen already, had made up their minds to give the usher possession, to enter. But having entered, the confusion and bedevilment was ten times worse than even in the churchyard itself. The benches were lined with a pack of overgrown rascals in corduroy vestments, and with leather at the knees, from all the neighbouring villages; in a gallery at one end sat a Scotch bagpiper, flanked by a blind fiddler, and an itinerant performer on the hurdygurdy, accompanied by his monkey—who in the course of his circuit through the village, had that morning received a special retainer, in the shape of half a quartern of gin, for the occasion; while in the usher's chair were ensconced two urchins of about fourteen years of age, smoking tobacco, playing at all fours, and drinking purl, with their legs diffused in a picturesque attitude along the writing-desk. One of the justices tried to command silence—till the Squire's commission to the usher should be read; but no sooner had he opened his mouth than the whole multitude burst forth as if the confusion of tongues had taken place for the first time; twenty spoke together, ten whistled, as many more sang psalms and obscene songs alternately; the bagpiper droned his worst; the fiddler uttered notes that made the hair of those who heard them stand on end; while the hurdygurdy man did his utmost to grind down both his companions, in which task he was ably assisted by the grinning and chattering of the honourable and four-footed gentleman on his left. Meantime stones, tiles, and rafters, pewter pint-pots, fragments of slates, rulers, and desks, were circulating through the schoolhouse in all directions, in the most agreeable confusion.
One of the justices tried to speak, but even from the first it was all dumb show; and scarcely had he proceeded through two sentences, when his oration was extinguished as suddenly and by the same means as the conflagration of the Royal Palace at Lilliput. After many attempts to obtain a hearing, it became obvious that all chance of doing so in the schoolhouse was at an end; and so the usher, the justices, and the rest, adjourned to the next ale-house, where they had the usher's commission quietly read over in presence of the landlord and the waiter, and handed him over the keys of the house before the same witnesses; of all which, and of their previous deforcement by a mob of rapscallions, they took care to have an instrument regularly drawn out by a notary-public. Thereafter they ordered a rump and dozen, being confident that as the day was bitterly cold, and the snow some feet deep upon the ground, the courage of the rioters would be cooled before they had finished dinner; and so it was, for towards evening, the temperature having descended considerably beneath the freezing point, the mob, who had now exhausted their beer and gin, and who saw that there was no more fun to be expected for the day, began to disperse each man to his home, so that before nightfall the coast was clear; on which the justices, with the posse comitatus, escorted the usher to the schoolhouse, opened the door, put him formally in possession, and, wishing him much good of his new appointment, departed.
But how did Jack, you will ask, bear this rebuff on the part of his own kin? Why, very ill indeed; in truth, he became furious, and seemed to have lost all natural feelings towards his own flesh and blood. He summoned such of his family as had given admission to the usher before him, called a sort of court-martial of the rest of his relations to enquire into their conduct; and, notwithstanding the accused protested that they had the highest respect and regard for Jack, were his humble servants to command in all ordinary matters, and only acted in this instance in obedience to the justices' warrant, (the which, if they had disobeyed, they were certain to have been at that moment cooling their heels in the stocks,) Jack, who was probably worked up to a kind of frenzy by his more violent of his inmates, kicked them out of the room, and sent a set of his myrmidons after them, with instructions to tear their coats off their backs, strip them of their wigs and small-clothes, and turn them into the street. Against this the unlucky wights appealed to the justices for protection, who, to be sure, sent down some policemen, who beat off the mob, and enabled them to make their doors fast against Jack and his emissaries. But beyond that they could give them little assistance; for though Jack and his abettors could not actually venture upon a trespass by forcing their way within doors, they contrived to render the very existence of all who were not of their way of thinking miserable. If it was an usher who, in spite of all their efforts to exclude him, had fairly got admittance into the schoolhouse, they set up a sentry-box at his very door, in which a rival usher held forth on Cocker and the alphabet; they drew off a few stray boys from the village school, and this detachment, recruited and reinforced by all the idlers of the neighbourhood, to whom mischief was sport, was studiously instructed to keep up a perpetual whistling, hooting, howling, hissing, and imitations of the crowing of a cock, so as to render it impossible for the usher and boys within the school to hear or profit by one word that was said. If the scholars within were told to say A, the blackguards without were bellowing B; or if the usher asked how many three times three made, the answer from the outside would be "ten," or else that "it depended upon circumstances." Every week some ribald and libellous paragraph would appear in the county newspaper, headed "Advertisement," in such terms as the following:—"We have just learned from the best authority, that the usher of a school not a hundred miles off from Hogs-Norton, has lately been detected in various acts of forgery, petty larceny, sedition, high treason, burglary, &c. &c. If this report be not officially contradicted by the said usher within a fortnight, by advertisement, duly inserted and paid for in this newspaper, we shall hold the same to be true." Or sometimes more mysteriously thus:—"Delicacy forbids us to allude to the shocking reports which are current respecting the usher of Mullaglass. Christian charity would lead us to hope they were unfounded, but Christian verity compels us to state that we believe every word of them." And though Jack and his editor sometimes overshot their mark, and got soused in damages at the instance of those whom they had libelled, yet Jack, who found that it answered his ends, persevered, and so kept the whole neighbourhood in hot water.
You would not believe me were I to tell you of half the tyrannical and preposterous pranks which he performed about this period; but some of them I can't help noticing. He had picked up some subscriptions, for instance, from charitable folks in the neighbourhood, to build a school upon a remote corner of North Farm, where not a single boy had learned his alphabet within the memory of man; and what, think ye, does he do with the money, but insists on clapping down the new school exactly opposite the old school in the village, merely to spite the poor usher, against whom he had taken a dislike—though there was no more need to build a school there than to ship a cargo of coals for Newcastle. Again, having ascertained that one of his servants had been seen shaking hands with some of Jack's family with whom he had quarrelled as above mentioned, he refused to give him a character, though the poor fellow was only thinking of taking service somewhere in the plantations.
Notwithstanding all Jack's efforts, however, it sometimes happened that when an usher was appointed he could not get up a sufficient cabal against him, and that even the schoolboys, knowing something of the man before, had no objection to him. In such cases Jack resorted to various schemes in order to cast the candidate upon his examinations. Sometimes he would shut him up in a small closet, telling him he must answer a hundred and fifty questions, in plane and spherical trigonometry, within as many minutes, and that he would be allowed the assistance of Johnson's Dictionary, and the Gradus ad Parnassum, for the purpose. At other tines he would ask the candidate, with a bland smile, what was his opinion of things in general, and of the dispute between him (Jack) and the Squire in particular; and if that question was not answered to his satisfaction, he remitted him to his studies. When no objection could be made to the man's parts, Jack would say that he had scruples of conscience, because he doubted whether his commission had been fairly come by, or whether he had not bribed the Squire by a five-pound note to obtain it. At last he did not even take the trouble of going through this farce, but would at once, if he disliked the look of the man's face, tell him he was busy at the moment;—that he might lay the Squire's letter on the table, and call again that day six months for an answer. He no longer pretended, in fact, to any fairness or justice in his dealings; for though those who sided with him might be guilty of all the offences in the calendar, Jack continued to wink so hard, and shut his ears so close, as not to see or hear of them; while as to the unhappy wights who differed from him, he had the eyes of Argus and the ear of Dionysius, and the tender mercies of a Spanish inquisitor, discovering scandalum magnatum and high treason in ballads which they had written twenty years before, and in which Jack, though he received a presentation copy at the time, had never pretended, up to that moment, to detect the least harm.
The last of these freaks which I shall here mention took place on this wise. Jack had never been accustomed to invite any one to his assemblies but the ushers who had been appointed by the Squire, and it was always understood that they alone had a vote in all vestry matters. But when John quarrelled with his family, as above mentioned, and a large part of the oldest and most respectable of his relatives drew off from him, it occurred to Jack that he could bring in a set of new auxiliaries, upon whose vote he could count in all his family squabbles, or his deputes, with Squire Bull; and the following was the device he fell upon for that end.
Here and there upon North Farm, where the village schools were crowded, little temporary schoolhouses had been run up, where one or two of the monitors were accustomed to teach such of the children as could not be accommodated in the larger school. But these assistants had always been a little looked down upon, and had never been allowed a seat at Jack's board. Now, however, he began to change his tone towards them, and to court and flatter them on all occasions. One fine morning he suddenly made his appearance on the village green, followed by some of his hangers on, bearing a theodolite, chains, measuring rods, sextants, compasses, and other instruments of land-surveying. Jack set up his theodolite, took his observations, began noting measurements, and laying down the bases of triangles in all directions, then, having summed up his calculations with much gravity, gave directions to those about him to line off with stakes and ropes the space which he pointed out to them, and which in fact enclosed nearly half the village. In the course of these operations, the usher, who had witnessed these mathematical proceedings of Jack from the window, but could not comprehend what the man would be at, sallied forth, and accosting Jack, asked him what he meant by these strange lines of circumvallation. "Why," answered Jack, "I have been thinking for some time past of relieving you of part of your heavy duties, and dividing the parish-school between you and your assistant; so in future you will confine yourself to the space outside the ropes, and leave all within the inclosure to him." It was in vain that the usher protested he was quite equal to the duty; that the boys liked him, and disliked his assistant; that if the village was thus divided, the assistant would be put upon a level with him, and have a vote in the vestry, to which he had no more right than to a seat in the House of Commons. Jack was not to be moved from his purpose, but gave orders to have a similar apportionment made in most of the neighbouring villages, and then inviting the assistants to a party at his house, he had them sworn in as vestrymen, telling them, that in future they had the same right to a seat at his board as the best of John's ushers had. Here again, however, he found he had run his head against a wall, and that he was not the mighty personage he took himself for; for, on a complaint to the justices of the peace, a dozen special constables were sent down, who tore up the posts, removed the ropes, and demolished all Jack's inclosures in a trice.
These frequent defeats rendered Jack nearly frantic. He now began to quarrel even with his best friends, not a few of whom, though they had gone with him a certain length, now left his house, and told him plainly they would never set foot in it again. He burst forth into loud invectives against Martin, who had always been a good friend to his penny subscriptions, and more than once had come to his assistance when Jack was hard pressed by Hugh, a dissenting schoolmaster, between whom and Jack there had long been a bloody feud. Jack now denounced Martin in set terms; accused him of being in the pay of Peter, with whom he said he had been holding secret conferences of late at the Cross-Keys; and of setting the Squire's mind against him (Jack)—whereas poor Martin, till provoked by Jack's abuse to defend himself, had never said an unkind word against him. Finding, however, that, with all his efforts, he did not make much way with the men, Jack directed his battery chiefly against the women, who were easily caught by his sanctimonious air, and knowing nothing earthly of the subject, took for gospel all that Jack chose to tell them. He held love-feasts in his house up to a late hour, at which he generally harangued on the subject of the persecutions which he endured. He vowed the justices were all in a conspiracy against him; that they were constantly intruding into his grounds, notwithstanding his warnings that spring-guns were set in the premises; that on one occasion a tall fellow of a sheriff's officer had made his way into his house and served him with a writ of fieri facias even in the midst of one of his assemblies, a disgrace he never could get over; that he could not walk ten yards in any direction, or saunter for an instant at the corner of a street, without being ordered by a policeman to move on; in short, that he lived in perpetual terror and anxiety—and all this because he had done his best to save them and their children from the awful scourge of deboshed and despotical ushers. At the conclusion of these meetings he invariably handed round his hat, into which the silly women dropped a good many shillings, which Jack assured them would be applied for the public benefit, meaning thereby his own private advantage.
Jack, however, with all his craze, was too knowing not to see that the women, beyond advancing him a few shillings at a time, would do little for his cause so far as any terms with Squire Bull was concerned; so, with the view of making a last attack upon the Squire, and driving him into terms, he began to look about for assistance among those with whom he had previously been at loggerheads. It cost him some qualms before he could so far abase his stomach as to do so; but at last he ventured to address a long and pitiful letter to Hugh, in which he set forth all his disputes with John, and dwelt much on his scruples of conscience; begged him to forget old quarrels, and put down his name to a Round Robin, which he was about to address to the Squire in his own behalf. To this epistle Hugh answered as follows:—"Dearly beloved,—my bowels are grieved for your condition, but I see only one cure for your scruples of conscience. Strip off the Squire's livery, and give up your place, as I did, and your peace of mind will be restored to you. In the mean time, I do not see very well why I should help you to pocket the Squire's wages, and do nothing for it. Yours, in the spirit of meekness and forgiveness—HUGH." After this rebuff, Jack, you may easily believe, saw there was little hope of assistance from that quarter.
As a last resource, he called a general meeting of his friends, at which it was resolved to present the proposed Round Robin to John, signed by as many names as they could muster; in which Jack, who seemed to be of opinion that the more they asked the greater was their chance of getting something at least, set forth the articles he wanted, and without which, he told John, he could no longer remain in his house; but that he and his relatives and friends would forthwith, if this petition was rejected, walk out, to the infinite scandal of the neighbourhood, leaving the Squire without a teacher or a writing-master within fifty miles to supply their place. They demanded that the Squire should give up the nomination of the ushers entirely, though in whose favour they did not explain; and that Jack was in future to be a law unto himself, and to be supreme in all matters of education, with power to himself to define in what such matters consisted. On these requests being conceded, they stated that they would continue to give their countenance to the Squire as in times past; otherwise the whole party must quit possession incontinently. Jack prevailed on a good many to sign this document—though some did not like the idea of walking out, demurred, and added after the word incontinently, "i.e. when convenient,"—and thus signed, they put the Round Robin under a twopenny cover, and dispatched it to "John Bull, Esquire"—with haste.
If they really thought the Squire was to be bullied into these terms by this last sally, they found themselves consumedly mistaken; for after a time down came a long and perfectly civil letter from the Squire's secretary, telling them their demands were totally out of the question, and that the Squire would see them at the antipodes sooner than comply with them.
Did Jack then, you will ask, walk out as he had threatened, when he got the Squire's answer? Not he. He now gave notice that he intended to apply for an Act of Parliament on the subject: and that, in the meantime, the matter might stand over. Meantime, and in case matters should come to the worst, he is busily engaged begging all over the country, for cash to erect a new wooden tenement for him, in the event of his having to leave his old one of stone and lime. Some say even that he has been seen laying down several pounds of gunpowder in the cellar of his present house, and has been heard to boast of his intention to blow up his successor when he takes possession; but for my own part, and seeing how he has shuffled hitherto, I believe that he is no nearer removing than he was a year ago. Indeed he has said confidentially to several people, that even if his new house were all ready for him, he could not, with his asthmatic tendency, think of entering it for a twelvemonth or so, till the lath and plaster should be properly seasoned. Of all this, however, we shall hear more anon.