THE BIG CRACKER.
Mr. Punch. "PULL AWAY, MY DEAR! I'LL BET YOU A KISS IT CONTAINS SOMETHING WE SHALL BOTH LIKE. PULL AWAY!"
MY HEALTH.
ALK over all these arrangements at dinner. Then, as we have, Pendell tells me, to be up early for otter-hunting, we determine upon going to bed early.
Process of Going to Bed Early.—Mrs. Pendell retires at nine, having seen that "everything we want" is left out on the sideboard. Pendell observes that he shan't be half an hour at most before he's upstairs. I yawn, to show how tired I am, and corroborate his statement as to the time we intend to pass in front of the fire.
Mrs. Pendell has retired. Pendell wishes to know what I'll take. Nothing, I thank him. Pendell doesn't "think—um—that—he'll—um—take anything," and stands before a row of bottles with the critical air of a Commander-in-Chief reviewing the line. It almost looks as if he wanted a bottle to step out of the rank and invite him to make up his mind at once and take a drop of him. In order not to prevent him from enjoying himself, I sacrifice myself, and say, "Well, I'll have just the smallest glass of whiskey." Pendell is of opinion that no one can do better than whiskey, it being, he says, the most wholesome spirit.
We whiskey. The quarter-past arrives. We take no notice of it, except that Pendell remarks that that clock is about twelve minutes fast, in which case, of course, we have nearly half an hour at our disposal. Conversation commences. We somehow get upon Literature, especially upon the subject of my Analytical History of Motion. Pendell quotes a line from somewhere. We can't think where it is to be found.
This leads Pendell to the book-shelves. While he is up, would he mind just mixing me the least drop more whiskey—and water, plenty of water. He does so, and continues his search for the book, ending by bringing down the Ingoldsby Legends. "Do I remember this one?" he asks me. No, I have forgotten it. He thinks the line he quoted is there. He is, he says, going to give it at a Penny Reading, and has already done so with great success. He reads a few lines.
Flash.—Ask him to read. Nothing so pleasant as the sound of some one reading poetry when you're very tired, and are sitting before a good fire. Light a pipe as an aid to listening comfortably. Better than going to bed. Besides, if he reads, it's his fault that we don't go to bed early, as we told Mrs. Pendell we would.
He reads aloud. I interrupt him occasionally (opening my eyes to do so), just to show I am attending, and twice I dispute the propriety of his emphasis; but I don't sustain my side of the argument, from a feeling that to close my eyes and be droned to sleep, is preferable to straining every nerve in order to talk and keep awake.
11 o'clock, P.M.—Pendell stops, and says, "Why, you're asleep!" I reply that he is mistaken (having, in fact, just been awoke by feeling as if a spring had given way at the nape of my neck), but I own, candidly, to feeling a little tired.
"Um!" says Pendell, and puts his selection for a Penny Reading away. Bed.
Morning.—Am aroused by Pendell, who is always fresh. "Lovely morning," he says, opening the curtains. [Note.—When you're only one quarter awake there's something peculiarly obtrusive in any remark about the beauty of the day. To a person comfortably in bed and wishing to remain there, the state of the weather is comparatively uninteresting, unless it's dismally foggy or thoroughly rainy, when, in either case, you can congratulate yourself upon your cleverness and forethought in not having got up.] "Is it?" I ask. Through the window I see only mist and drizzle.
"Just the morning for otter-hunting!" exclaims Pendell, enthusiastically. Then, as he's leaving the room, he turns, and says, "O, by the way, I've just remembered that Old Ruddock's pretty sure to be out with the hounds. He's great fun out hunting."
This stirs me into something like exertion. Otters and Ruddock. Ruddock, during a check, setting the field in a roar.
At Breakfast.—"Um," says Pendell, thinking over something as he cuts a ham, "we shan't want to take anything with us, because Old Penolver gives us lunch. He's a picture of an Old English Squire is Penolver. Quite a picture of a—um—yes——" here he apparently considers to himself whether he has given a correct definition of Penolver or not. He seems satisfied, and closes his account of him by repeating, "Yes—um—yes—an Old English Squire, you know—quite a character in his way," (I thought so,) "and you'll have pasties and cider."
"Pasties!" I exclaim. The word recalls Bluff King Hal's time, the jollifications—by my halidame!—gadso!—crushing a cup, and so forth. Now I have the picture before me (in my mind's eye) of the Old English Squire, attended by grooms bearing pasties and flagons, meeting the Otter Hunters with spears and dogs. Good! Excellent! I feel that My Health will be benefited by the air of the olden time. And perhaps by the pasties.
"Do any ladies come?" I ask.
"Safe to," answers Pendell, "last day of hunting—all the ladies out—sort of show meet, and lounge."
Pasties, flagons, dames, gallants with lutes, and pages with beakers of wine. I am all anxiety to start.
The Drive.—Bleak, misty, sharp, dreary. I am in summer costume of flannels, intended for running. Hope we shall have some running, as at present I'm blue with cold and shivering.
Six miles finished.—We get out at a tumble-down roadside inn. Three boys, each one lankier and colder-looking than the other, are standing together with their hands in their pockets, there being evidently among them a dearth of gloves. A rough man in a velveteen coat and leggings appears, carrying a sort of quarter-staff spiked. I connect him at once with otters. Pendell returns his salute. This is the Huntsman. The three chilly boys are the Field. We are all shivering, and evidently only half awake. Is this what Pendell calls a "show meet, and a lounge?"
Flash.—To say brightly, "Well, it couldn't have been colder for an otter hunt." The chilly boys hearing this, turn away, the man with the spear takes it literally and is offended, "because," he says, "we might ha' had a much worse day." Pendell says to himself, thoughtfully. "Um—colder—otter—ha! Yes, I see. I've made that myself lots of times." I thought that down here, perhaps, it wouldn't have been known. Never risk an old joke again. If I feel it's the only one I've got, preface it by saying, "Of course you've heard what the Attorney-General said the other day to (some one)?" and then, if on being told, they say, "O! that's very old," why it's not your fault.
A fly appears on the road with the Master. He welcomes Pendell and friend heartily and courteously. Is sorry that it's the last meet. Thinks it's a bad day, and in the most genial manner possible damps all my hopes of seeing an otter. "A few weeks ago," he says, "there were plenty of otters."
Flash.—To find out if that spearing-picture is correct. Show myself deeply interested in otters.
The Master says that spearing is unsportsmanlike. Damper number two. No spears. We walk on, and get a little warmer.
More "Field" meets us: some mounted.
Note on Otter-Hunting.—Better than fox-hunting, because you trust to your own legs. You can't be thrown, you can't be kicked off, or reared off; and, except you find yourself alone with the otter in a corner, there's no danger.
Note Number Two. Additional.—Yes, there is one other danger. A great one.
Here it is:—
We have been walking miles along the banks of a stream, crossing difficult stepping-stones, climbing over banks eight feet high [thank goodness, impossible for horses], with drops on the other side, and occasional jumpings down, which shake your teeth, but still you land on your own legs, and if you fall you haven't got a brute on the top of you, or rolling over you, or kicking out your brains with his hind hoofs. We number about sixty in the Field. The shaggy, rough hounds are working up-stream, swimming and trotting, and stopping to examine the surface of any boulder which strikes their noses as having been lately the temporary resting-place of an otter. A few people on horseback are proceeding, slowly in single file, along the bank. Difficult work for them. Ladies, too, are on foot, and all going along as pleasantly as possible. Suddenly a cry—a large dog is seen shaking its head wildly, and rubbing his front paws over his ears—another dog is rolling on the bank—another plunges into the river furiously, also shaking his head as if he was objecting to everything generally, and would rather drown than change his opinions.
Another cry.
Horses plunging—one almost into the river—shrieks of ladies—exclamations from pedestrians—the field is scattered—some attempt to ford the river—some jump right in—some on horseback cross it shouting—some plunge into the plantation on the left—some are running back upon us! A panic.
Mad bull, perhaps—if so—with admirable presence of mind I jump into the water up to my waist, and am making for the opposite side, when a man, running and smoking a short pipe, answers my question as to the bull with—
"No! Wasps! Wasps' nest!!" In a second I see them. At me. Pursuing me. I dive my head under water. Wet through! Scramble up bank. One wasp is after me. One pertinaciously. My foot catches in a root, I am down. Wasp down too, close at my ear. A minute more I am up. Wasp up too, by my right ear.
An Inspiration.—It flashes across me that wasps hate mud. Don't know where I heard it. Think it was in some child's educational book. No time for thinking. Jump—squish—into the mud! Over my knees—boots nearly off. The last thing I see of Pendell is holding on his spectacles with his left hand, and fighting a wasp with his stick in his right. Squish—flop—flosh!... Up against a stump—down in a morass. Wasp at me. Close to my ear as if he wanted to tell me a secret. I won't hear it! Now I understand why the dog shook his head. Through a bramble bush (like the Man in the Nursery Rhyme, who scratched both his eyes out and in again by a similar operation), and come out torn and scratched, but dry as a pen after being dragged through a patent wiper of erect bristles. No wasp. Gone. I am free. But still I keep on.
That's the only great danger in Otter-Hunting. At least, that I know of at present.
I pick up the man with pipe. Kindest creature in the world. He has two pipes, and he fills and gives me one. He says, "Wasps won't attack a smoker."
Flash.—Smoke.
Pendell comes up. "Um!—aha!" he says; "narrow escape!" He has not been stung.
The Field is pulling itself together again. Pendell chuckles. "Did you see Old Ruddock?" he asks. "There were two wasps at him."
No! It appears that Old Ruddock has been quite close to me throughout the day. Yet there was no laughing crowd, and I haven't heard one of Ruddock's jokes bruited about. Odd. Wonder how the wasps liked Ruddock.
