Adieu.
LETTER XXXVII
Just at the close of evening, Jerry came running towards the castle with a milk-pail on his head.
'See,' cried he, putting it down, 'how nicely I have choused a little milk-maid! There was she, tripping along as tight as her garter. 'Fly for your life,' cries I, striding up to her: 'there is the big bull at my heels that has just killed two children, two sucking pigs, two—— Here! here! let me hold your pail for you!' and I whips it off her head. So, what does she do, but she runs off without it one way; and what does I do, but I runs off with it another way. And besides this, I have got my hat filled with young potatoes, and my pockets stuffed with ears of wheat; and if we can't eat a hearty dinner off these dainties, why that our next may be fried fleas and toasted leather!'
Though I was angry at the means used by Jerry to get the provisions, yet, as dinner just then had more charms for me than moral sentiment, instead of instructing him in the lofty doctrines of the social compact, I bade him pound the grains of wheat between two flat stones. In the mean time, I sent the minstrel to the cottage for a light and some fuel; and on his return, made him stop up the window with grass and fern. He then kindled a fire of wood in the centre of the Black Chamber; for, as the floor was of stone, it ran no risk of being burned. This done, I mixed some milk with the bruised wheat, kneaded a cake, and laid it on the red embers, while Jerry took charge of roasting the potatoes.
As soon as our romantic repast was ready, I drew my stool to the fire: my household sat on large stones, and we made a tolerable meal, they on the potatoes, and I on the cake, which hunger had really rendered palatable.
The warden lifted the pail to my lips, and I took a draught of the rural nectar; while the minstrel remarked, that Nestor himself had not a larger goblet.
I now paid the poor cottagers a visit, and carried the fragments of our dinner to them.
On my return, we resumed our seats, and hung over the decayed embers, that cast a gloomy glare upon the bed and the drapery; while now and then, a flash from the ashes, as they sank, shot a reddened light on the paleness of the minstrel, and brightened the broad features of the warden. The wind had risen: there was a good deal of excellent howling round the turret: we sat silent, and looking for likenesses in the fire.
'Come, warden,' cried I, 'repair these embers with a fresh splinter, and let me hear the memoirs of your life.'