Having despatched my bacon and eggs, tea and ale, I fell into deep meditation. My mind reverted to a long past period of my life, when I was to a certain extent mixed up with commercial travellers, and had plenty of opportunities of observing their habits, and the terms employed by them in conversation. I called up several individuals of the two classes into which they used to be divided, for commercial travellers in my time were divided into two classes, those who ate dinners and drank their bottle of port, and those who “boxed Harry.” What glorious fellows the first seemed! What airs they gave themselves! What oaths they swore! and what influence they had with hostlers and chambermaids! and what a sneaking-looking set the others were! shabby in their apparel; no fine ferocity in their countenances; no oaths in their mouths, except such a trumpery apology for an oath as an occasional “confounded hard”; with little or no influence at inns, scowled at by hostlers, and never smiled at by chambermaids—and then I remembered how often I had bothered my head in vain to account for the origin of the term “box Harry,” and how often I had in vain applied both to those who did box and to those who did not “box Harry,” for a clear and satisfactory elucidation of the expression—and at last found myself again bothering my head as of old in a vain attempt to account for the origin of the term “boxing Harry.”
CHAPTER XXXIV
Northampton—Horse-Breaking—Snoring.
Tired at length with my vain efforts to account for the term which in my time was so much in vogue amongst commercial gentlemen I left the little parlour, and repaired to the common room. Mr. Pritchard and Mr. Bos were still there smoking and drinking, but there was now a candle on the table before them, for night was fast coming on. Mr. Bos was giving an account of his travels in England, sometimes in Welsh, sometimes in English, to which Mr. Pritchard was listening with the greatest attention, occasionally putting in a “see there now,” and “what a fine thing it is to have gone about.” After some time Mr. Bos exclaimed:
“I think, upon the whole, of all the places I have seen in England I like Northampton best.”
“I suppose,” said I, “you found the men of Northampton good-tempered, jovial fellows?”
“Can’t say I did,” said Mr. Bos; “they are all shoemakers, and of course quarrelsome and contradictory, for where was there ever a shoemaker who was not conceited and easily riled? No, I have little to say in favour of Northampton, as far as the men are concerned. It’s not the men but the women that make me speak in praise of Northampton. The men are all ill-tempered, but the women quite the contrary. I never saw such a place for merched anladd as Northampton. I was a great favourite with them, and could tell you such tales.”
And then Mr. Bos putting his hat rather on one side of his head told us two or three tales of his adventures with the merched anladd of Northampton, which brought powerfully to mind part of what Ellis Wynn had said with respect to the practices of drovers in his day, detestation for which had induced him to put the whole tribe into Hell.
All of a sudden I heard a galloping down the road, and presently a mighty plunging, seemingly of a horse, before the door of the inn. I rushed out followed by my companions, and lo, on the open space before the inn was a fine young horse, rearing and kicking, with a young man on his back. The horse had neither bridle nor saddle, and the young fellow merely rode him with a rope, passed about his head—presently the horse became tolerably quiet, and his rider jumping off led him into the stable, where he made him fast to the rack and then came and joined us, whereupon we all went into the room from which I and the others had come on hearing the noise of the struggle.
“How came you on the colt’s back, Jenkins?” said Mr. Pritchard, after we had all sat down and Jenkins had called for some cwrw. “I did not know that he was broke in.”