Chapter V.
THE CASTLES AT HOME.
It was very well for a man of Castle’s irritable temper to be made a shepherd, instead of a labourer at home, within sight and hearing of all the bustle and difficulty occasioned by much pressure of work and few hands to do it. He could not have borne to be, as his wife said, driven from pillar to post,—called off from one thing before he had done it, to do something else to which he was altogether unaccustomed. It suited him much better to be out upon the downs after the sheep; though even in that quiet place he had his troubles. The sheep-walk was too extensive to be under the management of one person; and Castle’s brother-shepherd was not a very congenial companion. He was a gentleman convict;—a young man who had gamed away his little fortune, and then taken to swindling, for which he had been transported. Being unequal to hard work, and having no mechanical skill, he was sent out to tend sheep; an employment as little suitable as might be to his social dispositions and active habits. The two reluctant companions agreed only in their inclination to grumble.
“They call this a fine scene,” observed the young man, “but it does not suit my taste. I had rather see our sheep in the Smithfield pens than on these downs. Then one misses the London cries, however much the magpies chatter here. As for the cooing of the doves, it really depresses the spirits. People talk of the stars being so brilliant here,—like golden lamps; but I like real lamps better. A row of them in Pall Mall is worth a hemisphere of stars.”
“I don’t know much about lamplight,” replied Castle, “having been too poor to burn candles at home, and so going to bed in the twilight; but this place is so lonesome, I sometimes wonder whether it is in the world or out of it. All this view is like an old deserted park, to be sure; but where is the squire’s house, or the church steeple, and the children coming out of school? There is no public-house far or near; and no parson or his lady to speak a word to one: only a young man that comes to read prayers on Sundays in a shed or on the green, and away again to do the same thing somewhere else. Not such a thing have I seen since I came as a carriage with ladies in it; and they say there are no hunts. With all the game there is here, no scarlet jackets ever come in sight from the woods.”
“That is the worst of it,” responded the other grumbler. “We have all the dulness of a country life without its solace of amusement. It was really too tantalizing lately, to see a kangaroo hunt which I could not join. If they would let me take my turn, I might be of some use to them as an experienced huntsman. I should like to hunt opossums till I could get skins enough to make your pretty daughter a cloak worthy to be worn; and——”
Castle here moved off impatiently, having too much paternal pride to listen to convict wooing on Ellen’s behalf. The young man followed him, continuing,
“The snipe-shooting is very choice, I’m told, in the marshes yonder. I must have leave when winter comes on, to go and try my luck. But the hunts are the best things,—more spirited perhaps than you are aware of.”
“Hunts! hunts!” cried Castle. “I see neither deer nor fox. An odd sort of hunting, if you mean killing any of these leaping things, with their queer ways. Why, the little ones don’t run beside their dams, as is natural, but she pops them into her bag, and off she hops, as if she had only two legs. The first I saw, I thought she had happened an accident, and had her fore legs cut short; and I thought she got on wonderfully well considering; and then in a minute appeared a whole herd of them, with their young in their bags.”
“It is a pretty sight to see them come down from the woods at sunrise to feed in the plains. Then is the time to hide behind a thicket, and make sure of one’s game. Which do you prefer, as a bottom dish, kangaroo or bandicoot? In a pie, properly seasoned, it is difficult to say which is the best. I have given many a hint down below that either is much more palatable to me than rations of salt meat.”
Castle, who thought no man need desire more in the way of diet than to eat meat every day, looked with contempt on the grimaces of his companion over his ample supply of beef, wheaten bread, and cider.