When Squire Forester gave up hunting, the hounds went to Aldenham, as trencher hounds; the farmers of the district agreeing to keep them. They were collected the night before the hunt, fed after a day’s sport, and dismissed at a crack of the whip, each dog going off to the farm at which he was kept. But it was a great trial to Tom to see them depart; and he begged to be allowed to keep an old favourite, with which he might often have been seen sunning himself in the yard. He continued with his master from first to last, with the exception of the short time he lived with Mr. Corbet, when the Sundorne roof-trees were wont to ring to the toast of “Old Trojan,” and when the elder Sebright was his fellow-whip.
Like the old Squire, Tom never married, although, like his master, he had a leaning towards the softer sex, and spent much of his time in the company of his lady friends. One he made his banker, and the presents made to him might have amounted to something considerable if he had taken care of them. In lodging them in safe keeping he usually begged that they might be let out to him a shilling a time; but he made so many calls and pleaded so earnestly and availingly for more, and was so constant a visitor at Hangster’s Gate, that the stock never was very large. Indeed he was on familiar terms with “Chalk Farm,” as the score behind the ale-house door was termed; still he never liked getting into debt, and it was always a relief to his mind to see the sponge applied to the score.
Tom was a great gun at this little way-side inn, which was altogether a primitive institution of the kind even at that period, but which was afterwards swept away when the present Hall was built. It then stood on the old road from Bridgnorth to Wenlock, which came winding past the Hall; and in the old coaching days was a well-known hostelry and a favourite tippling shop for local notables, among whom were old Scale, the Barrow schoolmaster and parish clerk; the Cartwrights and Crumps, of Broseley; and a few local farmers. One attraction was the old coach, which called there and brought newspapers, and still later news in troubled times when battles, sieges, and the movements of armies were the chief topics of conversation. Neither coachmen nor travellers ever appeared to hurry, but would wait to communicate the news, particularly in the pig killing season, when a pork pie and a jug of ale would be sufficient to keep the coach a good half hour if need be. We speak of course of “The time when George III. was king,” before “His Majesty’s Mail” became an important institution, and when one old man in a scarlet coat, with a face that lost nothing by reflection therewith—excepting that a slight tinge of purple was visible—who had many more calling places than post offices on the road, carried pistols in his holsters, and brought all the letters and newspapers Willey, Wenlock, Broseley, Benthall, Ironbridge, Coalbrookdale, and some other places then required; and these, even, took the whole day to distribute. Although the lumbering old vehicle was constantly tumbling over on going down slight declivities, it was a great institution of the period; it was—
“Hurrah for the old stage coach,
Be it never so worn and rusty!
Hurrah for the smooth high road,
Be it glaring, and scorching, and dusty!“Hurrah for the snug little inn,
At the sign of the Plough and Harrow,
And the frothy juice of the dangling hop,
That tickles your spinal marrow.”
It was a great treat to travellers, who would sometimes get off the coach and order a chaise to be sent for them from Bridgnorth or Wenlock, to stop and listen to Tom relating the incidents of a day’s sport, and a still greater treat to witness his acting, to hear his tally-ho, his who-who-hoop, or to hear him strike up—
“A southerly wind and a cloudy sky
Proclaim a hunting morning.”
Another favourite country song just then was the following, which has been attributed to Bishop Still, called—
THE JUG OF ALE.
“As I was sitting one afternoon
Of a pleasant day in the month of June,
I heard a thrush sing down the vale,
And the tune he sang was ‘the jug of ale,’
And the tune he sang was the jug of ale.“The white sheet bleaches on the hedge,
And it sets my wisdom teeth on edge,
When dry with telling your pedlar’s tale,
Your only comfort’s a jug of ale,
Your only comfort’s a jug of ale.“I jog along the footpath way,
For a merry heart goes all the day;
But at night, whoever may flout and rail,
I sit down with my friend, the jug of ale,
With my good old friend, the jug of ale.“Whether the sweet or sour of the year,
I tramp and tramp though the gallows be near.
Oh, while I’ve a shilling I will not fail
To drown my cares in a jug of ale,
Drown my cares in a jug of ale!”
To which old Amen, as the parish clerk was called, in order to be orthodox, would add from the same convivial prelate’s farce-comedy of “Gammer Gurton’s Needle:”—
“I cannot eat but little meat
My stomach is not good;
But sure I think that I can drink
With him that wears a hood.”