The other, without wit or antithesis, or point, or turn, this way or that; but leaving the images on one side, and the picture on the other, going straight forwards as nature could lead him, to the heart. O Trim! would to heaven thou had’st a better historian!—would thy historian had a better pair of breeches!——O ye critics! will nothing melt you?
[ CHAPTER VII]
———My young master in London is dead! said Obadiah.—
———A green sattin night-gown of my mother’s which had been twice scoured, was the first idea which Obadiah’s exclamation brought into Susannah’s head.—Well might Locke write a chapter upon the imperfection of words.—Then, quoth Susannah, we must all go into mourning.—But note a second time: the word mourning, notwithstanding Susannah made use of it herself—failed also of doing its office; it excited not one single idea, tinged either with grey or black,—all was green.——The green sattin night-gown hung there still.
—O! ’twill be the death of my poor mistress, cried Susannah.—My mother’s whole wardrobe followed.—What a procession! her red damask,—her orange tawney,—her white and yellow lutestrings,—her brown taffata,—her bone-laced caps, her bed-gowns, and comfortable under-petticoats.—Not a rag was left behind.—“No,—she will never look up again,” said Susannah.
We had a fat, foolish scullion—my father, I think, kept her for her simplicity;—she had been all autumn struggling with a dropsy.—He is dead, said Obadiah,—he is certainly dead!—So am not I, said the foolish scullion.
——Here is sad news, Trim, cried Susannah, wiping her eyes as Trim stepp’d into the kitchen,—master Bobby is dead and buried—the funeral was an interpolation of Susannah’s—we shall have all to go into mourning, said Susannah.
I hope not, said Trim.—You hope not! cried Susannah earnestly.—The mourning ran not in Trim’s head, whatever it did in Susannah’s.—I hope—said Trim, explaining himself, I hope in God the news is not true.—I heard the letter read with my own ears, answered Obadiah; and we shall have a terrible piece of work of it in stubbing the Ox-moor.—Oh! he’s dead, said Susannah.—As sure, said the scullion, as I’m alive.
I lament for him from my heart and my soul, said Trim, fetching a sigh.—Poor creature!—poor boy!—poor gentleman.
—He was alive last Whitsontide! said the coachman.—Whitsontide! alas! cried Trim, extending his right arm, and falling instantly into the same attitude in which he read the sermon,—what is Whitsontide, Jonathan (for that was the coachman’s name), or Shrovetide, or any tide or time past, to this? Are we not here now, continued the corporal (striking the end of his stick perpendicularly upon the floor, so as to give an idea of health and stability)—and are we not—(dropping his hat upon the ground) gone! in a moment!—’Twas infinitely striking! Susannah burst into a flood of tears.—We are not stocks and stones.—Jonathan, Obadiah, the cook-maid, all melted.—The foolish fat scullion herself, who was scouring a fish-kettle upon her knees, was rous’d with it.—The whole kitchen crowded about the corporal.