Shanty the Blacksmith; a Tale of Other Times

by Mary Martha Sherwood

"There is more though, there is much more though," muttered the old man, "and Jacob saw it too, and owned that he did."

"The fool!" repeated Rebecca, "the fool! did I not tell him that he was feeding your poor mind with follies; tell me, how should this poor girl be like your wife?"

The old man shook his head, and answered, "Because, he that made them both, fashioned them to be so; and Rebecca, I have been thinking that had my daughter lived, had Jessica lived till now, she would have been just such a one."

"Preserve you in your senses, master," exclaimed Rebecca, "such as they are, they are better than none; but had your daughter lived, she would have been as unlike this damsel as you ever were to your bright browed wife. Why you are short and shrivelled, so was your daughter; your features are sharp, and so were hers; she was ever a poor pining thing, and when I laid her in her grave beside her mother, it was a corpse to frighten one; it was well for you, as I ever told you, that she died as soon."

"Yet had she lived, I might have had a thing to love," replied the old man; and then, looking at Tamar, he added, "They tell me you are the Laird's daughter,--is it so, fair maid?"

Rebecca again interrupted him. "What folly is this," she said, raising her voice almost to a shriek, "how know you but that, whilst you are questioning the damsel, your chests and coffers are in the hands of robbers; your money, I tell you, is in danger: your gold, your oft-told gold. You were not wont to be so careless of your gold; up and look after it. You will be reduced to beg your bread from those you hate; arise, be strong. Where are your keys? Give them to the damsel; she is young and active; she will swiftly remove the treasure out of the way. Can you not trust her? See you not the fair guise in which she comes? Can you suspect a creature who looks like your wife, like Rachel? Is not her tale well framed; and are you, or are you not deceived by her fair seemings? She is the daughter of a beggar, and she knows herself to be such; and there is no doubt but that she has her ends to answer by giving this alarm."

The old man had arisen; he looked hither and thither; he felt for his keys, which were hanging at his girdle; and then, falling back into his chair, he uttered one deep groan and became insensible, his whole complexion turning to a livid paleness.

"He is dying!" exclaimed Tamar, holding him up in his chair, from which he would have otherwise fallen. "He is dying, the poor old man is dying; bring water, anything."

"He has often been in this way since he came here," replied Rebecca. "We have thought that he has had a stroke; he is not the man he was a few months since; and had I known how it would be, it is strange but I would have found means to hinder his coming."

"If he were ever so before," said Tamar "why did you work him up, and talk to him, as you did, about his daughter; but, fetch some water," she added.