“No, I hope you would not,” said Amy, in pure good faith, with a glance, however, at the thick bamboo, “because it would be so cruel. It is hollow, I hope; but it has such knots, and it looks so very hard!”
“Hollow, and thin as a piece of pie–crust; and you know how this wood splits.”
“Oh, I am so glad, because you canʼt hurt him so very much. Please not to go, if you can hold him, more than three miles and a half an hour. Papa says that is the pace that always suits his health best. And please to take the saddle off, and keep it at your house, that the Rushford boy may not ride him back. And please to choose a steady boy from the head–class in your Sunday school, and, if possible, a communicant. But Iʼm sadly afraid thereʼs no trusting the boys.”
“Indeed, I fear not,” said Octavius, gravely; and adding to himself, “at any rate when you are concerned, you darling. What a love you are! But thereʼs no chance for me, I know; and itʼs a good job for me that I knew it. Oh you little angel, I wonder who the lucky fellow is!” Aunt Eudoxia had dropped him a hint, quite in a casual way, when she saw that the stout young bachelor was going in, over head and ears.
Sweet Amy watched Mr. Pell, or rather his steed, with fond interest, until they turned the corner; and certainly the pace, so far, was very sedate indeed. Octavius was an upright man—you could see that by his seat in the saddle—as well as a kind and good–natured one; and on no account would he have vexed that gentle and beautiful girl. Nevertheless he grew impatient, as Coræbus pricked his ears pretentiously, and snorted so as to defy the winds, and was fain to travel sidewise, as if the distance was not enough for him; and all the time he was swallowing the earth at the rate of no more than four miles an hour. Then the young parson pulled out his watch, and saw that it wanted but half an hour of the time himself had fixed for the morning service at Rushford. And he could not bear the thought of keeping the poor folk waiting about the cross, as they always did and would wait, till the parson appeared among them. As Mr. Wise has well observed, “the peasant of the New Forest is too full of veneration.”
And here let me acknowledge, as behoveth a man to do, not in a scambling preface, which nobody ever would read, but in the body of my work, great and loving obligation to the labours of Mr. John R. Wise. His book is perfectly beautiful, written in admirable English, full of observation, taste, and gentle learning; and the descriptions of scenery are such that they make the heart yearn to verify them. I know the New Forest pretty well, from my own perambulations and perequitations—one barbarism is no worse than the other—but I never should have loved it as I do but for his loving guidance.
The Rev. Mr. Pell, as some people put when they write to a parson,—hoping still to keep faith with Amy, because her eyes were so lovely,—pulled the snaffle, and turned Coræbus into a short cut, through beeches and hazels. Then compromise came soon to an end, and the big bamboo was compelled to fall upon the fat flank of Coræbus, because he would not go without it. He showed sense of that first attention only by a little buck–jump, and a sprightly wag of his tail; then, hoping that the situation need not be looked in the face, shambled along at five miles an hour, with a mild responsibility.
“Five miles more,” said Octave Pell, “and only twenty minutes to do it in! Itʼs an unlucky thing for you, Coræbus, that your mistress is engaged.” Whack, came the yellow bamboo again, and this time in solid earnest; Ræbus went off as if he meant to go mad. He had never known such a blow since the age wherein he belonged to the innkeeper. Oh, could a horse with four feeds a day be expected to put up with tyranny?
But, to the naggyʼs great amazement, Octave Pell did not tumble off; more than that, he seemed to stick closer, with a most unpleasant embrace, and a pressure that told upon the wind—not of heaven but of horse—till the following symptoms appeared:—First a wheeze, and creak internal, a slow creak, like leather chafing, or a pair of bellows out of order; then a louder remonstrance, like the ironwork of a roller, or the gudgeons of a wheelbarrow; then, faster and faster, a sucking noise, like the bucket of an old pump, when the gardener works by the job; finally, puff, and roar, and shriek, with notes of passing sadness, like the neap–tide wailing up a cavern, or the lament of the Berkshire Blowing Stone.
In forest glades, where hollow hoofs fell on the sod quite mutely, that roar was enough to try masculine courage, though never unnerved by a heart–shock. How then could poor Pearl Garnet, sitting all alone, in a lonely spot, wherein she had pledged herself to her dead love, sitting there to indulge her tears, the only luxury left her—how could she help being frightened to death as the unearthly sound approached her?