However interesting these objects might formerly have been to Twm, he looked now only in one direction,—towards the spot where he might catch the earliest glimpse of his approaching mistress. Out of all patience at her long delay, he now began to wonder at the cause of it, when at length, to his great dismay, he saw one female hurrying on, and her not the right one, although the faithful Miss Meredith. Having reached the side of the river, which separated her from the base of Dinas, and finding that he was watching her, she placed a paper on the rock and a stone upon it, then kissing her hand to him, sportively, she turned about, and hastened homeward with the utmost precipitation. In his eagerness to overtake her, Twm attempted to run down the declivity, but soon lost his footing, sliding and rolling down several yards, by which he was for a few moments rather stunned. Losing all hope of catching his mistress’s confidante, to learn the cause of her non-appearance, according to promise, he applied to the paper on the rock, which he found to be a note hastily scrawled with a pencil, containing merely these words—“My father has unexpectedly arrived, with several of his friends—can’t see you till at Llandovery on fair day. Yours ever.”—“By the Lord!” muttered Twm to himself, “if this is a coquette’s trick which she puts on me, it will avail her nothing in the end;—mine she is, by promise, and mine she shall be, in spite of the devil, and all her Brecknockshire friends to boot.” Determined to bring his affairs with the widow to a speedy crisis, he changed his clothes, and soon made his way to Llandovery.
CHAP. XXVI.
Twm’s vagaries and disguises at Llandovery fair. The adventure of the bale of flannel and the iron pot. Quotations from Catwg the wise. Twm discovered. A strange catastrophe.
The day of Llandovery fair arrived; and Twm, who calculated nearly as much on the amusement he intended to create on this occasion for himself, as with meeting his mistress, determined that the grey horse should become the hero of another adventure. Much to their credit, the neighbouring gentry had recently opened a subscription for rebuilding between thirty and forty poor people’s houses, which had unfortunately been burnt down; and our hero resolved that every farthing gained by the grey horse, or otherwise, clandestinely, should be appropriated to this laudable purpose. It was no small satisfaction to him to find that while it mortified the purse-proud vanity of the haughty squires to see so large a sum attached to his name, it had the good effect of increasing their contributions, resolved not to be out-done, in money matters at least, by so obscure a personage as Twm.
For the purpose here named he assumed the garb and manner of the most absolute lout that ever trudged after a plough tail. His feet were thrust into a very heavy pair of clogs, or wooden-soled shoes, which being stiff and large, maintained such a haughty independence of the inmates, as to need being tied on with a hay-band. His legs were enveloped in a pair of wheat-stalk leggings, or bands of twisted straw, winding round and round, and covering them from the knee to the ankle. A raw hairy cow-hide formed the material of his inexpressibles, which were loose, like trowsers cut off at the knee; and his jerkin was of a brick-dust red, with black stripes, like the faded garb of the old Carmarthenshire women. A load of red locks, straight as a bunch of candles, hung dangling behind, but in front rather matted and entangled, quite innocent of the slightest acquaintance with that useful article, a comb: the whole surmounted with a soldier’s cast-off Monmouth cap, so highly varnished with grease, as to appear water-proof. Without any apology for a waistcoat, he wore a blue flannel shirt, striped with white, open from the chin to the waistband, which answered the purpose of a cupboard, to contain his enormous cargo of bread and cheese and leeks, which, as he was continually drawing upon his store, stood a chance of soon becoming wholly inside passengers. Added to this, his booby gait, and stupid vacant stare was such, that his most intimate acquaintance might have passed him by as a stranger.
Instead of entering the horse-fair, he stood with his dainty steed of grey at the entrance of the town, and munched his bread and cheese, apparently careless whether a purchaser appeared or not. Many persons, in passing by, gazed with wonder at this piece of cloddish rusticity, and asked if the horse was for sale; but receiving such drivelling and dolt-like answers, it became a matter of wonder who could have intrusted their property to such an oaf.
Just as the ground was once more cleared of gazing idlers and unprofitable querists, a gentleman, well mounted on a chesnut-coloured hunter, entered the town, and cast an eager eye at the grey horse. Twm recognized him at a glance as a Breconshire magistrate, named Powell, one of the many rejected admirers of the lady of Ystrad Fîn; riding up to our hero, he asked if the horse was for sale. Twm answered in broken English, imitating the dialect of the lower class, “I don’t no but it iss, if I can get somebody that iss not wice, look you, somebody that was fools to buy him.” “But why,” asked the gentleman, “don’t you take him into the horse-fair?” “Why indeed to goodness,” answered Twm, “I was shame to take him there; for look you, he hass a fault on him, and I do not find in my heart and my conscience to take honest pipple in with a horse that has a fault upon him, for all master did send me here to sell him.” “Well, and what is this mighty fault!” asked the stranger, smiling. “Why indeed to goodness and mercy,” replied Twm, “it was a fault that do spoil him—it was a fault that—” “But what is the fault?” asked the Breconshire magistrate impatiently: “give it a name man.” “Why indeed to goodness,” replied the scrupulous horse-dealer, “I will tell you like an honest cristan man, without more worts about it; I will make my sacraments and bible oaths”—“I don’t ask your oath,” cried Powell, almost out of humour, “merely tell me in a word, what ails the horse?” “Indeed and upon my sole and conscience to boot, I can’t say what do ail him.” “You don’t?” cried Powell in an angry tone, and looking as surprised and wroth as might be expected from a proud Breconshire magistrate. “Confound me if I do,” replied Twm, “but I will tell you why he wass no good to master; it wass this—Master iss a parson, a great parson, a gentleman parson, not a poor curate, one mister Evans, Rector of Tregaron, and the white hairs do come off the grey horse here, and stick upon his best black coat and breeches; and that wass his fault.”
It is needless to add that the rising choler of the fiery Powell immediately subsided, and laying no particular stress on this singular blemish, purchased the grey horse, and paid for it at once, apparently glad to escape from the tedious fooleries of the strange horse-dealer.
Anxious to discover his mistress, he chose another disguise, not daring to commune with her in his own proper person. He now appeared in a sober grey suit, shining brass buckles, stockings of the wool of a black sheep, and a knitted Welsh wig of the same, that fitted him like a skull-cap, and concealed every lock of his hair. Thus arrayed, he presented the appearance of a grave puritanical mountain farmer, from the most remote district of Cardiganshire. After gazing awhile at the motley train that constitute a fair, in a Welsh country town, he noticed a well known old crone, who had the reputation of being exceedingly covetous and disagreeable. Lean, yellow, and decrepid, her ferret-eyes glanced eagerly about for a customer, as she held beneath her arm a large roll of stout striped flannel. Twm, unobserved, took his stand behind her, and dexterously stitching her bale to his coat, he, with a sudden jerk, transferred it from the old woman’s grasp to his own. Her wonder and dismay was unutterable. Elbowed and toed by the bustling crowd who were passing to and fro, she knew not who to vent her spleen upon; but, in utter despair, set up a tremendous howl, as a requiem for her beloved departed. Instead of seeking the assistance of a light pair of heels, Twm scarcely moved a yard, but drew from his pocket a little black lighted tobacco-pipe, and puffed a cloud with admirable coolness, while his right arm lovingly embraced the bale of flannel. Roused by the old beldame’s outrageous expressions of grief and fury, he moved up to her with apparent concern, and asked in a very pathetic tone, the cause of her sorrow, which she related with many curses, sobs, and furious exclamations. Shocked at her impiety and want of resignation, Twm took upon him to rebuke her, and edified her much, by an extempore discourse on the virtue of patience; assuring her she ought to thank heaven that she was robbed, as it was a most striking proof she was not a neglected being. In conclusion, he remarked, that fairs and markets in these degenerate days were so sadly infested with rogues and vagabonds, that an honest person was completely encompassed by dangers. “Now for my part,” continued he, “I never enter such places without previously sewing my goods to my clothes, which you ought also to have done, in this manner”—shewing, at the same time, the roll beneath his arm, which he thought the old crone’s eye had glanced on, with something like a light shadow of suspicion, that however instantly vanished, on this notable display and explanation.
Hawking a roll of flannel through a fair was too tame a pastime for our hero, when unaccompanied with more animated trickery, and he began to think of giving it up, that he might more leisurely pursue his principal vocation of searching out the lady of Ystrad Fîn, when the genius of whim provided more mirth for him, and arrested his attention.