Nothing could more emphatically prove the excellency of Jack’s wares, than the circumstance of his being personally unpopular among the women, and yet his wares in the highest esteem. The frowns of the fair, which threw a gloom on the sunshine of his days, may be traced to a source not at all dishonourable to him. The girls at the squire’s had played him so many tricks, that once in the height of aggravation, Jack waged war against the whole sex, devoting to the infernal gods every creature that wore a petticoat, and vowing, from that day forward, not one of the proscribed race should ever enter his room, which was romantically situated over the stable, its wickered lattice commanding a full view of both the pigsty and the dunghill.
The consequence of this terrible row caused him, at first, some trouble, as, to keep it, he was obliged thenceforward to be his own chambermaid, laundress, and sempstress, offices that accorded ill with his previous habits. The laudable firmness of his nature, however, soon overcame these petty difficulties; and so far was he from backsliding from his previous determination, that he vowed to throw through the window the first woman who entered his chamber, which the satirical hussies called his den—a threat which effectually secured him from further intrusion.
Sometimes, indeed, while sitting at the door of the cow-house, or the stable, listening to the rural sounds of the cackling geese and grunting pigs, and darning his hose, or patching his leather breeches, or treading his shift in the brook by way of washing it, those eternal plagues of his, the girls, would be seen and heard behind the covert of a wall or hedge, smothering their tittering, which at last would burst out, in spite of suppression, into a loud horse-laugh, when, one and all, they would take to their heels, while Jack amused himself by pelting their rear, in their precipitate retreat, with clods of earth, small stones or anything that came in his way.
“Circumstances alter cases.” In time Jack gained the reputation of being rich. He had made spoons to some purpose, and however the fair sex may cry up their disinterestedness, we are all aware that money materially alters the position of a man in their eyes. One of the maids with this knowledge, became very suddenly enamoured of him, and tried to gain his good will. But having one day ventured to Jack’s “sanctum,” the wench was pitched into the dunghill below, and as a consequence the “pangs of despised love” raged in her bosom. The first act of her resentment was to spread about the insidious report that Jack Sheer was a woman-hater—an insinuation that rather preyed upon his mind, as he dreaded the effect such an unmerited stigma would have upon his private trade. But innocence is ever predestined to an ultimate triumph; and an event soon happened that proved the falsehood of those prevalent tales to his discredit, and convinced his greatest foes that he possessed a heart, if not overflowing with human charity, at least penetrable to the blandishments of beauty, and quick with sensibility to female merit.
On one auspicious market-day, Carmarthen Jack appeared in the streets of Tregaron where the market is held, loaded with his usual merchandise, which he spread on the ground, and sat beside them; but not meeting with a ready sale, and disdaining even momentary idleness, began with earnestness to cut and scoop away at a piece of alder, gradually forming it into a huge ladle, to correspond with the largest size three-legged iron pot. On this eventful morning Catty had occasion to perambulate the fair, to purchase a new ladle, her cross-grained sister having broken the old one, by thumping with it on the back of an overgrown hog, whose foraging propensities had led him to investigate the recesses of the schoolroom.
The notoriety occasioned by Jack’s peculiarities, and the fact of his having money, reached the ears of Catty, and our prudent tutor determined to make his acquaintance through the medium of the broken ladle. Some people say that Catty broke the ladle herself, broke it with a design and that design was an excuse for visiting and conquering one who hated all her sex. Be that as it may, she sought and found him in the fair, and fell in love with him and his ladle at the same instant. After an effort to conquer her native bashfulness, and to look as lovely as possible, she accosted him with such uncommon civility as utterly astounded the poor clownish misanthropic bachelor. She examined the ladle in his hand, and though not half finished, declared it to be the handsomest ever her eyes beheld, and paid for it without seeking the least abatement in the price. Jack gaped at her, with open mouth and staring eyes, and thought her a very interesting woman, though his first impression was, that she was mad, as he had asked double the selling price, on purpose to abate one half, according to the custom immemorial in Welsh dealings.
She next purchased half a dozen common birch-wood spoons, and, as many ornamental ones made of box, to adorn her shelf, and, as before paid him his own price. Jack thought her very lovely indeed: and when she made another purchase of a pair of clog soles, quite irresistible!—her ready money opened his heart as the best key in the world would have done a patent lock; and he was almost ready to offer them as a present, but for fear of wounding her delicacy. As she found he had no further variety, she ordered half a dozen more common spoons, and Jack, with all the amiability that he could possibly throw into his hard features, presented her with one of his most finished articles in box. She received it with that peculiar smile with which a lady accepts a welcome love-token, and replied in the softest tone imaginable, “Indeed I will keep it for your sake, John bach!”
Jack had nothing to do but wonder—he never had been called John in his life before; at any other time he would have thought she mocked him—and the endearing term of “bach” too, was equally new to his ears, which seemed to grow longer as they tingled with the grateful sound. This interesting scene was closed by Catty asking him to her house to partake of a dinner of flummery and milk, which he accepted with the best grace imaginable, and trudged off with his wares on his back and dangling from his arms and button-holes; and thus gallanting her in the most amatory style; he walked by her side to Llidiard-y-Fynon.
Unaccustomed to kindness in either word or deed, poor Jack of Sheer Gâr, met her condescensions and advances with a sheepish sort of gratitude. A cordial invitation on the part of Catty to repeat his visit as soon, and as often, as possible, affected him almost to tears; and as a proof of his unbounded confidence, he left in her care his whole stock of ready-made spoons and ladles, and almost blubbered when he shook her hand at parting.
As a proof of the beneficial effect of kindness on a churlish nature, and the contrary, of ridicule and persecution, we need but contrast this rugged man’s previous character and conduct with what followed, after the tenderness of Catty had melted the frost of misanthropy which formed a crusty coat round his heart. The adventure of the day produced a most extraordinary revolution in his habits. None of the servants of the hall, male or female, could conceive what it portended, when Jack asked one of them, his fellow husbandman, to trim his hair; and while the fellow clipped his rough red locks with his sheep-shears, once mischievously pinching his ear with them till he roared, he was surprised at his questions about the price of a new pair of leather breeches, and a red neck-cloth. Greater still was the astonishment of the whole house, when, in a few days after, he appeared changed into a complete rustic buck in those very articles of dress, and while he thought nobody saw him, endeavoured to cut a dancing caper on the green, which they mistook for a frisky bullock. Changes like these are seldom without a reason, thought his fellow servants; and when they saw Jack’s elated steps lead him towards Catty’s house, they jeered, and laughed, and winked; and nothing knew of course, although their knowledge made him all the worse. Tregaron and its neighbourhood had now food for gossip, and gossip to some people is indeed the very acme of human felicity.