“He once got warned himself, did old Thomas, so said he, ‘Where do you intend to go master?’ ‘Me,’ said the old man, scratchin’ his head, and lookin’ puzzled ‘nowhere.’ ‘Oh, I thought you intend to leave, said Thomas for I don’t.’ ‘Very good that, Thomas, come I like that.’ The old knight’s got an anecdote by that, and nanny-goats aint picked up every day in the country. He tells that to every stranger, every stranger larfs, and the two parsons larf, and the old ‘Sir’ larfs so, he wakes up an old sleepin’ cough that most breaks his ribs, and Thomas is set up for a character.
“Well, arter servants is gone, and women folks made themselves scarce, we haul up closer to the table, have more room for legs, and then comes the most interestin’ part. Poor rates, quarter sessions, turnpikes, corn-laws, next assizes, rail-roads and parish matters, with a touch of the horse and dog between primo and secondo genitur, for variety. If politics turn up, you can read who host is in a gineral way with half an eye. If he is an ante-corn-lawer, then he is a manufacturer that wants to grind the poor instead of grain. He is a new man and reformer. If he goes up to the bob for corn-law, then he wants to live and let live, is of an old family, and a tory. Talk of test oaths bein’ done away with. Why Lord love you, they are in full force here yet. See what a feller swears by—that’s his test, and no mistake.
“Well, you wouldn’t guess now there was so much to talk of, would you? But hear ‘em over and over every day, the same everlastin’ round, and you would think the topics not so many arter all, I can tell you. It soon runs out, and when it does, you must wait till the next rain, for another freshet to float these heavy logs on.
“Coffee comes, and then it’s up and jine the ladies. Well, then talk is tried agin, but it’s no go; they can’t come it, and one of the good-natured fat old lady-birds goes to the piany, and sits on the music stool. Oh, Hedges! how it creaks, but it’s good stuff, I guess, it will carry double this hitch; and she sings ‘I wish I was a butterfly.’ Heavens and airth! the fust time I heard one of these hugeaceous critters come out with that queer idee, I thought I should a dropt right off of the otter man on the floor, and rolled over and over a-laughin’, it tickled me so, it makes me larf now only to think of it. Well, the wings don’t come, such big butterflies have to grub it in spite of Old Nick, and after wishin’ and wishin’ ever so long in vain, one of the young galls sits down and sings in rael right down airnest, ‘I won’t be a nun.’ Poor critter! there is some sense in that, but I guess she will be bleeged to be, for all that.
“Now eatin’ is done, talkin’ is done, and singin’ is done; so here is chamber candles, and off to bed, that is if you are a-stayin’ there. If you ain’t, ‘Mr. Weather Mutton’s carriage is ready, Sir,’ and Mr. Weather Mutton and Mrs. Weather Mutton and the entire stranger get in, and when you do, you are in for it, I can tell you. You are in for a seven mile heat at least of cross country roads, axletree deep, rain pour-in’ straight up and down like Niagara, high hedges, deep ditches full of water, dark as Egypt; ain’t room to pass nothin’ if you meet it, and don’t feel jist altogether easy about them cussed alligators and navigators, critters that work on rail-roads all day, and on houses and travellers by night.
“If you come with Mr. Weather Mutton, you seed the carriage in course. It’s an old one, a family one, and as heavy as an ox cart. The hosses are old, family hosses, everlastin’ fat, almighty lazy, and the way they travel is a caution to a snail. It’s vulgar to go fast, its only butcher’s hosses trot quick, and besides, there is no hurry—there is nothin’ to do to home. Affectionate couple! happy man! he takes his wife’s hand in his—kisses it? No, not he, but he puts his head back in the corner of the carriage, and goes to sleep, and dreams—of her? Not he indeed, but of a saddle of mutton and curren’ jelly.
“Well, if you are a-stoppin’ at Sir Littleeared Bighead’s, you escape the flight by night, and go to bed and think of homeland natur’. Next mornin’, or rather next noon, down to breakfast. Oh, it’s awfully stupid! That second nap in the mornin’ always fuddles the head, and makes it as mothery as ryled cyder grounds. Nobody looks as sweet as sugar candy quite, except them two beautiful galls and their honey lips. But them is only to look at. If you want honey, there is some on a little cut glass, dug out of a dish. But you can’t eat it, for lookin’ at the genuwine, at least I can’t, and never could. I don’t know what you can do.
“P’raps you’d like to look at the picture, it will sarve to pass away time. They are family ones. And family picture, sarve as a history. Our Mexican Indgians did all their history in picture. Let’s go round the room and look. Lawful heart! what a big “Brown ox” that is. Old “Star and Garters;” father fatted him. He was a prize ox; he eat a thousand bushel of turnips, a thousand pound of oil cake, a thousand of hay, and a thousand weight of mangel wurzel, and took a thousand days to fat, and weighed ever so many thousands too. I don’t believe it, but I don’t say so, out of manners, for I’ll take my oath he was fatted on porter, because he looks exactly like the footman on all fours. He is a walking “Brown Stout,” that feller.
“There is a hunter, come, I like hosses; but this brute was painted when at grass, and is too fat to look well, guess he was a goodish hoss in his day though. He ain’t a bad cut that’s a fact.
“Hullo! what’s this pictur? Why, this is from our side of the water, as I am a livin’ sinner, this is a New-Foundlander, this dog; yes, and he is of the true genuwine breed too, look at his broad forehead—his dew-claws—his little ears; (Sir Littleeared must have been named arter him), his long hair—his beautiful eye. He is a first chop article that; but, oh Lord, he is too shockin’ fat altogether. He is like Mother Gary’s chickens, they are all fat and feathers. A wick run through ‘em makes a candle. This critter is all hair and blubber, if he goes too near the grate, he’ll catch into a blaze and set fire to the house.