THE
LAST DAYS OF AN OLD SAILOR;
OR,
"BUTTER YOUR SHIRT!
SING TANTARA-BOBUS, MAKE SHIFT!"
Among the few survivors of our "glorious" sea-fights which the Peace sent home to Gainsbro', a busy little port on the Trent, was old Matthew Hardcastle, a veteran of threescore and ten, and something more. It was said that Matthew might have been discharged from ship-board some years earlier; but his attachment to the sea was extreme, and he was at length, to speak plainly, forced out of the navy.
Gainsbro' was, at that particular period, somewhat fertile in the production of eccentric folk, for Joe Hornby was then to be seen in it, with his hat stuck full of field flowers, and sometimes, to the peril of its "crown," fixed on his head wrong side upwards, because "the world was turned upside down;" and the septuagenarian spinster, Nelly Fish, might be seen flaunting along the narrow causeway, her strange pile of five or six straw hats, which she wore one upon another, to show that "she knew all the fashions that had been, as well as those that were;"—and Martin Jackson would, ever and anon, sally forth in some odd guise that demonstrated his lunacy; for to-day he might be seen covered with papers on which were written all kinds of queer criticisms on the rulers of the day, and to-morrow he would go through the streets clad in his wife's chemise for an outer robe, and wearing an old horseman's helmet with a fox's tail for a plume, while half-a-dozen terriers yelped away at his heels, following thick and fast to the mad hunter's cries of "Yo-ho! yo-ho! Hark forward! Tantivy! Yo-ho! yo-ho!"
Such were some of the strange relics of humanity which afforded grave problems for those who were able to moralise, or thought they were, at that time, in Gainsbro'; but, amidst all and sundry of its human catalogue, none of the curious articles thereof attracted more general attention, as they passed to and fro in the streets of the little town, than the veteran warrior-seaman, Matthew Hardcastle. Indeed, Matthew was beheld, by "gentle and simple," in a different light to the eccentrics, poor things! before mentioned. The world, in spite of its conviction that it is wrong to laugh, laughs on at the antics and whims of the helpless beings it calls "insane;" and Gainsbro' followed the way of the world in laughing, too often, at poor Joe Hornby, and Nelly Fish, and Martin Jackson; but it was by no means a custom to laugh at Matthew Hardcastle.
Matthew was a tall, well-built old fellow, and did not lose an inch of his height, notwithstanding his very advanced age. His brave face resembled more the gnarled bark of an old oak than any other thing that ever existed; it was a real sea-faring face, was Matthew's, if ever a man wore one in this world. And then his wig! All the town talked of Matthew Hardcastle's wig. It did not fall below the shoulders, like the princely-looking old wigs of the days of Marlborough; but it was a very grand, burly wig, for all that. It reached below the ears of the fine old man, considerably; and it displayed five tiers of curls,—glorious curls they were! Matthew's grand three-cocked hat, too,—for he and old George Laughton, the currier, with his soul of independence, and Charley Careless, the little high-spirited silversmith, were the three last men in Gainsbro' who refused to put away the splendid head-covering of their forefathers for the paltry upper gear of modern times,—Matthew's three-cocked hat stood higher behind than it did before, and, conjoined with the grandeur of his wig, caused Matthew to look as bold and imposing as a brigadier major! And whoever met Matthew on the causeway, rocking as he went with a regular naval kind of motion, and supporting his aged steps by a bamboo in either hand, was sure to say, "Good morning to you, Matthew! I hope you are quite well this morning!" if they were considered to be his equals or superiors in rank; while all the little boys and girls were wont to stop and bow or courtesy to him, and say, "Your sarvant, Matthew!" Such was the real honour paid to the aged sailor who had fought "the battles of his country," as they were called.
The time came, however, when all this show of respect to the brave old sailor ceased, for he lived too long! Twenty more years made his age hard upon one hundred. That was a rare age to live; but it would have been better for Matthew if he had died ten years earlier, for he lived till the effects of the "glorious" battles in which he had been engaged began to be felt—and felt grievously, even in that district, which you will deem comparatively happy when viewed after your mind's eye has been dwelling on the fathomless miseries of our dense hives of manufacture. He lived till hungry and ragged labourers began to stand daily in melancholy groups, and with folded arms, in the streets, and till the parish authorities began to talk of pulling down the old workhouse, to build a new "bastile" on the lovely green spot where the children used to resort to play at sand-mills!
Matthew felt the change in the "civilisation," as it was called, of the times, sensibly, as old as he was; but there was an inexhaustible spring of vivacity in the old seaman's noble nature, and in spite of age, infirmities, and bad times, Matthew Hardcastle was the merriest, as well as the oldest man in Gainsbro'. "Butter your shirt, sing tantara-bobus make shift!" Matthew would say, morning, noon, and night, when the poor would be uttering their plaints in his ears; and the whimsical saying, together with the jolly old fellow's way of uttering it, many a time turned the mourning of his neighbours into mirth.
One day, a stranger heard this singular saying, as he was journeying through the town, and passing by the street end of the alley where Matthew was leaning on his two sticks to take the evening air, and chatting with his neighbours, according to his custom. The traveller could not fail to be struck with the saying, for he had heard it before; and he had seen the veteran who uttered it before, though it was many a long year since. The traveller stopped, and gazed on the old sailor for a moment or two, and then stretched out his aged hand—for he, too, was an old man—to grasp the hand of his ancient friend.
"Matthew Hardcastle! what, old Matthew!" he exclaimed.