SAINT MARK’S EVE.
A TALE OF THE OLDEN TIME.
“THE Devil choke thee with un!”—as Master Giles, the Yeoman, said this, he banged down a hand in size and colour like a ham, on the old-fashioned oak table;—“I do say the Devil choke thee with un!”
The Dame made no reply: she was choking with passion and a fowl’s liver—the original cause of the dispute. A great deal has been said and sung of the advantage of congenial tastes amongst married people, but true it is, the variances of our Kentish couple arose from this very coincidence in gusto. They were both fond of the little delicacy in question, but the Dame had managed to secure the morsel for herself, and this was sufficient to cause a storm of very high words—which properly understood, signifies very low language. Their mealtimes seldom passed over without some contention of the sort,—as sure as the knives and forks clashed, so did they—being in fact equally greedy and disagreedy—and when they did pick a quarrel—they picked it to the bone.
BOXER AND PINCHER.
It was reported, that on some occasions they had not even contented themselves with hard speeches, but they had come to scuffling—he taking to boxing, and she to pinching—though in a far less amicable manner than is practised by the takers of snuff. On the present difference, however, they were satisfied with “wishing each other dead with all their hearts”—and there seemed little doubt of the sincerity of the aspiration, on looking at their malignant faces,—for they made a horrible picture in this frame of mind.
Now it happened that this quarrel took place on the morning of St. Mark,—a Saint who was supposed on that Festival to favour his Votaries with a peep into the Book of Fate. For it was the popular belief in those days, that if a person should keep watch towards midnight, beside the church, the apparitions of all those of the parish who were to be taken by Death before the next anniversary, would be seen entering the porch. The Yeoman, like his neighbours, believed most devoutly in this superstition—and in the very moment that he breathed the unseemly aspiration aforesaid, it occurred to him, that the Even was at hand, when by observing the rite of St. Mark, he might know to a certainty whether this unchristian wish was to be one of those that bear fruit. Accordingly, a little before midnight he stole quietly out of the house, and in something of a Sexton-like spirit set forth on his way to the Church.