[54] "Nix my dolly, pals, Fake away!"—words of deep and mysterious import in the ancient language of Upper Egypt, and recently inscribed on the sacred standard of Mehemet Ali. They are supposed to intimate, to the initiated in the art of Abstraction, the absence of all human observation, and to suggest the propriety of making the best use of their time—and fingers.
[55] Vide Ingoldsby Legends (First Series), page 139.
In the succeeding Legend we come nearer home.—Father Ingoldsby is particular in describing its locality, situate some eight miles from the Hall—less, if you take the bridle-road by the Church-yard, and so along the valley by Mr. Fector's Abbey.—In the enumeration of the various attempts to appropriate the treasure (drawn from a later source), is omitted one, said to have been undertaken by the worthy ecclesiastic himself, who, as Mrs. Botherby insinuates, is reported to have started for Dover, one fine morning, duly furnished with all the means and appliances of Exorcism.—I cannot learn, however, that the family was ever enriched by his expedition.
[THE LAY OF THE OLD WOMAN CLOTHED IN GREY.]
A LEGEND OF DOVER.
Once there lived, as I've heard people say, An "Old Woman clothed in grey," So furrow'd with care, So haggard her air, In her eye such a wild supernatural stare, That all who espied her Immediately shied her, And strove to get out of her way.
This fearsome Old Woman was taken ill: —She sent for the Doctor—he sent her a pill, And by way of a trial, A two shilling phial Of green-looking fluid, like lava diluted, To which I've profess'd an abhorrence most rooted,[56] One of those draughts they so commonly send us, Labell'd "Haustus catharticus, mane sumendus;"—
She made a wry face, And, without saying Grace, Toss'd it off like a dram—it improved not her case. —The Leech came again; He now open'd a vein, Still the little Old Woman continued in pain. So her "Medical Man," although loth to distress her, Conceived it high time that her Father Confessor Should be sent for to shrive, and assoilzie, and bless her, That she might not slip out of these troublesome scenes "Unanneal'd and Unhouseled,"—whatever that means.[57]