“Why will you not speak?” cried they all together in one question, so loud that no question since the time when all the Barons of England asked, in one cry, King John to give them their rights, had ever exceeded it in intensity and vociferation.
But it was clear this could last no longer than the patience of the women; and every one knows that the time comprehended by the longevity of that feminine virtue, is not so long as the life of Methuselah; so, in a minute, they fell on him with their nails, and rugged his hair, and scratched his face, and pulled him to the earth, and trampled upon him, till he who had fought in the Peninsula began to think that it was time for him to call up his old courage, and fight once again in his advanced years. So, rising up, he placed himself in an attitude which he knew had produced terrible effects in former times; and, to be sure, so it might, for he gnashed his teeth, and held out his yard-long arms, and rolled his eyes in such a manner, yet saying not a word all the while, that the women got alarmed, and cried to the carrier to assist them; but the man was off the moment he saw there was a chance of battle. So the women gave in, and began to try the soothing system with him—an effort in which they were as successful as their sex ever is when a man is to be humbugged; and Gustavus was on the instant mollified into softness, and even lugubrious sentimentality.
CHAPTER IX.
AN APPARITION.
There was a pause, after which Gustavus, offering two of the women an arm each, leaving the other to bring up the rear, he began a solemn march to the scene of his grief—the mysterious spot, where he threw down his long, lank body upon the ground, and muttered his sorrows between his lubber lips, in accents that would have put to flight the ugliest satyr that ever sported in a wood. He took up his station close by the mouth of the deceptive grave, to mitigate his sorrow and fear by a little sentiment—a coarse commodity, that might have made another laugh, but sufficient to make him weep. That day he might be in prison and ruined for ever; and, as for Julia M’Iver, he would never see her again. “She has been in this hole three days,” said he, pointing to the grave.
“Ochone! ochone!” roared the three women, crying bitterly.
Meanwhile, his heavy eye was fixed on the ground; he heard a noise, and, looking up, what on earth should he see but the head of Julia herself above the ground, and all the rest of her body below it? She leered at him and the women knowingly, and laughed till the woods rang; and, rising up out of the very hole where she had been interred, she ran, or rather staggered to him—for she was fresh from the still—flung herself around his neck, and hugged him with a grasp of embrace that many a husband would give a hundred pounds for any day. Nor was Gustavus insensible to its efficacy; for he returned the embrace, and even cried and blubbered like (as all sentimental writers say when they wish to express great sensibility—that is, babyism) a child—and a very pretty child to be sure he was. We cannot tell how long the embrace lasted. Everything in nature has been measured but love embraces. Writers are chary on the subject; and very knowingly, too, because they know that it is what is called “a kittle point;” but we have no such qualms, and so boldly assert, that Mr and Mrs M’Iver’s embrace lasted at least three minutes.
This new apparition transcended all they had yet seen or experienced; for how she could have lain three days and nights in the cold earth, and risen on the fourth as drunk as she was when she was interred, puzzled them beyond any conjuration they had ever heard of. But Gustavus was glad to see her on any condition, and took her straight home, to get an account from her, when she was sober of all the wonders she had seen in the bowels of the earth; where, in the midst of Hop and Mop, Pip and Trip, Fib and Tib, and Jill and Jin, and all the other imps of Mab’s court, she had doubtless been since the day on which she was let down into the pit. Whether he or the women ever got this information or not, we cannot say; but it is certain that he attempted no further cure of Julia’s irregular habits, contenting himself with the evil lot of a bad wife, which is, perhaps, the only one on earth that it is utterly impossible to get quit of by any other means than death.