Having made this entry, he resumed—“And truly, as to this custom of the landlord attending the body of the peasant, I approve it, Caxon. It comes from ancient times, and was founded deep in the notions of mutual aid and dependence between the lord and cultivator of the soil. And herein I must say, the feudal system—(as also in its courtesy towards womankind, in which it exceeded)—herein, I say, the feudal usages mitigated and softened the sternness of classical times. No man, Caxon, ever heard of a Spartan attending the funeral of a Helot—yet I dare be sworn that John of the Girnel—ye have heard of him, Caxon?”
“Ay, ay, sir,” answered Caxon; “naebody can hae been lang in your honour’s company without hearing of that gentleman.”
“Well,” continued the Antiquary, “I would bet a trifle there was not a kolb kerl, or bondsman, or peasant, ascriptus glebae, died upon the monks’ territories down here, but John of the Girnel saw them fairly and decently interred.”
“Ay, but if it like your honour, they say he had mair to do wi’ the births than the burials. Ha! ha! ha!” with a gleeful chuckle.
“Good, Caxon, very good!—why, you shine this morning.”
“And besides,” added Caxon, slyly, encouraged by his patron’s approbation, “they say, too, that the Catholic priests in thae times gat something for ganging about to burials.”
“Right, Caxon! right as my glove! By the by, I fancy that phrase comes from the custom of pledging a glove as the signal of irrefragable faith— right, I say, as my glove, Caxon—but we of the Protestant ascendency have the more merit in doing that duty for nothing, which cost money in the reign of that empress of superstition, whom Spenser, Caxon, terms in his allegorical phrase,
—The daughter of that woman blind,
Abessa, daughter of Corecca slow—
But why talk I of these things to thee?—my poor Lovel has spoiled me, and taught me to speak aloud when it is much the same as speaking to myself. Where’s my nephew, Hector M’Intyre?”
“He’s in the parlour, sir, wi’ the leddies.”