There was a robbery at Uriah Sparey’s. Money and other articles were missed from the packages of the guests. The suspicion fell on a servant girl. Great was the stir, the inquiry, and the indignation. Mrs. Uriah Sparey was vehement in her wrath. She insisted that the affair should not be talked of lest it should bring discredit on her house; but to satisfy her guests, she would turn the girl out of it that instant. The girl with tears protested her innocence, but in vain. When she came to open her own box, she declared that she was robbed too. Her wages, and the money given her by visiters, were all gone. Mrs. Sparey exclaimed, that “never did she see such an instance of guilty art as this! The girl to remove from herself the charge of theft, to pretend that she herself was robbed!”
If the girl was guilty, she most admirably affected innocence; if she was of a thievish nature, never did nature so defend vice under the fair shield of virtuous lineaments. All saw and felt this; all had been much pleased with the appearance and behaviour of the girl. Her vows of innocence were now most natural; her tears fell with all the hot vehemence of wronged truth; she earnestly implored that every search and every inquiry should be made, that she might at least regain her character; her money she cared little for. But Mrs. Uriah Sparey only exclaimed, “Minx! get out of my house! I see what you want; you want to fix the theft upon me!” All started at that singular exclamation, and fixed their eyes on Mrs. Sparey; she coloured; but no one spoke. The girl stood weeping by the door. Then said John Earn, “Go home, my girl, go home, and let thy father and mother see into the matter for thee.” At these words, the girl, whose tears were before flowing fast but freely, burst into a sudden paroxysm of sobs and cries, and wrung her hands in agony. “What is the matter?” asked John Farn; “has the poor girl no parents?” “Yes, yes!” she exclaimed, suddenly looking at him, and the tears stopping as if choked in their bed; “but how can I go to them with the name of a thief?” The colour passed from her face, and she laid hold on a chair to save herself from falling. “Mary!” said John Farn, “I will not say who is the thief; but this I say, I will hire thee for a year and a day, and there is a guinea for earnest, and another to pay thy coach fare down. Be at my house in a fortnight, and till then go and see thy mother. Let them call thee thief that dare!” With that he rose up, gave Mary his address, paid his bill to Mrs. Sparey, and marched out of the house with his little round portmanteau under his arm. We all hurried out after him, gave him by turns a hearty rattling shake of the hand as he was about to mount his horse; and that was the last I saw of John Farn. I know no more of him, yet would I, at a venture, rather take the heart of that man, though compelled to take the long drab coat and the jack-boots with it, than that of many a lord with his robes of state, and all his lands and tenements besides.
Such were a few days and their real incidents passed by me at a Rural Watering-place some years ago.
CHAPTER XI.
SPORTS AND PASTIMES OF THE PEOPLE. HISTORY OF THEIR CHANGES, AND PRESENT STATE.
A mighty revolution has taken place in the sports and pastimes of the common people. They, indeed, furnish a certain indication of the real character of a people, and change with the changing spirit of a state. A mighty revolution has taken place in this respect, within the last thirty years, in England, and that entirely produced by the change of feeling, and advance of character. But if we look back through the whole course of English history, we shall find the sports and pastimes of the people taking their form and character from the predominant spirit of the age; in a great measure copied from the amusements and practices of their superiors, and always influenced by them. While the feudal constitution of society prevailed, and chivalry was in vogue, the sports of the common people had a certain chivalric character. They saw jousts and tourneys and feats of archery, and they jousted and tilted, and shot at butts. Tilting at the quintain was, in all the chivalric ages, a popular game. It was a Roman pastime, instituted for military practice, and continued for the same object by the feudal nations; and was adopted by the common people as a favourite game, because both the laws of chivalry and their slender finances prevented them taking part in jousts and tourneys. In Strutt may be found descriptions and quaint illustrative engravings of the various kinds of this game. “The Quintain,” says Strutt, quoting from Vegetius, de re militari, Menestrier and others, “originally, was nothing more than the trunk of a tree, or post set up for the practice of the tyroes in chivalry. Afterwards a staff or spear was fixed in the earth, and a shield being hung upon it, was the mark to strike at; the dexterity of the performance consisted in striking the shield in such a manner as to break the ligatures and bear it to the ground. In process of time this diversion was improved, and instead of the staff and the shield, the resemblance of a human figure, carved in wood, was introduced. To render the appearance of this figure more formidable, it was generally made in the likeness of a Turk, or a Saracen, armed at all points, having a shield upon his left arm, and brandishing a club or a sabre in his right. Hence this exercise was called by the Italians—‘running at the armed man, or at the Saracen.’ The quintain thus fashioned, was placed upon a pivot, and so contrived as to move round with facility. In running at this figure, it was necessary for the tilter to direct his lance with great adroitness, and make his stroke upon the forehead, between the eyes, or upon the nose; for if he struck wide of those parts, especially upon the shield, the quintain turned about with much velocity, and in case he was not exceedingly careful, would give him a severe blow upon the back with the wooden sabre held in the right hand, which was considered as highly disgraceful to the performer, while it excited the laughter and ridicule of the spectators. When many were engaged in running at the Saracen, the conqueror was declared from the number of strokes he had made, and the value of them. For instance, if he struck the image upon the top of the nose between the eyes, it was reckoned for three; if below the eyes upon the nose, for two; if under the nose to the point of the chin, for one; all other strokes were not counted: but, whoever struck upon the shield, and turned the quintain round, was not permitted to run again upon the same day, but forfeited his courses as a punishment for his unskilfulness.” Brande, in his Popular Antiquities, tells us that the Saracen was often armed with a bag of sand instead of a sabre, which came upon the back of the unlucky tilter with such violence as to fling him to the earth with no enviable shock. Various were the quintains, according to the age in which they were used, or the means of the players. In some cases the quintain was merely a common stake with a board fastened to it; in others, it was a post with a cross-bar moving on a pivot, something like a turnstile, with the sand-bag at one end of the bar, and the board, or shield, at the other. In others, it was a water-butt set upon a post, so as to throw its contents over the tilter if he struck it unskilfully. In others, it was a living person holding a shield. There was also the water-quintain. “A pole or a mast,” says Fitzstephen, “is fixed in the midst of the Thames, during the Easter holidays, with a strong shield attached to it; and a boat being previously placed at some distance, is driven swiftly towards it by the force of oars, and the violence of the tide, having a young man standing at the prow, who holds a lance in his hand, with which he is to strike the shield; and if he be dexterous enough to break the lance against it, and retain his place, his most sanguine wishes are satisfied. On the contrary, if the lance be not broken, he is sure to be thrown into the water, and the vessel goes away without him; but, at the same time, two other boats are stationed near to the shield, and furnished with many young persons, who are in readiness to rescue the champion from danger.” It appears to have been a very popular pastime, for the bridge, the wharfs, and the houses near the river, were crowded with people on this occasion, who came, says the author, to see the sports, and make themselves merry.
Running at the quintain continued to be a favourite game till Queen Elizabeth’s time; and was universal throughout the country. Plott, in his History of Oxfordshire, mentions it, and Laneham describes a curious instance of it exhibited at Kenilworth during the entertainment given by the Earl of Leicester to Queen Elizabeth. “There was,” he says, “a solemn country bridal; when in the castle was set up a quintain for feats of arms, where, in a great company of men and lasses, the bridegroom had the first course at the quintain, and broke his spear très hardiment. But his mare in his manage did a little stumble, that much-adoe had his manhood to sit in his saddle. But after the bridegroom had made his course, rose the rest of the band, awhile in some order; but soon after tag and rag, cut and long tail; where the specialty of the sport was to see how some for his slackness had a good bob with the bag, and some for his haste to topple downright, and come tumbling to the post. Some striving so much at the first setting out that it seemed a question between man and beast whether the race should be performed on horseback or on foot; and some put forth with spurs, would run his race byas, among the thickness of the throng, that down they came together, hand over head. Another, while he directed his course to the quintain, his judgment would carry him to a man among the people; another would run and miss the quintain with his staff, and hit the board with his hand.”
Boys imitated this game on their own scale, drawing one another on wooden horses to the quintain, or running at it on foot; and various other rustic exercises were derived from it. Of archery we need not speak, every one knowing how universal it was during the feudal ages; and quarter-staff, quoits, flinging the hammer, pitching the bar, and similar games were the offspring of the same state of society. Playing at ball and at bowls were very ancient and kingly sports, and became general amongst the people. They were ancient classical games, and no doubt were introduced by the Romans into this country. They are mentioned both in the oldest metrical romances, and the oldest of our popular ballads. Tennis courts were common in England in the sixteenth century, and the establishment of such places countenanced by the monarchs. Henry VIII. was a tennis player. Fives courts, and places for the practice of a variety of ball-games,—hand-ball, balloon-ball, stool-ball, principally played at by women; hurling, foot-ball, golf, bandy, stow-ball, pall-mall, club-ball, trap-ball, tip-ball, and that which is now become the prince of English ball-games, cricket.
Another circumstance in the feudal ages, which contributed to promote these and other games, was, that towns were few. The majority of the common people, living in the country; in forests and fields; watching the game, or cultivating the lands, or tending the herds and flocks of their lords, on open downs and wastes, naturally congregated with greater zest in villages after the day’s tasks were over, and entered into amusements with the lightheartedness of children; for they were as ignorant of all other cares, of book-learning, and what was going on in the world at a distance, as children. Hence their social pleasures were of an Arcadian stamp—they danced, they leaped, they wrestled, they kicked the foot-ball, or flung the hand-ball, the quoit, or the bar.