There was a great running from all parts of the village to see this monument of the tender mercies of Sir Roger Rockville, and many were the inverted blessings showered on his head. Very soon, however, the keeper came in hot haste to reclaim his trap, and Mr. Degge immediately apprehended him by warrant, and committed him to the house of correction and hard labour for six months.
The sensation with which the news of this event was received by Sir Roger, and amongst his confreres of the woods and the bench, it would be impossible to describe. The audacity of Simon Degge had reached a pitch which surpassed all their bounds of conception. Why, he was daring to treat them as they had treated the humble villagers for centuries. At first there was a great talk of Mr. Degge having committed a robbery, of having carried off Sir Roger’s property from his own ground. But soon his cautious clerk advised him that Mr. Degge, as a magistrate, could seize an unlawful instrument anywhere. The man-trap was accordingly secured to the public stocks by strong rivets, and there it remained for many years. Whilst the event was fresh, many gentlemen and ladies drove or rode to Hillmartin to have a look at this relic of ancient savagery. On the Sunday following, hundreds of the working people, men, women, and children, flocked thither to see it, and as they returned by Rockville Hall gave very hearty groans for Sir Roger.
There was a mighty consulting amongst this little group of the worst kind of country squires; and it was resolved to sign unanimously, of course, short of Mr. Degge and Sir Emanuel Clavering, an order for the release of the keeper—but the cautious clerk of the bench again advised against this. He represented that the man was legally committed for a legal offence, and such was the spirit of Mr. Degge, who was also now Mayor of Castleborough, that he would compel them by mandamus to show cause for such release, and this would make the affair still more widely commented upon. As it was, the liberal newspapers far and wide had published the account, and made most cutting criticisms upon it. They even called for the seizure of Sir Roger by warrant, and his committal to the treadmill. Nothing for a long time had excited such a paroxysm of public indignation.
The breach betwixt the Rockville, Bullockshed and Tenterhook class and that of Woodburn, Hillmartin and Cotmanhaye was enormously widened. Simon Degge, Mayor of Castleborough, and county magistrate of Hillmartin, was regarded as a pestilent demagogue of the first rank: and all those who fraternized with him, as the Claverings, Woodburns, Heritages, and indeed many of the more enlightened county families, and the whole of the Castleborough population, were looked on as a crooked generation, hostile to all the ancient institutions of the country. In woods and kennels, and in several country halls, Simon Degge and his friends were cursed before all the gods of the game-laws; in town and village everywhere Simon Degge was the hero of the people. All looked to him as their friend and powerful protector. “One of ourselves,” they said, “he does not desert us, he remains one of ourselves.” Whoever saw him, saw a man as little like a restless mischievous demagogue as it was possible to conceive. For a great part of the day he was in town, partly attending to his own mercantile affairs, partly to the affairs of his office. When he got to Hillmartin, he might be seen riding quietly over his farm, or at home happy and gay as possible amidst three or four children, now enlivening his house: or he was taking a quiet drive with his mother and wife, as if he had no care on him, and no desire in him to do battle with any one. Of the feeling abroad amongst the Nimrod class and their followers, a circumstance soon occurred to make him more deeply sensible.
On a fine summer evening, George and Letty Woodburn had ridden to Hillmartin, and Simon Degge had mounted his horse and accompanied them a few miles further on the road beyond Gotham. Letty was mounted on a handsome light bay mare, which had been newly purchased for her. She was delighted with it, and praised the easy paces of the creature.
“She is very handsome,” said Simon Degge, “but there is occasionally a rather vicious look in her eye that I don’t like. I would advise you to ride her with a martingale, and a curb-bit rather than with that snaffle.”
“Do you think so?” said Letty, “she is very fresh, certainly, but I think quite gentle and amiable,” and she patted her on the neck.
“She does sometimes cast side-glances with her eyes,” said George, “that are a little suspicious, and she is rather hard-mouthed. I shall adopt your advice, Mr. Degge, as safest.”
At this moment Letty found it rather hard work to hold her in. She had a short, dancing, impatient action, and seemed to long to be off at a smart rate. All at once there was a blow on the high hawthorn hedge on the left hand of the road, and off went the mare. She took the bit between her teeth, stretched out her neck as straight as a dart, laid back her ears, and away! George and Mr. Degge endeavoured to spring on before her and seize her by the bridle-rein, but this only set her off more impetuously than before. In vain Letty pulled her in with all her power, and endeavoured to pluck, by a sudden jerk, the bit out of her teeth. She held it as fast as if in a vice, and went off, spite of her efforts, at a furious rate. George and Mr. Degge were in the utmost alarm. Any attempt to pursue her only made the frantic animal dash on more madly. One thing appeared in Letty’s favour; there was a long, ascending, though not very steep hill, and her friends trusted that the mare would wind herself before she got to the top, and so allow herself to be pulled in. George, without daring to gallop after her at full speed, yet kept on at a smart pace, taking the grassy borders of the road, so as not to let the flying animal hear him more than he could help. Mr. Degge, who stopped a moment to look over a gate into the field, to see whence the alarm had come, was now galloping rapidly after. Letty kept her seat like a capital horsewoman as she was; and George felt confident that unless something caused the mare to start aside or to fall, she would go on safely home with her. But there might be people coming who might attempt to stop the mare, and cause her to swerve suddenly aside, or she might dash madly against one of the two turnpike gates and kill both herself and rider. The speed at which she flew on was frightful. God’s providence could alone prevent some fatal disaster. In one place there was a broken spot in the middle of the road, over which she sprang with a tremendous leap, but Letty sate securely, and away! away! they went like the wind: the two gentlemen in breathless terror following as near as they dare approach.
Anon, the flying maniac steed came to a steep and considerable descent. “If Letty keeps her seat there,” said or rather thought George, “it will all be well.” He gazed with fixed eyes and suspended breath as he himself sped along, expecting to see his sister lose in that rapid, shaking descent, her equilibrium, and perhaps fly over the horse’s head, but no,—unmoved, undaunted, as it would appear by her steady figure and attitude, on she flew, a cloud of dust coming driving thickly behind her.