CHAPTER XXVIII

PIGG’S POEMS

AN ye let us lie i’ yere barn, please, canny man?” inquired Pigg of a farmer, at whose door he knocked a long time on the night of this memorable run, before he got him to answer. “Ar’s drippin’ wet, huss is tired, and hunds can’t travel.”

“Who are ye?” inquired the farmer, unused to visitors at any time, more particularly after nightfall.

“Ar’s Pigg, Squire Jorrocks’s huntsman,” replied James; “we’ve had a desperate run, and canna get hyem te neet.”

“S-o-o-o!” replied the farmer in astonishment. “Here, Mary!” halloaing to his wife; “fetch a light, here be the hounds. And hev ye killed him?” inquired the farmer, looking closer at his visitor.

“Aye, killed him, aye. Ar’s gettin’ his head i’ my pocket—if ye can put your hand in you may get it—ar’s see numb ar can de nout.”

“Sure-lie he’s a big un!” exclaimed the farmer, pulling out the head, and weighing it by the ears; “Well, I think!—but come, let’s get ye put up—it’s a tarrible night; not one for standin’ out at doors. Here! fetch the lantern, Jane, and help me to put the beast away, so as to make room for the gen’leman’s horse;” adding to Pigg, “you are surely very wet.”

Pigg.—“Wet, aye! wet as muck. Ar wish ar may ha’ getten all my hunds away though. If ye can let us have some clean stree i’ the barn, wor ard maister ’ll pay ye liberal for ’t i’ the mornin’—he’s quite the gent.”

“A! never mind about the pay, we will do what we can for you,” replied the farmer. So saying, he led the way with the lantern, and the jaded horse and tired hounds followed on with Pigg.

The farmer’s lads took the horse, while Pigg looked over his hounds, and finding only a couple and a half wanting, he shook them down plenty of straw, and returned to the house to see what he could get to feed them on. A tub full of milk, with brown loaves sliced into it, was quickly prepared, but there was little demand for it, the majority of the hounds seeming to prefer a continuance of the rest into which they were quietly subsiding to being disturbed for a meal. At length they had all been coaxed to the pail, and after a hearty shake each nestled into his neighbour, and the pack were soon in a very small compass.

Having seen his horse done up also, Pigg began to turn his attention to himself.

“Sink, but it’s wet,” said he, giving his cap a dash towards the floor, which sent a shower bath on to the flags; “however, ar’s lucky in gettin’ housed at all; for ar really thou’ht ar’d ha’ had to lie out like them poor divils at Chobham;” saying which he followed the farmer into an apartment, in which sat his wife and daughters, round a fire composed of a little coal and a good deal of rubbish-wood.

“Ar think ar’ll gan into the kitchen,” observed Pigg, looking at the fire.

“This be the kitchen,” replied the farmer’s wife, setting him a chair by the fire, thinking he was shy.

Pigg sat down, and after contemplating the fire a few seconds, he exclaimed, “Ods wons! but ye keep varry bad fires i’ this country.”

“Nay, man,” replied Mr. Butterfield, his host, “we call that a varra good one.”

“Ar doesn’t ken what a bad un ’ll be like, then,” rejoined James.

“Well,” said Butterfield, throwing on another faggot, “you are welcome to it, such as it is. What will you have to eat?”

“Ought ye can give me,” said Pigg; “a rasher o’ bacon, collops and eggs, or ought,” casting his eye up at the flitches and hams hanging from the ceiling, adding, “ar’s mortal hungry.”

While the rashers of bacon were frying, Butterfield made Pigg exchange his wet coat, waistcoat, and shirt, for dry clothes of his own and adding a cold pork-pie and a flagon of ale to the hot bacon, Pigg was very soon in his glory. Having at length cleared the decks, he again turned to the fire, which, eyeing for some time with critical amazement, he at length exclaimed, with a laugh, “Sink, if mar coosin Deavilboger see’d sick a fire i’ his kitchen, ar wonder what he’d say!”

“You’ll keep good fires in your country, then, I presume?” inquired Mrs. Butterfield.

“Aye, fires, aye!” exclaimed Pigg; “nebody kens what a fire is but them as has been i’ wor country.”

“Whereabouts is it?” inquired Butterfield, puzzled with his dialect.

Pigg.—“A canny Newcassel, where all the coals come frae. You’ve niver been there, ar’s warn’d, or you’d have heard tell o’ mar coosin Deavilboger—farms a hundred and nine acres of land aside Kenton. Sink it, frae his loupin on stane ar’s seen all the country side flaring wi’ pit loues. Mar coosin’s kitchen fire niver gans out frae Kirsmas to Kirsmas. A! it is a bonny country! By my soule, ar’s niver been reetly warmed sin ar left the North.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Mrs. Butterfield, in astonishment; “your cousin must spend a fortin i’ firin’.”

“Deil a bit—coals cost nout—if they did, folks wad warm theirsels at the pit heaps. Iv’ry poor man has his shed full o’ coals; great blazin’ fires to come hyem te at night, a nice singin’ hinnies, all ready for slicin’ and butterin’, swingin’ o’ the girdle—but ye dinna ken what a girdle is i’ this country, ar’s warn’d.”

“No,” replied Mrs. Butterfield; “we don’t.”

“Why, ye see,” said James, “it’s a great round, flat iron broad like, may be, three times as big as your hat-crown, with a hoop over the top to hank it on tiv a crook i’ the chimley; and then the missis makes a thing like a spice loaf, which she rolls out flat with a rollin’-pin, till it’s the size o’ the girdle, and about as thick as yeer finger, and then she bakes it on the girdle, and splets it up, and butters it see that the grease runs right down your gob as ye eat it.”

“Nay, then!” exclaimed Mrs. Butterfield, “but that will only be for gentle folk?”

Pigg.—“Iv’ry man i’ the country has a singin’ hinnie of a Saturday night, and many of a Sunday, tee. There wasn’t a man on mar coosin Deavilboger’s farm but has his fifteen and sixteen shillin’ a-week, and some up to twenty.”

“Wonderful!” exclaimed Mr. Butterfield, who only paid his eight. “It must be a grand country to live in.”

“A, it’s a grand country!” repeated Pigg. “Ar’s sure ar’s never been rightly warm sin’ I left it. What they call a fire i’ the South, is nabbut what we wad tak to light one on with i’ the North;” rubbing his wet cords as he spoke. “A, it’s a bonny country!—bonny Shiney Raws all about the pits. Ivery man with his pig and his gairden; sweetbriar i’ the middle, and poseys round about.”

“You must have a drop of gin, and see if that will warm you,” rejoined Mr. Butterfield, unlocking a cupboard as he spoke. “Here, Mary, get some glasses, and put the kettle on, and let us have a cheerer to the gentleman’s health. It’s not every night that brings us a visitor.”

A large black bottle of Hollands, labelled “Eye Water,” part of a contraband cargo, was fearlessly placed on the table. More wood and coal were added to the fire; the wood crackled merrily up the chimney, shedding a cheerful blaze over the family group circled about. One seat of honour was ceded to Pigg, the other was occupied by Mrs. Butterfield, while her two daughters came in between her and their father, who sat in the centre, and the servant lads kept a little in the rear of their master on the left. The servant girl bustled about in the background.

“Help yourself, now,” said Mr. Butterfield, passing the bottle and tumbler to Pigg, having poured himself and his wife each out a glass. “Don’t be afraid of it; you’re heartily welcome, and there’s more in the cupboard when you’ve finished that. Here’s your good health! I’m fond of fox-hunters.”

“Thank ye,” replied Pigg, filling his glass half full of gin, and topping it with hot water. “Ar wish the country was made o’ sich chaps as ye; we shouldn’t hear se much ‘war wheat’ then, ar’s warn’d ye.”

Mr. Butterfield did not catch the latter part of the sentence, or he would have read him a lecture on riding over wheat.

A second half tumbler succeeded the first, and Pigg waxed uncommonly jovial; his eyes twinkled, and his tongue ran riot with all manner of stories, chiefly about hunting, the importance of his cousin Deavilboger, and the magnificence of the town of Newcassel. “Mr. Jorrocks was nothing but a good un. If it wasn’t for him, he’d never stop i’ the South.” At the third half tumbler, Deavilboger’s farm had grown into nine hundred acres, and Newcassel was bigger than London.

“God sink ar’ll sing ye a sang,” said he, turning the quid in his mouth. “A! one o’ the bonniest sangs that iver was sung—all about a dog o’ wor toon, and when ar stamps wi’ my foot, ye mun all join chorus. Now ar’ll begin:—

“Now, that last’s chorus,” observed Pigg, wiping the tobacco stream from his mouth with his sleeve.

Hereupon Pigg gave a mighty stamp, and the company joined in with—

Great applause followed, producing another song, “The Keel Row,” after which came another stiff tumbler of gin and water—then another song, or parts of a song rather—for the vocalist was fast becoming hors de combat;—his face turned green—his eye gradually glazed, and at length his chin sunk on his breast; but for the fortunate circumstance of the farmer’s boy being on the look-out, his tumbler would have dropped to the ground. They then carried Mr. Pigg off to bed, but not being able to get off his boots, they happed him up as he was.

The next morning when Farmer Butterfield came down-stairs, he found Pigg on his over-night seat, with his legs cocked over the back of a chair, with one of his boys blacking his boots. He had neither cold nor headache, and eat as much breakfast as if he had had no supper. His coat was dry, his waistcoat was dry, he was all dry together; the sun shone brightly, the lost hounds had cast up, and taken shelter in an out-house, his horse was freshish, and the pack poured out of the barn bright and glossy in their coats, though somewhat stiff in their limbs.

“If evir ye come to Handley Cross, wor and maister will be glad to thank ye and pay ye,” said Pigg, grasping the farmer’s hand as he mounted, “and if evir ye gan to canny Newcassel, cast your eye o’er mar coosin Deavilboger’s farm—A! what tormots he has! Aye, and see his grand pedigree bull—A! what a bull he has!”

“You’re heartily welcome,” replied Farmer Butterfield, shaking Pigg by the hand, “and whenever you pass this way, give us a look in, there’ll always be a drop of eye-water in the bottle; stay, let’s open the gate for you;” running to the fold-yard, from which Pigg emerged with the glad pack at his horse’s heels.

Mrs. Butterfield, her daughters and servants, were clustered at the door, to whom Pigg again returned thanks, and touching his cap, trotted down the lane on to the road, the brightness of the morning contrasting with the dark wildness of the hour in which he arrived. What a different place he had got to, to what he thought! On Pigg jogged, now coaxing a weakly hound, now talking to his horse, and now striking up the chorus of—

“Cappy’s the dog, Talliho! Talliho!”

“Your master’s just gone through,” said Anthony Smith at the Barrow Hill Gate.

“Mar maister,” replied Pigg, “what, Squire Jorrocks?”

“Yeas,” said the man, “he was axing if I could tell him what become of his hounds yesterday.”

“Indeed,” replied Pigg, “give me fourpence and a ticket.”

On Pigg trotted as well as he could with a pack of hounds without a whipper-in, and catching a view of Mr. Jorrocks’s broad red back rounding a bend in the road, he gave a puff of his horn that acted like magic.

Mr. Jorrocks stopped as though he was shot.

Turning short back, he espied his huntsman and the hounds, and great was the joy and exultation at meeting.

“Killed him, did you say?” exclaimed Mr. Jorrocks, in ecstasies, “vere’s his brush?”

“A, sink ’em, they’d spoil’d it,” replied Pigg, “afore iver I gat te them—but ar’s getten his head i’ my pocket!”

“Fatch it out!” exclaimed Mr. Jorrocks, “vy, man, you should ride with it at your ’osses’ side. Have you never a couple loup to your saddle?—run a bit of vipcord through his snout, and let the world see the wonders we’ve done—you’ve no proper pride about you! There now,” continued he, having adjusted the head at Pigg’s saddle side, “let the world see it—don’t let your coat-lap hang over it.”

Thus Mr. Jorrocks and Pigg proceeded at a foot’s pace, relating their mutual adventures. Before they had got to the end of their stories, who but Charles should pop upon them from a bye-road, and the three having got together again, they entered Handley Cross in triumphant procession, as though they had never parted. Rumours of the run had been rife all the morning, but in what direction it had been nobody could tell. The stables and kennel were besieged by inquirers, and Mr. Fribbleton, the man-milliner, who edited the “Paul Pry,” having been granted an audience, managed from Mr. Jorrocks’s account to manufacture the following article for the second edition of his paper. It was headed—

“Brilliant Run with Mr. Jorrocks’s Hounds!” and proceeded—

“As this unrivalled pack were taking their daily exercise on the Summerton Road, accompanied by the huntsman, their worthy master, and his friend Mr. James Stobbs, a large dog-fox suddenly crossed before them, with which the pack went away in gallant style, despite all efforts to stop them, as they were advertised to meet at the ‘Round of Beef and Carrots’ to-morrow. The place the fox so suddenly popped upon them was just at the four-mile-stone, near the junction on the Appledove Road, and as there were some coursers on Arthington open fields, it is conjectured bold Reynard, having been suddenly disturbed by the long dogs, had come upon the hounds in a somewhat ruffled state of mind, without dreaming of his danger. However, he was quickly convinced that there was some, by the cry of his redoubtable pursuers, and the shortness of his start caused him to put his best leg foremost; and setting his head for Wollaton Plantations, he went straight as an arrow towards them, passing near the main earths on Thoresby Moor and going through the low end of the plantations, where they run out into a belt.

“Here he was chased by a woodman’s dog, and the hounds came to a momentary check; but Mr. Jorrocks, being well up, made a scientific cast forward, and getting upon grass, they hit off the scent at a meuse, and went at a racing pace down to Crowland, through Lady Cross Park, leaving Bilson a little on the right, and so on to Langford Plantations, from thence by King’s Gate to Hookem-Snivey, and on by Staunton-Snivey to the Downs, crossing at Depedean, leaving the Windmill to the right, and the Smugglers’ Cave on the left. Night and a hurricane now came on; but, despite all impediments, this truly gallant pack realized their fox at the foot of Gunston Crags. A few more minutes would have thrown the mantle of protection over the varmint, for the crags are strongholds, from whence foxes are seldom or ever dislodged. It was the biggest Reynard that ever was seen, and the tag of his tail was uncommonly large.

“The distance gone over could not have been less than five-and-twenty miles; and altogether it was the very finest run ever encountered in the annals of fox-hunting. Mr. Jorrocks went like a bird, and earned a title to a niche among the crack riders of England.

“The hounds lay out all night, but have arrived at Handley Cross in very fair order; and we trust this run is a prelude to a long career of brilliant sport that we shall have the good fortune to record under the auspices of their most sporting master, and his equally renowned and energetic Scotch huntsman—Charles Pigg.”

Mr. Jorrocks wrote the following letter to Bill Bowker:—

“Dear Bowker,

“Your’s to hand, and note the contents. We’ve had a buster! Three hours without a check and a kill! Should have been ’appy to have sent old ‘Nunquam Dormio’¹ an account, but it was a bye on the sly, and no one being out, there are no names to bring in. It’s soapin’ chaps cleverly wot makes a run read. Howsomever, I hopes to have lots of clippers for him to record before long. Not that I cares about fame, but it’s well to let the ’ounds have the credit of what they do. You say Dormio will spice the articles up with learning and Latin. Latin be ’anged!—Greek too, if there’s any grown now-a-days. Now for the run.

“It’s an old sayin’, and a true ’un, that a bad beginnin’ often makes a good endin’. We lost Binjamin at startin’; the little beggar was caught in the spikes of a po-chay, and carried a stage out of town—teach him to walk up street for futur’. Howsomever, off we set without him, and a tremendious run was the result. I send you the “Pry,” and you can judge for yourself; the first part, about the find, must be taken cum grano salis, with a leetle Quieanne pepper, as Pomponius Ego would say. We meant to have a private rehearsal as it were, and got a five-act comedy instead of a three. Indeed, it were like to have been a tragedy.

“Somehow or other I got to the Earl of Bramber’s, where there was a great spread, and I had a good blowout, and a solemnish drink. Either I walked in my sleep and fell into a pond or some one pitched me into one, and I was as near drowned as a toucher. Howsomever, I got out, and werry attentive people were to me, givin’ me brandy, and whiskey, and negus, and all sorts of things. I slept pretty well after it, nevertheless; but when I awoke to get up. I seemed to be in quite a different room—no bell, no lookin’-glass, no wash-hand, no towels, no nothin’, but my ’unting clothes were laid nice and orderly. I dressed, and found my way to the breakfast-room, when sich a roar of laughter greeted my entrance! Still, they were all werry purlite; but I observed, whenever a servant came in he nearly split his sides with laughin’. Well, jist as I was goin’ away, I caught a sight of myself in a glass, and, oh, crikey! my face was painted broad red and yellow stripes, zebra-fashion! I couldn’t be angry, for it was so werry well done; but it certainly was werry disrespectful to an M.F.H. Have no great fancy for lords—werry apt to make first a towel, and then a dish-clout on one. But enough of that.

“I hope the Slender has not been silly enough to shoot an excise-man; they are clearly not game. It will be haukward for them both if he has: of course he has too many legal friends not to get the best advice. I’m sorry to hear about Susan’s legs—they were a pair of uncommon neat ones, certainlie; all the symmetry of Westris’s without the smallness. I don’t think blisterin’ would do them any good; rest—rest—with occasional friction: hand-rubbin’, in fact, is the best thing.

“Charley’s quite well, and slept last night at a lunatic’s, a poor chap wot went mad about ’unting. You needn’t send him none of your nasty ’baccy down here, for I don’t stand smokin’. As you say, Snarle’s business has fallen off, you’ll have fewer common forms to copy, and more time for letter-writing. Tip us a stave when you’ve nothin’ to do, and believe me yours to serve,

“John Jorrocks.

“P.S. 1.—I enclose you 5l. for the Slender. Tell him to buy a good hard-mouthed counsel with it. I fear Billy’s only a lusus naturæ, or ‘loose ’un by natur’,’ as Pomponius would say. J. J.

“P.S. 2.—Tell Fortnum and Mason to send me a dozen pots of marmeylad; also Gilbertson to send me three quartern loaves—two brown and a wite—every other day. Can’t get sich bread as his ’ere, and neither Alum nor Branfoote subscribe a dump to the ’ounds, so it’s no use puzzonin’ oneself on their account. Also see Painter, and tell him if his turtle’s first chop, to send me six quarts, with a suitable quantity of punch. J. J.”

¹An eye, with “nunquam dormio” round, is the crest and motto of Bell’s Life.