An Old English Home and Its Dependencies

Drive away dull melancholy;
For to grieve it is a folly
When we meet together!'"

The quarryman covered his eyes with his hands – he was ashamed to look up.

"If that wasn't bad enough, the words that followed were worse – and I a teetotaler down to the soles of my feet.

"'Here's the bottle, as it passes
Do not fail to fill your glasses;
Water drinkers are dull asses
When they're met together.

"'Milk is meet for infancy,
Ladies like to sip Bohea;
Not such stuff for you and me
When we're met together.'

"All the while I sang it I knew I was saying good-bye to my consistency, I was going against my dearest convictions. But I couldn't help myself, it was as though an evil spirit possessed me. I was myself and yet not myself. It was terrible – terrible – terrible!"

The quarryman swung his pasty bag and smote his breast with it.

"That warn't all," he continued, and lowered his tone. "There was an uncommon pretty barmaid with red rosy cheeks and curling black hair; and somehow I got my arm round her waist and was kissing her. Well, I don't so much mind about that, for kissing is scriptural, and Paul calls them kisses of peace. But these were not kisses of peace by any means – and there was the mischief, for I knowed my wife was looking on, and, sir, I knowed the consequences would be orful – orful – simply orful."

The quarryman's head sank on his knees, he clasped his hands over the back of his head, and groaned for full five minutes. Presently he looked up, pulled himself together, and continued his narrative.

"The worst of all is behind. I was very busy on Monday, as I was on Mr. Conybeare's committee. We were in for the election, and I'm tremendous strong as a Liberal, and for Home Rule, and I reckon I can influence a good many votes in my district of Cornwall. Well, sir, I'd been about canvassing for Mr. Conybeare very hard, yet all the while I had a sort of deadly fear at my heart that what I'd been doing, both hunting and drinking, and swearing and singing, and kissing the barmaid, would come out in public, or would be thrown in my teeth by the Consarvatives, and might damage the good cause. But no one said nothing about it on Monday, and towards evening my mind was more at ease.

"I was very tired when I went to bed, for I had been working, as I said, very hard indeed, and persuading of obstinate politicians is worse than breaking stones for the road, and far worse than converting of obstinate sinners. No sooner had I laid my head on the pillow than – will you believe it, sir? – I was in the full swing of the election. I didn't know it was coming on so fast. I thought it would be three weeks, but not a bit of it. They'd set up a polling place in the Board School, and there was I swaggering up to register my vote. There were placards – Unionist on one side, but I wouldn't look at them; on the other were the Radical posters – from Mr. Conybeare – and I knowed my own mind. If any man in England be true and loyal to the G.O.M. that's me. Well, sir, in I walked and gave my name. I knowed my number, and went as confident as possible into the little box of unplaned deal boards, and with my paper in one hand took the pencil in the other, wetted the pencil with my tongue to make sure it marked black enough, and then set down my cross. Will you believe it? – that sperit o' pervarsity and devilry had come over me once more, and I'd gone and voted Consarvative."

The quarryman staggered back, and I had just time to spring to his aid. He had fainted. I held him in my arms till he came round. I threw water over his face, and by degrees he was himself again.

"Orful! orful! wasn't it?" said he. "Well, sir, after that I would have nothing more to do with them teeth. They did it. I chucked 'em away; toothache would be better all night long, than the trials I had to undergo when I had them dead man's teeth about me."

"But have you not dreamed since?" I asked, looking at the pasty which, when he fainted, I had taken in my hand.

"Yes, sir, often, very often; but then my dreams since have always been Nonconformist, Temperance, and Radical dreams – and them's wholesome."

"You said something about knowing who it was whose grave you had disturbed?"

"Well, so I believe I do. I did not know at the time, but afterwards, when I began to tell my story; then there was a talk about it and a raking and a grubbing among old folks' memories, and there was an old woman who said she could throw some light on the subject. Her tale was that about a hundred years ago, or more perhaps, she could not be sure, there lived at the Old Hall one Squire Trewenna. The Hall has been pulled down because of the mines, and the Trewennas are all gone. Squire Trewenna was a terrible man for hunting and drinking, and was, moreover, a regular rory tory Conservative. He was a fast chap, and no good to nobody but to dogs and horses, and before he died he begged that he might be buried on the brink of the moor where he'd ridden so often and enjoyed himself so much, and had killed a tremendous big fox in the last hunt he ever went out in before gout got to his stomick. And he said he wanted no headstone over him, that fox and hounds and horses might go over his grave. Well, folks forgot, as there was no headstone, where he lay, exact, and old Betty Tregellas says she believes what we cut into was Squire Trewenna's grave. I think so too, for how else was it that when I had those teeth about me I was so possessed wi' a spirit of unrighteousness and drinking and Consarvatism? I reckon you've had a Board School education and been to the University, and are a larned man. Tell me, now, am I not right?"

notes

1

In the illustration the place occupied by the old woman is beneath the heap on the right hand side.

2

Wren Hoskins, in Systems of Land Tenure in Various Countries, London, 1870, p. 100.

3

Dumont, "La dépopulation," in Revue de l'École d'Anthropologie, Jan., 1897.

4

Dasent, History of Brunt Nial, 1861, vol. i. p. xiv.

5

Ireland and the Celtic Church, London, 1892, p. 276.

6

Bilder aus London, Leipzig, 1834.

7

Balm, The New Eldorado, Boston, 1889, p. 199.

8

"If a proprietor encroaches on a neighbouring proprietor, he shall pay fifteen solidi… The boundary between two estates is formed by distinct landmarks, such as little mounds of stones… If a man oversteps this boundary, marca, and enters the property of another, he shall pay the above mentioned fine." Laws of the Ripuarian Franks, Sect. 60. So the ancient Bavarian Laws spoke of a man who took a slave over the borders, extra terminos hoc est extra marcam.(xiii. 9). See The Origin of Property in Land, by F. de Coulanges, London, 1891.