You may remember the time I met with a very nice fellow (then Chowne’s head-groom), who gave me a capital supper of tripe elegantly stewed by a young cook-maid, himself lamenting the stress (laid upon him by circumstances) not to make his wife of her. He told me then with a sigh of affection between his knife and fork, that social duties compelled him instead to marry a publican’s daughter, with fifty pounds down on the nail, he believed, if it was a penny. Nevertheless he felt confident that all would be ordered aright in the end. Now Providence had not allowed such a case of faith to pass unrewarded. He married the publican’s daughter, got her money, and paid the last sad duties to her, out of the pocket of his father-in-law, in a Christian-minded manner. And then back he came to Nympton Rectory, and wedded that same cook-maid, who now was turning our ham so cleverly with the egg-slice. Thus we could speak before them both, without the least constraint; and indeed he helped us much by his knowledge of the affairs of the family. Also two Justices of the Peace, who had signed the warrant for poor Chowne’s end, upon the report of the doctors, but could find no one of strength and courage to carry it out, except Parson Jack; these sat with us to get their supper, before the long cold ride over the moors. And there sat Parson Jack himself, with his thick hands trembling, hopeless of eating a morsel, but dreading to be left alone for a moment.
“What a difference it will make in all this neighbourhood, to be sure!” So said one of their worships.
“Ay, that it will,” answered his brother magistrate. “Since Tom Faggus died, there has not been such a man to be found, nowhere round these here parts.”
“No, nor Tom Faggus himself,” said the other: “a noble highwayman he were; but for mind, not fit to hold a candle to our lamented friend now lying up there in the counterpane.”
Parson Jack shuddered, and shook his great limbs, and feigned to have done so on purpose; and then in defiance collected himself, and laid his iron hand on the table, watching every great muscle, to see how long he could keep it from trembling. Then I arose and grasped his hand—for nobody else understood him at all—and he let me take it with reluctance, wonder, and then deep gratitude. He had been saying to himself—as I knew, though his lips never moved; and his face was set, in scorn of all our moralising—within himself he had been thinking, “I am Jack Ketch; I am worse; I am Cain. I have murdered my own dear brother.”
And I, who had seen him brand his bitten arm with the red hot poker, laying the glowing iron on, until the blood hissed out at it, I alone could gage the strength of heart that now enabled him to answer my grasp with his poor scorched arm, and to show his great tears, and check them.
Enough of this, I cannot stand these melancholy subjects. A man of irreproachable life, with a tendency towards gaiety, never must allow his feelings to play ducks and drakes with him. If the justice of the Almighty fell upon Chowne—as I said it would—let Chowne die, and let us hope that his soul was not past praying for. It is not my place to be wretched, because the biggest villain I ever knew showed his wit by dying of a disease which gave him power to snap at the very devil, when in the fullness of time he should come thirsting to lay hold of him. And but for my purpose of proving how purely justice does come home to us, well contented would I be to say no more about him. Why had he been such a villain through life? Because he was an impostor. Why did he die of rabid madness, under the clutch of his own best friend? Because he lashed his favourite hound to fly at the throat of his own grandfather.
Not only does it confirm one’s faith in the honesty of breeding, but it enables me to acquit all the Chownes of Devonshire—and a fine and wholesome race they are—of ever having produced such a scamp, in true course of legitimacy; also enables me not to point out, so much as to leave all my readers to think of, the humble yet undeniable traces of old Davy’s sagacity.
What had I said to Mrs. Steelyard, when she overbore me so, upon an empty stomach? “Madam,” I said, “your son, you mean!” And it proved to be one of my famous hits, at a range beyond that of other men. When great stirs happen, truth comes out; as an earthquake starts the weasels.
Everybody knows what fine old age those wandering gypsies come to. The two most killing cares we have, are money, and reputation. Here behold gypsy wisdom! The disregard of the latter of the two does away with the plague of the former. They take what they want; while we clumsy fellows toil for the cash as the only way to get the good estimation. Hence it was that Chowne’s grandfather came about stealing as lively as ever, at the age of ninety. A wiry and leathery man he was, and had once been a famous conjurer. And now in his old age he came to sleep in his grandson’s barn, and to live on his grandson’s ducks, potatoes, and pigeons. This was
