"Forty year ago I did use to see her--she were then an old woman, wi'

white hair, and leaned on a stick--I never thought she'd a' lasted so long," replied Higgs, emptying his gla.s.s.

"She've had a pretty long spell on't," quoth d.i.c.kons, after slowly emptying his mouth of smoke.

"A hundred and two," replied the s.e.xton; "so saith her coffin-plate--a'

see'd it to-day."

"What were her name?" inquired Tonson--"_I_ never knew her by any name but Blind Bess."

"Her name be _Elizabeth Crabtree_ on the coffin," replied Higgs; "and she be to be buried to-morrow."

"She were a strange old woman," said Hazel, one of the farmers, as he took down one of the oatcakes hanging overhead; and breaking off a piece, held it with the tongs before the fire to toast, and then put it into his ale.

"Ay, she were," quoth Pumpkin; "I wonder what she thinks o' such things _now_--maybe--G.o.d forgive me!--she's paying dear for her tricks!"

"Tut, Pumpkin," said Tonson, "let t'ould creature rest in her grave, where she's going to, peaceably!"

"Ay, Master Tonson," quoth the clerk, in his reading-desk tw.a.n.g--"THERE _be no knowledge_, _nor wisdom_, _nor device_!"

"'Tis very odd," observed Pumpkin, "but this dog that's lying at my feet never could a' bear going past her cottage late o' nights--hang me if he could; and the night she died--Lord! you should have heard the howl Hector gave--and a' didn't then know she were gone--it's as true as the gospel--it _is_--actually!"

"No! but were't _really_ so?" inquired d.i.c.kons--several of the others taking their pipes out of their mouths, and looking earnestly at Pumpkin.

"I didn't half like it, I can tell you," quoth Pumpkin.

"Ha, ha, ha!--ha, ha!" laughed the gamekeeper--

"Ay, marry, you may laugh," quoth Pumpkin, "but I'll stake half-a-gallon o' ale you daren't go by yourself to the cottage where she's lying--_now_, mind--i' the dark."

"_I'll_ do it," quoth Higgs, eagerly, preparing to lay down his pipe.

"No, no--_thou'rt_ quite used to dead folk--'tis quite in thy line!"

replied Pumpkin--and, after a little faint drollery, silence ensued for some moments.

"Bess dropped off sudden like, at the last, didn't she?" inquired the landlord.

"She went out, as, they say, like the snuff of a candle," replied Jobbins, one of the farmers; "no one were with her but my Missis at the time. The night afore, she had took to the rattles all of a sudden. My Sall (that's _done for_ her, this long time, by Madam's orders,) says old Bess were a good deal shaken by a chap from London, which cam' down about a week afore Christmas."

"Ay, ay," quoth one, "I've heard o' that--what was it?--what pa.s.sed atwixt them?"

"Why, a' don't well know--but he seemed to know summat about t'ould girl's connections, and he had a book, and wrote down something, and he axed her, so Sall do tell me, such a many things about old people, and things that are long gone by!"

"What were the use on't?" inquired d.i.c.kons; "for Bess hath been silly this ten years, to my sartin knowledge."

"Why, a' couldn't tell. He seemed very 'quisitive, too, about t'ould creature's Bible and prayer-book (she kept them in that ould bag of hers)--and Sall said she had talked a good deal to the chap in her mumbling way, and seemed to know some folk he asked her about. And Sall saith she hath been, in a manner, dismal ever since, and often a-crying and talking to herself."

"I've heard," said the landlord, "that squire and parson were wi' her on Christmas-day--and that she talked a deal o' strange things, and that the squire did seem, as it were, _struck_ a little, you know--struck, like!"

"Why, so my Sall do say; but it may be all her own head," replied Jobbins.

Here a pause took place.

"Madam," said the s.e.xton, "hath given orders for an uncommon decent burying to-morrow."

"Well, a' never thought any wrong of ould Bess, for my part," said one--and another--and another; and they smoked their pipes for some short time in silence.

"Talking o' strangers from London," said the s.e.xton, presently--"who do know anything o' them two chaps that were at church last Sunday? Two such peac.o.c.k chaps I never see'd afore in _my_ time--and grinning all sarvice-time! the heathen!"

"Ay, I'll tell you something of 'em," said Hazel--a big broad-shouldered farmer, who plucked his pipe out of his mouth with sudden energy--"They're a brace o' good ones, to be sure, ha, ha! Some week or ten days ago, as I were a-coming across the field leading into the lane behind the church, I see'd these same two chaps, and on coming nearer, (they not seeing me for the hedge,) Lord bless me! would you believe it?--if they wasn't a-teasing my daughter Jenny, that were coming along wi' some physic from the doctor for my old woman! One of 'em seemed a-going to put his arm round her neck and t' other came close to her on t' other side, a-talking to her and pushing her about." Here a young farmer, who had but seldom spoken, took his pipe out of his mouth, and exclaiming, "Lord bless me!" sat listening with his mouth wide open.

"Well," continued the former, "a' came into the road behind 'em, without their seeing me; and"--(here he stretched out a thick, rigid, muscular arm, and clinched his teeth)--"a' got hold of each by the collar, and one of 'em I shook about, and gave him a kick i' the breech that sent him spinning a yard or two on the road, he clapping his hand behind him, and crying, to be sure--'You'll smart for this--a good hundred pound damages!' or summat o' that sort. T' other dropped on his knees, and begged for mercy; so a' just spit in his face, and flung him under t' hedge, telling him if he stirred till I were out o' sight, I'd crack his skull for him; and so I would!" Here the wrathful speaker pushed his pipe again between his lips, and began puffing away with great energy; while he who had appeared to take so great an interest in the story, and who was the very man who had flown to the rescue of Miss Aubrey, when she seemed on the point of being similarly treated, told that circ.u.mstance exactly as it occurred, amid the silent but excited wonder of those present--all of whom, at its close, uttered vehement execrations, and intimated the summary and savage punishment which the cowardly rascal would have experienced at the hands of each and every one of them, had they come across him.

"I reckon," said the landlord, as soon as the swell had a little subsided, "they must be the two chaps that put up here, some time ago, for an hour or so. You should ha' seen 'em get on and off the saddle--that's all! Why, a' laughed outright! The chap with the hair under his chin got on upon the wrong side, and t'other seemed as if he thought his beast would a' _bit_ him!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed all.

"I thought they'd a' both got a fall before they'd gone a dozen yards!"

"They've taken a strange fancy to my churchyard," said the s.e.xton, setting down his gla.s.s, and then preparing to fill his pipe again; "they've been looking about among 'em--among t'ould gravestones, up behind t'ould yew-tree yonder; and one of them writ something, now and then, in a book; so they're book-writers, in coorse!"

"That's scholars, I reckon," quoth d.i.c.kons; "but rot the larning of such chaps as them!"

"I wonder if they'll put a picture o' the Hall in their book," quoth the s.e.xton. "They axed a many questions about the people up there, especially about the squire's father, and some ould folk, whose names I knew when they spoke of 'em--but I hadn't heard o' them for this forty year. And one of 'em (he were the shortest, and such a chap, to be sure!--just like the monkey that were dressed i' man's clothes, last Grilston fair) talked uncommon fine about young _Miss_"----

"If _I'd_ a' heard him tak' her name into his dirty mouth, his teeth should a' gone after it!" said Tonson.

"Lord! he didn't say any harm--only silly like--and t' other seemed now and then not to like his going on so. The little one said Miss were a lovely gal, or something like that--and hoped they'd become by-and-by better friends--ah, ha!"

"What! wi' that chap?" said Pumpkin--and he looked as if he were meditating putting the little s.e.xton up the chimney, for the mere naming of such a thing.

"I reckon they're fro' London, and brought toon tricks wi' 'em--for I never heard o' such goings on as theirs down _here_ afore," said Tonson.

"One of 'em--him that axed me all the questions, and wrote i' t' book, seemed a sharp enough chap in his way; but I can't say much for the little one," said Higgs. "Lud, I couldn't hardly look in his face for laughing, he seemed such a fool!--He had a riding-whip wi' a silver head, and stood smacking his legs (you should ha' seen how tight his clothes was on his legs--I warrant you, Tim Timpkins never see'd such a thing, I'll be sworn) all the while, as if a' liked to hear the sound of it."

"If I'd a' been beside him," said Hazel, "I'd a' saved him that trouble--only I'd a' laid it into _another_ part of him!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" they laughed--and presently pa.s.sed on to other matters.

"Hath the squire been doing much lately in Parliament?" inquired the s.e.xton, of d.i.c.kons.

"Why, yes--he's trying hard to get that new road made from Harkley bridge to Hilton."

"Ah, that would save a good four mile, if a' could manage it!" said one of the farmers.

"I hear the Papists are trying to get the upper hand again--which the Lud forbid!" said the s.e.xton, after another pause.

"The squire hath lately made a speech in that matter, that hath finished them," said d.i.c.kons, in a grave and authoritative tone.

"What would they be after?" inquired the landlord of d.i.c.kons, of whom, in common with all present, he thought great things. "They _say_ they wants nothing but what's their own, and liberty, and that like"----