Part 13 (2/2)
_Both_. Through life the hue of first love true, Will never never fade.
_Ivor_. Thus may the frowns of life pa.s.s over, Happy then our lot,
_Gweno_. And the smile of peace be bright as ever In our humble cot!
_Both_. Through life the hue of first love true Will never never fade!
_Ivor_. The rain is past, the clouds are gone too, Hob y deri dando, far they spread;
_Gweno_. The lark is up, and bright the sun too, Hob y deri dando, on the mead!
He sang the last three tunes, and sold a dozen copies; but just as he was going to favour his audience with _Nos Galan_, the malignant face of Parson Evans presented itself before him.
As our hero wore petticoats, many gallant swains offered their treats of cake and ale, some of which was accepted; and presuming on that circ.u.mstance, they amusingly put in their claims to further notice, and seemed inclined to quarrel, as for a sweetheart.
With this phalanx of protectors, beaus, and chaperons, Twm resolved to employ them in a new scheme of vengeance on the unpopular parson. ”You see that old fellow in black,” said he, directing their attention to him as he pa.s.sed, ”he is a b.u.mbailiff, and the greatest villain in all the country I come from; and at this very moment, I'll be bound for it, he is hunting out some poor fellow to put him in prison. He wanted to be a lover of mine, but only intended to ruinate me; but if he had loved me ever so much I would not have had him, if his old yellow skin was stuffed with diamonds. The villainous old catchpole! it was owing to refusing him for a sweetheart, that he grew as spiteful as a snake, and by telling a parcel of falsehoods he got me turned out of my place without a character, so that I am now brought to this-to sing ballads in the streets.”
Here, a.s.suming a whimpering tone, Twm was compelled to smother a fit of laughter, which emotion was taken for sobbing, and consequently drew much on the sympathy of those now addressed! but suddenly withdrawing the ap.r.o.n that veiled the features, he exclaimed, with the vehemence of a young termagant, ”I'd give the world to see that old fellow tossed in a blanket!” Mark Antony's effort of eloquence to rouse the Roman citizens to avenge the death of Caesar, was not more effective than our hero's appeal.
Every one of those swains manifested the usual predilection for the smiles of a handsome young woman; being ”full of distempering draughts”
and ripe for a freak, their zeal became inflamed to a ferment; each felt himself the leading hero to avenge the wrongs of the fair ballad singer, in the manner suggested by himself.
One of the young men, a native of the town, and son to the innkeeper, immediately procured a blanket, when, watching their opportunity as the supposed bailiff pa.s.sed along, one tripped up his heels, while the rest received him in the extended blanket, and proceeded to the work-like play of giving the Black Kite an airing; or as Ready Rosser, a cunning clod of the party, expressed it, playing the wind-instrument to the tune of the b.u.mbailiff's courante. The athletic employments of grasping the plough-handles, as they guided it through a stubborn soil, and the no less powerful exertions of wielding the axe, or hedge-bill, had their due effect in nerving the brawny arms of those youths of the farm and woodlands for this rough exercise.
Drawing the extended blanket as tight as a drumhead, with their united efforts, up they tossed, re-tossed, and received into what threatened to be his winding-sheet, the quivering and terribly-frightened body of the Rev. and very wors.h.i.+pful Inco Evans. Whatever it might be to the parson, (and we do not venture to a.s.sert that it was agreeable to him,) the spectator of this singular and unexpected entertainment could not but enjoy it for the comical revolutions of the right rev. gentleman were, to say the least of them, very mirth-inspiring. As he flew upward, all legs and wings, and descended in the same sprawling style, one compared him to a cat shot from a cannon; another to a staked toad tossed in the air; while the hapless victim of their frolic foamed at the mouth with rage, and uncouthly floundered in his attempt to grasp the blanket in his fall.
If for a moment he seized its edge, and shouted his threats of vengeance, a terrific b.u.mp against the stony street loosened his hold, and up he bounced, again like the rebounding ball, struck on the flag-stone by the eager hand of a merry schoolboy.
Wearied by their arduous labours, and tempted by the s.h.i.+ning handful of silver which the woe-begone parson eagerly offered as a conciliatory bribe, they at length desisted, each venting his jest on the crest-fallen Evans, ”hoping it would be a warning not to prosecute again a poor friendless girl.” Inco answered not; but finding himself unable to walk, he was carried to the Inn, where he remained some days before he was able to remount his horse.
The knot of swains now separated, and ran in different directions to avoid being recognized as the perpetrators of the ”freak;” but soon met again at an appointed place, where they had left our hero, between the empty carts of the ware vendors.
On their arrival at the place, they searched in vain for their enchantress, in whose service they had wrought so gallantly, but no traces of the fair one could they find. There was a general smelling of a trick put upon them, and consequent ”curses on all jilting jades, and biting ballad-singers,” uttered by the unlucky clods.
A brilliant idea suddenly struck Ready Rosser. He had taken off his coat and left it in the careful custody of the injured damsel. Where was she?
Could she have disappeared? All doubts were soon removed, for on ascertaining the precise spot where he had left her, he found her complete feminine attire, made into a bundle and fastened to a cart with a band of straw, left as a love-gift for him, while she kept his as a similar token of affection; having inscribed with chalk on the side of the cart.-”An exchange is no robbery;” a motto in which our rustic could not see, in its present application, any principles of justice whatever.
CHAPTER XXII.
ESCAPE of Twm from Cardigan. Meets an old friend. The heiress of Maes-y-velin, a most tragical legendary ballad.
The addition to his wardrobe pleased Twm exactly, and he had no qualms of conscience to prevent him from using it, for he remembered how easily he had been despoiled of his own. Not being fastidious about a dressing-room, Twm retired to a stable, and soon came out fully clad in his male attire; of which a coat only was before wanting.
Bent on a precipitate retreat, as the urgency of his case demanded, he bolted down St. Mary's Street, and soon found himself on the turnpike road, with the good town of Cardigan some miles behind him. In little more than two hours he reached the small town of Dinas Emlyn, now called New-castle-in-Emlyn, on a romantic part of the Teivy, dividing the counties of Cardigan and Carmarthen, and occupying its banks on each side. Entering a small public-house, he regaled himself on the fine potent ale for which that place has been so long famous.
After addressing himself steadily for a good half hour to the pleasures of the table, he commenced a little private conversation with himself regarding his present and future prospects, and came to the conclusion that, on the whole, they were not worth much. Although the most serious cogitations on the subject might have availed little or nothing, chance very unexpectedly decided him, and relieved his apprehensions for the present.
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