In an agricultural district such as the Cotswolds it is inevitable that the game of cricket should be somewhat neglected. Men who work day after day in the open air, and to whom a half-holiday is a very rare experience, naturally seek their recreations in less energetic fashion than the noble game of cricket demands of its votaries. The class who derive most benefit from this game spring as a rule from towns and manufacturing centres and those whose work and interests confine them indoors the greater part of their time. Among the Cotswold farmers, however, a great deal of interest is shown; the scores of county matches are eagerly pursued in the daily papers; and if there is a big match on at Cheltenham or any other neighbouring town, a large number invariably go to see it. There is some difficulty in finding suitable sites for your ground in these parts, for the hill turf is very stony and shallow; it is not always easy to find a flat piece of ground handy to the villages. A cricket ground is useless to the villagers if it is perched up on the hill half a mile away. It must be at their doors; and even then, though they may occasionally play, they will never by any chance trouble to roll it. We made a ground in the valley of the Coln some years ago, and went to some expense in the way of levelling, filling up gravel pits, and removing obstructions like cowsheds; but unless we had looked after it ourselves and made preparations for a match, it would have soon gone back to its original rough state again. And yet two of the young Peregrines in the village are wonderfully good cricketers, and as "keen as mustard" about it; though when it comes to rolling and mowing the ground they are not quite as keen. They will throw you over for a match in the most unceremonious way if, when the day comes, they don't feel inclined to play. We have often tried to persuade these two young fellows to become professional cricketers, there being such a poor prospect in the farming line; but they have not the slightest ambition to play for the county, though they are quite good enough; so they "waste their sweetness on the desert air."
Old Mr. Peregrine, a man of nearly eighty years of age, is splendid fun when he is watching his boys play cricket. He goes mad with excitement; and if you take them off bowling, however much the batsmen appear to relish their attack, he won't forgive you for the rest of the day.
His eldest son, Tom--our old friend the keeper--generally stands umpire; he is not so useful to his side as village umpires usually are, because he hasn't got the moral courage to give his side "in" when he knows perfectly well they are "out." The other day, however, he made a slight error; for, on being appealed to for the most palpable piece of "stumping" ever seen in the cricket field, the ball bouncing back on to the wicket from the wicket-keeper's pads while the batsman was two yards out of his ground, he said, "Not out; it hit the wicket-keeper's pads." He imagined he was being asked whether the batsman had been bowled, and it never occurred to him that you could be "stumped out" in this way. Altogether, Cotswold cricket is great fun.
The district is full of memories of the prehistoric age, and in certain parts of the countryprehistoriccricket is still indulged in. Never shall I forget going over to Edgeworth with the Winson Cricket XI. to play agrandmatch at that seat of Roman antiquities. The carrier drove us over in his pair-horse brake--a rickety old machine, with a pony of fourteen hands and a lanky, ragged-hipped old mare over sixteen hands high in the shafts together. A most useful man in the field was the honest carrier, whether at point or at any other place where the ball comes sharp and quick; for, to quote Shakespeare,
"he was a manOf an unbounded stomach."
The rest of our team included the jovial miller; two of the village carpenter's sons--excellent folk; the village curate, who captained the side, and stood six feet five inches without his cricket shoes; one or two farmers; a footman, and a somewhat fat and apoplectic butler.
The colours mostly worn by the Winson cricketers are black, red, and gold--a Zingaric band inverted (black on top); their motto I believe to be "Tired, though united."
As the ground stands about eight hundred feet above sea level, all of us, but especially the fat butler, found considerable difficulty in getting to the top of the hill, after the brake had set us down at the village public. But once arrived, a magnificent view was to be had, extending thirty miles and more across the wolds to the White Horse Hill in Berkshire. However, we had not come to admire the view so much as to play the game of cricket. We therefore proceeded to look for the pitch. It was known to be in the field in which we stood, because a large red flag floated at one end and proclaimed that somewhere hereabouts was the scene of combat. It was the fat butler, I think, who, after sailing about in a sea of waving buttercups like a veritable Christopher Columbus, first discovered the stumps among the mowing grass.
Evident preparations had been made either that morning or the previous night for a grand match; a large number of sods of turf had been taken up and hastily replaced on that portion of the wicket where the ball is supposed to pitch when it leaves the bowler's hand. There had been no rain for a month, but just where the stumps were stuck a bucket or two of water had been dashed hastily on to the arid soil; while, to crown all, a chain or rib roller--a ghastly instrument used by agriculturists for scrunching up the lumps and bumps on the ploughed fields, and pulverising the soil--had been used with such effect that the surface of the pitch to the depth of about an inch had been reduced to dust.
In spite of this we all enjoyed ourselves immensely. Delightful old-fashioned people, both farmers and labourers, were playing against us; quaint (I use the word in its true sense) and simple folk, who looked as if they had been dug up with the other Saxon and Roman antiquities for which Edgeworth is so famous.
I was quite certain that the man who bowled me out was a direct descendant of Julius Caesar. He delivered the ball underhand at a rapid rate. It came twisting along, now to the right, now to the left; seemed to disappear beneath the surface of the soil, then suddenly came in sight again, shooting past the block. Eventually they told me it removed the left bail, and struck the wicket-keeper a fearful blow on the chest. It was generally agreed that such a ball had never been bowled before. "'Twas aprettyball!" as Tom Peregrine pronounced it, standing umpire in an enormous wideawake hat and a white coat reaching down to his knees, and smoking a bad cigar. "A very pretty ball," said my fellow batsman at the other wicket "A d--d pretty ball," I reiteratedsotto voce, as I beat a retreat towards the flag in the corner of the field, which served as a pavilion.
When I went on to bowl left-handed "donkey-drops," Tom Peregrine (my own servant, if you please) was very nearly no-balling me. "For," said he, "I 'ate that drabby-handed business; it looks so awkid. Muddling work, I calls it." But I am anticipating.
As I prepared myself for the fray, and carefully donned a pair of well-stuffed pads and an enormously thick woollen jersey for protection, not so much against the cold as against the "flying ball," it flashed across me that I was about to personify the immortal Dumkins of Pickwick fame; whilst in my companion, the stout butler, it was impossible not to detect the complacent features and rounded form of Mr. Podder. Up to a certain point the analogy was complete. Let the Winson Invincibles equal the All Muggleton C.C., while the Edgeworth Daisy Cutters shall be represented by Dingley Dell; then sing us, thou divine author of Pickwick, the glories of that never-to-be-forgotten day.
"All Muggleton had the first innings, and the interest became intense when Mr. Dumkins and Mr. Podder--two of the most renowned members of that distinguished club--walked bat in hand to their respective wickets. Mr. Luffy, the highest ornament of Dingley Dell, was pitched to bowl against the redoubtable Dumkins, and Mr. Struggles was selected to do the same kind office for the hitherto unconquered Podder...The umpires were stationed behind the wickets [Tom Peregrine had been suborned for Winson, and proved the most useful man on the side], the scorers were prepared to notch the runs. A breathless silence ensued. Mr. Luffy retired a few paces behind the wicket of the passive Podder, and applied the ball to his right eye for several seconds. Dumkins [the author] confidently awaited its coming with his eyes fixed on the motions of Mr. Luffy. 'Play!' suddenly cried the bowler. The ball flew from his hand straight and swift towards the centre stump of the wicket. The wary Dumkins was on the alert; it fell upon the tip of his bat...."
Here, with deep sorrow, let it be stated that the writer failed to evince the admirable skill displayed by his worthy prototype; the Dumkins of grim reality was unable to compete with the Dumkins of fiction. Instead of "sending the ball far away over the heads of the scouts; who just stooped low enough to let it fly over them," I caught it just as it pitched on a rabbit-hole, and sent it straight up into the air like a soaring rocket. "Right, right, I have it!" yelled bowler and wicket-keeper simultaneously. "Run two, Podder; they'll never catch it!" shouted Dumkins with all his might. "Catch it in your 'at, Bill!" screamed the Edgeworth eleven. Never was such confusion! I was already starting for the second run, whilst my stout fellow batsman was halfway through the first, when the ball came down like a meteor, and, narrowly shaving the luckless "Podder's" head, hit the ground with a loud thud about five yards distant from the outstretched hands of the anxious bowler, who collided with his ally, the wicket-keeper, in the middle of the pitch. Half stunned by the shock, and disappointed at his want of success in his attempt to "judge" the catch, the bowler had yet presence of mind enough to seize the ball and hurl it madly at the stumps. But the wicket-keeper being stillhors de combat, it flew away towards the spectators, and buried itself among the mowing grass. "Come six, Podder!" I shouted, amid cries of "Keep on running!" "Run it out!" etc., from spectators and scouts alike. And run we did, for the umpire forgot to call "lost ball," and we should have been running still but for the ingenuity of one of our opponents; for, whilst all were busily engaged in searching among the grass, a red-faced yokel stole up unawares, with an innocent expression on his face, raced poor "Podder" down the pitch, produced the ball from his trouser pocket, and knocked off the bails in the nick of time. "Out," says Peregrine, amid a roar of laughter from the whole field; and Mr. "Podder" had to go.
Now came the question how many runs should be scored, for I had passed my fellow batsman in the race, having completed seven runs to his five. Eventually it was decided to split the difference and call it a sixer; the suggestion of a member of our side that seven should be scored to me and five to Mr. "Podder" (making twelve in all) being rejected after careful consideration.
Thus, from the first ball bowled in this historic match there arose the whole of the remarkable events recorded above. Therein is shown the complete performances with the bat of two renowned cricketers; for, alas I in once more trying to play up to the form of Dumkins, I was bowled "slick" the very next ball, "as hath been said or sung."
There was much good-natured chaff flying about during the match, but no fighting and squabbling, save when a boundary hit was made, when the batsman always shouted "Three runs," and the bowler "No, only one." The scores were not high; but I remember that we won by three runs, that the carpenter's son got a black eye, that we had tea in an old manor house turned into an inn, and drove home in the glow of a glorious sunset, not entirely displeased with our first experience of "prehistoric" cricket.
Some of the pleasantest matches we have ever taken part in have been those at Bourton-on-the-Water. Owing to the very soft wicket which he found on arriving, this place was once christened by a well-known cricketerBourton-on-the-Bog. Indeed, it is often a case of Bourton-under-the-Water; but, in spite of a soft pitch, there is great keenness and plenty of good-tempered rivalry about these matches. Bourton is a truly delightful village. The Windrush, like the Coln at Bibury, runs for some distance alongside of the village street.
The M.C.C., or "premier club"--as the sporting press delight to call the famous institution at Lord's--generally get thoroughly well beaten by the local club. For so small a place they certainly put a wonderfully strong team into the field; on their own native "bog" they are fairly invincible, though we fancy on the hard-baked clay at Lord's their bowlers would lose a little of their cunning.
In the luncheon tent at Bourton there are usually more wasps than are ever seen gathered together in one place; they come in thousands from their nests in the banks of the Windrush.
If you are playing a match there, it is advisable to tuck your trousers into your socks when you sit down to luncheon. This, together with the fact that the tent has been known to blow down in the middle of luncheon, makes these matches very lively and amusing. What more lively scene could be imagined than a large tent with twenty-two cricketers and a few hundred wasps hard at work eating and drinking; then, on the tent suddenly collapsing, the said cricketers and the said wasps, mixed up with chairs, tables, ham, beef, salad-dressing, and apple tart, and the various ingredients of a cricket lunch, all struggling on the floor, and striving in vain to find their way out as best they can? Fortunately, on the only occasion that the tent blew down when we were present, it was not a good wasp year.
Besides the matches at Bourton, there is plenty of cricket at Cirencester, Northleach, and other centres in the Cotswolds. The "hunt" matches are great institutions, even though hunting people as a rule do not care for cricket, and invariably drop a catch. A good sportsman and excellent fellow has lately presented a cup to be competed for by the village clubs of this district. This, no doubt, will give a great impetus to the game amongst all classes; our village club has already been revived in order to compete. Our only fear with regard to the cup competition is that when you get two elevens on to a ground, and two umpires, none of whom know the rules (for cricket laws are the most "misunderstandable" things in creation), the final tie will degenerate into a free fight.
Be this as it may, anything that can make the greatest pastime of this country popular in the "merrie Cotswolds" is a step in the right direction. It is pleasing to watch boys and men hard at work practising on summer evenings. The rougher the ground the more they like it. Scorning pads and gloves, they "go in" to bat, and make Herculean efforts to hit the ball. And this, with fast bowling and the bumpy nature of the pitch, is a very difficult thing to do. They play on, long after sunset,--the darker it gets, and the more dangerous to life and limb the game becomes, the happier they are. We are bound to admit that when we play with them, a good pitch is generally prepared. It would be bad policy to endeavour to compete in the game they play, as we should merely expose ourselves to ridicule, and one's reputation as the man who has been known "to play in the papers," as they are accustomed to call big county matches, would very soon be entirely lost.
I was much amused a few years ago, on arriving home after playing for Somersetshire in some cricket matches, when Tom Peregrine made up to me with "a face like a benediction," and asked if I was the gentleman who had been playing "in the papers."
While on the subject of cricket, for some time past we have made experiments of all sorts of cricket grounds, and have come to the conclusion that the following is the best recipe to prepare a pitch on a dry and bumpy ground. A week before your match get a wheelbarrow full of clay, and put it into a water-cart, or any receptacle for holding water. Having mixed your clay with water, keep pouring the mixture on to your pitch, taking care that the stones and gravel which sink to the bottom do not fall out. When you have emptied your water-cart, get some more clay and water, and continue pouring it on to the ground until you have covered a patch about twenty-two yards long and three yards wide, always remembering not to empty out the sediment at the bottom of the water-cart, for this will spoil all. Then, setting to work with your roller, roll the clay and water into the ground. Never mind if it picks up on to the roller: a little more water will soon put that to rights. After an hour's rolling you will have a level and true cricket pitch, requiring but two or three days' sun to make it hard and true as asphalt. You may think you have killed the grass; but if you water your pitch in the absence of rain the day after you have played on it, the grass will not die. It is chiefly in Australia that cricket grounds are treated in this way; they are dressed with mud off the harbours, and rolled simultaneously. Such grounds are wonderfully true and durable.
If the pitch is naturally a clay one, it might be sufficient to use water only, and roll at the same time; but for renovating a worn clay pitch, a little strong loamy soil, washed in with water and rolled down will fill up all the "chinks" and holes. It will make an old pitch as good as new.
The reason that nine out of ten village grounds are bad and bumpy is that they are not rolled soon enough after rain or after being watered. Roll and water them simultaneously, and they will be much improved.
Another excellent plan is to soak the ground with clay and water, and leave it alone for a week or ten days before rolling. Permanent benefit will be done to the soil by this method. For golf greens and lawn-tennis courts situated on light soil, loam is an indispensable dressing. Any loamy substance will vastly improve the texture of a light soil and the quality of the herbage. Yet it is most difficult to convince people of this fact. We have known cases in which hundreds of pounds have been expended on cricket grounds and golf greens when an application of clay top-dressing would have put the whole thing to rights at the cost of a few shillings. One committee had artificial wells made on every "putting green" of their golf course, in order to have water handy for keeping the turf cool and green. What better receptacle for water could they have found than a top-dressing of half an inch of loam or clay, retaining as it does every drop of moisture that falls in the shape of dew or rain, instead of allowing it to percolate through like a sieve, as is the case with an ordinary sandy soil? Yet this clay dressing, while retaining water, becomes hard, firm, and as level as a billiard table on the timely application of the roller.
Those who look after cricket grounds and the like have seldom any acquaintance with the constitution of soils; they are apt to treat all, whether sand, light loam, strong loam, heavy clay, or even peat, in exactly the same way, instead of recollecting that, as in agriculture, a judicious combination will alone give us thatideal loamwhich produces the best turf, and the best soil for every purpose. I am quite convinced that our farmers do not realise how much worthless light land may be improved by a dressing of clay or loam. Such dressings are expensive without a doubt, but the amelioration of the soil is so marked that in favourable localities the process ought to pay in the long run.
Turning to cricket in general, perhaps the modern game, as played on a good wicket, is in every respect, save one, perfection. If only something could be done to curtail the length of matches, and rid us of that awful nuisance the poking, time-wasting batsman, there would be little improvement possible.
"All the world's a stage," and even at cricket the analogy holds good. Thus Shakespeare:
"As in a theatre the eyes of men,After a well-graced actor leaves the stage,Are idly bent on him that enters next,Thinking his prattle to be tedious."
So also one may say of some dull and lifeless cricketer who, after the famous Gloucestershire hitter has made things merry for spectators and scouts alike, "enters next":
"As in a cricket field the eyes of men,After a well-Gracedplayer leaves thesticks,Are idly bent on him that enters next,Thinking hisbattingto be tedious."
On the other hand, if we sow the wild oats of cricket--in other words, if we risk everything for the fleeting satisfaction of a blind "slog"--we shall be bowled, stumped, or caught out for a moral certainty. It is only a matter of time.
Perhaps the addition of another stump might help towards the very desirable end of shortening the length of matches, and thus enable more amateurs to take part in them. I cannot agree with those who lament the improved state of our best English cricket grounds; if only the batsmen play a free game and do not waste time, the game is far more entertaining for players and spectators alike, when a true wicket is provided. The heroes of old,
"When Bird and Beldham, Budd, and such as they,--Lord Frederick, too, once England's chief and flower,--Astonished all who came to see them play,"
those "scorners of the ground" and of pads and gloves doubtless displayed morepluckon their rough, bumpy grounds than is now called forth in facing the attack of Kortright, Mold, or Richardson. But on the other hand, on rough grounds much is left to chance andluck; cricket, as played on a billiard-table wicket certainly favours the batsman, but it admits of a brilliancy and finish in the matter of style that are impossible on the old-fashioned wicket. Whilst the modern bowler has learnt extraordinary accuracy of pitch, the batsman has perfected the art of "timing" the ball. And what a subtle, delicate art is correct "timing"!--the skilful embodiment of thought in action, depending for success on that absolute sympathy of hand and eye which only assiduous practice, confidence, and a good digestion can give. And on uncertain, treacherous ground confident play is never seen. A ball cannot be "cut" or driven with any real brilliancy of style when there is a likelihood of its abruptly "shooting" or bumping. No; if we would leave as little as possible to chance, our grounds cannot be too good. Even from a purely selfish point of view, apart from the welfare of our side, the pleasure derived from a good "innings" on a first-rate cricket ground is as great as that bestowed by any other physical amusement.
Perhaps one ought not to think of comparing the sport of fox-hunting, with its extraordinary variety of incident and surroundings, the study of a lifetime, to the game of cricket. At the same time, for actual all-round enjoyment, and for economy, the game holds its own against all amusements.
Bromley-Davenport has said that given agoodcountry and agoodfox,anda burning scent, the man on agoodhorse with a goodstart, for twenty or thirty minutes absorbs as much happiness into his mental and physical organisation as human nature is capable of containing at one time. This is very true. But how seldom the five necessary conditions are forthcoming simultaneously the keen hunting man has learnt from bitter experience. You will be lucky if the real good thing comes off once for every ten days you hunt. In cricket a man is dependent on his own quickness of hand and eye; in hunting there is that vital contingency of the well-filled purse. "'Tis money that makes the mare to go."
Then what a grand school is cricket for some of the most useful lessons of life! Its extraordinary fluctuations are bound to teach us sooner or later
"Rebus angustis animosus atqueFortis appare."
Therebus angustisare often painfully impressed on the memory by a long sequence of "duck's eggs"; and how difficult is theanimosus atque fortis apparewhen we return to the pavilion with a "pair of spectacles" to our credit!
Then, again, cricketers are taught to preserve a mind
"Ab insolenti temperatamLaetitiâ."
We must not permit thelaetitiâ insolentito creep in when we have made a big score. How often do we see young cricketers over-elated under these circumstances, and suffering afterwards from temporary over-confidence and consequent carelessness!
But we must have no more Horace, lest our readers exclaim, with Jack Cade, "Away with him! away with him! he speaksLatin!"
Hope, energy, perseverance, and courage,--all these qualities are learnt in our grand English game. There is always hope for the struggling cricketer. In no other pursuit are energy and perseverance so absolutely sure of bearing fruit, if we only stick to it long enough.
The fact is that cricket, like many other things, is but the image and prototype of life in general. And the same qualities that, earnestly cultivated in spite of repeated failure and disappointment, make good cricketers lead ultimately to success in all the walks of life. In spite of the improvement in grounds, cricket is still an excellent school for teaching physical courage. Many grounds are somewhat rough and bumpy to field on, beautifully smooth though they look from the pavilion. We have only to stand "mid-off" or "point" on a cold day at the beginning of May whilst a hard-hitting batsman, well set on a true wicket, is driving or cutting ball after ball against our hands and shins, to realise what a capital school for courage the game is!
How exacting is the critic in this matter of fielding! and how delightfully simple the bowling looks from that admirably safe vantage-ground, the pavilion! Just as to a man comfortably stationed in the grand-stand at Aintree nothing looks easier than the way in which the best horses in the world flit over the five-foot fences, leaving them behind with scarcely an effort, their riders sitting quietly in the saddle all the while, so does the pavilion critic pride himself on the way he would have "cut" that short one instead of merely stopping it, or blocked that simple ball that went straight on and bowled the wicket. Everything that is well and gracefully performed appears easy to the looker-on. But that ease and grace, whether in the racehorse or in the man, has only been acquired by months and years of training and practice.
It is seldom that the spectator is able to form a true and unbiassed opinion as to the varied contingencies which lead to victory or defeat in cricket. The actual players and the umpires are perhaps alone qualified to judge to what extent the fluctuations of the game are affected by the vagaries of weather and ground. For this reason it is well to take newspaper criticismcum grano salis.
What is the cause of the extraordinary fluctuations of form which all cricketers, from the greatest to the least, are more or less subject to? It cannot be set down altogether to luck, for a run of bad luck, such as all men have at times experienced, is often compatible with being in the very best form. A man who is playing very well at the net often gets out directly he goes in to bat in a match, whilst many a good player, who tells you "he has not had a bat in his hand this season," in his very first innings for the year makes a big score. In subsequent innings's, oddly enough, he feels the want of net practice.Confidencewould seem to be thesine quâ nonfor the successful batsman. Nothing succeeds like success; and once fairly started on a sequence of big scores, the cricketer goes on day by day piling up runs andvires acquirit eundo.
Perhaps "being in form" does not depend so much on the state of the digestion as on the state of themind. Anxiety or excitement, fostered by over-keenness, usually results in a blank score-sheet. Some men, like horses, are totally unable to do themselves credit on great occasions. They go off their feed, and are utterly out of sorts in consequence. On the other hand, sheer force of will has often enabled men to make a big score. Many a good batsman can recall occasions on which he made a mental resolve on the morning of a match to make a century, and did it.
How curious it is that really good players, from staleness or some unknown cause, occasionally become absolutely useless for a time! Every fresh failure seems to bring more and more nervousness, until, from sheer lack of confidence, their case becomes hopeless, and a child could bowl them out. Ah well! we must not grumble at the ups and downs of the finest game in creation: "every dog will have his day" sooner or later; of that we may be sure.
And not the least of the advantages of cricket is the large number of friends made on the tented field. For this reason the jolliest cricket is undoubtedly that which is played by the various wandering clubs. Whether you are fighting under the banner of the brotherhood whose motto is "United though untied,"[6]or under the flag of the "Red, Black, and Gold,"[7]or with any other of the many excellent clubs that abound nowadays, you will have an enjoyable game, whether you make fifty runs or a duck's egg.
[6]The Free Foresters.
[7]The I Zingari.
County cricket is nowadays a little over done. Two three-day matches a week throughout the summer don't leave much time for other pursuits. A liberal education at a good public school and university seems to be thrown away if it is to be followed by five or six days a week at cricket all through the summer year after year. Most of our best amateurs realise this, and, knowing that if they go in for county cricket at all they must play regularly, they give it up, and are content to take a back seat. They do wisely, for let us always remember that cricket is a game and not a business.
On the other hand, much good results from the presence in county cricket of a leavening of gentle; for they prevent the further development of professionalism. It is doubtless owing to the "piping times of peace" England has enjoyed during the past fifty years that cricket has developed to such an abnormal extent. The British public are essentially hero worshippers, and especially do they worship men who show manliness and pluck; and those feelings of respect and admiration that it is to be hoped in more stirring times would be reserved for a Nelson or a Wellington have been recently lavished on our Graces, our Stoddarts, our Ranjitsinhjis, and our Steels.
As long as war is absent, and we "live at home at ease," so long will our sports and pastimes flourish and increase. And long may they flourish, more especially those in which the quality of courage is essential for success! It will be a bad day for England when success in our sports and pastimes no longer depends on the exercise of pluck and manliness; when hunting gives place to bicycling, and cricket to golf; when, in fact, the wholesome element ofdangeris removed from our recreation and pursuits. Should, in the near future, the long-talked-of invasion of this country by a combination of European powers become an accomplished fact, Englishmen may perchance be glad, as the cannon balls and musket shots are whizzing round their heads, that on the mimic battlefields of cricket, football, polo, and fox-hunting they learnt two of the most useful lessons of life--coolness and courage.
Nowadays, thanks in a great measure to Mr. Madden's book, the "Diary of Master William Silence," it is beginning to dawn on us that the Cotswolds are more or less connected with the great poet of Stratford-on-Avon.
Mr. Blunt, in his "Cotswold Dialect," gives no less than fifty-eight passages from the works of Shakespeare, in which words and phrases peculiar to the district are made use of. Up to the reign of Queen Anne this vast open tract of downland formed a happy hunting ground for the inhabitants of all the surrounding counties. Warwickshire, Oxfordshire, and Wiltshire, as well as Gloucestershire folk repaired to the wolds for hunting, coursing, hawking, and other amusements; and in olden times, even more than to-day, Cotswold was, as Burton described it, "a type of what is most commodious for hawking, hunting, wood, waters, and all manner of pleasures." There never was a district so well adapted for stag-hunting. Nowadays the Cotswold district falls short in one desideratum, and that a most essential one, of being a first-rate hunting country. The large extent of ploughed land and the extreme dryness and poverty of the soil cause it on four days out of five to carry a most indifferent scent. But to-day we pursue the fox; in Shakespeare's time the stag was the quarry. And, as hunting men are well aware, the scent given off by a stag is not only ravishing to hounds, but it actually increases as the quarry tires, whilst that from a fox "grows small by degrees and beautifully less."
As with hunting, so also with coursing and hawking; the Cotswolds were the grand centre of Elizabethan sport. Here it was that Shakespeare marked the falcon "waiting on and towering in her pride of place." Here he saw the fallow greyhounds competing for the silver-studded collar.
What an interest and a dignity does a district such as this draw from even the slenderest association with the splendid name of William Shakespeare! For my part I freely confess that scenery, however grand and sublime, appeals but little to the imagination unless it be hallowed by association or blended in the thoughts with the recollection of those we have either loved or admired. Thus in India, in Natal and Cape Colony, in glorious Ceylon, I could admire those wonderful purple mountains and that tropical luxuriance of fertility and verdure; but I could notfeelthem. The boundless wolds of Africa, reminding one so much of Gloucestershire, yet far grander and far finer than anything of the kind in England, were to me a dreary wilderness. Passing through the fine broken hill country of Natal was like visiting chaos, a waste, inhospitable land,
"Where no one comesOr hath come since the making of the world."
How well I remember the first sight of the wolds of South Africa! It was the hour of uncertain light that comes before the dawn; and as our railway train wound its tortuous course like a snake up the awful heights that would ultimately end in Majuba Hill--to which ill-fated spot I was bound--the billowy waves of rolling down seemed gradually to change to an immensely rough ocean running mountains high, and the mimosa trees dotting the plain for hundreds of miles appeared like armies of the souls of all the black men that ever lived on earth since the world began. There were passes and chasms like the portals of far-off, inaccessible Paradise,
"With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms."
And then the scene changed. The hills rose like graves of white men and barrows to the long-forgotten dead. Great oblong barrows, round Celtic barrows, and stately sarcophagi. Monumental effigies in alabaster, granite and porphyry; grim Gothic castles dating back to the foundation of the world, and grim Gothic cathedrals with long-drawn aisles, where the "great organ of Eternity" kept thundering ceaselessly. For the lightning and the thunder are powers to be reckoned with in those awful realms of chaos. And then the scene changed again. There suddenly uprose weird shapes of giants and leviathans, huge mammoths and whole regiments of fantastic monsters that looked like clouds and yet were mountains; and there were fortresses and towers of silence, with vultures hovering over them, and cliffs and crags and jutting promontories that looked like mountains, but were really clouds: for the black clouds and the frowning hills were so much alike that, save when the lightning shone, you could not say where the sky ended and the land began. But there was one gleam of hope in this weird and dismal scene, for on the farthest verge of the horizon there appeared, as it were, a lake--such a lake as saw the passing of Arthur, vanishing in mystery and silently floating away upon a barge towards the east. It was a lake of beryl, whose far-off golden shores were set with rubies and sardonyx, and beyond these, again, were the more distant waters of the silver sea; and as when Sir Bedivere
"... saw,Straining his eyes beneath an arch of hand,Or thought he saw, the speck that bare the King,Down that long water opening on the deepSomewhere far off, pass on and on, and goFrom less to less and vanish into light.And the new sun rose bringing the new year,--"
so over the plains of Africa rose the mighty Alchemist and great revealer of truth, the scatterer of dreary darkness and secret night, turning those shadowy hills to purple and those mystic waters in the eastern sky to gold.
How different are our feelings when we traverse, either in reality or in fancy, such parts of the earth as are deeply blended in our hearts and minds with old familiar associations! Whilst wandering through the Lake District of England, how are we reminded of Wordsworth and the "Excursion"! How can we visit Devonshire and the West Country without summoning up pleasant thoughts of Charles Kingsley and Amyas Leigh; of the men of Bideford, Sir Richard Grenville, Kt., and "The little Revenge"? How vividly do the Trossachs recall "The Lady of the Lake" and Walter Scott! How with Edinburgh do we connect the sad story of Mary, the ill-fated queen! At Killarney, or standing amid the Gothic tracery of Tintern, how do we think on Alfred Tennyson and "the days that are no more"! These are only a few of the places in the British Isles that by universal consent are hallowed by tender associations. Of those spots in England which are dear to our hearts for personal reasons, there are of course hundreds. Every man has his own peculiar prejudices in this respect. To some London is the most sacred spot on earth. And who shall deny that with all her faults London is not a vastly interesting place? Is not every street hallowed by its associations with some great name or some great event in English history? Which of us can stand amid the Gothic tracery and the crumbling cloisters of Westminster, or under the shadow of the old grey towers of Whitehall, without recalling heart-stirring scenes and "paths of glory that lead but to the grave"? Who can stand unmoved on any of the famous bridges that span the silent river? Dr. Johnson, who acted up to Pope's well-known motto,
"The proper study of mankind is man,"
thought Fleet Street the most interesting place on the face of the earth; and perhaps he was right. Let us hear what he has to say about this halo of old association: "To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible if it were endeavoured; and would be foolish if it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me and from my friends be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue."
This, then, is the difference between the plains of Africa and the hills and valleys of England. The one is at present a vast inhospitable chaos, the other a land in which there is scarcely an acre that has not been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. Such are the signs by which we are to distinguish Cosmos from Chaos.
How far into the Cotswold Hills the halo of Stratford-on-Avon's glory may be said to extend it is not easy to determine. Let us allow at all events that thereflectionfrom the arc reaches across the whole extent of the wolds as far as Dursley. For here on the western edge of the Cotswolds it is probable that Shakespeare spent that portion of his life which has always been involved in obscurity--the interval between his removal from Warwickshire and his arrival in London.
On a fine autumnal evening in the year 1592 a horseman, mounted on a little ambling nag, neared the Cotswold village of Bibury. Both man and steed showed unmistakable signs of weariness. The horse especially, though of that wiry kind known as the Irish hobby, hard as iron, and accustomed to long journeys, evinced by that sober and even dejected expression of countenance so well known to hunting men, that he had been ridden both far and fast. The saddle too, as well as the legs, chest, and flanks of the nag, appeared wet and mud-stained, as if some brook had been swum or some deep and muddy river forded, whilst the left shoulder and knee of the rider bore marks which told tales of a fall. The personal appearance of the man was not such as to excite the interest of the casual passer-by; for his dress, though extremly neat, was that worn by clerks and other townsfolk of the day; yet a keen observer might have noticed that the features were those of a man of uncommon character, in whom, as Carlyle would have said, a germ of irrepressible force had been implanted.
It had indeed been a glorious day. The hounds, after meeting close to Moreton-in-the-Marsh, in Warwickshire, had found a great hart in the forest near Seizincote, and had hunted him "at force" over the deep undrained vale up on to the Cotswold Hills, away past Stow-on-the-Wold and Bourton-on-the-Water, towards the great woods of Chedworth. But the stag, after crossing the Windrush close to Mr. Dutton's house at Sherborne, had failed to make his point, and had "taken soil" in a deep pool of the river Coln, near the little village of Coln-St-Dennis, where eventually the mort had sounded. Such a run had not been seen for many a long day; for it measured no less than fourteen miles "as the crow flies," and about five-and-twenty as the hounds ran. The time occupied had been close on seven hours. There had of course been several checks; but so strong had been the scent of this hart that, in spite of two "lets" of some twenty minutes' duration, the pack had been able to hunt their quarry to the bitter end. Only two men had seen the end. The pride and chivalry of Warwickshire, mounted on their high-priced Flanders mares, their Galway nags, and their splendid Barbaries, had been hopelessly thrown out of the chase; and besides the huntsman, on his plain-bred little English horse, the only remnant of the field was our friend with his tough and wiry Irish hobby.
It is five o'clock, and the sun as it disappears beyond a high ridge of the wolds, is tinging the grey walls of an ancient Gothic fane with a rosy glow. This our sportsman does not fail to notice; but in spite of his keen appreciation of the beauties of nature, the question uppermost in his mind, as he jogs along the rough, uneven road or track which leads to Bibury, is where to spend the night. The thought of returning home at that late hour does not enter his head; for the stag having gone away in exactly the opposite direction to that from which the Warwickshire man had set out early in the morning, there are no less than three-and-thirty long and weary miles between the hunter and his home. In the days of good Queen Bess, however, hospitality was proverbially free, and any decently set up Englishman was tolerably sure of a welcome at any of the country houses which were then, as now, scattered at long intervals over this wild, uncultivated district. And as he rides round a bend in the valley, a fair manor house comes into view, pleasantly placed in a sheltered spot hard by the River Coln. It was built in the style which had just come into vogue--the Elizabethan form of architecture; and in honour of the reigning monarch its front presented the appearance of the letter E. The windows, instead of being made of horn, were of glass; and tall stone chimneys (a modern luxury but lately invented) carried away the smoke from the chambers within.
It so happened that at the moment the stranger was passing, the owner of the house--a squire of some sixty years of age, but hale and hearty--was standing in front of his porch taking the evening air. This fact the horseman did not fail to notice, and with a ready eye to the main chance, which showed its possessor to be a man of no ordinary apprehension, he glanced approvingly at the groined porch, the richly carved pinnacles above it, and at the quaint belfry beyond, exclaiming with great enthusiasm:
"'Fore God, you have a goodly dwelling and a rich here. I do envy thee thine house, sir."
BILBURY COURT."BILBURY COURT."
"Barren, barren, barren; beggars all, beggars all,"[8]was the reply, to which, after a pause, the squire added, "Marry, good air."
[8]2 Henry IV, V. iii.
"Ah, 'tis a good air up on these wolds," replied the sportsman. "But I am a stranger here in Gloucestershire; these high wild hills and rough, uneven ways draw out our miles and make them wearisome.[9]How far is it to Stratford?"
[9]King Richard II., II. iii.
"Marry, 'tis nigh on forty mile, I warrant. Thou'll not see Stratford to-night, sir; thy horse is wappered[10]out, and that I plainly see."
[10]Wappered= tired. A Cotswold word.
To him replied the stranger wearily:
Where is the horse that doth untread againHis tedious measures with the unbated fireThat he did pace them first? All things that are,Are with more spirit chased than enjoyed.[11]
[11]Merchant of Venice, II. vi.
"Hast been with the hounds to-day?" enquired the honest squire.
"Ah, sir, and that I have," was the reply; "and never have I seen such sport before. For seven long hours they made the welkin ring, and ran like swallows o'er the plain."[12]
[12]Titus Andronicus, II. ii.
"Please to step in; we be just a-settin' down to supper--a cold capon and a venison pasty. I'll tell my serving man to take thy nag to yonder yard, and make him comfortable for the night."
"Thanks, sir, I'll take him round myself, and give the honest beast a drench of barley broth,[13]and afterwards, to cheer him up a bit, a handful or two of dried peas."[14]
[13]Henry V., III. v.
[14]Midsummer Night's Dream, IV. i.
Whilst the hunter was seeing to his nag, the squire thus addressed his serving man:
"Some pigeons, Davy, a couple of short-legged hens, a joint of mutton, and any pretty tiny kickshaws, tell William cook."[15]
[15]2Henry IV., V. i.
DAVY: "Doth the hunter stay all night, sir?"
SQUIRE: "Yes, Davy. I will use him well; good sportsmen are ever welcome on Cotswold."
The wants of the Irish hobby having been thoroughly attended to, and the game little fellow having recovered in some measure his natural gaiety of spirits, the squire ushered the stranger into a long low hall, hung with pikes and guns and bows, and relics of the chase as well as of the wars. The stone floor was strewed with clean rushes, and lying about on tables were trashes, collars, and whips for hounds, as well as hoods, perches, jesses, and bells for hawks; whilst a variety of odds and ends, such as crossbows and jumping-poles, were scattered about the apartment. An enormous wood fire blazed at one end of the hall, and in the inglenook sat a girl of some twenty summers.
"My daughter, sir," exclaimed the squire; "as good a girl as ever lived to make a cheese, brew good beer, preserve all sorts of wines, and cook a capon with a chaudron! Marry! I forgot to ask thee thy name?"
"Oh, my name is Shakespeare--William Shakespeare, sir. I come from Stratford-on-the-Avon, up to'rds Warwick."
"Shakespy, Shakespy; a' don't know that name. Dost bear arms, sir?"
"I am entitled to them--a spear on a bend sable, and a falcon for my crest; but we have not yet applied to the heralds for the confirmation. And you, sir?"
"He writes himselfarmigeroin any bill, warrant, quittance, or obligation," here put in Davy the serving man.
"Ah, that I do! and have done any time these three hundred years."
"All his successors gone before him hath done it; and all his ancestors that come after him may," added Davy, with pride.
"To be sure, to be sure," said the squire. "Well, welcome to Cotswold, Master Shakespeare; good sportsmen are ever welcome on Cotswold. But tell me, how didst thou get thy downfall?"
"The first was at the mound into the tyning by Master Blackett's house at Iccomb; old Dobbin breasted it, and the stones did rattle round mine ears like a house a-coming down. We made a shard[16]that let the rest of 'em through. It was the only wall that came in the way of the chase to-day. The second downfall was at the brook by Bourton-Windrush, I think they call it. Dobbin being a bit short of wind, and quilting sadly, stuck fast in the mire, and tumbled on to his nose in scrambling out. Marry, sir, but 'twas a famous chase; the like of it I never saw before. 'Twas grand at first to see the hart unharboured--a stag with all his rights, 'brow, bay, and trey.'"
[16]A Cotswold word = breach.
"Thou shouldst know, our hounds at Warwick are a noted pack,
So flew'd, so sanded, and their beads are hungWith ears that sweep away the morning dew;Crook-knee'd, and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls;Slow in pursuit, but matched in mouth like bells,Each under each. A cry more tuneableWas never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn.'"[17]
[17]Midsummer Night's Dream, IV. i.
Then he told how, after leaving behind the deep undrained grass country round Moreton-in-the-Marsh, they rose the hills by Stow and came across the moor. How the riders who spurred their horses up the steep uprising ascent were soon left behind. For
"To climb steep hillsRequires slow pace at first; anger is likeA full hot horse, who, being allowed his way,Self mettle tires him."
He told how, after an hour's steady running over the wolds, a "let"[18]occurred, and "the hot scent-snuffing hounds are driven to doubt";[19]how Mountain, Fury, Tyrant, and Ringwood, who had been leading the rest of the pack, strove in vain for a considerable time to pick out the cold scent, until suddenly the cheery sound of the old huntsman's voice was heard crying:
[18]Two Noble Kinsmen, III. v.
[19]Venus and Adonis, 692.
"Fury! Fury! There, Tyrant, there! Hark! Hark!"[20]
and the whole pack went "yoppeting" off as happy as the hunt was long. He told how Belman fairly surpassed himself, and "twice to-day picked out the dullest scent";[21]and how little Dobbin, the Irish hobby, went cantering on "as true as truest horse, that yet would never tire."[22]He told how, after running from scent to view, they came down into the woodlands of the valley of the Coln, and awoke the echoes with their "gallant chiding."
[20]Tempest, IV, i.
[21]Taming of the Shrew, Introduction.
[22]Midsummer Night's Dream, III. i.
"... besides the groves,The skies, the fountains, every region nearSeem'd all one mutual cry: I never heardSo musical a discord, such sweet thunder."[23]
[23]Midsummer Night's Dream, IV.
And how the noble animal took soil in the Coln,
"Under an oak whose antique root peeps outUpon the brook that brawls along this wood:To the which place our poor sequester'd stagDid come to languish; and indeed, my lord,The wretched animal heaved forth such groansThat their discharge did stretch his leathern coatAlmost to bursting, and the big round tearsCoursed one another down his innocent noseIn piteous chase.Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends,''Tis right,' quoth he: 'thus misery doth partThe flux of company': anon a careless herd,Full of the pasture, jumps along by him,And never stays to greet him. 'Ah,' quoth Jaques,'Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens;'Tis just the fashion: wherefore do you lookUpon that poor and broken bankrupt there?'"[24]
[24]As You Like It, II. i.
And finally he told how the gallant beast died a soldier's death, fighting to the bitter end.
"Marry, 'twas a right good chase, and bravely must thy steed have borne thee. But thou wast too venturesome, Master Shakespeare," exclaimed the squire, "a-trying to jump that mound into the tyning by Master Blackett's house."
"Tell me, I prithee," answered Shakespeare, anxious to turn the conversation from his own share in the day's proceedings, "whose dog won the silver-studded collar this year in the coursing matches on Cotswold?"[25]
[25]Merry Wives of Windsor.
"Our Bill Peregrine, here, at the farm, carried it off. A prettier bit of coursing I never did see!"
"Ah! that was the country fellow that turned up when we sounded the mort by Col-Dene. He seemed to spring up out of the ground. He is a snapper up of unconsidered trifles, I'll be bound. The fellow claimed the hide: he said the skin was the keeper's fee."[26]
[26]3Henry VI, III. i.
"That 'ould be he. I warrant he lent a hand in taking assay and breaking up the deer. Tis just what he enjoys."
"Ah! I marked him disembowelling the poor dead beast in right good will, with hands besmeared with blood."[27]
[27]Henry IV., V. iv.
Then they fell to talking of other things; and the honest old squire began to brag about his London days, and how he was once of Clement's Inn.
"There was I, and little John Doit of Staffordshire, and black George Barnes, and Francis Pickbone, and Will Squele, a Cotswold man; you had not four such swinge-bucklers in all the Inns o' Court again."[28]
[28]Henry IV., III. ii.
But the old man was far too interested in his own doings to ask if his guest had ever been in London. It is the prerogative of age to take for granted that all younger men are of no account, and even as children, "to be seen and not heard."
"To-morrow," said the squire, "at break of day, we be a-going a-birding, to try some young falcons Bill Peregrine has lately trained. Wilt join us, Master Shakespeare?"
"Ah, that I will, sir! I know a hawk from a handsaw, or my name's not William Shakespeare."
By this time the cold capon and the venison pasty, as well as the "little tiny kickshaws," together with a gallon of "good sherris-sack," had been considerably reduced by the united efforts of the squire, the famished hunter, and those below the salt. During the meal such scraps of conversation as this might have been heard:
"Will you please to take a bit of bacon, Master Shakespeare?"
"Not any, I thank you," replied the poet.
"What, no bacon!" put in the serving man from behind, in a voice of surprise bordering on disappointment.
"No bacon for me, I thank you;I never take bacon," repeated Shakespeare, with some emphasis.
Then the master of the house would occasionally address a remark to his serving man about the farm, such as, "How a good yoke of bullocks at Ciren Fair?" or, "How a score of ewes now?" meaning how much are they worth. Once the serving man took the initiative, asking, "Shall we sow the headlands with wheat?" receiving the reply, "With red wheat, Davy."[29]
[29]2Henry IV, V. i.
Then there was some discussion concerning the stopping of William's (Peregrine's?) wages, "About the sack he lost the other day at Hinckley Fair."
SHAKESPEARE: "This Davy serves you for good uses; he is your serving man and your husbandman."
SQUIRE: "A good varlet, a good varlet, a very good varlet.... By the mass, I have drunk too much sack at supper! A good varlet."[30]
[30]2Henry IV, V. iii.
These were the squire's last words that night. He soon slept peacefully, as was his wont after his evening meal; whereupon the poet, with his accustomed gallantry, commenced making love in right good earnest to the fair daughter of the house.
The Cotswold girls, like the Irish, have always been famous for their beauty. Even amongst the peasants you may nowadays see the most beautiful and graceful women in the world, though their attire is usually of a plain and unbecoming character, and but ill adapted to set off the features and form of the wearer. The squire's daughter, whom we will call Jessica, was no exception to the rule. She was a handsome brunette--indeed, the squire called her a "black ousel." Shakespeare fell in love with her at once, and, forgetting all about the family at Stratford, he plunged into the most desperate flirtation. The girl, with that natural perception of the divine in man common to her sex, could not help feeling a strange admiration for this unexpected, though not unwelcome, guest. There was something about his countenance which exercised a peculiar charm and fascination. The thoughtful brow, the keen hazel eye, and the gentle bearing of the man were what at first attracted attention. But it was his manner and speech, half serious and half mirthful, which made such an impression on her mind; and perhaps she felt that, "to the face whose beauty is the harmony between that which speaks from within and the form through which it speaks, power is added by all that causes the outer man to bear more deeply the impress of the inner."
The surroundings, too, were as romantic as they possibly could be. A pair of rush candles were shedding their dim light through the long low oak-panelled apartment; they were the only lights that were burning, and even these flickered ominously at times, as if threatening to go out and leave the place in total darkness. A full moon, however, was casting her silvery beams through the great lattice casement, and in one of the upper panes of this window were richly emblazoned the arms of which the squire was so proud.
It was a glorious evening. Opening the window, William Shakespeare looked out upon the peaceful garden. The moon was shedding a pale light upon the woods and the stream, "decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass." A hundred yards away the silent Coln was gliding slowly onwards towards the sea. Owls were breathing heavily in the hanging wood, and a pair of otters were hunting in the pool.
As the two sat by the open window, the poet's own life and its prospects formed the principal topic of conversation. After years of toil in London his fortunes were beginning at length to improve. He was manager of a theatre, and was at length earning a moderate competency. He had already saved a little money, and hoped soon to buy a house at Stratford. He looked forward some day to returning to his native place and living a country life. At present he was enjoying a short holiday, the first for over a year.
As they sat and talked over these matters, a minstrel began to play in one of the cottages of the village; the sound of the harp added another charm to the peaceful surroundings, and filled the poet's mind with a strange delight.
"I am never merry when I hear sweet music," said Jessica.
Whereupon her companion replied:
"' ... soft stillness and the nightBecome the touches of sweet harmony.Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heavenIs thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'stBut in his motion like an angel sings,Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;Such harmony is in immortal souls;But whilst this muddy vesture of decayDoth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.'"[31]
[31]Merchant of Venice, V. i.
Sweet is the sound of soft melodious music on a moonlight night; sweet the faint sigh of the breeze among the elms, and the light upon the silent stream; but sweeter far is music on a moonlight night, sweeter the faint sigh of the breeze, and the light upon the silent stream, when hope, renewed after years of sorrow and sadness, flatters once again the aims and objects of youth, gilding the landscape of life with wondrous alchemy, shedding rays of happy sunshine on the vague, mysterious yearnings of the soul of man towards the hidden destinies of the boundless future.
It was not long, however, before Shakespeare bade the fair Jessica good-night and retired to his sleeping apartment; for a run of such uncommon excellence as he had enjoyed that day was calculated to produce the tired, though not unpleasant, sensation which even now sends the hunting man sleepy, though happy, to bed.
So, lulled by the strains of the minstrel's harp did William Shakespeare seek his couch and sleep the sleep of the just But even while the body was wrapped in slumber, the highly wrought, powerful mind, though yet unconscious of its awful destiny, was hard at work, "moving about in worlds not realised." Yonder on the turret of that grey Gothic castle, whose pinnacles point ever upwards to the skies, they stand and wait, a glorious throng; and as they stand they wave him onwards. Dante, Homer, Virgil, Chaucer, Plutarch, Montaigne, and many another hero of old is waiting there. See the sharp-pointed features of the Italian bard, and Homer no longer blind! The two are holding animated converse, and ever beckoning him on. And a voice seemed to speak out loud and clear amid the solemn silence of eternity:
"Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,Not light them for themselves; for if our virtuesDid not go forth of us, 'twere all alikeAs if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touch'dBut to fine issues."[32]
[32]Measure for Measure, I. i.
Can he linger? Away with blank misgivings, fears, and doubts! He will climb the rugged, steep ascent, and follow even unto the end.
The following morning a little before sunrise saw a party of five assembled for a hawking expedition on the downs. Besides the squire and William Shakespeare, the parson had turned up, whilst Bill Peregrine (ancestor of all the Peregrines, including, no doubt, the famous Peregrine Pickle) brought one of his brothers from the farm to "help him out" with the hawks. It was somewhat of a peculiar dawn--one of those dull grey mornings which often bodes a fine day. The bard was much interested in the glowing eastern sky, and as the sun began to appear he turned to William Peregrine and enthusiastically exclaimed:
"'.... what envious streaksDo lace the severing clouds in yonder east:Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund dayStands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.'"[33]
[33]Romeo and Juliet, III. v.
"To be sure, to be sure, it do look a bit comical, don't it?" answered the yeoman, with a cackle; and then, turning to his brother, he said, "Ain't 'e ever seen the sun rise before?"
"Please, squire, who be the gent from Warwickshire?" says Peregrine,sotto voce; "I cannot tell what the dickens his name is!"
"Oh! 'is name's Shakespy, William Shakespy. A good un at his books, I'll be bound. Get the hawks, Bill; the sun be up. A' must be off to Stratford shortly," answered the squire, glancing at the poet.