Читать книгу A Danish Parsonage - John Fulford Vicary - Страница 10

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"Hunting trains up the younger nobility to the use of manly exercises in their riper age."

—The Complete Angler.

To John Hardy the days passed pleasantly at the little Danish parsonage. He taught the boys English a short time daily, and their bright faces and strong desire to learn made Hardy interested in their progress. If they were inclined to be inattentive, which was rare, the hint that he should not take them with him fishing secured earnest and immediate attention. The Pastor saw that the boys made progress in learning English with Hardy, and he himself taught them several hours daily, or, if he were absent, he set them work to do, and his daughter Helga sat in the room until the Pastor returned.

Hardy accompanied him in his visits to his Sognebørn (literally, parish children), and he gradually became acquainted with the Danish farmers, and was known in the parish as Præsten's Englænder, or the parson's Englishman. He was amused by the habits of many of the men, in treating him as if he was a harmless idiot, to be humoured and always answered in the affirmative. Stories were told him of how in some parts of the river there were trout et Par Alen long (about four feet), but to amuse the idiot for the moment.

The peculiarity of knickerbockers received much consideration, and it was a frequent question if Hardy adopted that dress for a sickness in his legs. Hardy's knowledge of farming and the management of cattle, particularly horses, was an unfailing source of conversation. There are many good horses bred in Jutland for sale in England, Germany, and Sweden. The original breed appeared to Hardy to be either Hungarian or Polish. These horses are well adapted for light carriage work; and many a horse foaled on a Jutland farm has been in a London carriage, to the considerable profit of the importer.

The evenings at the parsonage passed in conversation with the Pastor, who held a sort of tobacco parliament. Hardy was a good listener, and was anxious to perfect himself in the Danish language. Frøken Helga knitted and listened. The boys learned lessons or played games. The Pastor liked to hear his daughter sing; but it would be doing that worthy man strong injustice to say he liked the piano, which was very old and worse than worthless. It was to Hardy's ear torture to hear it in contrast with Frøken Helga's clear voice. At last he could stand it no longer, and the matter came to a crisis.

"Herr Pastor," said Hardy, "when at the exhibition of Copenhagen, of your national industry, I was much struck by the tone of a piano by a Copenhagen maker, and I have ordered one, and I shall be much indebted to you if you will allow it to be sent here until I return to England."

"There will be much extra expense attached to that plan," replied the Pastor, "and, besides, it might get injured here."

"Those considerations I am fully prepared for," said Hardy; "but if I may take the leaf from my mouth, as you Danes say, or speak plainly, your piano is worn out, and is spoiling Frøken Helga's ear and taste for music. Her voice is excellent, and rings as clearly as a silver bell; but then the jingle of the piano is like the toothache."

"We are all accustomed to it," said the Pastor; "but I only hear Helga's voice."

So the piano appeared, and a man to tune it, and Frøken Helga played it. The tone was good, and the Pastor listened to the old Danish songs he had heard so many times with delight.

One evening Helga had to make a visit to a sick woman, and the Pastor puffed away at his teacup of a pipe, with longer puffs than usual. Hardy saw there was something in the way, and at last it struck him that he missed his daughter's song. He had once told Hardy that her voice was like her mother's.

Hardy sat down to the piano, and played and sang an English ballad, and then another. He then sang a plaintive German song, with a manly pathos and taste, that showed the well-bred gentleman he was.

The Pastor applauded loudly, and Hardy turned round, and, lo! there was Frøken Helga, with a look on her face that Hardy never forgot, so intense was her surprise.

"Helga," said her father, "go and thank Herr Hardy for his singing to me instead of you; he saw I missed you, my child, and he sang to divert me."

"A thousand thanks!" said Helga, using a common Danish expression. "I never heard so beautiful a song! But why did you not tell us that you could play and sing before?"

"Because I preferred Frøken Helga's voice to that of Præsten's Englænder," said Hardy.

Nothing would induce Frøken Helga to sing that evening; her father almost commanded her, but she would not. At last she said, "I cannot, father; Herr Hardy sings too well."

This speech was not forgotten for a long time, and Karl and Axel teased their sister with perpetual questions as to whether they or she was not doing something or other too well. If Karl caught no trout, he explained to his sister that he was afraid of fishing too well. If Axel had dirty hands, his explanation was that he was afraid of washing them too well.

John Hardy had visited the Gudenaa within walking distance, or boating distance, and he wished to make longer expeditions from the parsonage. He inspected several of the farms near, and at last arranged with farmer Niels Jacobsen to rent stabling for three horses. He then wrote the following letter, addressed to a groom at Hardy Place:—

"Robert Garth,

"I want you to bring Buffalo to me in Denmark. The horse is to be taken to Harwich, and thence on board the steamer for Esbjerg. The steamers are fitted up with stables for horses, and there will be no difficulty. When you come to Esbjerg, take train to Horsens, where I will meet you. A telegram must be sent me to Vandstrup Præstegaard, to say when you will arrive at Horsens. Bring two hunting saddles and bridles, and some of the snaffle bits that I like.

"Show this letter to the steward, and he will let you have what money he thinks is necessary for your journey.

"Yours truly,

"John Hardy."

In little more than a week, Buffalo and Robert Garth were in Niels Jacobsen's stables.

Buffalo was a good English-bred horse, a good jumper, with a chest like a wall, and hind-quarters up to weight. Niels Jacobsen and his neighbours had collected and criticized.

"Gild bevars! sikken en Hest!" ["God preserve us, what a horse!"] said Niels, sucking away at his pipe, with a chorus echoing the same words from his neighbours. There was no doubt of their approval, and Buffalo had a succession of visitors and admirers for days.

Hardy had communicated to Pastor Lindal that he intended to have one of his horses and a groom from England, and had great difficulty in preventing the Pastor turning out his own small stable to make room for Buffalo; but this Hardy would not allow. Robert Garth lodged at Jacobsen's, and Hardy, with that thoughtfulness he always had for those about him, arranged for his man's meals and sleeping quarters as nearly as possible to an English groom's notions.

"Well, Bob," said Hardy, "you will shake down after a bit; but what I want you to do is, to help me to pick out a pair of light carriage horses from here. I have seen a lot, and you will have plenty to choose from. They will suit my mother, and I wish to take them over as a present to her."

"I have seen some of them Danish horses," said Robert Garth, "and not half bad horses either; but it is the infernal lingo. They keep smoking them big wood pipes, and when they don't smoke they chews, and then they spits."

"Where did you see any Danish horses?" asked Hardy.

"At Sir Charles'; he had a pair, hardly up to fifteen hands, but very pretty steppers, with a thinish mane, a trifle small below the knee," said Garth.

"That's the very thing," said Hardy.

As soon as it was known that the priest's Englishman wanted to buy two Jutland horses, plenty offered; and Karl and Axel were intensely interested in the trial of the horses, which went on in a rough piece of land close to the parsonage.

When the horses were brought up, Hardy mounted one, and Robert Garth criticized. Hardy put the horse through its paces, and if his judgment was not favourable, it was declined; but if doubtful. Garth rode it, and Hardy looked on. A couple of horses were thus selected, and both had Robert Garth's unqualified approval.

"They are both as handsome as paint, and as sound as bells," said Garth.

"Are you a horse-dealer?" asked Pastor Lindal, of Hardy, one evening.

"No, certainly not," replied Hardy.

"You have shown every qualification for it," said the Pastor.

"Possibly," said Hardy. "I see I have done this also too well. I only wanted the horses for my mother's carriage. She likes an open light carriage, and it is difficult to procure really good horses in England of a suitable size. The horses I have bought will suit her exactly, if we have good luck with them; that is, that they turn out well, and we have no accident with them. I shall buy a light four-wheel carriage at Horsens, and my groom will drive them, and we shall then see if it be necessary to discard either or both, before they are taken to England."

"But why did you send for a horse from England?" said Pastor Lindal, to whom a horse was a horse and a cow was a cow.

"I fear because I like a good horse," replied Hardy. "Your Jutland horses are not adapted to the saddle, except for lady's hacks, or light carriage work; my English horse would jump the ditches that abound in your Danish fields, and would, for instance, jump your garden wall."

"That I am sure no horse can," said the Pastor, decidedly.

"Does he mean, father," said Frøken Helga, "that his horse can jump our garden wall?"

"Yes," said Hardy; "it is scarcely five feet. But will you promise, Frøken Helga, that if my horse does jump the wall, that you will not say that the horse does it too well? It is not me, but the horse that jumps the wall."

Helga looked annoyed at the reference made to her saying that he sang and played too well for any one to follow after him, but she said nothing.

Karl and Axel had listened. They too thought it impossible; but they believed in Hardy.

"Well, Karl," said Hardy, "don't you believe in me and the English horse?"

"No," said Karl. "A horse cannot jump the garden wall by himself, much more with a man on his back; no horse could do it. But I believe you can do anything."

"Well, Herr Pastor," said Hardy, "I have no one who believes in me or my horse. Frøken Helga regards me with suspicion; and no one in Jutland appears to believe more than they see."