Читать книгу Famous Persons and Places - N. P. Willis - Страница 18

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BORDER SCENERY—COACHMANSHIP—ENGLISH COUNTRY-SEATS—THEIR EXQUISITE COMFORT—OLD CUSTOMS IN HIGH PRESERVATION—PRIDE AND STATELINESS OF THE LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE GENTRY—THEIR CONTEMPT FOR PARVENUS.

If Scott had done nothing else, he would have deserved well of his country for giving an interest to the barren wastes by which Scotland is separated from England. “A’ the blue bonnets” must have had a melancholy march of it “Over the Border.” From Gala-Water to Carlisle it might be anywhere a scene for the witches’ meeting in Macbeth. We bowled away at nearly twelve miles in the hour, however, (which would unwind almost any “serpent of care” from the heart,) and if the road was not lined with witches and moss-troopers, it was well macadamized. I got a treacherous supper at Howick, where the Douglas pounced upon Sir Alexander Ramsay; and, recovering my good humor at Carlisle, grew happier as the fields grew greener, and came down by Kendal and its emerald valleys with the speed of an arrow and the light heartedness of its feather. How little the farmer thinks when he plants his hedges and sows his fields, that the passing wayfarer will anticipate the gleaners and gather sunshine from his ripening harvest.

I was admiring the fine old castle of Lancaster, (now desecrated to the purposes of a county jail,) when our thirteen-mile whip ran over a phæton standing quietly in the road, and spilt several women and children, as you may say, en passant. The coach must arrive, though it kill as many as Juggernaut, and Jehu neither changed color, nor spoke a word, but laid the silk over his leaders to make up the back-water of the jar, and rattled away up the street, with the guard blowing the French horn to the air of “Smile again, my bonny lassie.” Nobody threw stones after us; the horses were changed in a minute and three quarters, and away we sped from the town of the “red nose.” There was a cool, you-know-where-to-find-me sort of indifference in this adventure, which is peculiarly English. I suppose if his leaders had changed suddenly into griffins, he would have touched them under the wing and kept his pace.

Bound on a visit to ——Hall in Lancashire, I left the coach at Preston. The landlady of the Red Lion became very suddenly anxious that I should not take cold when she found out the destination of her post-chaise. I arrived just after sunset at my friend’s lodge, and ordering the postillion to a walk, drove leisurely through the gathering twilight to the Hall. It was a mile of winding road through the peculiarly delicious scenery of an English park, the game visible in every direction, and the glades and woods disposed with that breadth and luxuriance of taste that make the country houses of England palaces in Arcadia. Anxious as I had been to meet my friend, whose hospitality I had before experienced in Italy, I was almost sorry when the closely-shaven sward and glancing lights informed me that my twilight drive was near its end.

An arrival in a strange house in England seems, to a foreigner, almost magical. The absence of all the bustle consequent on the same event abroad, the silence, respectfulness, and self-possession of the servants, the ease and expedition with which he is installed in a luxurious room, almost with his second breath under the roof—his portmanteau unstrapped, his toilet laid out, his dress shoes and stockings at his feet, and the fire burning as if he had sat by it all day—it is like the golden facility of a dream. “Dinner at seven!” are the only words he has heard, and he finds himself (some three minutes having elapsed since he was on the road) as much at home as if he had lived there all his life, and pouring the hot water into his wash-basin with the feeling that comfort and luxury in this country are very much matters of course.

The bell rings for dinner, and the new-comer finds his way to the drawing-room. He has not seen his host, perhaps, for a year; but his entrée is anything but a scene. A cordial shake of the hand, a simple inquiry after his health, while the different members of the family collect in the darkened room, and the preference of his arm by the lady of the house to walk into dinner, are all that would remind him that he and his host had ever parted. The soup is criticised, the weather “resumed,” as the French have it, gravity prevails, and the wine that he used to drink is brought him without question by the remembering butler. The stranger is an object of no more attention than any other person, except in the brief “glad to see you,” and the accompanying just perceptible nod with which the host drinks wine with him; and, not even in the abandon of after-dinner conversation, are the mutual reminiscences of the host and his friend suffered to intrude on the indifferent portion of the company. The object is the general enjoyment, and you are not permitted to monopolize the sympathies of the hour. You thus escape the aversion with which even a momentary favorite is looked upon in society, and in your turn you are not neglected, or bored with a sensation, on the arrival of another. In what other country is civilization carried to the same rational perfection?

I was under the hands of a physician during the week of my stay at ——Hall, and only crept out with the lizards for a little sunshine at noon. There was shooting in the park for those who liked it, and fox hunting in the neighborhood for those who could follow, but I was content (upon compulsion) to be innocent of the blood of hares and partridges, and the ditches of Lancashire are innocent of mine. The well-stocked library, with its caressing chairs, was a paradise of repose after travel; and the dinner, with its delightful society, sufficed for the day’s event.

My host was himself very much of a cosmopolite; but his neighbors, one or two most respectable squires of the old school among them, had the usual characteristics of people who have passed their lives on one spot, and though gentlemanlike and good-humored, were rather difficult to amuse. I found none of the uproariousness which distinguished the Squire Western of other times. The hale fox-hunter was in white cravat and black coat, and took wine and politics moderately; and his wife and daughters, though silent and impracticable, were well-dressed, and marked by that indefinable stamp of “blood,” visible no less in the gentry than in the nobility of England.

I was delighted to encounter at my friend’s table one or two of the old English peculiarities, gone out nearer the metropolis. Toasted cheese and spiced ale—“familiar creatures” in common life—were here served up with all the circumstance that attended them when they were not disdained as the allowance of maids of honor. On the disappearance of the pastry, a massive silver dish, chased with the ornate elegance of ancient plate, holding coals beneath, and protected by a hinged cover, was set before the lady of the house. At the other extremity of the table stood a “peg tankard” of the same fashion, in the same massive metal, with two handles, and of an almost fabulous capacity. Cold cheese and port were at a discount. The celery, albeit both modish and popular, was neglected. The crested cover erected itself on its hinge, and displayed a flat surface, covered thinly with blistering cheese, with a soupçon of brown in its complexion, quivering and delicate, and of a most stimulating odor. A little was served to each guest, and commended as it deserved, and then the flagon’s head was lifted in its turn by the staid butler, and the master of the house drank first. It went around with the sun, not disdained by the ladies’ lips in passing, and came to me, something lightened of its load. As a stranger I was advised of the law before lifting it to my head. Within, from the rim to the bottom, extended a line of silver pegs, supposed to contain, in the depth from one to the other, a fair draught for each bibber. The flagon must not be taken from the lips, and the penalty of drinking deeper than the first peg below the surface, was to drink to the second—a task for the friar of Copmanhurst. As the visible measure was of course lost when the tankard was dipped, it required some practice or a cool judgment not to exceed the draught. Raising it with my two hands, I measured the distance with my eye, and watched till the floating argosy of toast should swim beyond the reach of my nose. The spicy odor ascended gratefully to the brain. The cloves and cinnamon clung in a dark circle to the edges. I drank without drawing breath, and complacently passed the flagon. As the sea of all settled to a calm, my next neighbor silently returned the tankard. I had exceeded the draught. There was a general cry of “drink! drink!” and sounding my remaining capacity with the plummet of a long breath, I laid my hands once more on the vessel, and should have paid the penalty or perished in the attempt, but for the grace shown me as a foreigner, at the intercession of that sex distinguished for its mercy.

This adherence to the more hearty viands and customs of olden time, by the way, is an exponent of a feeling sustained with peculiar tenacity in that part of England. Cheshire and Lancashire are the stronghold of that race peculiar to this country, the gentry. In these counties the peerage is no authority for gentle birth. A title unsupported by centuries of honorable descent, is worse than nothing; and there is many a squire, living in his immemorial “Hall,” who would not exchange his name and pedigree for the title of ninety-nine in a hundred of the nobility of England. Here reigns aristocracy. Your Baron Rothschild, or your new-created lord from the Bank or the Temple, might build palaces in Cheshire, and live years in the midst of its proud gentry unvisited. They are the cold cheese, celery, and port, in comparison with the toasted cheese and spiced ale.