Читать книгу Wenderholme - Philip Gilbert Hamerton - Страница 13

"But we shouldn't say Mister Stanburne now," observed the Doctor; "he's Colonel Stanburne."

"Do militia officers keep their titles when not on duty?" asked Mr. Isaac.

"Colonels always do," said the Doctor, "but captains don't, in a general way, though there are some places where it is the custom to call 'em captain all the year round. I suppose Mr. Isaac here will be Captain Ogden some of these days."

"I was not aware you intended to join the militia, Mr. Isaac," said the clergyman. "I am very glad to hear it. It will be a pleasant change for you. Since you left business, you must often be at a loss for occupation."

"I've had plenty to do until a year or two since in getting Twistle Farm into order. It's a wild place, but I've improved it a good deal, and it amused me. I sometimes wish it were all to be done over again. A man is never so happy as when he's very busy about carrying out his own plans."

"You made a fine pond there, didn't you?" said Mr. Prigley, who always had a hankering after this pond, and was resolved to improve his opportunity.

"Yes, I need a small sheet of water. It is of use to me nearly the whole year round. I swim in it in summer, I skate on it in winter, and in the spring and autumn I can sail about on it in a little boat, though there is not much room for tacking, and the pond is too much in a hollow to have any regular wind."

"Ah! when the aquatic passion exists in any strong form," said Mr. Prigley, "it will have its exercise, even though on a small scale. One of the great privations to me in Shayton is that I never get any swimming."

"My pond is very much at your service," said Mr. Isaac, politely. "I am sorry that it is so far off, but one cannot send it down to Shayton in a cart, as one might send a shower-bath."

Mrs. Ogden was much pleased to see her scheme realizing itself so naturally, without any ingerence of her own, and only regretted that it was not the height of summer, in order that Mr. Prigley might set off for Twistle Farm the very next morning. However enthusiastic he might be about swimming, he could scarcely be expected to explore the too cool recesses of the Twistle pond in the month of November—at least for purposes of enjoyment; and Mrs. Ogden was not Papist enough to encourage the good man in any thing approaching to a mortification of the flesh.

Little Jacob had been admitted to the ceremony of tea, and had been a model of good behavior, being "seen and not heard," which in Shayton comprised the whole code of etiquette for youth when in the presence of its seniors and superiors. Luckily for our young friend, he sat between the Doctor and the hostess, who took such good care of him that by the time the feast was over he was aware, by certain feelings of tightness and distension in a particular region, that the necessities of nature were more than satisfied, although, like Vitellius, he had still quite appetite enough for another equally copious repast if only he had known where to put it. If Sancho Panza had had an equally indulgent physician at his side, one of the best scenes in Don Quixote could never have been written, for Dr. Bardly never hindered his little neighbor, but, on the other hand, actually encouraged him to do his utmost, and mentally amused himself by enumerating the pieces of tea-cake and buttered toast, and the helpings to crab and potted meat, and the large spoonfuls of raspberry-jam, which our hero silently absorbed. The Doctor, perhaps, acted faithfully by little Jacob, for if nature had not intended boys of his age to accomplish prodigies in eating, she would surely never have endowed them with such vast desires; and little Jacob suffered no worse results from his present excesses than the uncomfortable tightness already alluded to, which, as his vigorous digestion operated, soon gave place to sensations of comparative elasticity and relief.

The parson's children had not been admitted to witness and partake of the splendor of the festival, but had had their own tea—or rather, if the truth must be told, their meal of porridge and milk—in a nursery upstairs. They had been accustomed to tea in the evening, but of late the oatmeal-porridge which had always been their breakfast had been repeated at tea-time also, as the Prigleys found themselves compelled to measures of still stricter economy. People must be fond of oatmeal-porridge to eat it with pleasure seven hundred times a-year; and whenever a change did come, the children at the parsonage relished it with a keenness of gastronomic enjoyment which the most refined epicure might envy, and which he probably never experienced. There were five little Prigleys, and it is a curious fact that the parson's children were the only ones in the whole parish that did not bear Biblical names. All the other households in Shayton sought their names in the Old Testament, and had a special predilection for the most ancient and patriarchal ones; but the parson's boys were called Henry and William and Richard, and his girls Edith and Constance—not one of which names are to be found anywhere in Holy Scripture, either in the Old Testament or the New.