Shanty the Blacksmith Part 2

"Why do you fill the young girl's mind, Dymock," said he, "with such fancies as you do? But, leaving her alone, let us speak of the Jews in general. They that wish them well should not fill them up with notions of a birth-right which they have forfeited, and thus confirm them in the very same pride which led them to crucify the Lord of Glory. What is a Jew more than another man? for he is not a Jew which is one outwardly; neither is that circ.u.mcision which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circ.u.mcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men but of G.o.d."

Rom. ii. 28, 29.

Mr. Dymock would not listen to honest Shanty on this subject, much as he respected him; and, indeed, the poor Laird was at this time deeply oppressed with other matters.

He had, in his various speculations, so entirely neglected his own affairs for some years past, that poverty, nay actual penury, was staring in his face. He had formerly mortgaged, by little and little, most of his lands, and nothing now remained to make money of, but the Castle itself and a few acres around it, with the exception only of a cottage and a small field, hitherto occupied by a labourer, which lay in a kind of hollow on the side of the knoll, where the entrance of the secret cavern was. This cottage was as remote from Dymock's Tower in one way, as Shanty's shed was in another; although the three dwellings formed together a sort of equilateral triangle. Mr. Dymock long suspected that this labourer had done his share to waste his substance; and once or twice it had occurred to him, that if he left the Castle he might retire to the cottage. But yet, to part with the Castle, could he find a purchaser, would, he feared, be death to Mrs. Margaret, and how would Tamar bear it?--this glorious Maid of Judah, as he was wont to call her,--this palm tree of Zion, this daughter of David,--the very fine person, and very superior air of Tamar having confirmed him in the impression of her n.o.ble birth. It was whilst these heavy thoughts respecting what must be done in the management of his affairs dwelt on his mind, that the same man who had finished the unfortunate plough appeared again in Shanty's shed.

The old man recognized him immediately, although fourteen years had much changed his appearance, and he at once charged him with having had some concern with the woman who left the child.

The well-acted astonishment of the vagrant, for such he was, silenced Shanty, though it did not convince him that he was mistaken in his conjecture. However, the old man, changing his mode of attack, and regretting that he had put the stranger on his guard by giving him so home a thrust, pretended to be convinced, and entered into easy conversation with him; amongst other things asking him if perchance he knew of any one who wanted to purchase an estate?

"Aye!" said the vagrant, to whom as we small have the pleasure of introducing him again, we think it may be well to give the name of Harefoot,--"Aye! old gentleman, and might one ask where this estate of yours may be?"

"It is of no consequence," replied Shanty, "I answer no questions, as not being empowered so to do. At all events, however, the estate is not far from hence, and it is a magnificent place, I promise you, More's the pity, that those who have owned it for some hundreds of years, should be compelled to part with it."

Other matters were then introduced, and Shanty endeavoured to wind about Harefoot, but with little success; for, deep as he thought himself, he had one deeper to deal with. In truth, poor Shanty was but a babe in cunning, and the vagrant departed, without having dropped a single hint which could be taken hold of respecting Tamar. In the meantime troubles were pressing upon poor Dymock, the interest of moneys lent on the motgage was not forthcoming, and the Laird having no better friend (and as to a sincerer he needed none,) than poor Shanty, used from day to day to go down to the shed, to open his heart to the old man.

Shanty had long advised his patron to tell his situation to Mrs.

Margaret, and to advertise the sale of the castle, but Dymock's pride had not yet so far submitted itself, as to enable him to make so public a confession of the downfall of the family, as an advertis.e.m.e.nt would do.

"I cannot open my heart to my aunt, Shanty," he said, "she, poor creature, has devoted her whole life to keeping up the dignity of the house; how, then, will she bear to see the whole labour of her life annihilated?"

"The sooner she knows of what is coming the better," returned Shanty, "if she is not prepared, the blow when it comes, will go nigh utterly to overpower her," and the old man proposed to go himself, to open the matter to her.

"You shall, Shanty, you shall," said the Laird, "but wait a little, wait a little, we may hear of a purchaser for the castle, and when such a one is found, then you shall speak to my aunt."

"But first," said Shanty, "let me prepare your adopted one, let me open the matter to her; she is of an age, in which she ought to think and act no longer as a child; it is now fourteen years since I carried her up in my arms to Dymock's Tower, and though the young girl is too much filled up with pride, yet I fear not but that she is a jewel, which will shine brighter, when rubbed under the wheel of adversity; allowing what I hope, that there is a jewel under that crust of pride."

"Pride!" repeated Dymock, flying off into the region of romance, "and if a daughter of Zion, a shoot from the Cedar of Lebanon, is not to carry her head high, who is to do so? the fate of her race may indeed follow her, and she may be brought down, to sit in the dust, but still even in the dust, she may yet boast her glorious origin."

Shanty raised his hands and eyes, "Lord help you! Dymock," he said, "but you are clean demented. I verily believe, that the child is nothing mere than the offspring of a begging gipsy, and that if her mother had been hanged, she would only have met with her deserts."

Discussions of this kind were constantly taking place between Shanty and Dymock, and it was in the very midst of one these arguments, that the rare appearance of a hired chaise,--a job and pair, as Shanty called it, appeared coming over the moor, directly to the shed, and so quick was the approach, that the Laird and the blacksmith had by no means finished their conjectures respecting this phenomenon, before the equipage came to a stand, in the front of the hut.

As the carriage stopped, a spare, sallow, severe looking old gentlemen, put his head out of the window, and calling to the post boy, in a sharp, querulous tone, asked if he were quite sure that he was right?

"Not sure that this is old Shanty's hut; Shanty of Dymock's Moor,"

replied the post-boy, in a broad Northern accent; "ask me if I don't know my own mother's son, though she never had but one bairn."

Dymock and Shanty no sooner heard the voice of the boy, than they both recognized him, and stepping forward, they went up to the carriage and offered to a.s.sist the old gentleman to alight; he received their civilities with very little courtesy. However, he got out of the carriage, and giving himself a shake, and a sort of twist, which caused the lappets of his coat to expand, like the fan-tail of a pigeon, he asked, if the place was Dymock's Moor, and if the old man he saw before him, was one called Shanty of the Moor? The blacksmith declared himself to be that same person, "and this gentlemen," he added, pointing to Dymock, whose every day dress, by the bye, did not savor much of the Laird, "This gentleman is Dymock himself."

"Ah, is it so," said the stranger, "my business then is with him, show me where I can converse with him."

"I have no parlour to offer you," said Shanty; "to my shed, however, such as it is, I make you welcome."

No gracious notice was taken by the stranger of the offer, but without preamble or ceremony, he told his errand to Mr. Dymock. "I hear," he said, "that you wish to sell your Tower, and the lands which surround it; if after looking at it, and finding that it suits me, you will agree to let me have it, I will pay you down in moneys, to the just and due amount of the value thereof, but first I must see it."

"It stands there, Sir," said Shanty, seeing that Mr. Dymock's heart was too full to permit him to speak; "it stands there, Sir, and is as n.o.ble an object as my eye ever fell upon. The Tower," continued the old man, "at this minute, lies directly under the only dark cloud now in the heavens; nevertheless, a slanting ray from the westering sun now falls on its highest turret; look on, Sir, and say wherever have you seen a grander object?"

The old gentleman uttered an impatient pish, and said, "Old man, your travels must needs have lain in small compa.s.s, if you think much of yon heap of stones and rubbish." The Laird's choler was rising, and he would infallibly have told the stranger to have walked himself off, if Shanty had not pulled him by the sleeve, and, stepping before the stranger, said something in a soothing way, which should enhance the dignity of the Tower and encourage the pretended purchaser.

"I must see it, I must see it," returned the old gentleman, "not as now mixed up with the clouds, but I must examine it, see its capabilities, and know precisely what it is worth, and how it can be secured to me and my heirs for ever."

It was warm work which poor Shanty now had to do; between the irritated seller and the testy buyer, he had never been in a hotter place before his own forge, and there was wind enough stirring in all reason, without help of bellows, for the Laird puffed and groaned and uttered half sentences, and wished himself dead, on one side of the old blacksmith, whilst the stranger went on as calmly, coolly, and deliberately, with his bargain, on the other side, as if he were dealing with creatures utterly without feeling. Shanty turned first to one, and then to another; nodding and winking to Dymock to keep quiet on one side, whilst he continued to vaunt the merits of the purchase on the other.

At length, on a somewhat more than usually testy remark of the stranger reaching the ears of the Laird, he burst by Shanty and had already uttered these words, "Let me hear no more of this, I am a gentleman, and abominate the paltry consideration of pounds, shillings, and pence;"

when Shanty forcibly seizing his arm, turned him fairly round, whispering, "Go, and for the sake of common sense, hold your tongue, leave the matter to me, let me bargain for you; go and tell Mrs.

Margaret that we are coming, and make what tale you will to her, to explain our unceremonious visit; you had better have told her all before."

The Laird informed Shanty that there was no need of going up to the Tower to inform his aunt, as she and Tamar were gone that day over the border to visit a friend; but added he, "I take your offer, Shanty, make the bargain for me if you can, and I shall not appear till I am wanted to sign and seal," and away marched the Laird nor was he forthcoming again for some hours.

After he was gone, Shanty begged leave to have a few minutes given him for washing his hands and face and making himself decent, and then walked up with the testy old gentlemen to the castle. Little as Shanty knew of the great and grand world, yet his heart misgave him, lest the ruinous state of the castle, (although the Tower itself stood in its ancient and undilapidated strength,) should so entirely disgust the stranger that he should at once renounce all ideas of the purchase; he was therefore much pleased when the old gentleman, having gone grumbling and muttering into every room and every outhouse, crying, it is naught!

it is naught! as buyers generally do, bade Shanty tell the Laird that he was going to the nearest town, that he should be there till the business was settled, that he would give the fair valuation for the estate, and that the payment should be prompt.

Shanty was, indeed astonished; he was all amazement, nor did he recover himself, till he saw the old gentleman walk away, and get into his carriage which was waiting on the other side of the moat, it not being particularly convenient, on account of the total deficiency of anything like a bridge or pa.s.sable road? to bring a carriage larger than a wheel-barrow up to the castle.

Dymock returned to the shed, when he, from some place of observation on the moor, saw that the carriage had reached the high road, and there, having been told all that had pa.s.sed, the poor gentleman (who, by the bye, was not half pleased with the idea of the honours of Dymock falling into the hands of such a purchaser,) informed Shanty that he must prepare to go with him the next day to Hexham, where the stranger had appointed to meet him.

"I go with you!" exclaimed Shanty, "was ever so strange a conceit."

"I shall be fleeced, shorn, ruined," implied Mr. Dymock, "if I go to make a bargain, without a grain of common sense in my company."

"True," returned Shanty, "your worship is right; but how are we to go? I have plenty of horse-shoes by me, but neither you, nor I Laird, I fear could find any four legs to wear them."

"We must e'en walk then," said Dymock, "nay, I would gladly carry you on my back, rather than descend to the meanness of driving a bargain with a testy old fellow like that; by the bye, Shanty, what does he call himself?"

"Salmon," replied Shanty, "and I mistake if he has not a touch of the foreigner on his tongue."

"You will accompany me, then Shanty," said the Laird.

"I will," he replied, "if this evening you will open the business out to Mrs. Margaret."

"It cannot be Shanty," replied Dymock chuckling, "for she does not expect to be back over the border till to-morrow, and when to-morrow is over and we know what we are about, then you shall tell her all."

"Dymock," said Shanty, "you are hard upon me, when you have a morsel to swallow that is too tough for you, you put it into my mouth; but," added the old man kindly, "there is not much that I would refuse to do for your father's son."

The sun had not yet risen over the moor, when Dymock and Shanty, both arrayed in their best, set off for Hexham, where they found the crabbed old gentlemen, still in the humour of making the purchase, though he abused the place in language at once rude and petulant; his offer, however, was, as Shanty compelled Dymock to see, a very fair one, though the more sensible and wary blacksmith could not persuade his friend to beware of trusting anything to the honour of Mr. Salmon.

Dymock's estate had been deeply mortgaged, the sale was made subject to the mortgages, and the purchaser was bound to pay the mortgagee the mortgage moneys, after which there was small surplus coming to poor Dymock. This small surplus was, however, paid down on the signing of the papers; still, however, there was an additional payment to take place soon after possession.

This payment was, it was supposed, to be for fixtures and other articles, which were to be left on the premises, and it was not to be asked till Mr. Salmon had been resident a few weeks. The amount was between five and six hundred pounds, and was in fact all that Dymock would have to depend upon besides his cottage, his field, a right of shooting on the moor, and fishing in a lake which belonged to the estate, and about twenty pounds a year which appertained to Mrs.

Margaret, from which it was supposed she had made some savings.

Shanty had succeeded in forcing the Laird to listen to the dictates of prudence, and to act with sufficient caution, till it came to what he called the dirty part of the work, to wit, the valuation of small articles, and then was the blood of the Dymocks all up; nor would he hear of requiring a bond for the payment of this last sum, such a doc.u.ment, in fact, as should bind the purchaser down to payment without dispute. He contented himself only with such a note from the old man as ought he a.s.serted to be quite sufficient, and it was utterly useless for Shanty to expostulate. The Laird had got on his high horse and was prancing and capering beyond all the controul of his honest friend, whilst Mr. Salmon, no doubt, laughed in his sleeve, and only lamented that he had not known Dymock better from the first, for in that case he would have used his cunning to have obtained a better bargain of the castle and lands. It was not one nor two visits to Hexham which completed these arrangements; however Mr. Dymock, after the first visit, no longer refused to permit Shanty to open out every thing to his aunt, and to prepare her to descend into a cottage, on an income of forty or fifty pounds a year.

Mrs. Margaret bore the information better than Shanty had expected; she had long antic.i.p.ated some such blow, and her piety enabled her to bear it with cheerfulness. "I now," she said, "know the worst, and I see not wherefore, though I am a Dymock, I should not be happy in a cottage, I am only sorry for Tamar; poor Tamar! what will become of her?"

"Oh mother! dear mother!" said Tamar weeping, "why are you sorry for me, cannot I go with you? surely you would not part from me;" and she fell weeping on Mrs. Margaret's bosom.