Digby Heathcote: The Early Days of a Country Gentleman's Son and Heir. Kingston William Henry Giles
with which they, in their ignorance of the injury they were inflicting, supplied him.
I think that we have now got a very good idea of Bloxholme, its inhabitants, and its neighbourhood. I must again warn my readers that none of the characters I have described were model people. Mr Heathcote himself certainly was not, nor was altogether Mrs Heathcote, nor was her brother, Mr Nugent; and the troubles and difficulties Digby brought upon himself, and the pain and suffering he endured, will show that he is intended for a warning rather than an example.
I must not, however, forget my old friend John Pratt – a very worthy, honest fellow. He was a sort of under steward on the property. He looked after the cows, and pigs, and poultry, and sheep, and young colts. He assisted in the kitchen garden, but did not profess to know much about flowers. He acted also as a gamekeeper, but he was especially great in fishing matters, and everything connected with the ponds and the rookery. He always decided when the young rooks were to be shot, and when the ponds were to drained or drawn. He superintended the taking of all wasp’s nests. He had charge of the ferrets, the hawks, and dogs; and as to vermin, the stoats, and the weasels, and polecats, and even the rats, it was supposed had positively an instinctive dread of him. He was a tall, thin, wiry man, with a bald forehead, and grey hair, and a keen intelligent countenance. Digby was very fond of him, and he in return doted on the young master, and would have gone through fire and water to serve him. He had already contrived to instruct Digby in many of the secrets of his science, and as he used to say, “It was a pleasure to teach Master Digby, he took to it so kindly, and was afraid of nothing. He’d grapple with a weasel, or a snake, or a pike, and not cry out for help, when most other young ’uns would a been running screaming away from them. To see him once tackle-to with one of the big swans, and only a little stick in his hand, it was for all the world like St. George a-fighting the dragon, just as you see on a gold sovereign.”
Digby, however, had, in the encounter mentioned, very nearly got his arm broken, and would in other ways have suffered probably severely had not John come to the rescue. It proved, however, the fearlessness of his disposition, which had so won John Pratt’s admiration. John Pratt himself feared no mortal foes; but the poorer classes in that part of the country were excessively superstitious, and he partook to the full of the general feeling.
Whereas, happily, throughout England generally, the grosser styles of superstition have been in a great degree eradicated by the exertions of the ministers of the Gospel and by the spread of education, in some parts, and this was one of them, all the absurd notions in which our ancestors indulged in the dark ages have been handed down to the present generation. Ghosts, hobgoblins, witches and their secret powers, charms, amulets, spirits of every sort, were believed in with undoubting faith. Education had not spread into the district, and, unfortunately, the clergymen who had successively ministered in that and the neighbouring parishes had done little or nothing to eradicate the pernicious and anti-Christian notions which were prevalent among the people. They had been what were called very good sort of men. They had preached very fair average sermons on a Sunday, and if people chose to come to church to hear them they were welcome to do so. If any of their parishioners were sick and sent for them, they went to them, with their Bibles in their pockets, from which, perhaps, they read a chapter or two, and, with a few ordinary words of consolation or advice, they hurried away as fast as they could. They hunted, and shot, and dined with Mr Langley and Mr Heathcote, and all the gentlemen round; and drank their wine, and told good stories, and amused themselves and those with whom they associated to the utmost of their power. They passed for worthy jolly good fellows, and no more was demanded of them. It never seemed to occur to them that they would have to answer some day or other respecting the souls of their fellow-creatures committed to their pastoral care. They wondered why there was so much ignorance and superstition in their parishes; why people did not come to church; why dissent was rife; why dissenting chapels were built; why the country people were so immoral; why there was so much drunkenness, folly, and wickedness.
John Pratt, as I was saying, notwithstanding all his good qualities, was a firm believer in witches, ghosts, and hobgoblins, and an arrant coward with regard to the spiritual world.
As Digby ran through the grounds he found him by the side of the lake, repairing one of the fishing punts. As he sat with mallet and blunt chisel in hand, driving the oakum into her seams, he was neither whistling nor smiling, as was his wont. So absorbed was he, indeed, in his own thoughts, that he did not observe the young master’s approach.
“What’s the matter, John?” said Digby; “you don’t seem happy to-day.”
John started, and looked up, “Oh, Master Digby, is that you? I didn’t see you, that I didn’t,” he exclaimed. “Happy, did you say, Master Digby? No, I ain’t happy by no means. I’m going to be bewitched; and that’s enough to make a man anything but happy, I’m thinking.”
“What does that mean, John?” asked Digby; “I don’t understand.”
“Why, Master Digby, you knows Dame Marlow – she as lives with her old man down in the gravel-pits at Mile-End – she’s a witch, and a wicked old body, if ever there was one in this world. Well, t’other day, as I was sauntering like down the green lane, who should I see breaking through the fence at the corner of the copse but the old Dame herself. She’d a bird in her hand, and as I ran up to her I found ’twas a hen pheasant. When she seed me she tried to hide it away under her red cloak, and, in her hurry, very nearly toppled down the bank on her nose, into the road. ‘Oh, Dame Marlow, Dame Marlow, what have you been about?’ I cried out. ‘You’ve been a-stealing master’s pheasants, that you have; you wicked old woman, that you are.’ Still I didn’t like to lay hands on her, do you see, for I know’d well what she was, and what she can do. On she went, hobbling away with her crutch as fast as I could walk, almost. At last she stopped, and turning round her face – oh how wicked and vengeful it looked, how her red ferret eyes glared at me – says she to me, ‘Who calls? Ay, is that you, John Pratt? Ay; and you’re seeking your own harm. You want to bring down a curse on your own head; you want to malign and injure a poor old body with a decrepit husband, who can’t help himself, do you? Speak, man – what is it you want?’ ‘I want master’s pheasant which you’ve been trapping, dame,’ says I; ‘and I must have it, too,’ says I, growing bold. ‘Ay, I see you want to be cursed,’ says she; ‘you want to have the marrow dry up in your bones, and the skin wither up on your flesh, and the hair fall off your head, and your eyes grow dim, and your teeth drop out, and your legs not to bear your body, and your hands to tremble,’ – ‘Stop, stop, dame,’ says I, ‘don’t curse me now; I’m only doing my duty. I want the pheasant back; I’d sooner give you its value than quarrel with you.’ ‘It’s too late,’ says she, looking more wicked than ever, and not trusting me, I suppose; ‘you’re bewitched already, and you’ll find it out before long, that you will, let me tell you.’ Saying this, on she hobbled, as before. I followed, thinking that I ought and must have the pheasant; but she turned upon me such a wicked look, and again hissed out, ‘You’re bewitched, John Pratt; you’re bewitched, man,’ that I couldn’t stand it, and had to run away as fast as my legs could carry me, while she set up a shout of laughter which is even now ringing in my ears.”
“Very horrid, indeed, John,” said Digby, who did not exactly know whether or not to believe in Dame Marlow’s powers. “But do you really think she can do what she says?”
“No doubt about it, Master Digby,” answered the old man, with grave earnestness; “you should just hear what all the folks in the country round do say of her. There’s no end of the cows, and sheep, and pigs, she’s bewitched in her time. Many’s the one she’s sent to their graves before their glass was run out, just because they’d offended her. Oh, she’s a terrible woman, depend on that, Master Digby.”
Much more nonsense of a similar character did poor John talk. I need not repeat it. Digby was almost persuaded to believe all that the old man told him.
This conversation was interrupted by a light, hearty fit of laughter. So eager had they become that they had not perceived that Kate had approached them, and had been an attentive and amused listener to much that had been said on the subject.
“All that you have been saying is arrant nonsense, John,” she exclaimed, unable longer to restrain herself;