Lancashire Sketches. Edwin Waugh
she caressed it and croodled about it, like a mother singing lullabies to a tired child. And Bardsea was pleased and still, as if it knew it all. It seemed the enchanted ear of the landscape; for everywhere else the world was alive with the jocund restlessness of the season. My friend and I wandered about from morning to night. In the heat of the day the white roads glared in the sun; and, in some places, the air seemed to tremble at about a man's height from the ground, as I have seen it tremble above a burning kiln sometimes. But for broad day we had the velvet glades and shady woods of Conishead to ramble in; and many a rich old lane, and some green dells, where little brooks ran whimpling their tiny undersongs, in liquid trebles, between banks of nodding wild flowers. Our evening walks were more delightful still; for when soft twilight came, melting the distinctions of the landscape in her dreamy loveliness, she had hardly time to draw "a thin veil o'er the day" before sea and land began to shine again under the radiance of the moon. Wandering among such scenes, at such a time, was enough to touch any man's heart with gratitude for the privilege of existence in this world of ours.
My friend's house stands upon a buttressed shelf of land, half-way up the slope which leads from the shore into Bardsea. It is the most seaward dwelling of the place; and it is bowered about on three sides with little plots of garden, one of them kept as a playground for the children. It commands a glorious view of the bay, from Hampsfell, all round by Arnside and Lancaster, down to Fleetwood. Sometimes, at night, I have watched the revolutions of the Fleetwood light, from the front of the house, whilst listening to the surge of the tide along the shore, at the foot of the hill.
One day, when dinner was over, we sat down to smoke at an open window, which looked out upon the bay. It was about the turning of the tide, for a fisherman's cart was coming slowly over the sands, from the nets at low water. The day was unusually hot; but, before we had smoked long, I felt as if I couldn't rest any longer indoors.
"Where shall we go this afternoon?" said I, knocking the ashes out of my pipe upon the outside sill.
"Well," replied my friend, "I have been thinking that we couldn't do better than stroll into the park a while. What do you say?"
"Agreed," said I. "It's a bonny piece of woodland. I dare say many a Roman soldier has been pleased with the place, as he marched through it, sixteen centuries ago."
"Perhaps so," said he, smiling, and taking his stick from the corner; "but the scene must have been very different then. Come along."
At the garden gate we found three of his flaxen-headed children romping with a short-legged Scotch terrier, called "Trusty." The dog's wild eyes shone in little slits of dusky fire through the rusty thicket of gray hair which overhung them. "Trusty" was beside himself with joy when we came into the road; and he worried our shoes, and shook our trousers' slops in a sham fury, as if they were imaginary rats; and he bounced about and barked, till the quiet scene, from Bardsea to Birkrigg, rang with his noisy glee. Some of the birds about us seemed to stop singing for a few seconds, and, after they had taken an admiring look sideway at the little fellow, they burst out again louder than ever, and in more rollicking strains, heartily infected with the frisky riot of that little four-legged marlocker. Both the dog and the children clamoured to go with us. My friend hesitated as first one, then another, tugged at him, and said: "Pa, let me go." Turning to me, he scratched his head, and said: "I've a good mind to take Willie." The lad instantly gave a twirl round on one heel, and clapped his hands, and then laid hold of his father's coat-lap, by way of clenching the bargain at once. But, just then, his mother appeared at the gate, and said: "Eh, no, Willie, you'd better not go. You'll be so tired. Come, stay with me. That's a good boy." Willie let go his hold slowly, and fell back with a disappointed look. "Trusty" seemed to know that there was a hitch in the matter, for he suddenly became quieter; and, going up to Willie, he licked his hands consolingly, and then, sitting down beside him, he looked round from one to another, to see how the thing was to end.
"Don't keep tea waiting for us," said my friend, "we'll be back in time for an early supper."
"Very well," replied his good wife; "we'll have something nice. Don't be late."
The dog was now whining and wrestling in the arms of Willie, who was holding him back. We made our bows, and bade "Good-bye" to the children and to their mother, and then turned up the road. Before we had got many yards, she called out:—
"I say, Chris, if you go as far as Ulverstone, call at Mrs. Seatle's, and at Town and Fell's, for some things which I ordered. Bella Rigg can bring them down in her cart. These children want a new skipping rope, too: and you might bring something for Willie."
The little girls begun to dance about, shaking their sunny locks, and singing, "Eh, a new skipping rope! a new skipping rope!" Then the youngest seized her father's hand, and cocking up her rosy button-hole of a mouth, she said, "Pa! Pa! lift me up! I want to tell you somefin."
"Well; what is it, pet?" said he, taking her in his arms.
Clipping his neck as far as she could, she said, "Div me a tis, first." And then she whispered in his ear, "If—you'll—buy—me—a big doll, I'll sing, 'Down in a low and drassy bed,' four times, when you tum home,—now then. 'Trusty' eated my odder doll, when we was playin' shop in de dardin." And then he had to kiss them again, and promise—I know not what.
Once more we said "Good bye," and walked up towards the white village; the chime of sweet voices sinking into a silvery hum as we got farther off. Everything in Bardsea was unusually still. Most of the doors and windows were open; and, now and then, somebody peeped out as we passed by, and said it was "a fine day." Turning round to look at the sands, we saw the dumpy figure of "Owd Manuel," the fisherman, limping up from the foot of the slope, with his coat slung upon his arm. The old man stopped, and wiped his forehead, and gave his crutch a flourish, by way of salutation. We waved our hats in reply, and went on. At the centre of the village stands the comfortable inn, kept by "Old Gilly," the quaint veteran who, after spending the prime of manhood in hard service among the border smugglers, has settled down to close the evening of his life in this retired nest. Here, too, all was still, except the measured sound of a shoemaker's hammer, ringing out from the open door of a cottage, where "Cappel" sat at his bench, beating time upon a leather sole to the tune of a country song. And, on the shady side, next door to the yard wall, which partly encloses the front of the old inn, the ruddy, snow-capped face and burly figure of "Old Tweedler" was visible, as still as a statue. He was in his shirt sleeves, leaning against the door-cheek of his little grocery shop, smoking a long pipe, and looking dreamily at the sunny road. "Tweedler" needs a good deal of wakening at any time; but when he is once fairly wakened, he is a tolerable player on the clarionet, and not a very bad fiddler; and he likes to talk about his curious wanderings up and down the kingdom with show-folk. When the old man had found us out, and had partly succeeded in getting his heavy limbs into a mild disposition to move, he sidled forth from his little threshold, and came towards us, gurgling something from his throat that was not unlike the low growl of an old hoarse dog. His gruff, slow-motioned voice sounded clear all around, waking the echoes of the sleepy houses, as he said, "Well,—gen-tle-men. What? Wheer are you for,—to-day?" We told him that we were going down to the Priory, for a stroll; but we should like to call at "Gilly's" first, for a few minutes, if he would go in with us. "Well," said he; "it's a very het day an' I don't mind hevin' an odd gill. In wi' ye,—an' I'll follow—in a minute," and then he sidled back to his nest.
There was not a sound of life in "Old Gilly's" house; but the trim cap of his kind dame was visible inside, bobbing to and fro by the window of the little bar. "Gilly," in his kind-hearted way, always calls her "Mammy." We looked in at the bar, and the old lady gave us a cordial welcome. "My good-man has just gone to lie down," said she; "but I'll go and tell him." We begged that she would let him rest, and bring us three glasses of her best ale. The sun shone in strongly at the open back door. At the rear of the house, there is a shady verandah, and a garden in front of it. There we sat down, looking at the bright bay. The city of Lancaster was very distinct, on the opposite side of the water, more than twenty miles off. In a few minutes we heard Tweedler's cart-horse tread, as he came through the lobby, with two books in his hand.
"There," said he, handing one of them to me; "I've turned that up amang a lot o' lumber i't house. I warnd it's just the thing for ye. What the devil is't, think ye? For it's past my skill."
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