Lavengro: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest. Borrow George
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keys; crayons, moreover, and water colours, and a sketch of a wild prospect near, which, though but half finished, afforded ample proof of the excellence and skill of the boyish hand now occupied upon it.
Ah! he was a sweet being, that boy soldier, a plant of early promise, bidding fair to become in after time all that is great, good, and admirable. I have read of a remarkable Welshman, of whom it was said, when the grave closed over him, that he could frame a harp, and play it; build a ship, and sail it; compose an ode, and set it to music. A brave fellow that son of Wales—but I had once a brother who could do more and better than this, but the grave has closed over him, as over the gallant Welshman of yore; there are now but two that remember him—the one who bore him, and the being who was nurtured at the same breast. He was taken, and I was left! Truly, the ways of Providence are inscrutable.
“You seem to be very comfortable, John,” said I, looking around the room and at the various objects which I have described above: “you have a good roof over your head, and have all your things about you.”
“Yes, I am very comfortable, George, in many respects; I am, moreover, independent, and feel myself a man for the first time in my life—independent did I say?—that’s not the word, I am something much higher than that; here am I, not sixteen yet, a person in authority, like the centurion in the book there, with twenty Englishmen under me, worth a whole legion of his men, and that fine fellow Bagg to wait upon me, and take my orders. Oh! these last six weeks have passed like hours of heaven.”
“But your time must frequently hang heavy on your hands; this is a strange wild place, and you must be very solitary?”
“I am never solitary; I have, as you see, all my things about me, and there is plenty of company below stairs. Not that I mix with the soldiers; if I did, good-bye to my authority; but when I am alone I can hear all their discourse through the planks, and I often laugh to myself at the funny things they say.”
“And have you any acquaintance here?”
“The very best; much better than the Colonel and the rest, at their grand Templemore; I had never so many in my whole life before. One has just left me, a gentleman who lives at a distance across the bog; he comes to talk with me about Greek, and the Odyssey, for he is a very learned man, and understands the old Irish and various other strange languages. He has had a dispute with Bagg. On hearing his name, he called him to him, and, after looking at him for some time with great curiosity, said that he was sure he was a Dane. Bagg, however, took the compliment in dudgeon, and said that he was no more a Dane than himself, but a true-born Englishman, and a sergeant of six years’ standing.”
“And what other acquaintance have you?”
“All kinds; the whole neighbourhood can’t make enough of me. Amongst others there’s the clergyman of the parish and his family; such a venerable old man, such fine sons and daughters! I am treated by them like a son and a brother—I might be always with them if I pleased; there’s one drawback, however, in going to see them; there’s a horrible creature in the house, a kind of tutor, whom they keep more from charity than anything else; he is a Papist and, they say, a priest; you should see him scowl sometimes at my red coat, for he hates the king, and not unfrequently, when the king’s health is drunk, curses him between his teeth. I once got up to strike him, but the youngest of the sisters, who is the handsomest, caught my arm and pointed to her forehead.”
“And what does your duty consist of? Have you nothing else to do than pay visits and receive them?”
“We do what is required of us: we guard this edifice, perform our evolutions, and help the excise; I am frequently called up in the dead of night to go to some wild place or other in quest of an illicit still; this last part of our duty is poor mean work, I don’t like it, nor more does Bagg; though without it, we should not see much active service, for the neighbourhood is quiet; save the poor creatures with their stills, not a soul is stirring. ’Tis true, there’s Jerry Grant.”
“And who is Jerry Grant?”
“Did you never hear of him? that’s strange, the whole country is talking about him; he is a kind of outlaw, rebel, or robber, all three, I daresay; there’s a hundred pounds offered for his head.”
“And where does he live?”
“His proper home, they say, is in the Queen’s County, where he has a band; but he is a strange fellow, fond of wandering about by himself amidst the bogs and mountains, and living in the old castles; occasionally he quarters himself in the peasants’ houses, who let him do just what he pleases; he is free of his money, and often does them good turns, and can be good-humoured enough, so they don’t dislike him. Then he is what they call a fairy man, a person in league with fairies and spirits, and able to work much harm by supernatural means, on which account they hold him in great awe; he is, moreover, a mighty strong and tall fellow. Bagg has seen him.”
“Has he?”
“Yes! and felt him; he too is a strange one. A few days ago he was told that Grant had been seen hovering about an old castle some two miles off in the bog; so one afternoon what does he do but, without saying a word to me—for which, by-the-bye, I ought to put him under arrest, though what I should do without Bagg I have no idea whatever—what does he do but walk off to the castle, intending, as I suppose, to pay a visit to Jerry. He had some difficulty in getting there on account of the turf-holes in the bog, which he was not accustomed to; however, thither at last he got and went in. It was a strange lonesome place, he says, and he did not much like the look of it; however, in he went, and searched about from the bottom to the top and down again, but could find no one; he shouted and hallooed, but nobody answered, save the rooks and choughs, which started up in great numbers. ‘I have lost my trouble,’ said Bagg, and left the castle. It was now late in the afternoon, near sunset, when about half-way over the bog he met a man—”
“And that man was—”
“Jerry Grant! there’s no doubt of it. Bagg says it was the most sudden thing in the world. He was moving along, making the best of his way, thinking of nothing at all save a public-house at Swanton Morley, which he intends to take when he gets home and the regiment is disbanded—though I hope that will not be for some time yet: he had just leaped a turf-hole, and was moving on, when, at the distance of about six yards before him, he saw a fellow coming straight towards him. Bagg says that he stopped short, as suddenly as if he had heard the word halt, when marching at double-quick time. It was quite a surprise, he says, and he can’t imagine how the fellow was so close upon him before he was aware. He was an immense tall fellow—Bagg thinks at least two inches taller than himself—very well dressed in a blue coat and buff breeches, for all the world like a squire when going out hunting. Bagg, however, saw at once that he had a roguish air, and he was on his guard in a moment. ‘Good evening to ye, sodger,’ says the fellow, stepping close up to Bagg, and staring him in the face. ‘Good evening to you, sir! I hope you are well,’ says Bagg. ‘You are looking after some one?’ says the fellow. ‘Just so, sir,’ says Bagg, and forthwith seized him by the collar; the man laughed, Bagg says it was such a strange awkward laugh. ‘Do you know whom you have got hold of, sodger?’ said he. ‘I believe I do, sir,’ said Bagg, ‘and in that belief will hold you fast in the name of King George, and the quarter sessions;’ the next moment he was sprawling with his heels in the air. Bagg says there was nothing remarkable in that; he was only flung by a kind of wrestling trick, which he could easily have baffled, had he been aware of it. ‘You will not do that again, sir,’ said he, as he got up and put himself on his guard. The fellow laughed again more strangely and awkwardly than before; then, bending his body and moving his head from one side to the other as a cat does before she springs, and crying out, ‘Here’s for ye, sodger!’ he made a dart at Bagg, rushing in with his head foremost. ‘That will do, sir,’ says Bagg, and drawing himself back he put in a left-handed blow with all the force of his body and arm, just over the fellow’s right eye—Bagg is a left-handed hitter, you must know—and it was a blow of that kind which won him his famous battle at Edinburgh with the big Highland sergeant. Bagg says that he was quite satisfied with the blow, more especially when he saw the fellow reel, fling out his arms, and fall to the ground. ‘And