CHAPTER XXXV

THE “CAT AND CUSTARD-POT” DAY

HE above day deserves a more extended notice than it receives in Mr. Jorrocks’s journal. He writes that “somehow or other in shavin’, he thought they’d ’ave mischief,” and he went into the garden as soon as he was dressed to consult the prophet, Gabriel Junks, so that he might take his pocket Siphonia in case it was likely to be wet, but the bird was not there. Then just as he had breakfasted and was about ready for a start, young May, the grocer, sent him a horse to look at, and as “another gen’l’man” was waiting for the next offer of him, Charley and Mr. Jorrocks stayed behind to try him, and after a hard deal, Mr. Jorrocks bought him for £30—which he makes a mem.: “to call £50.”

Meanwhile Pigg and Ben trotted on with the hounds, and when they reached the meet—the sign of the “Cat and Custard-pot,” on the Muswell Road, they found an immense assemblage, some of whom greeted Pigg with the familiar inquiry, “what he’d have to drink?”

“Brandy!” replied Pigg, “brandy!” and tossing off the glass with great gusto, a second horseman volunteered one, then a third, then a fourth, then a fifth; for it is observable that there are people in the world who will give away drink to any extent, who yet would be chary of offering either money or meat. Pigg, who, as Mr. Jorrocks says in his journal, is only a lusus naturæ, or loose ’un by natur’, tosses off glass after glass, smacking his lips and slapping his thigh, getting noisier and noisier with each succeeding potation. Now he would sing them a song, now he would take the odds ag’in Marley Hill, then he would tell them about Deavilboger’s farm, and how, but for his foreelder John, John Pigg, ye see, willin’ his brass to the Formary ye see, he’d ha been a gen’l’man that day and huntin’ his own hunds. Then as another glass made its appearance, he would take off his cap and halloo out at the top of his voice, making the hounds stare with astonishment, “Keep the tambourine a rowlin’!” adding as he tossed it off, “Brandy and baccy ’ill gar a man live for iver!” And now when he was about at the noisiest, with his cap turned peak-backwards, and the tobacco juice simmering down the deeply indented furrows of his chin, our master and Charley appear in the distance, jogging on, not too quickly for consequence, but sufficiently fast to show they are aware they are keeping the field waiting.

“Here he comes! here’s Jorrocks! here’s the old boy! here’s Jackey at last!” runs through the meeting, and horsemen begin to arrange themselves for the reception.

“A—a—a sink!” exclaims Pigg, shaking his head, blinking and staring that way, “here’s canny ard sweet-breeks hissel!” adding with a slap of his thigh as the roar of laughter the exclamation produced subsided, “A—a—a, but ar de like to see his feulish ’ard feace a grinnin’ in onder his cap!”

“How way, canny man; how way!” now shouts Pigg, waving his hand as his master approached. “How way! canny man, how way! and give us a wag o’ thy neif,” Pigg extending his hand as he spoke.

Mr. Jorrocks drew up with great dignity, and placing his fist in his side, proceeded to reconnoitre the scene.

“Humph!” grunted he, “wot’s all this about?”

“Sink, but ar’ll gi’ thou a gob full o’ baccy,” continued James, nothing daunted by his master’s refusal of his hand. “Sink, but ar’ll gi’ thou a gob full o’ baccy,” repeated he, diving into his waistcoat pocket and producing a large steel tobacco box as he spoke.

Mr. Jorrocks signified his dissent by a chuck of the chin, and an ominous shake of the head.

“A—a—a man!” exclaimed Pigg, now changing his tone, “but ar’ll tell thee of a lass well worth her licks!”

“You deserve your own, sir, for gettin’ so drunk,” observed Mr. Jorrocks, haughtily.

Pigg.—“Ar’s as sober as ye are, and a deal wizer!”

Jorrocks (angrily).—“I’ll not condescend to compare notes with ye!”

Pigg (now flaring up).—“Sink; if anybody ’ill had mar huss, ar’ll get off and fight him.”

Jorrocks, contemptuously.—“Better stick to the shop-board as long as you can.”

Pigg, furious.—“Gin ar warn’t afeard o’ boggin mar neif, ard gi thou a good crack i’ thy kite!”

Jorrocks, with emphasis.—“Haw—da—cious feller. I’ll ’unt the ’ounds myself afore I’ll put hup with sich himperence!”

Pigg, throwing out his arms and grinning in ecstacies.—

“Ar’ll be death of a guinea but arl coom and see thee!”

Jorrocks (looking indignantly round on the now mirth-convulsed company).—“Who’s made my Pigg so drunk?”

Nobody answered.

“Didn’t leave his sty so,” muttered our master, lowering himself jockey ways from his horse.

“’Old my quad,” said he to Charley, handing him Arterxerxes, “while I go in and see.”

Our master then stumped in, and presently encountering the great attraction of the place—the beautiful Miss D’Oiley—asked her, with a smiling countenance and a hand in a pocket, as if about to pay, “Wot his ’untsman ’ad ’ad?”

“Oh, sir, it is all paid,” replied Miss D’Oiley, smiling as sweetly upon Jorrocks as she did on the generality of her father’s customers, for she had no more heart than a punch-bowl.

“Is all paid?” muttered our friend.

“Yes, sir; each gentleman paid as he sent out the glass.”

“Humph!” twigged Mr. Jorrocks, adding, with a grunt, “and that’s wot these critters call sport!”

Our master then stumped out. “Well, gen’l’men,” exclaimed he, at the top of his voice off the horse-block, “I ’opes you’re satisfied wi’ your day’s sport!— you’ve made my nasty Pigg as drunk as David’s sow, so now you may all go ’ome, for I shalln’t throw off; and as to you,” continued our indignant master, addressing the now somewhat crestfallen Pigg, “you go ’ome too, and take off my garments, and take yourself off to your native mountains, for I’ll see ye at Jericho ayont Jordan afore you shall ’unt my ’ounds,” giving his thigh a hearty slap as he spoke.

“Wy, wy, sir,” replied Pigg, turning his quid; “wy, wy, sir, ye ken best, only dinna ye try to hont them thysel’—that’s arle!”

“There are as good fish i’ the sea as ever came out on’t!” replied Mr. Jorrocks, brandishing his big whip furiously; adding, “I’ll see ye leadin’ an old ooman’s lap-dog ’bout in a string afore you shall ’unt ’em.”

“No, ye won’t!” responded Pigg. “No, ye won’t! Arve ne carle te de nothin’ o’ the sort! Arve ne carle te de nothin’ o’ the sort!—Arle gan back to mar coosin Deavilboger’s.”

“You may gan to the devil himself,” retorted Mr. Jorrocks vehemently—“you may gan to the devil himself—I’ll see ye sellin’ small coals from a donkey-cart out of a quart pot afore you shall stay wi’ me.”

“Thou’s a varra feulish, noisey, gobby, insufficient, ’ard man!” retorted Pigg, “and ar doesn’t regard thee! No; ar doesn’t regard thee!” roared he, with a defiant flourish of his fist.

“You’re a hignorant, hawdacious, rebellious rascal, and I’ll see ye frightenin’ rats from a barn wi’ the bag-pipes at a ’alfpenny a day, and findin’ yoursel’, afore I’ll ’ave anything more to say to ye,” rejoined Mr. Jorrocks, gathering up his big whip as if for the fray.

“Sink, arle tak’ and welt thee like an ard shoe, if thou gives me ony mair o’ thy gob!” rejoined the now furious Pigg, ejecting his baccy and motioning as if about to dismount.

Jorrocks, thinking he had done enough, then took his horse from Charley Stobbs, and hoisting himself on like a great crate of earthenware, whistled his hounds away from the still stupefied Pigg, who sat blinking and staring and shaking his head, thinking there were two Jorrocks’s on two Arterxerxes’, two Ben’s, two Charley Stobbs’s, and something like five-and-forty couple of hounds.

The field remained behind praising Pigg and abusing Jorrocks, and declaring they would withdraw their subscriptions to the hounds if Pigg “got the sack.” None of them would see Pigg want; and Harry Capper, more vehement than the rest, proposed an immediate subscription, a suggestion that had the effect of dispersing the field, who slunk off different ways as soon as ever the allusion to the pocket was made.

Jorrocks was desperately angry, for he had had an expensive “stop,” and came bent on mischief. His confusion of mind made him mistake the road home, and go by Rumfiddler Green instead of Muswell Hill. He spurred, and cropped, and jagged Arterxerxes—now vowing that he would send him to the tanners when he got ’ome—now that he would have him in the boiler afore night. He was very much out of sorts with himself and everybody else—even the hounds didn’t please him— always getting in his way, hanging back looking for James Pigg, and Ben had fine fun cutting and flopping them forrard.

Charley, like a wise man, kept aloof.

In this unamiable mood our master progressed, until the horrible apparition of a great white turnpike-gate, staring out from the gable-end of a brick toll-house, startled his vision and caused him to turn short up a wide green lane to the left. “Take care o’ the pence and the punds ’ill take care o’ theirsels,” muttered our master to himself, now sensible that he had mistaken his road, and looking around for some landmark to steer by. Just as he was identifying White Choker Church in the distance, a sudden something shot through the body of the late loitering, indifferent hounds, apparently influencing them with a sort of invisible agency. Another instant, and a wild snatch or two right and left ended in a whimper and a general shoot up the lane.

“A fox! for a ’underd!” muttered our master, drawing breath as he eyed them. “A fox! for two-and-twenty ’underd!” continued he, as Priestess feathered but spoke not.

“A fox! for a million!” roared he, as old Ravager threw his tongue lightly but confidently, and Jorrocks cheered him to the echo.

“A fox! for ’alf the national debt!” roared he, looking round at Charley as he gathered himself together for a start.

Now as Jorrocks would say, Beckford would say, “where are all your sorrows and your cares, ye gloomy souls? or where your pains and aches, ye complaining ones? one whimper has dispelled them all.”

Mr. Jorrocks takes off his cap and urges the tail-hounds on. A few more driving shoots and stops, producing increased velocity with each effort, and a few more quick snatchy whimpers, end in an unanimous outburst of downrightly determined melody.

Jorrocks, cocking his cap on his ear seats himself plump in his great saddle, and, gathering his reins, gallops after them in the full grin of delight. Away they tear up the rutty, grassy ride, as if it was a railway. “F-o-o-r-rard on! F-o-o-r-rard on!” is his cry.

“H-o-i-c cry! h-o-i-c cry! h-o-i-c!” squeaks Ben, wishing himself at home at the mutton, and delighted at having got rid of James Pigg, who always would have the first cut.

It is a long lane that never has a turn, and this one was no exception to the rule, for in due course it came to an abrupt angle. A convenient meuse, however, inviting the fox onward, he abandoned the line and pursued his course over some bare, badly-fenced pastures, across which Mr. Jorrocks cheered and rode with all the confidence of a man who sees his way out. The pace mended as they went, and Jorrocks hugged himself with the idea of killing a fox without Pigg. From the pastures they got upon Straggleford Moor, pretty much the same sort of ground as the fields, but the fox brushing as he went, there was a still further improvement of scent. Jorrocks then began to bet himself hats that he’d kill him, and went vowing what he would offer to Diana if he did. There was scarcely any promise too wild for him to make at this moment. The fox, however, was not disposed to accommodate Jorrocks with much more plain sailing for the purpose, and seeing, by the scarlet coats, that he was not pursued by his old friends the Dotfield harriers, as at first he thought, and with whom he had had many a game at romps, he presently sunk the hill and made for the stiffly-fenced vale below.

“Blow me tight!” exclaimed Jorrocks, shortening his hold of Arterxerxes, and putting his head straight as he used to do down the Surrey hills, “Blow me tight! but I wish he mayn’t be gettin’ me into grief. This looks to me werry like the Ingerleigh Wale, and if it is, it’s a bit of as nasty ridin’ grund as ever mortal man got into— yawnin’ ditches with him practicable fences, posts with rails of the most formidable order, and that nasty long Tommy bruk, twistin’ and twinin’ about in all directions like a child’s rattle-snake. ’Owever, thank goodness, ’ere’s a gap and a gate beyond,” continued he, as his quick eye caught a gap at the corner of the stubble field he was now approaching, which getting through, he rose in his stirrups and cheered on the hounds in the line of the other convenience. “For-r-a-r-d! For-r-a-r-d!” shrieked he, pointing the now racing hounds out to Charlie, who was a little behind; “for-rard! for-rard!” continued Jorrocks, rib-roasting Arterxerxes. The gate was locked, but Jackey—we beg his pardon—Mr. Jorrocks—was quickly off, and setting his great back against it, lifted it off the hinges. “Go on! never mind me!” cried he to Charley, who had pulled up as Jorrocks was dancing about with one foot in the stirrup, trying to remount.—“Go on! never mind me!” repeated he, with desperate energy, as he made another assault at the saddle. “Get on, Ben, you most useless appendage!” continued he, now lying across the saddle, like a miller’s sack. A few flounders land him in the desired haven, and he trots on, playing at catch-stirrup with his right foot as he goes.

“Forrard on! forrard on!” still screamed he, cracking his ponderous whip, though the hounds were running away from him as it was, but he wanted to get Charley Stobbs to the front, as there was no one to break his fences for him but him.

The hounds, who had been running with a breast-high scent, get their noses to the ground as they come upon fallow, and a few kicks, jags, and objurgations on Jorrocks’s part soon bring Arterxerxes and him into the field in which they are. The scent begins to fail.

“G—e-e-e-nt—ly there!” cries Jorrocks, holding up his hand and reining in his horse, inwardly hoping the fox might be on instead of off to the right, where he sees his shiny friend, long Tommy, meandering smoothly along.

“Yo dote! Ravager, good dog, yo dote, Ravager!” cheers Jorrocks, as the sage feathers and scuttles up the furrow. “Yo-o dote!” continued Mr. Jorrocks, cheering the rest on—adding as he looks at them scoring to cry, “wot a petty it is we can’t put new legs to old noses!” The spurt, however, is of short duration, for the ground gets worse as it rises higher, until the tenderest-nosed hound can hardly own the scent. A heavy cloud too oppresses the atmosphere. Jorrocks sees if he doesn’t look sharp he’ll very soon be run out of scent, so getting hold of his hounds, he makes a rapid speculation in his mind as to which way he would go if he were the fox, and having decided that point, he loses no time in getting the pack to the place.—Jorrocks is right!— Ravager’s unerring nose proclaims the varmint across the green headland, and the next field being a clover ley, with a handy gate in, which indeed somewhat influenced Jorrocks in his cast, the hounds again settle to the scent, with Jorrocks rolling joyfully after them, declaring he’d be the best ’untsman under the sun if it warn’t for the confounded lips. Away he now crams, up the field road, with the hounds chirping merrily along on his right, through turnips, oat stubble, winter beans, and plough. A white farm onstead, Buckwheat Grange, with its barking cur in a barrel, causes the fox to change his course and slip down a broken but grassy bank to the left. “Dash his impittance, but he’s taken us into a most unmanageable country,” observes Mr. Jorrocks, shading his eyes from the now out-bursting sun with his hand as he trotted on, eyeing the oft occurring fences as he spoke. “Lost all idee of where I ham, and where I’m a goin’,” continued he, looking about to see if he could recognize anything. Hills, dales, woods, water were equally new to him.

Crash! now go the hounds upon an old dead thorn fence, stuck on a low sod-bank, making Jorrocks shudder at the sound. Over goes Stobbs without doing anything for his followers.

“Go on, Binjimin! go on! Now,” cries Jorrocks, cantering up, cracking his whip, as if he wanted to take it in stride, but in reality to frighten Ben over to break it. “Go on, ye miserable man-monkey of a boy!” repeats he, as Xerxes now turned tail, nearly upsetting our master—“Oh, you epitome of a tailor!” groaned Jorrocks; “you’re of no more use wi’ ’ounds than a lady’s-maid,—do believe I could make as good a wipper in out of a carrot! See! you’ve set my quad a refusin’, and I’ll bet a guinea ’at to a ’alf-crown wide-awake he’ll not face another fence to-day.—Come hup, I say, you hugly beast!” now roared Jorrocks, pretending to put Arterxerxes resolutely at it, but in reality holding him hard by the head,—“Get off, ye useless apology of a hosier and pull it down, or I’ll give you sich a wopping as ’ll send you to Blair Athol for the rest of the day,” exclaimed our half-distracted master, brandishing his flail of a whip as he spoke.

Ben gladly alighted, and by dint of pulling away the dead thorns, and scratching like a rabbit at the bank, he succeeded in greatly reducing the obstacle.

“Now lead him over!” cried Mr. Jorrocks, applying his whip freely to Xerxes, and giving Ben a sly, accidental cut. Xerxes floundered over, nearly crushing Ben, and making plain sailing for Jorrocks. Our master then followed and galloped away, leaving Ben writhing and crying, and vowing that he would “take and pull him off his ’oss.”

The hounds had now shot a few fields ahead, but a flashy catching scent diminishing their pace, Mr. Jorrocks was soon back to them yoicking and holding them on. “Yooi, over he goes!” cheered he, taking off his cap, as Priestess endorsed Ranger’s promissory note on a very wet undrained fallow—“Yooi, over he goes!” repeated he, eyeing the fence into it, and calculating whether he could lead over or scuttle up to the white gate on the left in less time, and thinking the latter was safer, having got the hounds over, he rose in his stirrups, and pounded away while Charley took the fence in his stride. They were now upon sound old pasture, lying parallel with tortuous Tommy, and most musical were the hounds’ notes as each in turn prevailed. Mr. Jorrocks had lit on his legs in the way of gates, and holloaed and rode as if he didn’t know what eraning was.

“Forrard on, Priestess, old betch!” cheered he, addressing himself to the now leading hound, “forrard on! —for-rard!” adding, “I’ll gie ye sich a plate o’ bones if we do but kill.”

On the hounds went bustling, chirping, and whimpering, all anxious to fly, but still not able to accomplish it. The scent was shifty and bad, sometimes serving them, and then as quickly failing, as if the fox had been coursed by a dog. Jorrocks, though desperately anxious to get them on better terms with their fox, trots gently on, anxiously eyeing them, but restraining his ardour, by repeating the old couplet,—

“Aye, aye, but full well he knows also,” continued our master, after he had repeated the lines three or four times over, “that to kill their fox they must press ’im, at some period or other o’ the chase, which they don’t seem at all inclined to do,” continued he, looking at their indifferent, slack mode of proceeding. “Forrard on!” at length cries our master, cracking his whip at a group of dwellers, who seemed inclined to reassure every yard of the ground —“Forrard on!” repeated he, riding angrily at them, adding, “cus your unbelievin’ ’eads, can’t you trust old Priestess and Ravager?”

To increase our worthy master’s perplexities, a formidable flock of sheep now wheel semicircularly over the line, completely obliterating any little scent that remained, and though our finest huntsman under the sun, aided by Charley as whip, quickly got the hounds beyond their foil, he was not successful in touching upon the line of the fox again.

“Humph,” grunted our master, reviewing his cast, “the ship must ha’ heat ’im, or he’s wanished into thin hair;” adding, “jest put ’em on to me, Charley, whilst I makes one o’ Mr. Craven Smith’s patent all-round-my-’at casts, for that beggar Binjimin’s of no more use with a pack of ’ounds than a hopera-box would be to a cow, or a frilled shirt to a pig.” So saying, Mr. Jorrocks out with his tootler, and giving a shrill blast, seconded by Charley’s whip, proceeded to go down wind, and up wind, and round about wind, without, however, feeling a touch of his fox. At length scarce a hound would stoop, and old black Lucifer gave unmistakable evidence of his opinion of matters by rolling himself just under Jorrocks’s horse’s nose, and uttering a long-drawn howl, as much as to say, “Come, old boy! shut up! it’s no use bothering: let’s off to dinner!”

“Rot ye! ye great lumberin’ henterpriseless brute!” roared Jorrocks, cutting indignantly at him with his whip, “rot ye! d’ye think I boards and lodges and pays tax ’pon you to ’ave ye settin’ up your ’olesale himperance that way?—g-e-e-t-e away, ye disgraceful sleepin’ partner o’ the chase!” continued he, as the frightened hound scuttled away with his tail between his legs.

“Well, it’s nine ’underd and fifty thousand petties,” muttered our master now that the last of the stoopers had got up their heads, “it’s nine ’underd and fifty thousand petties that I hadn’t got close away at his brush, for I’d ha’ killed ’im to a dead certainty. Never was a fox better ’unted than that! Science, patience, judgment, skill, everything that constitutes an ’untsman —Goodhall, himself, couldn’t ha’ done it better! But it’s not for mortals to command success,” sighed our now greatly dejected master.