X
Whatever degree of small merit the act of benignity in favour of the midwife might justly claim, or in whom that claim truly rested,вБ†вАФat first sight seems not very material to this history;вБ†вЄЇвБ†certain however it was, that the gentlewoman, the parsonвАЩs wife, did run away at that time with the whole of it: And yet, for my life, I cannot help thinking but that the parson himself, though he had not the good fortune to hit upon the design first,вБ†вАФyet, as he heartily concurred in it the moment it was laid before him, and as heartily parted with his money to carry it into execution, had a claim to some share of it,вБ†вАФif not to a full half of whatever honour was due to it.
The world at that time was pleased to determine the matter otherwise.
Lay down the book, and I will allow you half a day to give a probable guess at the grounds of this procedure.
Be it known then, that, for about five years before the date of the midwifeвАЩs licence, of which you have had so circumstantial an account,вБ†вАФthe parson we have to do with had made himself a country-talk by a breach of all decorum, which he had committed against himself, his station, and his office;вБ†вАФand that was in never appearing better, or otherwise mounted, than upon a lean, sorry, jackass of a horse, value about one pound fifteen shillings; who, to shorten all description of him, was full brother to Rocinante, as far as similitude congenial could make him; for he answered his description to a hair-breadth in everything,вБ†вАФexcept that I do not remember вАЩtis anywhere said, that Rocinante was broken-winded; and that, moreover, Rocinante, as is the happiness of most Spanish horses, fat or lean,вБ†вАФwas undoubtedly a horse at all points.
I know very well that the HeroвАЩs horse was a horse of chaste deportment, which may have given grounds for the contrary opinion: But it is as certain at the same time, that RocinanteвАЩs continency (as may be demonstrated from the adventure of the Yanguesian carriers) proceeded from no bodily defect or cause whatsoever, but from the temperance and orderly current of his blood.вБ†вАФAnd let me tell you, Madam, there is a great deal of very good chastity in the world, in behalf of which you could not say more for your life.
Let that be as it may, as my purpose is to do extra justice to every creature brought upon the stage of this dramatic work,вБ†вАФI could not stifle this distinction in favour of Don QuixoteвАЩs horse;вБ†вЄЇвБ†in all other points, the parsonвАЩs horse, I say, was just such another,вБ†вАФfor he was as lean, and as lank, and as sorry a jade, as Humility herself could have bestrided.
In the estimation of here and there a man of weak judgment, it was greatly in the parsonвАЩs power to have helped the figure of this horse of his,вБ†вАФfor he was master of a very handsome demi-peakвАЩd saddle, quilted on the seat with green plush, garnished with a double row of silver-headed studs, and a noble pair of shining brass stirrups, with a housing altogether suitable, of grey superfine cloth, with an edging of black lace, terminating in a deep, black, silk fringe, poudr√© dвАЩor,вБ†вАФall which he had purchased in the pride and prime of his life, together with a grand embossed bridle, ornamented at all points as it should be.вБ†вЄЇвБ†But not caring to banter his beast, he had hung all these up behind his study door:вБ†вАФand, in lieu of them, had seriously befitted him with just such a bridle and such a saddle, as the figure and value of such a steed might well and truly deserve.
In the several sallies about his parish, and in the neighbouring visits to the gentry who lived around him,вБ†вАФyou will easily comprehend, that the parson, so appointed, would both hear and see enough to keep his philosophy from rusting. To speak the truth, he never could enter a village, but he caught the attention of both old and young.вБ†вЄЇвБ†Labour stood still as he passвАЩdвБ†вЄЇвБ†the bucket hung suspended in the middle of the well,вБ†вЄЇвБ†the spinning-wheel forgot its round,вБ†вЄЇвБ†even chuck-farthing and shuffle-cap themselves stood gaping till he had got out of sight; and as his movement was not of the quickest, he had generally time enough upon his hands to make his observations,вБ†вАФto hear the groans of the serious,вБ†вАФand the laughter of the lighthearted;вБ†вАФall which he bore with excellent tranquillity.вБ†вАФHis character was,вБ†вАФhe loved a jest in his heartвБ†вАФand as he saw himself in the true point of ridicule, he would say he could not be angry with others for seeing him in a light, in which he so strongly saw himself: So that to his friends, who knew his foible was not the love of money, and who therefore made the less scruple in bantering the extravagance of his humour,вБ†вАФinstead of giving the true cause,вБ†вАФhe chose rather to join in the laugh against himself; and as he never carried one single ounce of flesh upon his own bones, being altogether as spare a figure as his beast,вБ†вАФhe would sometimes insist upon it, that the horse was as good as the rider deserved;вБ†вАФthat they were, centaur-like,вБ†вАФboth of a piece. At other times, and in other moods, when his spirits were above the temptation of false wit,вБ†вАФhe would say, he found himself going off fast in a consumption; and, with great gravity, would pretend, he could not bear the sight of a fat horse, without a dejection of heart, and a sensible alteration in his pulse; and that he had made choice of the lean one he rode upon, not only to keep himself in countenance, but in spirits.
At different times he would give fifty humorous and apposite reasons for riding a meek-spirited jade of a broken-winded horse, preferably to one of mettle;вБ†вАФfor on such a one he could sit mechanically, and meditate as delightfully de vanitate mundi et fug√Ґ saeculi, as with the advantage of a deathвАЩs-head before him;вБ†вАФthat, in all other exercitations, he could spend his time, as he rode slowly along,вБ†вАФto as much account as in his study;вБ†вАФthat he could draw up an argument in his sermon,вБ†вАФor a hole in his breeches, as steadily on the one as in the other;вБ†вАФthat brisk trotting and slow argumentation, like wit and judgment, were two incompatible movements.вБ†вАФBut that upon his steedвБ†вАФhe could unite and reconcile everything,вБ†вАФhe could compose his sermonвБ†вАФhe could compose his cough,вБ†вЄЇвБ†and, in case nature gave a call that way, he could likewise compose himself to sleep.вБ†вАФIn short, the parson upon such encounters would assign any cause but the true cause,вБ†вАФand he withheld the true one, only out of a nicety of temper, because he thought it did honour to him.
But the truth of the story was as follows: In the first years of this gentlemanвАЩs life, and about the time when the superb saddle and bridle were purchased by him, it had been his manner, or vanity, or call it what you will,вБ†вАФto run into the opposite extreme.вБ†вАФIn the language of the county where he dwelt, he was said to have loved a good horse, and generally had one of the best in the whole parish standing in his stable always ready for saddling; and as the nearest midwife, as I told you, did not live nearer to the village than seven miles, and in a vile country,вБ†вАФit so fell out that the poor gentleman was scarce a whole week together without some piteous application for his beast; and as he was not an unkind-hearted man, and every case was more pressing and more distressful than the last,вБ†вАФas much as he loved his beast, he had never a heart to refuse him; the upshot of which was generally this, that his horse was either clappвАЩd, or spavinвАЩd, or greazвАЩd;вБ†вАФor he was twitter-bonвАЩd, or broken-winded, or something, in short, or other had befallen him, which would let him carry no flesh;вБ†вАФso that he had every nine or ten months a bad horse to get rid of,вБ†вАФand a good horse to purchase in his stead.
What the loss on such a balance might amount to, communibus annis, I would leave to a special jury of sufferers in the same traffick, to determine;вБ†вАФbut let it be what it would, the honest gentleman bore it for many years without a murmur, till at length, by repeated ill accidents of the kind, he found it necessary to take the thing under consideration; and upon weighing the whole, and summing it up in his mind, he found it not only disproportioned to his other expenses, but withal so heavy an article in itself, as to disable him from any other act of generosity in his parish: Besides this, he considered that with half the sum thus galloped away, he could do ten times as much good;вБ†вАФand what still weighed more with him than all other considerations put together, was this, that it confined all his charity into one particular channel, and where, as he fancied, it was the least wanted, namely, to the childbearing and child-getting part of his parish; reserving nothing for the impotent,вБ†вАФnothing for the aged,вБ†вАФnothing for the many comfortless scenes he was hourly called forth to visit, where poverty, and sickness, and affliction dwelt together.
For these reasons he resolved to discontinue the expense; and there appeared but two possible ways to extricate him clearly out of it;вБ†вАФand these were, either to make it an irrevocable law never more to lend his steed upon any application whatever,вБ†вАФor else be content to ride the last poor devil, such as they had made him, with all his aches and infirmities, to the very end of the chapter.
As he dreaded his own constancy in the firstвБ†вАФhe very cheerfully betook himself to the second; and though he could very well have explained it, as I said, to his honour,вБ†вАФyet, for that very reason, he had a spirit above it; choosing rather to bear the contempt of his enemies, and the laughter of his friends, than undergo the pain of telling a story, which might seem a panegyrick upon himself.
I have the highest idea of the spiritual and refined sentiments of this reverend gentleman, from this single stroke in his character, which I think comes up to any of the honest refinements of the peerless knight of La Mancha, whom, by the by, with all his follies, I love more, and would actually have gone farther to have paid a visit to, than the greatest hero of antiquity.
But this is not the moral of my story: The thing I had in view was to show the temper of the world in the whole of this affair.вБ†вАФFor you must know, that so long as this explanation would have done the parson credit,вБ†вАФthe devil a soul could find it out,вБ†вАФI suppose his enemies would not, and that his friends could not.вБ†вЄЇвБ†But no sooner did he bestir himself in behalf of the midwife, and pay the expenses of the ordinaryвАЩs licence to set her up,вБ†вАФbut the whole secret came out; every horse he had lost, and two horses more than ever he had lost, with all the circumstances of their destruction, were known and distinctly remembered.вБ†вАФThe story ran like wildfireвБ†вАФвАЬThe parson had a returning fit of pride which had just seized him; and he was going to be well mounted once again in his life; and if it was so, вАЩtwas plain as the sun at noonday, he would pocket the expense of the licence, ten times told, the very first year:вБ†вАФSo that everybody was left to judge what were his views in this act of charity.вАЭ
What were his views in this, and in every other action of his life,вБ†вАФor rather what were the opinions which floated in the brains of other people concerning it, was a thought which too much floated in his own, and too often broke in upon his rest, when he should have been sound asleep.
About ten years ago this gentleman had the good fortune to be made entirely easy upon that score,вБ†вАФit being just so long since he left his parish,вБ†вАФand the whole world at the same time behind him,вБ†вАФand stands accountable to a Judge of whom he will have no cause to complain.
But there is a fatality attends the actions of some men: Order them as they will, they pass throвАЩ a certain medium, which so twists and refracts them from their true directionsвБ†вЄЇвБ†that, with all the titles to praise which a rectitude of heart can give, the doers of them are nevertheless forced to live and die without it.
Of the truth of which, this gentleman was a painful example.вБ†вЄЇвБ†But to know by what means this came to pass,вБ†вАФand to make that knowledge of use to you, I insist upon it that you read the two following chapters, which contain such a sketch of his life and conversation, as will carry its moral along with it.вБ†вАФWhen this is done, if nothing stops us in our way, we will go on with the midwife.