Krindlesyke

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Title: Krindlesyke
Author: Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
Release Date: July 3, 2006 [EBook #18743]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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KRINDLESYKE
BY WILFRID GIBSON

Macmillan And Co., Limited?St. Martin's Street, London?1922
Copyright?Printed in Great Britain
To
CATHERINE and LASCELLES ABERCROMBIE
NOTE
On the occasion of an obscure dramatic presentation, an early and rudimentary draft of Book I. was published in 1910. It has since been entirely re-written. Book II., written 1919-22, has not been printed hitherto. Though the work was not conceived with a view to stage-production, the author reserves the acting rights.
It may be added that, while "Krindlesyke" is not in dialect, it has been flavoured with a sprinkling of local words; but as these are, for the most part, words expressive of emotion, rather than words conveying information, the sense of them should be easily gathered even by the south-country reader.
W. G.
PRELUDE
Four bleak stone walls, an eaveless, bleak stone roof,?Like a squared block of native crag, it stands,?Hunched, on skirlnaked, windy fells, aloof:?Yet, was it built by patient human hands:?Hands, that have long been dust, chiselled each stone,?And bedded it secure; and from the square?Squat chimneystack, hither and thither blown,?The reek of human fires still floats in air,?And perishes, as life on life burns through.?Squareset and stark to every blast that blows,?It bears the brunt of time, withstands anew?Wildfires of tempest and league-scouring snows,?Dour and unshaken by any mortal doom,?Timeless, unstirred by any mortal dream:?And ghosts of reivers gather in the gloom?About it, muttering, when the lych-owls scream.
"From one generation to another."

BOOK I
PHOEBE BARRASFORD

BOOK I
PHOEBE BARRASFORD
_Krindlesyke is a remote shepherd's cottage on the Northumbrian fells, at least three miles from any other habitation. It consists of two rooms, a but and a ben. EZRA BARRASFORD, an old herd, blind and decrepit, sits in an armchair in the but, or living-room, near the open door, on a mild afternoon in April. ELIZA BARRASFORD, his wife, is busy, making griddle-cakes over the peat fire._
ELIZA (_glancing at the wag-at-the-wa'_):?It's hard on three o'clock, and they'll be home?Before so very long now.
EZRA:
Eh, what's that?
ELIZA:?You're growing duller every day. I said?They'd soon be home now.
EZRA:
They? And who be they?
ELIZA:?My faith, you've got a memory like a milk-sile!?You've not forgotten Jim's away to wed??You're not that dull.
EZRA:
We cannot all be needles:?And some folk's tongues are sharper than their wits.?Yet, till thon spirt of hot tar blinded me,?No chap was cuter in all the countryside,?Or better at a bargain; and it took?A nimble tongue to bandy words with mine.?You'd got to be up betimes to get round Ezra:?And none was a shrewder judge of ewes, or women.?My wits just failed me once, the day I married:?But, you're an early riser, and your tongue?Is always up before you, and with an edge,?Unblunted by the dewfall, and as busy?As a scythe in the grass at Lammas. So Jim's away?To wed, is he, the limb? I thought he'd gone?For swedes; though now, I mind some babblement?About a wedding: but, nowadays, words tumble?Through my old head like turnips through a slicer;?And naught I ken who the bowdykite's to wed--?Some bletherskite he's picked up in a ditch,?Some fond fligary flirtigig, clarty-fine,?Who'll turn a slattern-shrew and a cap-river?Within a week, if I ken aught of Jim.?Unless ... Nay, sure, 'twas Judith Ellershaw.
ELIZA:?No, no; you're dull, indeed. It's Phoebe Martin.
EZRA:?Who's Phoebe Martin? I ken naught of her.
ELIZA:?And I, but little.
EZRA:
Some trapsing tatterwallops,?I'll warrant. Well, these days, the lads are like?The young cockgrouse, who doesn't consult his dad?Before he mates. In my--yet, come to think,?I didn't say overmuch. My dad and mammy?Scarce kenned her name when I sprung my bride on them;?Just loosed on them a gisseypig out of a poke?They'd heard no squeak of. They'd to thole my choice,?Lump it or like it. I'd the upper hand then:?And well they kenned their master. No tawse to chide,?Nor apron-strings to hold young Ezra then:?His turn had come; and he was cock of the midden,?And no braw cockerel's hustled him from it yet,?For all their crowing. The blind old bird's still game.?They've never had his spirit, the young cheepers,?Not one; and Jim's the lave of the clutch; and he?Will never lord it at Krindlesyke till I'm straked.?But