The Attache | Page 5

got well housed a'most, afore it came on to rain, as
if it was in rael right down airnest. It warn't just a roarin', racin',
sneezin' rain like a thunder shower, but it kept a steady travellin' gait,
up hill and down dale, and no breathin' time nor batin' spell. It didn't
look as if it would stop till it was done, that's a fact. But still as it was
too late to go out agin that arternoon, I didn't think much about it then. I
hadn't no notion what was in store for me next day, no more nor a child;
if I had, I'd a double deal sooner hanged myself, than gone brousing in
such place as that, in sticky weather.

"A wet day is considerable tiresome, any where or any way you can fix
it; but it's wus at an English country house than any where else, cause
you are among strangers, formal, cold, gallus polite, and as thick in the
head-piece as a puncheon. You hante nothin' to do yourself and they
never have nothin' to do; they don't know nothin' about America, and
don't want to. Your talk don't interest them, and they can't talk to
interest nobody but themselves; all you've got to do, is to pull out your
watch and see how time goes; how much of the day is left, and then go
to the winder and see how the sky looks, and whether there is any
chance of holdin' up or no. Well, that time I went to bed a little airlier
than common, for I felt considerable sleepy, and considerable strange
too; so as soon as I cleverly could, I off and turned in.
"Well I am an airly riser myself. I always was from a boy, so I waked
up jist about the time when day ought to break, and was a thinkin' to get
up; but the shutters was too, and it was as dark as ink in the room, and I
heer'd it rainin' away for dear life. 'So,' sais I to myself, 'what the dogs
is the use of gittin' up so airly? I can't get out and get a smoke, and I
can't do nothin' here; so here goes for a second nap.' Well I was soon
off agin in a most a beautiful of a snore, when all at once I heard
thump-thump agin the shutter--and the most horrid noise I ever heerd
since I was raised; it was sunthin' quite onairthly.
"'Hallo!' says I to myself, 'what in natur is all this hubbub about? Can
this here confounded old house be harnted? Is them spirits that's
jabbering gibberish there, or is I wide awake or no?' So I sets right up
on my hind legs in bed, rubs my eyes, opens my ears and listens agin,
when whop went every shutter agin, with a dead heavy sound, like
somethin' or another thrown agin 'em, or fallin' agin 'em, and then
comes the unknown tongues in discord chorus like. Sais I, 'I know now,
it's them cussed navigators. They've besot the house, and are a givin' lip
to frighten folks. It's regular banditti.'
"So I jist hops out of bed, and feels for my trunk, and outs with my
talkin' irons, that was all ready loaded, pokes my way to the
winder--shoves the sash up and outs with the shutter, ready to let slip
among 'em. And what do you think it was?--Hundreds and hundreds of

them nasty, dirty, filthy, ugly, black devils of rooks, located in the trees
at the back eend of the house. Old Nick couldn't have slept near 'em;
caw caw, caw, all mixt up together in one jumble of a sound, like
"jawe."
"You black, evil-lookin', foul-mouthed villains,' sais I, 'I'd like no better
sport than jist to sit here, all this blessed day with these pistols, and
drop you one arter another, I know.' But they was pets, was them rooks,
and of course like all pets, everlastin' nuisances to every body else.
"Well, when a man's in a feeze, there's no more sleep that hitch; so I
dresses and sits up; but what was I to do? It was jist half past four, and
as it was a rainin' like every thing, I know'd breakfast wouldn't be ready
till eleven o'clock, for nobody wouldn't get up if they could help
it--they wouldn't be such fools; so there was jail for six hours and a
half.
"Well, I walked up and down the room, as easy as I could, not to waken
folks; but three steps and a round turn makes you kinder dizzy, so I sits
down again to chaw the cud of vexation.
"'Ain't this a handsum fix?' sais I, 'but it sarves you right, what busniss
had