Yankee Gypsies | Page 5

green meadows to the east; the small stream which came noisily down
its ravine, washing the old garden-wall and softly lapping on fallen
stones and mossy roots of beeches and hemlocks; the tall sentinel
poplars at the gateway; the oak-forest, sweeping unbroken to the
northern horizon; the grass-grown carriage-path, with its rude and crazy
bridge,--the dear old landscape of my boyhood lies outstretched before
me like a daguerreotype from that picture within, which I have borne
with me in all my wanderings. I am a boy again, once more conscious
of the feeling, half terror, half exultation, with which I used to
announce the approach of this very vagabond and his "kindred after the
flesh."
The advent of wandering beggars, or "old stragglers," as we were wont
to call them, was an event of no ordinary interest in the generally
monotonous quietude of our farm-life. Many of them were well known;
they had their periodical revolutions and transits; we would calculate
them like eclipses or new moons. Some were sturdy knaves, fat and
saucy; and, whenever they ascertained that the "men folks" were absent,
would order provisions and cider like men who expected to pay for
them, seating themselves at the hearth or table with the air of
Falstaff,--"Shall I not take mine ease in mine inn?" Others, poor, pale,
patient, like Sterne's monk,(1) came creeping up to the door, hat in
hand, standing there in their gray wretchedness with a look of
heartbreak and forlornness which was never without its effect on our
juvenile sensibilities. At times, however, we experienced a slight
revulsion of feeling when even these humblest children of sorrow
somewhat petulantly rejected our proffered bread and cheese, and
demanded instead a glass of cider. Whatever the temperance society
might in such cases have done, it was not in our hearts to refuse the
poor creatures a draught of their favorite beverage; and was n't it a
satisfaction to see their sad, melancholy faces light up as we handed
them the full pitcher, and, on receiving it back empty from their brown,
wrinkled hands, to hear them, half breathless from their long, delicious
draught, thanking us for the favor, as "dear, good children"! Not
unfrequently these wandering tests of our benevolence made their
appearance in interesting groups of man, woman, and child, picturesque

in their squalidness, and manifesting a maudlin affection which would
have done honor to the revellers at Poosie-Nansie's, immortal in the
cantata of Burns. (2) I remember some who were evidently the victims
of monomania,--haunted and hunted by some dark thought,--possessed
by a fixed idea. One, a black-eyed, wild- haired woman, with a whole
tragedy of sin, shame, and suffering written in her countenance, used
often to visit us, warm herself by our winter fire, and supply herself
with a stock of cakes and cold meat; but was never known to answer a
question or to ask one. She never smiled; the cold, stony look of her
eye never changed; a silent, impassive face, frozen rigid by some great
wrong or sin. We used to look with awe upon the "still woman," and
think of the demoniac of Scripture who had a "dumb spirit."
(1) Whom he met at Calais, as described in his *Sentimental Journey.*
(2) The *cantata* is *The Jolly Beggars,* from which the motto
heading this sketch was taken. *Poosie-Nansie* was the keeper of a
tavern in Mauchline, which was the favorite resort of the lame sailors,
maimed soldiers, travelling ballad-singers, and all such loose
companions as hang about the skirts of society. The cantata has for its
theme the rivalry of a "pigmy scraper with his fiddle" and a strolling
tinker for a beggar woman: hence the *maudlin affection.*
One--I think I see him now, grim, gaunt, and ghastly, working his slow
way up to our door--used to gather herbs by the wayside and called
himself doctor. He was bearded like a he-goat, and used to counterfeit
lameness; yet, when he supposed himself alone, would travel on lustily,
as if walking for a wager. At length, as if in punishment of his deceit,
he met with an accident in his rambles and became lame in earnest,
hobbling ever after with difficulty on his gnarled crutches. Another
used to go stooping, like Bunyan's pilgrim, under a pack made of an old
bed-sacking, stuffed out into most plethoric dimensions, tottering on a
pair of small, meagre legs, and peering out with his wild, hairy face
from under his burden like a big-bodied spider. That "man with the
pack" always inspired me with awe and reverence. Huge, almost
sublime, in its tense rotundity, the father of all packs, never laid aside
and never opened, what might there not be within it? With what
flesh-creeping curiosity I used to walk round about it at a