wanted there; and then he did what a common mind would have done at
once--looked into the garden, and there saw Mr. Wardle. 'How are
you?' said the good-humoured individual, out of breath with his own
anticipations of pleasure.'Beautiful morning, ain't it? Glad to see you
up so early. Make haste down, and come out. I'll wait for you here.'
Mr. Pickwick needed no second invitation. Ten minutes sufficed for the
completion of his toilet, and at the expiration of that time he was by
the old gentleman's side.
'Hollo!' said Mr. Pickwick in his turn, seeing that his companion was
armed with a gun, and that another lay ready on the grass; 'what's going
forward?'
'Why, your friend and I,' replied the host, 'are going out rook-shooting
before breakfast. He's a very good shot, ain't he?'
'I've heard him say he's a capital one,' replied Mr. Pickwick, 'but I
never saw him aim at anything.'
'Well,' said the host, 'I wish he'd come. Joe--Joe!'
The fat boy, who under the exciting influence of the morning did not
appear to be more than three parts and a fraction asleep, emerged from
the house.
'Go up, and call the gentleman, and tell him he'll find me and Mr.
Pickwick in the rookery. Show the gentleman the way there; d'ye hear?'
The boy departed to execute his commission; and the host, carrying both
guns like a second Robinson Crusoe, led the way from the garden.
'This is the place,' said the old gentleman, pausing after a few minutes
walking, in an avenue of trees. The information was unnecessary; for the
incessant cawing of the unconscious rooks sufficiently indicated their
whereabouts.
The old gentleman laid one gun on the ground, and loaded the other.
'Here they are,' said Mr. Pickwick; and, as he spoke, the forms of Mr.
Tupman, Mr. Snodgrass, and Mr. Winkle appeared in the distance. The fat
boy, not being quite certain which gentleman he was directed to call,
had with peculiar sagacity, and to prevent the possibility of any
mistake, called them all.
'Come along,' shouted the old gentleman, addressing Mr. Winkle; 'a keen
hand like you ought to have been up long ago, even to such poor work as
this.'
Mr. Winkle responded with a forced smile, and took up the spare gun with
an expression of countenance which a metaphysical rook, impressed with
a foreboding of his approaching death by violence, may be supposed
to assume. It might have been keenness, but it looked remarkably like
misery. The old gentleman nodded; and two ragged boys who had been
marshalled to the spot under the direction of the infant Lambert,
forthwith commenced climbing up two of the trees. 'What are these lads
for?' inquired Mr. Pickwick abruptly. He was rather alarmed; for he was
not quite certain but that the distress of the agricultural interest,
about which he had often heard a great deal, might have compelled the
small boys attached to the soil to earn a precarious and hazardous
subsistence by making marks of themselves for inexperienced sportsmen.
'Only to start the game,' replied Mr. Wardle, laughing.
'To what?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.
'Why, in plain English, to frighten the rooks.'
'Oh, is that all?'
'You are satisfied?'
'Quite.'
'Very well. Shall I begin?'
'If you please,' said Mr. Winkle, glad of any respite.
'Stand aside, then. Now for it.'
The boy shouted, and shook a branch with a nest on it. Half a dozen
young rooks in violent conversation, flew out to ask what the matter
was. The old gentleman fired by way of reply. Down fell one bird, and
off flew the others.
'Take him up, Joe,' said the old gentleman.
There was a smile upon the youth's face as he advanced. Indistinct
visions of rook-pie floated through his imagination. He laughed as he
retired with the bird--it was a plump one.
'Now, Mr. Winkle,' said the host, reloading his own gun. 'Fire away.'
Mr. Winkle advanced, and levelled his gun. Mr. Pickwick and his friends
cowered involuntarily to escape damage from the heavy fall of rooks,
which they felt quite certain would be occasioned by the devastating
barrel of their friend. There was a solemn pause--a shout--a flapping of
wings--a faint click.
'Hollo!' said the old gentleman.
'Won't it go?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.
'Missed fire,' said Mr. Winkle, who was very pale--probably from
disappointment.
'Odd,' said the old gentleman, taking the gun. 'Never knew one of them
miss fire before. Why, I don't see anything of the cap.' 'Bless my
soul!' said Mr. Winkle, 'I declare I forgot the cap!'
The slight omission was rectified. Mr. Pickwick crouched again. Mr.
Winkle stepped forward with an air of determination and resolution; and
Mr. Tupman looked out from behind a tree. The boy shouted; four birds
flew out. Mr. Winkle fired. There was a scream as of an individual--not
a rook--in corporal anguish. Mr. Tupman had saved the lives of
innumerable unoffending birds by receiving a portion of the charge in
his left arm.
To describe the confusion that ensued would be impossible. To tell
how Mr. Pickwick in the first transports of emotion called Mr. Winkle
'Wretch!' how Mr. Tupman lay prostrate on the ground; and how Mr. Winkle
knelt horror-stricken beside him; how Mr. Tupman called distractedly
upon some feminine Christian name, and then opened first one eye, and
then the other, and then fell back and shut them both--all this would be
as difficult to describe in detail, as it would be to depict the gradual
recovering of the unfortunate individual, the binding up of his arm
with pocket-handkerchiefs, and the conveying him back by slow degrees
supported by the arms of his anxious friends.
They drew near the house. The ladies were at the garden gate, waiting
for their arrival and their breakfast. The spinster aunt appeared; she
smiled, and beckoned them to walk quicker. 'Twas evident she knew not
of the disaster. Poor thing! there are times when ignorance is bliss
indeed.
They approached nearer.
'Why, what is the matter with the little old gentleman?' said Isabella
Wardle. The spinster aunt heeded not the remark; she thought it applied
to Mr. Pickwick. In her eyes Tracy Tupman was a youth; she viewed his
years through a diminishing glass.
'Don't be frightened,' called out the old host, fearful of alarming his
daughters. The little party had crowded so completely round Mr. Tupman,
that they could not yet clearly discern the nature of the accident.
'Don't be frightened,' said the host.
'What's the matter?' screamed the ladies.
'Mr. Tupman has met with a little accident; that's all.'
The spinster aunt uttered a piercing scream, burst into an hysteric
laugh, and fell backwards in the arms of her nieces.
'Throw some cold water over her,' said the old gentleman.
'No, no,' murmured the spinster aunt; 'I am better now. Bella, Emily--a
surgeon! Is he wounded?--Is he dead?--Is he--Ha, ha, ha!' Here
the spinster aunt burst into fit number two, of hysteric laughter
interspersed with screams.
'Calm yourself,' said Mr. Tupman, affected almost to tears by this
expression of sympathy with his sufferings. 'Dear, dear madam, calm
yourself.'
'It is his voice!' exclaimed the spinster aunt; and strong symptoms of
fit number three developed themselves forthwith.
'Do not agitate yourself, I entreat you, dearest madam,' said Mr. Tupman
soothingly. 'I am very little hurt, I assure you.'
'Then you are not dead!' ejaculated the hysterical lady. 'Oh, say you
are not dead!'
'Don't be a fool, Rachael,' interposed Mr. Wardle, rather more roughly
than was consistent with the poetic nature of the scene. 'What the
devil's the use of his saying he isn't dead?'
'No, no, I am not,' said Mr. Tupman. 'I require no assistance but yours.
Let me lean on your arm.' He added, in a whisper, 'Oh, Miss Rachael!'
The agitated female advanced, and offered her arm. They turned into the
breakfast parlour. Mr. Tracy Tupman gently pressed her hand to his lips,
and sank upon the sofa.
'Are you faint?' inquired the anxious Rachael.
'No,' said Mr. Tupman. 'It is nothing. I shall be better presently.' He
closed his eyes.
'He sleeps,' murmured the spinster aunt. (His organs of vision had been
closed nearly twenty seconds.) 'Dear--dear--Mr. Tupman!'
Mr. Tupman jumped up--'Oh, say those words again!' he exclaimed.
The lady started. 'Surely you did not hear them!' she said bashfully.
'Oh, yes, I did!' replied Mr. Tupman; 'repeat them. If you would have
me recover, repeat them.' 'Hush!' said the lady. 'My brother.' Mr. Tracy
Tupman resumed his former position; and Mr. Wardle, accompanied by a
surgeon, entered the room.
The arm was examined, the wound dressed, and pronounced to be a very
slight one; and the minds of the company having been thus satisfied,
they proceeded to satisfy their appetites with countenances to which an
expression of cheerfulness was again restored. Mr. Pickwick alone
was silent and reserved. Doubt and distrust were exhibited in his
countenance. His confidence in Mr. Winkle had been shaken--greatly
shaken--by the proceedings of the morning. 'Are you a cricketer?'
inquired Mr. Wardle of the marksman.
At any other time, Mr. Winkle would have replied in the affirmative. He
felt the delicacy of his situation, and modestly replied, 'No.'
'Are you, sir?' inquired Mr. Snodgrass.
'I was once upon a time,' replied the host; 'but I have given it up now.
I subscribe to the club here, but I don't play.'
'The grand match is played to-day, I believe,' said Mr. Pickwick.
'It is,' replied the host. 'Of course you would like to see it.'
'I, sir,' replied Mr. Pickwick, 'am delighted to view any sports
which may be safely indulged in, and in which the impotent effects of
unskilful people do not endanger human life.' Mr. Pickwick paused,
and looked steadily on Mr. Winkle, who quailed beneath his leader's
searching glance. The great man withdrew his eyes after a few minutes,
and added: 'Shall we be justified in leaving our wounded friend to the
care of the ladies?'
'You cannot leave me in better hands,' said Mr. Tupman.
'Quite impossible,' said Mr. Snodgrass.
It was therefore settled that Mr. Tupman should be left at home in
charge of the females; and that the remainder of the guests, under the
guidance of Mr. Wardle, should proceed to the spot where was to be held
that trial of skill, which had roused all Muggleton from its torpor, and
inoculated Dingley Dell with a fever of excitement.
As their walk, which was not above two miles long, lay through shady
lanes and sequestered footpaths, and as their conversation turned upon
the delightful scenery by which they were on every side surrounded, Mr.
Pickwick was almost inclined to regret the expedition they had used,
when he found himself in the main street of the town of Muggleton.
Everybody whose genius has a topographical bent knows perfectly well
that Muggleton is a corporate town, with a mayor, burgesses, and
freemen; and anybody who has consulted the addresses of the mayor to the
freemen, or the freemen to the mayor, or both to the corporation, or
all three to Parliament, will learn from thence what they ought to have
known before, that Muggleton is an ancient and loyal borough, mingling
a zealous advocacy of Christian principles with a devoted attachment to
commercial rights; in demonstration whereof, the mayor, corporation,
and other inhabitants, have presented at divers times, no fewer than one
thousand four hundred and twenty petitions against the continuance of
negro slavery abroad, and an equal number against any interference with
the factory system at home; sixty-eight in favour of the sale of livings
in the Church, and eighty-six for abolishing Sunday trading in the
street.
Mr. Pickwick stood in the principal street of this illustrious town,
and gazed with an air of curiosity, not unmixed with interest, on the
objects around him. There was an open square for the market-place; and
in the centre of it, a large inn with a sign-post in front, displaying
an object very common in art, but rarely met with in nature--to wit,
a blue lion, with three bow legs in the air, balancing himself on the
extreme point of the centre claw of his fourth foot. There were, within
sight, an auctioneer's and fire-agency office, a corn-factor's,
a linen-draper's, a saddler's, a distiller's, a grocer's, and a
shoe-shop--the last-mentioned warehouse being also appropriated to
the diffusion of hats, bonnets, wearing apparel, cotton umbrellas,
and useful knowledge. There was a red brick house with a small paved
courtyard in front, which anybody might have known belonged to the
attorney; and there was, moreover, another red brick house with Venetian
blinds, and a large brass door-plate with a very legible announcement
that it belonged to the surgeon. A few boys were making their way to the
cricket-field; and two or three shopkeepers who were standing at their
doors looked as if they should like to be making their way to the same
spot, as indeed to all appearance they might have done, without losing
any great amount of custom thereby. Mr. Pickwick having paused to
make these observations, to be noted down at a more convenient period,
hastened to rejoin his friends, who had turned out of the main street,
and were already within sight of the field of battle.
