The Cruise of the Land-Yacht «Wanderer»: or, Thirteen Hundred Miles in my Caravan

“‘You’re a lady, polly,’ i says, says i, ‘and i ain’t a gentleman – no, beggar me if i be’s.’

“‘You sometimes speak the truth,’ says polly, she says.

“Which that was a kind o’ 2-handed compliment, dear dobbin. Gee up and away you goes!

“Which polly is unkimmin clever, and I allers appeals to polly.

“Which polly often amooses i like, while we Be a-munchin’ a bit o’ meadow hay, arter we’ve been and gone and ’ad our jackets brushed, and our Feet washed, and got bedded-up like; Polly allers tells me o’ the toime when she were a-pullin’ of a big chariat and a-draggin’ of a duchess to church, and what a jolly nice stable she lived In, and what fine gold-plated ’arness she used to put on, and Lots else I don’t recomember, dobbin, and all in such Fine english, dobbin, as you and i couldn’t speak with our bits out. Yes, polly be’s unkimmin clever. Gee up and away you goes!

“But 1 nite, dobbin, i says to myself, says i, i’ll tell polly summit o’ my younger days, so I hits out as follers: ‘When i were a-livin’ wi’ farmer Frogue, polly,’ says i, which he were a farmer in a small way, and brew’d a drop o’ good beer for the publics all round like, there were me and my mate, a boss called dobbin; and bless your old collar, polly, dobbin were a rare good un, and he’d a-draw’d a tree out by the roots dobbin would. Gee op and away ye goes! And there were old Garge who drov us like, which he Had a fine temper, polly, ’ceptin’ when he got a drop too much, then it was whip, whip, whip, all day, up hill and down, and my shoulders is marked till this day. But Old farmer frogue, he comes to the stable once upon a time, which a very fat un were farmer frogue, wi’ no legs to speak of like. Well, polly, as I were a sayin’, he comes to the stable, and he says to Garge, ‘Garge,’ says he —

“But would you believe it, dear dobbin? I never got further on with my story like.

“‘Oh! bother you,’ cries polly, a-tossin o’ her mane that proud like. ‘Do you imagine for a moment that a born lady like me is interested in your Dobbins, and your Garges, and your fat old farmer Frogues? You’re a vulgar old horse, Corn-flower.’

“Gee op, says i, and away ye goes!

“And polly ups wi’ her hind foot and splinters the partition, and master had to pay for that, which polly is amazin’ clever at doin’ a kick like.

“But I likes polly unkimmon, and polly likes i, and though she bites and kicks she do be unhappy when i goes away to be shoed. Which I never loses my temper, dobbin, whatsomever. Gee up and away ye goes!

“Which we never funks a hill though, neither on us. When we Comes to a pertikler stiff un like i just appeals to polly.

“‘Pull up,’ says Polly, says she, ‘every hill has a top to it; pull up, you old hass, pull op!’

“Sometimes the hay we gets ain’t the sweetest o’ perfoomery, dobbin, old chummie; then I appeals to polly, cause you see if polly can eat it so kin i.

“Sometimes we meet the tractive hengine; i never liked it, and what’s more i never will. It seems unnatural like, so i appeals to polly.

“‘What’s the krect thing to do, polly?’ i says, says i; ‘shall us kick or shall us bolt?’

“‘Come straight on, ye hold fool,’ says polly pea-blossom, says she.

“Gee up, says i, and away ye goes!

“Which i must now dror to a klose, dobbin, and which i does hope you’ll allers have a good home and good shoes, dobbin, till you’re marched to the knacker’s. Gee up and away ye goes! —

“Good-bye, dobbin, polly’s gone to sleep, and master is a-playin’ the fiddle so soft and low like, in the meadow beyant yonder, which it allers does make me think o’ what the parson’s old pony once told me, dobbin, o’ a land where old hosses were taken to arter they were shot and their shoes taken off, a land o’ green meadows, dobbin, and a sweet quiet river a-rollin’ by, and long rows o’ wavin’ pollards like, with nothing to do all day, no ’arness to wear, no bit to hurt or rein to gall. Think o’ that, dobbin. Good-bye, dobbin – there goes the moosic again, so sweet and tremblin’ and sobbin’-like. i’m goin’ to listen and dream.

“Yours kindly, —

“Poor old Corn-flower.”

III.

From Polly the Cockatoo to Dick the Starling.

“Dear Dick, – If you weren’t the cleverest starling that ever talked or flew, with a coat all shiny with crimson and blue, I wouldn’t waste a tail feather in writing to you.

“You must know, Dick, that there are two Pollys on this wandering expedition, Polly the mare, Polly Pea-blossom, and Polly the pretty cockatoo, that’s me, though however master could have thought of making me godmother to an old mare, goodness only knows. Ha! ha! ha! it makes me laugh to think of it.

“They do say that I’m the happiest, and the prettiest, and the merriest bird, that ever yet was born, and I won’t be five till next birthday, though what I shall be before I am a hundred is more than I can think.

“Yes, I’ll live to a hundred, cockatoos all do; then my body will drop off the perch, and my soul will go into something else – ha! ha! ha! Wouldn’t you laugh too, if you had to live for a hundred years?

“All that time in a cage, with only a run out once a day, and a row with the cat! Yes, all that time, and why not? What’s the odds so long as you’re happy? Ha! ha! ha!

“I confess I do dream sometimes of the wild dark forest lands of Australia, and I think at times I would like to lead a life of freedom away in the woods yonder, just as the rooks and the pigeons do. Dash my bill! Dick, but I would make it warm for some of them in the woods – ha! ha! ha!

“Sometimes when the sparrows – they are cheeky enough for anything – come close to my cage, I give vent to what master calls my war-cry, and they almost drop dead with fright.

“‘Scray!’ that’s my war-cry, and it is louder than a railway whistle, and shriller than a bagpipe.

“‘Scray! Scray! Scray – ay – ay!’

“That’s it again.

“Master has just pitched a ‘Bradshaw’ at my cage. I’ll tear that ‘Bradshaw’ to bits first chance I have.

“Master says my war-cry is the worst of me. It is so startling, he says.

“That’s just where it is – what would be the use of a war-cry if it weren’t startling? Eh, Dick?

“Now out in the Australian jungles, this war-cry is the only defence we poor cockatoos have against the venomous snakes.

“The snakes come gliding up the tree.

“‘Scray! Scray!!’ we scream, and away they squirm.

“A hundred years in a cage, or chained by a foot to a perch! A hundred years, Dick! It does seem a long time.

“But the other day, when master put my cage on the grass, I just opened the fastening, and out I hopped. Ha! ha! ha! There were butterflies floating about, and bees on the flowering linden trees, and birds singing, and wild rabbits washing their faces with their forefeet among the green ferns, and every creature seemed as happy as the summer day is long. I did have an hour’s good fun in the woods, I can tell you. I caught a bird and killed it; I caught a mouse and crunched it up; and I scared some pigeons nearly to death, for they took me for an owl. Then an ugly man in a velvet jacket fired a gun at me, and I flew away back to my cage.

“I wouldn’t have got much to eat in the woods, and there is always corn in Egypt.

“But hanging up here in the verandah of the Wanderer is fine fun. I see so many strange birds, and so many strange children. I dote on children, and I sing and I dance to them, and sometimes make a grab at their noses.

“Hullo! Dick. Why, the door of my cage is open! Master has gone out.

“I am going out too, Dick.

“I’ve been out, Dick. I have had a walk round the saloon. I’ve torn ‘Bradshaw’ all to pieces. I made a grab at Hurricane Bob’s tail, and the brute nearly bit my head off. Just as if his tail was of any consequence! I’ve been playing the guitar, and cut all the strings in two. I’ve pitched a basket of flowers on the carpet, and I’ve spilt the ink all over them, and I’ve danced upon them; and torn master’s letters up, and enjoyed myself most thoroughly. Ha! ha! ha! Master’s face will be as long as his fiddle when he comes back.

“‘Scray! Scray! Scray – ay – ay!’

“Well, no more at present, Dick my darling. I never tried to pull your tail off, did I? I don’t think I have done very much harm in this world, and I never say naughty words, so, perhaps, when my hundred years are over, and my body drops off the perch, my soul will go into something very nice indeed.

“Ha! ha! ha!

“Scray! Scray!! Scray!!!

“Poor Polly.”

IV.

From Hurricane Bob to his Kennel-Mate Eily.

“You said in your last, dear Eily, that you wanted to know how I enjoyed my gipsy life, and the answer is, ‘out and out,’ or rather, ‘out and in,’ outside the caravan and inside the caravan. If there be a happier dog than myself in all the kingdom of kenneldom, let him come right up and show himself, and the probability is we’ll fight about it right away.

“Well, you see, I don’t take many notes by the way, but I notice everything for all that.

“First thing in the morning I have my breakfast and a trot out.

“It pains me though to see so many poor dogs muzzled. I am sure that Carlyle was right, and that most men – especially magistrates – are fools. Wouldn’t I like to see some of them muzzled just? – the magistrates, I mean.

“Every dog on the street makes room for me, and if they don’t – you know what I mean, Eily.

“The other day a Scotch collie – and you know, Eily, you are the only Scotch collie I could ever bear – walked up to me on the cliff-top at Filey, and put up his back. As he did not lower his tail, I went straight for him, and it would have done you good to see how I shook him. There was a big dandy on me too, and as soon as I had quietened the collie I opened the dandy up. My bites are nearly well, and I am quite prepared for another fight. I won’t allow any dog in the world to come spooning round my master.

“We travel many and many a long mile, Eily, and I am generally tired before the day is done, but at night there is another long walk or a run behind the tricycle. Then a tumble on the greensward; sometimes it is covered all over with beautiful flowers, prettier than any carpet you ever lay upon.

“Everybody is so kind to me, and the ladies fondle me and say such pretty things to me. I wonder they don’t fondle master and say pretty things to him. I wish they would.

“Good-bye, Eily. There is a tramp coming skulking round the caravan, and I don’t like his looks.

“‘R-r-r-r-r-bow! Wow-w!’

“He is gone, Eily. Good-bye, take care of master’s children till we all come back.

“Yours right faithfully, —

“Hurricane Bob.”

V.

From the Author to his Good Friend C.A.W.

(C.A. Wheeler, Esq, of Swindon, the clever author of “Sports-scrapiana,” etc, etc.)

“The Wanderer Caravan, —

“Touring in Notts, —

“July 28, 1886.

“My dearly-beloved Caw, – For not writing to you before now I must make the excuse the Scotch lassie made to her lover – ‘I’ve been thinkin’ aboot ye, Johnnie lad.’ And so in my wanderings I often think of thee and thine, poor old Sam included; and my mind reverts to your cosy parlour in Swindon, Nellie in the armchair, Sam on the footstool, my Hurricane Bob on the hearth, and you and I viewing each other’s smiling faces through the vapour that ascends from a duality of jorums of real Highland tartan toddy.

“Yes, I’ve been thinking of you, but I have likewise been busy. There is a deal to be done in a caravan, even if I hadn’t my literary connection to keep up, and half-a-dozen serieses to carry on. You must know that a gentleman gipsy’s life isn’t all beer and skittles. Take the doings of one day as an example, my Caw. The Wanderer has been lying on the greensward all night, we will say, close by a little country village inn. Crowds gathered round us last night, lured by curiosity and the dulcet tones of your humble servant’s fiddle and valet’s flute, but soon, as we loyally played ‘God save the Queen,’ the rustics melted away, our shutters were put up, and soon there was no sound to be heard save the occasional hooting of a brown owl, and the sighing of the west wind through a thicket of firs. We slept the sleep of gipsies, or of the just, the valet in the after-cabin, I in the saloon, my faithful Newfoundland at my side. If a step but comes near the caravan at night, the deep bass, ominous growl that shakes the ship from stem to stern shows that this grand old dog is ready for business.

“But soon as the little hands of the clock point to six, my eyes open mechanically, as it were, Bob gets up and stretches himself, and, ere ever the smoke from the village chimneys begins to roll up through the green of the trees, we are all astir. The bath-tent is speedily pitched, and breakfast is being prepared. No need of tonic bitters to give a gipsy an appetite, the fresh, pure air does that, albeit that frizzly ham and those milky, newborn eggs, with white bread and the countriest of country butter, would draw water from the teeth of a hand-saw. Breakfast over, my Caw, while I write on the coupé and Bob rolls exultant on the grass, my valet is carefully washing decks, dusting, and tidying, and the coachman is once more carefully grooming Captain Corn-flower and Polly Pea-blossom.

“It will be half-past eight before the saloon and after-cabin are thoroughly in order, for the Wanderer is quite a Pullman car and lady’s boudoir, minus the lady. Then, my old friend, visitors will begin to drop in, and probably for nearly an hour I am holding a kind of levée. It is a species of lionising that I have now got hardened to. Everybody admires everything, and I have to answer the same kind of questions day after day. It is nice, however, to find people who know me and have read my writings in every village in the kingdom. Hurricane Bob, of course, comes in for a big share of admiration. He gets showers of kisses, and many a fair cheek rests lovingly on his bonnie brow. I have to be content with smiles and glances, flowers and fruit, and eggs and new potatoes. The other day a handsome salmon came. It was a broiling hot day. The salmon said he must be eaten fresh. I was equal to the occasion. The lordly fish was cooked, the crew of the Wanderer, all told, gathered around him on the grass, and soon he had to change his tense– from the present to the past.

“The other day pigeons came. My valet plucked them, and the day being windy, and he, knowing no better, did the work standing, and, lor! how the feathers flew. It was a rain of feathers, and a reign of terror, for the ladies passing to the station had to put up their umbrellas.

“But the steps are up, the horses are in, good-byes said, hands are waved by the kindly crowd, and away we rattle. My place is ever on the coupé, note-book in hand.

“‘A chiel’s among ye,’ etc.

“My valet is riding on ahead on the tricycle. This year it is the charming ‘Marlborough,’ which is such a pleasant one to ride. On and on, now we go, through the beautiful country; something to attract our attention at every hundred yards. Heavens! my dear Caw, how little those who travel by train know of the delights of the road. We trot along while on level roads, we madly rush the short, steep hills at a glorious gallop, we crawl up the long, bad hills, and carefully – with skid and chain on the near hind wheel – we stagger down the break-neck ‘pinches.’ The brake is a powerful one, and in bad countries is in constant use, so that its brass handle shines like gold, and my arm aches ere night with putting it on and off.

“Well, there is a midday halt after ten miles, generally on the roadside near water. We have a modest lunch of hard-boiled eggs, milk, beer, cheese, bread, and crushed oats and a bit of clover. Then on and on again. By five we have probably settled for the night, when dinner is prepared. We hardly need supper, and what with the rattling along all day, and the hum of the great van – with running and riding, and studying natural history and phenomena, including faces – I am tired, and so are we all, by nine o’clock.

“But we generally have music before then. I have a small harmonium, a guitar, and a fiddle, and my valet plays well on the flute.

“‘Then comes still evening on.’

“The bats and owls come out, and we retire.

“Of weather we have all varieties – the hot and the cool, the rain that rattles on the roof, the wind that makes the Wanderer rock, and the occasional thunderstorm. One dark night last week – we were in a lonely place – I sat out on the coupé till one o’clock – ‘the wee short hoor ayont the twal’ – watching the vivid blue lightning, that curled like fiery snakes among the trees. By the way, I had nothing on but my night-shirt, and a dread spectre I must have appeared to anyone passing, seen but for a moment in the lightning’s flash, then gone. I marvelled next day that I had caught a slight cold.

“I love little, quiet meadows, Caw. I dote on rural villages, and hate big towns. If the caravan is not lying on the grass there is no comfort.

“I lay last night in the cosiest meadow ever I have been in. The very rural hamlet of Bunny, Notts, is a quarter of a mile away, but all the world is screened away from me with trees and hedges. I have for meadow-mates two intelligent cows, who can’t quite make us out. They couldn’t make Bob out either, till in the zeal of his guardianship he got one of them by the tail. There is in this hamlet of three hundred souls one inn – it is tottering to decay – a pound, a police-station, and a church. The church is ever so old, the weather-cock has long been blown down, and the clock has stopped for ever. The whole village is about as lively and bright as a farthing candle stuck in an empty beer bottle.

“But here come the horses. Good-bye till we meet.

“Gordon Stables, —

“Ye Gentleman Gipsy.”

Chapter Fifteen.

The Humours of the Road – Inn Signs – What I am Taken for – A Study of Faces – Milestones and Finger-Posts – Tramps – The Man with the Iron Mask – The Collie Dog – Gipsies’ Dogs – A Midnight Attack on the Wanderer

“I am as free as Nature first made man,Ere the base laws of servitude began,When wild in woods the noble savage ran.”Dryden.

Madly dashing on through the country as cyclists do, on their way to John o’ Groats or elsewhere, probably at an average rate of seventy miles a day, neither scenery nor anything else can be either enjoyed or appreciated.

The cyclist arrives in the evening at his inn, tired, dusty, and disagreeably damp as to underclothing. He has now no other wish except to dine and go to bed. Morning sees him in the saddle again, whirring ever onwards to the distant goal.

He is doing a record. Let him. For him the birds sing not in woodland or copse; for him no wild flowers spring; he pauses not to listen to hum of bee or murmur of brooklet, nor to admire the beauties of heathy hills, purple with the glorious heather, or bosky dells, green with feathery larch or silvery birch; nor does he see the rolling cloudscapes, with their rifts of blue between. On – on – on – his way is ever on.

But gipsy-folks, like myself, jogging along at a quiet six-or-seven-miles-an-hour pace, observe and note everything. And it is surprising what trifles amuse us.

Although I constantly took notes from the coupé, or from my cycle saddle, and now and then made rough sketches, I can in these pages only give samples from these notes.

A volume could be written on public-house or inn signs, for example.

Another on strange names.

A third on trees.

A fourth on water – lakes, brooklets, rivers, cataracts, and mill-streams.

A fifth upon faces.

And so on, ad libitum.

As to signs, many are curious enough, but there is a considerable amount of sameness about many. You meet Red Lions, White Harts, Kings’ Arms, Dukes’ Arms, Cricketers’ Arms, and arms of all sorts everywhere, and Woolpacks, and Eagles, and Rising Suns, ad nauseam.

The sign of a five-barred gate hung out is not uncommon in the Midland Counties, with the following doggerel verse: —

“This gate hangs well,    And hinders none;Refresh and pay,    And travel on.”

Although the Wanderer is nearly always taken for what she is – a private carriage on a large scale – still it is amusing sometimes to note what I am mistaken for, to wit: —

1. “General” in the Salvation Army.

2. Surgeon-attendant on a nervous old lady who is supposed to be inside.

3. A travelling artist.

4. A photographer.

5. A menagerie.

6. A Cheap-Jack.

7. A Bible carriage.

8. A madman.

9. An eccentric baronet.

10. A political agent.

11. Lord E.

12. Some other “nob.”

13. And last, but not least, King of the Gipsies.

It must not be supposed that I mind a single bit what people think of me, so long as I have a quiet, comfortable meadow to stand in at night and a good stable for Corn-flower and Pea-blossom. But how would you like, reader, to be taken for a travelling show, and to make your way through a village followed by a crowd of admiring children, counting their pence, and wondering when you were going to open?

Polly’s cage would occasionally be hanging from the verandah over the coupé, with Hurricane Bob lying on his rug, and I would hear such remarks as these from the juvenile crowd: —

“Oh! look at his long moustache.”

“Oh! look at his hat, Mary.”

“Susan, Susan, look at the Poll parrot.”

“Look! it is holding a biscuit in its hand.”

“Look at the bear.”

“No, it’s a dog.”

“You’re a hass! it’s a bear.”

“Lift me up to see, Tildie.”

“Lift me up too.”

Here again is my coachman being interviewed by some country bumpkins: – “Who be your master, matie?”

“A private gentleman.”

“Is he a Liberal?”

“No.”

“Is he a Tory?”

“Perhaps.”

“Is he a Salvationist?”

“Not much.”

“What does he do?”

“Nothing.”

“What does he keep?”

“The Sabbath.”

“Got anything to sell?”

“No! Do you take us for Cheap-Jacks?”

“Got anything to give away, then?” It will be observed that even a gentleman gipsy’s life has its drawbacks, but not many. One, however, is a deficiency of privacy. For instance, though I have on board both a guitar and fiddle, I can neither play nor sing so much of an evening as I would like to do, because a little mob always gathers round to listen, and I might just as well be on the stage. But in quiet country places I have often, when I saw I was not unappreciated, played and sang just because they seemed to like it.

The faces I see on the road are often a study in themselves, and one might really make a kind of classification of those that are constantly recurring. I have only space to give a sample from memory.

1. This face to me is not a pleasing memory. It is that of the severe-looking female in a low pony carriage. She may or may not be an old maid. Very likely she is; and no wonder, for she is flat-faced and painfully plain. Beside her sits her companion, and behind her a man in a cheap livery; while she herself handles the ribbons, driving a rough, independent, self-willed pony. These people sternly refuse to look at us. They turn away their eyes from beholding vanity; or they take us for real gipsies – “worse than even actors.” I can easily imagine some of the items of the home life of this party: the tidily kept garden; the old gardener, who also cleans the boots and waits at table; the stuffy little parlour, with the windows always down; the fat Pomeranian dog; the tabby cat; and the occasional “muffin shines,” as Yankees call them, where bad tea is served – bad tea and ruined reputations. Avast! old lady; the sun shines more brightly when you are out of sight.

2. The joskin or country lout. He stops to stare. Probably he has a pitchfork in his hand. On his face is a wondering, half-amused smile, but his eyes are so wide open that he looks scared. His mouth is open, too, and big enough apparently to hold a mangel-wurzel.

Go on, Garge; we won’t harm thee, lad.

3. Cottage folks of all kinds and colours. Look at the weary face of that woman with the weary-looking baby on her arm. The husband is smoking a dirty pipe, but he smiles on us as we go whirling past; and his children, a-squat in the gutter, leave their mud pies and sing and shout and scream at us, waving their dusty hats and their little brown arms in the air.