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Updated: June 25, 2025
Ever at this peroration, the eyes of the Squire began to twinkle, and new thanks were given to the veteran for his disinterested affection, and new promises pledged him in inadequate return. The pious Dealtry felt a little jealousy at the trust imparted to his friend.
'fegs you've a soul, man! a soul fit for the forty- second! augh! A soul above the inches of five feet two!" There was something bitter and sneering in the Traveller's aspect as he now, regarding Dealtry, repeated "Vagrant humph! And pray what is a vagrant?" "What is a vagrant?" echoed Peter, a little puzzled. "Yes! answer me that." "Why, a vagrant is a man what wanders, and what has no money."
"Dealtry, Peter Dealtry, Sir, is my name. Why the most noticeable man, you must know, is a great scholard, a wonderfully learned man; there yonder, you may just catch a glimpse of the tall what-d'ye-call-it he has built out on the top of his house, that he may get nearer to the stars.
"Well, now," said Peter Dealtry, as he pushed the brown jug towards the Corporal, "this is what I call pleasant; it puts me in mind " "Of what?" quoth the Corporal. "Of those nice lines in the hymn, Master Bunting. 'How fair ye are, ye little hills, Ye little fields also; Ye murmuring streams that sweetly run; Ye willows in a row!
"Contented! a suitable fate for the old dog But Peter Dealtry?" "Of Peter Dealtry know we nothing more, save that we have seen at Grassdale church-yard, a small tombstone inscribed to his memory, with the following sacred poesy thereto appended, "'We flourish, saith the holy text One hour, and are cut down the next: I was like grass but yesterday, But Death has mowed me into hay."
His hat was fastened tight on his brows by a blue pocket-handkerchief; he wore a spencer of a light brown drugget, a world too loose, above a leather jerkin; his breeches of corduroy, were met all of a sudden half way up the thigh, by a detachment of Hessians, formerly in the service of the Corporal, and bought some time since by Peter Dealtry to wear when employed in shooting snipes for the Squire, to whom he occasionally performed the office of game-keeper; suspended round his wrist by a bit of black ribbon, was his constable's baton; he shouldered his musket gallantly, and he carried his person as erect as if the least deflexion from its perpendicularity were to cost him his life.
Come, Jacobina, we will lock up the house, and go and see the quarters I have provided for you. Heigho!" As he finished his harangue, the Corporal locked the door of his cottage, and Jacobina trotting by his side, he stalked with his usual stateliness to the Spotted Dog. Dame Dorothy Dealtry received him with a clouded brow, but the man of the world knew whom he had to deal with.
"Weary and hungry," said he; "why did not you say that before? That would have been quite enough for Peter Dealtry. Thank God! I am a man what can feel for my neighbours. I have bowels yes, I have bowels. Weary and hungry! you shall be served in an instant. I may be a little hasty or so, but I'm a good Christian at bottom ask the Corporal. And what says the Psalmist, Psalm 147?
"I! your honour's too good; and indeed, though I say it, Sir, you might do worse; not but what I should be sorry to leave nice snug home here, and this stream, though the trout have been shy lately, ah! that was a mistake of yours, Sir, recommending the minnow; and neighbour Dealtry, though his ale's not so good at 'twas last year; and and but, in short, I always loved your honour dandled you on my knees; You recollect the broadsword exercise? one, two, three augh! baugh! and if your honour really is going, why rather than you should want a proper person who knows the world, to brush your coat, polish your shoes, give you good advice on the faith of a man, I'll go with you myself!"
And Peter Dealtry was the same as ever, only he seemed perhaps shorter and thinner than of old, as if Time did not so much break as wear mine host's slender person gradually away. The horseman gazed for a moment, but observing Peter return the gaze, he turned aside his head, and putting his horse into a canter, soon passed out of cognizance of the Spotted Dog.
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