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Arraying himself in his best, and saddling a gaunt steed that might have rivalled Rosinante, and placing a pillion behind his saddle, he departed to wed and bring home the humble lassie who was to be made mistress of the venerable hovel of Lauckend, and who lived in a village on the opposite side of the Tweed. A small event of the kind makes a great stir in a little quiet country neighborhood.
Often now in the late afternoon Madam Wetherill would mount her horse with the pillion securely fastened at the back, and Primrose quite as secure, and with a black attendant go cantering over the country roads, rough as they were, to Belmont Mansion with its long avenue of great branching hemlocks; or to Mount Pleasant, embedded in trees, that was to be famous many a long year for the tragedy that befell its young wife; and Fairhill, with English graveled walks and curious exotics brought from foreign lands where Debby Norris planted the willow wand given her by Franklin, from which sprang a numerous progeny before that unknown in the New World.
"O," said the Fröken, "she follows me wherever I go." "No, that she certainly must not, for she would betray us: the door of my house is too narrow for her to enter, and we dare not let her stand without. You are too good to suffer harm," said he to the mare, while taking off the saddle and pillion, "but every one is nearest to himself."
And the stepping-block may tell in turn of the good old days when her broad sunny face was pressed by the feet of fair colonial dames who, with faces hidden in riding-hoods and masks, stepped lightly from saddle or pillion to "board and bait" at Bartholomew Woodbury's cheerful inn.
But two had riding furniture for the use of females the one being accoutred with a side-saddle, the other with a pillion attached to the saddle.
Sir Geoffrey himself superintended the purchase of a new pillion, and ordered it to be covered with green velvet. Lord Marnell, who did not often come to Lovell Tower himself, sent over a trusty messenger every day to inquire if Mistress Margery had rested well and was merry. From the latter condition she was very far.
They dashed past us on goodish nags, followed at a distance of three hundred yards by a covey of negro servants, mounted on mules, in white Osnaburg trowsers, with a shirt or frock over them, no stockings, each with one spur, and the stirrup iron held firmly between the great and second toes, while a snow white sheep's fleece covered their massas portmanteaus, strapped on to the mail pillion behind.
She had been a coquette from the earliest times almost, trying her freaks and jealousies, her wayward frolics and winning caresses, upon all that came within her reach; she set her women quarrelling in the nursery, and practised her eyes on the groom as she rode behind him on the pillion. She was the darling and torment of father and mother.
The ponderous waggon, with its bells and plodding team; the light post-coach that achieved the journey from the "White Hart," Salisbury, to the "Swan with Two Necks," London, in two days; the strings of pack-horses that had not yet left the road; my lord's gilt post-chaise and six, with the outriders galloping on ahead; the country squire's great coach and heavy Flanders mares; the farmers trotting to market, or the parson jolting to the cathedral town on Dumpling, his wife behind on the pillion all these crowding sights and brisk people greeted the young traveller on his summer journey.
De Lacy, who was engaged in removing the pillion from behind the saddle, stopped short in his task, and said, "Ha, dame! what would you with him?" "A great deal, good palmer, an I could light on him; for his lands and offices are all to be given, it's like, to that false thief, his kinsman." "What! to Damian, his nephew?" exclaimed the Constable, in a harsh and hasty tone.
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