Part 24 (1/2)

Ay, ay! this was old England, indeed! I had found it at last--there it was in the country! Hovering over the scene was a soft, dewy air, that seemed faintly tinged with the green of the gra.s.s; and I thought, as I breathed my breath, that perhaps I might be inhaling the very particles once respired by Rosamond the Fair.

On I trudged along the London road--smooth as an entry floor--and every white cottage I pa.s.sed, embosomed in honeysuckles, seemed alive in the landscape.

But the day wore on; and at length the sun grew hot; and the long road became dusty. I thought that some shady place, in some shady field, would be very pleasant to repose in. So, coming to a charming little dale, undulating down to a hollow, arched over with foliage, I crossed over toward it; but paused by the road-side at a frightful announcement, nailed against an old tree, used as a gate-post--

”man-traps and spring-guns!”

In America I had never heard of the like. What could it mean? They were not surely cannibals, that dwelt down in that beautiful little dale, and lived by catching men, like weasels and beavers in Canada!

”A man-trap!” It must be so. The announcement could bear but one meaning--that there was something near by, intended to catch human beings; some species of mechanism, that would suddenly fasten upon the unwary rover, and hold him by the leg like a dog; or, perhaps, devour him on the spot.

Incredible! In a Christian land, too! Did that sweet lady, Queen Victoria, permit such diabolical practices? Had her gracious majesty ever pa.s.sed by this way, and seen the announcement?

And who put it there?

The proprietor, probably.

And what right had he to do so?

Why, he owned the soil.

And where are his t.i.tle-deeds?

In his strong-box, I suppose.

Thus I stood wrapt in cogitations.

You are a pretty fellow, Wellingborough, thought I to myself; you are a mighty traveler, indeed:--stopped on your travels by a man-trap! Do you think Mungo Park was so served in Africa? Do you think Ledyard was so entreated in Siberia? Upon my word, you will go home not very much wiser than when you set out; and the only excuse you can give, for not having seen more sights, will be man-traps--mantraps, my masters! that frightened you!

And then, in my indignation, I fell back upon first principles. What right has this man to the soil he thus guards with dragons? What excessive effrontery, to lay sole claim to a solid piece of this planet, right down to the earth's axis, and, perhaps, straight through to the antipodes! For a moment I thought I would test his traps, and enter the forbidden Eden.

But the gra.s.s grew so thickly, and seemed so full of sly things, that at last I thought best to pace off.

Next, I came to a hawthorn lane, leading down very prettily to a nice little church; a mossy little church; a beautiful little church; just such a church as I had always dreamed to be in England. The porch was viny as an arbor; the ivy was climbing about the tower; and the bees were humming about the h.o.a.ry old head-stones along the walls.

Any man-traps here? thought I--any spring-guns?

No.

So I walked on, and entered the church, where I soon found a seat. No Indian, red as a deer, could have startled the simple people more. They gazed and they gazed; but as I was all attention to the sermon, and conducted myself with perfect propriety, they did not expel me, as at first I almost imagined they might.

Service over, I made my way through crowds of children, who stood staring at the marvelous stranger, and resumed my stroll along the London Road.

My next stop was at an inn, where under a tree sat a party of rustics, drinking ale at a table.

”Good day,” said I.

”Good day; from Liverpool?”

”I guess so.”

”For London?”