The Project Gutenberg eBook, Th' Barrel Organ, by Edwin Waugh

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Title: Th' Barrel Organ

Author: Edwin Waugh

Release Date: June 4, 2005 [eBook #15986]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TH' BARREL ORGAN***

E-text prepared by Todd Augsburger <[email protected]>

TH' BARREL ORGAN

by

EDWIN WAUGH

Manchester:
John Heywood, 143 Deansgate.
London: Simkin, Marshall & Co.

I came out at Haslingden town-end with my old acquaintance, "Rondle o'th Nab," better known by the name of "Sceawter," a moor-end farmer and cattle dealer. He was telling me a story about a cat that squinted, and grew very fat because—to use his own words—it "catched two mice at one go." When he had finished the tale, he stopped suddenly in the middle of the road, and looking round at the hills, he said, "Nea then. I'se be like to lev yo here. I mun turn off to 'Dick o' Rough-cap's' up Musbury Road. I want to bargain about yon heifer. He's a very fair chap, is Dick,—for a cow-jobber. But yo met as weel go up wi' me, an' then go forrud to our house. We'n some singers comin' to neet."

"Nay," said I, "I think I'll tak up through Horncliffe, an' by th' moor-gate, to't 'Top o'th Hoof.'"

"Well, then," replied he, "yo mun strike off at th' lift hond, about a mile fur on; an' then up th' hill side, an' through th' delph. Fro theer yo mun get upo' th' owd road as weel as yo con; an' when yo'n getten it, keep it. So good day, an' tak care o' yorsel'. Barfoot folk should never walk upo' prickles." He then turned, and walked off. Before he had gone twenty yards he shouted back, "Hey! I say! Dunnot forget th' cat."

It was a fine autumn day; clear and cool. Dead leaves were whirling about the road-side. I toiled slowly up the hill, to the famous Horncliffe Quarries, where the sounds of picks, chisels, and gavelocks, used by the workmen, rose strangely clear amidst the surrounding stillness. From the quarries I got up by an old pack horse road, to a commanding elevation at the top of the moors. Here I sat down on a rude block of mossy stone, upon a bleak point of the hills, overlooking one of the most picturesque parts of the Irwell valley. The country around me was part of the wild tract still known by its ancient name of the Forest of Rossendale. Lodges of water and beautiful reaches of the winding river gleamed in the evening sun, among green holms and patches of woodland, far down the vale; and mills, mansions, farmsteads, churches, and busy hamlets succeeded each other as far as the eye could see. The moorland tops and slopes were all purpled with fading heather, save here and there where a well-defined tract of green showed that cultivation had worked up a little plot of the wilderness into pasture land. About eight miles south, a gray cloud hung over the town of Bury, and nearer, a flying trail of white steam marked the rush of a railway train along the valley. From a lofty perch of the hills, on the north-west, the sounds of Haslingden church bells came sweetly upon the ear, swayed to and fro by the unsettled wind, now soft and low, borne away by the breeze, now full and clear, sweeping by me in a great gush of melody, and dying out upon the moorland wilds behind. Up from the valley came drowsy sounds that tell the wane of day, and please the ear of evening as she draws her curtains over the world. A woman's voice floated up from the pastures of an old farm-house, below where I sat, calling the cattle home. The barking of dogs sounded clear in different parts of the vale, and about scattered hamlets, on the hill sides. I could hear the far-off prattle of a company of girls, mingled with the lazy joltings of a cart, the occasional crack of a whip, and the surly call of a driver to his horses, upon the high road, half a mile below me. From a wooded slope, on the opposite side of the valley, the crack of a gun came, waking the echoes for a minute; and then all seemed to sink into a deeper stillness than before, and the dreamy surge of sound broke softer and softer upon the shores of evening, as daylight sobered down. High above the green valley, on both sides, the moorlands stretched away in billowy wildernesses—dark, bleak, and almost soundless, save where the wind harped his wild anthem upon the heathery waste, and where roaring streams filled the lonely cloughs with drowsy uproar. It was a striking scene, and it was an impressive hour. The bold, round, flat-topped height of Musbury Tor stood gloomily proud, on the opposite side, girdled off from the rest of the hills by a green vale. The lofty outlines of Aviside and Holcombe were glowing with the gorgeous hues of a cloudless October sunset. Along those wild ridges the soldiers of ancient Rome marched from Manchester to Preston, when boars and wolves ranged the woods and thickets of the Irwell valley. The stream is now lined all the way with busy populations, and evidences of great wealth and enterprise. But the spot from which I looked down upon it was still naturally wild. The hand of man had left no mark there, except the grass-grown pack-horse road. There was no sound nor sign of life immediately around me.

The wind was cold, and daylight was dying down. It was getting too near dark to go by the moor tops, so I made off towards a cottage in the next clough, where an old quarry-man lived, called "Jone o'Twilter's." The pack-horse road led by the place. Once there, I knew that I could spend a pleasant hour with the old folk, and, after that, be directed by a short cut down to the great highway in the valley, from whence an hour's walk would bring me near home. I found the place easily, for I had been there in summer. It was a substantial stone-built cottage, or little farm-house, with mullioned windows. A stone-seated porch, white-washed inside, shaded the entrance; and there was a little barn and a shippon, or cow-house attached. By the by, that word "shippon," must have been originally "sheep-pen." The house nestled deep in the clough, upon a shelf of green land, near the moorland stream. On a rude ornamental stone, above the threshold of the porch, the date of the building was quaintly carved, "1696," with the initials, "J. S.," and then, a little lower down, and partly between these, the letter "P.," as if intended for "John and Sarah Pilkington." On the lower slope of the hill, immediately in front of the house there was a kind of kitchen garden, well stocked, and in very fair order. Above the garden, the wild moorland rose steeply up, marked with wandering sheep tracts. From the back of the house, a little flower garden sloped away to the edge of a rocky back. The moorland stream rushed wildly along its narrow channel, a few yards below; and, viewed from the garden wall, at the edge of the bank, it was a weird bit of stream scenery. The water rushed and roared here; there it played a thousand pranks; and there, again, it was full of graceful eddies; gliding away at last over the smooth lip of a worn rock, a few yards lower down. A kind of green gloom pervaded the watery chasm, caused by the thick shade of trees overspreading from the opposite bank. It was a spot that a painter might have chosen for "The Kelpie's Home."

The cottage door was open; and I guessed by the silence inside that old "Jone" had not reached home.