Charles Dickens - Barnaby Rudge — A Tale Of The Riots Of Eighty

The sun had begun to peep above the forest trees, and already flung across the curling mist bright bars of gold, when Joe dropped from his window on the ground below, a little bundle and his trusty stick, and prepared to descend himself.

It was not a very difficult task; for there were so many projections and gable ends in the way, that they formed a series of clumsy steps, with no greater obstacle than a jump of some few feet at last. Joe, with his stick and bundle on his shoulder, quickly stood on the firm earth, and looked up at the old Maypole, it might be for the last time.

He didn't apostrophise it, for he was no great scholar. He didn't curse it, for he had little ill-will to give to anything on earth. He felt more affectionate and kind to it than ever he had done in all his life before, so said with all his heart, “God bless you!” as a parting wish, and turned away.

He walked along at a brisk pace, big with great thoughts of going for a soldier and dying in some foreign country where it was very hot and sandy, and leaving God knows what unheard-of wealth in prize-money to Dolly, who would be very much affected when she came to know of it; and full of such youthful visions, which were sometimes sanguine and sometimes melancholy, but always had her for their main point and centre, pushed on vigorously until the noise of London sounded in his ears, and the Black Lion hove in sight.

It was only eight o'clock then, and very much astonished the Black Lion was, to see him come walking in with dust upon his feet at that early hour, with no grey mare to bear him company. But as he ordered breakfast to be got ready with all speed, and on its being set before him gave indisputable tokens of a hearty appetite, the Lion received him, as usual, with a hospitable welcome; and treated him with those marks of distinction, which, as a regular customer, and one within the freemasonry of the trade, he had a right to claim.

This Lion or landlord,—for he was called both man and beast, by reason of his having instructed the artist who painted his sign, to convey into the features of the lordly brute whose effigy it bore, as near a counterpart of his own face as his skill could compass and devise,—was a gentleman almost as quick of apprehension, and of almost as subtle a wit, as the mighty John himself. But the difference between them lay in this: that whereas Mr Willet's extreme sagacity and acuteness were the efforts of unassisted nature, the Lion stood indebted, in no small amount, to beer; of which he swigged such copious draughts, that most of his faculties were utterly drowned and washed away, except the one great faculty of sleep, which he retained in surprising perfection. The creaking Lion over the house-door was, therefore, to say the truth, rather a drowsy, tame, and feeble lion; and as these social representatives of a savage class are usually of a conventional character (being depicted, for the most part, in impossible attitudes and of unearthly colours), he was frequently supposed by the more ignorant and uninformed among the neighbours, to be the veritable portrait of the host as he appeared on the occasion of some great funeral ceremony or public mourning.

“What noisy fellow is that in the next room?” said Joe, when he had disposed of his breakfast, and had washed and brushed himself.

“A recruiting serjeant,” replied the Lion.

Joe started involuntarily. Here was the very thing he had been dreaming of, all the way along.

“And I wish,” said the Lion, “he was anywhere else but here. The party make noise enough, but don't call for much. There's great cry there, Mr Willet, but very little wool. Your father wouldn't like “em, I know.”

Perhaps not much under any circumstances. Perhaps if he could have known what was passing at that moment in Joe's mind, he would have liked them still less.

“Is he recruiting for a—for a fine regiment?” said Joe, glancing at a little round mirror that hung in the bar.

“I believe he is,” replied the host. “It's much the same thing, whatever regiment he's recruiting for. I'm told there an't a deal of difference between a fine man and another one, when they're shot through and through.”

“They're not all shot,” said Joe.

“No,” the Lion answered, “not all. Those that are—supposing it's done easy—are the best off in my opinion.”

“Ah!” retorted Joe, “but you don't care for glory.”

“For what?” said the Lion.

“Glory.”

“No,” returned the Lion, with supreme indifference. “I don't. You're right in that, Mr Willet. When Glory comes here, and calls for anything to drink and changes a guinea to pay for it, I'll give it him for nothing. It's my belief, sir, that the Glory's arms wouldn't do a very strong business.”

These remarks were not at all comforting. Joe walked out, stopped at the door of the next room, and listened. The serjeant was describing a military life. It was all drinking, he said, except that there were frequent intervals of eating and love-making. A battle was the finest thing in the world—when your side won it— and Englishmen always did that. “Supposing you should be killed, sir?” said a timid voice in one corner. “Well, sir, supposing you should be,” said the serjeant, “what then? Your country loves you, sir; his Majesty King George the Third loves you; your memory is honoured, revered, respected; everybody's fond of you, and grateful to you; your name's wrote down at full length in a book in the War Office. Damme, gentlemen, we must all die some time, or another, eh?”

The voice coughed, and said no more.

Joe walked into the room. A group of half-a-dozen fellows had gathered together in the taproom, and were listening with greedy ears. One of them, a carter in a smockfrock, seemed wavering and disposed to enlist. The rest, who were by no means disposed, strongly urged him to do so (according to the custom of mankind), backed the serjeant's arguments, and grinned among themselves. “I say nothing, boys,” said the serjeant, who sat a little apart, drinking his liquor. “For lads of spirit'—here he cast an eye on Joe—'this is the time. I don't want to inveigle you. The king's not come to that, I hope. Brisk young blood is what we want; not milk and water. We won't take five men out of six. We want topsawyers, we do. I'm not a-going to tell tales out of school, but, damme, if every gentleman's son that carries arms in our corps, through being under a cloud and having little differences with his relations, was counted up'—here his eye fell on Joe again, and so good-naturedly, that Joe beckoned him out. He came directly.

“You're a gentleman, by G—!” was his first remark, as he slapped him on the back. “You're a gentleman in disguise. So am I. Let's swear a friendship.”

Joe didn't exactly do that, but he shook hands with him, and thanked him for his good opinion.

“You want to serve,” said his new friend. “You shall. You were made for it. You're one of us by nature. What'll you take to drink?”

“Nothing just now,” replied Joe, smiling faintly. “I haven't quite made up my mind.”

“A mettlesome fellow like you, and not made up his mind!” cried the serjeant. “Here—let me give the bell a pull, and you'll make up your mind in half a minute, I know.”

“You're right so far'—answered Joe, “for if you pull the bell here, where I'm known, there'll be an end of my soldiering inclinations in no time. Look in my face. You see me, do you?”

“I do,” replied the serjeant with an oath, “and a finer young fellow or one better qualified to serve his king and country, I never set my—” he used an adjective in this place—'eyes on.

“Thank you,” said Joe, “I didn't ask you for want of a compliment, but thank you all the same. Do I look like a sneaking fellow or a liar?”