Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 01.pdf/580

 A Country Lawyer s Christmas Eve. forgotten all about the bankrupt himself. I had omitted to give him the requisite no tice to attend for examination. Gazing dejectedly at the watch which I held in my hand, I went mechanically through the calculation that it wanted only thirty-six hours of the time fixed for the meeting. The insolvent gentleman, a farmer, was then lying asleep in his bed near the village of R, just forty-eight miles from my easy-chair. No trains found their way into those re mote regions in those days. There is not a telegraph even now. A stage-coach made the journey twice a week, but Christmas was not one of its days. The unsuspect ing farmer could not be informed timeously or fetched timeously by the coach. I must send specially for him, and my messenger, whoever he should be, must be despatched at once. No time was to be lost. The roads, bad at any time, were pe culiarly difficult during the winter months, — if, indeed, they might not be all but impassable in consequence of the recent snow. Very hastily I muffled up again, and with out informing my slumbering domestics that I was going out, I made my way to the livery-stables. The snow was falling now, thick and clammy; a gradually rising wind kindly assisting gravitation at times by fit fully hurrying the flakes to the ground. Few prospects could be less inviting to a man who had quitted the very essence of comfort. The distance I had to walk was something under a mile. That allowed time for reflec tion, and I made such use of it. Strange and incredible though it may appear to the reader, true it is that before I reached the stables, I had resolved to undertake the journey myself. I chose to face the severities of the weather — repelling though these were to a philosopher of my persuasion — rather than intrust to a post-boy the rectification of a serious mistake. Not only would I be more active in my own interests than

I could expect any mere hireling to be; there was also, at the turning-point of the journey, the farmer to be soothed and per suaded, and fetched back with me without loss of time. A post-boy could not do that. The ill-slept hostlers got me out a gig and a horse, with an alacrity which the most finished hypocrite could not have shown had he been about to perform the journey himself. They aroused the poor brute from a sound sleep, and led him forth from a warm stable, so that I felt servilely apologetic to wards him from that moment onwards. He had not at all taken in the situation, when I was obliged to put him in motion. He quit ted the yard in a docile but thoroughly dazed state. We passed through the badly lighted streets without breaking their still ness, for the freshly fallen snow made us glide along as silently as spectres. When we had cleared the town, and its few but companionable lights were receding rapidly, I felt (I must own) a gloomy feeling coming over me. It looked so black ahead. Pene trating farther into it seemed so desperate and comfortless that, in spite of myself, my spirits sank. Reason myself out of the feeling I could not; it lowered on me and shrouded me like a mist. Had it not been truly, that half mechanically I had to keep urging for ward my unwilling horse, — had I been, for instance, walking, and so dealing with my own will alone; had I not had to combat also that of another creature, — I must cer tainly have turned my face at once and have sped swiftly back to bed. But I pressed the horse forwards, from habit, I suppose; and not unnaturally I and the gig continued to go forward too. The thermometer must have been in a bad way. Before I reached the toll my fingers were so chilled and powerless that I could hardly get out my money. Not that I was at all hurried in the operation. The tollkeeper (tacksman, I beg his pardon) gave me ample time. Indeed, he took so very long to come out after he had at length ap prised me of his awakening that I twice