It was difficult, even for Mr. Hill's sagacity, to make sense of this dream: but he had the wise art of always finding in his dreams something that confirmed his waking determinations. Before he went to sleep, he had half resolved to consult the king of the gipsies, in the absence of the attorney; and his dream made him now wholly determined upon this prudent step. "From Bampfylde the Second," thought he, "I shall learn for certain who made the hole under the cathedral, who pulled down my rick of bark, and who made away with my dog Jowler; and then I shall swear examinations against O'Neill, without waiting for attorneys. I will follow my own way in this business: I have always found my own way best."So, when the dusk of the evening increased, our wise man set out towards the wood to consult the cunning man. Bampfylde the Second, king of the gipsies, resided in a sort of hut made of the branches of trees; the verger stooped, but did not stoop low enough, as he entered this temporary palace, and, whilst his body was almost bent double, his peruke was caught upon a twig. From this awkward situation he was relieved by the consort of the king; and he now beheld, by the light of some embers, the person of his gipsy majesty, to whose sublime appearance this dim light was so favourable that it struck a secret awe into our wise man's soul;and, forgetting Hereford Cathedral, and oak bark, and Limerick gloves, he stood for some seconds speechless. During this time, the queen very dexterously disencumbered his pocket of all superfluous articles. When he recovered his recollection, he put with great solemnity the following queries to the king of the gipsies, and received the following answers:-"Do you know a dangerous Irishman of the name of O'Neill, who has come, for purposes best known to himself, to settle at Hereford?""Yes, we know him well."
"Indeed! And what do you know of him?"
"That he is a dangerous Irishman."
"Right! And it was he, was it not, that pulled down, or caused to be pulled down, my rick of oak bark?""It was."
"And who was it that made away with my dog Jowler, that used to guard the tan-yard?""It was the person that you suspect."
"And was it the person whom I suspect that made the hole under the foundation of our cathedral?""The same, and no other."
"And for what purpose did he make that hole?""For a purpose that must not be named," replied the king of the gipsies, nodding his head in a mysterious manner.
"But it may be named to me," cried the verger, "for I have found it out, and I am one of the vergers; and is it not fit that a plot to blow up the Hereford Cathedral should be known TO me, and THROUGHme?"
"Now, take my word, Wise men of Hereford, None in safety may be, Till the bad man doth flee."These oracular verses, pronounced by Bampfylde with all the enthusiasm of one who was inspired, had the desired effect upon our wise man; and he left the presence of the king of the gipsies with a prodigiously high opinion of his majesty's judgment and of his own, fully resolved to impart, the next morning, to the mayor of Hereford his important discoveries.
Now it happened that, during the time Mr. Hill was putting the foregoing queries to Bampfylde the Second, there came to the door or entrance of the audience chamber an Irish haymaker who wanted to consult the cunning man about a little leathern purse which he had lost whilst he was making hay in a field near Hereford. This haymaker was the same person who, as we have related, spoke so advantageously of our hero O'Neill to the widow Smith. As this man, whose name was Paddy M'Cormack, stood at the entrance of the gipsies' hut, his attention was caught by the name of O'Neill; and he lost not a word of all that pasted. He had reason to be somewhat surprised at hearing Bampfylde assert it was O'Neill who had pulled down the rick of bark. "By the holy poker!" said he to himself, "the old fellow now is out there. I know more o' that matter than he does--no offence to his majesty; he knows no more of my purse, I'll engage now, than he does of this man's rick of bark and his dog: so I'll keep my tester in my pocket, and not be giving it to this king o' the gipsies, as they call him: who, as near as I can guess, is no better than a cheat. But there is one secret which I can be telling this conjuror himself: he shall not find it such an easy matter to do all what he thinks; he shall not be after ruining an innocent countryman of my own whilst Paddy M'Cormack has a tongue and brains."Now, Paddy M'Cormack had the best reason possible for knowing that Mr. O'Neill did not pull down Mr. Hill's rick of bark; it was M'Cormack himself who, in the heat of his resentment for the insulting arrest of his countryman in the streets of Hereford, had instigated his fellow haymakers to this mischief; he headed them, and thought he was doing a clever, spirited action.
There is a strange mixture of virtue and vice in the minds of the lower class of Irish: or rather, a strange confusion in their ideas of right and wrong, from want of proper education. As soon as poor Paddy found out that his spirited action of pulling down the rick of bark was likely to be the ruin of his countryman, he resolved to make all the amends in his power for his folly--he went to collect his fellow haymakers, and persuaded them to assist him this night in rebuilding what they had pulled down.
