The Romany Rye by George Borrow

  CHAPTER XIII

  VISIT TO THE LANDLORD--HIS MORTIFICATIONS--HUNTER AND HISCLAN--RESOLUTION

  On the following morning, after breakfasting with Belle, who was silentand melancholy, I left her in the dingle, and took a stroll amongst theneighbouring lanes. After some time I thought I would pay a visit to thelandlord of the public house, whom I had not seen since the day when hecommunicated to me his intention of changing his religion. I thereforedirected my steps to the house, and on entering it found the landlordstanding in the kitchen. Just then two mean-looking fellows, who hadbeen drinking at one of the tables, and who appeared to be the onlycustomers in the house, got up, brushed past the landlord, and saying ina surly tone, 'We shall pay you some time or other,' took theirdeparture. 'That's the way they serve me now,' said the landlord, with asigh. 'Do you know those fellows,' I demanded, 'since you let them goaway in your debt?' 'I know nothing about them,' said the landlord,'save that they are a couple of scamps.' 'Then why did you let them goaway without paying you?' said I. 'I had not the heart to stop them,'said the landlord; 'and, to tell you the truth, everybody serves me sonow, and I suppose they are right, for a child could flog me.''Nonsense,' said I, 'behave more like a man, and with respect to thosetwo fellows run after them, I will go with you, and if they refuse to paythe reckoning I will help you to shake some money out of their clothes.''Thank you,' said the landlord; 'but as they are gone, let them go on.What they have drank is not of much consequence.' 'What is the matterwith you?' said I, staring at the landlord, who appeared strangelyaltered; his features were wild and haggard, his formerly bluff cheekswere considerably sunken in, and his figure had lost much of itsplumpness. 'Have you changed your religion already, and has the fellowin black commanded you to fast?' 'I have not changed my religion yet,'said the landlord, with a kind of shudder; 'I am to change it publiclythis day fortnight, and the idea of doing so--I do not mind tellingyou--preys much upon my mind; moreover, the noise of the thing has gotabroad, and everybody is laughing at me, and what's more, coming anddrinking my beer, and going away without paying for it, whilst I feelmyself like one bewitched, wishing but not daring to take my own part.Confound the fellow in black, I wish I had never seen him! yet what can Ido without him? The brewer swears that unless I pay him fifty poundswithin a fortnight he'll send a distress warrant into the house, and takeall I have. My poor niece is crying in the room above; and I am thinkingof going into the stable and hanging myself; and perhaps it's the bestthing I can do, for it's better to hang myself before selling my soulthan afterwards, as I'm sure I should, like Judas Iscariot, whom my poorniece, who is somewhat religiously inclined, has been talking to meabout.' 'I wish I could assist you,' said I, 'with money, but that isquite out of my power. However, I can give you a piece of advice. Don'tchange your religion by any means; you can't hope to prosper if you do;and if the brewer chooses to deal hardly with you, let him. Everybodywould respect you ten times more provided you allowed yourself to beturned into the roads rather than change your religion, than if you gotfifty pounds for renouncing it.' 'I am half inclined to take youradvice,' said the landlord, 'only, to tell you the truth, I feel quitelow, without any heart in me.' 'Come into the bar,' said I, 'and let ushave something together--you need not be afraid of my not paying for whatI order.'

  We went into the bar-room, where the landlord and I discussed between ustwo bottles of strong ale, which he said were part of the last six whichhe had in his possession. At first he wished to drink sherry, but Ibegged him to do no such thing, telling him that sherry would do him nogood, under the present circumstances; nor, indeed, to the best of mybelief under any, it being of all wines the one for which I entertainedthe most contempt. The landlord allowed himself to be dissuaded, and,after a glass or two of ale, confessed that sherry was a sicklydisagreeable drink, and that he had merely been in the habit of taking itfrom an idea he had that it was genteel. Whilst quaffing our beverage,he gave me an account of the various mortifications to which he had oflate been subject, dwelling with particular bitterness on the conduct ofHunter, who he said came every night and mouthed him, and afterwards wentaway without paying for what he had drank or smoked, in which conduct hewas closely imitated by a clan of fellows who constantly attended him.After spending several hours at the public-house I departed, notforgetting to pay for the two bottles of ale. The landlord, before Iwent, shaking me by the hand, declared that he had now made up his mindto stick to his religion at all hazards, the more especially as he wasconvinced he should derive no good by giving it up.