Hodge

“ Hodge. I say, Tib, if thou be Tib, as I trow sure thou be,
What devil make-ado is this, between our dame and thee?
Tib. Gog's bread, Hodge, thou had a good turn thou wert not here this while!
It had been better for some of us to have been hence a mile;
My gammer is so out of course and frantic all at once,
That Cock, our boy, and I, poor wench, have felt it on our bones.
Hodge. What is the matter—say on, Tib—whereat she taketh so on?
Tib. She is undone, she saith; alas! her joy and life is gone!
If she hear not of some comfort, she is, faith! but dead ”

“ It may be that the Chaplain, Mr. Hodge, was very much of the same mind as your Humble. He said often, that he had been bearleader quite long enough to this young Cub, and was sick alike of his savage hugs, and uncouth gestures, when he had a mind to dance. Yet was he wise enough in his generation to acknowledge the commodity of a fat Pasty and a full Flask every day in the year, and of a neverfailing crown piece in the pouch in the morning for a draught to cool one's throat, when the bottle had been pushed about pretty briskly overnight. Parson Hodge was a philosopher. ”

“ With cheerfulness the eighteen pence he paid, And proudly to himself in whispers said, "This rascal stole the razors, I suppose.
"No matter if the fellow be a knave. Provided that the razors shave; It certainly will be a monstrous prize." So home the clown, with his good fortune, went, Smiling in heart and soul content, And quickly soaped himself to ears and eyes.
Being well lathered from a dish or tub, Hodge now began with grinning pain to grub, Just like a hedger cutting furze ”

“ After all the ploughing and the sowing, the hoeing and the harvest, comes the miserable end. Strong as the labourer may be, thick-set and capable of immense endurance; by slow degrees that strength must wear away. The limbs totter, the back is bowed, the dimmed sight can no longer guide the plough in a straight furrow, nor the weak hands wield the reaping-hook, Hodge, who, Atlas-like, supported upon his shoulders the agricultural world, comes in his old age under the dominion of his last masters at the workhouse. ”

“ Hodge. ’Fore God, a proper man, and I warrant, a fine workman. Master, farewell; dame, adieu; if such a man as he cannot find work, Hodge is not for you. [Offers to go.
Eyre. Stay, my fine Hodge.
[Pg 22]
Firk. Faith, an your foreman go, dame, you must take a journey to seek a new journeyman; if Roger remove, Firk follows. If Saint Hugh’s bones shall not be set a-work, I may prick mine awl in the walls, and go play. Fare ye well, master; good-bye, dame.
Eyre. Tarry, my fine Hodge, my brisk foreman! Stay, Firk! Peace, pudding-broth! By the Lord of Ludgate, I love my men as my life. ”

“ It is murder; Hodge is an assassin: he will kill what he hates, if he dares. I have been so aroused to defend his faithful character that I have devised two pleadings: first, Hodge is the essence of British parliaments, the sum total of British institutions; therefore he patriotically believes that things British should be good enough for the British—of course, their own ferns. At other times I am rather inclined to surmise that his malice and murderous resentment are due to his inability to take on any more Latin, least of all imported Latin. ”

“ BEVERLEY.
[Enclosed letter from Edward Blackthorne]
MY DEAR MR. SANDS:
I follow up my letter of yesterday with the unexpected tidings of to-day. I am willing to believe that these will interest you as associated with your coming visit.
Hodge is dead. His last birthday, his final natal eclipse, has bowled him over and left him darkened for good. He can trouble us no more, but will now do his part as mould for the rose of York and the rose of Lancaster. He will help to make a mound for some other Englishman's ferns. ”

“ Hodge. Tush, tush, her nee'le, her nee'le, her nee'le, man: 'tis neither flesh nor fish,
A little thing with an hole in the end, as bright as any sil'er,
Small, long, sharp at the point, and straight as any pillar.
Diccon. I know not what a devil thou meanest, thou bring'st me more in doubt.
Hodge. Knowest not with what Tom-tailor's man sits broaching through a clout?
A nee'le, a nee'le, a nee'le, my Gammer's nee'le is gone.
Diccon. Her nee'le! Hodge, now I smell thee; that was a chance alone:
By the mass, thou hast a shameful loss, and it were but for thy breeches. ”

“ But I have more respect for Hodge. He has nothing to say for himself. If he is picturesque, it is not after the received fashion. If his life contains a poem, it is not one that would be appreciated, generally, either in the Eastern, or the Western, Row. He has, however, a stout, and withal a good heart. One ought to be the better for knowing something of his unobtrusive manly virtues. Achmed has a gust for pleasure, in which matter he has had some training. He is a merry fellow who will enliven your holiday. Hodge’s spiriting lies in a different direction. ”

“ What devil can I tell, man, I could not have one word,
They gave no more heed to my talk than thou wouldst to a lord.
Hodge. Ich cannot skill but muse, what marvellous thing it is:
Chill in and know myself what matters are amiss.
Diccon. Then farewell, Hodge, a while, since thou dost inward haste,
For I will into the good wife Chat's, to feel how the ale doth taste. ”

“ Tib. See, Hodge, what's this? may it not be within it?
Hodge. Break it, fool, with thy hand, and see and thou canst find it.
[14]
Tib. Nay, break it you, Hodge, according to your word.
Hodge. Gog's sides! fie! it stinks! it is a cat's turd!
It were well done to make thee eat it, by the mass!
Gammer. This matter amendeth not; my nee'le is still where it was.
Our candle is at an end, let us all in quite,
And come another time, when we have more light.
THE SECOND ACT. First a Song.
Back and side go bare, go bare,
Both foot and hand go cold;
But, belly, God send thee good ale enough. ”

“ Hodge comes into the place, walking slowly behind cattle or sheep, or jolting in on a waggon. His wife comes, too, on foot, through the roughest weather, to fetch her household goods. His daughter comes into the hiring fair, and stands waiting for employment on the pavement in the same spot used for the purpose from time immemorial, within sight of the stately façades of the banks. He himself has stood in the market-place with reaping hook or hoe looking for a master. ”

“ As skilled in noise and sounds as Hodge himself;
And, quite convinced with the proofs it gives,
The boy drives on and fancies echo lives,
Like some wood-fiend that frights benighted men,
The troubling spirit of a robber's den. ”

“ Hodge. Yes, forsooth, at the poulterer’s in Gracious Street. [68]
Marg. Thou art an ungracious wag; perdy, I mean a false hair for my periwig.
Hodge. Why, mistress, the next time I cut my beard, you shall have the shavings of it; but they are all true hairs.
Marg. It is very hot, I must get me a fan or else a mask.
Hodge. So you had need to hide your wicked face.
Marg. Fie, upon it, how costly this world’s calling is; perdy, but that it is one of the wonderful works of God, I would not deal with it. ”

“ Hodge is the fellow who knows the ferns according to the slabs. It is time you should know Hodge by his slab. No such being can yet be found in the United States: your civilisation is too young. Hodge is my British-Empire gardener; and as he now looks out for every birthday much as for any total solar eclipse of the year—with a kind of growing solicitude lest the sun or the birthday should finally, as it passes, bowl him over for good—he announced to me with visible relief the other day that he had successfully passed another total natal eclipse ”

“ Hodge for the most part lives and dies in his ancestral village: marries Mary, the daughter of Hodge Secundus of that parish, and begets assorted Hodges and Marys in vast quantities, all of the same pattern, to replenish the earth in the next generation. There you have a very well-marked hereditary caste, little given to intermixture with others, and from whose members, however recruited by fresh blood, the object of our quest, the Divine Genius, is very unlikely to find his point of origin. ”

“ Hodge. Gog's heart! thou false villain, dost thou bite me?
Baily. What, Hodge, doth he hurt thee ere ever he begin?
Hodge. He thrust me into the buttock with a bodkin or a pin.
[He discovers the needle.
I say, gammer! gammer!
Gammer. How now, Hodge, how now?
Hodge. God's malt, gammer Gurton!
Gammer. Thou art mad, ich trow!
Hodge. Will you see the devil, gammer?
Gammer. The devil, son! God bless us!
Hodge. Chould, [if] ich were hanged, gammer—
Gammer. Marry, see, ye might dress us—
Hodge. ”

“ All that I wish to protest against is the assumption made by some that because he has written so feelingly about Hodge, because he has shown so quick a response to the beauties of the natural world, he was therefore gifted with a deep nature, as has been claimed for him by some of his admirers. ”

“ Hodge wondered, but interfered not, but at last the supernatural thieves began to busy themselves in a way still less to his taste, for each elf set about conveying the crop away, a straw at a time, with astonishing activity and perseverance. The keyhole was still their port of egress and regress, and it [186] resembled the aperture of a beehive, on a sunny day in June. The farmer was rather annoyed at seeing his grain vanish in this fashion, when one of the fairies, while hard at work, said to another, in the tiniest voice that ever was heard—
“I weat; you weat?” (I sweat; do you sweat?) ”

“ And then farewell Gib, she is undone and lost, all save the skin.
Hodge. 'Tis [271] your nee'le, woman, I say; Gog's soul, give me a knife,
And chill have it out of her maw, or else chall lose my life.
Gammer. What! nay, Hodge, fie, kill not our cat, 'tis all the cats we ha' now.
Hodge. By the mass, dame Chat hase me so moved, ich care not what I kill, ma' God a vow.
Go to then, Tib, to this gear, hold up her tail and take her,
Chill see what devil is in her guts, chill take the pains to rake her.
Gammer. Rake a cat, Hodge! what wouldest thou do? ”

“ The good little girl then began to feed Arphu out of her bason; but at this unlucky minute the ill-natured Hodge came in, calling in a surly tone for his breakfast. He had been clipping the hedge in the front of the house, and was in a very ill humour, as he always was when he had any thing to do. Little Maudlin got up to pour his milk out of the boiler, but no sooner had she placed the kitten on her stool than the cruel Hodge in a moment laid his hands on it, and seizing the shears, cut the poor thing's nice velvet ears close to its head. ”

“ You were perfectly familiar with Carson City.”
“Yes, I had been there before, and it is a place I shall not soon forget, for it was there I last saw my old chum of Fardale, Bart Hodge.”
“You have spoken of him often of late.”
“Yes; I have been thinking of him very much. It is natural, as I am near where I saw him last. Dear old fellow! How we fought in the old days when we first met! And, after that, what firm friends we became! Hodge had his failings, but he was white at heart. He would lay down his life for a friend. ”

“ He searched the floor, picked up the cigar, looked at it regretfully, and threw it out of an open window.
"This," he resumed, waving his hand toward the piano, "is Mrs. Ernest Hodge. This is Miss Fane, Mrs. Hodge's daughter—no, not by a first marriage; everybody suggests that. Professional name, you know—she sings. Hodge really wouldn't do, would it, Mrs. Hodge? This is Philip Hume. This is Arthur Angell, who writes verses—like me. This is—but I expect you know these gentlemen?" ”

“ Hodge. Chill broach thee with this, by m' father's soul, chill conjure that foul spreet.
Let door stand, Cock, why com'st indeed? keep door, thou whoreson boy.
Chat [to Doll.] Stand to it, thou dastard, for thine ears; ise teach the sluttish toy.
Hodge. Gog's wounds, whore, chill make thee avaunt,
Take heed, Cock, pull in the latch.
Chat. I' faith, sir loose-breech, had ye tarried, ye should have found your match.
Gammer. Now 'ware thy throat, losel, [263] thou'se pay for all. ”

“ But it is not alone the Ghetto-dweller, the prisoner, and the pauper that starve. Hodge, of the country, does not know what it is always to have a full belly. In truth, it is his empty belly which has driven him. ”

“ His host and his host’s household, his men and his maids, as they became intimately known to Clare began to differentiate themselves as in a chemical process. The thought of Pascal’s was brought home to him: ‘A mesure qu’on a plus d’esprit, on trouve qu’il y a plus d’hommes originaux. Les gens du commun ne trouvent pas de difference entre les hommes.’ The typical and unvarying Hodge ceased to exist. ”

“ Hodge. “Don’t crowd around Miss Gay so closely, children! She needs room to breathe.”
“I’m all right now—really,” said Mary Louise. The warmth of the room was working its magic spell; for the first time now she noticed the Christmas tree and the toys around the floor.
“I’ve been locked up alone in that empty house of Mrs. Ferguson’s since five o’clock last night——” she began. But Mrs. Hodge refused to let her talk until she had eaten her breakfast. ”

“ Giles and Mike began to laugh, as much at Hodge's angry disgust as at the thing itself.
"You've not hit it off, after all," said Michael to his host. "Still, anything's better than nothing. I vote that we eat what there is," and he cut a slice off his loaf. The others—Hodge very gloomily—did the same and began to eat. The provisions were good of their kind.
"I wonder what I did wrong, or didn't do right," said Giles. "At worst, Hodge, I've got on better than you, and next Sunday maybe Michael will manage best of all. Surely you'll get some hot potatoes at least, Mike?" ”