The Richmond palladium. (Richmond, Ind.) 1906-1907, 1906-11-14

/ and horns and voices. which presently
came nearer. Then-I the road was filled
up with the dancing May jewellers, and
verify / wondered net 50 much at
those DEGREES against such practices
before the Restoration. for il was as
if the savages which they do say are
underneath the outer gloss of the best
of Us had broke loose and | wondered
if it might not be like those mad and
unlawful orgies which It was said the
god Pan led himself in person through
ThesSalian groves.
Those honest country maids. who in
the morning had advanced with rustic
but innocent freedom. with their glossy
heads crowned with flowers. and those
lusty youths. who We're indeed some
thing boisterous. yet still held in a tight
rein by decency. had seemingly chang
ed their very natures. or rather. per-
haps. had come to that pass when their
natures could be no longer concealed.
Along the road in the white moon
light they stamped as wantonly as
/ any herd of kline; youths and maids
| with arms about each other and all
with faces flushed with ale drinking.
| and the maids with tossing hair and
CULTS, anu the llt>H
| lands withered or scattered.
And the old graybeard who was
Maid Marion was riotously drunk and
borne aleft with mad and feeble GEES
turings on the shoulders of two stag
gering yoi.ng men, and after him came
aSeu inoTris uancers, only upneiu
from collapse in the mire by mutual
upholdings, until they seemed like
some monStrous animal moving with
uncouth sprawls of legs as mutifold
as centipede, and wavering drunk
emily from one side of the road TO
the other, lurching into the dewy
bushes, then recovering by the joint
effort of the whole.
1 stood well back to let them pass,
being in that mood of self Importance,
by reason of my love and the service
rendered by il, that / could have seen
the whole posse led to the whipping
block with relish, when suddenly,
from their tipsy threats, came a shout
of such import that my heart stood
still. Down with the king" hallooed
one mad reveler, in a voice of such
thickness that the whole sentence
seemed one word; then the others took
it up, until verify it seemed to me
that their heads were not worth a
farthing. Then, Down with the gov
ernor. Down with Lord Culpeper."'5
shouted that same thick voice of the
man who was leading the wild crew
like a bellwether. He forged ahead,
something more steady on his legs, but
all the madden of his wits for that,
with an arm around the waist of a
buxom lass on either side, and all
three dancing in time. Then all the
rest echoed that shout of Down with
the governor Then out he burst
again with, Down, down with the to-
bacco, down with the tobacco.'
But the volley of that echo was cut
short by five horsemen galloping after
the throng and scattering them to the
right and left. Then great voice of
authority, set out with the strangest
oaths which ever an imagination of
evil comprised, called out to them to
be still if they valued their heads and
cursed them all for drunken fools, and
as he spoke dashed with his whip from
side to side, and his face cleaned with
wrath like demons in the full light,
and saw he was Captain Noel Jaynes.
a name for himself on the high seas.
After him rode the brothers. Nicho-
las and Richard Barry. two great men.
sticking to their saddles like rocks.
with fair locks alike on the head of
each flung out on the wind, and then
came Ralph Drake, rising in his stir
rups and laughing wildly. and last
Parson Downs, but only last because
the road was blocked, for verify l
thought his plunging horse would have
all before him under his feet.
They We're all past me in a trice like
dream, the May revelers scattering
and Fastening forward with shrieks
of terror and shouts of rage and peals
of defiant laughter, and Captain
Jaynes' voice, like trumpet, overbear
ing everything, and shouts from the
Barry brothers echoing him. and now
and then coming the deep rumble of
expostula tons from the parsons great
chest. and Ralph brakes peals of horse
laughter, and 1 was left to consider
what finder box this colony of Nir-
ginia was, and how ready to leap to
flame at spark even when seeming
ly most at peace, and to regard with
more ana more anxiety Mary odfeu-
dish's part i'll this brewing tumult.
After the shouting and hallooing
throng had passed walked along slow
ly. rejecting, as l have said, when l
saw in the road before me two advanc-
ing-a woman and a man leading a
horse by the bridle-and it was Mary
Cayendish and Sir Humphrey Hyde.
And when 1 came up with them they
stopped, and Humphrey addressed me
rudely enough, but as one gentleman
might another when he was angered
with him, and not eontemptuously, for
that was never the lads way with me.
Master Wingfield,'' he said, standing
before me and holding his champing
horse hard by the bits. Il pray you
have the grace to explain this matter
of the goods
1 saw that Mistress Mary had been
aequainting him with what had passed
and her puzZlement over it.
There is naught TO explain, Sir
HumphFey' said I. It's very SIM
pie. Mistress Mary hath the goods
for which she sent to England