Chapter XVII. Foo-foo the First.

by Mark Twain

　　Miles Hendon hurried along toward the Southwark end of the bridge,keeping a sharp look-out for the persons he sought, and hoping andexpecting to overtake them presently. He was disappointed inthis, however. By asking questions, he was enabled to track thempart of the way through Southwark; then all traces ceased, and hewas perplexed as to how to proceed. Still, he continued hisefforts as best he could during the rest of the day. Nightfallfound him leg-weary, half-famished, and his desire as far fromaccomplishment as ever; so he supped at the Tabard Inn and went tobed, resolved to make an early start in the morning, and give thetown an exhaustive search. As he lay thinking and planning, hepresently began to reason thus: The boy would escape from theruffian, his reputed father, if possible; would he go back toLondon and seek his former haunts? No, he would not do that, hewould avoid recapture. What, then, would he do? Never having hada friend in the world, or a protector, until he met Miles Hendon,he would naturally try to find that friend again, provided theeffort did not require him to go toward London and danger. Hewould strike for Hendon Hall, that is what he would do, for heknew Hendon was homeward bound and there he might expect to findhim. Yes, the case was plain to Hendon--he must lose no more timein Southwark, but move at once through Kent, toward Monk's Holm,searching the wood and inquiring as he went. Let us return to thevanished little King now.The ruffian whom the waiter at the inn on the bridge saw 'about tojoin' the youth and the King did not exactly join them, but fellin close behind them and followed their steps. He said nothing.His left arm was in a sling, and he wore a large green patch overhis left eye; he limped slightly, and used an oaken staff as asupport. The youth led the King a crooked course throughSouthwark, and by-and-by struck into the high road beyond. TheKing was irritated, now, and said he would stop here--it wasHendon's place to come to him, not his to go to Hendon. He wouldnot endure such insolence; he would stop where he was. The youthsaid--"Thou'lt tarry here, and thy friend lying wounded in the woodyonder? So be it, then."The King's manner changed at once. He cried out--"Wounded? And who hath dared to do it? But that is apart; leadon, lead on! Faster, sirrah! Art shod with lead? Wounded, ishe? Now though the doer of it be a duke's son he shall rue it!"It was some distance to the wood, but the space was speedilytraversed. The youth looked about him, discovered a boughsticking in the ground, with a small bit of rag tied to it, thenled the way into the forest, watching for similar boughs andfinding them at intervals; they were evidently guides to the pointhe was aiming at. By-and-by an open place was reached, where werethe charred remains of a farm-house, and near them a barn whichwas falling to ruin and decay. There was no sign of lifeanywhere, and utter silence prevailed. The youth entered thebarn, the King following eagerly upon his heels. No one there!The King shot a surprised and suspicious glance at the youth, andasked--"Where is he?"A mocking laugh was his answer. The King was in a rage in amoment; he seized a billet of wood and was in the act of chargingupon the youth when another mocking laugh fell upon his ear. Itwas from the lame ruffian who had been following at a distance.The King turned and said angrily--"Who art thou? What is thy business here?""Leave thy foolery," said the man, "and quiet thyself. Mydisguise is none so good that thou canst pretend thou knowest notthy father through it.""Thou art not my father. I know thee not. I am the King. Ifthou hast hid my servant, find him for me, or thou shalt supsorrow for what thou hast done."John Canty replied, in a stern and measured voice--"It is plain thou art mad, and I am loath to punish thee; but ifthou provoke me, I must. Thy prating doth no harm here, wherethere are no ears that need to mind thy follies; yet it is well topractise thy tongue to wary speech, that it may do no hurt whenour quarters change. I have done a murder, and may not tarry athome--neither shalt thou, seeing I need thy service. My name ischanged, for wise reasons; it is Hobbs--John Hobbs; thine is Jack--charge thy memory accordingly. Now, then, speak. Where is thymother? Where are thy sisters? They came not to the placeappointed--knowest thou whither they went?"The King answered sullenly--"Trouble me not with these riddles. My mother is dead; my sistersare in the palace."The youth near by burst into a derisive laugh, and the King wouldhave assaulted him, but Canty--or Hobbs, as he now called himself--prevented him, and said--"Peace, Hugo, vex him not; his mind is astray, and thy ways frethim. Sit thee down, Jack, and quiet thyself; thou shalt have amorsel to eat, anon."Hobbs and Hugo fell to talking together, in low voices, and theKing removed himself as far as he could from their disagreeablecompany. He withdrew into the twilight of the farther end of thebarn, where he found the earthen floor bedded a foot deep withstraw. He lay down here, drew straw over himself in lieu ofblankets, and was soon absorbed in thinking. He had many griefs,but the minor ones were swept almost into forgetfulness by thesupreme one, the loss of his father. To the rest of the world thename of Henry VIII. brought a shiver, and suggested an ogre whosenostrils breathed destruction and whose hand dealt scourgings anddeath; but to this boy the name brought only sensations ofpleasure; the figure it invoked wore a countenance that was allgentleness and affection. He called to mind a long succession ofloving passages between his father and himself, and dwelt fondlyupon them, his unstinted tears attesting how deep and real was thegrief that possessed his heart. As the afternoon wasted away, thelad, wearied with his troubles, sank gradually into a tranquil andhealing slumber.After a considerable time--he could not tell how long--his sensesstruggled to a half-consciousness, and as he lay with closed eyesvaguely wondering where he was and what had been happening, henoted a murmurous sound, the sullen beating of rain upon the roof.A snug sense of comfort stole over him, which was rudely broken,the next moment, by a chorus of piping cackles and coarselaughter. It startled him disagreeably, and he unmuffled his headto see whence this interruption proceeded. A grim and unsightlypicture met his eye. A bright fire was burning in the middle ofthe floor, at the other end of the barn; and around it, and litweirdly up by the red glare, lolled and sprawled the motliestcompany of tattered gutter-scum and ruffians, of both sexes, hehad ever read or dreamed of. There were huge stalwart men, brownwith exposure, long-haired, and clothed in fantastic rags; therewere middle-sized youths, of truculent countenance, and similarlyclad; there were blind mendicants, with patched or bandaged eyes;crippled ones, with wooden legs and crutches; diseased ones, withrunning sores peeping from ineffectual wrappings; there was avillain-looking pedlar with his pack; a knife-grinder, a tinker,and a barber-surgeon, with the implements of their trades; some ofthe females were hardly-grown girls, some were at prime, some wereold and wrinkled hags, and all were loud, brazen, foul-mouthed;and all soiled and slatternly; there were three sore-faced babies;there were a couple of starveling curs, with strings about theirnecks, whose office was to lead the blind.The night was come, the gang had just finished feasting, an orgywas beginning; the can of liquor was passing from mouth to mouth.A general cry broke forth--"A song! a song from the Bat and Dick and Dot-and-go-One!"One of the blind men got up, and made ready by casting aside thepatches that sheltered his excellent eyes, and the patheticplacard which recited the cause of his calamity. Dot-and-go-Onedisencumbered himself of his timber leg and took his place, uponsound and healthy limbs, beside his fellow-rascal; then theyroared out a rollicking ditty, and were reinforced by the wholecrew, at the end of each stanza, in a rousing chorus. By the timethe last stanza was reached, the half-drunken enthusiasm had risento such a pitch, that everybody joined in and sang it clearthrough from the beginning, producing a volume of villainous soundthat made the rafters quake. These were the inspiring words:--'Bien Darkman's then, Bouse Mort and Ken,The bien Coves bings awast,On Chates to trine by Rome Coves dineFor his long lib at last.Bing'd out bien Morts and toure, and toure,Bing out of the Rome vile bine,And toure the Cove that cloy'd your duds,Upon the Chates to trine.'(From 'The English Rogue.' London, 1665.)Conversation followed; not in the thieves' dialect of the song,for that was only used in talk when unfriendly ears might belistening. In the course of it, it appeared that 'John Hobbs' wasnot altogether a new recruit, but had trained in the gang at someformer time. His later history was called for, and when he saidhe had 'accidentally' killed a man, considerable satisfaction wasexpressed; when he added that the man was a priest, he was roundlyapplauded, and had to take a drink with everybody. Oldacquaintances welcomed him joyously, and new ones were proud toshake him by the hand. He was asked why he had 'tarried away somany months.' He answered--"London is better than the country, and safer, these late years,the laws be so bitter and so diligently enforced. An' I had nothad that accident, I had stayed there. I had resolved to stay,and never more venture country-wards--but the accident has endedthat."He inquired how many persons the gang numbered now. The'ruffler,' or chief, answered--"Five and twenty sturdy budges, bulks, files, clapperdogeons andmaunders, counting the dells and doxies and other morts. {7} Mostare here, the rest are wandering eastward, along the winter lay.We follow at dawn.""I do not see the Wen among the honest folk about me. Where mayhe be?""Poor lad, his diet is brimstone, now, and over hot for a delicatetaste. He was killed in a brawl, somewhere about midsummer.""I sorrow to hear that; the Wen was a capable man, and brave.""That was he, truly. Black Bess, his dell, is of us yet, butabsent on the eastward tramp; a fine lass, of nice ways andorderly conduct, none ever seeing her drunk above four days in theseven.""She was ever strict--I remember it well--a goodly wench andworthy all commendation. Her mother was more free and lessparticular; a troublesome and ugly-tempered beldame, but furnishedwith a wit above the common.""We lost her through it. Her gift of palmistry and other sorts offortune-telling begot for her at last a witch's name and fame.The law roasted her to death at a slow fire. It did touch me to asort of tenderness to see the gallant way she met her lot--cursingand reviling all the crowd that gaped and gazed around her, whilstthe flames licked upward toward her face and catched her thinlocks and crackled about her old gray head--cursing them! why an'thou should'st live a thousand years thoud'st never hear somasterful a cursing. Alack, her art died with her. There be baseand weakling imitations left, but no true blasphemy."The Ruffler sighed; the listeners sighed in sympathy; a generaldepression fell upon the company for a moment, for even hardenedoutcasts like these are not wholly dead to sentiment, but are ableto feel a fleeting sense of loss and affliction at wide intervalsand under peculiarly favouring circumstances--as in cases like tothis, for instance, when genius and culture depart and leave noheir. However, a deep drink all round soon restored the spiritsof the mourners."Have any others of our friends fared hardly?" asked Hobbs."Some--yes. Particularly new comers--such as small husbandmenturned shiftless and hungry upon the world because their farmswere taken from them to be changed to sheep ranges. They begged,and were whipped at the cart's tail, naked from the girdle up,till the blood ran; then set in the stocks to be pelted; theybegged again, were whipped again, and deprived of an ear; theybegged a third time--poor devils, what else could they do?--andwere branded on the cheek with a red-hot iron, then sold forslaves; they ran away, were hunted down, and hanged. 'Tis a brieftale, and quickly told. Others of us have fared less hardly.Stand forth, Yokel, Burns, and Hodge--show your adornments!"These stood up and stripped away some of their rags, exposingtheir backs, criss-crossed with ropy old welts left by the lash;one turned up his hair and showed the place where a left ear hadonce been; another showed a brand upon his shoulder--the letter V--and a mutilated ear; the third said--"I am Yokel, once a farmer and prosperous, with loving wife andkids--now am I somewhat different in estate and calling; and thewife and kids are gone; mayhap they are in heaven, mayhap in--inthe other place--but the kindly God be thanked, they bide no morein England! My good old blameless mother strove to earn bread bynursing the sick; one of these died, the doctors knew not how, somy mother was burnt for a witch, whilst my babes looked on andwailed. English lawnow all togetherand with a cheer!--drink to the merciful English law thatdelivered her from the English hell! Thank you, mates, one andall. I begged, from house to house--I and the wife--bearing withus the hungry kids--but it was crime to be hungry in England--sothey stripped us and lashed us through three towns. Drink ye allagain to the merciful English law!--for its lash drank deep of myMary's blood and its blessed deliverance came quick. She liesthere, in the potter's field, safe from all harms. And the kids--well, whilst the law lashed me from town to town, they starved.Drink, lads--only a drop--a drop to the poor kids, that never didany creature harm. I begged again--begged, for a crust, and gotthe stocks and lost an ear--see, here bides the stump; I beggedagain, and here is the stump of the other to keep me minded of it.And still I begged again, and was sold for a slave--here on mycheek under this stain, if I washed it off, ye might see the red Sthe branding-iron left there! A slave! Do you understand thatword? An English slave!--that is he that stands before ye. Ihave run from my master, and when I am found--the heavy curse ofheaven fall on the law of the land that hath commanded it!--Ishall hang!" {1}A ringing voice came through the murky air--"Thou shalt not!--and this day the end of that law is come!"All turned, and saw the fantastic figure of the little Kingapproaching hurriedly; as it emerged into the light and wasclearly revealed, a general explosion of inquiries broke out--"Who is it? What is it? Who art thou, manikin?"The boy stood unconfused in the midst of all those surprised andquestioning eyes, and answered with princely dignity--"I am Edward, King of England."A wild burst of laughter followed, partly of derision and partlyof delight in the excellence of the joke. The King was stung. Hesaid sharply--"Ye mannerless vagrants, is this your recognition of the royalboon I have promised?"He said more, with angry voice and excited gesture, but it waslost in a whirlwind of laughter and mocking exclamations. 'JohnHobbs' made several attempts to make himself heard above the din,and at last succeeded--saying--"Mates, he is my son, a dreamer, a fool, and stark mad--mind himnot--he thinketh he is the King.""I am the King," said Edward, turning toward him, "as thou shaltknow to thy cost, in good time. Thou hast confessed a murder--thou shalt swing for it.""Thou'lt betray me?--thou? An' I get my hands upon thee--""Tut-tut!" said the burley Ruffler, interposing in time to savethe King, and emphasising this service by knocking Hobbs down withhis fist, "hast respect for neither Kings nor Rufflers? An' thouinsult my presence so again, I'll hang thee up myself." Then hesaid to his Majesty, "Thou must make no threats against thy mates,lad; and thou must guard thy tongue from saying evil of themelsewhere. Be King, if it please thy mad humour, but be notharmful in it. Sink the title thou hast uttered--'tis treason; webe bad men in some few trifling ways, but none among us is so baseas to be traitor to his King; we be loving and loyal hearts, inthat regard. Note if I speak truth. Now--all together: 'Longlive Edward, King of England!'""Long live Edward, King of England!"The response came with such a thundergust from the motley crewthat the crazy building vibrated to the sound. The little King'sface lighted with pleasure for an instant, and he slightlyinclined his head, and said with grave simplicity--"I thank you, my good people."This unexpected result threw the company into convulsions ofmerriment. When something like quiet was presently come again,the Ruffler said, firmly, but with an accent of good nature--"Drop it, boy, 'tis not wise, nor well. Humour thy fancy, if thoumust, but choose some other title."A tinker shrieked out a suggestion--"Foo-foo the First, King of the Mooncalves!"The title 'took,' at once, every throat responded, and a roaringshout went up, of--"Long live Foo-foo the First, King of the Mooncalves!" followed byhootings, cat-calls, and peals of laughter."Hale him forth, and crown him!""Robe him!""Sceptre him!""Throne him!"These and twenty other cries broke out at once! and almost beforethe poor little victim could draw a breath he was crowned with atin basin, robed in a tattered blanket, throned upon a barrel, andsceptred with the tinker's soldering-iron. Then all flungthemselves upon their knees about him and sent up a chorus ofironical wailings, and mocking supplications, whilst they swabbedtheir eyes with their soiled and ragged sleeves and aprons--"Be gracious to us, O sweet King!""Trample not upon thy beseeching worms, O noble Majesty!""Pity thy slaves, and comfort them with a royal kick!""Cheer us and warm us with thy gracious rays, O flaming sun ofsovereignty!""Sanctify the ground with the touch of thy foot, that we may eatthe dirt and be ennobled!""Deign to spit upon us, O Sire, that our children's children maytell of thy princely condescension, and be proud and happy forever!"But the humorous tinker made the 'hit' of the evening and carriedoff the honours. Kneeling, he pretended to kiss the King's foot,and was indignantly spurned; whereupon he went about begging for arag to paste over the place upon his face which had been touchedby the foot, saying it must be preserved from contact with thevulgar air, and that he should make his fortune by going on thehighway and exposing it to view at the rate of a hundred shillingsa sight. He made himself so killingly funny that he was the envyand admiration of the whole mangy rabble.Tears of shame and indignation stood in the little monarch's eyes;and the thought in his heart was, "Had I offered them a deep wrongthey could not be more cruel--yet have I proffered nought but todo them a kindness--and it is thus they use me for it!"