"For John can reap, and Dick he can plough, Look after the dairy, and churn the cream; 66 OLD COUNTRY SONG. A COUNTRY Statute, (or Stattice," as it is always pronounced by the villagers,) is a rural feast or wake, where farmers hire their assistants, and is held both in villages and small market towns. Servant men and women, who are out of place, come for miles to attend the stattice; and, if they can, "get hired." It is a kind of English slave-market, in which the hireling has a voice in the bargain, and can either hire himself or not. If the "hireling" agrees with the farmer, he accepts his "fasten-penny," which is generally a shilling now; and this binds him down to serve for twelve months. Hiring and fasten-penny are genuine old Saxon words, and we here see an ancient custom still in existence; for, so far back as the time of Alfred, the serfs or villeins, who had, by their merit or by purchase, procured their freedom, were thus hired by the farmers, and received their fasten-money at some wake, mart, or marketcross, generally on a Saint's-day. Such as were not free, in those days, belonged to the soil; if the estate was sold, they were sold with it; and the land-owner or thane, or whatever he was called, had as much right to the serfs, as he had to the swine, trees, sheep, or oxen; for such was then the law of England, in the "good old times," which we so much deplore in romances; for, thank God! in reality, they have long since passed away. Let it be understood, that, in regard to a country "stattice," we use the words "slave-market" in no other sense, than that the servants stand there, waiting for a bidder; and that the farmers walk round, examine their bulk, bone, and sinew, and hire such as they think likeliest to do the most work, the servants selling or letting themselves out to hire of their own free will. Nor does the scene vary much from a registry office in London, where you see announced outside, that servants of all kinds are in daily attendance, waiting to be hired. The farmer rarely inquires about character; he asks the man what he 's been used to, and, if he is satisfied with his answers, and they agree about wages, the bargain is soon concluded, and the day appointed when John is to arrive at his new place. The scene of a country stattice is so peculiarly English, that we regret no great artist has ever attempted to paint it; for it is rich in character, and such as can never be met with, at any other time, in all that mixed variety which is there assembled. Men and women, who have lived at lonely farm-houses, far away from any busy high road, as ignorant of the ways of the great world as children—many of whom can neither read nor write, and have scarcely an idea beyond what enables them to cultivate the soil, and look after the cattle; who, the moment they are seated by the kitchen fire, fall asleep, as if, when their hunger is appeased, and their day's work ended, they had no other duty to perform, but to slumber soundly until the morrow. And yet many of these are fine-looking men and women ; stamped with the ruddy, round, old English face; ready to weep at a tale of sorrow, or laugh at a merry jest; harmless, kind, simple, and tender-hearted: yet, beyond the routine of their daily life, buried in heathen ignorance. True, there has been a change during the last few years; though the nooks and corners, which we have before us now, are still as dark as they were a century ago, for the light of knowledge has not yet extended to these places. They believe in dreams and omens, wise men and witches, and practice such superstitions as were common at the time of the early Saxons. Argument is wasted upon such as these; their forefathers were believers in the same follies; and, if a dog howl, or a raven croak, they know it denotes something; and they have a score of old traditions, to them as clear as gospel truth. They never had the chance of obtaining knowledge when children, they had to mind other children, two or three years younger than themselves, while their mothers and fathers were out at work in the fields. At six or seven they could tent the corn, or herd the cows in the lanes, or run errands. In another year or two, some farmer took them into the house, to feed pigs and poultry, fetch up the cows, ride to the mill, and bring home a sack of flour, take a horse two or three miles to be shod, and, by so doing, "earn their keep." Years creep on, they get hired, find a sweetheart, are married, and rear up another race, just in the same footsteps as their fathers reared them; and this is the true history of many a farmer's servant. But this is the morning of stattice, and Johnny is dressed out in his best; his clean blue or white smock frock is drawn up through the openings that lead to his pockets. You see a portion of his substantial corduroys, with pearl buttons at the knees, and a length of strong drab riband; his worsted stockings, which are generally ribbed, fit as if they were glued to his legs; while his highancle, heavy-nailed boots glitter again with grease-you feel that you could not walk a hundred yards in them, so heavily are they shod with iron. His neckerchief is generally red, or blue, or yellow, flowered or spotted; his sleeved waistcoat a warm plush, the richest pattern he can find; his hat has the nap rubbed the wrong way down, to let you see it is "real beaver." He carries a stick, which he cut himself; and when he is in serious conversation, he every now and then thrusts the knob of it into his mouth. Molly mostly has a pair of pattens in the left hand, and an umbrella in the right, rarely either wearing the one or putting up the other, unless she is going home. Her gown, if in summer, is the gaudiest print that can be purchased, covered with enormous somethings between a cabbage and a dahlia. Her shawl is also of a glaring colour; and she is very fond of wearing either red or blue ribbons in her bonnet, shaped into tremendous bows. Her hands are rough as rasps, and almost as hard, through scouring kits, and other household drudgery. If she wears gloves, they make her feel uncomfortable; so much has she exposed her hands to water and weather, that they fairly burn again, and the gloves are soon thrust into her pocket. She wears a large gilt brooch, with a piece of yellow cut glass in the centre as big as the eye of an ox; but, above all, she prides herself on a smart shoe and stocking; and will sometimes, when the roads are dirty, bring a clean pair of the latter in her pocket, which she puts on in some retired corner of the fields or woods, just before entering the market-town or village. She has at times a colour like the rose, and here and there you will see a neck, that has escaped the sun, almost as white as the milk in her own dairy, while her eyes are generally of that bright, cheerful, shifting colour, called hazel, looking dark at a distance, yet as if you can see through them when near. Her lips are full, round, and open; and when her mouth is in repose, you can see the white teeth between. She is the image of embodied health, and can eat fat bacon like a ploughman; and as to work, from morning until night she does nothing but sing over it. She meets John, with whom she had, perhaps, lived in service a year or two before, and of whom she had only heard of from a fellow-servant once or twice since that time; or she had seen him at a feast, and he regretted that he did not still live in the same place with her, and we know not what beside, though the following dialogue takes place:— John, stopping short as he sees her approach, and lifting up his stick high above his head in astonishment, exclaims, |