or rather nicknames, from some quality of body or mind, but
generally from some disadvantageous peculiarity of feature; for there is
no denying that the English, Norse, or whatever we may please to call
them, are an envious, depreciatory set of people, who not only give their
poor comrades contemptuous names, but their great people also. They
didn't call you the matchless Hurler, because, by doing so, they would
have paid you a compliment, but Hull over the Head Jack, as much as to
say that after all you were a scrub; so, in ancient time, instead of
calling Regner the great conqueror, the Nation Tamer, they surnamed him
Lodbrog, which signifies Rough or Hairy Breeks--lod or loddin signifying
rough or hairy; and instead of complimenting Halgerdr, the wife of Gunnar
of Hlitharend, the great champion of Iceland, upon her majestic presence,
by calling her Halgerdr, the stately or tall; what must they do but term
her Ha-brokr, or Highbreeks, it being the fashion in old times for
Northern ladies to wear breeks, or breeches, which English ladies of the
present day never think of doing; and just, as of old, they called
Halgerdr Long-breeks, so this very day a fellow of Horncastle called, in
my hearing, our noble-looking Hungarian friend here, Long-stockings. Oh,
I could give you a hundred instances, both ancient and modern, of this
unseemly propensity of our illustrious race, though I will only trouble
you with a few more ancient ones; they not only nicknamed Regner, but his
sons also, who were all kings, and distinguished men: one, whose name was
Biorn, they nicknamed Ironsides; another, Sigurd, Snake in the Eye;
another, White Sark, or White Shirt--I wonder they did not call him Dirty
Shirt; and Ivarr, another, who was king of Northumberland, they called
Bienlausi, or the Legless, because he was spindle-shanked, had no sap in
his bones, and consequently no children. He was a great king, it is
true, and very wise, nevertheless his blackguard countrymen, always
averse, as their descendants are, to give credit to anybody, for any
valuable quality or possession, must needs lay hold, do you see--"

But before I could say any more, the jockey, having laid down his pipe,
rose, and having taken off his coat, advanced towards me.

CHAPTER XLII

A Short-tempered Person--Gravitation--The Best Endowment--Mary
Fulcher--Fair Dealing--Horse-witchery--Darius and his Groom--The Jockey's
Tricks--The Two Characters--The Jockey's So