g them.
As for myself, I did nothing that day, but the next, on which my
companions did nothing, I showed off at hulling stones against a cripple,
the crack man for stone throwing, of a small town, a few miles farther
on. Bets were made to the tune of some pounds; I contrived to beat the
cripple, and just contrived; for to do him justice I must acknowledge he
was a first-rate hand at stones, though he had a game hip, and went
sideways; his head, when he walked--if his movements could be called
walking--not being above three feet above the ground. So we travelled, I
and my companions, showing off our gifts, Giles and I occasionally for a
gathering, but Ned never hopping unless against somebody for a wager. We
lived honestly and comfortably, making no little money by our natural
endowments, and were known over a great part of England as "Hopping Ned,"
"Biting Giles," and "Hull over the head Jack," which was my name, it
being the blackguard fashion of the English, do you see, to--'

Here I interrupted the jockey, 'You may call it a blackguard fashion,'
said I, 'and I dare say it is, or it would scarcely be English; but it is
an immensely ancient one, and is handed down to us from our northern
ancestry, especially the Danes, who were in the habit of giving people
surnames, 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 surnames, 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 High Breeks, 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