Did; many who were present tried to do the same
thing, but all failed.
"Another time when I was at Chester I lifted a barrel of porter
from the street to the hinder part of the waggon solely by strength
of back and arms."
He was once run over by a loaded waggon, but strange to say escaped
without the slightest injury.
Towards the close of his life he had strong religious convictions,
and felt a loathing for the sins which he had committed. "On their
account," says he in the concluding page of his biography, "there
is a strong necessity for me to consider my ways and to inquire
about a Saviour, since it is utterly impossible for me to save
myself without obtaining knowledge of the merits of the Mediator,
in which I hope I shall terminate my short time on earth in the
peace of God enduring unto all eternity."
He died in the year 1810, at the age of 71, shortly after the death
of his wife, who seems to have been a faithful, loving partner. By
her side he was buried in the earth of the graveyard of the White
Church, near Denbigh. There can be little doubt that the souls of
both will be accepted on the great day when, as Gronwy Owen says:-
"Like corn from the belly of the ploughed field, in a thick crop,
those buried in the earth shall arise, and the sea shall cast forth
a thousand myriads of dead above the deep billowy way."
CHAPTER LX
Mystery Plays - The Two Prime Opponents - Analysis of Interlude -
Riches and Poverty - Tom's Grand Qualities.
IN the preceding chapter I have given an abstract of the life of
Tom O' the Dingle; I will now give an analysis of his interlude;
first, however, a few words on interludes in general. It is
difficult to say with anything like certainty what is the meaning
of the word interlude. It may mean, as Warton supposes in his
history of English Poetry, a short play performed between the
courses of a banquet or festival; or it may mean the playing of
something by two or more parties, the interchange of playing or
acting which occurs when two or more people act. It was about the
middle of the fifteenth century that dramatic pieces began in
England to be called Interludes; for some time previous they had
been styled Moralities; but the earliest name by which they were
known was Mysteries. The first Mysteries composed in England were
by one Ranald, or Ranulf, a monk of Chester, who flourished about
1322, whose verses are mentioned rather irreverently in one of the
visions of Piers Plowman, who puts them in the same rank as the
ballads about Robin Hood and Maid Marion, making Sloth say:
