"Oh, there can be no mistake about that," said one; "when did a natural
Christian's coffin stick in the mud in that way?" "Ah, to be sure," said another; "I knew no good would come of his goings
on; he never was a decent sort of man like his neighbours, and many
queer things have been said of him that I have no doubt are true enough,
if we did but know the rights of them." "Ah, but," said a young lad, thrusting his head between the two who were
talking, "if he is a vampyre, how does he get out of his coffin of a
night with all that weight of mould a top of him?" One of the men considered for a moment, and then finding no rational
answer occur to him, he gave the boy a box on the ear, saying,--

"I should like to know what business that is of yours? Boys, now-a-days,
ain't like the boys in my time; they think nothing now of putting their
spokes in grown-up people's wheels, just as if their opinions were of
any consequence." Now, by a vigorous effort, those who were tugging at the ropes succeeded
in moving the coffin a little, and that first step was all the
difficulty, for it was loosened from the adhesive soil in which it lay,
and now came up with considerable facility. There was a half shout of satisfaction at this result, while some of the
congregation turned pale, and trembled at the prospect of the sight
which was about to present itself; the coffin was dragged from the
grave's brink fairly among the long rank grass that flourished in the
churchyard, and then they all looked at it for a time, and the men who
had been most earnest in raising it wiped the perspiration from their
brows, and seemed to shrink from the task of opening that receptacle of
the dead now that it was fairly in their power so to do. Each man looked anxiously in his neighbour's face, and several audibly
wondered why somebody else didn't open the coffin. "There's no harm in it," said one; "if he's a vampyre, we ought to know
it; and, if he ain't, we can't do any hurt to a dead man." "Oughtn't we to have the service for the dead?" said one. "Yes," said the impertinent boy who had before received the knock on the
head, "I think we ought to have that read backwards." This ingenious idea was recompensed by a great many kicks and cuffs,
which ought to have been sufficient to have warned him of the great
danger of being a little before his age in wit. "Where's the use of shirking the job?" cried he who had been so active
in shoveling the mud upon the multitude; "why, you cowardly sneaking set
of humbugs, you're half afraid, now." "Afraid--afraid!" cried everybody: "who's afraid." "Ah, who's afraid?" said a little man, advancing, and assuming an heroic
attitude; "I always notice, if anybody's afraid, it's some big fellow,
with more bones than brains." At this moment, the man to whom this reproach was more particularly
levelled, raised a horrible shout of terror, and cried out, in frantic
accents,--

"He's a-coming--he's a-coming!" The little man fell at once into the grave, while the mob, with one
accord, turned tail, and fled in all directions, leaving him alone with
the coffin. Such a fighting, and kicking, and scrambling ensued to get
over the wall of the grave-yard, that this great fellow, who had caused
all the mischief, burst into such peals of laughter that the majority of
the people became aware that it was a joke, and came creeping back,
looking as sheepish as possible. Some got up very faint sorts of laugh, and said "very good," and swore
they saw what big Dick meant from the first, and only ran to make the
others run. "Very good," said Dick, "I'm glad you enjoyed it, that's all. My eye,
what a scampering there was among you. Where's my little friend, who was
so infernally cunning about bones and brains?" With some difficulty the little man was extricated from the grave, and
then, oh, for the consistency of a mob! they all laughed at him; those
very people who, heedless of all the amenities of existence, had been
trampling upon each other, and roaring with terror, actually had the
impudence to laugh at him, and call him a cowardly little rascal, and
say it served him right. But such is popularity! "Well, if nobody won't open the coffin," said big Dick, "I will, so here
goes. I knowed the old fellow when he was alive, and many a time he's
d----d me and I've d----d him, so I ain't a-going to be afraid of him
now he's dead. We was very intimate, you see, 'cos we was the two
heaviest men in the parish; there's a reason for everything." "Ah, Dick's the fellow to do it," cried a number of persons; "there's
nobody like Dick for opening a coffin; he's the man as don't care for
nothing." "Ah, you snivelling curs," said Dick, "I hate you. If it warn't for my
own satisfaction, and all for to prove that my old friend, the butcher,
as weighed seventeen stone, and stood six feet two and-a-half on his own
sole, I'd see you all jolly well--"

"D----d first," said the boy; "open the lid, Dick, let's have a look." "Ah, you're a rum un," said Dick, "arter my own heart. I sometimes
thinks as you must be a nevy, or some sort of relation of mine. Howsomdever, here goes. Who'd a thought that I should ever had a look at
old fat and thunder again?--that's what I used to call him; and then he
used to request me to go down below, where I needn't turn round to light
my blessed pipe." "Hell--we know," said the boy; "why don't you open the lid, Dick?" "I'm a going," said Dick; "kim up." He introduced the corner of a shovel between the lid and the coffin, and
giving it a sudden wrench, he loosened it all down one side. A shudder pervaded the multitude, and, popularly speaking, you might
have heard a pin drop in that crowded churchyard at that eventful
moment. Dick then proceeded to the other side, and executed the same manoeuvre. "Now for it," he said; "we shall see him in a moment, and we'll think we
seed him still." "What a lark!" said the boy. "You hold yer jaw, will yer? Who axed you for a remark, blow yer? What
do you mean by squatting down there, like a cock-sparrow, with a pain in
his tail, hanging yer head, too, right over the coffin? Did you never
hear of what they call a fluvifium coming from the dead, yer ignorant
beast, as is enough to send nobody to blazes in a minute? Get out of the
way of the cold meat, will yer?" "A what, do you say, Dick?" "Request information from the extreme point of my elbow." Dick threw down the spade, and laying hold of the coffin-lid with both
hands, he lifted it off, and flung it on one side. There was a visible movement and an exclamation among the multitude. Some were pushed down, in the eager desire of those behind to obtain a
sight of the ghastly remains of the butcher; those at a distance were
frantic, and the excitement was momentarily increasing.