The Project Gutenberg eBook of Household words, No. 23, August 31, 1850
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Title: Household words, No. 23, August 31, 1850
A weekly journal
Editor: Charles Dickens
Release date: March 11, 2026 [eBook #78193]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Bradbury & Evans, 1850
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78193
Credits: Richard Tonsing, Steven desJardins, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOUSEHOLD WORDS, NO. 23, AUGUST 31, 1850 ***
“_Familiar in their Mouths as HOUSEHOLD WORDS._”—SHAKESPEARE.
HOUSEHOLD WORDS.
A WEEKLY JOURNAL.
CONDUCTED BY CHARLES DICKENS.
N^{o.} 23.] SATURDAY, AUGUST 31, 1850. [PRICE 2_d._
A PAPER-MILL.
Down at Dartford in Kent, on a fine bright day, I strolled through the
pleasant green lanes, on my way to a Paper-Mill. Accustomed, mainly, to
associate Dartford with Gunpowder Mills, and formidable tin canisters,
illustrated in copper-plate, with the outpourings of a generous
cornucopia of dead game, I found it pleasant to think, on a summer
morning when all living creatures were enjoying life, that it was only
paper in my mind—not powder.
If sturdy Wat Tyler, of this very town of Dartford in Kent (Deptford had
the honour of him once, but that was a mistake) could only have
anticipated and reversed the precept of the pious Orange-Lodges; if he
could only have put his trust in Providence, and kept his paper damp—for
printing—he need never have marched to London, the captain of a hundred
thousand men, and summarily beheaded the archbishop of Canterbury as a
bad adviser of the young king, Richard. Then, would William Walworth,
Lord Mayor of London (and an obsequious courtier enough, may be) never
have struck him from his charger, unawares. Then, might the “general
enfranchisement of all bondmen”—the bold smith’s demand—have come, a
long time sooner than it did. Then, might working-men have maintained
the decency and honour of their daughters, through many a hazy score of
troubled and oppressive years, when they were yet as the clods of the
valley, broken by the ploughshare, worried by the harrow. But, in those
days, paper and printing for the people were not; so, Wat lay low in
Smithfield, and Heaven knows what became of his daughter, and the old
ferocious wheel went driving round, some centuries longer.
The wild flowers were blowing in these Dartford hedges, all those many
summertimes; the larks were singing, high in air; the trees were
rustling as they rustle to-day; the bees went humming by; the light
clouds cast their shadows on the verdant fields. The pleasant little
river Darent ran the same course; sparkled in the same sun; had, then as
now, its tiny circles made by insects; and its plumps and plashes, made
by fish. But, the river has changed, since Wat the Blacksmith, bending
over with his bucket, saw his grimy face, impatient of unjust and
grievous tribute, making remonstrance with him for his long endurance.
Now, there are indeed books in the running brooks—for they go to feed
the Paper-Mill.
Time was, in the old Saxon days, when there stood a Mill here, “held in
ferm by a Reve,” but _that_ was not a Paper-Mill. Then, came a Nunnery,
with kings’ fair daughters in it; then, a Palace; then, Queen Elizabeth,
in her sixteenth year, to sojourn at the Palace two days; then, in that
reign, a Paper-Mill. In the church yonder, hidden behind the trees, with
many rooks discoursing in their lofty houses between me and it, is the
tomb of Sir John Spielman, jeweller to the Queen when she had grown to
be a dame of a shrewd temper, aged fifty or so: who “built a Paper-Mill
for the making of writing-paper,” and to whom his Royal Mistress was
pleased to grant a license “for the sole gathering for ten years of all
rags, &c., necessary for the making of such paper.” There is a legend
that the same Sir John, in coming here from Germany, to build his Mill,
did bring with him two young lime-trees—then unknown in England—which he
set before his Dartford dwelling-house, and which did flourish
exceedingly; so, that they fanned him with their shadows, when he lay
asleep in the upper story, an ancient gentleman. Now, God rest the soul
of Sir John Spielman, for the love of all the sweet-smelling lime-trees
that have ever greeted me in the land, and all the writing-paper I have
ever blotted!
But, as I turn down by the hawthorn hedge into the valley, a sound
comes in my ears—like the murmuring and throbbing of a mighty giant,
labouring hard—that would have unbraced all the Saxon bows, and shaken
all the heads off Temple Bar and London Bridge, ever lifted to those
heights from the always butchering, always craving, never
sufficiently-to-be-regretted, brave old English Block. It is the noise
of the Steam Engine. And now, before me, white and clean without, and
radiant in the sun, with the sweet clear river tumbling merrily down
to kiss it, and help in the work it does, is the Paper-Mill I have
come to see!
It is like the Mill of the child’s story, that ground old people young.
Paper! White, pure, spick and span new paper, with that fresh smell
which takes us back to school and school-books; can it ever come from
rags like these? Is it from such bales of dusty rags, native and
foreign, of every colour and of every kind, as now environ us, shutting
out the summer air and putting cotton into our summer ears, that virgin
paper, to be written on, and printed on, proceeds? We shall see
presently. Enough to consider, at present, what a grave of dress this
rag-store is; what a lesson of vanity it preaches. The coarse blouse of
the Flemish labourer, and the fine cambric of the Parisian lady, the
court dress of the Austrian jailer, and the miserable garb of the
Italian peasant; the woollen petticoat of the Bavarian girl, the linen
head-dress of the Neapolitan woman, the priest’s vestment, the player’s
robe, the Cardinal’s hat, and the ploughman’s nightcap; all dwindle down
to this, and bring their littleness or greatness in fractional portions
here. As it is with the worn, it shall be with the wearers; but there
shall be no dust in our eyes then, though there is plenty now. Not all
the great ones of the earth will raise a grain of it, and nothing but
the Truth will be.
My conductor leads the way into another room. I am to go, as the rags
go, regularly and systematically through the Mill. I am to suppose
myself a bale of rags. I _am_ rags.
Here, in another room, are some three-score women at little tables, each
with an awful scythe-shaped knife standing erect upon it, and looking
like the veritable tooth of time. I am distributed among these women,
and worried into smaller shreds—torn cross-wise at the knives. Already I
begin to lose something of my grosser nature. The room is filled with my
finest dust, and, as gratings of me drop from the knives, they fall
through the perforated surface of the tables into receptacles beneath.
When I am small enough, I am bundled up, carried away in baskets, and
stowed in immense bins, until they want me in the Boiling-Room.
The Boiling-Room has enormous cauldrons in it, each with its own big
lid, hanging to the beams of the roof, and put on by machinery when it
is full. It is a very clean place, “coddled” by much boiling, like a
washer-woman’s fingers, and looks as if the kitchen of the Parish Union
had gone into partnership with the Church Belfry. Here, I am pressed,
and squeezed, and jammed, a dozen feet deep, I should think, into my own
particular cauldron; where I simmer, boil, and stew, a long, long time.
Then, I am a dense, tight mass, cut out in pieces like so much clay—very
clean—faint as to my colour—greatly purified—and gradually becoming
quite ethereal.
In this improved condition, I am taken to the Cutting-Room. I am very
grateful to the clear fresh water, for the good it has done me; and I am
glad to be put into some more of it, and subjected to the action of
large rollers filled with transverse knives, revolving by steam power
upon iron beds, which favour me with no fewer than two million cuts per
minute, though, within the memory of man, the functions of this machine
were performed by an ordinary pestle and mortar. Such a drumming and
rattling, such a battering and clattering, such a delight in cutting and
slashing, not even the Austrian part of me ever witnessed before. This
continues, to my great satisfaction, until I look like shaving lather;
when I am run off into chambers underneath, to have my friend the water,
from whom I am unwilling to be separated, drained out of me.
At this time, my colour is a light blue, if I have indigo in me, or a
pale fawn, if I am rags from which the dyes have been expelled. As it is
necessary to bleach the fawn-coloured pulp (the blue being used for
paper of that tint), and as I _am_ fawn-coloured pulp, I am placed in
certain stone chambers, like catacombs, hermetically sealed, excepting
the first compartment, which communicates with a gasometer containing
manganese, vitriol, and salt. From these ingredients, a strong gas (not
agreeable, I must say, to the sense of smell) is generated, and forced
through all the chambers, each of which communicates with the other.
These continue closed, if I remember right, some four-and-twenty hours,
when a man opens them and takes to his heels immediately, to avoid the
offensive gas that rushes out. After I have been aired a little, I am
again conveyed (quite white now, and very spiritual indeed) to some more
obliging rollers upstairs.
At it these grinders go, “Munch, munch, munch!” like the sailor’s wife
in MACBETH, who had chesnuts in her lap. I look, at first, as if I were
the most delicious curds and whey; presently, I find that I am changed
to gruel—not thin oatmeal gruel, but rich, creamy, tempting, exalted
gruel! As if I had been made from pearls, which some voluptuous Mr.
Emden had converted into groats!
And now, I am ready to undergo my last astounding transformation, and be
made into paper by the machine. Oh what can I say of the wonderful
machine, which receives me, at one end of a long room, gruel, and
dismisses me at the other, paper!
Where is the subtle mind of this Leviathan lodged? It must be
somewhere—in a cylinder, a pipe, a wheel—or how could it ever do with me
the miracles it does! How could it receive me on a sheet of wire-gauze,
in my gruel-form, and slide me on, gradually assuming consistency—gently
becoming a little paper-like, a little more, a little more still, very
paper-like, indeed—clinging to wet blankets, holding tight by other
surfaces, smoothly ascending Witney hills, lightly coming down into a
woolly open country, easily rolling over and under a planetary system of
heated cylinders, large and small, and ever growing, as I proceed,
stronger and more paper-like! How does the power that fights the wintry
waves on the Atlantic, and cuts and drills adamantine slabs of metal
like cheese, how does it draw me out, when I am frailest and most liable
to tear, so tenderly and delicately, that a woman’s hand—no, even though
I were a man, very ill and helpless, and she may nurse who loved
me—could never touch me with so light a touch, or with a movement so
unerring! How can I believe, even on experience, that, being of itself
insensible, and only informed with intellect at second hand, it changes
me, in less time than I take to tell it, into any sort of paper that is
wanted, dries me, cuts me into lengths, becomes charged, just before
dismissing me, with electricity, and gathers up the hair of the
attendant-watcher, as if with horror at the mischiefs and desertions
from the right, in which I may be instrumental! Above all, how can I
reconcile its being mere machinery, with its leaving off when it has cut
me into sheets, and NOT conveying me to the Exciseman in the next room,
whom it plainly thinks a most unnatural conclusion!
I am carried thither on trucks. I am examined, and my defective portions
thrown out, for the Mill, again; I am made up into quires and reams; I
am weighed and excised by the hundredweight; and I am ready for my work.
Of my being made the subject of nonsensical defences of Excise duty, in
the House of Commons, I need say nothing. All the world knows that when
the Right Honourable the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for the time
being, says I am only the worse by a duty of fifteen shillings per
hundredweight, he is a Wrong Honourable, and either don’t know, or don’t
care, anything about me. For, he leaves out of consideration all the
vexatious, depressing, and preventing influences of Excise Duty on any
trade, and all the extra cost and charge of packing and unpacking,
carrying and re-carrying, imposed upon the manufacturer, and of course
upon the public. But we must have it, in future, even with Right
Honourables as with birds. The Chancellor of the Exchequer that can
sing, and won’t sing, must be made to sing—small.
My metempsychosis ends with the manufacture. I am rags no more, but a
visitor to the Paper-Mill. I am a pleased visitor to see the Mill in
such beautiful order, and the workpeople so thriving; and I think that
my good friend the owner has reason for saying with an agreeable smile,
as we come out upon the sparkling stream again, that he is never so
contented, as when he is in rags.
Shining up in the blue sky, far above the Paper-Mill, a mere speck in
the distance, is a Paper Kite. It is an appropriate thing at the
moment—not to swear by (we have enough of that already) but to hope by,
with a devout heart. May all the Paper that I sport with, soar as
innocently upward as the paper kite, and be as harmless to the holder as
the kite is to the boy! May it bring, to some few minds, such fresh
associations; and to me no worse remembrances than the kite that once
plucked at my own hand like an airy friend. May I always recollect that
paper has a mighty Duty, set forth in no Schedule of Excise, and that
its names are love, forbearance, mercy, progress, scorn of the Hydra
Cant with all its million heads!
So, back by the green lanes, and the old Priory—a farm now, and none the
worse for that—and away among the lime-trees, thinking of Sir John.
CHEERFUL ARITHMETIC.
“Competition is fast crushing us!” the tradesman exclaims as he drives
you out to his elegant villa behind his seventy-guinea gelding. “Wheat
at forty shillings a quarter is ruin!” groans the farmer, while dallying
with his champagne glass. “_We_ are all going to the workhouse.”—“A
diamond necklace, my dear?” replies the mill-owner to a lovely
Lancashire witch, whose smile is on other occasions law—“What? two
hundred pounds for a bauble, while calico is only three farthings a
yard, and cotton-spinning on the brink of bankruptcy. Impossible!”
Should these gentlemen ever meet it is ten to one that on comparing
notes they resolve unanimously that the whole country is going to the
dogs; but it is also ten to one that this resolution is passed at a
public dinner to which they have each cheerfully contributed
one-pound-one: besides another guinea to the occasion of the feast:—some
plethoric, bloated, routine charity.
Considering their patriotic despondency in regard to the utterly
hopeless condition of the nation, it is wonderful to observe the
contented complacency with which these gentlemen eat their filberts and
sip their claret. Neither is this stoic philosophy confined to them
alone. All sorts of predicted want and impending misery are borne with
exemplary fortitude by all sorts of Englishmen. The skilful artisan
seldom allows a week to pass without deploring the inadequacy of wages;
but, although he manages to get a good Sunday’s dinner some fifty times
a year, and once or twice in the twelvemonth indulges his family with a
healthful pleasure trip in the country, he is able to scrape up a few
pounds in the savings’ bank. Yet if you ask him touching the state of
things in his particular line, he will tell you that “Times never were
so bad.” So universally is the propensity to depreciate things as they
are, that if a commission were appointed to inquire into the state of
the nation, their report, if derived solely from the evidence of
well-to-do witnesses, would be lugubrious in the extreme. It is only the
very poor who gaze cheerfully into the future; for their existence is a
condition of hope. They apprehend nothing, for they have nothing to
lose; whatever change fortune may bring, must be, they believe, for the
better.
Happily, better testimony, to the real condition of the industrious
classes is producible than that dark cloud of witnesses who speak out of
the fulness of an Englishman’s privilege—grumbling. That testimony has
been lucidly sifted, and was adduced by Mr. G. R. Porter at the recent
meeting of the British Association in Edinburgh. It consisted—in proof
of the well-being and continued progress of our country—of a comparison
between the income tax returns in respect of incomes derived from trades
and professions in 1812, and the like returns in 1848, excluding from
the former period the incomes below one hundred and fifty pounds; which,
under the existing law, are allowed to pass untaxed. The total amount
thus assessed, after deducting exemptions, was, in 1812, about
twenty-one millions and a quarter; while, in 1848, the amount was nearly
fifty-seven millions; showing an increase, in thirty-six years, of about
thirty-five millions and three-quarters, or one hundred and sixty-eight
per cent.; being at the rate of upwards of four and a half per cent.,
yearly:—an increase very nearly three-fold greater than the increase
during the same period of the population of Great Britain; where, alone,
the income tax flourishes in full bloom.
But how has this three-fold prosperity been distributed? Have the rich
grown richer, and the poor, poorer; or has Fortune taken off her bandage
and rewarded honest industry, with a discriminating hand? Have the bulk
of the people shared in the productive wealth which thirty-six years
have accumulated? In order to answer these questions, Mr. Porter entered
into a series of elaborate and interesting calculations, which prove the
pleasing fact that the great progressive wealth _has_ been shared among
the middle and working classes.
He found that the returns of 1812 as well as those of 1848 gave the sums
assessed to Income Tax in various classes; and, for the purpose of his
examination, he distinguished the incomes thus given:—those between one
hundred and fifty pounds and five hundred pounds; those between five
hundred pounds and one thousand pounds; incomes between one thousand
pounds and two thousand pounds; incomes between two thousand pounds and
five thousand pounds; and those above five thousand pounds. Adhering
strictly to these distinctions, Mr. Porter perceived, in 1848, a
positive increase in incomes between one hundred and fifty and five
hundred pounds per annum, of thirteen millions seven hundred thousand
pounds, over the incomes assessed in 1812. Between five hundred pounds
and one thousand pounds per annum, the increase since 1812 has been five
millions. On incomes between one thousand pounds and two thousand
pounds, and incomes between two thousand pounds and five thousand
pounds, there is an increase of upwards of four millions respectively;
while in the highest class, which includes all incomes above five
thousand pounds per annum, the increase is found to be no more than
eight millions and three-quarters. Comparing the highest with the lowest
class, the increase has been greater in the lowest by nearly five
millions—or fifty-six per cent.
This improvement in circumstances, however, descends to no lower a class
of society than persons in the receipt of at least one hundred and fifty
pounds per annum. It was necessary to dig a little lower in the strata
of private circumstances, in order to show the progress of wealth among
the working classes; and Mr. Porter had recourse to the returns from
savings’ banks; these being chiefly used by the humbler orders. From
data thus derived it was ascertained, that, while the deposits in
England, Wales, and Ireland, proportioned to the whole population,
amounted in 1831 to twelve shillings and eightpence per head; in 1848
they had risen to twenty shillings and eleven-pence per individual. The
largest amount of these savings occurred in 1846; when they reached, in
England alone, to more than twenty-six millions and three-quarters, and
in the three Kingdoms, to more than thirty-one millions seven hundred
thousand pounds, being equal to twenty-four shillings per head on the
population of England, Wales, and Ireland, and ten shillings and one
penny per head on that of Scotland.[1]
Footnote 1:
The comparative smallness of the deposits in Scotland arises from two
causes: first, the system of allowing interest upon very small sums
deposited in private and joint-stock banks; and, secondly, the more
recent connexion of savings’ banks with the Government in that
division of the kingdom. Hence, there is no reason for supposing that
the labouring-classes of Scotland are less saving than those of
England or Ireland.
The exceeding moderation of this estimate will be observed when we
mention another description of savings’ banks which Mr. Porter has taken
no account of—we mean Friendly Societies. Of these, there are fourteen
thousand in Great Britain, regularly enrolled according to Act of
Parliament, consisting of one million six hundred thousand members, with
a gross annual revenue of two millions eight hundred thousand, and
accumulated capital amounting to six millions four hundred thousand
pounds sterling. To this must be added the capital belonging to
unenrolled benefit societies (exclusive of those in Ireland), which has
been estimated at a greater amount than those which exist “as the Act
directs;” namely, at nine millions sterling, belonging to two millions
and a half of members. It is indeed a most gratifying proof of the
prudential, and therefore moral, as well as pecuniary advance which this
country has made during the past thirty years, that half our labouring
male population belong to Friendly Societies. The operative classes of
Great Britain alone possess, at this moment, capital in savings’ banks
and friendly societies, the total of which reaches the enormous sum of
forty-two millions of money. How very like national ruin _this_ looks!
In further proof of the greater distribution of means among the humbler
than the higher orders, we can turn once more to Mr. Porter, who assures
us that in proportion as the savings of the industrious poor have
augmented, the dividends received at the Bank by the “comfortable” and
the rich have decreased.
The test of the dividend-books of the Bank of England, to which Mr.
Porter next brought his calculations, varies essentially from that
afforded by the progress of savings’ banks; inasmuch as it excludes all
evidence of actual saving or accumulation, while it offers a strictly
comparative view of such saving as between different classes of the
community. The accounts furnished to Parliament by the Bank of the
number of persons entitled to dividends upon portions of the public
debt, divide the fund-holders into ten classes, according to the amount
of which they are so entitled. Mr. Porter contrasted the numbers in each
class as they stood on the 5th of April and 5th of July of the years
1831 and 1848, respectively. He then went on to show, that there has
been a very large addition between 1831 and 1848 to the number of
persons receiving under five pounds at each payment of dividends, and a
small increase upon the number receiving between five pounds and ten
pounds, while, with the exception of the largest holders—those whose
dividends exceed two thousand pounds at each payment, and of whom there
has been an increase of five—every other class has experienced a
considerable decrease in its numbers. There has been a diminution of
more than Eight per cent. in the numbers receiving between three hundred
pounds and five hundred pounds; of Twelve and a half per cent. of those
receiving between five hundred pounds and one thousand pounds; and of
more than Twenty per cent. among holders of stock yielding dividends
between one thousand pounds and two thousand pounds; this would seem
conclusively to prove that, at least as respects this mode of disposing
of accumulations, there is not any reason to believe that the already
rich are acquiring greater wealth at the expense of the rest of the
community.
All evidence proves, then, that the great accession of wealth which has
been accumulated in this country during the past thirty years, has been
most distributed amongst the middle classes. The natural effect of a
change from agricultural to manufacturing industry—a change which has
come over this country during the roll of a single century—is to
increase the wealth of the manufacturing and trading elements of the
community, in proportion as these are called into activity. The “great
fortunes” of the old time were nobles and land-holders; the millionaires
of to-day are merchants, bankers, and mill-owners. Forty years ago a
rich retail tradesman was a rarity; his dealings with the wholesale
trade were chiefly carried on by means of bills at long dates, in which
large sums were included for risk and interest; charges which decreased
his profits, and increased the price of all articles to the consumer.
Now the more frequent rule amongst retailers is prompt payment,
discounts in their own favour, and affluence. In our “nation of
shopkeepers,” it is industry which has prospered and had its reward.
Turning from the British Association to the Poor-Law Board—from Mr.
Porter to Mr. Baines—we shall see that in the scramble for wealth,
pauperism itself has benefited; that, in fact, the highest grades in the
scale of society have benefited as little as the very lowest. It is true
that in the progress of accumulation by manufactures, the necessity of
bringing large masses of operatives into confined _foci_, and of
providing work for them at all times and seasons, has caused temporary
spasms of poverty, that have occasionally almost defied relief; but
despite the rapid increase of the population, the ranks of what may be
called permanent pauperism have not been augmented. Consequently the
increased wealth of the country has descended even to the lowest ranks
of the people. In the year 1813, when the population of England and
Wales was only ten millions, the sum expended for the relief of the poor
amounted to six millions and a half sterling. From the return of the
Poor-Law Board, now before us, it appears that during the year which
ended on Lady Day, 1849, and with a population in England and Wales of
one-third more—or nearly fifteen millions—the exactions for poors’-rates
amounted to no more than five millions, seven hundred and ninety-two
thousand, nine hundred and sixty-three pounds—three-quarters of a
million less than was drawn for the pauperism of 1813. The poor have
ceased to regard the rich, as a class, as their natural enemies. We hear
no more, now, of a “grinding oligarchy.”
Besides the decrease of poor rates, other taxes have diminished. Let the
three grumblers with whom we started be pleased to remember that, no
longer ago than 1815, when war had done its worst on the lives and
fortunes of our fathers, they were taxed at the enormous rate of five
pounds four shillings and ten pence a head to each individual of the
population, from the centegenarian to the latest born baby; while we, in
this day and generation of “ruin,” pay per head, only fifty shillings
and eleven-pence, or scarcely one-half.
It is the strength and safeguard of the English nation, that its most
prominent elements are industry and commerce; for, tending as they do,
to the general dissemination, as well as to the general accumulation of
wealth, they effect a fusion of interests—a union of classes, and a
dependence of each upon the others—which is true national power. At the
moment at which we write, we learn from local sources of information,
the accuracy of which we have never had occasion to question, that
skilled labour of nearly every kind is in demand in the manufacturing
districts; and that all sorts of capable “hands” can have work.
Everything indicates improvement. If, indeed, our friends the Croakers
will only look their phantom “Ruin” boldly in the face, his gaunt form
will soon assume the smiling semblance of Prosperity.
AN EMIGRANT AFLOAT.
I knew very little of the sea when I determined to emigrate. Like most
emigrants, I thought beforehand more of the dangers than of the
disagreeables of this voyage; but found, when actually at sea, that its
disagreeables seemed more formidable than its dangers. I shall describe
the voyage, in order that those who follow me may know precisely what it
is that they have to encounter, satisfied as I am, that nothing will
tend more to conduce to the comforts of the emigrant at sea, than his
being able to take a full and accurate measure of its disagreeable as
well as its agreeable accompaniments, before stepping on board.
It was late in the afternoon of a bright May day, when the Seagull, 480
tons register, and bound for Quebec, spread her wings to the wind, after
having been towed out of the harbour of Greenock. A gentle breeze
carried her smoothly by the point of Gourock, the Holy Loch, Dunoon, and
other places familiar to the tourist on the noble Frith of Clyde. We
were off the neat little town of Largs, when the shadows of evening
thickened around us. I was one of more than a hundred steerage
passengers, most of whom soon afterwards went below for the night, many
with heavy hearts, thinking that they had seen the last glimpses of
their native land.
I remained long enough on deck to perceive the approach of a marked
change in the weather. We were still landlocked, when the wind veered
round to the west, directly ahead of us. It increased so rapidly in
violence, that by the time we were off Brodick, in the Island of Arran,
it was blowing more than half a gale. As we tacked to and fro to gain
the open sea, the vessel laboured heavily, and I soon felt sufficiently
squeamish to descend and seek refuge in my berth. Here a scene awaited
me for which I was but little prepared. With very few exceptions, all
below were far advanced in sea-sickness. Some were groaning in their
berths; others were lying upon the floor, in a semi-torpid state; and
others, again, were retching incessantly. What a contrast was the
Seagull then, to the neat, tempting picture she presented when lying
quietly in dock, and when, as I paced her white, dry, warm, sunny decks,
visions filled my mind of the pleasant days at sea before me, when,
reclining on the cordage, beneath the shelter of the bulwarks, I could
read the live-long day, whilst the stout ship sped merrily on her
voyage. Delightful anticipations! Let no one be extravagant in forming
them, unless he has a preference for disappointment. My faith in the
romance of the sea was greatly shaken by my first night’s experiences on
board, and it soon received a fatal blow from the commotion which was
being gradually engendered within my own frame, and which, at length,
resulted in a catastrophe. I could not sleep, for as the gale increased,
so did the noises within and without. I could hear the heavy wind
whistling mournfully through the damp, tight-drawn cordage, and the
waves breaking in successive showers on the deck overhead. It made my
flesh creep, too, to hear the water trickling by my very ear, as it
rushed along outside the two-inch plank which (pleasing thought) was all
that separated me from destruction. As the storm gained upon us, the
ship laboured more and more heavily, until, at length, with each lurch
which she made, everything moveable in the steerage rolled about from
side to side on the floor. Pots and pans, trunks, boxes, and pieces of
crockery kept up a most noisy dance for the entire night, their
respective owners being so ill as to be utterly indifferent to the fate
of their property. In the midst of the horrid din, I could distinguish
the distressing groan of the strong man prostrated by sea-sickness, the
long-drawn sigh and scarcely audible complaint of the woman, and the
sickly wail of the neglected child; and, that nothing might be wanting
to heighten the horrors of the scene, we were all this time in perfect
darkness, every light on board having been extinguished for hours.
Morning was far advanced as I fell into a fitful and feverish sleep. On
awaking, I found all as still as before leaving port. My
fellow-passengers were all on deck; and I hurried up after them to
ascertain the cause of the change. It was soon explained. The gale had,
at length, become so violent, that the ship had put back for shelter,
and was now lying quietly at anchor in the beautiful bay of Rothesay.
But what a change had, in the meantime, taken place in the appearance of
my fellow-passengers. The buoyant air of yesterday had disappeared; and
those who were then in ruddy health, now looked pale and woebegone. Such
was the effect of our night’s prostration.
For my own part, I began to feel that I had already had enough of the
sea, and heartily wished myself safe ashore on the banks of the St.
Lawrence. I had formerly experienced a sort of enthusiasm in listening
to such songs, as “The sea, the sea, the open sea!” “A life on the ocean
wave!” &c., &c. But had anyone on board now struck up either of them, I
should assuredly have set him down for a maniac. We remained for two
days in Rothesay Bay, waiting for a change of wind, during which time we
recruited our spirits—and water, a fresh stock of which we shipped. It
was not, therefore, without some of the lightness of heart, which had
characterised our first start, that, on the morning of the third day, we
made way again for the New World. But it seemed as if we were never to
get rid of the coast, for we were overtaken by a dead calm off Ailsa,
causing delay for ten days more sweltering under a hot sun, within half
a mile of that lonely and stupendous rock. On the evening of the second
day a gentle breeze from the northeast carried us out of the Channel,
and next morning found us with all sail set, speeding westward, with the
Irish coast on our lee.
We were a very mixed company in the steerage. Some had been farmers, and
were going out to try their hands at agriculture in the wilds of Canada.
Others had been servants, predial and domestic, and were on their way in
search of better fortunes in the New World, although they had not yet
made up their minds as to the precise manner in which they were to woo
the fickle dame. We had a brace of wives on board who were proceeding to
join their husbands in Canada, who had prudently preceded their
families, and prepared for their advent, by constructing a home for them
in the woods. There was an old man with a slender capital, who was
emigrating at an advanced period of life, that he might make a better
provision for his grandson, a lusty youth of about seventeen, of whom he
seemed doatingly fond. We had also amongst us a large family from
Edinburgh, of that class of people who have “seen better days,” who were
hurrying across the Atlantic in the hope of at least catching a glimpse
of them again. Besides the father and mother, there were several sons
and two daughters, the eldest son having duly qualified himself for the
honour of writing W. S. after his name—a nominal appendage which he
would find of far less value to him than a good axe in the woods. We had
a clergyman, too, of the poorer class, in worldly circumstances, who had
been accredited as a missionary to the Canadian wilds. I must not
overlook four or five infants, the precise ownership of which I never
thoroughly traced, they were so tumbled about from one to another; and
which generally of nights favoured us with prolonged choruses of the
most enlivening description.
Thus mixed and assorted, the first few days passed off agreeably enough
to such as were proof against a relapse of sea-sickness. When it was not
blowing too strong, the deck was a pleasant place for exercise, which is
necessary to comfort, as it is generally cold and disagreeable at sea,
except when calm, and then one is annoyed, whilst being broiled, at the
thought of making no progress. The chief occupation on board, seemed to
be that of cooking and eating. The cooking apparatus for the steerage
was on deck; each family, and each individual who had no family, was
continually cooking for themselves. As the accommodation for cooking was
not very ample for upwards of a hundred passengers, there was scarcely
an hour of the day between sunrise and sunset, that was not witness to
the progress of some culinary operations—men, women, and children were
constantly appearing and disappearing at the hatchways with pots,
saucepans, kettles, and other utensils; and it was not long ere some
began to fear, having made but little account of the voracity of
appetite engendered by convalescence after sea-sickness, that their
stock of provisions would prove rather scanty for the voyage.
Perhaps the greatest privation to which the poor steerage passenger is
subjected, is in connection with the water which he uses for drinking
and in some of his cooking processes. As the voyage may be protracted
beyond reasonable calculation, an extra supply of fresh water is or
should be laid in to meet such an emergency. To preserve this extra
stock from becoming impure, different devices are resorted to,—such as
impregnating it with lime, large quantities of which are thrown into
each cask. Were this the case only with the extra stock, the comfort of
the passenger might, for a time at least, be unimpaired in this respect;
but the misfortune is, that all the water for steerage consumption,
immediate and contingent, is treated in the same way; so that the
emigrant is scarcely out of harbour, when he finds the water of which he
makes use not only extremely unpalatable to drink, but in such a state
as to spoil every decoction into which it enters. Fancy a cup of tea
without cream, but with sugar and coarse lime, in about equal
proportions, to flavour it. The most unquestionable sloe leaves might,
under such circumstances, pass for young hyson, and the worst of chicory
for the best of coffee. This sorely discomfited the more elderly of the
females on board, whose cup of life was poisoned by very thin mortar.
On the fifth day out, after gaining the open sea, we were overtaken by a
tremendous gale, which did us considerable damage. I was standing near
the forecastle, when a heavy block dropped from aloft with terrific
force at my feet. I had scarcely recovered from my fright, when crash
after crash over head, making me run under the jolly boat in terror. For
a moment afterwards all was still, and then arose a tremendous uproar on
board, officers giving all sorts of directions at once, and sailors
running about, and jumping over each other to obey them. When I ventured
to peep out from my place of safety, a sad spectacle of wreck and ruin
presented itself to me. On our lee, masts, ropes, spars, and sails were
floating alongside on the uneasy waters. Our fore-top-mast had given
way, and in falling overboard, had dragged the maintop-gallant mast and
the greater part of our bowsprit along with it. Sails and rigging went
of course with the wreck, which was provoking, as the wind was a-beam
and so far favourable. We soon hauled the wreck on board, however, and
in the course of two or three days, with the aid of the carpenter, the
dismantled ship was re-rigged in a very creditable manner.
We had scarcely yet put to rights, when a vessel made up to us bound
westward like ourselves. What a sight to the lonely wanderers on the
ocean is a ship at sea!—it seems like a herald coming to you from the
world, from which you are seemingly cut off for ever. It is a sight
which must be seen to be appreciated. She was labouring heavily on our
lee, and every now and then her whole keel became visible to us. To
this, one of the passengers very innocently directed attention, much to
the horror of the second mate, who smartly rebuked the offender; it
being, he said, not only indelicate, but perilous to own having seen the
keel of any ship under canvas. We all, of course, admitted the
reasonableness of this caution, and strictly observed it.
The ship was no sooner repaired, than the wind, which had abated a
little, seemed to redouble its fury. We were now in the midst of a
terrible storm, and great was the commotion in the steerage. Some moaned
in pain—others screamed occasionally in terror—whilst one old lady was
constantly inquiring in a most piteous voice, if there was not one good
man on board, for whose sake the rest might be saved. On making the
inquiry of a rough, but good-natured tar, he rebuked her scepticism, and
referred her to the minister. We had two sailors on board, named Peter.
One was an ordinary looking mortal, from whom the other was
distinguished by the appellation of Peter the Leerer, a name having
reference to the extraordinary facial phenomena which he exhibited. On
the point of his nose was an enormous wart, the counterpart of which had
taken possession of his chin. He had likewise one, but of smaller
dimensions, on either cheek, only wanting one on his forehead, to
complete the diagram; a want, which, for most of the voyage, was
providentially made up by a large pimple, which underlay his bump of
benevolence. Add to this an enormous quantity of wiry red hair, and a
portentous squint, and you may form some conception of the goblin in
question. He was the terror of all the children on board, and came
regularly into the steerage in the morning, begging a “toothful” from
the passengers. We never saw his tooth, but it must have been very
large, as what he meant by the term was a glass of raw spirits, to the
strength of which he was stoically indifferent, so that it was above
proof. It appeared that he now thought that the time had come for making
some sort of return for sundry gifts of this nature. He appeared amongst
us, as the storm was at its height, and confidentially informed us that,
unless some of the “canvas” were immediately taken down, the ship “had
not another hour’s life in her.” To describe the confusion and dismay
occasioned by this announcement is impossible. Nobody questioned Peter’s
judgment, who stood looking at us as if he thought that one good turn
deserved another. But every one was too much frightened to think of
rewarding him for his kindness. Some ran at once upon deck to take
immediate advantage of the boats—the women all screamed together—and we
had a pretty tolerable taste of the horrors to be witnessed on the eve
of a shipwreck. The hubbub at length ended in the appointment of a
deputation to wait upon the captain, and solicit him to shorten sail.
The deputation went upon its mission, but soon afterwards returned from
the cabin to their constituents with the report that they had been
politely requested by the functionary in question to mind their own
business. The storm, however, gradually abated, and things and persons
resumed their ordinary aspect.
Great was the anxiety evinced every time the log was thrown, to
ascertain our rate of sailing, and at noon of each day, to know our
daily run, and our precise locality on the terraqueous globe. It is
difficult for an emigrant to reconcile himself to less than eight or
nine knots an hour. He may put up with seven, or even six, provided the
ship is in her direct course, but he regards everything below that as a
justifiable ground of murmuring and complaint. Sometimes it is the ship
that is wrong, and sometimes the captain, sometimes the rigging, and at
other times, all is wrong together. But to do the emigrant justice, if
he is in the surly mood when he is making but little progress, he makes
amends for his ill-humour when the vessel is making a good run. We, one
day, made but about twenty miles, and I apprehended a mutiny. On another
we made two hundred, and nothing could exceed the hilarity and
good-humour of those on board. At one time, the Seagull was the merest
tub, a disgrace to her owners, and to the mercantile navy of the
kingdom. At another, she was one of the best vessels afloat; the captain
one of the best sailors on the sea; and the crew the cleverest set of
fellows in the world. But all this time it was the same ship, the same
captain, and the same crew. The diversity of opinion was the result of
extraneous circumstances which caused us at different times to take
different points of view. If the weather was favourable, and we made
good way, the ship, captain, and crew, got all the honour and glory; if
it was adverse and our progress was retarded, the ship, captain, and
crew, had to bear all our sinister glances and ill humours. One morning,
after we had been about ten days out, our minds were all made up that we
were pretty near the banks of Newfoundland, when a fellow-passenger,
evidently not very deeply versed in human nature, had the hardihood to
inform us that he had, but the day before, seen the mate’s log book,
from which it appeared that we were as yet but five hundred miles to the
westward of the Irish coast. I can scarcely understand to this day, how
it was that he escaped being thrown overboard.
We had two men on board, the very antipodes of each other. The one was a
colossal bachelor, who was never ill; the other a diminutive member of a
large family, who was never well. They resembled each other only in one
point—that they both ate prodigiously. The only account the bachelor
could give of himself was that he was going out to Canada to saw the big
trees. He had, in fact, been engaged as a sawyer to proceed to the banks
of the Ottawa, there to prosecute his avocation in connection with some
of the large timber establishments, which are situated far up that noble
river. He was so powerful a fellow, that a Yankee passenger declared “he
would have only to look at a tree to bring it down.” He lived, whilst on
board, on nothing but oatmeal porridge, a large goblet-full of which,
after first making it himself, he devoured regularly on deck four times
a day. As to the little man, he lived, as regularly, on mashed potatoes,
enriched with butter and melted cheese; and his meals were invariably
followed by fits of sea-sickness which he considered quite
unaccountable. His habits became at length such a scandal to all on
board, that the doctor was compelled, by the force of public opinion, to
order him to eat less. He had remained below from our time of starting,
until the day we made land, when he appeared on deck for the first time,
and was for the first time seen without his nightcap.
When we had been about three weeks at sea an incident occurred which
appalled us all, and elicited the sympathies of everyone for one of the
unfortunate sufferers. I have already alluded to the old man, who was
emigrating with his only grandson, whom he wished to see comfortably
settled in life, ere his eyes were sealed in death. The youth was one of
several on board who were fond, after having been a few days at sea, of
climbing the rigging, and exposing themselves to a variety of
unnecessary risks. He had been frequently warned, with the rest, against
the consequences which might ensue, but disregarded the advice. One day,
whilst out upon the bowsprit, he missed his hold and dropped into the
water. The alarm of “man overboard” was instantly raised, and, to save
him, the ship was immediately hove to; but he had disappeared, and
although we remained for an hour upon the spot, we never caught a
glimpse of him again. One of the men near him at the time said that, on
reaching the water, he was struck on the head by the cut-water of the
ship, which was then running about eight knots an hour. The blow stunned
him, and he sank like a stone. The poor old man was inconsolable, and
gradually sank into a state of vacant imbecility; and, on landing, found
a home in the Lunatic Asylum at Quebec.
Let no one dream that the sea, particularly on board an emigrant ship,
is the place for reading or study. It is either too cold, when there is
the slightest breeze, or too hot when it is calm: it is too noisy at all
times. Happy is he who, under such circumstances, has a resource against
_ennui_ in his own reflections. Having a clergyman on board, we had
divine service regularly on the Sundays. When it was rough, the
assemblage took place between decks in the steerage; but when fine we
were convened upon deck. Sailors have a dread, not exactly of clergymen
in the abstract, but of clergymen on board. A blackbird on the rigging
as the ship is about to start, or a clergyman on board, is equally, in
their estimation, a token of ill luck; and some of the crew pitied us
for anticipating anything else, under the circumstances.
If there is one thing more disagreeable than a storm at sea, it is a
calm. It is all very well for a steamer, which can then make her way
nobly over the waters; but, the annoyance and tedium on board a sailing
vessel are indescribable. In all our calms we were surrounded by
sea-gulls and other marine birds. Some of them ventured so close as to
be shot; others we endeavoured to catch by means of baited hooks tied to
a stick, which was attached to a long cord; but they were too wary for
us, for, after closely examining it, they fought shy of the temptation.
On nearing the banks of Newfoundland we were constantly immersed in
fogs. One morning, whilst thus situated, the temperature of the sea
suddenly lowered, which the captain interpreted into an indication of
icebergs not being far off, and a sharp look out was ordered to be kept.
It was scarcely noon ere we were in imminent peril of running at full
speed against one. We owed our escape to a passenger, who was on the
lookout, and who called the attention of one of the sailors to something
ahead of us. “Starboard—starboard hard!”—cried he at once to the man at
the wheel. The helm was scarcely turned ere we glided rapidly by the
frozen mass, which gleamed like a huge emerald in the faint and
struggling sunlight. We passed so close to it that I could have leaped
upon it with ease. We might as well have run against a whinstone rock as
encountered this floating peril, at the rate at which we were then
gliding through the water.
Whilst crossing the banks the ship was frequently hove to for soundings.
We took advantage of such occasions to fish for cod; nor were we
unsuccessful, for we, altogether, hauled on board several dozen fish of
a large size. The delight with which we feasted upon our prey, after
some weeks’ experience of nothing but salt meat, I leave the reader to
imagine. It was during one of our angling attempts that an incident
occurred, which would have seemed as incredible to me as it may now do
the reader, had I not been an eye-witness of it. One of the crew, whilst
fishing for a few minutes, with a line belonging to a passenger, hooked
a very large fish, which dropped into the water in the act of being
hauled on board. The man, determined on securing his prize, without a
moment’s hesitation, leaped overboard after it; and, seizing the half
insensible fish in his arms, held it there until he was hauled on board,
with his extraordinary booty. In explanation of this, it should be known
that the gills of a cod-fish, when out of the water, swell considerably,
so as to prevent it from properly performing their functions when
restored, even alive, to its native element. It was whilst the fish in
question was in the act of thus “coming to” that the man seized and
secured it.
On the banks, when the night was clear, we witnessed magnificent
exhibitions of the aurora-borealis. It was generally between midnight
and ten in the morning that the phenomenon attained the greatest
splendour. When the whole northern sky was enveloped in a trellis-work
of flashing wavy light, of a mingled golden, silvery pink, and blood-red
hue.
The first land we made, was Cape Breton, an island off the northern
extremity of Nova Scotia; and between which and Newfoundland, is the
entrance to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The bold shore of the island was
more picturesque than inviting; but for the live-long day every
passenger strained his eyes upon this, the first positive revelation of
the New World to him. The delight imparted by the first sight of land,
can only be appreciated by those who have been for weeks at sea, with
nothing to meet the eye, day after day, but the same monotonous and
dreary circle of waters, in the midst of which the ship seems to rest
immoveable. From Cape Breton we stood up the Gulf, and being favoured by
the wind, soon made the Island of Anticosti, not far from the mouth of
the St. Lawrence. It looked like a mass of petrified guano; an illusion
which was not disturbed by the myriads of water-fowl which hovered about
its precipices.
The Gulf of St. Lawrence has not been inaptly designated, the “vilest of
seas.” It was our lot to have ample experience of its capricious
humours. When almost at the mouth of the river, which expands into a
magnificent estuary of from seventy to ninety miles in width, we were
becalmed for two whole days. Between us and the rocky shore on our left,
to which we were very close, lay a vessel from Belfast, crowded with
emigrants. There was music and dancing on board; and so near were we to
each other, that we, too, sometimes danced to the sound of her solitary
violin. On the evening of the second day, we were suddenly overtaken by
a furious squall, which descending the river, came upon us so
unprepared, that much of our canvas was cut to pieces ere it could be
taken in. In about half an hour all was comparatively tranquil again,
but on looking for our comrade, not a vestige of her was to be seen. It
was not for three weeks afterwards, when we heard of her total loss,
with upwards of three hundred and fifty souls on board, that our
dreadful suspicions respecting her, were confirmed. Next morning it blew
very fresh; and although it was the 3rd of June, we had several heavy
falls of snow.
After beating about for two days longer in the mouth of the river, we
were boarded by a pilot, and made way for Quebec, about four hundred
miles up. The ascent of the stream is sometimes exceedingly tedious; as,
when the wind is adverse, it is necessary to come to anchor at every
turn of the tide. Thus as much time is sometimes consumed in ascending
the river, as in crossing the Atlantic. We were more fortunate, for we
made the quarantine ground, thirty miles below the city, in ten days.
Under such circumstances, the sail up the river is interesting and
agreeable. For the first hundred miles or so, it is so wide, that land
on either side is but dimly visible. But, as the estuary narrows,
objects on either side become more distinct. The northern shore, which
is bold and mountainous, is replete with scenes of the most romantic
grandeur. The southern bank being much tamer in its character, and more
adapted for human habitations. The channel too, some distance up, is
occasionally studded with islands, which add greatly to the interest of
the sail.
The quarantine ground of Canada is Gros Isle, between which and Quebec
stretches the long Island of Orleans. We had scarcely dropped anchor
when we were boarded by an officer of the Board of Health. Whilst
ascending the river, the ship had been thoroughly cleaned, and the
berths in the steerage white-washed. We were all passed in review before
the functionary in question, and could have been at once permitted to
proceed to our destination, but for one old lady, who was not exactly
ill, but ailing; on her account we were detained until every piece of
clothing on board had undergone a thorough ablution. We landed
immediately in boats, and, after having been for about six weeks at sea,
it was with inexpressible joy that I sprang ashore, for the first time,
in the New World.
Gros Isle! With what melancholy associations have the events of 1847
encircled the name of the Canadian lazaretto! On our arrival, in a year
when the tide of emigration was not strong, there was a little fleet
anchored along side of it. Some of the vessels (they were all from
Ireland), with their overloaded cargoes of human beings, had been
already there for a month, nor was there any prospect of their being
relieved for some weeks to come. There was an hospital for the sick; the
accommodation ashore for such as were well, consisted of several large
open sheds, tolerably well covered and floored. In these, meals were
taken during the day, and beds were made for the night. Outside, the
scene presented was picturesque, and even gay; there were nearly three
thousand people ashore, and a universal washing of clothes of all kinds
was going on; the water being heated by hundreds of wood fires, which
were blazing and smoking amongst the rocks in the open air. When there
were families, the families belonging to them washed for them; such as
were alone had to hire the services of professional washerwomen. The
appliances of washing are rather peculiar. Between high and low
water-mark the island was very rocky, and the action of the water had
here and there scooped out bowls of various sizes from the rock. Into
them, for the most part, the hot water was poured, and in them, between
tides, the clothes were washed. They were then spread upon the rocks, or
hung upon the trees to dry, which gave the island a holiday look. It was
anything, however, but a holiday time for hundreds, who were forced to
tenant it.
To our great satisfaction, we were permitted, after but one day’s
detention, to resume our course. With wind and tide in our favour, we
soon dropped up to the city. It was a clear and brilliant morning in
June when we left Gros Isle, and as we made our way up the narrow
channel between the Island of Orleans and the southern bank of the
river, nothing could exceed the beauty of the scene, the great basin,
into which the city juts, being visible in the distance, directly ahead
of us, whilst the precipitous bank on either side, particularly that on
our left, was covered with the most luxuriant vegetation, in the shade
of which we could, every here and there, discover foaming torrents,
dashing headlong from the country above into the river, like those
which, after heavy rains, rush with such fury down the western bank of
Loch Ness. On opening one of the points of the Isle Orleans, the
cataract of Montmorency burst suddenly upon our view, looking in the
distance like a long streak of snow amid the rich green foliage which
imbedded it. Considerably higher up, Point Levy still projected between
us and the city, but long before we turned it, we could see over it the
British flag floating in the distance from the lofty battlements of Cape
Diamond. On turning the point, the change of scene was as sudden and
complete as any ever effected by the scenic contrivances of the stage.
The city was at once disclosed to view, skirting the fort and crowning
the summit of the bold rocky promontory on which it stands, its tinned
roofs and steeples gleaming in the sunlight, as if they were cased in
silver. Very few vessels were at the wharves, but abreast of the city
hundreds were anchored in the middle of the stream, some getting rid of
their ballast, and others surrounded by islands of timber, with which
they were being loaded. The clearness of the air, the brightness of the
sky, the merry tumble of the water, slightly ruffled by a fresh easterly
breeze, the singular position and quaint appearance of the town, with
its massive battlements, its glistening turrets, and its break-neck
looking streets, zigzagging up the precipice, with the rich greenery of
the Heights of Abraham beyond, and that of Point Levy right opposite,
and with hundreds of vessels lying quietly at anchor on the broad
expanse of the river, whilst the echoes reverberated to the merry
choruses of their busy crews,—all conspired to form a picture calculated
to make an impression upon the imagination too deep to be ever effaced.
The anchor had scarcely dropped, terminating our long and weary voyage,
when we were boarded by a Custom-House officer, and by an officer of the
Board of Health. After another inspection, we were permitted to land;
and it was not without many anxious reflections upon the novelty of my
situation, that I found myself retiring that night to rest within a
stone’s throw of the monument raised to the joint memories of Wolf and
Montcalm.
Such were the incidents of my voyage. I have set them down simply, and
exactly as they occurred, for the purpose of presenting a true picture
of the emigrant’s life afloat. I have since learned that, in all
respects, ours was an average journey across the wide waste. Intending
emigrants, therefore, who picture to themselves in bright colours the
glories of a sea voyage, will, by reading these pages, have their dreams
modified by some touches of reality and truth, if not entirely
dispelled. If, however, they are adapted for success in the other
hemisphere, they will not be daunted by the trials and inconveniences I
have pictured.
THE SISTER’S FAREWELL.
Dear Sister, sit beside my bed,
And let me see your gentle smile,
And let me lay my aching head
Upon your kindly arm awhile;
I shall not long be with you now,
My time is drawing to an end:
May we our spirits meekly bow,
And He release from suffering send.
The longed-for summer’s drawing near;
The wind is softer, and the sun
Streams down so brightly on me here,
It almost seems already come.
But now—I never more shall see
The fields and lanes, all gay with flowers,
Nor hear the murmur of the bee,
Nor song of birds among the bowers.
For here, no beauteous change we see
In nature, as the year rolls on;
No green bursts forth on bush and tree
When winter’s chilling frosts are gone.
No gentle flowers or odours sweet,
In summer cheer us as we go;
Nought see we but th’ unchanging street,
And weary passing to and fro.
The summer, though ’tis summer still,
Seems not the same while we are here.
How sweet the thought of that clear rill,
That trembled from the hillock near
To our old house! I sometimes think,
With my eyes closed, and half-asleep,
That I am lying on the brink
Of the old fish-pond, still, and deep.
Methinks in one of those sweet nooks,
Beneath the hanging willow-trees,
I listen to the cawing rooks
And busy humming of the bees.
And, moodily, I watch the trout
Make circles in the tranquil pool;
And watch the swallows skim about,
And feel the breeze so fresh and cool.
Let me awake—the dream was brief—
Be thankful for my sufferings here;
Be thankful, too, for Heaven’s relief,
E’en though I leave thee, sister dear.
Yet let me once more see you smile;
A Vision opens on me bright!
Lay your hand by me for a while—
And now, God bless you, love—Good Night!
THE HOME OF WOODRUFFE THE GARDENER.
IN EIGHT CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER IV.
Fleming did what he could to find fair play for his father-in-law. He
spoke to one and another—to the officers of the railway, and to the
owners of neighbouring plots of ground, about the bad drainage, which
was injuring everybody; but he could not learn that anything was likely
to be done. The ditch—the great evil of all—had always been there, he
was told, and people never used to complain of it. When Fleming pointed
out that it was at first a comparatively deep ditch, and that it grew
shallower every year, from the accumulations formed by its uneven
bottom, there were some who admitted that it might be as well to clean
it out; yet nobody set about it. And it was truly a more difficult
affair now than it would have been at an earlier time. If the ditch was
shallower, it was much wider. It had once been twelve feet wide, and it
was now eighteen. When any drain had been flowing into it, or after a
rainy day, the contents spread through and over the soil on each side,
and softened it, and then the next time any horse or cow came to drink,
the whole bank was made a perfect bog; for the poor animals, however
thirsty, tried twenty places to find water that they could drink, before
going away in despair. Such was the bar in the way of poor Woodruffe’s
success with his ground. Before the end of summer, his patience was
nearly worn out. During a showery and gleamy May and a pleasant June, he
had gone on as prosperously as he could expect under the circumstances;
and he confidently anticipated that a seasonable July and August would
quite set him up. But he had had no previous experience of the
peculiarities of ill-drained land; and the hot July and August from
which he hoped so much did him terrible mischief. The drought which
would have merely dried and pulverised a well-drained soil, leaving it
free to profit much by small waterings, baked the overcharged soil of
Woodruffe’s garden into hard hot masses of clay, amidst which his
produce died off faster and faster every day, even though he and all his
family wore out their strength with constant watering. He did hope, he
said, that he should have been spared drought at least; but it seemed as
if he was to have every plague in turn; and the drought seemed, at the
time, to be the worst of all.
One day, Fleming saw a welcome face in one of the carriages; Mr. Nelson,
a Director of the railway, who was looking along the line to see how
matters went. Though Mr. Nelson was not exactly the one, of all the
Directors, whom Fleming would have chosen to appeal to, he saw that the
opportunity must not be lost; and he entreated him to alight, and stay
for the next train.
“Eh! what?” said Mr. Nelson; “what can you want with us here? A station
like this! Why, one has to put on spectacles to see it!”
“If you would come down, Sir, I should be glad to show you....”
“Well: I suppose I must.”
As they were standing on the little platform, and the train was growing
smaller in the distance, Fleming proceeded to business. He told of the
serious complaints that were made for a distance of a few miles on
either hand, of the clay pits, left by the railway brickmakers, to fill
with stagnant waters.
“Pho! pho! Is that what you want to say?” replied Mr. Nelson. “You need
not have stopped me just to tell me that. We hear of those pits all
along the line. We are sick of hearing of them.”
“That does not mend the matter in this place,” observed Fleming. “I
speak freely, Sir, but I think it my duty to say that something must be
done. I heard, a few days ago, more than the people hereabouts
know,—much more than I shall tell them—of the fever that has settled on
particular points of our line; and I now assure you, Sir, that if the
fever once gets a hold in this place, I believe it may carry us all off,
before anything can be done. Sir, there is not one of us, within half a
mile of the Station, that has a wholesome dwelling.”
“Pho! pho! you are a croaker,” declared Mr. Nelson. “Never saw such a
dismal fellow! Why, you will die of fright, if ever you die of
anything.”
“Then, Sir, will you have the goodness to walk round with me, and see
for yourself what you think of things. It is not only for myself and my
family that I speak. In an evil day, I induced my wife’s family to
settle here, and....”
“Ay! that is a nice garden,” observed Mr. Nelson, as Fleming pointed to
Woodruffe’s land. “You are a croaker, Fleming. I declare I think the
place is much improved since I saw it last. People would not come and
settle here if the place was like what you say.”
Instead of arguing the matter, Fleming led the way down the long flight
of steps. He was aware that leading the gentleman among bad smells and
over shoes in a foul bog would have more effect than any argument was
ever known to have on his contradictious spirit.
“You should have seen worse things than these, and then you would not be
so discontented,” observed Mr. Nelson, striking his stick upon the
hard-baked soil, all intersected with cracks. “I have seen such a soil
as this in Spain, some days after a battle, when there were scores of
fingers and toes sticking up out of the cracks. What would you say to
that?—eh?”
“We may have a chance of seeing that here,” replied Fleming; “if the
plague comes,—and comes too fast for the coffin-makers,—a thing which
has happened more than once in England, I believe.”
Mr. Nelson stopped to laugh; but he certainly attended more to business
as he went on; and Fleming, who knew something of his ways, had hopes
that if he could only keep his own temper, this visit of the Director
might not be without good results.
In passing through Woodruffe’s garden, very nice management was
necessary. Woodruffe was at work there, charged with ire against railway
directors and landed proprietors, whom, amidst the pangs of his
rheumatism, he regarded as the poisoners of his land and the bane of his
fortunes; while, on the other hand, Mr. Nelson, who had certainly never
been a market-gardener, criticised and ridiculed everything that met his
eye. What was the use of such a toolhouse as that?—big enough for a
house for them all. What was the use of such low fences?—of such high
screens?—of making the walks so wide?—sheer waste!—of making the beds so
long one way, and so narrow another?—of planting or sowing this and
that?—things that nobody wanted. Woodruffe had pushed back his hat, in
preparation for a defiant reply, when Fleming caught his eye, and, by a
good-tempered smile, conveyed to him that they had an oddity to deal
with. Allan, who had begun by listening reverently, was now looking from
one to another, in great perplexity.
“What is that boy here for, staring like a dunce? Why don’t you send him
to school? You neglect a parent’s duty if you don’t send him to school.”
Woodruffe answered by a smile of contempt, walked away, and went to work
at a distance.
“That boy is very well taught,” Fleming said, quietly. “He is a great
reader, and will soon be fit to keep his father’s accounts.”
“What does he stare in that manner for, then? I took him for a dunce.”
“He is not accustomed to hear his father called in question, either as a
gardener or a parent.”
“Pho! pho! I might as well have waited, though, till he was out of
hearing. Well, is this all you have to show me? I think you make a great
fuss about nothing.”
“Will you walk this way?” said Fleming, turning down towards the osier
beds, without any compassion for the gentleman’s boots or olfactory
nerves. For a long while Mr. Nelson affected to admire the reeds, and
water-flags, and marsh-blossoms, declared the decayed vegetation to be
peat soil, very fine peat, which the ladies would be glad of for their
heaths in the flower-garden,—and thought there must be good fowling here
in winter. Fleming quietly turned over the so-called peat with a stick,
letting it be seen that it was a mere dung-heap of decayed rushes, and
wished Mr. Nelson would come in the fowling season, and see what the
place was like.
“The children are merry enough, however,” observed the gentleman. “They
can laugh here, much as in other places. I advise you to take a lesson
from them, Fleming. Now, don’t you teach them to croak.”
The laughter sounded from the direction of the old brick-ground; and
thither they now turned. Two little boys were on the brink of a pit, so
intent on watching a rat in the water and on pelting it with stones,
that they did not see that anybody was coming to disturb them. In answer
to Mr. Nelson’s question, whether they were vagrants, and why vagrants
were permitted there, Fleming answered that the younger one—the
pale-faced one—was his little brother-in-law; the other—
“Ay, now, you will be telling me next that the pale face is the fault of
this place.”
“It certainly is,” said Fleming. “That child was chubby enough when he
came.”
“Pho, pho! a puny little wretch as ever I saw—puny from its birth, I
have no doubt of it. And who is the other—a gipsy?”
“He looks like it,” replied Fleming. On being questioned, Moss told that
the boy lived near, and he had often played with him lately. Yes, he
lived near, just beyond those trees; not in a house, only a sort of
house the people had made for themselves. Mr. Nelson liked to lecture
vagrants, even more than other people; so Moss was required to show the
way, and his dark-skinned playfellow was not allowed to skulk behind.
Moss led his party on, over the tufty hay-coloured grass, skipping from
bunch to bunch of rushes, round the osier beds, and at last straight
through a clump of alders, behind whose screen now appeared the house,
as Moss had called it, which the gipsies had made for themselves. It was
the tilt of a waggon, serving as a tent. Nobody was visible but a woman,
crouching under the shadow of the tent, to screen from the sun that
which was lying across her lap.
“What is that that she’s nursing? Lord bless me! Can that be a child?”
exclaimed Mr. Nelson.
“A child in the fever,” replied Fleming.
“Lord bless me!—to see legs and arms hang down like that!” exclaimed the
gentleman: and he forthwith gave the woman a lecture on her method of
nursing—scolded her for letting the child get a fever—for not putting it
to bed—for not getting a doctor to it—for being a gipsy, and living
under an alder clump. He then proceeded to inquire whether she had
anybody else in the tent, where her husband was, whether he lived by
thieving, how they would all like being transported, whether she did not
think her children would all be hanged, and so on. At first, the woman
tried a facetious and wheedling tone, then a whimpering one, and,
finally, a scolding one. The last answered well. Mr. Nelson found that a
man, to say nothing of a gentleman, has no chance with a woman with a
sore heart in her breast, and a sick child in her lap, when once he has
driven her to her weapon of the tongue. He said afterwards, that he had
once gone to Billingsgate, on purpose to set two fishwomen quarrelling,
that he might see what it was like. The scene had fulfilled all his
expectations; but he now declared that it could not compare with this
exhibition behind the alders. He stood a long while, first trying to
overpower the woman’s voice; and, when that seemed hopeless, poking
about among the rushes with his stick, and finally, staring in the
woman’s face, in a mood between consternation and amusement:—thus he
stood, waiting till the torrent should intermit; but there was no sign
of intermission; and when the sick child began to move and rouse itself,
and look at the strangers, as if braced by the vigour of its mother’s
tongue, the prospect of an end seemed further off than ever. Mr. Nelson
shrugged his shoulders, signed to his companions, and walked away
through the alders. The woman was not silent because they were out of
sight. Her voice waxed shriller as it followed them, and died away only
in the distance. Moss was grasping Fleming’s hand with all his might
when Mr. Nelson spoke to him, and shook his stick at him, asking him how
he came to play with such people, and saying that if ever he heard him
learning to scold like that woman, he would beat him with that stick: so
Moss vowed he never would.
“When the train was in sight by which Mr. Nelson was to depart, he
turned to Fleming, with the most careless air imaginable, saying,
“Have you any medicine in your house?—any bark?”
“Not any. But I will send for some.”
“Ay, do. Or,—no—I will send you some. See if you can’t get these people
housed somewhere, so that they may not sleep in the swamp. I don’t mean
in any of your houses, but in a barn, or some such place. If the physic
comes before the doctor, get somebody to dose the child. And don’t fancy
you are all going to die of the fever. That is the way to make
yourselves ill: and it is all nonsense, too, I dare say.”
“Do you like that gentleman?” asked Moss, sapiently, when the train was
whirling Mr. Nelson out of sight. “Because I don’t—not at all.”
“I believe he is kinder than he seems, Moss. He need not be so rough:
but I know he does kind things sometimes.”
“But, do you like him?”
“No, I can’t say I do.”
Before many hours were over, Fleming was sorry that he had admitted
this, even to himself; and for many days after he was occasionally heard
telling Moss what a good gentleman Mr. Nelson was, for all his roughness
of manners. With the utmost speed, before it would have been thought
possible, arrived a surgeon from the next town, with medicines, and the
news that he was to come every day while there was any fear of fever.
The gipsies were to have been cared for; but they were gone. The marks
of their fire and a few stray feathers which showed that a fowl had been
plucked, alone told where they had encamped. A neighbour, who loved her
poultry yard, was heard to say that the sick child would not die for
want of chicken broth, she would be bound; and the nearest farmer asked
if they had left any potato-peels and turnip tops for his pig. He
thought that was the least they could do after making their famous gipsy
stew (a capital dish, it was said,) from his vegetables. They were gone;
and if they had not left fever behind, they might be forgiven, for the
sake of the benefit of taking themselves off. After the search for the
gipsies was over, there was still an unusual stir about the place. One
and another stranger appeared and examined the low grounds, and sent for
one and another of the neighbouring proprietors, whether farmer, or
builder, or gardener, or labourer; for every one who owned or rented a
yard of land on the borders of the great ditch, or anywhere near the
clay pits or osier beds. It was the opinion of the few residents near
the Station that something would be done to improve the place before
another year; and everybody said that it must be Mr. Nelson’s doings,
and that it was a thousand pities that he did not come earlier, before
the fever had crept thus far along the line.
CHAPTER THE FIFTH.
For some months past, Becky had believed without a doubt, that the day
of her return home would be the very happiest day of her life. She was
too young to know yet that it is not for us to settle which of our days
shall be happy ones, nor what events shall yield us joy. The promise had
not been kept that she should return when her father and mother removed
into the new cottage. She had been told that there really was not, even
now decent room for them all; and that they must at least wait till the
hot weather was completely over before they crowded the chamber, as they
had hitherto done. And then, when autumn came on, and the creeping mists
from the low grounds hung round the place from sunset till after
breakfast the next day, the mother delayed sending for her daughter,
unwilling that she should lose the look of health which she alone now,
of all the family, exhibited. Fleming and his wife and babe prospered
better than the others. The young man’s business lay on the high ground,
at the top of the embankment. He was there all day while Mr. Woodruffe
and Allan were below, among the ditches and the late and early fogs.
Mrs. Fleming was young and strong, full of spirit and happiness; and so
far fortified against the attacks of disease, as a merry heart
strengthens nerve and bone and muscle, and invigorates all the vital
powers. In regard to her family, her father’s hopeful spirit seemed to
have passed into her. While he was becoming permanently discouraged, she
was always assured that everything would come right next year. The time
had arrived for her power of hope to be tested to the utmost. One day
this autumn, she admitted that Becky must be sent for. She did not
forget, however, to charge Allan to be cheerful, and make the best of
things, and not frighten Becky by the way.
It was now the end of October. Some of the days were balmy elsewhere—the
afternoons ruddy; the leaves crisp beneath the tread; the squirrel busy
after the nuts in the wood; the pheasants splendid among the dry ferns
in the brake, the sportsman warm and thirsty in his exploring among the
stubble. In the evenings the dwellers in country houses called one
another out upon the grass, to see how bright the stars were, and how
softly the moonlight slept upon the woods. While it was thus in one
place, in another, and not far off, all was dank, dim, dreary and
unwholesome; with but little sun, and no moon or stars; all chill, and
no glow; no stray perfumes, the last of the year, but sickly scents
coming on the steam from below. Thus it was about Fleming’s house, this
latter end of October, when he saw but little of his wife, because she
was nursing her mother in the fever, and when he tried to amuse himself
with his young baby at mealtimes (awkward nurse as he was) to relieve
his wife of the charge for the little time he could be at home. When the
baby cried, and when he saw his Abby look wearied, he did wish, now and
then, that Becky was at home: but he was patient, and helpful, and as
cheerful as he could, till the day which settled the matter. On that
morning he felt strangely weak, barely able to mount the steps to the
station. During the morning, several people told him he looked ill; and
one person did more. The porter sent a message to the next large Station
that somebody must be sent immediately to fill Fleming’s place, in case
of his being too ill to work. Somebody came; and before that, Fleming
was in bed—certainly down in the fever. His wife was now wanted at home;
and Becky must come to her mother.
Though Becky asked questions all the way home, and Allan answered them
as truthfully as he knew how, she was not prepared for what she
found—her father aged and bent, always in pain, more or less, and far
less furnished with plans and hopes than she had ever known him; Moss,
fretful and sickly, and her mother unable to turn herself in her bed.
Nobody mentioned death. The surgeon who came daily, and told Becky
exactly what to do, said nothing of anybody dying of the fever, while
Woodruffe was continually talking of things that were to be done when
his wife got well again. It was sad, and sometimes alarming, to hear the
strange things that Mrs. Woodruffe said in the evenings when she was
delirious; but if Abby stepped in at such times, she did not think much
of it, did not look upon it as any sign of danger; and was only thankful
that her husband had no delirium. His head was always clear, she said,
though he was very weak. Becky never doubted, after this, that her
mother was the most severely ill of the two; and she was thunderstruck
when she heard one morning the surgeon’s answers to her father’s
questions about Fleming. He certainly considered it a bad case; he would
not say that he could not get through; but he must say it was contrary
to his expectation. When Becky saw her father’s face as he turned away
and went out, she believed his heart was broken.
“But I thought,” said she to the surgeon, “I thought my mother was most
ill of the two.”
“I don’t know that,” was the reply, “but she is very ill. We are doing
the best we can.—You are, I am sure,” he said, kindly; “and we must hope
on, and do our best till a change comes. The wisest of us do not know
what changes may come. But I could not keep your father in ignorance of
what may happen in the other house.”
No appearances alarmed Abby. Because there was no delirium, she
apprehended no danger. Even when the fatal twitchings came, the arm
twitching as it lay upon the coverlid, she did not know it was a symptom
of anything. As she nursed her husband perfectly well, and could not
have been made more prudent and watchful by any warning, she had no
warning. Her cheerfulness was encouraged, for her infant’s sake, as well
as for her husband’s and her own. Some thought that her husband knew his
own case. A word or two,—now a gesture, and now a look,—persuaded the
surgeon and Woodruffe that he was aware that he was going. His small
affairs were always kept settled; he had probably no directions to give;
and his tenderness for his wife showed itself in his enjoying her
cheerfulness to the last. When, as soon as it was light, one December
morning, Moss was sent to ask if Abby could possibly come for a few
minutes, because mother was worse, he found his sister alone, looking at
the floor, her hands on her lap, though the baby was fidgetting in its
cradle. Fleming’s face was covered, and he lay so still that Moss, who
had never seen death, felt sure that all was over. The boy hardly knew
what to do; and his sister seemed not to hear what he said. The thought
of his mother,—that Abby’s going might help or save her,—moved him to
act. He kissed Abby, and said she must please go to mother; and he took
the baby out of the cradle, and wrapped it up, and put it into its
mother’s arms; and fetched Abby’s bonnet, and took her cloak down from
its peg, and opened the door for her, saying, that he would stay and
take care of everything. His sister went without a word; and, as soon as
he had closed the door behind her, Moss sank down on his knees before
the chair where she had been sitting, and hid his face there till some
one came for him,—to see his mother once more before she died.
As the two coffins were carried out, to be conveyed to the churchyard
together, Mr. Nelson, who had often been backward and forward during the
last six weeks, observed to the surgeon that the death of such a man as
Fleming was a dreadful loss.
“It is that sort of men that the fever cuts off,” said the surgeon. “The
strong man, in the prime of life, at his best period, one may say, for
himself and for society, is taken away,—leaving wife and child helpless
and forlorn. That is the ravage that the fever makes.”
“Well: would not people tell you that it is our duty to submit?” asked
Mr. Nelson, who could not help showing some emotion by voice and
countenance.
“Submit!” said the surgeon. “That depends on what the people mean who
use the word. If you or I were ill of the fever, we must resign
ourselves, as cheerfully as we could. But if you ask me whether we
should submit to see more of our neighbours cut off by fever as these
have been, I can only ask in return, whose doing it is that they are
living in a swamp, and whether that is to go on? Who dug the clay pits?
Who let that ditch run abroad, and make a filthy bog? Are you going to
charge that upon Providence, and talk of submitting to the consequences?
If so, that is not my religion.”
“No, no. There is no religion in that,” replied Mr. Nelson, for once
agreeing in what was said to him. “It must be looked to.”
“It must,” said the surgeon, as decidedly as if he had been a railway
director, or king and parliament in one.
CHAPTER THE SIXTH.
“I wonder whether there is a more forlorn family in England than we are
now,” said Woodruffe, as he sat among his children, a few hours after
the funeral.
His children were glad to hear him speak, however gloomy might be his
tone. His silence had been so terrible that nothing that he could say
could so weigh upon their hearts. His words, however, brought out his
widowed daughter’s tears again. She was sewing—her infant lying in her
lap. As her tears fell upon its face, it moved and cried. Becky came and
took it up, and spoke cheerfully to it. The cheerfulness seemed to be
the worst of all. Poor Abby laid her forehead to the back of her chair,
and sobbed as if her heart would break.
“Ay, Abby,” said her father, “your heart is breaking, and mine too. You
and I can go to our rest, like those that have gone before us: but I
have to think what will become of these young things.”
“Yes, father,” said Becky gently, but with a tone of remonstrance, “you
must endeavour to live, and not make up your mind to dying, because life
has grown heavy and sad.”
“My dear, I am ill—very ill. It is not merely that life is grown
intolerable to me. I am sure I could not live long in such misery of
mind: but I am breaking up fast.”
The young people looked at each other in dismay. There was something
worse than the grief conveyed by their father’s words in the hopeless
daring—the despair—of his tone when he ventured to say that life was
unendurable.
Becky had the child on one arm; with the other hand she took down her
father’s plaid from its peg, and put it round his rheumatic shoulders,
whispering in his ear a few words about desiring that God’s will should
be done.
“My dear,” he replied, “it was I who taught you that lesson when you
were a child on my knee, and it would be strange if I forgot it when I
want so much any comfort that I can get. But I don’t believe (and if you
ask the clergyman, he will tell you that he does not believe), that it
is God’s will that we, or any other people, should be thrust into a
swamp like this, scarcely fit for the rats and the frogs to live in. It
is man’s doing, not God’s, that the fever makes such havoc as it has
made with us. The fever does not lay waste healthy places.”
“Then why are we here?” Allan ventured to say. “Father, let us go.”
“Go! I wonder how or where! I can’t go, or let any of you go. I have not
a pound in the world to spend in moving, or in finding new employment.
And if I had, who would employ me? Who would not laugh at a crippled old
man asking for work and wages?”
“Then, father, we must see what we can do here, and you must not forbid
us to say ‘God’s will be done!’ If we cannot go away, it must be His
will that we should stay, and have as much hope and courage as we can.”
Woodruffe threw himself back in his chair. It was too much to expect
that he would immediately rally; but he let the young people confer, and
plan, and cheer each other.
The first thing to be done, they agreed, was to move hither, whenever
the dismal rain would permit it, all Abby’s furniture that could not be
disposed of to her husband’s successors. It would fit up the lower room.
And Allan and Becky settled how the things could stand so as to make it
at once a bedroom and sitting-room. If, as Abby had said, she meant to
try to get some scholars, and keep a little school, room must be left to
seat the children.
“Keep a school?” exclaimed Woodruffe, looking round at Abby.
“Yes, father,” said Abby, raising her head. “That seems to be a thing
that I can do: and it will be good for me to have something to do. Becky
is the stoutest of us all, and....”
“I wonder how long that will last,” groaned the father.
“I am quite stout now,” said Becky; “and I am the one to help Allan with
the garden. Allan and I will work under your direction, father, while
your rheumatism lasts; and....”
“And what am I to do?” asked Moss, pushing himself in.
“You shall fetch and carry the tools,” said Becky; “that is, when the
weather is fine, and when your chilblains are not very bad. And you
shall be bird-boy when the sowing season comes on.”
“And we are going to put up a pent-house for you, in one corner, you
know, Moss,” said his brother. “And we will make it so that there shall
be room for a fire in it, where father and you may warm yourselves, and
always have dry shoes ready.”
“I wonder what our shoe leather will have cost us by the time the spring
comes,” observed Woodruffe. “There is not a place where we ever have to
take the cart or the barrow that is not all mire and ruts: not a path in
the whole garden that I call a decent one. Our shoes are all pulled to
pieces; while the frost, or the fog, or something or other, prevents our
getting any real work done. The waste is dreadful. Nothing should have
made me take a garden where none but summer crops are to be had, if I
could have foreseen such a thing. I never saw such a thing
before,—never—as market-gardening without winter and spring crops. Never
heard of such a thing!”
Becky glanced towards Allan, to see if he had nothing to propose. If
they could neither mend the place nor leave it, it did seem a hard case.
Allan was looking into the fire, musing. When Moss announced that the
rain was over, Allan started, and said he must be fetching some of
Abby’s things down, if it was fair. Becky really meant to help him: but
she also wanted opportunity for consultation, as to whether it could
really be God’s will that they should neither be able to mend their
condition nor to escape from it. As they mounted the long flight of
steps, they saw Mr. Nelson issue from the Station, looking about him to
ascertain if the rain was over, and take his stand on the embankment,
followed by a gentleman who had a roll of paper in his hand. As they
stood, the one was seen to point with his stick, and the other with his
roll of paper, this way and that. Allan set off in that direction,
saying to his sister, as he went,
“Don’t you come. That gentleman is so rude, he will make you cry. Yes, I
must go; and I won’t get angry; I won’t indeed. He may find as much
fault as he pleases; I must show him how the water is standing in our
furrows.”
“Hallo! what do you want here?” was Mr. Nelson’s greeting, when, after a
minute or two, he saw Allan looking and listening. “What business have
you here, hearkening to what we are saying?”
“I wanted to know whether anything is going to be done below there. I
thought, if you wished it, I could tell you something about it.”
“You! what, a dainty little fellow like you?—a fellow that wears his
Sunday clothes on a Tuesday, and a rainy Tuesday too! You must get
working clothes and work.”
“I shall work to-morrow, Sir. My mother and my brother-in-law were
buried to-day.”
“Lord bless me! You should have told me that. How should I know that
unless you told me?” He proceeded in a much gentler tone, however,
merely remonstrating with Allan for letting the wet stand in the
furrows, in such a way as would spoil any garden. Allan had a good ally,
all the while, in the stranger, who seemed to understand everything
before it was explained. The gentleman was, in fact, an agricultural
surveyor—one who could tell, when looking abroad from a height, what was
swamp and what meadow; where there was a clean drain, and where an
uneven ditch; where the soil was likely to be watered, and where flooded
by the winter rains; where genially warmed, and where fatally baked by
the summer’s sun. He had seen, before Allan pointed it out, how the
great ditch cut across between the cultivated grounds and the little
river into which those grounds should be drained: but he could not know,
till told by Allan, who were the proprietors and occupiers of the
parcels of land lying on either side the ditch. Mr. Nelson knew little
or nothing under this head, though he contradicted the lad every minute;
was sure such an one did not live here, nor another there: told him he
was confusing Mr. Smith and Mr. Brown: did not believe a word of Mr.
Taylor having bought yonder meadow, or Mrs. Scott now renting that
field. All the while, the surveyor went on setting down the names as
Allan told them; and then observed that they were not so many but that
they might combine, if they would, to drain their properties, if they
could be relieved of the obstruction of the ditch—if the surveyor of
highways would see that the ditch were taken in hand. Mr. Nelson
pronounced that there should be no difficulty about the ditch, if the
rest could be managed: and then, after a few whispered words between the
gentlemen, Allan was asked first, whether he was sure that he knew where
every person lived whose name was down in the surveyor’s book; and next,
whether he would act as guide to-morrow. For a moment he thought he
should be wanted to move Abby’s things: but, remembering the vast
importance of the plan which seemed now to be fairly growing under his
eye, he replied that he would go: he should be happy to make it his
day’s work to help, ever so little, towards what he wished above
everything in the world.
“What makes you in such a hurry to suppose we want to get a day’s work
out of you for nothing?” asked Mr. Nelson. He thrust half-a-crown into
the lad’s waistcoat pocket, saying that he must give it back again, if
he led the gentleman wrong. The gentleman had no time to go running
about the country on a fool’s errand; Allan must mind that. As Allan
touched his hat, and ran down the steps, Mr. Nelson observed that boys
with good hearts did not fly about in that way, as if they were merry,
on the day of their mother’s funeral.
“Perhaps he is rather thinking of saving his father,” observed the
surveyor.
“Well; save as many of them as you can. They seem all going to pot as it
is.”
When Allan burst in, carrying nothing of Abby’s, but having a little
colour in his cheeks for once, his father sat up in his chair, the baby
suddenly stopped crying, and Moss asked where he had been. At first, his
father disappointed him by being listless—first refusing to believe
anything good, and then saying that any good that could happen now was
too late; and Abby could not help crying all the more because this was
not thought about a year sooner. It was her poor husband that had made
the stir; and now they were going to take his advice the very day that
he was laid in his grave. They all tried to comfort her, and said how
natural it was that she should feel it so; yet, amidst all their
sympathy, they could not help being cheered that something was to be
done at last.
By degrees, and not slow degrees, Woodruffe became animated. It was
surprising how many things he desired Allan to be sure not to forget to
point out to the surveyor, and to urge upon those he was to visit. At
last he said he would go himself. It was a very serious business, and he
ought to make an effort to have it done properly. It was a great effort,
but he would make it. Not rheumatism, nor anything else, should keep him
at home. Allan was glad at heart to see such signs of energy in his
father, though he might feel some natural disappointment at being left
at home, and some perplexity as to what, in that case, he ought to do
about the half-crown, if Mr. Nelson should be gone home. The morning
settled this, however. The surveyor was in his gig. If Allan could hang
on, or keep up with it, it would be very well, as he would be wanted to
open the gates, and to lead the way in places too wet for his father,
who was not worth such a pair of patent waterproof tall boots as the
surveyor had on.
The circuit was not a very wide one; yet it was dark before they got
home. There are always difficulties in arrangements which require
combined action. Here there were different levels in the land, and
different tempers and views among the occupiers. Mr. Brown had heard
nothing about the matter, and could not be hurried till he saw occasion.
Mr. Taylor liked his field best, wet—would not have it drier on any
account, for fear of the summer sun. When assured that drought took no
hold on well-dried land in comparison with wet land, he shook with
laughter, and asked if they expected him to believe that. Mrs. Scott,
whose combination with two others was essential to the drainage of three
portions, would wait another year. They must go on without her; and
after another year, she would see what she would do. Another had drained
his land in his own way long ago, and did not expect that anybody would
ask him to put his spade into another man’s land, or to let any other
man put his spade into his. These were all the obstructions. Everybody
else was willing, or at least, not obstructive. By clever management, it
was thought that the parties concerned could make an island of Mrs.
Scott and her field, and win over Mr. Brown by the time he was wanted,
and show Mr. Taylor that, as his field could no longer be as wet as it
had been, he might as well try the opposite condition—they promising to
flood his field as often and as thoroughly as he pleased, if he found it
the worse for being drained. They could not obtain all they wished,
where every body was not as wise as could be wished; but so much was
agreed upon as made the experienced surveyor think that the rest would
follow; enough, already, to set more labourers to work than the place
could furnish. Two or three stout men were sent from a distance; and
when they had once cut a clear descent from the ditch to the river, and
had sunk the ditch to seven feet deep, and made the bottom even, and
narrowed it to three feet, it was a curious thing to see how ready the
neighbours became to unite their drains with it. It used to be said,
that here—however it might be elsewhere—the winter was no time for
digging: but that must have meant that no winter-digging would bring a
spring crop; and that therefore it was useless. Now, the sound of the
spade never ceased for the rest of the winter; and the labourers thought
it the best winter they had ever known for constant work. Those who
employed the labour hoped it would answer—found it expensive—must trust
it was all right, and would yield a profit by and by. As for the
Woodruffes, they were too poor to employ labourers. But some little hope
had entered their hearts again, and brought strength, not only to their
hearts, but to their very limbs. They worked like people beginning the
world. As poor Abby could keep the house and sew, while attending to her
little school, Becky did the lighter parts (and some which were far from
light) of the garden work, finding easy tasks for Moss; and Allan worked
like a man at the drains. They had been called good drains before; but
now, there was an outfall for deeper ones; and deeper they must be made.
Moreover, a strong rivalry arose among the neighbours about their
respective portions of the combined drainage; and under the stimulus of
ambition, Woodruffe recovered his spirits and the use of his limbs
wonderfully. He suffered cruelly from his rheumatism; and in the
evenings felt as if he could never more lift a spade; yet, not the less
was he at work again in the morning, and so sanguine as to the
improvement of his ground, that it was necessary to remind him, when
calculating his gains, that it would take two years, at least, to prove
the effects of his present labours.
LINES TO A DEAD LINNET.
BY A SOLITARY STUDENT.
Sweet little friend in hours of lonely thought,
And studious toil thro’ the unresting day,
Why hast thou left me to the sullen hours,
So dull and changeless now? Thy light-heart song,
And fluttering plume of joy, beguile no more
My weary mind, happy when so estranged,
From books, which are the bane of all repose.
The secret bustle of thy frequent meal,
Like elfin working mischief, all unseen
At bottom of thy cage; thy dipping bill,
Oft splashing sportive o’er the learned tome,
And rousing my ’rapt soul to homelier themes;
The tuning twitter, snatch’d and interrupt—
The timorous essay, low and querulous—
The strain symphonious—and the full burst of song,
That made my study-walls re-echo sweet,
The harmonious peal, while all its tatter’d maps
And prints unframed, responsive tremblings gave;—
All these are past, and joy takes wing with thee.
Nor less, when in the dreary night, far spent,
Still was I pondering o’er the murky page,
Hast thou attracted notice by thy bill
Battling along the wires; and in the twinkle—
The clos’d—and then, bright little eye, half-oped.
Well have I read thy meaning, and full soon,
Thus warned of needful slumber, borne away
The wasted lamp, and sought my lonely couch.
Thy empty cage now hangs against the wall!
No one inhabits it—nothing is there—
Thy seed-box is half full of dust and film;
A spider weaves within thy water-glass:
The wretchedness of silence—no response
To calls and questionings of the heart—the mind—
All show me thou art dead—for ever gone!
I stand and gaze on thy perplexing cage—
Like a friend’s house—deserted!—one we have loved—
And before which, returning after years,
We pause, and think of hours enjoyed within;
And gaze upon the dusty shutters—closed!
THE GOOD GOVERNOR.
In a region where favourable latitude and tempering sea-breezes combine
to produce perpetual summer, lie “the still vexed Bermoothes,” the
Bermuda of modern navigators, where one-half of the year is the fitting
seedtime for plants of the tropical, and the other half of the temperate
zones. These islands, discovered to us by a shipwreck, with one
exception, our oldest colony, offer a miniature copy of the institutions
of the parent state.
About twenty square miles of surface, consisting of one island thirty
miles long by two broad, and a half-dozen _aide-de-camp_ sort of islets,
support a population rather less numerous, and considerably less
wealthy, than that of the City of Canterbury; and enjoy the dignity of a
capital, with two thousand inhabitants; of a Governor and
Commander-in-Chief, who takes his seat on “the throne” when opening the
Bermoothean Parliament; of a Council, or miniature House of Lords, and a
Representative Assembly of thirty-six members, forming a miniature House
of Commons. They had formerly an Archdeacon, but, by one of those
extraordinary decisions that occasionally originate in high quarters,
the Archdeacon has been metamorphosed into a Bishop of Newfoundland,
whom the Bermudians never see, although they still have the honour of
paying the salary of the late Archdeacon.
Formerly Bermuda, like Virginia, from which it was an offshoot, was a
slave colony, and grew tobacco. But tobacco would not pay, and every
Bermudian, being born within a mile of the water, was bred amphibious.
Capital cedar for ship-building grows on the hills, and harbours are all
around to receive the craft when built. So it came to pass, that the
“‘Mudian” clippers became plentiful all over the neighbouring seas, and
took a large share of the carrying trade between our American colonies
and the West Indies. Even when a large slice of these said colonies had
struggled into the Republic of the United States, the ’Mudians continued
to do a good stroke of sea-faring business.
Then whales abounded in the neighbouring seas, and every ’Mudian took to
handling the oar, the lance, or the harpoon, at a time of life when
other children were driving hoops, or riding rocking-horses.
It was the natural result of these handy occupations in so limited a
space, that the whole population, with the exception of that supported
by the expenditure of the garrison, was occupied in building, or
rigging, or manning, or loading, vessels of some kind, if not whaling or
fishing. White or black, they were all sailors and sea-faring to a man,
almost to a woman. The real mermaid still lingers round Bermuda’s coast.
Breechless babies swaggered along with a mixture of long and short steps
in true jack-tar style. Bermudian young ladies directed their maids to
let out a reef in a petticoat, and officers driving tandem were bid “put
yer helm down,” by native guides.
There are no records to show when first in Bermuda sea-faring arts began
to devour all others; certain it is that just as the manufacture of
glass and porcelain, purple dye, and other signal utilities and
ornaments have been more than once discovered, lost, and re-discovered,
so were agriculture and horticulture in the year 1839 of the islands of
perpetual spring, among the lost arts. If in that year some convulsion
had for ever separated them from external communications, the process of
food-growing among a British race would have been left as rude in
theory, more imperfect in practice, than among the New Zealanders or
South Sea Islanders.
There were in that year two persons in the islands who could plough, but
they did not. Haymaking and mowing was a theory learned in books, just
as curious inquirers in Lancashire may have read of cotton cultivation.
As for the state of gardening, it was about parallel with British
gardening in the time of Queen Bess, who used to send to Holland for a
salad.
So there was neither corn nor hay, and very little fruit, of the worst
quality. A sort of bitter orange-tree abounded through the islands.
Inquisitive strangers asked “Why not graft or bud sweet oranges on these
luxuriant stocks, or why not sow sweet seeds?” But the natives were
positive that buds would not take, and seeds would not grow.
Such was Bermuda in 1839; somewhat depressed in its fishing, whaling,
ship-building, sea-carrying commerce, by the competition of New
Brunswick and the United States. Although less affected than the
sugar-growing islands by negro emancipation, still whites, who had lived
easily although barely by hiring out a few black artisans, were reduced
to sore straits.
It was in this year there arrived a new Governor. He travelled the
length and breadth of his islands, and found all green and all barren; a
light, but fertile soil, bearing fine timber, and luxuriant weeds. Round
the government house was a waste of eight acres, within sight a great
swamp. According to popular opinion, Colonial Governors are gentlemen of
broken fortunes, and strong political connections, who endure temporary
evils for the sake of future ease and dignity.
At any rate, among military martinet Governors; naval bashaw Governors;
didactic despatch-writing Governors; Governors landing with crotchets
all ready-cut and dry; Governors who support the Royal Prerogative by
quarrelling with all their subjects, and Governors whose whole soul is
in quiet and domestic economy, the popular Governor, the wise,
conciliating Governor, is indeed a rare bird. According to stereotyped
precedent, our Bermoothean Governor ought to have first sat down and
written a flaming despatch home, painting the misery of the island,
detailing his plans, and asking for money. Next he should have filled up
a scheme on a scale large enough to satisfy the ideas of a Paxton in
horticulture, or a Smith of Deanston in agriculture, and applied to his
little parliament for a vote, in order to make a garden for himself, and
a model farm for his own amusement and the benefit of the islanders.
But it happened that our “good” Governor as he was afterwards called
with good reason, was not a stereotyped Governor, so that the people he
was sent to rule became happy and prosperous. He cared not to become
either rich or famous. Therefore, all his proceedings were on a humble,
commonplace scale. Seeing that the climate was admirably adapted for
oranges; which, if of good quality, would afford a valuable export, he
sent for slips and seeds of the best kinds.
In front of Government House stands a bitter citron-tree: on this, with
his own hands, he budded a sweet orange. The bud, contrary to all
Bermudian opinions, sprouted, and grew, and flourished. After the living
example of the Governor’s tree, it became a fashion—a rage—to bud sweet
oranges; so by this simple and short cut an horticultural revolution was
effected. Still working out the maxim that example is better than
precept, our good Governor beat up for gardener recruits, accepting
those who knew a little as well as those who knew nothing, but were
willing to learn. With their aid, and at his own expense, the eight
acres of waste round his residence, Mount Langton, were converted into a
pleasure-ground, adorned with plants and shrubs of the tropical and
temperate zones, which he threw open freely to the inhabitants without
distinction of colour.
The next step was to drain the great marsh, the Langton Marsh, and grow
hay upon it, so as to give the Bermudians a hint on the oddness of
importing hay, while fine grass land lay waste. Two men who could plough
were discovered, and pupils put under their hands; at the same time
ploughs were imported. Having, out of his own pocket, offered prizes for
garden flowers and vegetables, for corn and hay, for the best ploughman,
and the best scytheman, the performances of these two being as wonderful
to the islanders as skating to an Indian prince, or wine-making to a
Yorkshireman, the Local Parliament willingly voted other prizes for the
same purpose.
It would take up too much time to detail all the good Governor’s
efforts—by example, by instruction, by rewards, by distribution of
books, and by the promotion of industrial schools, to educate the rising
generation of Bermuda in useful, civilising arts.
A grand holiday, held in May, 1846, showed that these efforts had not
been without pleasant and practical results.
Mount Langton and all the pleasure-grounds created under the personal
inspection and at the expense of the good Governor, were crowded with a
noisy happy population, of all ranks, all ages, and all colours, black,
white, and brown, assembled to enjoy and celebrate the taking stock of
the revived Industry of the islands. Not equal in variety to the great
Parisian Exposition, or in quality to the Royal Agricultural Shows, it
was still an era in the history of the colony.
The Queen’s representative did not grudge to give up for the occasion
his private domain, as that was the best site in the Island. Amid the
luxuriant shrubs and gorgeous tropical flowers, the gay groups wandered;
sweetly the sounds of the regimental band intermingled with the shouts
and whip-crackings of the contending ploughmen as they turned up the
brown furrows of long neglected soil, and with the switching of
twenty-five scythe-men exhibiting their newly acquired skill on the
drained pasture of Langton Marsh. Below lay the shipping in harbour, and
far beyond the golden purple ocean was dotted over with the cloud-like
canvas of the famous ’Mudian craft. Almost at once—one glance—it was
possible to take in a view of the pursuits of old and young Bermuda.
Government House was closed;—to have entertained the thousands who had
assembled (beyond the needful supply of cold water found in huge jars
and tubs in every shady place, a provision so grateful under a tropical
sun,) was impossible; to have entertained a part—an exclusive few—on
such an occasion, would have been contrary to the Governor’s principles;
so for that day all personal attendants were enabled to share in the
universal holiday.
In due time after the ploughing and mowing matches, came the competition
in turnips, strawberries, potatoes, dahlias, barley, potherbs, flax, and
cabbages, and the parading and comparison of horse-colts, ass-colts,
calves, heifers, bulls, sows, and boars.
Now, before the advent of this reforming Governor, the Bermudians had
been accustomed to no other competition than that of sailing or cricket
matches or steeple-chases; to no other exhibitions than military
reviews; all excellent in their way, but now usefully varied by a kind
of competition that brought new comforts to every cottager.
Years have elapsed since the day of this well-remembered _fête_. But the
good Governor is still affectionately remembered. The Bermudians love to
show passing strangers the sweet orange-tree on Mount Langton which
still blooms a green and golden monument of plain, practical,
kind-hearted common sense. And this sketch of a remote and insignificant
dependency has been thought worth telling for the benefit, not only of
colonial Governors, but of well-meaning reformers in all parts of the
world. If we would do good we must not be content with mere talk; we
must not disdain to commence at our own doors by budding—a sweet orange
on a bitter citron.
LONDON PAUPER CHILDREN.
High and dry upon a pleasant breezy hilltop about seven miles south of
London stands a house worthy of a visit. Far enough away to be quite
free from the cloud of smoke, yet near enough for easy access from
London; it is a large house in the country, in and out of which a large
family of essentially London tenants are perpetually going. Walk round
the hill it stands upon, and a succession of charming views present
themselves for admiration. A far distant horizon bounds a country made
up of purple woods, rich golden brown stripes of corn-fields, and bright
green meadows. Here young plantations; there stately single timber
trees; with villas nestling under fringes of woods on pleasant slopes,
whilst in the valley below runs the Croydon Railway, linking this
charming, quiet country round Norwood, to the smoky, busy, useful
London.
The place we speak of is the Pauper-School at Norwood, which may be
called a factory for making harmless, if not useful subjects, of the
very worst of human material—a place for converting those who would
otherwise certainly be miserable, and most likely vicious, into
rational, reasonable, and often very useful members of society;—in
short, a house for training a large and wretched class in habits of
decency, regularity, and order, and leading a pitiable section of the
great two-million-strong family of London from the road to crime into
that of honest industry and self-respect.
The exterior of the building has no trace of the architectural display
that won for the school near Manchester the title of a Pauper Palace.
The exterior of the Norwood house is as dingy and ugly as a small
brewhouse. In shape it reminds one of the old cities, built upon no
definite plan, but enlarged from time to time as the population found it
most convenient. It is neither square, nor round, nor triangular; but
then, when we go over it, we shall find that the lack of straight lines
and right angles does not prevent the presence of much good, and of a
fair amount of comfort and happiness within its confines.
The irregularity of its construction is explained by the fact that the
place was established twenty-seven years ago, not by a public body, but
by a private individual, Mr. Aubin, the present superintendant. The
commencement of such a place was an epoch in the history of pauperism in
this country. Before the time of the benevolent Jonas Hanway, no regard
was paid to the destitute children of the poor, and those young
children, whose ill-fate it was to be born of pauper parents, in town,
were condemned to a life that began in the gutters of back lanes, and
usually ended in the gaol, by fever, or more suddenly, on the gallows.
Hanway secured the passing of a law empowering the parishes to collect
the juvenile paupers and send them into the country for nurture and
maintenance. It was a step in advance to get the children away from the
dens in which they had previously been confined, but the nurture was of
a very unsatisfactory kind. When an old woman applied for parish relief,
she had two or three children given to her to keep, and out of their
allowance she was to help to keep herself. She usually set them to
collect firewood for her; or to watch sheep, or to scare crows; and, in
their search for fuel, they were often taught to rob hedges, or fences,
or trespass on plantations. At seven years’ old they were sent back to
finish their education in the workhouses, and frequently remained there
for six or seven years without even learning their letters. Indeed, to
teach them at all was regarded as a kind of small treason. “Teach
paupers to read! What next?” was a common exclamation. Reading was, by a
great many people, considered to be a mere premium for laziness—whilst
writing was thought to be a temptation to forgery, and its then certain
result—the gallows. To collect the pauper children, and “farm them out”
to persons who would teach as well as feed them, was the next step in
advance. The fruit of this plan was the growth of various places where
large numbers of the pauper rising generation were gathered together in
houses, the proprietors of which often realised large profits upon the
moneys allowed for maintaining this class of the population.
Taking advantage of the generally and loudly expressed public opinion,
that “something must be done,” the Poor-Law Board succeeded in
establishing some school districts near the metropolis. The first step
taken was to purchase Mr. Aubin’s place at Norwood, and thus take it
into their own hands. This school had long been regarded as the best of
its class, and as one where many steps of great practical value had been
taken for the improved treatment of youthful paupers. The purchase-money
of this school is said to have been about eleven thousand pounds, and
the authorities wisely retained the aid of the man who had originated
it, to carry out still further into effect their improved plans. This
step was soon followed by others. In the publication of the Poor-Law
Board, just issued—the promoters of our present poor-law system long ago
saw the mischiefs of this plan, and after some years’ consideration, and
many difficulties, succeeded in procuring an Act of Parliament for the
establishment of district pauper Industrial Schools. But though the law
was made, it was found impossible to overcome the objections raised by
parish authorities, and it was not carried out to any extent, until the
terrible calamity of Tooting startled all England with the spectacle of
hundreds of deaths by cholera, in an establishment where the little
unfortunates were “farmed out.”
In the Second Annual Report of the Poor-Law Board, Mr. Baines, its
President, says, that three very important school districts have, within
the year, been formed in and near the metropolis. These are:—
“1st. The Central London School District, comprising the City of
London Union, the East London Union, and the St. Saviour’s Union. The
Board of Management of this district have completed all their
arrangements and hold their regular meetings. They have purchased of
Mr. Aubin his premises at Norwood for the district school, retaining
him in the capacity of steward or superintendant of the establishment,
and have appointed an efficient staff of teachers in every department.
The school is now in full activity, upon an improved footing, and
nearly eight hundred children (nine hundred) are maintained and
educated in it.
“2nd. The South Metropolitan School District comprised, as originally
formed, the Union of St. Olave’s, and the large parishes, not in
Union, of Bermondsey, Camberwell, and Rotherhithe.
“3rd. The North Surrey School District includes the Unions of
Wandsworth and Clapham, Kingston, Croydon, Richmond, and Lewisham. The
managers have purchased fifty acres of land near Norwood, and have
commenced the erection of a building capable of accommodating six
hundred children.
“It will thus be seen that provision has been made in and around
London for the proper education and training of more than two thousand
poor children. We have, moreover, sanctioned arrangements whereby,
when completed, the state of the children of other metropolitan
parishes will be very materially improved.”
About nine hundred children are congregated at Norwood, and out of the
whole number there is not perhaps a dozen the offspring of decent
parents. Many are foundlings, picked up at the corners of streets, or at
the doors of parish officers. The names of some of them suggest an idea
of how they began life. Thus, one owned the name of Olive Jewry, whilst
another was called Alfred City. Others have lost both parents by death,
and been left puling living legacies to the parish, but the majority are
the children of parents living in workhouses. When able-bodied paupers
claim relief, they are “offered the house.” They are received into the
Union, and their children are sent up to this out-of-town school, that
fresh air, cleanliness, good food and the schoolmaster, may try what can
be done to lift them up from the slough of pauperism. Let us examine the
process through which they go.
The children, on their first appearance at this Norwood School, are
usually in the most lamentable plight. Ignorance and dirt, rags and
vermin, laziness and ill health, diseased scalps, and skins tortured by
itch, are their characteristics. They are the very dregs of the
population of the largest city in the world—the human waifs and strays
of the modern Babylon; the children of poverty, and misery, and crime;
in very many cases labouring under physical defects, such as bad sight
or hearing; almost always stunted in their growth, and bearing the stamp
of ugliness and suffering on their features. Generally born in dark
alleys and back courts, their playground has been the streets, where the
wits of many have been prematurely sharpened at the expense of any
morals they might have. With minds and bodies destitute of proper
nutriment, they are caught, as it were, by the parish officers, like
half-wild creatures, roaming poverty-stricken amidst the wealth of our
greatest city; and half-starved in a land where the law says no one
shall be destitute of food and shelter. When their lucky fate sends them
to Norwood, they are generally little personifications of genuine
poverty—compounds, as somebody says, of ignorance, gin, and sprats.
A number of pauper children having been owned as chargeable upon the
Central London District, to whom the Norwood School now belongs, and the
requisite papers having been filled up, they are sent to Weston Hill.
Arrived there, and their clothes having been steamed, if worth
preservation, or burned if mere rags,—the new comers are well washed,
have their hair cut, and are newly clad in clean and wholesome, but
homely, garments. According to their ages, they are then drafted into a
class; those between two and six years pass to the infant school; those
of greater age are enrolled on the industrial side of the establishment.
Now the training begins. They are all sent before the doctor, who
usually finds them sallow and sickly; but by aid of Nature’s
physic,—fresh air,—and Nature’s rule of exercise and regularity,
assisted by extra diet, and with the occasional aid of some good London
beef and porter, very few drugs are wanted, and their looks change for
the better. Early in August, this year,—the period of our visit,—there
were but two children confined to bed out of more than nine hundred; and
those two were poor little scrofulous shadows of humanity, such as may
be found in the top wards of hospitals, labouring under disease of the
hip and spine,—paying the penalty of sins committed by their parents
before them. There had recently been an epidemic of measles in the
place, when that disease destroyed eight of the sickliest out of ninety
cases. But for this, the mortality would not have gone beyond one in a
hundred through the year. The summer is their healthiest season; for
winter brings chilblains, a disease of poor blood, and ophthalmia, to
which pauper children seem to be especially liable.
After their introduction to the doctor, the bath, the wardrobe, and the
pantry, they are handed over to the schoolmaster or mistress, as the
case may be. On the day of our visit, two hundred and forty boys were
receiving instruction in one large new school-room; two hundred (infants
between two and six years old) were being taught in another room; two
hundred girls were reading, writing, and sewing in a third apartment;
the rest of the occupants being at work, or at drill, or at play, in
other parts of the establishment. The boys are kept four days a week at
school, and two days at work in shops which we shall presently see and
describe: the girls have three days’ schooling and three days’ training
in household occupations,—such as cleaning the house, washing, ironing,
mangling, and needlework. The way these portions of the establishment
are arranged may possibly furnish materials for a future paper.
The school for the eldest boys is a long room newly built, with an
enormous dormitory above it. The ventilation has been provided for in a
way that seems very satisfactory. By day the boys are divided into six
classes, ranged on forms with desks before them, each class being
separated from the others by a curtain which hangs from the ceiling, and
is sufficiently wide to separate the sections of scholars from each
other, and to deaden the sounds of so large a seminary, but yet not wide
enough to prevent the master as he stands on the side opposite his
pupils, from getting a view of the entire school. Black boards and large
slates are amongst the tools employed for conveying instruction, but the
more advanced pupils are supplied with paper copy-books for writing
lessons. The school is under the charge of a chief-master, far more
competent than those usually found in schools beyond the pale of
Government inspection. He is a B.A. of the University of London, is
author of a small English grammar; and enjoys, as he deserves, a liberal
salary. Under his hands the pupils appear to make excellent progress.
The upper classes write well to dictation, are ready at figures, and are
practised in the grammatical construction of English words and
sentences. Twelve of the boys are in training as teachers, and six of
these are now what is called “pupil-teachers,” and are entitled to an
allowance of money by way of reward from the Privy Council. This
allowance is set aside for them till they display, on examination, a
sufficient proficiency to entitle them to admission to the
training-school at Knellar Hall or Battersea. Whilst in these higher
schools they receive the money set aside for them in the earlier stages
of their school progress, and when, by successive examinations, their
efficiency is sufficiently tested, they pass from the grade of pupil to
that of master: the boys from Knellar Hall being appointed schoolmasters
to Workhouses; the boys from Battersea to be masters of National Schools
in various parts of the country. A boy gets this promotion in life by
his own merits. For instance, at the Norwood Pauper-School, the most apt
pupil becomes, as elsewhere, the monitor of his form or class. When the
day of examination arrives, he distinguishes himself before the
Government Inspector of Schools. This official is empowered thereupon to
select him as a “pupil-teacher,” &c.; he becomes an apprentice to the
art of instruction. To encourage the chief-master of the school to help
on his boys to this reward, an allowance of three pounds a year is made
to the master for each boy who thus distinguishes himself, and thus
gains promotion. Thus, there being twelve boys at Norwood so in
training, Mr. Imeson, their instructor, gains thirty-six pounds a year
for his success in bringing forward that number of his scholars.
In appearance, the boys have little to recommend them, and it is
tolerably evident, that if not raised a little in the social scale—if
not taught to do something and know something—they would inevitably
belong to the class of incurable paupers, who burden poor’s-rates and
hang about workhouses all their lives. Society must educate such boys,
if only in self-defence. Some of them are at first most turbulent, but
by patient management they gradually subside into the orderly
arrangements of the place, and often those at first most unruly become
the quickest boys in the school. The energy that would make them
nuisances, when rightly directed makes them most useful.
When the hours of teaching are over, the boys are assembled in one of
the large open yards belonging to the establishment, and are there
exercised by the drill-master. This official is an ex-non-commissioned
officer of Guards, who in a short time makes the metamorphosis seen on
parade. The ungainly, slouching, slow lout, is taught to march, wheel
right or left, in concert with others, punctually and accurately. They
answer the command, “left wheel,” “right form, four deep,” and so on,
like little soldiers, and seem to like the fun. This gives them at once
exercise in the fresh air, notions of regularity and prompt attention,
and a habit of obedience to discipline.
There is also a naval class. Behind the school is a playground, two
acres in extent, and in the centre of this stands a ship. True, its deck
is of earth, but there are bulwarks, real bulwarks all round, and rising
up above are genuine lofty masts, with rigging complete. Up these ropes
the boys swarm with great delight. At a given signal they “man the
yards,” give three miniature cheers, and then, all in chorus, sing God
save the Queen. They evidently like the fun, pride themselves, boy-like,
upon their feline power of climbing, and one or two of them show their
expertness and bravery by disdaining the rope-ladder—pardon us, the
shrouds—and slide down the main-stay from the top of the foremast to the
bowsprit. All these things are evident sources of enjoyment; for
running, and climbing, and shouting in the open air, are natural to the
human animal in a normal state of existence. Of the climbing, there is a
story told which illustrates the character of a very worthy man now
passed away. Dr. Stanley, the late Bishop of Norwich, paid many visits
to this school, and always looked on with evident pleasure whilst the
lads were enjoying themselves with their ship. One day the good-natured
dignitary was looking on, when he began to rub his hands together, and
presently turning to an officer of the place who stood by, said in a
genial, half confidential tone, “If I were not a bishop I’d join in and
climb that pole myself!”
Besides this drill, or parade, and this exercise aloft, the boys, on two
days of the week, are employed in the Industrial training of the place.
The smaller boys, in classes of about thirty-five, are ranged on benches
round a large tailor’s shop. Patterns decorate the walls, and
“corduroys” in all stages, from the huge bale to the perfect breeches,
are seen all round the room. The boys stitch and sew, and make and mend,
under the instruction of a master tailor, a large part of the clothes
worn in the place. When each boy grows bigger he is drafted into a
neighbouring shop, where, also, under a competent master, he learns the
craft of St. Crispin. It is curious to see thirty or forty little
cobblers, all in rows, waxing and stitching, and hammering on
lap-stones, and entering _con amore_ into the mysteries of sole and
upper leathers, brads, pegs, and sparrowbills. When they have learned
all these things, some of the lads pass into a third shop, where they
are made acquainted with the forge, and anvil, and sledge hammer, and
where they help to shoe horses, construct iron bedsteads, and make and
mend all the iron-work (and there is a great deal of it) required by
this family party of nearly a thousand souls—pauper children, masters,
and servants, together. After going through all these stages of
training, with the incidental knowledge picked up in the stables with
the horses, in the playground with the dogs, when helping to feed the
pigs, and whilst aiding the operation of milking the twenty-five cows
which supply milk for the house, the boys have acquired a great amount
of useful knowledge. The place is indeed a little colony in itself, and
if its inmates had not often to pass from it back to the sinkholes of
London, they might leave Norwood almost with the certainty of becoming
good and prosperous citizens.
* * * * *
Monthly Supplement of “HOUSEHOLD WORDS,”
Conducted by CHARLES DICKENS.
_Price 2d., Stamped, 3d._,
THE HOUSEHOLD NARRATIVE
OF
CURRENT EVENTS.
_The Number, containing a history of the past month, was issued with
the Magazines._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
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