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Title: Illustrations of taxation
Author: Harriet Martineau
Release date: October 15, 2025 [eBook #77059]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Charles Fox, Paternoster-Row, 1834
Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, KD Weeks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ILLUSTRATIONS OF TAXATION ***
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Transcriber’s Note:
The volume is a collection of five previously published texts, each with
its own title page and pagination.
THE PARK AND THE PADDOCK
THE TENTH HAYCOCK
THE JERSEYMEN MEETING
THE JERSEYMEN PARTING
THE SCHOLARS OF ARNESIDE
This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects.
Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_. On each title
page, the phrase “A Tale” was printed in a blackletter font, which is
rendered here delimited by ‘=’.
Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please
see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding
the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
OF
_TAXATION._
---------------------
No. I.
THE
PARK AND THE PADDOCK.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES,
Duke-street, Lambeth.
THE
PARK AND THE PADDOCK.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
1. Pride of Patrimony 1
2. Patrimonial Appendages 15
3. Clerical Duty 29
4. Clerical Recreations 57
5. Vowed Sisterhood 73
6. Battles at Navarino 105
7. Lounging and Listening 129
8. Characteristics 135
THE
PARK AND THE PADDOCK.
CHAPTER I.
PRIDE OF PATRIMONY.
The inhabitants of the town of A were divided in opinion as to whether
they ought to be thankful or not for the new road having been brought
within a quarter of a mile of their marketplace. There were traditions,
in the memories of the old people, of their town having once been a
place of considerable importance; and a few vestiges of such importance
remained to gratify the pride, and fill up the spare hours of two or
three antiquarians within its bounds. The old people and these
antiquarians agreed in trembling for the fate of their beloved carved
gateways and projecting fronts of houses, amidst the brick edifices
which were springing up in the neighbourhood, and the new incentives to
improvement which had arisen; but they granted that every townsman ought
to wish for the increase of his native place in consequence and wealth.
There were some who already began to look contemptuously on the streets
of low, rambling houses, amidst which their days had been passed, and to
expend all their love and admiration on the new inn which flared upon
the scarce-finished road, and the sets of red “lodges,” “villas,” and
“cottages,” which stood in patches on the western outskirts of the town.
The builders of the place, of course, spoke much in praise of
improvement, and those whose house-property stood in the half empty
streets on the eastern side of A had no less to say against innovation.
There was little dispute, meanwhile, on one point: that the town had
always suffered from its being in the centre of a fine sporting country.
The dwellings of the gentry were, almost without exception, situated at
some distance among the moors or the fells. Even the physicians’ and
lawyers’ houses stood by themselves—in gardens or surrounded by walls—in
emulation of the mansions and shooting-boxes which might be seen from
the church tower; so that this church tower, and the blue slates of a
few meeting-houses rose from amidst a congregation of tradesmen’s
dwellings. The large old inn, the Turk’s Head, was almost the only
handsome house of any respectable age. The town was thought to suffer
much in the estimation of strangers from this deficiency; and the
inhabitants became the more sensible of it, the more strangers were
brought to cast a passing glance upon the place from the new road, or to
make a note of what they saw from the balcony of the modern inn, the
Navarino, while waiting for horses.
A party of strangers arrived one day, whose opinion of the town was of
some consequence, as it might determine or prevent their residence in
the neighbourhood. They did not stop either at the Turk’s Head or at the
Navarino, but only for two minutes to inquire for the steward of
Fellbrow Park, who was found to have preceded the party to their
destination. News had circulated for some days past of the arrival of a
letter from young Mr. Cranston, declaring his intention of coming to
throw open the house, and to examine the estate which had been deserted
by his father for many years before his death. The steward was desired
not to draw a nail from the gates; and to make no further preparation
for the arrival of the heir than having workmen ready to open a way for
him into his own court-yard.
Mr. Cranston, the elder, had taken a disgust to this abode, and quitted
it on the death of his lady, sixteen years ago. Before he drove away,
carrying with him his three little boys and his infant daughter, he
superintended the extraordinary ceremony of nailing iron plates over the
gates of the court-yard, and took effectual care that no part of the
old-fashioned wall which surrounded the house should be left in a state
to tempt foot to climb, or eye to look over it. His last charge to his
steward had been to see that not a tree was planted or felled,—not so
much as a weed pulled up, till further orders. The fish were to be
undisturbed in their ponds, and the game in their covers. All the
servants left behind were to be sinecurists till a change of policy or
of administration should arrive. Till the news of Mr. Cranston’s death,
all these directions had been complied with, except in as far as certain
instances of connivance might be regarded as breach of orders. If a few
aged neighbours were seen now and then helping themselves with firewood
from the thickets, and a youth might be descried from afar stealing
towards the ponds, or the game-keeper occasionally found certain of his
charge fluttering in springes, no notice was taken, and no remorse
followed, as it was decided that both ponds and covers remained as much
overstocked as the owner could possibly desire. The first change of
management took place when the approach of young Mr. Cranston was
announced. The steward was grieved at the thought that the heir should
see his estate in so desolate a condition, and took the liberty,—not to
fell trees,—but to clear away underwood, and weed and new-gravel the
walks which led from the entrance of the park to the house. A little
mowing of the grass, and trimming of some patches near the house which
were once flower-beds, further improved the aspect of the place, so as
to destroy all anticipation of what the family was likely to see within
doors.
When the carriages stopped at the park entrance, the steward appeared to
pay his respects, and suggest that immediate orders should be sent to
one or other of the inns, to provide that accommodation which it was
impossible the house should afford. He must venture also to say that the
young lady would not find the place fit for her to enter. It would
really be better that she should not proceed this afternoon.
Mr. Cranston had been,—not stretched out at length, for no carriage
could thus accommodate his length of limb,—but leaning back, reading,
till the last moment. He seemed sorry to be roused, even by his arrival
at his own estate, and to be greeted by his own steward.
“What do you think, Fanny?” said he to his sister, who was just emerging
from a reverie beside him. “Perhaps you had better go back to the inn
with Mrs. Day and Maynard till to-morrow.”
Mrs. Day, the respectable elderly personage who had never been exactly
Fanny’s nurse, and was now far from being her governess, ventured to say
from her corner of the carriage that she really could not think of
Fanny’s proceeding to the house till she knew that it had been properly
aired. She had been asking, for a week past, what measures had been
taken for this end; and could learn nothing that satisfied her that
Fanny could go anywhere to-night but to the inn.
Fanny, meanwhile, had given orders to drive on; and before Mrs. Day had
done speaking, the carriage was rolling on the gravel within the gates.
If Richard had put away his book, and sat upright in preparation for
what was approaching, it was not to be expected that she should turn
back, she declared.
The phaeton which her brother James was driving had passed the carriage
during the consultation with the steward; and Wallace, the youngest of
the three brothers, might now be seen pointing out certain things that
he perceived in the grass, and in the neighbouring coppice. James
flourished his whip, and quickened the pace of his steeds. Their mirth
communicated itself to Fanny, and she sprang forward with an exclamation
of joy when the next turn of the road disclosed a splendid view, bathed
in the sunshine of a bright autumnal afternoon. Mrs. Day had never been
more out of love with these wild young people, (as she sometimes called
them,) than at the present moment. She did not expect that they should
remember the place, or her whose death had occasioned their quitting it;
but she really thought that they might show themselves more sensible of
what had happened there. Some thought of their parents might be
suggested by the scene, which should sober their spirits a little. But
she never saw anything like the spirits of these young people. So far
from their father having subdued them, it seemed as if he had left them
his wildness without his fits of melancholy. Perhaps it was hardly fair
to expect that the children of such a parent should be like other
people.
The steward, on his grey pony, had trotted past the carriage; and he was
now collecting the workmen and their tools in preparation for Mr.
Cranston’s order to throw open the gates.
“Come, Richard, you must get out,” cried Wallace, who had alighted from
the phaeton. “We are only waiting for you.”
The knocking began. Mrs. Day could not bear it. Every blow went to her
heart. She wandered away, thick and damp as was the grass, till she
turned an angle of the wall where the noise was deadened, and she was
out of sight of the rest of the party. There was a strange mingling of
sounds. The high wall of rock which rose on the other side of the
stream, to which the lawn sloped down before her, sent back an echo of
the workmen’s blows. The rooks were disturbed, and rose from the high
trees in a cloud, to add their hoarse music to the din. Daws came
fluttering out of the nest of chimneys which was visible above the wall,
and pigeons appeared upon the roof, rustling and flapping their wings in
prodigious perturbation. Laughter (it was Wallace’s laugh) mingled
strangely with the other sounds; and Mrs. Day decided in her own mind
that Mr. Cranston, who was never wanting in proper feeling, ought to
check such unseasonable mirth. She presently saw that Mr. Cranston was
not at hand to interpose such a check. While she had wandered round one
way, Fanny and her eldest brother had taken the other, and they might
now be seen,—Richard standing in his usual lazy attitude, and Fanny
exploring the beds where all the flowers of the garden seemed to have
grown into a tangled thicket. Mrs. Day found her pronouncing that such a
beautiful spot for a garden was never so wasted before, and that this
unaccountable wall round the house must be immediately thrown down, that
the coppice, the stream, and the opposite rocks might be seen. Richard
listened with an air of resignation, and hoped that James would think
his living near enough to allow of his remaining at Fellbrow till all
the alterations were completed. Richard would heartily thank anybody who
would take the trouble off his hands.
“O, yes; and let you sleep till noon; till the sun is warm enough to let
you sit down there by the waterside, reading till dinner; and then let
you lounge on the sofa till tea, and then read or listen to us all the
evening. That is the life you would like to lead this autumn,” said
Fanny.
“Just so,” Richard agreed, looking round to see if there was no seat at
hand. The rotten remains of one were just distinguishable among the rank
grass, under a moss-grown tree; but there was no hope that it would
support Richard’s lazy length.
A shout, and then a screech, with a final clang, now told that the gates
would open and shut, and that Richard was wanted. His brothers were in
the yard when he joined them, both breast-high in thistles. They would
not hear of their sister being kept back by this cause. They carried her
through,—or rather over, this wilderness of weeds, and placed her on the
steps of the door. They offered to perform the same service for Mrs.
Day, but she once more turned away, almost without answering. Fanny
thought this the most curious-looking old house she had ever seen, and,
in spite of the desolation of its present aspect, she could not help
enjoying the romantic prospect which began to open upon her of the kind
of life she might lead here. These lattice windows,—so many and so
small,—were made to be gently opened, in greeting to the rising moon.
That carved wooden seat beside the door should be restored for the sake
of the wandering merchant who might wish to open his pack before the
eyes of the lady of the house. Those broad eaves were made for the
swallows to build under.—When she entered the hall, what a sight was
there!
“O, Wallace, stop! Do stand still a minute,” cried she, as Wallace
strode before her, dealing destruction right and left among the cobwebs.
Never were such cobwebs seen; and it was difficult to imagine what the
spiders could be that wove them. They hung like flimsy curtains from the
ceiling to the floor, and, as the newly-admitted air waved them in the
yellow sunshine which burst in at the door (the windows being wholly
obscured by dust) they exhibited a texture of such beauty as it indeed
required some resolution to destroy. Wallace would not, however, submit
to a long detention. Parting at the stroke of his switch, the delicate
fabrics fell, forming a dusty tapestry for the walls.
“Do but look!” cried Wallace, when he had made his way first into the
library. “Grass grown to seed on the mantel-piece! Where the deuce did
the seed and the soil come from?”
As one and another entered the room, new wonders became apparent. Fanny
was surprised to see the shelves full of books. She looked close to see
what they were, and was startled by meeting a pair of bright eyes where
a space was left between the volumes.
“It is—yes, it is a stuffed owl,” said she to Richard. “But what an odd
place to hide it in!”
“A stuffed owl!” cried Wallace, coming up: “we will soon see that;” and
he touched the creature with the end of his switch; in answer to which
salutation it ruffled its speckled plumage, pecked angrily, and then
burst away in the direction of a window which was now perceived to be
broken. James decreed that this room should be appropriated to Fanny,
and that she should never more be known by any other name than Minerva.
Seated here, with her owl and her books, she could never say a foolish
thing again.
The young lady was not long in doing something which, in most young
ladies, would be called foolish. She kneeled on the stained carpet to
draw out a volume or two of the row of mouldy folios next the floor. She
was fortunate in finding another curiosity.
“Look, look, Richard! Leave those globes alone, and come here. Here is a
skeleton of something. What is it, Wallace? A rabbit? It looks like a
rabbit; but there can be no rabbits in this place. That is right; take
away the next volume, and the next.” Wallace was doing this, under
pretence of wanting more light; for he was vexed at not being able to
pronounce in a moment what animal this was the skeleton of.
“How curious! how very pretty!” continued Fanny; “spun all over with
cobwebs, and fastened to the wall with cobwebs! But what animal can it
be? Something that crouches.”
“Ah, ha!” cried Wallace; “now I see. It is a cat. Here is the skeleton
of a rat a little way before it. Plainly a rat, you see, which could get
no farther between the books and the wall: this great Josephus stopped
it.”
“And it dared not go back for fear of the cat; and the cat could not
quite reach it. But what prevented the cat’s going back? Oh, it had
forced its way in too far; and the more it crouched, the broader its
back would be. How it must have longed to get at the rat! If the rat had
had any generosity, it would have gone back and given itself up. It was
not jammed, but only barred in behind and before; and when it was
certain not to escape, it might as well have been eaten as starved.”
“Perhaps it hoped to be released,” observed James.
“I am sure that cat did, if, as I believe, it is the same that I used to
take care of and torment,” said Richard. “I plagued the poor thing
terribly, I have no doubt; but she never mewed but I answered her. How
she must have wondered what had become of me! How piteously she must
have cried for me, while she was starving to death here! One touch of
mine to those books would have given her her prey and her liberty. Bring
her out, Wallace, and the rat too; I shall have them taken care of.”
“I think James had better make a sermon about them,” Fanny observed;
“something about malice, or greediness, and what comes of them.”
“There is matter for many sermons in this room,” observed Richard
gravely. The steward touched his hat at this remark, and was uncovered
from that moment.
The apartments in which no windows were broken were in better condition,
though it was at first difficult to breathe in them, and the green
stains on the wall forbade Fanny to hope to be immediately established
there. Three westerly rooms,—one of which was the drawing-room,—were in
better condition than any others, and it was decided that upon these
should the science and art of the tradespeople of A—— be first employed.
“Come, come, Fanny, you have been here long enough for to-day,” said
Richard. “Do go down before you are quite chilled or suffocated.” Fanny
declared herself in no danger of either the one or the other calamity.
She was at the moment looking abroad upon the park at her feet, and the
mountainous range behind, and feared nothing so much as this being
pronounced an unfit residence for her, and her return to London insisted
upon. She waited anxiously for the reply to the steward’s question,—
“What do you think of the place, sir? Have you any idea of living in it,
now you see what it is?”
“O yes, if you have people at hand who can set it to rights, and if——”
His brothers understood the contortion of his long form, and laughed.
“And if,” said they, “anybody will be master instead of you. Leave it to
us.”
Wallace would enjoy nothing so much as such an excuse for making the
most of a fine sporting season; and James had no objection to go
backwards and forwards between Fellbrow and his new living,—taking what
sport he could get at the one place, and perhaps amusing himself with
building a house at the other.
“As for the quality of the tradespeople, sir,” said the steward, “you
will be better off than if you had happened to come a while ago. Among
other things that the new road has brought us, sir, is a number of
better workmen than we had before. Some of the old folks, who cannot
give up their custom of doing their work as slow as they please, and
charging what they like, are apt to stand grumbling at their doors, with
their hands in their pockets. But what you have to do with, sir, is the
new-comers, in the new part of the town, who will be glad of the
opportunity of keeping a-head in the competition, and doing your work
out of hand.”
“I had rather employ the old ones who used to work for my father, if
they will bestir themselves to serve me properly.”
“I doubt they won’t, sir; and I would not have you think yourself under
obligation to employ them. They have made, and are making, provision
enough for themselves out of your property already.”
What could this mean? The gentlemen must ask Morse. Morse, the
gamekeeper? Then it was meant that the tradesmen and work-people of A——
were poachers. But which? It could not surely be meant that glaziers and
carpenters, shoemakers and chimney-sweepers, made any hand of poaching.
The steward supposed time would show what sort of men the gangs were
composed of. This much he knew; that the people he alluded to spoke of
the falling off of their business for the sake of new-comers, and of the
weight of their taxation, as if they thought it justified their laying
hands on a property which they did not consider as a property; which was
the case with game all over the world.
Wallace threatened to rectify the notions of the people of A—— as to
property very speedily, if they ventured to interfere with the present
or future sport of himself and his brothers. James, meanwhile, was
hoping that the poachers had not, at any time, found the way to the
cellars. If the carpets were left on the floors to rot, and the books on
the shelves to grow mouldy, it would be very hard that there should be
no wine in the cellars to ripen. He proposed that a descent should be
effected for purposes of search, and that a supply of any which might be
found should be sent to the inn, as it was scarcely likely that wine of
a good quality could be met with there. The steward had a word to say in
favour of the wine at the Turk’s Head; but added, that he knew the
cellars under their feet to be well-stocked, both with ale and wines,
which must now be in fine order.
Mrs. Day had more thoughts about the levity of young people when she saw
how the family issued from the old mansion, after their first greeting
of it. The clergyman seemed to be taking equal care about the conveyance
of his sister and some crusted port; and Wallace was vociferating for
glasses, as he was bent on trying the ale upon the spot. The steward was
nearly as grave as herself; but for him there was the comfort of having
employment, and the countenance and encouragement of a master once more.
He was relieved from the misery of seeing the property going to ruin;
and, after all, as he comforted himself with saying, let these young men
be as wild as they will, they can never be so eccentric as their poor
father,—at least, not if they had the least touch of their mother in
them.
CHAPTER II.
PATRIMONIAL APPENDAGES.
Whatever the steward might have to say in favour of the new workmen of
A—— over the old, he did not wish the preference to apply in the case of
a choice of innkeepers. His old acquaintance, Pritchard, of the Turk’s
Head, was warmly patronised by him, in opposition to the upstart at the
Navarino, who, with all his show of balconies and a splendid furnishing
of his bar, treated his guests with sour wines and cold rooms.
As might be supposed, so rare a party of inmates was indulged with all
the luxury that Pritchard could afford. In hopes of diverting them from
their intention of taking their sister for a little tour among the lakes
while a corner of the house at Fellbrow was being prepared for her, the
host of the Turk’s Head took care that she should be worshipped as if
she had been a rich ward on her way to Gretna. Every time she moved, the
entire household seemed to start to anticipate her wishes. She was made
so comfortable at the inn, and she so thoroughly enjoyed the beauties of
the park and neighbourhood of Fellbrow, that there was little fear that
she would desire to go to the lakes, or anywhere else, while awaiting
her reception in what she wished to be her future home. The only
circumstance that annoyed her was the notice she excited in the town, or
at least in the neighbourhood of the inn. Pritchard shook his head over
this, as over a grievance which could only be lamented, when any one
could have told that his bragging, and his complacency, and his
confidences had given the Cranstons half the consequence which caused
them to be watched through shop-windows, waylaid by loungers, and talked
over by gossips. A large portion of the remaining half might be ascribed
to the extraordinary accession of goods, chattels, and followers which
they brought into the place.
The half-deserted street in which Mrs. Barton, the perfumer, lived had
not afforded such a sight for many a day as might now be witnessed
morning and evening. Maynard, Miss Cranston’s old serving-man, took the
young lady’s spaniel out for an airing twice a day; and all the
inhabitants who remained in the neighbourhood soon learned to watch for
the approach of the curious pair,—the prim beau, with his pig-tail
hanging down his back, and the animal, no less spruce in its jacket of
the finest flannel, tied with blue ribbons.
“Miss Biggs!—do make haste, Miss Biggs!” cried Mrs. Barton to her
shopwoman. “Did you ever see such a fine head for powder as the old
gentleman has? Quite one of the old school, I will answer for it;—the
school for manners, as I say.”
Miss Biggs smiled sweetly as Maynard came up the street, and pronounced
the phenomenon charming. She had not a very distinct idea of what the
old school was; for while Mrs. Barton was always praising it, and might
therefore be supposed a pupil, she was, in dress, of the very newest
school she could get any tidings of, and, in manners, of no school but
her own. She had one scholar in Miss Biggs, who had, by this time,
learned to hang her head as far to the left as her mistress to the
right. She had not Mrs. Barton’s prime requisite—an extremely wide
mouth—for smiling; but she did not fall behind her in drawling and
universal sympathy.
“It is really a privilege,” said Mrs. Barton, withdrawing her head from
between two glasses of wash-balls, “to see such a fine old relic of
Church and King, which always has my vote.”
“And mine, I am sure: I am always for Church and King,” replied Miss
Biggs. “So different, you see, ma’am, from the upstarts, with not a
grain in their hair, that come to the new inn, and are gone! Do you
think, ma’am, we shall have the gentleman’s custom for powder? Perhaps
if——”
Mrs. Barton was already sailing round the counter, and she reached the
door in time to prepare a deep curtsey for Maynard. The old man looked
behind him, to make sure that the obeisance was meant for him, and then
took off his hat, and offered a bow of the last century. Mrs. Barton did
not leave him long uncertain whether he was to pass on or stay. Might
she presume to hope that self-love was to be flattered by the stranger’s
approbation of the old town?
“Dear ma’am,” interposed Miss Biggs, “how can we expect that strangers
should feel as we do towards our old town? Is it reasonable, dear
ma’am?”
All were ready to agree in this; but Maynard protested that it was not a
town to be despised. He admired enthusiasm in behalf of one’s native
place——
O! how good he was to say so!
And independent of this, he saw much to admire in A——. The church-tower
was a great ornament; and the market-place was remarkable for a town of
the size. He was sorry to see so many shops shut up in this quarter; and
that red-brick meeting-house——
“Ah! there—there, sir, you touch a tender point. Our dissenters,—I am
ashamed to say it, I assure you,—our dissenters are so——O, dear sir! You
cannot think what a weight it is upon our minds,—upon loyal minds, sir,
that espouse Church and King.”
“O, sir!” added Miss Biggs, “I hope Church and King is your motto. I am
sure _you_ must be loyal.”
Maynard flattered himself that he was so; and he had been put to a
pretty strong trial on that head,—so much as he had been in France.
“In France!—in that land of rebellion and conflagration, and blasphemy!”
Mrs. Barton shuddered, and Miss Biggs followed her example. They begged
pardon,—they did not mean to hurt his feelings,—but, if they set foot in
that place, they should expect a judgment to overtake them before they
could get back again.
Perhaps so; unless they went in the way of duty, the old gentleman said:
but he went in the way of duty,—in the service of his young lady;
notwithstanding which, he was very glad to get back again. He had had an
idea, before he went, that he should find everybody wearing powder; but,
if it used to be so, it was not so now.
Mrs. Barton had once found herself in a precisely similar mistake, which
Miss Biggs allowed to be very remarkable. When our gentry began to
return after the war, there was really very little more hair-powder
issued from her shop than before. She had looked forward to this as a
set-off, if Miss Biggs remembered, against the increase of rent which
her landlord clapped on in proportion as people came home to live.
Heaven knew she was loyal in her heart, and ready to assist the war as
long as his Majesty chose to fight; but she could not but feel that she
had borne her full share. She had renewed her lease at a higher rent, in
the prospect of more custom, and then found that the tax on
hair-powder,—a tax laid on to help the war,—had put people off wearing
hair-powder!
“And your rent was not low, during the war, I dare say, ma’am. Though
you let it be raised afterwards, I dare say it was high enough before.
You like these times of low rents much better, I don’t doubt.”
“Low rents!”
“Better!” cried the ladies, looking piteously at each other.
“Why, let me see. There are a great many empty houses in this street,
ma’am. House rent cannot be high here, though you are in the
neighbourhood of the market.”
“But my lease, dear sir. Ah! there is the point, you see. When my lease
was renewed, this street was the great thoroughfare of the town. It is
untold the traffic there was,—it is indescribable the gentlemen’s
carriages that used to pass my door, before people went out of their
minds, as I say, about the new inn, and all the building that has gone
on in that quarter.”
“For my part, I have never countenanced such doings,” said Miss Biggs,
“going so far as to take my walk the other way on Sundays. To build new
houses, when such as these that you see are standing——but the rage for
building exceeds everything.”
“That came of the high rents,” said Maynard. “There was too much
building by far, in most places.”
“And the new road. O! the opening of that new road! I shall never forget
it. And my lease with six years to run from that very day.”
“It was a bad speculation, indeed, ma’am, Speculators in leases should
take care——”
Mrs. Barton looked full of woe at being called a speculator. She had the
testimony of her conscience that she did not deserve it.
“I mean no offence, I assure you, ma’am,” continued Maynard. “I mean no
more than that every tenant who takes a lease is a speculator. If you
agree to pay so much rent, and be answerable for so much tax, for
fourteen years, and the tax happens to be presently taken off——”
The bare idea seemed to afford rapture.
“Your bargain turns out a good one; and the same if the neighbourhood
improves, so as to render your situation a more desirable one than it
was before. Your case, you say, is the reverse. Rent and tax remain as
they were, and the neighbourhood is less desirable than it was; and so I
say it is a bad speculation to you. ’Tis a pity you can’t take up your
house, and carry it to the new road, and set it down there.”
Maynard was easily convinced how clever he should be thought, if he
could put the ladies in the way of doing this. Such a very capital idea!
the ladies thought it, till told that it was not original;—that in
America such a thing had been heard of and seen as the removal of a
dwelling on wheels.
The speculation was followed out;—how charming it must be to the owner
of the house to be able to put it where it would be sure of bringing a
good rent till it was worn out, instead of placing it, as now, where
there was no certainty of how much or how little it would be in request
twenty years hence.—How charming it would be to the tenant to have the
power of wheeling himself into any position he liked, or of obtaining a
reduction of rent in case of the desired ground being preoccupied! (for
in those circumstances, rent would be precisely proportioned to the
advantages of the locality.) How charming, lastly, to the government, to
receive the house-tax in a steady proportion which none could dispute:
for no house-tax could then be collected unless it were lowered _ad
valorem_. No one who could move away would stay in a poor situation, to
pay a tax as high as had been imposed in a favourable locality. Equity
would be the order of the day, Mrs. Barton decided, if houses went on
wheels; and landlords, tenants, and assessors might be all loyal and
harmonious together.—Miss Biggs put her head out at the door to take a
survey of the solid front of the dwelling, while her mistress tried the
stability of the foundations with her toe. There was little hope that
this house could be set upon wheels. The house would be even more
difficult to shift than the lease.
Mrs. Barton next declared herself liable to nearly as much sorrow for
her neighbours’ afflictions as for her own; during which announcement
her companion smiled with arch amiability at Maynard. Mr. Pritchard, at
the Turk’s Head, paid prodigiously in the articles of rent and taxes;
and how he had suffered from his Navarino rival could only be known to
those who had been formerly accustomed to see the sporting gentry throng
to his inn at this season. He was once proud of the consequence of his
inn, as shown by the charges it had to bear; but now, he talked very
differently, poor man, about such charges. He had been heard to say,
more than once lately, a thing—a fact—something which he would hardly
say to the young gentlemen who were now occupying his best apartments.—
What could this be?—After much pressing on the one side, and “Shall I,
Miss Biggs?” on the other, it appeared that Pritchard complained of his
house having been for years taxed nearly three times as much as Fellbrow
itself. No one could believe it, as Mrs. Barton had told the
complainant. It was impossible that any one could credit it.
“I can, ma’am,” said Maynard. “I heard a good deal of that matter in
London; and I dare say some of the same ridiculous confusion and
partiality,—or I should rather say inequality,—may exist in this place.
But, halloo, what comes here? Please to let me in, ladies. If you will
let me in, and shut the door—I never could abide these packs of those
animals,—a very different thing from carrying one quiet little creature
like this. There! look how it hugs me, at the very hearing and sight of
the pack! Now we shall do!”
Mrs. Barton rejoiced in such an opportunity for hospitality. She became
suddenly remarkably afraid of a pack of harriers, and took care that the
door was fastened as securely as if harriers had been especially
addicted to eating and drinking pomatum and lavender water. Miss Biggs
kneeled to the spaniel, and coaxed it till sent by a sign from her
mistress to bring a little glass of fine cordial for their guest, whom
they declared they should keep fast prisoner till all danger of
encountering that dreadful pack of dogs was past. There was an upper
window from which their progress could be traced for some distance; and
the cook was called from cooking the “little rasher” to take her station
at this watch-post. Maynard had so much to say about his young master’s
love of sport, and his young mistress’s virtues and graces, and the
wealth of them all, that there was little chance of the spaniel having
its usual airing this morning. The inventory of Mr. Cranston’s dogs,
with the necessary comments, consumed as much time as would have carried
Fanny’s favourite a couple of miles on the moor.
The pack and the huntsman were not without their admirers, meanwhile.
Among the many who looked knowingly or joyously on them, none were more
emphatic than Mr. Taplin,—the lawyer, as he was called before he
failed,—the assessor, as he had been generally named since his friends
had procured him the appointment. What a fine set of new subjects for
assessment had he in this family of the Cranstons! How many servants and
carriages! Armorial bearings, of course; and here was the huntsman; and
besides this pack, there were Mr. James’s pointers, and Miss Cranston’s
spaniel, and the fine terrier of Mr. Wallace. Then there were horses in
abundance on the road, he understood. It was a pity the house and window
duties could not be made more suitable in amount to such a mansion as
that at Fellbrow. He must try, for the sake of justice, as well as of
his own pocket, to contrive an increase. He trusted that such wealthy
and high-spirited young men would not be troublesome as to the amount of
tax they were to pay,—either for their habitations or their pleasures.
He stood watching the picturesque group for some time after it had
reached the Paddock,—a place well known to every sporting gentleman who
passed through A——. The Paddock was the residence of a noted
horse-dealer; and Swallow, the tenant, had had the honour of welcoming
to his stables almost every man of note in his particular line in the
kingdom. Many a characteristic group might be seen in the shadow of his
spacious gateway. Many an honoured voice might be heard in oath or
laughter from his range of stables; and many a hero of the field had
trod the grass of the ample paddock in the rear. The thresher in Mr.
Whitford’s barn sometimes laid aside his flail to watch the
curiously-coated and hatted gentry who were let into the sacred
enclosure; and the thresher’s son, a shepherd-boy on the sheep-walk
above, stood to wonder at the friskiness of the fine animals in
Swallow’s field.
Swallow was not sorry that the dogs had come by this road, as it was of
importance to him to establish a friendly intercourse with Mr.
Cranston’s huntsman; but the present moment was not exactly that which
he would have chosen for their arrival. Half an hour later would have
been better. A van, on its way to London, was at the door. It could not
wait; and certain packages must be put into it whose contents could
scarcely fail to be guessed by the huntsman, any more than by the
gamekeeper. It was provoking that the girls were out. They would have
got the packages in at the back of the van very cleverly, while he was
amusing the huntsman with a glass of liquor and conversation. He must
try whether George could take the hint.
George was less quick at taking a hint than he would have been if he had
not been accustomed to depend much on his sisters. He was not ashamed of
being excelled by them, and, in a manner, taken care of by them, they
having, as he always said, each a double mind, with which his single one
could not pretend to compete. These girls were twins, and more perfectly
alike in mind (if possible) than in form and feature. Their brother,
still a rough and sadly careless boy, laughed at them, was proud of
them, and depended upon them. The book which every horse-dealer is by
law obliged to keep open to the inspection of the assessor was left in
George’s charge by his father, who had him educated sufficiently to
qualify him for making the necessary entries of sales. George was
perpetually warned of the heavy penalties to which his father would be
liable if the due entries were not made, if the book was not always kept
open to the observation of the assessor, and regularly delivered in,
every quarter, for examination and discharge; but it is probable that
his father would more than once have been compelled to disburse the
penalty, if Anne and Sarah had not been on the watch to guard against
his carelessness. It was indeed a pity that they were absent now. George
was so busy forming friendships with the dogs that his father’s coughs
and winks were disregarded; and package after package was brought out
and left within sight and scent, while room was being made for each in
the van. In vain did Swallow interpose his broad shoulders and offer
snuff. The huntsman was mounted, and could see what was passing in the
rear; and he was moreover not to be persuaded to take a pinch. Swallow
saw that his new acquaintance had picked up a notion at the Paddock
which would not be long in reaching the owner of the Fellbrow preserves.
George’s mind had risen a flight too high to be brought down this
morning by usual influences. He was off with the harriers, in the midst,
and almost as fleet as any of them, before his father’s angry voice
roused his ear. He looked back a moment, saw the assessor entering the
gateway, supposed his father would find the book if it was wanted, and
immediately heard nothing more than the greetings of the dogs.
“There is no knowing now,” growled his father, “when we shall get the
lad back again. He had rather kennel with the dogs than come home to his
business, any day of the year.—The book! O, it is at your service, I
don’t doubt.—Let me see: where can the boy have hid it? My family are
all out, you see, sir. If it is equally convenient, I will send one of
them with the book, this afternoon.”
“Show it me now, Swallow. I don’t call this keeping the book open for my
inspection at all times. Make haste, and find it, if you please. Your
boy is not the only one of the family, I fancy, who has the taste you
describe,—for sport rather than business. Hey, Swallow? But you will
remember the gentlemen are on the spot now, and take care of yourself, I
suppose. Remember they are on the spot, I advise you.”
“It would be rather hard to forget it,” replied the horse-dealer; “so
many shows as they have brought into this quiet place. There is not a
soul in A—— but is watching them from morning till night,—except,
indeed, the people (and they are not few) that are swarming about the
Fellbrow house, like bees building their comb. Here’s the book, sir; and
when I have added the sale I made half-an-hour ago——”
While Swallow was laboriously scrawling his two lines, the assessor
walked off. There was no room for talk of penalties in his department
this day. He would come again when all the Mr. Cranstons’ riding-horses
should have arrived, and would want to be discussed. Swallow looked
after Mr. Taplin, saying to himself, “Fine talk that, of my taking care
of myself against the gentlemen, when he himself is in as deep as any of
us! If he threatens me, I can bid him look to his own share.”
CHAPTER III.
CLERICAL DUTY.
October was not half gone before a sufficient portion of the Fellbrow
house was made habitable to accommodate the family. Fanny’s rapture was
great when the ugly high wall was in process of being demolished, to
give place to the light fence which would not exclude such a view as her
eyes desired to rest upon as long as the sun was above the horizon.
These October mornings were glorious. One especially, when the whole
family were anxious for fine weather, equalled any that she had enjoyed
in a southern climate. It was to be a morning of fishing,—the first
regular fishing party since their arrival; and Fanny was at her window
before the rich hues of the sunrise had melted from the northern
mountain tops, or the white frost evaporated from the unsunned lawn. The
face of the limestone rocks opposite was grey in the shadow, and the
stream below was yet black as if it had no bottom; but the rays were
abroad which would soon make it gleam at every bend, and paint in it the
reflection of the autumn leaves that yet danced above it when the breeze
sported in the overhanging coppice on the hither side. Some of the
loftiest trees in the park already began to be lighted up; and on a
green platform of the retiring rocks, the blue roofs of a little hamlet
glistened in the gush of sunshine poured upon them through the chasm
which brought the waters from the heights to the cisterns at the doors
of the inhabitants. Already might the hind be distinguished, pacing
forth warily from the thicket, and looking from side to side, while her
fawn bounded past her, breast-high in the hoar grass. Already might the
shepherd and his dog be distinguished on the faint track of the
sheep-walk, now driving their scudding flock, and now letting them
disperse themselves over the upland. Already were lively voices heard
below the window, and already were busy hands making a picturesque
display of nets and wicker baskets on the grass. Never was there a
lovelier morning seen; and Fanny’s spirits were braced to their highest
pitch when she threw open her lattice,—(how much more willingly than she
would have thrown up the sash!) and sent a greeting down to her brother
James who was talking with one of the men.
“Who is going to ride?” she asked, seeing that a groom was leading a
saddled horse. “Who wants Diamond this morning, James?”
“I do. Ah! it is a great plague that anybody should want to be buried
this morning, of all mornings. But I put the people off before, and I
cannot do it again. I can get it over, with what else I have to do,
before you have finished your sport, if you will only make me sure where
I may find you. That is what I am settling now; and then I am off.”
“But what else have you to do? A marriage or two, perhaps?”
“Very likely; and three or four more funerals. They find they must make
the most of me when they can catch me. But the business I mean is,
looking about to see where I shall build my house. You ought to be with
me for that. If your mare was but here, I would make you give up the
fishing for to-day, and ride over with me.”
“I will do that when you know there is to be a wedding or two. The
little brides will not object to my seeing them married, I dare say; and
I should like to make acquaintance with these mountain brides that you
used to talk so finely about before——”
“Before I saw them:—before I knew how confoundedly they would come in
the way of sport. I have seen none yet that it would be worth your while
to ride seven miles to make acquaintance with. I don’t see how they are
better than the Easter-Monday brides in Birmingham, in tawdry shawls and
flying ribbons. If they have not such gay shawls, they are ten times
more dull and silly: so, if you mean to keep your romance about them,
you must keep your distance, too. Good-bye: only be so good as not to
leave Moystarn before two, unless you see me sooner. I’ll make Diamond
do his duty this morning. Good-bye.”
Diamond had no other inclination than to do his duty. Once having
cleared the park, he brought all the little children out of the cottages
by the sound of his firm and rapid trot on the hard road. Their mothers
curtseyed at the doors and windows, inspired with an equal respect for
the handsome rider and his sleek steed; and the labourers turned round
from their work on the fences and in the fields to smile the vacant
smile with which they honoured passengers who took their fancy. It was
not Diamond’s fault that he was urged on so nearly over a child as to be
obliged to bolt to avoid the sin of manslaughter. It was not his fault
that he could not, before he reached the brook, slacken his speed
sufficiently to avoid splashing the fair horsewomen who were crossing at
the time. For this last offence he received a more severe punishment
from his master than for any preceding. The flogging was so vigorous,
and Diamond’s resentment of it so strong, that he bolted once more into
the water, and there made a splashing which sent the ripples of the
clear stream in chase of one another, high and low. The boy on the foot
bridge shrank from the wetting, and the horsewomen retired right and
left to watch the issue. Each patted her pony’s neck; each laughed as
Diamond turned round and round; each prepared to use the switch, when
her own pony began to exhibit signs of restlessness. James was so far
struck with this amidst his contest with Diamond, that he looked
curiously at the pair when he came up finally out of the brook. He was
as much amused as surprised at what he beheld. No twins that he had ever
seen could compare with these for likeness. It was not only the colour
of the eyes and of the hair, and the frame of the features; much less
the perfect similarity of their dress, and of the animals they rode. The
glance was the very same, revealing an identity of mind. They were now
side by side, and he perceived that every touch of the rein was the
same. Smiles came and went as if from one heart; and yet they did not
look at each other, except to agree which should utter the words that
were on the tongues of both. If they had been less pretty than they
were, James could not have pushed on his way as before. His curiosity
was so amused, that he laughed without restraint; and could scarcely
repent having done so when he saw the blush and confused gravity of each
little face which filled up its close straw bonnet.
“That boy is like you, though less like than you are to each other,”
observed James. “I suppose he is your brother?”
“Yes, sir; our brother George. People think him most like father.”
“And you most like your mother? Your mother must be a very pretty woman.
Is not she?”
There was no answer. The girls were too busy trying to help laughing. In
order to find out whether this arose from the mother being otherwise
than pretty, or from the daughters liking to be complimented, James went
on to praise their riding. They took this as a matter of course, having
been in the habit of riding almost as regularly as of dining, all their
lives. How could they contrive rides for every day?
“We have always some place that we must go to, especially at this time
of the year; and sometimes it is a weary round before we can get home.
We are going one of our longest rides to-day.”
“To some market, I should have thought, if your pack-saddles had not
been empty. Why do you use empty pack-saddles?”
“They will not be empty long, sir. Anne has begun to load her’s, you
see.”
“So her name is Anne. What is your’s? Sarah? Very well; I shall know
Anne from Sarah by her having a load on her pack-saddle. Pray do your
parents know you from each other?”
“Dear, yes, Sir! except just in the twilight.”
“Yet your voices are the same. I would give a crown-piece to know
whether one voice ever gets above the other,—whether you ever quarrel. I
do not see how you can well help it; for you must often want the same
thing at the same time—something that you cannot both have.”
What sort of thing did he mean ? Almost everything that could not be
divided might be used by them together.
“And do you always wish the same thing, and think the same thing?”
“We do presently, if we don’t directly. Good-bye, sir; we are going down
this lane to the farm-house.”
“But you will have to come out upon this road again: there is no other
path away from that farm-house. I shall go with you.”
“You must not; they will not want you. We shall not stay two minutes.”
“Then I shall wait for you.”
“Oh, thank you, sir! We will make haste. George has run on already, you
see: he goes no farther than here; so we can get on faster than we have
been going.”
“Stop! Why should you both go? There is George to take care of one.
Anne, do you stay with me, and let the empty saddle go down the lane.”
Left alone with Anne, the gentleman began to animate her with praises of
her native district. She agreed that it was a pretty part to ride in for
pleasure. She supposed the gentleman rode for pleasure.
“Not exactly so to-day, though I do not pretend that my ride is not a
very pleasant one just now. I am going to bury a child. Yes: you need
not look so shocked; I did not say I was going to kill a child. You
would have children buried when they die, would not you?”
“Yes, sir; but we did not know that you were a clergyman;” and she
looked as if she had thoughts of dismounting to make a curtsey.
“O yes, I am a clergyman; and besides burying a child a good deal
younger than you, perhaps I may have to marry a girl very little older
than you.”
“That will be Catherine Scott, perhaps,” observed Anne; “she was
eighteen last July. Do you think she will be married to-day, sir? I
think she might have told us, however.”
“You had better ride on with me, and take her by surprise. Come, give
your pony the switch a little. Never mind Sarah,” seeing her look back;
“she will overtake us presently. Her saddle is not loaded, you know.”
Anne shook her head: Sarah was not in sight; and the faithful twin
evidently meditated turning back. If the gentleman would go forward, she
said, and not keep the family waiting for the burial, Sarah and she
might come up in time to see the marriage, if it should be Catherine
Scott’s. James muttered something about being late, and gave her pony
such a cut with his whip as sent the animal forward at a rate that Sarah
was scarcely likely to surpass; and, by keeping half a length in the
rear, he sustained the pony’s panic, and baffled all the damsel’s
attempts to check its speed. This lasted till they came within sight of
a row of cottages, at the door of one of which was a funeral train, just
beginning to form. It would not do, even James perceived, for the
mourners to see him galloping to the churchyard in a race with a country
girl. He turned her horse, as well as his own, into a field, and then
stopped to laugh. In answer to Anne’s reproaches, he declared that he
only wanted to make her do something unlike her sister for once. He rode
between her and the gate of the field, saying that, before she went, she
must tell him whether she did not think this field the very place to
build a house upon. If she would only look up at the view to the north,
and measure with her eye the distance from the church——
“There’s Sarah!” cried Anne, cleverly wheeling her pony round, and
effecting her escape. She was off, like an arrow from a bow; and Sarah
might be seen hastening hitherward over a heath, about a mile and a half
distant.
“They will come together point-blank, like knights in a single combat,”
thought James. “I must be there to pick them up, if they are unhorsed. I
must find a gap in the fence, lower down, that these people about the
cottages may not be scandalized. I must behave well to-day, when once I
have seen what those girls are doing.”
When met, they were pacing side by side, looking equally offended. James
could scarcely appear as penitent as he intended, so infinitely amused
was he at the perfect resemblance of the twins being preserved and made
more striking amidst their change of mood. If Anne looked heated by her
violent exercise, Sarah was not less so through fear and resentment.
Both glanced away from him; neither would turn the head when he spoke.
The tendency to ponder the ground was rather the strongest in Anne: as
she had lost out of her glove the sixpence she had brought to pay the
turnpike. What turnpike?—where was it? Half a mile beyond the church.—
Oh! that would do very well. If they would go on, and wait for him
there, he would come to them when his service was done, and take their
opinion about where he should build his house, and then Anne should not
be left behind for want of a sixpence: they would proceed all together.
He heard Anne say to her sister that he would serve her the same trick
that he had played Sarah, and that she did not believe he had any child
to bury, nor any such thing.
“Only come on and see, Miss Anne,” said he. “You shall get into the
grave yourself, if you like, to make sure; only I suppose you would not
go in without your sister. But, really now, if you will help me to
settle where I shall build my house, I will help you with your business
afterwards, if you will only tell me what it is.”
And he looked narrowly at the sacks with which the saddles were
provided.
“Picking up poultry,” the girls replied, “to send to London by the van.”
“Poultry! I shall begin to listen for a cock-a-doodle-doo, such as once
kept me awake all the way to London, when I went in a stage-coach. Shall
we have a cock-a-doodle-doo presently?”
“We take the poultry up dead.”
“Ah! dead. Now, does this belong to a chicken, or a turkey, or what?”
drawing out a long pheasant’s feather, whose tip had just peeped out of
a hole in the sack. Sarah snatched the feather, and tickled Diamond’s
nose with it, so that Diamond’s master had no attention to spare for
more questions for some time. There was no doubt that Anne would have
done the same, if she had chanced to be next him; for she did not laugh
with surprise, but smiled, as at a corroboration of an idea of her own.
The act was Sarah’s, however; and she had immediately the advantage of
Anne in the gentleman’s estimation. He now saw that there was certainly
a something more in the one sister than in the other,—a drollery in the
eyes—an archness about the mouth. It was to Sarah’s side that he
returned when Diamond was once more subdued. Before he sent them on to
the turnpike, he had been almost whispering to her, saying something
which Anne had not heard, though she now stooped forward on her saddle,
and now leaned over behind her sister, and finally rode round to James’s
other side to listen, being as yet unaware that anything would ever be
said to either which the other might not share.
“You must go now,” said she, tired at last of not being able to catch
what he was saying. “Those people are the weddingers. See to the bride’s
silk gown! and it is no more like Catherine Scott——How came you to tell
me so?”
When James had explained that he did not pretend to know brides’ names
till they asked him to change them, he drew off from his companions,
with a final glance in the direction of the turnpike, and directed his
horse, with all sobriety of demeanour, towards the vestry. The sisters
were at last convinced that he was a clergyman, when they saw the
uncovered heads of the men, and the obeisances of the women and
children, amidst which he moved to the discharge of his duty.
“There, I knew it would be so! How people do plague one—some with
wanting to be married, and some with their squeamish troubles, as if
nobody but the parson could do anything for them,” said he to himself
when, on reaching the turnpike at last, no horsewomen were to be seen.
“To be sure, I don’t know who else should serve the people’s turn
hereabouts, unless they would step across the border to the blacksmith,
and advertise for a methodist to hear them confess. But here are the
blessings of having a living! These pretty creatures are tired of the
very idea of me, I don’t doubt, after being kept waiting till they had
no patience left.”
He was mistaken; the girls had not waited at all, but gone straight
through, rather in a hurry than not, the gatekeeper said. One of them
had explained that she had lost her sixpence on the road, and had left
her silver thimble in pledge of payment, to be redeemed the next time
she should pass that way. James, of course, redeemed the thimble, which
he tried on his little finger end before he consigned it to his
waistcoat pocket. It betokened as small a finger as need be seen; but
that only made it the greater pity that the thimble was not Sarah’s.
The gatekeeper was deplorably stupid about the girls. He did not seem to
know which was meant by the pretty one; and could give no further
account of them than that they set off, at a brisk trot, along the
cross-road to the right. He could not even tell whether they meant to go
to the large farm-house that might be seen standing back from this road.
There was nothing for it but going to learn on the spot; so James left
the situation of his house to be discussed hereafter, and was presently
at the gate of the farm.
The farmer knew the girls, he acknowledged; could not deny he had seen
them to-day—just for a minute—an hour ago or more;—supposed they were at
home by this time;—advised the gentleman to come in and have a snack and
a glass of ale, and he would talk to him about ground for his house.
James recollected, now that the chase had escaped him, that he really
was hungry, and had some miles to ride, at the end of which he might
find nothing in the shape of provisions but fish in their dying agonies.
It was true, he had refused the hospitality of others of his flock;—of
the old schoolmaster, who stood, hat in hand, at his humble door, ready
to usher in the clergyman; of the late clerk’s widow, who had taken
pains to spread her board for him; of the mourners, who had hoped to
receive at home a confirmation of the words of solace which had been
spoken at the grave. All this he had declined, on the plea of extreme
haste; but this was no reason that he should not now avail himself of
the farmer’s cakes and ale. He gave his horse to the boy who had just
stopped from swinging on a gate, and entered the dwelling.
“Don’t let me disturb you, I beg, ma’am,” said James to the farmer’s
wife, who was hearing her little boy say his letters when her husband
and the clergyman entered. “While you go on with your lessons, Mr. Riley
will tell me where to look for a piece of land to build upon. Your
little boy will be all the sooner ready to say his catechism, you know,
if you go on steadily. So do not let me disturb you.”
Mr. Riley bowed; Mrs. Riley blushed, and took up her scissars once more
to point with: but apparently little Harry did not appreciate the
desirableness of soon knowing his catechism, for he called every letter
F, whether it stood at the top, bottom, or middle of the page. According
to him, F stood for apple, F for fig, and F for window. He was told to
turn his head towards his mamma, instead of quite away from his book;
and the head was soon in its right place; but the eyes still wandered
off to the extreme left, and F once more stood for pie. Then came loud
whispers,—“Who is that gentleman?” “Will that gentleman fly my kite for
me?” “May I look through that gentleman’s spy-glass?” “Is that the
parson that will frown at me if I don’t behave well at church?”
This was too much. Mr. Riley lost the thread of his discourse; Mrs.
Riley escaped from the room, and James laughed, while the boy stood
staring at him.
“So you have got a kite. Will I help you to fly it? Yes, that I will,
some day.” And thus was the guest entertained, till the tray made its
appearance, and the cloth was laid for a substantial luncheon.
“My dear sir, make no apologies. Here is quite a feast, I see. By all
means, ma’am; a sausage, if you please. Your sausages are irresistible;
and especially with such game as this. A leg, if you please, sir. A
pheasant’s leg and sausage is the most superb thing in the universe.”
No wonder the Rileys were flattered. The most superb thing in the
universe was under their humble roof!
“I will try some day,” James continued, “if I cannot supply you with
another luncheon to equal this. I will send you in some game as I pass,
the first time I shoot in your neighbourhood. You relish game, I
presume, Mrs. Riley?”
Mrs. Riley assented; then hesitated, and hoped Mr. Cranston would not
trouble himself to do as he had said. The farmer declared that Mr.
Cranston was welcome to shoot over his farm, but they could not accept
any game. While James was insisting, little Harry, who had been sent
away, ran in crying, and complaining that he had lost his tail, and he
could not get another.
“His tail? What sort of tail?”
Mrs. Riley explained that Harry was indulged with the tail feathers of
pheasants, and that he therefore disliked the disappearance of game from
the pantry.
There were so many this morning, the boy complained, and now they were
all gone! There were a great many indeed, hanging all in a row, and
Nancy had promised him all the tails. Now there was not one left. “O
dear, O dear! what shall I do without my tail?” was the boy’s pathetic
lamentation.
“If you will let me carry you on my horse after those young ladies who
were here this morning, I dare say they can give us the very tails that
were in the pantry,” observed James, looking askance at the farmer as he
spoke. “But, Harry, don’t you like fur tails as well as feather tails?
If you were a girl, you might make a fur tippet for your doll’s throat
of a pretty, soft, white rabbit’s tail.”
Harry made a hop, skip, and jump to a cupboard, and brought out a string
of hares’ and rabbits’ tails, tied together with string, which promised
to be soon as long as the leech-line of a fisherman.
“I see how it is,” said James, smiling. “I am not the only person, I
fancy, Mr. Riley, that you make welcome to shoot over your farm and in
your neighbourhood.”
“Why, sir, to speak out, what else can we farmers say to those that help
away with the vermin that do us all sorts of mischief?”
“Ah! I suppose the birds plague you with the people they bring upon your
ground. I saw one cover, I remember, standing alone in the middle of
some very wide fields of yours, with not a hedge near enough to tempt a
bird to stray; and I thought I would try my luck there next.”
“You will be sure to find luck there, sir, however many may come before
you. You may chance to see three hundred cock pheasants walking about
there in one day. But the birds are nothing to the hares, sir; I was
very nearly quarrelling with my farm, on account of the hares; and
should have done so, if my landlord had not made me an allowance for
them.”
“How much does he allow you?”
“Two sacks of wheat per acre, sir.”
“Upon my word, you have a very kind landlord.”
“Not on this head, sir. My loss is much greater than two sacks per acre,
I can assure you. Take the year round, and a hare is as expensive as a
sheep;—for this reason,—that the hare picks the last particle of
vegetation. If my grain springs an eighth of an inch one day, and the
vermin nips seven hundred of the sprouts in a day,—what sheep will ever
cause me such damage as that? I can stand and see the pheasants picking
up their berries and acorns, at this time of the year, without wanting
to wring every neck of them; but, if you’ll believe me, sir,—and my wife
will bear me out, I never see a hare cross the field I am in without
swearing an oath at her.”
Mrs. Riley not only corroborated this, but added that Mr. Riley was
still more cross with rabbits.
“The rabbits! And well I may! They do such mischief round the outskirts
of my coppices, that the wood will not be so fit to cut at the end of
twenty years as it would at the end of sixteen without them. You cannot
wonder, sir, that we farmers cannot see poachers. They are a sort of
thing we are blind to. If you consider, sir, that there are six hundred
acres of wheat land in this parish, and that hares consume, at the
least, two sacks per acre, there are twelve hundred sacks of corn taken
from men to be given to hares. I cannot think it a great sin, at this
rate, to let alone anybody that helps to root out the hares.”
“You should get your landlord to allow you to shoot over your farm.”
“’Tis done, sir; and what comes of that? Every labourer in the parish
may go and inform, unless I do him some favour that will keep his
good-will; and if his liking should be for sport, why, what can we do
but let each other alone?”
“Then I am afraid the landlord’s only dependence is on his own
servants,—the tenant and poacher being leagued against him.”
“That sort of dependence is but small, especially when gentlemen are not
on the spot in all seasons; as I may say to you, sir. There may be such
a thing as a league between the poacher and the woodman;—just such a
sort of league to break the laws as there was till lately between
gentlemen and their woodmen.”
“My dear, what are you saying?” interrupted Mrs. Riley.
“Only what Mr. Cranston knows to be true. He knows that, till the sale
of game was allowed by law, gentlemen encouraged their servants to sell
the game the gentlemen themselves shot. The woodmen that I have known
used to receive a quarter of the money so brought in. And, after a
sporting bout, when their masters had company staying with them for the
purpose, there was a higher allowance to the woodman, from the
consideration of the difficulty of disposing of a large quantity of game
at once.”
“I wonder how much a servant might make in this manner?” observed James.
“It is a pleasant way enough of making a fortune.”
“You must consider, sir, how many the gains have to be divided amongst.
Where poaching is done by gangs, as it is here, there are a great number
to share in the first instance. Then there are the coachmen or
van-drivers that carry the game up to London, and the porters that take
charge of it there. Then the poulterers must have their commission;
double what they have on poultry, on account of the risk. And then there
is the waste,—which is more than is easily counted,—what with the game
being mangled, and killed out of season, and sent up in a bad state.
Pheasants are sent up long after January, and hares with young; and
sometimes half a sackfull is good for nothing when it is unpacked. All
this can leave but little gain for the woodman’s share.”
“And his gains must be most uncertain, too. When he sends up a fine
batch of game, he may chance to find that the market is overstocked.
There can be no regularity of supply where it is carried on in an
illegal and underhand manner.”
“That is true, sir; and I have heard from people here, disappointed in
the way you speak of, that in the very middle of the season, when every
dinner-table in the London gentry’s houses had game upon it, full
one-third of what was sent up was thrown away. After hawking about what
was not quite past cooking, and selling birds for a few pence to anybody
that passed by, one poulterer alone threw two thousand partridges into
the Thames. This makes our people here so united as they are. They keep
up a perfect understanding all the way to London, that there may be the
less difficulty in poaching to order,—which is the surest way to make
money.”
“To the poulterer’s order?”
“Yes. He sends down a message, perhaps, that he has engaged to furnish
some thousand head a week for three weeks, and that he depends upon this
district; and then poaching is the order of the day. By the time the job
is done, the newspapers begin to cry out. There is often work for the
coroner, before all is over; and account is laid for a few going to
prison; but where all are banded together in prospect of this, the going
to prison is no disgrace, and not much of a hardship; and the
manslaughter comes to be looked upon as a matter of course.”
“I shall tell my brother all this,” said James, rising. “Not so as to
implicate you,” he added, perceiving that Mr. Riley looked alarmed. “Now
is the time, while I am at Fellbrow, to keep a watch over our poaching
neighbours. Pray do they meddle with deer?”
“Your gamekeeper can tell you that better than I can,” replied the
farmer, now grown wary as to his communications. “Would you like to step
abroad, sir, and look at the bit of ground I told you of?”
“Why, yes: if you think the people below have got no more funerals ready
by this time.—Yes; let us go,” he added gravely, upon seeing Mrs.
Riley’s glance of astonishment. “Mrs. Riley, I owe you thanks for your
hospitality. If I have injured your son’s learning, I must do my best to
help him to make it up, by and bye, when he may come to church without
fear of being frowned at.”
Mrs. Riley pronounced him a pleasant-mannered gentleman, as she peeped
between the climbers that covered the window to watch him and her
husband up the hill at the back of the house.
“You will not be troubled with a heavy ground-rent, you see, sir, in a
situation like this,—(if you should pitch upon this place, where the
land is not to be sold.) You will find the difference between building
here, and building near the falls in the hills yonder, where the gentry
are rearing their boxes and their villas. Here you will have to pay no
great deal more than if the spot of ground was to be under the plough
instead of under a roof.”
“Ah! you country folks know little yet of the difference in value of
bits of land that measure the same to a hair’s-breadth. A friend of mine
has been building a villa at Chiswick lately, and he pays four times as
much for the ground as he gets as the ground-rent of a capital house in
Winchelsea. This is all very fair. People must pay for good situations;
but I dare say you have no idea of such differences here?”
“Enough to wish that the land-tax went a little more according to
situation than it does. ’Tis really ridiculous, how one has to pay five
times as much as another, without any reason that ever I heard tell.”
“We south people beat you there, too. The very place I was mentioning,
Winchelsea, where there are not more than fifty houses that yield the
house-tax, pays, within thirty pounds, as much land-tax as Bath; and if
you could look down upon Bath as we now do upon your parish, you would
see the absurdity of such a taxation. In London, the difference is wider
still. I know of two parishes that pay above 9000_l._ in land-tax, with
a rental of 116,000_l._; while another parish that has now a rental of
720,000_l._ pays—how much land-tax, do you think?”
“To be in the same proportion with the parishes you mention, it should
be 55,000_l._”
“Instead of which it is under 500_l._ This is the fault of the way the
tax was managed at first, and not of anything that is done with it now:
but it sets one to inquire, before one begins to build or to purchase.
While some parishes pay 2_s._ 4_d._ in the pound, and others half a
quarter of a farthing, one likes to look into the matter.”
“I see no end to the inequality, sir; that is the worst of it. If a
valuation once made is never to be altered, I don’t see but that every
improvement, every new bit of waste that is tilled, and every new
quarter of a town that is built, must increase the inequality. There is
our neighbouring county of Lancaster, with all its fine towns and
villages, almost as busy as London itself, paying no more land-tax than
some four or five such London parishes as you mentioned just now. You
see, its being made perpetual, some five-and-thirty years ago, and
allowed to be redeemed, and half of it being redeemed, makes it
difficult to touch now.”
“Except to redeem the remainder. That was what Mr. Pitt wanted, no
doubt—to have done with this, without loss, and then to be free to lay
on a new tax. For my part, I like neither making valuation nor tax
perpetual; and to allow redemption is worse still, in principle. The
sacrifice made in redeeming a tax is made for ever and ever. See what a
scrape we are in now, in the case of this land-tax! The only way of
escape the sufferers can think of is by violating the valuation which
was declared unalterable. They cry out for a new assessment; leaving the
redeemed portions of land exempt, and equalizing the rest at the same
rate as formerly—4_s._ in the pound. They say that this would bring the
Government between one and two millions a-year more than at present; and
that if the assessment was kept equal, the whole would be gradually
redeemed.”
“If the tax is to be got rid of, it may be more easily done now than by
and by; and a farmer may be allowed to wish it done with.”
“Why? It does not fall upon you?”
“Ask the assessor, sir, if I do not pay it into his hands, year by
year.”
“Yes; but you pay it for your landlord, and you stop it out of your
rent. You know, if you run away to-night, the assessor comes upon your
landlord for it, instead of running after you. You know it is levied on
empty houses. Why, Mr. Riley, I never before heard anybody question that
the land-tax falls on the landlords, however much the point might be
doubted about the house-tax.”
“I assure you, sir, there is less corn grown, by far, than there would
be without this tax; and is not that a bad thing for the farmer, when a
tax is the cause?”
“A bad thing for everybody: but this is, so far, only like every other
tax. Every tax stints production in its way; yet there must be taxes. If
we are to go on taxing classes of people, I do not know that we could
have a better tax than this, if it was but made equal.”
“It will never be that, sir.”
“Perhaps so; but a direct tax, like this, is the only kind that can be
made equal; so we ought to take care how we quarrel with it, and show a
preference for indirect taxes,—a kind which never can be made equal.
Besides its capacity of being made equal, it has other good qualities.
It is certain. It is levied in a convenient way; and it goes pretty
straight to the Treasury. So that, (except that I should like to see a
simpler method of taxation, which should save us from laying a burden on
one class, and then balancing it with a burden laid upon another class,)
I have nothing to say against a properly-managed land-tax.”
“But, sir, how are you to make it equal, while the land is so unequal?
If you tax all land at so much per acre, the owner of those bleak hills
above will pay much more than his share; and the fine land in our best
counties will yield much less than its share. Then, if you tax according
to the produce, people will not be long in finding out that your tax is
a tithe, sir; and you and I both know what they think of tithe.”
“What should prevent its being levied—not in proportion to surface, or
to produce—but to rent? It would be thus thrown on the landlords, as I
said before. The exclusive taxation of a particular class is a bad
principle to go upon. But, while we do go upon that principle, and while
the poorer classes pay so much more taxes than their share, this tax
(equalized) is one of the last to be complained of. Rent, you know, is
naturally always rising.”
“Then I wonder governments do not maintain themselves on rent. If a
government was a great landowner, it might live without taxing anybody.”
“The governments of new countries, where land enough is left without an
owner, will be sufficiently wise, perhaps, to see this, in course of
time. If a government kept a portion of land, and behaved to its tenants
like a good landlord, it would find its revenues perpetually on the
increase, (with no other checks than would, at the same time, reduce its
expenditure), and not a farthing would be taken from the profits of the
farmer or the manufacturer; not a particle from the rewards of anybody’s
industry. A fine prospect that, for a new country, is not it?”
“A fine dream, sir.”
“A dream that might as certainly come true as my dream of a white house
upon this slope, with a wood behind, and a sheet of water spread out
where that stream is now wasted. No spot that I have seen compares with
this, certainly. I should set about securing it before I leave the
place, but that,”—and he half laughed, as if ashamed of his thought,—“I
must bring somebody to see it first.”
“I hear, Mr. Cranston, that your sister——”
“No, not my sister.—But, what were you going to say?”
“Only what you have heard often enough before, I dare say. I hear that
your sister is the prettiest and kindliest lady that has ever been seen
here since——”
He was going to allude to her mother, but stopped.
“It depends upon how you happen to see her. If you find her in the
clouds, you may speak to her ten times before you get an answer; and I
doubt whether she looks pretty then. But when she is——I will positively
get her a horse from Swallow’s. I am more tired than she is of waiting
for her favourite mare. Nobody knows what Fanny is like that has not
seen her ride,—seen her hunt. O, yes! I will bring her here when she
begins to ride; and she will hear your little boy his alphabet. You
should see her with children.”
The hour struck, and the sound came from the church tower below to
remind James of his fishing engagement. He had ceased to care about the
fishing; but he had some lingering hopes of falling in again with the
twins, if he pursued the circuitous road (over moorland and through a
park) which they had taken.
Once on his way, he relaxed his speed no more. To judge by the starting
and shying of Diamond, Diamond’s master was nervous, or in excessive
haste. The moor-hen and her brood fled away uncoveted from beneath the
hoofs of the steed. The goats browzed unnoticed, or skipped from point
to point of the grey rocks under which the road wound for a part of the
way. The startling echo of the sportsman’s fowling-piece, sent back by
these fells, only made James look round to see if any timid girls were
in sight who might be alarmed by the shock. He was as much startled
himself as any timid girl, when he heard, in his passage through the
park, a rustling among the underwood and high ferns in just such a
corner as the twins might have chosen, for its shade and retirement, to
rest in. But it was only a fawn which burst away from his doubtful call,
as Sarah had done from his appointment. He was sorry and out of humour
at coming so soon in sight of the party he proposed to join.
They did not see him—so busy were they with their sport. The horses,
which were loose and grazing near, looked up, tossed their heads, and
began to graze again. A boatman, sitting in a skiff that lay in the dark
reflection of the oaks and hollies which clothed the island in the
middle of the river, touched his hat. But the party about Moy’s-pool
(the most promising pool in the whole length of the river) were too much
occupied with their sport to look behind them, or to listen for horses’
hoofs. Fish lay heaped and scattered on the grass; and more was being
drawn. Richard, who was stretched at length, showed himself interested
in as far as he had raised himself on his elbow. Fanny herself had hold
of a net; and Wallace and the servants were as active as the occasion of
so large a prey required.
“They do not want me,” thought James, half sulkily. “I shall ride on to
the Paddock, and see about a horse for Fanny, and—whether those girls
are home.”
Diamond’s hoofs made a crash on the small pebbles as he turned back to
the road. Fanny had so much to tell and to show, about how long they had
been expecting him, how they had wished for him, and what feats they had
performed without him, that James dismounted to admire the plumpness of
the char, and to verify Wallace’s boast that that fat old fellow that he
had just caught weighed two pounds. It was not long before James was
trying whether he could not draw one which would weigh two pounds and an
ounce.
CHAPTER IV.
CLERICAL RECREATIONS.
James was indefatigable in his exertions to get his sister suited with a
horse. He was at the Paddock every day for a fortnight; and he would not
be satisfied without Fanny’s going there too, to try one and another
horse in the fields behind the stables. Sometimes the girls came out,
curtseying to the young lady, and giving an opinion when asked. Fanny
delighted her brother by a spontaneous exclamation about their beauty,
the first time she saw them: but she presently vexed him by being
extremely amused at their perfect likeness. If it had not been that a
young greyhound was for ever in attendance upon one, Fanny could not
have pretended to distinguish them. James told her she had no eyes.
“They are all stupid alike,” muttered he. “That greyhound has more sense
than any of them. It is only three days since I gave him to her, and
_he_ never mistakes Anne for her, in the dusk or in the daylight. To
talk of their eyes being alike! as if colour was everything in eyes!
Anne’s are pretty enough; but they never had such a light in them as
Sarah’s. And then the blush——I thought Fanny had been fond enough of her
garden to know the difference between a folded convolvulus (which is a
graceful thing enough in its way) and one that is glowing in dew when
the sun has just expanded it.”
A very short dialogue showed Fanny which it was that James preferred. It
would not have been necessary, if she had known how Sarah came by the
greyhound.
“What a pretty creature Anne is!” observed Fanny, when, with a smile,
Anne opened the gate, for her horse to pass into the field.
“Beautiful,” cried James, with enthusiasm. “O, she is a beautiful
creature!”
“You think her the prettiest,—you like her the best of the two?”
“No,” said he, with sudden quietness; “I admire Sarah the most.”
This made Fanny turn her head to take another look; but it was Anne who
gazed after them. Sarah was busy with her dog Fido.
James was not wrong in his observations on eyes. A new light had fixed
itself in Sarah’s; and if he did not perceive something of the same kind
in Anne’s, it was perhaps owing to the light being often troubled, and
sometimes dimmed. The serenity of both was gone. Sarah did not wish it
back again. Anne did; every hour between rising and rest.
They had ceased to move together,—unavoidably, when one had a dog and
the other had not,—but neither was yet awake to the fact that they no
longer thought and felt alike. One morning they sat, like the reflection
of each other, on either side of a work-table: each making herself a
frill of the same material; each with her footstool: and that the left
foot of the one, and the right of the other was advanced, only made the
resemblance more complete. The difference was that Anne attended to her
work, while Sarah peered anxiously through the glass door which
communicated with the office, where her father might be seen reading a
letter. After a while, Anne reared her chin to try on the frill.
“Let me see how yours looks,” said she. “Sarah! here is mine finished;
and yours is not done!”
Sarah began to ply her needle, uneasy at being left behind. Anne amused
herself with stroking and coaxing the greyhound. She did not think of
beginning any other employment till Sarah should be ready.
“I wonder why Mr. Cranston did not give me a greyhound!” observed Anne.
“I dare say my father will,” replied Sarah.
“But I had rather Mr. Cranston had. I am afraid,—I am pretty sure, Mr.
Cranston does not like me.”
“O yes, he does.”
“How do you know? Did he tell you so?—Why did not he tell me? He never
told me that he liked you.”
A deep blush spread itself over Sarah’s cheeks.
“I never saw anybody like Mr. Cranston,” pursued Anne. “None of the
gentlemen that have passed through A—— have been the least like him.”
“O, no: nor ever will.”
“His manner is so—I don’t know what. And his voice——”
“You may know it among a hundred;—as far off as you can hear it.”
“It goes through one’s heart.—How dull the day is now when he does not
come!”
“But he does come every day.”
“No: not last Wednesday.”
“O yes! he did. But he did not stay very long: and you were in the field
with George, looking after the foal. He has never once missed a day
yet.”
Anne’s face was crimson while she asked why she had not seen him; why
she had not been told: why——she stopped because she could not go on, and
Sarah had nothing more to say than that she did not see that there was
any particular occasion for telling.
“Where did he come?” demanded Anne. “Was he in this room, or in the
paddock, or where?”
“I had my bonnet on, just coming to you in the field,” replied Sarah:—
“my bonnet _was_ on; and so I went with him;—he wanted to show me
something in the park.”
“Why did not you call me? I could have come in a moment.”
Sarah did not raise her eyes while she said in a low voice that Mr.
Cranston did not wish it. She was not very much taken by surprise when
she saw Anne, an instant after, in a passion of tears. Her own were
streaming immediately, while she hoped Anne was not very angry with her.
Indeed she could not help it.—Whatever might be the mixture of feelings
which embittered Anne’s tears, she spoke only of her sister’s reserve.
Her reproaches were very grievous, till Sarah’s patient sorrow softened
her in spite of herself. She had had no comfort of her life, for some
time past, she declared. There was always something to expect and be
afraid of. She could not help wishing Mr. Cranston to come, and yet she
was often glad when he went away. He never came but something
disagreeable passed. She did not think he would have been so careful to
give her back her thimble, that he had got from the turnpike-house. It
had prevented her daring to give him anything, for fear he should refuse
it; and yet he had seemed to be very much pleased with the purse Sarah
had netted for him. She supposed Sarah had found out that she had felt
mortified often lately; for nobody could help seeing that Sarah had
taken a great deal upon her lately;—more than anybody could have
expected that had always known them.
Sarah tried to speak calmly while she answered that she had never
intended to take more upon her than she should. She could truly say she
had been more sorry for Anne than she had ever been for any one in her
life. She had hoped, every time that Miss Cranston came, that either the
eldest Mr. Cranston or Mr. Wallace would come with her, instead of the
one that did come:—she was so certain that either of them must like Anne
quite as well as the one that did come liked her.
Anne saw that all was over. She declared she did not want to be liked by
anybody, sent the dog away from her knee with a rebuke, and left the
room.
It was not long before Sarah was again by her side; not to comfort or
condole, but to consult with her. She had been so completely thrown out
by the failure of what she meant for sympathy, just now, that she did
not venture to touch upon any matter of feeling with Anne. She had, in
ten minutes, grown almost as much afraid of her as of a stranger: but
she felt herself less able than ever to act without Anne’s opinion.
“Do you know, Anne, I do believe there is going to be an expedition
to-night or to-morrow night!”
“I dare say there is. I saw my father reading a letter from London; and
he sent George out to A——, directly after. Why should not there be an
expedition, as there has been often before?”
“It is so different now from what it was before, when the family were
not here!”
“Yes: our party will not have all their own way any longer. I suppose
the woodmen must take some notice, now; and Mr. Morse has grown violent
against the poachers, they say, since there has been some use in keeping
up the game, as he says. Alick Morse says his father has as good a mind
to dodge a poacher now as a stoat has to dodge a hare.”
“That is a bright thing for Alick Morse to say. But I am afraid of their
coming to a fight, Anne.”
“O, I’m not afraid of what would come of a fight. Our party is too
strong to take any harm; and they will do none to Alick and the other
woodman; and Mr. Morse won’t run himself into danger against the party.”
“I was not thinking of the Morses,” replied Sarah, wondering at her
sister’s dulness. “If the Mr. Cranstons mean to do what they say——”
“Ah! to be sure,” cried Anne. “They can’t know what a party they would
have to come out against.”
“So, let us go and tell them,” said Sarah, briskly.
Anne stared in astonishment. To go and inform against their family and
their neighbours; to provide for the discomfiture of their own party; to
prevent their father from executing the orders which brought him in as
much as his trade in horses;—to do this confounded all Anne’s notions of
right and wrong. Sarah must be out of her mind to think of such a thing.
The more vehement she was in saying this, the more inclined Sarah was to
go and entreat the family not to enter the woods at night, whatever
might be going on there. If she could prevail,—(and if she saw James,
she had no doubt of prevailing,)—all danger to both parties might be
avoided. If Anne would not accompany her, she thought she should go
alone.
“You shall not,” said Anne. “If you think of such a thing, I will run
and tell my father.”
“No, you will not,” said Sarah, with quivering lips. “We never told my
father of one another in our lives.”
“You never thought of doing such a thing as this in your life. I shall
make haste and tell him.”
They did not know that their father had just gone out. The moment Anne
had turned her back, Sarah seized her bonnet,—(her field bonnet and
gloves, for there was no time to run up for those in which she would
have wished to appear at Fellbrow,)—and was gone from under the archway
before any one noticed her escape, except Fido, against whom, in her
hurry, she had shut the door, but who found his way to his mistress
through an open window.
While she was breathlessly crossing a corner of the park, she fell in
with Alick Morse, who sheepishly smiled and pulled off his hat.
“O, Alick, I am glad I met you. Can you tell me where the gentlemen are?
Are they abroad to-day?”
Alick pointed towards the mansion, as much as to say that they were
there. His smile had vanished: for if she was going up there, among the
gentry, he could not walk with her, as he was about to offer to do.
“How is your father, as relates to the game?”
“Very cross, Miss Sarah. But now that I catch you alone, by a chance,—
for I never had the chance before,—I want to say——”
“But I want to hear about the game and your father.”
“Well, the long and short is, I think he gets no rest for the game,
night nor day. The gentlemen,—the two younger,—are after his own heart;
for they have him up early every fine morning, after some sport or
other; and he likes, as he says, making up for all the years he has been
idle. But, dear me! ’tis at night he makes up most for all the sleep he
had all those years. There’s not a bough can rustle, nor a gust moan,
but he is up, and out to watch.”
“And there has been no cause, lately.—You look sly, as if you thought
there soon would be.”
“Perhaps you know as much about it as I, Miss Sarah, and perhaps more.
But there is no use in disturbing my father’s mind, if you should chance
to meet him. Well now, if there be not——Dear me, I suppose I must go!
Who would have thought of any gentry sitting reading out of doors
to-day!”
“Yes: it is Mr. Cranston and Miss Cranston. You must go, Alick.”
Alick withdrew within the verge of the wood, and Sarah and Fido advanced
to the bench where Richard and Fanny were sitting in the late autumnal
sunshine, each with a book, and neither of them reading.—Sarah said that
she came to speak to Mr. Cranston, the clergyman; but if he was not at
home, she would speak now what she meant to say. Richard was always
afraid of the propounding of any matter of business; and was therefore
as willing to help her to an interview with James as Fanny was, because
she perceived that James was the one whom Sarah wished to see. James had
just gone towards the stables, and was coming directly in his gig to
take up his sister, whom he was going to drive over to his living. If
Sarah went straight from hence towards the stables, she could not miss
him.
She did not miss him. He was approaching in his gig; and in another
minute, notwithstanding an abundance of protestations, blushes and
tremors, Sarah filled Miss Cranston’s place in the vehicle, and a
circuitous road was found to the park gates, by which another sight of
the reading party was avoided. James never used any ceremony with his
sister; he declared she had a sort of pride in not keeping her
appointments; so she was fair game. Ten to one, too, that she preferred
dawdling with Richard till dinner-time; and Sarah could say what she
wanted much better in the gig; and, besides, James had always wished to
show her the house he was building, and to see how she liked it; and
there could not be a better opportunity than now.
When Sarah returned, hoping, but not assured, that James would leave the
poachers to their own devices, her sister asked her no questions as to
where she had been all this long time. Anne had also repented, before
her father appeared again in the office, of her resolution to inform
against her sister. There was peace between them, and they were at
liberty to communicate their speculations upon the expedition which they
were now certain was intended for to-night. There was more than usual
preparation made, as soon as it grew dusk, in stocking the office with
bottles and cans, with stools, pipes and tobacco, and sawdust, strewn
lest any feet should bring in marks of blood—the blood of man, or of
beast or fowl. The girls were sent up to bed earlier than usual. They
found it extremely vexatious that their chamber looked towards the
street, so that they could not see the poachers drop in through the
Paddock. Mr. Taplin, the assessor, called between nine and ten—as they
supposed, at a very inconvenient time; and they could imagine how vexed
their father must be at his staying so long. He certainly did not go
away before they gave over watching for his departure.
Sarah little knew her lover yet if she really confided in his keeping at
home when he knew that poachers were abroad. All the evening he was
rousing, or trying to rouse, his brother to the due degree of
indignation at being despoiled of his property in so provoking a way. He
paid as much for every family of pheasants as would bring up ten broods
of fowls. Large sums were stopped off his rents for damage done by his
hares. His deer were kept within bounds at a great expense. He paid duty
for gamekeepers, horses, and dogs used in his sports; and yet the game,
for which all this cost was incurred, was to be taken by a set of
wretches who would be beneath notice but for their power of doing
mischief. If they were stout young men, who came for the frolic of the
thing, he should not be so angry; but, as far as he could learn——
Nobody could imagine where and how James managed to learn who and what
the poachers were.
That did not matter; he had good authority for what he said,—that one
boy, at least, was sent out to set snares—sent out by himself, or with
only his father,—not amidst any bustle and frolic, but coolly, and as
the agent of a theft. Then, of those who went out at night, some enjoyed
the sport; but the greater number joined to get drink and money for
their services as guard. The shoemaker, and the chimney-sweeper, and the
constable——
The constable!
Yes. The constable went out to break heads, if need were, in defiance of
the law. These men were considered too clumsy to be employed in taking
the game: but they could carry bludgeons, for the consideration of a
glass of gin, and a dividend from the poulterers; through what hands
delivered, his brother might be surprised, some day, to learn.
Richard was willing to wait for that day. As long as they let him alone,
they were welcome to anything that was in the park. If they left him
deer enough to please his eye as he sat under the trees, and birds
enough for his brothers’ sports, his purposes were answered. He was glad
they could amuse themselves with his property while he was asleep. This
last word brought on him an appeal under the head of morals. Poachers
were always utterly corrupted, if their practices were long unchecked;
like most people (unless the members of the House of Commons might be
excepted) whose work is done at night instead of in the day. Instead of
the shoemaker taking up his awl, or the chimney-sweeper his sack, with
the spirit that the morning naturally brings with it, these creatures
would stagger home at dawn, and be thrown into bed for the day, while
their wives must invent lies which their children are to tell, in excuse
for their not being seen at their work. Richard could not deny that such
an order of affairs was a bad one; but did not see how his arm could
arrest a host of poachers; and he could not possibly be answerable for
the morals of the shoemakers and constables of A——.
As nothing more was to be made of Richard, his brothers left him, and
prepared for a long and wary walk. Mrs. Day turned pale, and Fanny was
very grave when the bustle of assembling their home forces began in the
hall; when strips of something white were called for to be put round the
hats, to distinguish friends from enemies; when pistols gleamed; and
when deep voices from the court pronounced it a sharp, starlight night.
“Who is that tall man, James?” whispered Fanny, who was looking on from
the stairs. “The one on the steps, I mean.”
“Who are you?” asked James, going up to the person.
It was Richard. Of course, he did not mean to stay behind, if his
brothers chose to spoil sport. Thus, Fanny and Mrs. Day were to be left
to listen from the windows, without the support of any person qualified
to laugh at what was really foolish in their apprehensions. With
chattering teeth, with shawls drawn over their heads, did they lean out
of the window of the darkened drawing-room, trusting that, if there
should be any shot, they should have notice of it from the face of the
rock below.
The gentlemen and their servants proceeded first to Morse’s cottage. He
was not at home; but Alick was,—looking out of the window, as was the
fashion this night. His father had gone out some time ago, he said,
fancying, as he did every night, that he heard a noise somewhere. The
wonder was that he was not back yet. Alick was pressed into the service
to go and seek for him.
Nothing could be more exciting to the young men than their walk through
the wood, treading cautiously on the thick strewn leaves, and mistaking
every sigh of the gust among the naked boughs for the coming forth of an
enemy from ambush. The stars, bright as they were, gave too little light
to be of much service amidst the trees; and a guide was appointed from
among the servants to lead the way to the woodman’s cottage. When he
reached the fence which surrounded it, he turned to whisper,
“They can’t be far off now, sir. There is a man up in that tree. If you
will stand where I do, you will see him.”
“Come down, whoever you are!” said James. “Come down, or I’ll fire!”
“For mercy’s sake, sir, don’t!” cried a voice which had nothing very
manly in it; and the dark form was seen to be descending with all speed.
“What was he doing there?” asked Richard, as a boy was pulled by the
collar into his immediate presence. “Stealing walnuts! What brought you
out, you little wretch, to steal walnuts?”
He had been told by his father to stay here till the party came past on
their way home, lest he should get a mischief; and he thought he might
as well be doing something, like the rest of them. He had tried the
hen-roost first; but some of the party had been there before him, and
there was nothing left for him but the walnuts; and they were only the
gleanings, after the best part of the crop had been gathered. He had
news to give of the keeper. He had seen him taken.—Taken?—Ay; skulking
behind this cottage, to watch the poachers. It seemed to him that
somebody from within had given notice that he was there. However that
might be, Morse’s gun was taken from him, and he was carried off. Such
was the story told by George Swallow.
The inmate of this cottage was sound asleep, if prodigious snoring might
be taken as a test. He was not allowed further repose, but summoned to
bring out his gun; and George Swallow was left tenant of the house,—tied
by the leg to the bed-post.
If the gentlemen had come out in pursuit of game, they could have
started none more tempting than the fine stag which, being roused from
its lair, stood for an instant gazing on them from a distance of forty
paces. Wallace had a cry of admiration ready as the graceful creature
stood in the dim light; but before he could utter it,—before the animal
could bound away, a perfectly aimed shot came from some other quarter;
and instantly a large body of men crowded round the fallen stag. In vain
was the signal of silence given by Mr. Cranston, and most earnestly
propagated by Alick and the other woodman. Wallace shouted, James echoed
him, and the servants followed. The poachers rushed forward. A gun was
fired; by whom, and with what effect, nobody knew at the moment. A
second shot ensued, whose consequences were immediately perceived by Mr.
Cranston’s party. Alick sunk down with a cry like that of a woman. His
father knew the voice, and sprang from among his captors to the side of
his son. The fight which ensued was very harmless, the poachers
perceiving that they were in no danger from such a handful of enemies.
With the most provoking coolness, they retreated, carrying their game
with them, and only laughing at the pursuit of their foes. If they would
only have been angry, and gone on fighting, there would have been some
consolation. But they would fight no more.
Neither did they sport any more; at least, not visibly nor audibly. As
it was undesirable that they should be tracked to their place of
carouse, and as it was necessary to cut up their venison into a more
portable state, they retired behind Whitford’s granary, and there took
up a strong position, rightly supposing that the enemy would see no use
or safety in watching them for any length of time. While knives were
being plied with skill upon the venison, those who were not wanted for
the work thought it a pity they should be idle. A sheep of Whitford’s
was abstracted from the flock by one detachment, while another sought
the place where the granary had been last tapped, and drew a further
supply of fine wheat which was pretty sure not to be missed. In these
expeditions, it was a rule of morals to employ every man according to
his capacity. Those who could neither kill game nor cut it up delicately
were very capable of boring a hole in the floor of a loft full of corn,
and, when the bag was filled, of stopping up the hole with a cork till
next time. This done, all proved themselves capable of swearing
fellowship and drinking more or less gin or other spirit in Swallow’s
office, whether or not they could sing such songs as frightened the twin
sisters from their sleep in the farthest corner of the house.
On this occasion, the sisters were spared the panic suffered by Mrs. Day
and Fanny, when a wounded man was brought in to be put to bed, and
supposed dying till the surgeon could be summoned to see him. Fanny’s
satisfaction at her brothers’ coming home safe was much impaired by the
moodiness of their countenances, which seemed to betoken that the strife
with their neighbours was not at an end.
CHAPTER V.
VOWED SISTERHOOD.
Poor Alick Morse died in three days. The brothers did not wait for the
event to show their determination to put down the practice of poaching
in their neighbourhood. Several suspected persons at A—— were brought up
before the magistrates, the morning after the adventure; some of them
being caught (before they had completely emerged from their drunken fit)
with sheep’s wool or grains of corn stuck with blood to their
shoe-soles, or their hands blackened with powder, or smelling of
venison. George Swallow was committed, with all ceremony; and the county
was pledged to prosecute him for his theft of five walnuts. His father
offered to whip him to any extent their worships might think proper; but
it was decided that he should be consigned to vagabond society in gaol
for a couple of months, and cause the county an expense of the requisite
number of pounds, in order to his being finally condemned to four days’
imprisonment. When poor Alick died, (after having been removed, by his
father’s peremptory desire, to his cottage,) Morse was much cheered by
seeing his natural office of avenger of blood so well filled as it was
by his two younger masters, who actually dogged the heels of the
reluctant constable, to see that he did his duty in taking up the
suspected. The only thing that vexed the gamekeeper was Mr. James’s
obstinacy in disbelieving that Swallow had anything to do in the affair.
There was more reason for arresting Swallow than many another that was
marched before their worships: but James quashed every hint in this
man’s disfavour; and Swallow might be seen exhibiting himself about his
own premises with an air of triumph equally offensive to his accomplices
and to him whom some believed him to have most deeply injured.
“Come, come, my poor fellow,” said James to Morse, “let us have no more
of this. I cannot listen to an information that has so little in it as
yours. Tell me of anything else that I can do for you, Morse. Would it
be a satisfaction to you that I should bury your son?”
Morse uncovered his grizzled locks, and a deeper red than usual burned
in his jolly cheeks, as he acknowledged the young clergyman’s kindness.
He did not think Alick had supposed his young master would do him this
honour, though the poor lad had brought himself to ask whether his
father believed that a funeral sermon would be preached for him.
“There shall be one, certainly, if it will be any satisfaction to you. I
should not wonder at your desiring it; but what could make Alick wish
it?”
“He liked the idea that Sarah Swallow would hear him made much of, sir.
In fact, sir, he left his silver-topped gin-bottle to the parson, if he
made her cry at his funeral sermon. Hope no offence, sir?”
James had an idea that he had a better chance of making Sarah cry than
any other parson in the world. He was pretty sure of the gin-bottle, if
he chose to try for it: but he was heartily vexed that he had promised
the sermon. While he was meditating his next evasion, Morse went on,—
“And since you have been so ready about the sermon, sir, perhaps you
have no objection to be accommodating about the text?”
“None in the world,” replied James, hoping that the matter would end in
the necessity of making Sarah laugh. “Let me hear.”
“Perhaps you remember, sir, the text about the soul——something about the
bird and the snare of the fowler. My son thought that text would tell
that the manner of his death was by poachers.”
“As if everybody did not know that already!” muttered James. “Well,
Morse; make yourself easy.”
“And you may depend, sir, on having the gin-bottle on the Monday
morning.”
“And when is the funeral to be, Morse?”
“Why, sir, they say it must be to-morrow, sir. The undertaker says so,
sir; or else——”
“To-morrow! D—n it!” muttered James. “Wallace and I had fixed to-morrow
for a morning’s shooting; and it is the last day we shall have this
week. Morse, did your master say he could spare you to-morrow?”
“He did, sir. I am as sorry as you can be to spoil sport in such a way.
But the undertaker is positive.”
“Then there is no help for it. I am not going back from my word, Morse.”
It was a most delicious morning for sport. James came down with a
countenance as black as night. Wallace was making ready to go forth. He
only waited to know whether James meant to meet him in A——, some hours
hence, on business relating to these poachers. Certainly. James thought
he might as well get two irksome engagements fulfilled in one day. He
would meet Wallace at the Turk’s Head in the afternoon.
“Bless me! I’m late, I suppose,” cried he. “Here’s poor Morse himself
coming to look after me. That punch was so confoundedly strong last
night, I could not wake for the life of me this morning. Coming, Morse.
I’m sorry if I’m late; but I dare say you have got a methodist or two
from A——, and they will entertain your company with a hymn till we get
up to beat their cover. Don’t hurry yourself, my poor fellow.”
“By no means, sir. But what I came for was——I hate to spoil sport, sir,
and it is a rare morning; and so, sir, if you will make me sure of the
sermon, I’ll let you off this morning’s work, and secure you the
gin-bottle, all the same.”
“Now I call that kind, Morse.”
“And when I have seen him earthed, sir——”
“Ah! you will hardly know what to do with yourself. Suppose you look for
the text you mentioned; and by the time you have found it for me, we
shall have something to amuse you with—about what is done with the
poachers at A——.”
It did not appear, in the sequel, that looking out texts was precisely
the occupation that best suited Morse, even on this occasion. As Fanny
and Mrs. Day were walking, a little after noon, in a field at some
distance from the park, they saw Morse, with his gun on his arm, and his
dog snuffing about at a little distance. Fanny’s feelings for the bereft
father would have led her to avoid intruding upon him to-day; but he
bent his steps towards her. He evidently meant to accost her, and she
therefore broke the ice.
“What brought you here, Morse? Where have you been walking?”
“I’ve been no farther than Lye Wood. I’ve been to my son’s funeral not
far from there; and I thought I would try the cover as I came back. Now
I’ve happened to meet you, ladies, I am glad I let off the young parson
from the funeral. He would have been with me, as I’ve taken the sporting
circuit instead of the straight road; and it is of him that I am going
to speak. No harm, or no great harm,” said he to Mrs. Day, who had
turned pale through some undefined apprehension of evil. “No greater
harm, ladies, than his making love down yonder; making love, as all
young men do.”
“What do you mean? Making love to whom? What sort of person is she?”
hastily inquired Mrs. Day.
“You may guess it is to no unfitting person,” replied Morse; “for my
poor son meant to have had her himself, if he had but lived. ’Tis Sarah
Swallow that I mean; and all I tell you for is, that he may not make her
his lady, as the folks have it he means to do. Her father looks boastful
enough to put it into every one’s head; and I myself saw them in the gig
together when, it is my belief, she had been to view his new house,
where he will be taking her to live, one of these days, if you don’t
look to it.”
“I was pretty sure he was in love,” said Fanny. “I have thought so this
fortnight past.”
“Breast-high,” observed Morse.
“This young person must be sent away immediately,” declared Mrs. Day.
“We must speak to Mr. Cranston directly, Fanny, and get it done.”
“You will hardly manage that,” said Fanny, “unless the girl has done
something wrong. How can we send her away? What right have we to quarrel
with her having a lover?”
“The scent will lie too strong; you’ll never break it. He will start
after her,” solemnly declared Morse.
“But, Fanny, you would not send away your brother; you would not attempt
it, if you consider this new living that he has to attend to. Besides, I
believe he would not go.”
“Certainly not, if he is in love. Why send away either of them? Why
roughen the course of true love?”
“My dear, think of the consequences! You are so strangely wild, Fanny,
sometimes. Think of the consequences, if they stay in the same
neighbourhood,—one of the Mr. Cranstons marrying the daughter of a
country horse-dealer!”
Fanny thought the real wildness and folly was in people’s loving one
person and marrying another. If James and Sarah loved each other, she,
for one, should not dare to interfere between them. Once convinced of
the fact of their attachment, she would offer herself as a sister to
Sarah Swallow, even if Sarah were herself a horse-dealer, and rode to
the fair at the end of a string of her own quadrupeds.
“I suppose, then, you will be for going to vow sisterhood with this
girl, this moment,” said Mrs. Day, with much vexation in her tone. “You
will do your best to assist the scandal against your family, Fanny.”
“I shall vow nothing till I know whether they are in love. If they are—
(I put it to you, Mrs. Day)—if they are in love, which is the greater
scandal—that the wedded in heart should be wedded in hand, or that he
should break this poor girl’s heart, and give his hand to somebody
else?”
“You do not choose to look into consequences, Fanny; you will not, or
you would see what would become of society, if young men of family are
to marry in such a way, on pretence of being in love.”
Fanny would not allow the word “pretence.” Pretence is not used to
secure disadvantages—of alliance or anything else. She also declared
that she did look very far into consequences,—into the cold married life
of the lover, and the dreary lot of the deserted, and all the crimes
which must be perpetrated on all hands before hearts that cling can be
separated.
“But, my dear, only look at what will happen in such a case as this.
The——”
“I see,—the endless troubles of a horse-dealer’s daughter in polished
society; (for I suppose we Cranstons are more or less polished in
London, however wild we may be here.) I grant you all these troubles;
but they are better than broken or hardened hearts. Depend upon it, Mrs.
Day, these are cases for prevention, not cure.”
“What else have I been saying, Fanny? I want to send her away before it
is too late.”
“It is too late, in this case,—always provided that they really love.
God has joined them, and I will not help to put them asunder. What I
mean about prevention and cure is, that people should be prepared to
love in the right place—where there is equality, not of rank, but of
mind. Till then, I am for love—true love—leading on to marriage, sooner
or later, as naturally as dawn leads on to perfect day.”
“But I have no doubt this is a mere fancy of your brother’s,—a mere
pastime while he is in the country.”
“Ah! that is altogether another question. I agree with you that it is
far too likely: but in that case, it is particularly necessary that I
should make a friend of this good girl; for I am sure she is a good
girl.”
“She is, Miss Cranston,” averred Morse.
“I may save her from a bitter disappointment, or prepare her, in some
degree, for it,” added Fanny. “But, Mrs. Day, I rather think my
brothers, and thousands more, would never dream of such cruel sport—
would have no such fancies—if it was a natural and a settled thing that
they should marry where they love.”
“So you are going to run down to this young person, and put it into her
head that it is her duty and your brother’s that they should marry!”
“If that is not in her head already, Mrs. Day, she will spurn me for
trying to put it there, you may be quite sure, if Sarah has the true
woman’s heart; and she is too young to have a more sophisticated one. I
am going; but I am afraid you will not be my companion.”
“Certainly not, till I have spoken to Mr. Cranston.”
“Poor Richard!” thought Fanny; “it would be rather burdensome to him to
have to alter the laws of nature, to evade the talk of our London
acquaintance. I don’t think Mrs. Day will persuade him to try.——
Good-bye, Mrs. Day. If this news is not true, perhaps I shall be as glad
as you; if it is true, I really advise you to try to be as content as I
shall be, and (I think I may say) Richard too.”——
Of course, Mrs. Day shook her head. She turned back in the direction of
Fellbrow; while Fanny proceeded towards the Paddock—not with her usual
step, but sometimes lingering under the hedges, and sometimes hastening.
Her heart was in a kind of tumult,—now fluttering with pleasure—a new
kind of pleasure—at the idea of a brother being in love, (an event which
she had long looked for in vain in Richard’s case,) and now full of
anxiety lest there should be a lowness of heart and mind, as well as of
birth, in Sarah, which should injure or extinguish the love. Fanny was a
somewhat partial sister; and she was not aware how essentially vulgar
was the mind of him before whom heads were uncovered, as if, because he
was a clergyman, he must be a wise and good man.
Fanny was herself surprised at the time she had lost when the church
clock of A—— gave out the hour, just as she had succeeded in dragging
down a lofty hazel-bough, and in obtaining the last nut that danced in
the air with it. She reproached herself duly for the divers blackberry
stains she had incurred, and crossed the last stile of Whitford’s
fields, into the road which led to the Paddock and to A——. Here she
walked on with all sobriety, pondering the ground rather than the high
hazel-boughs, till she was roused by a shout of many voices—a din which
alarmed her. Looking up, she saw the twins, preceded by Fido, flying
along the road towards her; while, some way behind them, just at the
entrance of the town, appeared a rushing crowd, from which proceeded the
clamour. The girls eagerly waved to her to turn back, and were evidently
exhausting their own strength in flight. “An over-driven bullock,”
thought Fanny, turning, and making for the stile she had crossed. She
reached and passed it; and then, supposing herself in a perfectly safe
place, she leaned over to make a signal to the girls that here their
flight might end. They could not speak when they approached; but they
made vehement signs that she must not stand there. It was, indeed, a
dog, and not a bullock, that was being chased. She saw the creature
making along the road, and could recognize the peculiar carriage which
denoted its madness. She was in agony for the exhausted girls, who were
actually stumbling amidst their attempts to reach the stile. The dog
might take it into his head to fly at them over, or through, the stile;
but it was worth any exertion to get them out of the direct path of the
animal. She stood on the middle rail, and stretched out her arms to
them; while Fido leaped backwards and forwards between her and them.
They made another effort, when they heard from her the words—“A barn!
here is a barn!” One reached and threw herself upon her, was dragged
over, and fell on the grass; the other, Sarah, was somewhat stronger,
and helped to lift up Anne, and pull her towards the barn, whose wide
doors stood open. The thresher was wondering what all this could mean,
when he stopped work, so as to hear something besides his own flail. The
dog appeared, leaping through the stile, and explained everything. The
girls were rudely pushed into the barn, and the doors closed upon them.
Fido would not come in. “Tie him up! tie him up!” cried Sarah through
the door. “Ay, ay,” answered the thresher from without. They hoped that
Fido was safe at the back of the building; and were spared the sight of
the dashing out of the mad creature’s brains by the flail of the
thresher.
“Do give us air,” cried Fanny, when he put his head in to tell them all
was safe. “These girls seem suffocating. May we have the doors open?”
Each pretty creature lay panting on the great heap of straw, while their
friend fanned them with her hat; they looking as if they would intreat
her not to trouble herself, if they could but find voice. How fresh came
in the cool air,—how bright did the pale sunshine look,—when the doors
were once more thrown wide! When the crowd were convinced that nothing
more was to be expected from the dog, and that the best chance of
amusement lay in finding out how many people he might have bitten in the
town, the field was presently cleared, and the thresher returned to the
barn.
While wiping his flail, preparatory to using it again, he growled and
grumbled about the danger from mad dogs, and its increase of late. In
his young days, nobody thought of dogs being mad later in the year than
September. We should soon be subject to them all the year round, he
supposed.
Fanny supposed this individual dog had been driven mad by some
particular accident or ill-usage. As for the rest, how was it to be
helped? Did the thresher mean to say that it was any body’s fault that
there were more mad dogs than formerly?
“Ay, ay,” replied the thresher. “If dogs were taxed as they should be,
they would not swarm as they do in the dog-days.”
“But I thought there was abundance of taxation of dogs: I am sure my
brothers pay as much for theirs as would maintain a poor man’s family.
There is a duty of six-and-thirty pounds on their pack of hounds, in the
first place; and then fourteen shillings a-head on all their other dogs,
which are not a few.”
“Very well—very right,” observed the thresher. “Your brothers are not
the gentlemen to grumble at paying for luxuries, I dare say, any more
than these young ladies have hitherto grudged their pound a year for the
pretty creature behind there,” nodding towards the back of the barn. The
girls looked at one another, not having been aware that the possession
of Fido would bring upon Sarah or her father the expense of a pound a
year duty.
Fanny thought nothing could be more proper than that her brothers should
pay duty for their luxuries, whether of dogs, horses, or any thing else.
If they grew displeased with the expense, they had only to give up the
indulgence, which was more than the poor man could do in regard to the
taxed articles used by him. She only mentioned what her brothers paid
because the thresher seemed to think dogs were not sufficiently taxed.
The thresher thought so still. He did not want that dogs used for such
real and useful service as his boy’s dog on the sheep-walk above should
be taxed. When Mr. Taplin had tried to make out, last appeal day, that
that dog belonged to Mr. Whitford, and ought to pay duty, the thresher
had successfully opposed him, and the Commissioners had decided that a
shepherd’s dog used in the shepherd’s business, should be exempt. But it
was a very different thing, allowing dogs to go free of duty because
they belong to the poor; and letting a vast number go unaccounted for in
compounding for taxes. If poor men keep dogs for a luxury, let them pay
more or less for this luxury, since it is one that brings mischief after
it if too extensively used; and it is not difficult to draw the line
between these dogs and those which help the poor man in his occupation,—
such as butchers’ and drovers’ dogs.
“I am sure,” said Fanny, “I have seen hundreds of dogs in London, whose
masters can pay no tax, to judge by the plight of the poor animals.”
“Just so, ma’am. Half-starved and neglected as they are, they roam the
streets just in a condition to turn mad as soon as hot weather comes;
and as this is a sort of luxury that cannot be left to the poor man with
safety to his neighbours, it is only fair, in my opinion, to put some
restraint upon it. I would let the charge of eight shillings a year lie
on all the inferior kinds of dogs but those used in business; and to
make sure, every dog should by law have a collar with his master’s name
upon it, and the place where the duty is paid. If this was done, and the
constables had power to destroy all dogs that have no collars, and that
are not owned after due notice, we should hear little more of deaths
from mad dogs, and the government would find its profit,—and a fair
profit,—from such a plan.”
“There would be more to pay the duty, you think, as well as fewer to
keep dogs?”
“No doubt of it, ma’am. Mr. Taplin says the number of dogs accounted for
to the assessors in this country is between three and four hundred
thousand, besides packs of hounds,—which are about seventy. Now it is
pretty sure that, of the many thousands more that the assessors cannot
touch, some good number would pay duty, instead of all being put out of
the way.”
“There would be a prodigious slaughter of lurchers, I fancy,” said
Fanny, “to the great displeasure of poachers, and of some who make their
dogs do business, though the business may not be accounted for to the
assessor. One cannot go ten yards in this neighbourhood without seeing a
lurcher. I suppose it is that dog’s cunning that makes it so common near
gentlemen’s seats, and in poor men’s service.”
The thresher turned suddenly to his work again; and the girls arose.
They were all the sooner ready to go for poaching having been mentioned.
“If you will just tell me where you tied up my dog,” said Sarah, after
duly thanking the thresher.
“O, just behind there; you can’t miss him. I dare say he is dead and
half-cold by this time.”
“Dead!” murmured both the girls. The thresher turned round quickly.
“Why, you bade me tie him up, did not you? What would you have?”
“He has hanged the dog!” cried Fanny. “O, how could you do so?”
The thresher was all amazement. He had supposed that the young ladies
were afraid of their own dog after it had been in company with the mad
one, and he had saved them the trouble of hanging it; that was all.—A
kind of trouble he seemed disposed to save the constable, Fanny thought.
Had he drowned any pups, this day?—He could not say but he had,—before
he came to work in the morning.—If the thresher went on at this rate,
drowning pups in the morning, and slaying two dogs at noon, this
district was likely to be pretty safe during his life. Fanny would take
good care, however, to keep her spaniel out of reach of his cruel hands.
“O, his cruel hands!” repeated Sarah, catching the last words as she
reappeared from behind the barn, whither she and her sister had run to
see if poor Fido had any life left in him. The first glance at the
suspended animal, in an attitude of convulsion, was too much for Sarah.
Anne ran on to cut him down with a sickle she had seized in the barn.
Sarah returned, and threw herself at length on the straw, hiding her
face, and sobbing till even the thresher’s soul was moved.
Lord love her! how her fright about the mad dog must have shaken her!
There is no mischief that may not be mended, more or less, wise folks
say; and he would get her another greyhound, if she would not take on
so. Nothing easier than to get a pretty pup of a greyhound for her; and
he would christen it Fido, like the last. He would christen it himself:
for all he was known not to be overfond of encouraging dogs.
“You!” cried Sarah, with flashing eyes. “You bring me a dog! It shall go
straight into the pond if you do.—But it was all my own fault,—for
letting you touch him.—I wish—I wish he had been bitten, and that he had
bitten me again, before I asked you to touch him.—I will never have
another dog as long as I live!”
“O, yes, you will,” whispered Fanny; “you will take another from the
same hand that gave you this.”
“O, Miss Cranston,” wept poor Sarah, “he will never give me another; and
I shall have no heart to take it, after having used this in such a way.—
How shall I tell him?—I’m sure I hope he will not come to the Paddock
to-day.”
“Yes, he will. Let us go and be ready for him.”
“Did he say he should come? Did he tell you——”—Sarah’s blushing face now
looked infinitely less miserable.
“You must tell me,—yes, everything,” said Fanny, smiling. “There is
nobody in the field now. Come and take a walk with me.”
The thresher was furiously at work as they left the barn without
remembering to say another word to him. He swore to himself that the
young gentlemen were welcome to try to please pretty girls, if they
chose. He had had enough of it. There was nothing to be got but abuse
for doing just what they desired.
Anne was the next person to be discontented. When she had completely
tired herself with attempts to resuscitate Fido, with a vague idea in
her mind that she was doing something generous, she came back to her
companions, with a heavy heart and a faltering tongue, to tell that poor
Fido was irrecoverable. She found Sarah smiling consciously, and looking
the picture of happiness, while Miss Cranston’s arm was round her waist,
and it was plain that neither of them was in any want of her, or in any
distress about Fido. She was about to turn in and scold the thresher, as
the most natural way of letting off her wrath, when Miss Cranston called
her.
“Come, Anne, we want you. You are Sarah’s only sister. We want your
leave that she may have another.”
“O, Anne!” said her sister, in sorrowful reproach, when Anne silently
turned her head away to disperse her tears.
“Indeed, I don’t mean——,”—Anne declared,—“I was only taken by surprise.
We did not know, Miss Cranston, what it was right to expect,—what you
might think——”
Miss Cranston did not answer for any one but herself. How matters were
to stand with her she did not leave doubtful. If James had taken Sarah
to see the new house, and learn her wishes about its arrangements, she
could not be wrong in taking Sarah thither once more, to hear what had
been planned, and how she might help to advance everybody’s wishes.
How rapid are the changes of feeling that all are subject to; and how
the most interesting communion of friends may be instantly transformed
into a mere contagion of mirth! An exclamation escaped from all the
three girls, as a hare burst from the dry ditch beside which they were
walking, and made across the field. On passing the barn, she seemed to
be taken possession of by a sudden thought. She turned and sprang in
upon the very heap of straw on which Sarah and her sister had reposed
from their terrors of the chase.—At that moment, two pointers sprang
through the hedge, and followed precisely on her track, while Wallace
appeared in a gap, and James’s voice was heard behind the fence.
With quivering lips, Sarah entreated that nothing might be said of Fido;
and she was assured in return that James would be too eager about this
hare to remember the greyhound, so that she might keep the topic for
some occasion when she could privately explain the whole to James, and
when she would be better able to bear the subject than at present. James
had no attention to spare for the ladies till he had ascertained why his
dogs fidgetted about the barn in so strange a manner. He seemed to be
peremptory with the thresher as to which way the hare was gone, while
the man looked more sulky than ever. Instead of wasting words upon him,
Wallace made bold to search; and in a minute, the poor animal was
exhibited,—its skull having been fractured with his very handy and
diligent flail, and the carcase pushed in beneath the straw. The poor
thresher seemed likely to have no rest from animadversion this day. One
brother now threatened him with an information for killing the animal
sacred to the qualified, while the other heaped curses upon him for
spoiling the sport. No wonder the thresher pronounced his neighbours
hard to please. He was not even allowed to keep the hare,—“to roast the
game that he had killed.” James wanted it,—of course for Sarah; and then
came a race about the field, he trying to throw the carcase, as if it
had been a tippet, over her shoulders, and she naturally wishing to
escape such an adornment She was happily looking away in a struggle to
escape, when he said—
“You had better have brought Fido with you. He would have carried your
game home. As it is, you see I shall be obliged to go with you myself.
Now, don’t you think that is very hard?”
Fanny explained that she was going to carry off Sarah from Fellbrow for
a long ride, instead of letting her go home with her game. James must
now be satisfied why he found the three girls together like sisters; and
it was not long before he was walking between Fanny and Sarah, talking
of his new house.
“Do you know, Fanny,” said he,——“(hold your tongue Sarah, I told you I
would make them laugh at you;) do you know, Fanny, she would have my
house built after the fashion of a shopkeeper’s house in the city. She
thought of nothing but a room or two on the ground-floor, and others
built over them,—and more piled up till we had got as many as we wanted;
with a window stuck here and there wherever we could not possibly do
without one. That is Sarah’s notion of a house.”
Sarah declared that she did not wish the house to be anything but what
Mr. Cranston liked. She was only looking for the house being something
like the new ones on the new road.
“Not knowing the why and because of the case, my dear. Houses run up
like maypoles where ground rents are high: (which is reason enough,
Fanny, why the house-tax should not proceed upon a measurement of square
feet, as some would have it;) and, as for windows, what can be the
reason, do you suppose, that there are not as many in our new houses as
at Fellbrow, where the walls are chequered with lattices? Is it because
Fellbrow is particularly ugly, do you think?”
Sarah had little to say in praise of the beauty of either the
many-windowed Fellbrow mansion, or the new houses where a window
appeared here and there amidst an expanse of red brick.
We might all think there was most beauty in a proportion between the
two, Fanny conjectured, if all were at liberty to consult their taste.
But Richard had told her that it was owing to the window-tax that those
architects were the most popular who put the smallest possible number of
windows into their plans for building. Thus, we might arrive in time at
a national preference for dead wall. But Fanny could not bear the idea
of English streets looking like those of Damascus and other eastern
cities, where you may walk for a mile in an avenue of blank edifices.
James laughed at the notion of such an evasion of taxes as this. The
people of England must become poor indeed, if they denied themselves
light and air to avoid a duty of sixteen shillings and sixpence upon the
lowest,—viz., a house of eight windows,—and of no more than thirty
pounds upon the palace of a hundred windows. The people must, before
this, become as poor as Sarah must suppose him to be, judging from her
anxiety to have his house as dark as she could persuade him to make it.
Sarah had had no such thought as of his being poor. She only judged from
the way that houses were often built now. It must be very bad for the
poor, (who are seldom disposed to be too cleanly,) to be stinted in air
and light. She wished the days would return when houses might be half
made of glass, like that at Fellbrow.
“I do not,” said James: “for there was a worse tax then. The window-tax
indeed was laid on to relieve us from that. There was a tax of two
shillings on every hearth, Sarah. Only think of the bore of having a
tax-gatherer come round, insisting upon going into every room, to see
how many hearths there were! It struck somebody that if windows were
made to pay, instead of hearths, the tax-gatherer might walk round the
outside to count them; which was infinitely less disagreeable than his
presence within. At that time, the poor were not very heavily burdened
by it, and now they are not so burdened at all. Houses with no more than
seven windows then paid twopence a window; and now they pay nothing. So,
for once, you may spare your pity for the poor on account of a tax. This
does not touch them.”
“Then I call it a good tax,” declared Fanny. “Richard shall pay his
share without any murmurs, as he does for his hounds and his horses, if
he means to begin his housekeeping with a good grace. It makes me quite
uncomfortable to think that we pay no more tax upon every pound of soap
or sugar than the poorest of Whitford’s labourers. There is some comfort
in paying for something,—even if it be light and air,—which may come to
them free. I like this window-tax. It seems, too, as if it must be fair
towards those on whom it does fall, if it rises with the number of
windows.”
“It is not so, however. A tenant who takes a 10_l._ house in A——, an
old-fashioned house in one of those half-deserted streets, may have to
pay for sixteen windows, while a London shopkeeper, in a 70_l._ house,
in a first-rate situation, may have to pay only for ten windows. This is
not fair. I like the tax in so far as it is direct,—a prime virtue in a
tax,—and because it falls on none below the middling classes; but I
cannot call it equal.”
“Why, no: the London shopkeeper ought to pay more instead of less
(whether his house be modern or old-fashioned) for living in a good
situation. But, to be sure, he does this in his rent, and, I suppose, in
his house-tax. And yet it seems as if the landlord must at last pay both
the house-tax and the window-tax. How is it? It is a great puzzle.”
“Not at all. When a man is choosing a house, he takes the expense of the
whole into consideration,—the rent, and the house-tax, and the
window-tax. The tenant of the house with many windows in A—— would have
taken a house with fewer windows, if he had not been tempted by the
lowness of the rent; and the London shopkeeper finds himself able to pay
a higher rent for his house than he could have done if it had been more
abundant in windows. Thus, though the tenants may pay the tax into the
collector’s hand, it falls upon the landlords. The one landlord obtains
a lower rent because his windows are many; and the other a higher rent
because his windows are few.”
“Then, if this tax were to be taken off, it would relieve the landlords,
not the tenants?”
“When the tenant’s leases had expired. Till then, the tenant would
pocket the amount of the tax; but, the lease expired, the rent would
rise. If the tenant could before afford to pay so much to live in this
particular house, he will pay it again rather than quit a situation
which suits him. But there is one way in which the tenant will gain. He
can have more air and light.”
“And families who live in their own old houses in the country,—families
who are not rich enough to afford themselves many luxuries,—would find
the relief great. If Fellbrow had been left to fall into ruins because
we were poor, and not because we were wild,—if we had come back to live
cheap,—we should have found the window-tax a great burden, and should be
glad to be rid of it.”
“Yes: it is not nearly so good a tax as its companion, the house-tax.”
“I hope, however,” said Sarah, “some other tax that falls upon the poor
will be taken off first. It is a pity that landlords should pay
unequally for their windows; but I think it is far worse that the poor
should pay as much for some things as any landlord. But I suppose these
taxes will make your house worth more than it would be worth without
them.”
“In general, the value of houses must be raised by these taxes, because
it will not be worth while to build till the ground-rent is high enough
to pay the taxes as well as remunerate the landlord. But much depends
upon situation, you see. The ground-rent of my new house is very low,
because it stands in a situation that nobody cares about but myself; and
the ground-rent of a house in the Strand is very high, because people
bid against one another for the advantage of living in the Strand. If
the taxes were taken off to-morrow, the value of the houses in the
Strand would not be lowered till the Strand began to be deserted for
some other great thoroughfare.”
“But if the taxes were to be taken off to-morrow, the value of your
house would be lowered.”
“If I had not secured my bargain with the ground-landlord. If we were
only beginning our negotiation, he would say, ‘You will be at so much
less expense for your house than you calculated upon and can afford; and
you must therefore pay me more for your ground.’ But Sarah knows that my
house is too far advanced for any such speech to be made to me.”
“Besides that the taxes remain.”
“For how long? You know what an outcry there is about them in London?”
“From landlords or tenants?”
“From tenants chiefly;—from shopkeepers who will pocket the amount of
tax for the time their leases have to run, and will then be just where
they are now.”
“But they ought not to be indulged, while so many worse burdens are
pressing on a larger and more suffering class. They surely ought not to
be indulged.”
“Not as to the repeal of the house-tax, which is, if people would but
examine and judge, perhaps the very best tax we have. But then, it wants
to be equalized. The London shopkeepers are right enough in saying that.
But its being unequally laid on is no reason for its being taken off
altogether.”
“How does it want to be made equal? between houses of a different rank
in London? or between houses of the same rank in London and in the
country?”
“Chiefly between houses of a different rank, in London and in the
country. It seems to me ridiculous to make such prodigious complaints as
we hear about the enormous amount levied on London in comparison with
the country. London may measure no more miles than there may be seen
lying below my new house; but the property of London is more than our
whole county; and the property on which the tax is levied is the
question; not the space within which it is levied. The number of houses
assessed in London and Middlesex is above 116,000; and in the county of
Rutland 240.”
“People must pay for the privilege of living in London,—for the
thousands of comforts and conveniences which are to be had there only.
Here, if people want to send letters a few miles, two or three times
a-day, they must dispatch two or three messengers, for want of a
twopenny post. If they want to buy meat, they must go a good way to a
butcher, and take the chance of getting what they want, if it be not
market-day, instead of having an universally-stocked market at hand
every day of the week. If they want to ride any distance, they must hire
horses, for want of omnibuses and stages; and they have none of the
luxuries of fine buildings, inexhaustible libraries, and the best of
pictures, and of music, and of theatrical and other exhibitions at hand.
O, people ought to pay for living in London.”
“And the most natural way is to pay in rent, and therefore in house-tax
also. In as far as the country improves,—as provincial towns approach
more nearly to the glory of London,—rents and house-tax will rise much
more certainly than by any law that shall attempt to equalize them with
the metropolis. I would not interfere between the shop-owner of
Charing-Cross and the shop-owner of A——. The real grievance lies between
the noblemen of Charing-Cross and of Yorkshire, and the landlord of a
shop in the Strand. While the shop-owner pays a house-duty of 80_l._
a-year, and the peer in the park no more, and another peer in his
country palace less than half, there is certainly ample room for
complaint.”
“Without proving that the tax itself is bad. I should think some test of
value, other than the rent they would bring, might be found out for
those country palaces which, with all their splendour and convenience,
might be difficult to let. Very rich men would not mind having the value
of one article of their property ascertained, in order to be taxed,
however disagreeable the inquisition may be to a less wealthy man, whose
credit depends on the amount of his property. The house-tax would become
a property-tax in this way.”
“It is a property-tax already; and therefore a tax of the best kind; and
therefore to be parted with only when swallowed up in a general
property-tax. Yet I am afraid it will be parted with, on account of the
clamour of people who live near enough to the Treasury to make their
clamour seem very terrible. If the sum which will then be taken off——”
“How much?”
“The house and window taxes together are between two and three
millions.”
“That would go a great way towards relieving the poor of some really bad
taxes, and particularly if great houses were taxed as they should be, so
as to allow of more reduction in a right place.”
“Besides that the excise,—the really bad taxes, some of which press so
heavily on the poor,—cost such an amazing deal to collect, that the
saving in taking them off would be much more than the amount that comes
into the Treasury.”
“If the house-tax is taken off,” said Fanny, “I shall persuade Richard
to rebel at not being asked for it, as vehemently as some people in
London threaten to rebel for a contrary reason. I should like to see a
higher tax laid upon Fellbrow. I think we do not pay our share.”
“You have nothing to do but to give Mr. Taplin a hint to that effect. He
will be very thankful for it.”
“Why?”
“He will gain a per centage upon the increase. These surveyors of the
assessed taxes have so much per cent. upon all that they can lay hold
of, which would not have been paid but for their exertions.”
“That is what makes Mr. Taplin so disliked,” Sarah observed. “He
squeezes every shilling he can get from people who do not know how to
answer him, or resist him.”
“Let them come to Richard,” cried Fanny. “He knows the law. He will help
them, I am sure.”
“He cannot,” said James. “There is nothing for it but applying in person
to the Commissioners; and many people do not think the matter is mended
by going to the Commissioners at all.”
“But Richard might keep Mr. Taplin in awe.”
“That depends on whether Taplin has most reason to wish to stand well
with Richard or to have his per centage on increases. He will soon be
taxing you for Fido, Sarah. I will answer for it he has Fido down in his
memorandum-book already.”
Fanny dreaded a burst of grief from Sarah; but she did not know Sarah’s
power of self-command, or appreciate the strength of the motive to keep
back the sad tale till the lovers should be alone. Wallace had sauntered
near them, so as to hear the last sentence, and be struck with a bright
idea in consequence.
“What do you think I have a good mind to do?” said he to Anne. “It would
be capital fun to send an anonymous letter,—very solemn,—to Taplin, to
bid him look to your sister’s dog, and tell him of half a hundred more
taxable articles that she never had or will have.”
“O, don’t do it, Mr. Wallace! You will make him so angry, and my father,
too!”
“And then,” pursued Wallace, “she will have to come before the
Commissioners to tell her story, and——”
“O, Mr. Wallace, pray do not!” entreated Anne.
The more alarmed she looked, the more Wallace was amused with the idea
of bringing up, not only Sarah, but half the neighbourhood, before the
Commissioners. He suspected that Taplin’s avarice about his per centages
would carry him a great way in demanding what he had no right to. In
answer to her “Pray do not,” Anne obtained a “Well, well,” which
satisfied her. In all innocence, she allowed him to extract from her
everything she knew about the little concerns of her acquaintance among
the small housekeepers of A——, and the cottages on Whitford’s lands. She
was charmed by Mr. Wallace’s close interest in such trifles, and so
engrossed by it that her father’s voice startled her when he called to
her over the hedge. He was mounted, leading a string of horses which he
was conducting to a fair at some distance. As George was otherwise
engaged, it was necessary for the girls to be at home to keep the books,
he said, and they had been out a very long time. Where was Sarah?
When Anne looked round, Sarah and her companions were not to be seen.
Till lately, nothing so wonderful had ever happened as that the one
sister should not know where the other was, or should have to go home
alone. Wallace’s gallantry was exhausted. After explaining the
improbability of Anne’s meeting another mad dog this day, he loaded his
piece, and declared he must have a turn through yonder cover before he
showed himself in A, though the hour for business appointed by himself
was already past. He supposed James was there; and he would serve the
purpose at present. If James was gone elsewhere after his amusement, why
the people at A—— must wait a little.
CHAPTER VI.
BATTLES AT NAVARINO.
“Who said James was at his living?” asked Fanny of her brother Richard,
as she sat at a window of the Navarino, waiting till he should have
settled his business with the surveyor and the commissioners, and be at
liberty to finish his walk with her. “Who said James was at his house
this morning?”
“Not I,” said Richard. “I know nothing about him. Where is he?”
“Riding over the moor with the Lees. You may see them from this window.
Now look? Just turning down towards Bray Fells. He wants to show Mary
Lee that ride under the crags; and they could not have a finer morning.”
“When did the Lees come? I heard nothing of their being here.”
“They only arrived yesterday; and they will be off to town again in a
month. They spend Christmas here, that is all. Mary Lee little expected
such weather as this,—little expected any rides so near Christmas, I
should think.”
“James will take care that she has one every day, I dare say, while the
roads are in their present state. He will make the most of a party of
friends while they are to be had. How long are we to be kept here, I
wonder?”
“There is no knowing. There is quite a little crowd below, and more are
coming up every minute. If all these people are here on business, like
you, there is no telling when it will be done.” Leaning forward to
whisper, she added, “The Swallows are here, I see. Let me ask the girls
to this window. I want you to see Sarah. I don’t call it seeing her, to
sit in the park, and take a curtsey from her as she passes.”
Nor did Richard: but he did not wish to be aiding and abetting in
deceiving the poor girl. From this hour James’s head would be full of
Miss Lee——
“Of Mary Lee! he never cared for her in London.”
“Because he was taken up with other things then. At Fellbrow, he fell in
love for want of better amusement——”
“If I thought that——”—cried Fanny.
“I do not mean but that he would be as angry as you, if he heard me say
so. He is fully persuaded,—at least he was yesterday,—that he has lost
his heart in that direction,” glancing towards the girls; “but before
Christmas-day, he will find that he has it to lose again.”
Fanny spoke not another word. She repeated again and again to herself
how glad she was that she had warned Sarah against the infirmity of some
of James’s purposes, though she had believed as fully as Sarah herself
that he was really in love. She had prepared Sarah for his house never
being finished,—for his betaking himself to the turf when he should be
tired of the field,—for his putting a curate into his living, and
carrying Sarah to London, never perhaps to visit A—— again: but that he
would give up Sarah,—that is, that he did not really love her, was a
danger that Fanny herself had not anticipated since she had witnessed
the courtship. Her spirits were sunk fathoms deep in a moment.
It was Sarah who had said that James was to be at his living this
morning. She could not go with him, because she had to appear before the
commissioners to plead against paying duty for the dog she had lost. She
was now not in the best spirits. The errand hither was not a pleasant
one: her grief for Fido was still fresh; and a strange trouble connected
with him was in her mind. James had not been half so angry, or half so
sorry, as she had expected, when she told him, the day before, of Fido’s
fate. She had dreaded his anger so much that she was not sorry that he
had been detained by his clerical duties all Sunday, and that Monday was
a pouring rain, so that she did not see him. Yet on Tuesday, when she
told him, she was as much surprised at his indifference as he was at her
tears. He could easily get her another dog, he said; and she had been
almost as much offended at the words as when the thresher had said the
same thing. As if another could be the first gift! She was not much
cheered at this moment by what she saw from the window,—the riding party
lightly winning its way over the moor towards the very rocks whose
echoes——O, what had not been confided to those echoes! But he was coming
this afternoon, to consult her about a Christmas feast he was planning
for the poor people in his parish, and then she should hear who these
gentry were, and why he was obliged to ride with them. What a bustle
there was below!
The Navarino indeed looked something like the rallying point of a host
of hoaxed persons. When the commissioners arrived, they saw at a glance
that to-day they must not dawdle about for a quarter of an hour, hat in
hand, and yawn, and go away again, but prepare for the transaction of
real business. Was there a rebellion against Taplin and his customary
charges? or had an informer been stimulating Taplin to make new charges
which were to be resisted?
“Let Swallow speak first,” said Richard. “His time is more precious than
mine.”
“Whose is not?” asked his sister, laughing.
It ended in every body’s business being dispatched before Richard’s. His
main occupation,—that of observing men and manners,—proceeded, however,
to his satisfaction.
“Mine is a very extraordinary case, gentlemen,” pleaded Swallow. “The
surveyor fixes the assessment of my premises at 70_l._ Gentlemen, I was
never asked for more than 20_l._ till now.”
Taplin thought he ought to be very thankful for escaping the larger
payment so long. His ranges of stables,—all his large back premises,—had
been hitherto overlooked, and the house alone charged for.
The plan of the premises was produced. Swallow insisted that there was
no connexion whatever between the house and the back premises;—merely
that the house-door opened under the gateway. No witnesses could be
heard as to the supposed value of the property compared with the
neighbouring houses, or as to any of the points Swallow wished to
establish. The rent of the entire estate was sworn to, and that the
house was not considered separate from the back premises on any occasion
but when the house-tax was to be levied. Swallow’s case was pronounced a
bad one. He must pay the 70_l._ Swallow was very cross,—declaring that
taxation was enough to ruin any man. No man was more burdened than he.
His very calling was taxed. Who else, he wondered, but horse-dealers,
paid 12_l._ 10_s._ a-year for following their business?
“Come, come; that won’t do,” said Taplin. “We all know well enough that
it is your customers that pay that tax, and your interest upon your
12_l._ 10_s._ ’Tis a very good tax; and you won’t succeed in making
people discontented with it. If every thirteen thousand pounds of tax
was as pleasantly raised as that, we assessors should hear few
complaints.”
“Move off, sir, unless you have any other complaint to make,” said one
of the commissioners to Swallow.
“I have, sir. Here is a charge of a pound for a dog of my daughter’s.
Neither of my daughters has a dog; as they are both here to testify.”
“A pound charged! A greyhound then. Will these young ladies swear that
they have not been in possession of a greyhound?”
“That is the point,” declared Taplin. “The young ladies will not deny
that a greyhound, by name Fido——”
“Never mind the name,” said the commissioner.
“But he is dead,” murmured Sarah. “I had him only——only——”
“O, you grant you had one: then you must pay.”
Swallow muttered that if his daughter had had the impertinence to deny,
or equivocate, or battle the matter with the surveyor, she might have
got off. He now vented his displeasure upon the girls, desiring them to
accept of no more dogs; unless somebody else could be found to pay the
duty: for he could not and would not.
Yet it was owing to Sarah that he escaped a far heavier and more
expensive vexation. Horse-dealers are bound to deliver in accounts of
the exercise of their trade (as they do not take out licenses) once a
quarter, to the assessor. Partly from his having delivered the book into
George’s keeping, and having a short memory for what was not before his
eyes, and partly from the hurry and bustle consequent on George’s
commitment, and his own narrow escape, Swallow had forgotten all about
this quarterly report. It was Sarah who remembered it, just in time, and
saved the fine. Swallow took occasion, in the midst of his wrath, to ask
the surveyor if he was not grievously disappointed that this fine of
50_l._ remained safe in the horse-dealer’s pocket. The surveyor declared
it was no concern of his.
Mrs. Barton! the loyal Mrs. Barton! what could she be here for? She
might have been expected to pay the last half of her last cup of tea in
tax, if the king had been graciously pleased to call for it. What could
bring her here?
A very aggravated distress about windows. She and Miss Biggs could use
no more than one window each to look out of; and when the maid had
appropriated a third, far more remained than were necessary for the
ventilation of Mrs. Barton’s small house. Four windows had for years
been shut up. The surveyor had now taken it into his head to charge for
these windows. He pretended to suppose that these windows might be
opened the day after he had turned his back. Such a dreadful
supposition! that Mrs. Barton would cheat the king! She,—the most
devoted to Church and King——
“Please to tell us, ma’am, how these windows are closed up.”
“Sir, the shutters are put to, and painted black, sir; and then there is
lath and plaster erected within; so that not the minutest particle of
light——not the most piercing eye——O, who could suspect me? But I cannot,
you see, gentlemen, when the commerce of the place has so fallen off,
and such a revolution and transition is going on; and when four windows
are in question——”
Taplin only knew that he had received information that Mrs. Barton’s
dead windows could let in any convenient portion of light upon occasion.
As for her business failing off, everybody knew that she had fresh
customers for hair-powder——”
“What is that to us, Taplin?” said the surveyor. “Do keep to business.
It is the least you can do, after bringing all these people about us
to-day.”
“They brought me; not I them, gentlemen. If they had chosen to pay at
once, there would have been none of this trouble. But her selling more
hair-powder has to do with business. She cannot deny that she has starch
in her house.”
“I!—Bless me! Starch in my house!” cried Mrs. Barton, looking from side
to side, as if not knowing whether to admit or deny that she had starch
in her house.
“Remember your oath. You have sworn to speak the truth, remember,” said
Taplin, terrifically. “Your having starch gives me a strong impression
that I shall find alabaster there, one of these days.”
“We have nothing to do with strong impressions,” declared the
commissioners. “If you have nothing more to say about these windows,
Taplin,—if you cannot overthrow Mrs. Barton’s evidence of their being
completely shut up, we must decide in her favour.”
“What is all this about starch, and alabaster, and strong impressions?”
asked Fanny of her brother.
“Those who sell hair-powder (which is made of alabaster and starch) are
prohibited from keeping alabaster in their houses. Taplin chooses to
suppose Mrs. Barton has alabaster, because he is told she has starch.
But that is an excise inquiry, and has nothing to do with the assessed
taxes, as he knows. He only wants to frighten her, and make her give up
about the windows.”
“They assess Maynard’s white head, however.”
“Yes, I have had to pay 1_l._ 3_s._ 6_d._ for your serving man’s white
head.”
“Must I make him leave off powder?”
“Not unless you wish to send him to his grave. No, government shall have
the advantage of Maynard’s taste in dress as long as the old fellow
lives with us. How Mrs. Barton’s head shakes! How triumphant she looks!
I am afraid she will grow disloyal, after all. The commissioners are
offering her a direct premium on resistance to——”
“Ah! to what? To Taplin, not to taxation. I am sure it must be a very
bad thing for a government to have such servants as Taplin,—so prying,—
so grasping!”
“There will be such till people grow as honest about paying their taxes
as their other liabilities.”
“Stay, ma’am, we have not done with you yet,” said Taplin to Mrs.
Barton. “There is a gentleman below, that I find travels for your
house,—a commercial traveller, ma’am; 1_l._ 10_s._ is the tax, ma’am,
which I hope he brings you orders enough to enable you to pay. I shall
by no means give up the claim for the windows, but refer it to the six
judges: but I conceive you will hardly contest the traveller.”
“If you mean Mr. Taylor, who brought me a message from cousin Becky that
she wanted some eau de Cologne, I am happy to tell you that gentleman
never rode a mile out of his way for me.” And Mrs. Barton related that
Mr. Taylor and her cousin were engaged, and that Mr. Taylor, being a
commercial traveller, called on Mrs. Barton as he passed through A——, to
give her news of Becky; but she offered to swear that he never took an
order for her, or paid her any money, in his life. Some wag had imposed
upon Taplin. Everybody laughed. Mrs. Barton had better have stopped
here. Emboldened by the success of her eloquence, she went on to
complain of the distresses of the times to commercial people, and of the
favour shown to the agricultural class over that to which she belonged.
She was afraid his Majesty forgot that kings formerly lived upon the
land, and at the expense of those who held it. It was quite an
innovation, their now living upon their trading subjects. Farmers had no
house-tax to pay. There were actually near 137,000 farm-houses in
England and Wales exempt from the house-tax. Farmers’ horses were to pay
no tax, forsooth; and her friend Mr. Whitford had insured his
farm-stock, and been charged nothing for the stamp. If a rich man’s
wealth did but happen to be land, he was not charged the inventory and
legacy duties; and so it was in these degenerate days, that traders, the
most useful set of subjects the king could have——
“You say so because you are a trader, and not a farmer, Mrs. Barton,”
observed her friend, Mr. Whitford. “If you had to pay such burdens as I
have, or even such a charge as I am here about now——”
“Come, let us hear it, Mr. Whitford,” said the Commissioners.
“Of all unconscionable things, the surveyor wants to charge me for my
market-cart.”
“Because you use it to ride in, I suppose?”
“The horse cannot go to market without somebody to drive him; but we
have a gig for our pleasure; and that I pay for.”
“Your gig for pleasure, and your cart for convenience, I suppose. Does
nobody ever ride in your cart for convenience?”
Whitford could not deny that if his wife and he wanted to go into A——,
or to the village of M——, they took the opportunity of a lift when the
good wife and her boy were going with mutton, eggs, and butter; but the
cart was a market-cart, and he already paid for a gig. It came out,
however, that the cart was painted so as to look very pretty; and there
was a seat which could be strapped on, to make the vehicle convenient
for more persons than could be wanted to drive it to market.—The
assessment was confirmed.
Whitford hoped Mrs. Barton perceived that agriculture was not too much
considered. She saw the treatment he met with to-day; and if she was
aware how Taplin was on the watch whenever the farm-horses went to
drink, to find out that they were used for some purpose which might
justify a charge,—if she knew how nearly he prevailed with the
Commissioners last time to tax Whitford for his shepherd’s dog, she
would to think trade particularly aggrieved.
Taplin declared that Whitford’s horses went to drink oftener than any
horses at the Navarino or the Turk’s Head thought of drinking. It had
become quite a joke, Whitford’s horses going to drink; and the dog was
certainly seen feeding off one of Whitford’s sheep.
Because the sheep happened to die, Whitford declared. In that case, the
Commissioners had done justice to agriculture.
“These people are a specimen of how people talk, the wide world over,”
observed Richard to his sister. “You see how they argue upon the vast
interests of vast bodies from the temporary aspect of their own little
affairs. Agriculture is protected or oppressed, according as Whitford
has to pay thirty shillings more or less; and Mrs. Barton’s windows are
to be the test how trade is regarded by King, Lords, and Commons.”
“I wonder how King, Lords, and Commons are ever to know what to depend
upon, if all interests are urged in this partial way,” observed Fanny.
“There are always principles to be depended upon in this matter of
taxation, as in everything else; and there can be no other safe guides.
Amidst the inconsistent, the bewildering representations offered, a
certain number must be in accordance with true principles; and it is
these which must be professedly acted upon.”
“But if foolish representations abound, and wise ones are scarce, what
must Government do then?”
“The last thing it ought to do is to ground its proceedings on the
ignorance of the people,—to yield them that which they will hereafter
despise the donors for granting them.”
“The house-tax, for instance, which some people in London are clamouring
to be rid of.”
“The house-tax, indeed, is an instance. The house-tax is one of the best
taxes that ever was imposed. It is one of the very few which falls only
on the wealthy and substantial—on none below the owners of houses. It is
a direct tax, and might be made an equal one; and is particularly
convenient as to the time and mode of payment, to all who are not such
babies as to prefer having their money taken from them without their
knowing it. This tax is unpopular with a portion of a particular class;
and an immense proportion of the nation knows nothing, and has nothing
to say, about it. This gives a favourable opportunity to the highest
classes, who have not paid their due share, to get rid together of the
question and the odium of not paying their share; and thus the
Government is tempted to silence clamour and please the aristocracy, on
the plea of yielding to the popular wish. But if the Government yields
to this temptation,—if it takes off the best-principled tax we have, and
leaves the worst,—I hope it is preparing itself for that retribution
which, sooner or later, overtakes every government which founds its
measures on popular ignorance.”
“But what can be done? Is not its unpopularity a sufficient reason for
the abolition of a tax, when some tax is to be abolished?”
“Its general unpopularity. But, in this instance, the opposition, though
harassing, is partial, and only such as might easily be diverted, by
equalizing the pressure of the tax. If it were now to be thus equalized,
and if any pains whatever were taken to exhibit to the people the
comparative qualities of this duty, and of any one of our worst excise
taxes, the very shopkeepers of London would soon worship the footsteps
of the Chancellor of the Exchequer for preferring to their dictation the
unurged interests of the many.”
“The taxes that have been in question to-day have none of them fallen on
the poor.”
“None of the direct taxes do; yet they are so few, that the poorer
classes pay five times as much as the classes above them. Now, mark our
consistency. We admit (because nobody can deny) that an equitable
taxation leaves all parties in the same relative position in which it
found them. We know (or might know) that the poorer classes are made, by
indirect taxation, to pay five times as much as others; and yet, as soon
as there is a tax to take off, we leave the excise untouched, and
relieve the upper classes of the very heaviest which bears particularly
on them, and the very fairest which our long list can exhibit. This
injustice could not be perpetrated if the poor had their rights, either
of enlightenment or of parliamentary representation.”
“I do wonder that these assessed taxes are so unpopular, even among
those who pay them; for, however disagreeable it may be to have the
tax-gatherer come and take a certain sum, which the owner would like to
keep for some other purpose, the tax-payer is, at least, master of his
own house and his own business. The brewer, and the paper-maker, and the
glass-manufacturer have much more reason to complain, liable as they are
to be watched and persecuted by excisemen, and insulted by anybody who
chooses to inform.”
“These direct taxes are difficult to evade; and this, which is a real
virtue in a tax, makes it disliked by those who entertain ‘an ignorant
impatience of taxation.’ But it ought to be known that the most
ingenious person that ever evaded the payment of his share of tax would
part with less of his money by manly payment, under a system of direct
taxation, than by paying no more than he could possibly help under an
excise and customs’ system. Mr. Pitt lowered the duty on tea in 1784;
and, to make up for the deficiency to Government, laid on an additional
window-tax. What happened? The same classes who had to pay an additional
window-duty found that they had more money than before to spend on tea.
The consumption of tea increased so marvellously, that the amount of
revenue it brought in was not much less than before; and Government was,
on the whole, a great gainer, and the people not losers. Less was lost
between the people’s pockets and the Treasury. If we could but take a
lesson from this event, and go on diminishing our indirect and
increasing our direct taxation, both Government and people might be
astonished at the apparent creation of wealth to them both. It is
grievous to think of 2,000,000_l._ being levied on our own manufactures,
and 6,000,000_l._ on the raw materials in the country, while only five
millions and a quarter are raised by direct taxation, while the cost of
collection of the one is three times that of the other. If, out of this
five millions and a quarter, the house-tax is yet to be taken, we must
bear to be taunted with ‘the wisdom of our ancestors,’ and be sure that
our posterity will not have much to say in praise of ours.”
“And yet people talk of absentees being brought home by the doing away
of direct taxes.”
“The absentees will hardly talk of coming home for any such reason. They
see that there is now a smaller proportion of direct taxation in this
country than in any other in Europe; and they know that out of our
government revenue of between forty and fifty millions, scarcely one
million and a half is raised on expenditure peculiar to the rich, and
that they did not go abroad to escape this very slight burden. If they
did not go abroad to escape it, they will not be brought back by a small
reduction of their small share.”
“And if they could be brought back, their return is not for a moment to
be set against any advantage given to the lower and more
heavily-burdened classes.—But see! there are some poor people standing
before the Commissioners; some really poor people, Richard.”
“Who can yet afford some luxury which Mr. Taplin has got scent of,
perhaps.”
“Do you know, I think some informer has been busy among us. Mr. Taplin
can never have had the wit to find out so suddenly all these
liabilities.”
“There are informers for profit, and informers for fun, Fanny. I have
seen somebody enjoying the joke as the tax-payers came up to appeal; and
the more cross they look, the more he enjoys the fun. He is a good deal
annoyed, I fancy, at our sitting here so quietly, waiting to let my case
be the last.”
“Wallace! Do you think he would connect himself with Mr. Taplin?”
“Anonymous letters would serve the purpose. But I will not forgive him
for wasting the time of these poor people, if they are not liable; and I
cannot think they can be liable.”
The group consisted of a poor woman and her two sons, the elder of whom
resembled her in his evident dread of being sworn, while the younger
seemed likely to fail in nothing for want of courage. The mother might
safely swear, however, that the mule for which she was to be taxed, if
Mr. Taplin was to have his way, was given by Mr. Whitford to her elder
lad, and that it was too young to be used yet; and when it should be
strong enough, it would not pay its own tax of half a guinea. If she
might be let off now, she would get rid of the beast before night, if
the gentlemen pleased. Any of them should be welcome to the mule, which
was of no use to her, but only cropped its living along the lanes. Mr.
Taplin was made duly ashamed of this charge.
Perhaps the being upon oath tied the tongue of the elder lad; for he
would not say that he had not carried a gun any day this last season;
that he had not, in any manner, knocked down a hare or a rabbit; that he
had not been seen coursing when Mr. Cranston’s harriers were in the
field. He declared that he was there merely as a spectator; that he had
no dogs; and that he was returning on horseback from an errand on which
he had been sent by his master, and had merely joined the sport because
the horse he rode wished to do so. These excuses were not admitted: he
was requested to pay 3_l._ 13_s._ 6_d._; on hearing which request, he
turned as white as ashes, and looked apprehensively at his mother. It
was clear that they could not raise the money.
“For God’s sake, Richard, tell me how I may get this poor fellow off,”
said Wallace, coming up to his brother, in much perturbation.
“Suppose you pay the fine. It is hardly fair that the Government should
not have something out of your pocket to-day, when you have managed to
extract more or less from almost every body else. I do wonder you could
bring yourself to waste the valuable time of these poor people; and pray
observe how their consciences are racked about the oath. I fancy a
little bold swearing would have brought off that good lad. Stop,
Wallace!” as Wallace was darting towards his victim. Wallace returned.
“I am pretty sure the Commissioners are wrong here. You can offer to
refer the case to the six judges, if you think proper: I feel sure they
will give it against the Commissioners.”
“You must make the offer, Richard; I will take all the trouble, I
faithfully promise you. But you would not have me be thanked by these
people, when they do not know that I brought them into this scrape: you
must speak up for them.”
Richard did so; and Wallace whispered to them that, happen what might,
they would have nothing to pay. The younger lad swore to all and
everything that was convenient, in order to escape what his brother had
been threatened with. He had not carried a gun. Well, if he had, it was
only to shoot crows. O yes; he had shot at something besides crows,—he
had brought down a paper kite that had stuck in a tree. That which he
brought home in his bag was a weasel, which his master thanked him for
destroying. Thus did he get rid of every question; and he evidently took
credit to himself for his superiority over his brother in cleverness.
Fanny thought it all very bad, and was glad to be convinced that the
fault lay, not in the principle of the taxes in question, but in the
methods of managing their collection. Even now, all this was far less
disagreeable and pernicious than the management of the excise and
customs’ duties; and the remedy would certainly arrive whenever the race
of tax-gatherers should improve, which will be whenever the people shall
learn their duty in respect of paying taxes. When all shall be done
openly, and persons shall subscribe to government as they subscribe to
any other institution, as a condition of sharing the privileges, there
will be an end of secret informations and of perjury. Till then, as it
is clear that there is far less of these grievances and crimes under a
system of direct than indirect taxation, let those who dislike underhand
enmity and false swearing advocate the utmost possible simplification of
the system,—the imposition of few and direct, in place of many and
complicated, taxes.
It was a sad necessity for Mr. Pritchard of the Turk’s Head to have to
appear in the house of his rival of the Navarino; but it was necessary,
not only to show himself, but to lose his cause. The Expedition
stage-coach had started from the Turk’s Head from the time when
Pritchard was the smartest of young innkeepers till now, when he was
losing his energy and going out of fashion; and, during many a year, had
he, the proprietor, paid the tax upon the two coaches which daily passed
each other on the road. It had now suddenly occurred to Mr. Taplin that
there must be a third coach always ready for use, in case of any
accident happening to the other two. No protestations of the
impossibility of more than two being wanted were of any use. The
existence of the third could not be denied, nor its having been seen on
the road within a month. Pritchard was compelled to pay for three.
And now was Richard’s turn. He happened to have a seal with a horse’s
head and his initials upon it. Taplin charged him for armorial bearings.
Richard paid for these on his carriages, and he thought this enough. He
stoutly argued his point about crests and coats of arms; and even went
so far as to talk of appealing to the six judges if the commissioners
decided against him. It was in vain. He threw down his 2_l._ 8_s._ at
last, to save further trouble to himself and other people, and sighed
over the seal, with the use of which he should indulge himself no more
while in Mr. Taplin’s neighbourhood. He had nothing to say against the
tax. There could hardly be a better, particularly as it was improving in
productiveness; but he could not submit to use a seal in so expensive a
way.
“It rather gives one pleasure to see you suffer,” observed Fanny, when
one considers a surcharge on ourselves as a kind of reparation to the
poor for their bearing, as a class, so much more than we do. It is a
comfort to think that Mr. Taplin has not laid a finger on one poor
person to-day, except——”
“Except the poor fellow whose suffering, if inflicted, would have been
ultimately owing to our game-laws. Those game-duties are fair enough
while our gentry go on preserving their game, and bringing upon their
heads the blood and moral destruction of the hundreds and thousands that
are lost for their indulgence.”
Fanny observed that she had never thought so much about the old French
nobility as since the gaol at A—— had been tenanted by offenders against
Richard’s game.
“I cannot bear it,” said Richard. “I must go through with the affair,
now it is begun, I suppose, for the sake of the country gentlemen in the
neighbourhood: but it is the last time poor men shall first be tempted
by me into what they do not consider crime, and then punished in a way
which makes them criminal. I feel already as if I must be answerable for
all the real crime and all the misery which must result from these men
being separated from their families and their employments, and thrown
into the corruption of a prison. I cannot bear it.”
“What will you do?”
“Leave off preserving my game; give it up as property; do anything
rather than foster night meetings of poachers, and cause an annual
transformation of some of them into burglars, or lawless wretches of
some proscribed class or another. Ah! I know James and Wallace will be
very angry. But let them go and sport elsewhere, if they must sport.
They shall not have my countenance in spoiling my neighbourhood. When
they have to go a long way to find a bird, and have tried in vain to
start a hare, they may invite themselves somewhere else, and leave me
with my rooks, which I like better than my pheasants, after all.”
“But is it not rather a pity?” Fanny had some regrets.
“Certainly it will require some self-denial, even in me, who am careless
about sport: but are we rich people so very sorely exercised in
self-denial that, living in a country where food is the one scarce
thing, we must forbid the half-starved labourer to touch the tempting
flesh and fowl that spring from beneath his feet, as he walks where no
eyes see him?—flesh and fowl which he regards as common property,
because they are by nature wild? Be the labourer right or wrong in his
notion, as long as his want and his notion co-exist, I will surrender to
the weakness of his condition what I am not at all sure that I should
deny to the strength of his arguments. No man shall in my time go to
gaol for offences against the Fellbrow game. Maynard may teach Mrs.
Barton to set springes if he pleases; and Swallow may carry away his
dozen hares in broad day, instead of at night. If George comes out no
worse a boy than he went in, his pretty sisters shall hold him at his
post in the office for me. We must think of some way of keeping Morse’s
heart from breaking. That is the thing most to be dreaded. He cares more
for the pheasants than for poor Alick, I believe.”
“Those game-duties must be given up, if every gentleman followed your
example. But, to be sure, there are more important things involved in
the question than the game-duties.”
“Taxes on luxury are excellent things, when that part which is paid in
money is all. But when reputation, innocence, the comfort of some entire
families, and the actual subsistence of others, are the tax paid for one
factitious luxury enjoyed by those who revel in luxuries, the cost is
too great. James says that one of our neighbours will be transported;
that he has evidence of something worse than the mere poaching. For my
part, I conclude that most of those concerned will be either transported
or hanged, sooner or later. Such is the common issue of poaching.”
“One would think some man-hater had ingeniously planned this method by
which to slide from mere carelessness or frolic into crime. Here is just
the intermediate step between honesty and dishonesty, without which many
an one would never have transgressed. Here is a property which is so
peculiar as not to be considered a property by those who are tempted to
take it. Punish them as for taking property, and they become wilful
thieves, and all is over. But who is the one neighbour James means?”
“You will be surprised to learn; but it is a secret at present. Now,
shall we walk?”
“As soon as Mrs. Barton is gone from before the door. I think she will
never have done talking to Maynard.”
“Not till you go down. She is waiting to speak to you, and you may as
well take it graciously.”
“O, but I bought some lavender water of her only yesterday.”
“Never mind! I dare say she has something new to say to you to-day about
Church and King.”
CHAPTER VII.
LOUNGING AND LISTENING.
“I never said anything so decidedly to you before, James, but you must
stay,” said Richard to his brother, the clergyman, who was lounging from
window to window of the library.
“Such a place to keep one shut up in, in the midst of winter!” muttered
James. “It is enough to make one melancholy to look at that black frozen
water under the rocks, and all the trees within sight loaded with snow,
and not a twig stirring to shake off so much as a flake. ’Tis so
desolate when one compares it with London, I declare my spirits won’t
stand it.”
“One week cannot make much difference. It was all your doing that any
stir was made about these poachers at all, and you must stay a few days
longer to carry the matter through. What difference can one week make?”
“All the difference in the world. The journey up to town with the Lees
signifies more than any thing I shall meet with when I get there. The
happiness of my whole life may depend on those three days of travelling—
—”
“How little you know of yourself, James,” said his sister, “if you think
that anything that can happen in three days can make you happy!”
“You can make me preciously unhappy, I know, if you keep me three days
longer in this miserable place. Why, ’tis a place only fit for a hermit
to live in, in winter.”
And he glanced at a green stain which was still conspicuous on the
ceiling. It was convenient to overlook the thick new carpet, the roaring
fire, and the ample provision of books, whose arrangement had been just
completed under his own eye. “It is very strange if you cannot transport
a man without my help. I am sure I wish Taplin had gone on thumbing his
Ready Reckoner for many a night to come before I had meddled with him.
It will end in my being full as much punished as he, or any of his
gang.”
“Thumbing his what?” asked Fanny of Richard.
“The Ready Reckoner. Taplin has been the head of the poaching gang. It
has been organized by him,—made into a kind of club, sworn to
co-operate. Taplin administered the oath; and his excuse is, that the
men were sworn, not on a Testament, but on the Ready Reckoner. We have
evidence enough to transport Taplin. It was James that obtained it; (you
had better ask him how;) and now he wants to be off to London, at the
critical moment, (you had better ask him why,) and leave me to manage
the matter in which I have never stirred, except in as far as I was
forced by him.”
“I know the how and the why,” observed Fanny, gravely. “The greatest
wonder of all is to hear him talk of the happiness of his future life,
with such a how and why lying on his conscience.”
“Now, you just show, at this moment, the folly of meddling in other
people’s affairs, and preaching about other people’s consciences,” said
James, turning round from the window. “I can tell you that Sarah Swallow
is going to be married. I know it for fact; for her intended told me of
it himself. Indeed, he asked me to marry them. What do you think of
this, Fanny?”
“I think just as I did before. If Sarah proved herself as light-minded
and fickle as yourself,—if she so injured and betrayed the interests of
her sex,—how does that excuse your treachery to——”
“Now, if you say another word about the sanctity of the church, and the
dignity of the clerical character, and all that, I will never set foot
in my living again to the end of my days.”
“I was not going to make any appeal to you which I know to be so
useless. The clerical character has no dignity in your keeping; and you
take care that the church shall have no sanctity in the eyes of your
people.”
“That is not my fault.”
“I know it. You can no more be a clergyman than you can be a musician or
a sculptor. Your misfortune and that of your people is that you are
called a clergyman.”
“Ah! I saw two old women dreadfully scandalized, the last time I came
from the hunt. They thought I was over the ears in a pitcher of ale; but
I heard them say, ‘There’s our parson, with not a thread of black on him
but his neck-cloth.‘”
“The sin of the case lies with the church that makes a point of a black
coat while she tempts in——”
“Black hearts?”
“Hearts that must needs come out black from being steeped in the
hypocrisy of a professed sanctity.”
“I am sure I never professed any sanctity.”
“Therefore your heart is not of the deepest black of all. But what has
been your only alternative? Leading your people to think that no
sanctity exists.”
“That is the fault of the system,—not mine. The system made it a matter
of course that I should be a clergyman. Here I am. I must either set my
face at its full length, and play a damned deep part when I talk of
righteousness, and temperance, and——and all that—-”
“And judgment to come,” said Richard, gravely.
“Or, if the people see I am thinking of anything but what I am saying,
they can hardly believe that such threats signify much. You should lay
the blame on those that put me into the church.”
“They would plead that you were put there as a matter of course;—that
you were born to it. They would refer the blame farther back; where,
indeed, it ought to rest. The day must come when faithless parents must
be arraigned by their injured children: and then will your people, among
a countless multitude besides, rise up in judgment against mother-church
for having made an elaborate provision for, not only desecrating the
gospel, but generating infidelity towards both God and man.”
“That may be all very true; but I cannot help my share of it now.”
“You can stop the spread of the mischief which has sprung up through
you. Come out of the church. You look more astonished than there is any
occasion for. Remember——”
“Remember, sister, how it is with other professions. A bad physician
does not give up practice; nor does an ignorant lawyer, because of
incapacity.”
“Remember that the physician and lawyer who are as well known to be as
unfit for their business as you are for yours, are not employed. In the
profession of the church alone are the incapable sure of their
occupation and its recompense. But no one is more aware than you that
the days are coming when, if the unqualified do not step out of the
church, they will be plucked out; or, if time be promised them to die
out, it will be a chance whether the impatience of the long-betrayed
people will not unroof the sanctuary from over their heads. You well
know this, James. Your duty to your church, then, requires that you
vacate your place: that at least one——”
“Knave? Hypocrite? Come. Out with it!”
“At least one unqualified person may give place to a true-hearted one
who may help to restore what has been laid waste. If you owe no duty to
your church, you do to your people; and both the one and the other
require you to vacate.”
“And Mary Lee forbids. If you had said all this a month ago——”
“Then Sarah Swallow would have forbidden. Your people must be betrayed
in order to enable you to marry, while, at the same time, you cannot
make up your mind whom to marry. You will persuade yourself, when you
have been married a month, that you have made the wrong choice, after
all. If you would give up your living, and work with your conscience in
some other employment, instead of sporting with it in this, you might
find at last that you had a heart, and that there was some one person
who alone could satisfy it. You might be happy, James, after all.”
“There is no use in that sort of thing now,” urged James. “Sarah is
disposed of, and Mary Lee——”
“Disposed of!” said Fanny, fixing her eyes upon him so that his were
immediately turned away.
“Upon my honour, I had nothing to do with it. It was all their own
doing. It was as much news to me as to anybody when Morse came to ask me
to marry him.”
“I believe you. I acquit you of providing for the prostitution of one
whose innocent heart you had just gained, and found it convenient to
throw away.”
“But the winning and casting off led to the rest,” observed Richard.
“I tell you, she threw herself away. The old man sought her because his
son loved her,—not because I did. But he is a good old fellow; and after
all——”
“Silence!” cried Fanny. “Go on, if you dare, to say that to be the slave
of an ignorant old man,—the household drudge of a being she despises for
marrying her almost as much as she despises herself for marrying him,—
say, if you dare, that this is a good enough lot for one whom you
yourself taught to feel that she had a mind and a heart, to be free in
action, and devoted in affection——”
Her eyes rained tears, and her voice trembled so that she could not go
on to say that with which her heart was overfull. James began to ask
himself whether he had not committed a great mistake in deserting one
for whom Fanny seemed to feel so passionate an affection. In the midst
of her agitation, Fanny saw his misapprehension.
“It is for my sex,—it is for our nature, that I feel it so much,” she
struggled to say. “That no more should be understood of what love is by
those who are acting in the very name of love! That any one should dare
to open only to darken,—to expand only to crush! Anne says, ‘I did say a
great deal, but Sarah is so much cleverer now than I am, that I dare not
say all that was in my mind. She sees how foolish many things are that
we never used to doubt of, and that I do not understand any better now.’
Nothing can be truer. The whole being of the one sister has been
awakened, in order to be tortured; and the other can no longer console.”
To carry off some emotion which could not be helped, James began to
jest. He thought it was only fair,—for the purpose of restoring the
sympathy between the sisters,—that he should flirt a little with Anne.
“Try;” Fanny said; and she spoke no more.
James next made an attempt upon Richard.
“I am sure you ought to thank me, Richard. You wanted to have Morse’s
heart kept from breaking, if you should give up preserving your game.
The thing is done, you see, thanks to me.”
Richard took no notice.
“I never saw such a brother and sister in my life,” cried James, with a
heavy tread up and down the room. “I believe you do not care for
anything that happens to me.”
“We do,” said Richard; “but we are bound to care for others too.”
“And for your future self,” added Fanny. “James, do promise that you
will not seek Mary Lee. I do not know why you should look amazed. You
must know that she would not think of you, if she knew all; and that you
cannot make her life happy, if you could persuade her that you love her
now. Do not crush another heart.”
James was, of course, quite sure that he loved Miss Lee, and pretty
confident that he could attach her, and absolutely certain that they
should make one another perfectly happy. He should go now, and learn
whether her departure could by no stratagem be deferred till he could
accompany her; if not, he should fly after her the very hour that
sentence should be pronounced on Taplin.
He returned in two hours, very much out of humour. The Lees were going
the next morning. He should hasten to Brighton, or somewhere, till the
spring; any where (after Fellbrow) except London. He hated London at
this time of year almost as much as in the autumn. He should speak to
Riley about getting so much of the new house ready as should fit it for
the residence of a curate. It might as well go on so far, now it was
begun; but he could not think what had possessed him to begin building
in such a place.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHARACTERISTICS.
Sarah seemed quite disposed to allow Morse’s plea that a long courtship
was not so suitable to his years as it might have been to those of his
poor boy. She left him the choice of the day, and called on her sister
to assist her in speeding the necessary preparations. Anne humbly obeyed
all directions. She might wonder,—she was indeed lost in wonder, at all
she heard and saw; but Anne was by this time persuaded that she was very
stupid in comparison with Sarah, and that she had been very wicked in
envying Sarah a happiness which Sarah had parted with so much more
easily,—with so much a better grace than Anne herself could have done.
She was angry with herself, too, for not respecting and liking good Mr.
Morse as she had done. The more love-letters Sarah threw into her lap to
be read, the more presents Mr. Morse brought for Sarah, and the more
carefully he spread them out to be admired, the less did she like him;
and she could not sit quiet, like Sarah, under his jokes and pretty
speeches, while she remembered things that Mr. Cranston had said. She
wished Sarah would not laugh when people said it would be Anne’s turn
next, and when they talked about the new tax-collector,—of his honesty
and civility, and his wish to be comfortably settled;—as if that was any
business of hers. She had seen enough of love and marriage. She was not
very fond of the bustle there always was about the Paddock, and she
should find living there very forlorn when Sarah would be half a mile
off; but she would be content with her lot; and she now knew how to deal
with any Mr. Cranstons that might come in her way.
When the wedding-party had encountered a good many acquaintances who had
accidentally happened to take their walk, on the bridal morning, past
the gamekeeper’s cottage and towards the church—when they had slipped
past Mrs. Barton at the moment when she was relieving Maynard from the
charge of the spaniel, and had received Mr. Pritchard’s smiling bow, and
heard his promise to drink their healths after dinner, they fell in, at
a cross path, with James himself, who was riding to the church in
company with his curate, to whom he introduced the bridal party.
“I should have said,” observed James, walking his horse by Anne’s
side,“that—You remember that you were the first I became acquainted
with,—when your sister rode down the lane, and left you with me;—you
remember?”
“Yes, sir, I remember.”
“Well, I should have said then that you were likely to be the first to
be seen at the altar. I am sure it must be your own fault that you are
not. I cannot think what you are to do without your sister.”
Anne was vexed that tears would spring.
“Ah! It will be sadly lonely. I am quite sorry for you. You shall have a
dog to keep you company. No better company than a dog, when one is
melancholy! You shall have a spaniel as pretty as my sister’s; and I
dare say you will take better care of it than your sister did of hers. I
will bring it myself in a day or two.”
Anne said she should be busier than ever after her sister’s departure,
and should have no time for dogs or visiters. She showed no regret when
he talked of going away; no pleasure at his doubt whether he might not
be induced to stay. She looked up, as for an explanation, when he sighed
about misunderstanding and precipitation, and the blindness of some
people to their own attractions. How Anne wished, at that moment, that
Sarah had ever happened to look full in the face of her late admirer,
and seen how he could be confused by such silent questioning!
James put as little sanctity into the service as could be desired by the
strongest foe to hypocrisy, or lamented by his astonished curate. Why
Morse should be so proud as he was of being married by anybody who could
marry him in such a manner as this, was more than a stranger could
comprehend. In the midst, the cry of hounds was heard. The clergyman
stopped a moment, and went on uneasily. Another cry followed, and he
halted again. Morse made bold to step forward and whisper.
“If there had been no other clergyman here, I don’t know that I should
have offered such a thing as to put our affair off till to-morrow; but
perhaps that gentleman——I think it is a pity, sir, you should lose the
hunt, sir, on our account; that’s all. But you are the best judge, sir.”
In another minute, James had leaped upon his horse at the church-door,
and his curate had taken his place at the altar,—so discomposed as to
find it difficult to proceed as if nothing had happened. When all was
done, Sarah was still pale with the sense of insult, while her husband
was congratulating himself on his own good-breeding in not standing in
the way of his young master’s pleasure.
This was the last marriage service attempted by James, except in the
instances of gay friends, who liked to be helped through the ceremony by
one resembling themselves. He was better known, as a clergyman, in the
newspapers than in any other way. Mrs. Barton now and then read a
paragraph to Miss Biggs which showed that “our young clergyman” was
still in existence, and still a clergyman; and Mr. Pritchard’s guests
were on such occasions enlightened as to James’s connexions, and the
family estate, and the tenure of the living in the vicinity. But thus
alone was James heard and spoken of among the neighbours of those who
would have been happy to forget that they had ever seen him. He never
gave his curate any trouble about the living, or cared about Fellbrow
when better sporting was to be had elsewhere.
THE END.
London: Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES, Duke-street, Lambeth.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
OF
_TAXATION._
---------------------
No. II.
THE
TENTH HAYCOCK.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
LONDON:
Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES,
Duke-street, Lambeth.
THE
TENTH HAYCOCK.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
1. Perambulation 1
2. Interlocutory Decrees 14
3. Intrusion 31
4. Heresy 55
5. Extortion 68
6. Commutation 88
7. Dimission 112
8. Benefit of Clergy 136
THE TENTH HAYCOCK.
---------------------
CHAPTER I.
PERAMBULATION.
Widow Lambert liked to be told, a very few years ago, that the Abbey
Farm was as great an ornament to her native district as the abbey itself
could ever have been in the days of its splendour. She recalled the
tales with which she had been struck in her childhood, before her sober
father forbade her climbing old apple-trees, and her strict mother
ordained the adoption of the quaker cap, and the handkerchief she had
worn ever since;—tales of the former grandeur of this religious house,
with its eighty monks and its hundred and ten servants: and it gratified
her maternal pride to be assured that her two comely sons and their
labourers kept the estate in as flourishing a condition as their
predecessors,—the ecclesiastics and their lay brethren who were
subordinate to them.
This abbey was believed to have held a distinguished rank among the
religious houses which existed before there was any division of land
into parishes, or when a parish meant the same as a diocese does now:
when every man paid his ecclesiastical dues to any church he thought
fit, provided he paid them to some; and when these dues were delivered
into the hands of the bishop, to be divided among the four objects to
which they must be appropriated,—the ease of the bishop, the aid of the
church, the relief of the poor, and the support of the administering
clergyman. Nor was it afterwards in less repute, when the dignitaries of
the church were otherwise amply provided for, and the tithes were
appropriated to three objects instead of four. The monks were of opinion
that a very small sum was sufficient for the maintenance of the
officiating priest; and they were active in gathering in their dues on
the plea of the wants of the poor, while their train of servants was
lengthened, the beauty of their abbey improved, and their fields and
gardens were made to abound in the means of luxurious living. By a
liberal expenditure of their peculiar purchase-money, masses and obits,
and sometimes by a sacrifice of solid gold, they obtained all the
advowsons within their reach, and became patrons of a great many
benefices. It was made worth while to royalty to grant its license for
such appropriation; and the consent of the bishop was regularly granted
in return for the promise that the service of the church should be duly
cared for. The brethren, therefore, were enriched from year to year with
tithe and glebe; while, instead of presenting any clerk, they themselves
contributed as much as they chose to the spiritual aid of the flocks
they had thus gathered into their own ample fold. This process of
appropriation went on very smoothly, (to the brethren, however it might
be to the people under their charge) till this spiritual corporation was
dissolved by Henry VIII; his bluff majesty constituting himself parson
in their stead. There was little wonder that he busied himself about the
Faith when he became at once parson of more than one-third of the
parishes of England. However zealous he might be in his office, it was
too burdensome for any man. The work of appointing vicars to so many
benefices was more than the king could undertake. He sold the
appropriations,—not always to holy men, (for he had himself deprived the
holy of the power of bidding high for the property he had to sell,) but
to laymen who transmitted them to their children, or disposed of them to
other laymen, without any scruple as to thus alienating the pious
contributions of believers to the church. This alienation was made the
more extensive by a statute of the same monarch which ordained that the
church lands purchased by laymen should remain exempt from tithes, as if
they still belonged to the ecclesiastics. In this respect alone did the
Abbey Farm of Mrs. Lambert’s time resemble the abbey domain of the day
of Henry VIII. Instead of the cowled company whose members issued in
state from the splendid building, to mount their sleek steeds to go
forth and counsel the punctual payment of their dues, there was now Sir
William Hood, the impropriator of the parish, marking with quick eye,
from the rectory window, the luxuriance of the abbey fields, and
calculating the loss to himself from their being tithe-free. Instead of
the shaven priest who went down when required to perform some spiritual
service, there was the gowned student muttering Hebrew in the little
vicarage garden, or allowing himself to be talked to by his daughter
Alice, when she tempted him abroad among his people. Instead of
travellers of high and low degree craving hospitality at the portal of
the monastery, there was the staid widow Lambert moving quietly between
the poultry yard and the dairy, while her sons were training their
fruit-trees against the grey unroofed walls which had once echoed back
the prayers of the devout and the jests of the convivial. All these
things were changed; but the neighbouring soil still yielded its
produce, as formerly, unquestioned as to the amount of its tenths.
Very unlike indeed was any thing that passed in these grounds in monkish
times to the preparation now made by the Lamberts for the reception of
the minister, the churchwardens and the parishioners on occasion of
their annual perambulation of the parish. The widow, more neat, if
possible, than usual, in her plaited cap, silk mittens and muslin
handkerchief, consulted with her son Charles as to the sufficiency of
the beer and buns provided for the host of visiters they were expecting:
while Joseph gave another brush to his broad brim before he went to
station himself at the gate by which the crowd must enter. The
intercourse between the vicar and this family was not very frequent, and
of a somewhat strange character. He could not help admiring Mrs.
Lambert’s kindliness of spirit as much as he marvelled at her thrift;
while she, distinguished above all things for good sense, was no less
astonished at the manner in which he passed his time, and the mode in
which he brought up his little daughter. She was at the same time drawn
towards him by the simplicity of his manners and the evidence which his
whole demeanour bore to his piety. On Sundays, he woke out of a reverie
on his way to the church, when Mrs. Lambert passed him and bowed her
head with a cheerful “Good morning to thee;” and on week days, the young
men, however busy, were always ready to listen to the vicar’s
suggestions in any affair which concerned the interests of their
neighbours. Charles was his favourite of the two, when he had once
learned to distinguish them; for Charles listened without distraction to
what was said. Joseph wished to do the same; but he could not conquer
his confusion when Alice looked likely to laugh at his calling her
father Mark Hellyer. He was apt to twist his sentences, and be thinking
how he should avoid Quaker peculiarities of speech, when Mr. Hellyer
wanted his whole attention; and Charles was therefore pronounced by the
vicar the more promising young man, and the most like his mother.
Joseph, however, was the first at his post this morning. When, standing
at the gate, he heard the shouts from a distance, and could distinguish
the tips of the white wands carried by the churchwardens, he took one
more survey of his well-brushed suit, smoothed once more his sleek
beaver, and was ready with a broad smile to welcome the crowd. The vicar
was in the midst, smiling as broadly as any one, and as heartily amused
as he had ever been by the choicest Greek epigram. The men and boys
about him were equally diverted by the fulfilment of their prophecy that
the vicar would not know the bounds of the parish any better this year
than any preceding year. All possible pains had been taken, from his
first entrance upon the vicarage, to instruct him in the localities
which he had a direct interest in understanding; but he looked as much
astonished as ever when informed that he must not go along this path, or
through that gate, but must lead the way in traversing this fallow, and
climbing the gap in that hedge. Mr. Peterson, a neighbour, who took a
kind interest in his affairs, was now on one side of him, and Byrne, a
labourer of the Lamberts, on the other; and all the little boys in the
parish were at their heels, watching for his reverence’s mistakes, and
daring each other to offer him cowslips from every field they passed.
While in full progress towards Joseph, Mr. Hellyer was carried off to
the right, to make an unwilling circuit before he could reach his young
friend; and while he was performing this task, Joseph learned something
of the events of the morning;—how there was no difficulty to-day about
their crossing the rectory garden, Sir William Hood not being there to
murmur at the ground lying half in one parish and half in another, and
his lessee not having arrived: how Miss Alice had earnestly wished to be
one of the perambulating party, and had been pacified under the
impossibility only by being permitted to view the ceremony from the
cottage of her nurse,—Byrne’s wife, who had married from the vicarage.
The young lady had amused herself with the annual joke of throwing water
upon the perambulators; and it was thought that her own father had not
escaped a sprinkling. No such greeting had awaited the party as they
passed Miss Fox’s school, where not a window was opened, and nothing
could be seen but the sudden apparition of a dozen curled heads above
the blinds, and their equally sudden disappearance. The poor young
ladies there were kept in better order than Miss Alice. Mr. Parker had
been more surly than ever, this morning, about the churchwardens
crossing his hop ground; though the boys had been sent round by the
lane, and not half a dozen hop poles thrown down. The vicar’s spirit had
been roused, and it was thought he had made Mr. Parker ashamed of
himself. He might take a lesson from old Mrs. Beverley. The gentlemen
were very sorry that her house stood on the boundary, so that they had
to pass through her little hall and out at her back gate; but the poor
old lady made light of the disturbance, and desired her maid to let
every body through that wished to pass, and always had her glass of
gooseberry wine ready for the vicar and the churchwardens, even when (as
was the case this year), she was too feeble to be brought down stairs to
bid them welcome. She had said nothing about having lost one of her
bantams last year. It would not have been known, but that the maid was
observed to look very anxiously after the fowls this morning. The
gentlemen were duly concerned, and had alarmed the maid with promises of
such reparation as she feared would bring her mistress’s anger upon her
for having betrayed the circumstance. The narrator concluded with an
opinion that Mr. Parker might also take a lesson from Charles and Joseph
Lambert, who always threw open their gates cheerfully on these
occasions.
“My mother hopes thou wilt rest at the farm,” said Joseph to the vicar,
justifying the compliment which he had just received, “and any of thy
friends will be welcome also. My brother is expecting the whole company
at the farm.”
The whole company poured into the field, appearing fully disposed to
accept the invitation.
“If thou hast no objection,” he presently added, “I will step to John
Byrne’s for thy daughter, and bring her to our summer house on the hill.
We conceive that the finding the boundary this year, among the new
enclosures, will be amusing; and I could conduct thy daughter and Jane
Byrne to the summer house, while our friends here are refreshing
themselves at the farm. Have I thy permission?”
“Alice? Yes; it is a pity Alice should not be here. You are very good. I
think it is a pity Alice should not be here.”
The obliging Joseph only waited to see his guest under his brother’s
charge, and then set off for Byrne’s cottage. He knew how fond the
little girl was of this summer house on the hill, when the dog was
silenced and chained up, and she was at liberty either to gather the
wall-flowers which grew around as profusely as common grass, or to look
abroad over the vast prospect which was spread out below the high hill
from which this building projected. As two fields and an extent of down
had to be traversed before the hill could be climbed, no time was to be
lost; and Joseph made all speed: and though Alice overheated herself
with running, and left Mrs. Byrne to clamber up the ascent as she best
could, she was only just in time to see the crowd leave the Abbey Farm
house. When she had taken courage to rush past the chained dog, and was
at length leaning out of the middle window, she said amidst her panting,
“What a little way they have to go now! It will be all over presently. I
wish I had come here at first.”
Joseph pointed out to her that the extent of the landscape had led her
into a mistake. The church, the vicarage, and Mr. Parker’s hop-ground
were as far apart as usual, though from this height they appeared to lie
close together.
“And all this farm of yours looks like a bit of a garden,” observed
Alice; “and there is the farm house where uncle Jerom lives, and his
little church. They seem to belong to us,—they lie so near.”
“Dost thou see thy uncle Jerom himself?” asked Joseph.
Alice looked every where, she thought, and could not see him;—down the
steep white path which descended from the summer house, past the
sheep-fold to the stile, but no one was there but Mrs. Byrne, mounting
step by step;—along the grey abbey wall,—but nothing cast a shadow there
in this fine May sunshine, but a ladder placed against the wall among
the fruit-trees:—into the farm yard,—but if uncle Jerom was one of the
moving group there, she could not distinguish him. Mrs. Lambert, with
her white cap, and the churchwardens with their wands were alone
recognizable. Somebody was stealing about in the churchyard, but so
feebly, that he must be thirty years older than uncle Jerom. She saw,
finally, a black dot or two on the green meadow which stretched far away
to the right; but whether these were horses, cows, or men, she could
defy Joseph to pronounce. She had not looked every where yet. Mrs. Byrne
had by this time entered; but she was too breathless and dizzy to supply
any effective eyesight. Alice must try again, assisted by a broad hint
from Joseph. “O, I see, I see! but who would have thought of looking
there?—in that bare field,—all in confusion with new banks and ditches.
That is uncle Jerom, however; I know by his leaning backwards upon his
stick, with both his hands behind him. What is he standing there for, as
if he was looking for the stars to come out?”
“I dare say he is waiting for our friends,—perhaps to shake hands with
thee across the boundary. The boundary passes along those new
enclosures, as we shall see presently.”
“There, Jane,” said Alice to her nurse; “you are the only person, I do
believe, that would not let me go the rounds. I am sure papa would have
let me go, if you had said nothing about it; and there is uncle Jerom
waiting for me now. I will go, after all,” she declared, jumping down
from the chair on which she was lolling.
Mrs. Byrne believed uncle Jerom would be as much surprised to see his
niece under such circumstances, as to behold the stars come out which
Alice supposed him to be looking for through the sunshine. Joseph
declared that the whole ceremony would be over before Alice could reach
the new enclosures.
“Thoud’st better stay, and see what thou canst from this place, if I may
advise,” said he. “It is my opinion that they are going to leave our
farm yard now.”
“There they go! how slowly they seem to move!” cried Alice. “Those boys
with the green boughs are certainly running as fast as they can go; but
they scarcely get on at all. Though you say I must not go, there is Mrs.
Lambert following them, you see. Look, Jane! why should not we be
walking there as well as Mrs. Lambert?—O dear! she is turning back. She
only went to see that the gate was shut,—that those staring calves might
not take it into their heads to go too, I suppose.—No. They had rather
stay with her. Do look how they rest their heads on her shoulders!”
Mrs. Byrne was now rested; and she came to see what was the reason of
the shout which seemed to be prodigious, however faint it was made by
distance. Joseph believed that there had been some jealousy between this
parish and the next about the tithes being unequal, or something being
wrong about the provision for the clergyman. He did not well understand
the matter, as he paid no tithes, and did not interfere in disputes
which arose out of them: but he hoped all jealousies were to be buried
in these new enclosures, and that this must be what the people were
shouting for.
“Then, if you do not pay tithes,” said Alice,“But you will have
quantities of hay, I am sure; and you see you have calves. Why do not
you pay like other people?”
Joseph and Mrs. Byrne answered at the same moment. “My brother and I do
not think it right to pay tithes. The Friends never pay tithes.”
“No body that rents the Abbey Farm pays tithes.”
“Well: if you do not pay tithes, I suppose there will be no hay-making
for me to do in your meadows. I am to help to make papa’s haycock in the
rectory field.”
“Has the vicar any claim upon the rectory field?”
“Yes; because papa says he is a specially endowed vicar.”
“Dost thou know what that means?”
“No: I only know that we have had three dear little chickens from Sir
William Hood’s broods; and papa says we are to make a haycock, and to
have some turnips by and bye, from the glebe.”
“And he has some glebe land too, has not he?”
“Yes to be sure: you know our field very well. I have not forgotten what
a race you once gave me there, when you made me run over the young
beans.—How they do shake hands!—papa and uncle Jerom. Uncle Jerom is
going home with papa to tea, I think. He steps over the new bank into
the field, you see. I wish I might gather some wall-flowers to carry
home for them.”
Mrs. Byrne begged Joseph to be Alice’s guardian, as he knew best how to
silence the dog which would certainly bark, and frighten Alice. He must
be particularly careful not to let her go too near the edge of the
projection on which the summer-house was built, and where the very
finest of the wall-flowers grew. She, meanwhile, would watch from the
window, and call them if any thing more was to be seen.—It was not long
before she gave notice that the boys had thrown their green boughs into
a corner of the churchyard, and that the ceremony seemed to be finished,
as many were dispersing to their homes. As soon, therefore, as Alice had
gathered more wall-flowers than she could conveniently carry, she was
ready to proceed towards the vicarage, provided her companions could
settle whether she was to rest on the way at the Abbey Farm, or at Mrs.
Byrne’s cottage. It was certainly the Lamberts’ turn, as she had been at
her nurse’s already to-day: but Mrs. Byrne had a little cream-cheese in
readiness for the vicarage table, and she must go home with Alice, for
the sake of carrying this cheese and a bunch of radishes for the
gentlemen’s supper, as they were to sup together to-night. So Joseph had
no more to do than to see his charge safe down the hill, before he
hastened home to refresh himself with a draught of the ale that might be
left, and to tell his mother that cream-cheeses were liked at the
vicarage.
CHAPTER II.
INTERLOCUTORY DECREES.
Alice did not reach home before she was wanted. She found her father
making tea;—the single domestic accomplishment in which the most
abstracted student is seldom deficient. Mr. Hellyer knew his way to the
tea-caddy, however he might lose himself in any other destination; and
the tea made by him was never to be complained of, however much might be
spilled by the way. His brother seemed to have intuitions equally bright
respecting bread and butter. He could cut up a loaf with as much speed
as he could demolish a bad argument; and the provision of the tea-table
had half disappeared before Alice entered. A look from her uncle towards
the radishes seemed to ask whether it was necessary that they should be
left for supper. The fact was, that uncle Jerom had been on one of his
literary excursions this day;—that is, that he had dined on a crust of
bread which he had put in his pocket in the morning, to be eaten while
looking over some books in the bookseller’s shop at Y, where he had
liberty to go, from time to time, to keep himself on a level with the
age, without buying any thing. Uncle Jerom rarely bought any thing; for
the sufficient reason that he had scarcely any money to spend. When he
had paid the low sum required for his board and lodging in a farm-house,
he had just enough left to purchase a coat every two years, and new
shirts when the old ones would hold together no longer. Hats were
obliged to take their chance; and a poor chance it was, as any one might
see who happened to meet him in the lanes with the brown,
crooked-brimmed covering which hung down almost over his eyes. When his
engagements allowed him to sit down to the common farm-house diet, his
heart was strengthened with solid fat bacon, or bread and milk: but when
he chanced to be elsewhere at meal times, he was sure to repair before
night to his brother, with desponding views of the prospects of the
church, and of the interests of mankind in general.—Thus it was to-day;
and while the vicar gave half his mind to investigating whether the
water boiled, Jerom required of the other half to prove that the spirit
of innovation which was spreading over the land was not threatening to
uproot the very foundations of religion, as incorporated with the church
of England. His spirits were not cheered by the apparition of Alice,
ornamented with the hat he had left in the hall,—the very brownest and
most misshapen of all that he had ever exhibited.
“Papa, what a pity uncle Jerom’s hat did not lie in the way when you
spilled all that ink, this morning! I am sure it is browner than the
carpet you spoiled.”
The vicar believed that he and his brother ought both to be thinking
about new hats. It had occurred to him several times lately.
“Then you must let me have your old one, uncle. You cannot want it any
more when you have a new one; and I want one for a scare-crow, for my
radish bed. I shall never get another so ugly. Let me put it on you. Do
be my scare-crow for a minute?”
Jerom put the little girl away, bidding her pour out his tea, and occupy
herself with her own. He could not spare the hat. The clergy were fallen
on evil days, and had not need give away any thing till something was
done for them, instead of the little they had being taken away.
“I have reason to complain of the last,” observed the vicar; “but can
you exactly say that nothing is done for the church? I suppose you mean,
new measures. But this Bounty is something to you, is not it? You were
very eager for it, I remember.”
“It is Queen Anne that we must thank, if we must thank any body. But
this bounty ought not to be so called. It is a mere restoration of the
property of the church, which had been usurped. It is folly to call it a
gift.”
“Still, it is something done for the church, to take these first fruits
and tenths from the rich clergy and give them to the poorer. It is
something done for you, Jerom.”
“My first consideration is the church at large: and in that view, what
is this bounty, after all? Its operation is slow and inconsiderable. Let
it be managed as well as you will, it will be between two and three
centuries before all the livings already certified will exceed 50_l._ a
year. In the meantime, I must come back out of my grave, if I am ever to
have 50_l._ a year from my living.”
“But it will be a great thing to see you settled in a parsonage house.
It will be but a small one that can be built for 200_l._: but I confess
I am concerned for the dignity of the church; and I agree with you so
far as to desire to see every living with the parsonage house and glebe
land to which it is entitled by common right. I shall look with pleasure
on the building of your little parsonage, and thank Queen Anne.”
“You will see no such building in my time, brother. What am I to do with
a parsonage, when I have not the means of living in it? As soon as I
heard that the lot had fallen upon me, I requested that the 200_l._
might be applied in some better way than building me a house that I
could not afford to live in.”
“Do you mean to exchange it for tithes, or to let it be invested in
lands? I hope, as you have objected to the house, that you will accept
the amount in land.”
“Why? The rules allow me to exchange the bounty for an equal or greater
amount of tithes, as well as for a different portion of land.”
“True: but I cannot make up my mind,—I have been long trying to make up
my mind,—as to how far any traffic in tithes is agreeable to the divine
law. I am sure, also, that you will be wise to keep clear of all
unnecessary dealings with so uncertain and vexatious an article as
tithes are now made. This last is only a secondary consideration; but——”
“I am not sure of that,” replied Jerom.
“The dignity of the church must be first consulted, Jerom: and I have a
certain repugnance to any thing like speculation in so sacred a property
as tithes. In my opinion, the worst omen for the church is this peculiar
revenue being in the hands of any laymen: and I much question whether
the royal act of allowing lay impropriations be not the cause of the
present adversity of the establishment.”
Alice looked up from her cup of tea, on hearing that tithe property was
sacred. She asked, with a look of mortification,
“May not I play with the tithe lamb Mr. Parker sent this morning, papa?
And he sent some eggs, too; and I bade Susan make a custard with them.
Must not we eat any custard?”
“To be sure, my dear child. Why not?”
“I thought you said that what was tithe was sacred, papa.”
“Well, my dear, that does not prevent its being used. Do you forget what
your Latin lesson was about, this morning?”
“About the bullocks that were offered to Jupiter. People did eat them,
to be sure; and they were sacred. But those people were not Christians.”
“Which only shows, my dear child, that there are some things which are
inherently sacred,—shown to be so by the light of reason and nature: and
among these are tithes. You will find, hereafter, that the Phenicians
paid tithes. So did the Egyptians and the Hindoos, as well as the Greeks
and Romans: all which seems to prove that these nations must have been
under one common guidance as to this institution. This is confirmed by a
reference to the attributes of some of the heathen deities. Thus Apollo—
—”
“O, Apollo! The author of light——”
“Exactly so. Now mark what is conjoined with his being the source of
light. He was emphatically called the ‘tithe-crowned,’ the ‘taker of
tithes,’ and so on.”
“Then, papa, I will put some of Mrs. Parker’s mint and sage and parsley
upon your head, and then you will be like Apollo.”
“As the Jews paid tithe in consequence of a divine revelation,” observed
Jerom, “I should be disposed to doubt whether the tithe system arose
from the light of nature.”
“Whether we so consider it, or conclude that it arose from some
unrecorded revelation made to Adam,” returned the vicar, “my doubts
remain as to whether this kind of property may be made the material of
speculation, like any other kind of property.”
“But, papa, who took Adam’s tithes? Did he pay them to Eve, or to the
angels? or, perhaps, to himself? Only, there would not be much use in
that. If every body did so, I don’t know what would become of _us_.”
“I do not speak as from knowledge, child. I only mention what seems to
me the most probable solution.—But, brother, there is further evidence,
from its wide extension, of this being an institution of the highest
origin, whether natural or revealed;—evidence which has not yet been
duly improved. Governments have been supported in a vast majority of
countries, by contributions analogous to our tithes;—contributions from
the produce, not from the rent, of land.”
“Ancient Egypt, for instance. There the sovereign appropriated the fifth
part, I believe, did not he?”
“A fifth, I believe: and the same was the case under the Mahomedan
government in Bengal. In China, they take our exact proportion,
one-tenth, which is a remarkable coincidence. Not that they are able to
raise one-tenth——”
“Any more than ourselves.”
“Any more than ourselves; which extends the coincidence. In some
provinces, a thirtieth is the utmost that can be levied.”
“Then I hope the coincidence will extend no further.”
“Indeed I don’t know,” sighing: “but my proportion becomes less every
year. Those Asiatic governments have a power which we English clergy
have not. They can help to improve the country from which they levy
their tenths, while we can only claim the tithe, without having any
title or power to aid its production. There is no inducement to a vicar,
like myself, to plan a road, for instance, to some new market for
produce, though my tithe might be much increased in value thereby. If I
were a prince, on the other hand, I should do this directly, and profit
by it.”
“And the land also; which seems to point out that this method of raising
funds is better for a state than for a church, whose ministers can never
have the same power of promoting improvement with those of a
government.”
“But, papa, does the emperor of China take his fortune in hay or fruit,
like you and Apollo, not in money? I should think it would be very easy
to cheat him: and what a quantity of things he must have to stow away!
And so must a clergyman in a very large parish.”
“Yes,” replied Jerom; “and that is the reason that tithes are generally
paid in money, in large parishes. The tax would be so in China, too, I
dare say, but that the mandarins like to have the collecting of it.”
“I think papa had better get a mandarin to collect his for him, if he
finds that people cheat him, and do not pay him so much as they ought.
Papa, I wish you would make me your mandarin I should like to go about
gathering eggs, and apples, and all the things that people pay you.”
“The mandarins have a different reason for liking to make these
collections. They can cheat as well as the people under them. But yet,
collecting under my own eye, as I do, mine is a hard case;—it is hard
that I cannot get my tenths of the articles which are as much the
property of the church as of the farmer who refuses me my due.”
“Mrs. Byrne says, however, that her husband’s is a hard case. He has all
the trouble of planting and rearing, she says; and ever so much goes to
those who have had none of the toil and the cost.”
“Mrs. Byrne shall have a rebuke from me, my child, if she talks so to
you. So long as she has lived in this house, she must have heard me say,
that the whole of what grows out of the ground is no more the property
of the grower, than the parsonage is the property of the brick-layer
that builds it. Mr. Parker’s hops never were all his; and it is quite
wrong in him to murmur about any of them being taken away. He has a
partner. Sir William Hood is his partner; and yet Mr. Parker repines at
every payment, as if he were obliged to give something that belonged to
himself.”
“I would give something to Sir William Hood to persuade him to leave off
being a partner,” Alice observed: “for it must be very provoking to have
so much trouble about another person’s share of hops.”
“Our first duty is, child, to maintain the claims of the church; and now
that discontent is spreading, every good minister of the church will
assert his right rather than suit his convenience.—And, besides, I doubt
whether any clergyman or other tithe-holder, has a right to make any
arrangement which would be objected to by those who will come after him.
The property is that of the church, not of the individual; and he must
keep it inviolate, for his successor: not even planning any disposal of
it which the church may not approve a thousand years hence.”
“That was precisely the argument used by our predecessors,” observed
Jerom, “when they scrupled about paying their first fruits and tenths to
any but the Pope. They feared not only excommunication, but what the
church might say five hundred years afterwards. But we hear little now
of excommunication, and nobody wishes to pay to the Pope. Seeing,
therefore, how little can be known of what is to come after, and that
nothing is at present done for the relief and aid of the church, I
should be disposed to make such agreement as should yield advantage in
our own day, leaving it to Heaven to protect its own gospel in time to
come.”
“Would you really, then, advise my letting my tithes to Peterson, as he
desires? Is that what you would say?”
Jerom knew nothing of Peterson’s desire to be the lessee of the vicar’s
tithes. He was thinking now of his own affair,—the application of the
share of Queen Anne’s Bounty which had fallen to him. He had the power
of getting it invested in the land now in course of enclosure in his
parish. An inducement to such an arrangement was added in the wish of
the landlord of the Abbey Farm to give Jerom a slice off his new fields,
in lieu of tithe for the remainder. The Lamberts were taking in these
new fields, and were evidently watching, with some anxiety, what would
be done about the tithe. Being quakers, they would not countenance this
claim of the church; and it was natural that they should be desirous of
the matter being settled in a way which should save the necessity of
resistance hereafter on their part, and aggression on that of the
neighbouring clergyman. The matter remained in Jerom’s choice,—whether
he should seek the consent of the patron and ordinary to his accepting,
for the period of his incumbency, an addition to his allotment in lieu
of tithe on the Lamberts’ new fields, or levy tithe upon his quaker
neighbours. This was the argument which his spirit was revolving when
Alice saw him from the summer-house, and thought he was watching for the
stars to come out, while the sun was yet high.
The vicar looked full of consternation when he asked his brother whether
he really meant to turn farmer. He knew the present law allowed the
clergy to cultivate their allotments; but, in these evil days, when the
holiness of the profession had suffered in the eyes of the people, no
true church minister would run the risk of offence, by giving his
attention to secular cares.
Very true, Jerom thought, if the church were duly protected: but, till
its humblest ministers were sufficiently provided for, they must use the
means that God put before them, to obtain bread. The employment of
tilling the ground was a remarkably innocent and a primitive one, and
there was less disgrace to the church in pursuing it, than in appearing
in such a garb——in such——
“O, yes, your hat is very shabby indeed, uncle,” observed Alice. “But
you would not object to uncle’s fishing, papa: would you?”
“Fish, my dear, do not yield tithe of common right, though, in some
places, they are titheable by custom. Where tithed, it is only a
personal tithe, and must be paid to the church where the payer attends
divine service and receives the sacraments; and in your uncle’s parish,
or mine, where there is neither sea nor a river where fish is taken for
profit, there is no such tithe due. We have only ponds near, where fish
are kept for pleasure; and it is agreed, as the law is uncertain on the
point of such preserves of fish, that no claim for tithe shall be
preferred. I have reason to know——”
“But I did not mean all this, papa. I asked you whether you would object
to uncle Jerom’s fishing. I suppose farming is no worse than fishing,
and some of the Apostles were fishermen.—And you are often busy about
other things besides your preaching, papa, or your books either.
Remember the battle you had with Mr. Byrne, about the turkey, in the
winter. Mrs. Byrne could scarcely help laughing, though you and Mr.
Byrne seemed likely to pull the poor thing to pieces between you. O,
uncle, you should have heard the noise, when papa was talking very loud
about the church, and Mr. Byrne was in a great passion, and the turkey
gobbled as loud as either of them.”
“Why, brother,” said Jerom, “did not you know that it was decided in the
case of Houghton and Prince, that turkies are to be ranked among the
things that are _feræ natureæ_; and consequently not titheable?”
“On the other hand, it was affirmed in the case of Carleton and
Brightwell, that it does not appear but that turkies are birds as tame
as hens, or other poultry, and must therefore pay tithes; and this was
in the face of the plea that turkies were not brought from beyond sea
before the time of Queen Elizabeth. My distinction is between their
being sold and spent in the house. However, I am willing to acknowledge
that it would satisfy me well to place this part of my duty in the hands
of a lessee, if I could be thoroughly persuaded that I should not
thereby betray my responsibility and the dignity of the church.”
Jerom thought that if turkies must be wrestled for, it was more for the
dignity of the church that it should be done by Peterson than by the
vicar. He was by no means bent on farming his own land. He was rather
disposed to let it. If the vicar would also let his tithes, he believed
that both might be easy in conscience as to the guardianship of their
trust.
“Moreover,” observed the vicar, “it will be in some sort an advantage to
the church that Peterson should have the collecting of its dues in this
parish, inasmuch as, with all my endeavours, I am compelled to forego
many claims which I know to be just; and for another reason which I will
presently relate. As to foregoing my claims,—I am well assured that I do
not recover more than two-thirds of that to which I have a just claim;
and I thus become guilty under the article of the ecclesiastical
constitution which declares that those who, from the fear of man, shall
not demand their whole tithe with effect, shall be liable to pay a fine
to the archdeacon for disobedience.”
“If that article were put in force, how many of our brethren would be
proved liable! On the average, they are thought to forego forty, and
some say fifty per cent. of their dues.”
“God knows I have laboured diligently to avoid this sin! No pastor has
brought more actions for an equal amount: and I have written to the
justices so often that they begin, I fear, to be weary of my
informations. But what can I do else for the ease of my conscience? The
distraint and sale of Stratten’s goods last year caused me to lie awake
a whole night from concern for the recusant; and I believe I could not
have gone through with the affair but for the fear of being myself
disobedient to the law of the church.”
“I saw little Mary Stratten to-day, sitting at the workhouse gate as you
went by,” observed Alice. “She is not nearly so puny now,—since they all
went into the workhouse,—as she was when you brought her in to be warmed
and have a bit of bread that day in the winter. But, papa, Mr. Peterson
will not prevent my making your hay, will he? You know you promised that
I might make up your haycock in the rectory-field: and I told Joseph
Lambert so, this afternoon.”
“It will be Mr. Peterson’s haycock, my child: but he will allow you to
make sport with the hay-makers, I do not doubt. And this reminds me,
brother, of my other reason for allowing Peterson to become my lessee. I
may thereby avoid all intercourse (unless on purely spiritual matters)
with the person who is about to inhabit the rectory.”
“Ah! I heard that Sir William had let the rectory to a gentleman for two
or three years; and I hoped he might be a prop to the church in this
neighbourhood.”
“So far from it, that I must be incessantly vigilant lest he should
poison the streams at which our flocks must drink.”
“Poison!” exclaimed Alice. “O, papa! is Mr. Mackintosh a bad man?”
“Go, my dear child, and occupy yourself in something pleasant till we
send for you,” said the vicar.
“Papa, uncle Jerom has not done eating yet: and you know if you once
send me away, you will forget to send for me again. You always do.”
The vicar, however, did not choose that his little daughter should have
her mind contaminated by any ideas about infidelity, and uncle Jerom
therefore resolutely pushed from him the last remains of the loaf, and
Alice withdrew, full of curiosity about poisoning, and the dreadful
thing, whatever it was, that was the matter with Mr. Mackintosh. She
chose to employ herself in watering the flower-bed below the parlour
window,—not for the purpose of overhearing, which was out of the
question,—but that her father might, by seeing her, be reminded, in the
midst of his affection for mother-church, that he had a daughter. She
could not give up her privilege of being called ‘dear child,’ the last
thing before she went to bed. She saw that papa and uncle had drawn
their chairs close together, and that they looked very much like people
talking secrets. And so they were.
“What! absolutely deistical? Well; such an open boast is better than
concealed infidelity. Will have nothing to say to a clergyman? Then we
are saved the trouble of declining his acquaintance. But how came Sir
William to let his house to such a man? Living upon the church, as Sir
William does, he might refrain from setting her interests at defiance by
showing any countenance to such a man. You will begin a course on the
Evidences directly, I suppose.”
“Immediately; though my custom has been to deliver them in the winter.
But, Jerom;—your hat. It is not becoming that such a hat should be seen
within the precincts of your church; and I would not give occasion of
scandal to this unbeliever. I am afraid, Jerom, that you have no money.”
Jerom threw down two half-crowns,—the whole of his present wealth. The
vicar shook his head, and drew out of an unlocked drawer his canvas
money-bag. It was not very rich; but he concluded that it should furnish
Jerom and himself with new hats, and that the supply of their further
wants should be left to the evolution of circumstances.
“And now, about the purchase of them,” said the vicar. “One of us may as
well put the vicarial office upon the other: for it is disagreeable to
buy a hat; and no more awkward to buy two than one.”
“But our heads are not of the same size,” objected Jerom. “If it were
not for the shabbiness of my own hat, I should propose that we should go
together to the hatter’s, the next time I am called by the new
literature to Y——. As it is, I propose that you should make the
adventure first; and then I will borrow your hat for the occasion, and
follow your example.”
It was finally settled thus; and that Jerom should accept an allotment
in the new inclosures, to be cultivated by a tenant, while the vicar was
to let his dues, consisting of his endowment of hay, and of his small
tithes, to Peterson; it being kept a secret from his parishioners that
Peterson had anything to do with the tithes but to collect them. The
vicar feared lest the bargain being known should lessen the little
respect there was among the people for the claims of the church. All
this had long been settled, and the brothers were deeply engaged in an
argument upon a point of ecclesiastical history, when Alice tapped at
the window, and asked disconsolately if she might not come in, because
she had left her doll’s right shoe under the parlour table, and she
could find nothing more to do in the garden. Susan said she would drown
the flowers if she went on watering them any longer. And, besides, it
was almost time now for the cream cheese: they had been so long, Susan
said, over their tea.—Leave granted.
CHAPTER III.
INTRUSION.
Mr. Mackintosh came and took possession of the rectory at Midsummer. He
was a single gentleman, everybody was surprised to find. Nothing was
heard of either mother or sister who might make his home comfortable;
and why such a handsome gentleman, rich enough, it was supposed, and
certainly not past middle age, should be still single, was more than
could be comprehended by the people of the parish. His housekeeper was
questioned; but the housekeeper knew nothing of the how and the why. She
could only tell that her master was sometimes low-spirited, and apt to
find fault with people; and that he was so fond of his books and of
business that he did not seem to have time for the society of ladies.
She had never heard anything of his being engaged to be married; and,
for her own part, she could not believe that it was so at present; for
her master seemed to be as anxious about matters within his little
domain as if he had nothing to look to beyond.
It was indeed true that he looked into his business with a keen eye;—
with the keen eye of one who wants occupation, and therefore vehemently
takes up whatever comes before him. He was the owner of the Abbey Farm,
and of another in the neighbourhood,—the Quarry Wood farm,—which was now
out of lease; and there were no bounds to the diligence with which he
walked over both, from day to day, in order to investigate the condition
of every part in every conceivable respect. Both the Lamberts were sure
to tell, every day at their early dinner, that they had met their
landlord in two opposite directions, while their mother had nearly as
often to mention the variety of questions she had been requested to
answer, and the odd kind of chat she had had with friend Mackintosh. He
was incessantly visiting the cottage at Quarry Wood, to know if any one
had called to view the vacant farm; and his housekeeper believed he knew
almost every blade of grass in the rectory garden, and was sorry he did
not rent the glebe as well as the dwelling, as it would have afforded
him something more to do. He was no favourite with the neighbours; for
his manners were haughty and careless. Byrne was the only person known
to take heartily to him: but Byrne seemed on such friendly terms with
him that there must certainly be something kindly in him; for Byrne was
not apt to attach himself easily. He had actually left his work at the
Abbey Farm, several times, in order to serve Mr. Mackintosh. When tried
by the common and best test of kindliness, Mr. Mackintosh, however, was
found wanting. He was not always kind to children; as Alice could
testify.
She ran in, one day, at her nurse’s, in tears,—in a passion of mingled
anger and woe. She had been watching, this fortnight, for the symptoms
of an intention to cut the grass at the rectory. She had looked through
the garden paling, every day, and had seen the grass growing longer and
longer on the lawn, till the wind waved it as if it had been ripening
corn. Papa had promised for a whole year, that she should make his
haycock; and Susan had given her a hay-rake, just tall enough for her,
on her last birth-day. Mrs. Byrne herself had told her on Tuesday, that
the grass was to be cut this day, if the weather should be fine. Alice
had jumped out of bed an hour before Susan called her, to see how bright
the sun was shining; and now, after all, Mr. Mackintosh would not admit
her to make hay because she was the vicar’s daughter.
“My dear, that cannot be the reason. There has been no time yet for Mr.
Mackintosh to quarrel with your papa. I dare say he does not like to
have little girls running about his grass plat; though I see no great
harm that you could do him and his grass.”
“But he said himself that it was because I was the vicar’s daughter; and
that he would have nobody belonging to a clergyman go near him.”
“Well, that does agree with his saying that he would not let the Quarry
Farm to any religious people; superstitious people, as he calls them.”
“I don’t think I am very religious. He might as well let me go in and
make hay,” murmured Alice, relapsing into tears.
“Come and look at my bees,” said Mrs. Byrne. “You should see how they
have got on with the comb since you were here. Since we laid out the bed
for the thyme——Take care, my dear; you will upset the milk. There! there
goes your hat into it! Dear! dear! how came you not to see the milk
pail?”
While she plunged the straw bonnet in water, to get rid of the milk in
which it had already been dipped, Alice asked how the milk pail happened
to stand there, full in the sun, where the milk would be sure to turn
sour before night. How could she help stumbling over it?
And she was about to remove it into a better place; but Mrs. Byrne
stopped her. Byrne would be angry if it was moved. She had promised that
it should stand in that place and nowhere else. If Alice’s bonnet should
be quite spoiled, Byrne and Mr. Peterson must settle it between them
which should buy her another, for Mrs. Byrne could not take upon herself
to say which was answerable for the milk standing there. It did seem a
sin and a shame that the milk should be turning sour there, when the
neighbours she usually supplied were doing without.
“Then why do not you let them have it?”
“It is tithe milk. As we do not make cheese, Mr. Peterson will have us
set by every tenth milking for your papa’s tithe. There is a dispute
between him and my husband as to which ought to carry the milk. Mr.
Peterson says that my husband is bound to carry it, either to the
vicarage or to the church porch; and I would have taken it myself to the
church porch, to save quarrelling, but my husband stopped me. He is sure
that he has the law on his side in making the tithe-taker send his own
pails for the milk; and so here it stands spoiling. I make the less stir
about it that Mr. Peterson now collects the tithes instead of the vicar
himself.”
Alice was immediately bent on going to tell Mr. Peterson that he had
better send for the milk; or, perhaps, authorize her to carry it. This
was exactly such an enterprise as suited Alice. She seized every
opportunity of following a swarm of bees, or of driving pigs, or of
helping to push sheep into the water before shearing. She had never
recovered the prohibition to go the bounds of the parish; and had a
secret plan to do it by herself some day, to show that she could. Mrs.
Beverley would let her through her house, she was sure; and Joseph
Lambert was too good-tempered to quarrel with her for climbing his
hedge. Meantime, it would be good entertainment, in a small way, to haul
a full milk-pail half through the parish, without spilling a drop; and
she could sit down in the church porch to grow cool when the task was
done.
Mrs. Byrne would not allow this; that was the worst of it. Alice grew
cross. Nobody would let her do as she liked this day. She would not now
look at the bees; nor gather herself a nosegay; nor try whether she
could not find green peas enough ripe to make a little dish for her
papa’s supper; nor dust Mrs. Byrne’s prized collection of shells and
birds’ eggs. Nothing would she do but go down again to the rectory
garden, and peep through the palings to watch the mowing, and the
process of tedding the grass, the delicious process which she must not
aid. Mrs. Byrne foresaw that the smell of the hay would be a provocative
to melancholy, and sighed when she found all her blandishments in vain,
and that the wilful girl would have her way.
She was still looking grave over the kneading of the dumpling for her
husband’s dinner, when Alice came back, seeming much disposed to fly but
for the care she was taking of something in her frock, which was turned
up round her, and made the depôt of something very precious. The
hay-making seemed all forgotten, with every other grief, and Alice was
trembling with pleasure.
“The milk-pail! the milk-pail, my dear,” cried Mrs. Byrne. “Bless me!
how nearly you were in again, you giddy thing! What can you have got in
your lap? What a lot of eggs! Partridge’s eggs! What a number!”
“O, they will get cold, if you don’t make haste,” cried Alice. “I came
as quick as ever I could without breaking them. Mr. Byrne says they will
be hatched, if you put them near the fire before they have grown cold.”
“I did not think he would have ventured to take them from under the hen.
I wonder what Mr. Mackintosh will say if he finds it out,” observed Mrs.
Byrne, bustling about to seek a shallow basket, which, lined with a
flannel petticoat, and placed near the fire, might serve as a warm nest
for the fourteen eggs.
“The poor hen partridge is dead,” said Alice. “She was sitting on the
eggs when Mr. Byrne cut off her head, poor thing, with his scythe. He
saw me through the pales, and gave me the eggs, and bade me come to you
with them; but before I left, the cock partridge came home; and there he
is walking about, poor fellow, in the middle of the grass, just as if he
was too unhappy to be afraid of any body. But when do you think these
eggs will be hatched?”
Very soon, if at all, Mrs. Byrne thought. She advised Alice to stay here
and watch, instead of going down to the rectory any more to-day. It was
not likely that more partridges’ eggs would be found; and she had
remembered since Alice left her—(she was sorry she had forgotten it
before)—that she might make hay, after a manner, in this garden, though
she did not pretend that it could compare with the rectory garden.
“You see, however, that it is very well I went,” said Alice, with a
superior air. “Now I should like to stay and watch the eggs. Papa will
not mind about my going home to dinner, just to-day.”
Mrs. Byrne forthwith made another dumpling, and Alice stood, growing
hotter every moment, close by the fire, peeping in between the folds of
the flannel, in the incessant expectation of seeing a tiny bird’s head
pop up. Mrs. Byrne soon perceived that she would at this rate totally
exhaust herself before anything could come to pass, and opened up again
her proposition about hay-making in the garden. The grass borders were
somewhat overgrown, and there was a little plat,—a very small one, to be
sure,—behind the cottage, where Mrs. Byrne hung out the linen to dry.
From this plat a good deal of grass might be cut with Byrne’s shears; if
they could be found; and Alice could be called in the first moment that
a bird was hatched. It would be a fine thing to show people that Alice
could make hay in other places besides the rectory garden.
Alice looked at the borders, and thought it would be a prodigious
condescension. The sight of the rusty shears, however, subdued her
pride; and as soon as Mrs. Byrne’s coarsest blue apron could be tied
over the young lady’s frock, she was down on her knees, clipping and
hacking at the dry grass, and severing as much as a handful in a quarter
of an hour. She actually forgot her new property of eggs till Byrne came
home to dinner, and startled her with his gruff voice, while she was
trying to clip a bunch which was too obstinate for her shears. She
looked up, vexed at being interrupted, but sufficiently exhausted to be
in need of her dinner; and no vexation could withstand the news that
three little partridges were huddling together and tumbling over one
another in the basket.
No vexation of hers could withstand this news. Byrne’s was too highly
wrought to be conquered so easily. He came home in a most terrible
temper indeed. His wife was aghast when she heard how he abused
Peterson, the church, and even the vicar himself, before Alice. Peterson
had come down to the rectory to demand tithe of the mown grass, which
Mr. Mackintosh had contemptuously refused, on the ground of there being
no claim. Mr. Mackintosh had said that while the church had taken care
that every other party should pay to the church, it had also taken care
of itself, and had decreed that the church should not pay to the church.
The parson might not pay to the vicar, or the vicar to the parson. Much
as he hated the church, therefore, he was now sheltered under its wings;
and not a blade of rectory grass should the vicar touch.—Well; what
answer did Peterson make? Why; it was the most provoking thing in the
world; he had his law-book in his pocket, (as he seemed always to have,)
and he showed that in the case of a vicar being specially endowed, (as
Mr. Hellyer was,) small tithes, and even hay, might be levied upon the
impropriator’s ground, as well as other people’s. Mr. Mackintosh said
some very sound, good things, Byrne thought, when he found he really was
liable. He said he thought it would be no more than fair to leave people
to choose whether they would have a religion or not; and that they might
as well demand from him his meat and drink to maintain Punch in a
puppet-show——
Mrs. Byrne stopped her husband by throwing a bit of partridge’s
egg-shell at him to make him look up, just when Alice’s eyes began to
open wide with expectation of what it was that was to be likened to
Punch in a puppet-show. It was grief enough to Mrs. Byrne that her
husband should snatch up Mr. Mackintosh’s revolting sayings about
religion; she would not have this child exposed to the evil under her
roof; and so she had told her husband. He went on muttering, while he
tore his dumpling to pieces, that he did not believe Mr. Mackintosh
would allow the grass to be carried away; and, for his part, he hoped he
would not. It was time somebody was beginning to resist encroachment, or
there was no saying what pass the parish would come to. He had seen, and
so had his father, how the burden of tithes grew and grew; but it was
not till he told the facts to Mr. Mackintosh, and Mr. Mackintosh
explained them, that Byrne knew the reason why the burden must always go
on to increase, unless the church should——
Here he was again stopped. His wife wondered whether Mr. Mackintosh
could explain why tithes were only half the amount in the next parish.
If the soil was really equally good in the two parishes, it was very odd
that wheat land should yield twelve shillings per acre of tithe here,
and only six shillings in the next parish.
“I have known a worse case than that; where fourteen shillings were paid
for an acre on one side a hedge, and five and sixpence for an acre on
the other side, of precisely the same quality of soil. But, bad as it is
to have to depend on parsons’ tempers, and such accidents, it is not so
bad as seeing the tithe go on growing and growing, and knowing that it
will never stop, unless such men as Mr. Mackintosh put a short stop to
it. Ah! you look frightened; but you had better look frightened at the
tithes than at any thing that I say about Mr. Mackintosh. In my father’s
time and mine, I’ll tell you what has happened. Rent is higher, as you
know only too well from every farmer you meet. The rise of tithe helps
rent to rise; and the tithes have trebled while rent has risen
one-fourth. Rent has risen fast enough; but tithes have risen twelve
times as much.”
Mrs. Byrne thought this must be a mistake; because if matters went on at
this rate, there must come an end of tithe, and tillage, and all.
“And so there will, if tithe goes on. Tithes are higher than the rent
now, in some spots hereabouts, where hops and other expensive articles
are grown. And the reason why it must be so is so plain, that Mr.
Mackintosh does not believe but that those who made tithe foresaw all
that is coming to pass. The tithe is part of the crop, which cost a vast
deal of toil and expense to raise; and as the toil and expense of
raising a crop increase, the tithe must become a larger and larger share
of the profit. Don’t you see?”
“To be sure, the more it costs to grow a bushel of corn, the dearer the
corn will be, and the more value there will be in the tenth part. But if
the tithe makes corn and other things dearer, and their being dearer
raises the value of the tithe again, there can be nothing but ruin
before us.”
“Except to the church, which is to fatten on our starvation, Mr.
Mackintosh says.”
“But this makes a fine profit for the Lamberts, and those who pay no
tithe, and yet sell their corn as dear as other people.”
“To be sure it is; for every farmer, in Wales or Scotland, or wherever
else in the kingdom he may be, that holds tithe-free land. Where some
are obliged to sell dear, as the tithe-payers are, those few that could
sell cheaper are sure to follow, as long as there is too little instead
of too much of what they have to sell; and the tithe-free thus profit at
the expense of those who buy bread and hay. However, we should not talk
of the farmers profiting, except as far as they can get their burden of
tithes lightened during their lease. The Lamberts pay a fine rent for
the Abbey Farm, in consideration of its being tithe-free; and if tithes
were to be done away by the time their lease is out, their rent would be
lowered to meet the fall of prices that would take place. So it is their
landlord that gains from their land being tithe-free, except for the
convenience of having no mischief made in their field, and for the price
of corn rising as tithe rises while their lease runs. Their rent will be
raised again, Mr. Mackintosh says, if tithing goes on at the present
rate in the parish.”
“I always think no people look so like prosperous folks as the
Lamberts.”
“Ah! the old man was a thrifty one; and ’tis said there are no better
farmers in the county than his sons. Sir William will make no difficulty
of letting them keep the Abbey Farm in the family as long as he and they
have to do with lands, as long as they keep on this side Sticks, as Mr.
Mackintosh says; but I don’t know what he means exactly.”
“I do,” said Alice; “Styx is the river where dead people get across in a
boat.”
“Well; do you believe that, now? I would as soon believe what your
father preaches——”
“O, no, nobody believes about Styx now,” said Alice. “Mr. Mackintosh
only talks as some people used to talk, hundreds of years ago, because
he does not choose to talk as people talk now.”
Byrne shook his head. His opinion of Mr. Mackintosh was lowered. It was
a pity Mr. Mackintosh did not speak of something that he really
believed, instead of something that had been already disbelieved
hundreds of years ago.
“How neat Mrs. Lambert looks now! and how quick she always walks!” said
Alice, quitting her dinner. “I will call her in to see my birds and the
eggs.”
There was no occasion to make haste to call Mrs. Lambert. She was coming
to Byrne’s cottage. She had a smile for Alice, though she was evidently
in haste to say something.
“I wish, friend,” said she to Byrne, “that thou wouldst make haste down
to the rectory. They want thee there; and thy dinner will keep, I dare
say.”
“What’s the matter?” cried Byrne, seizing his hat. “Is that scoundrel
Peterson kicking up a row?”
“I scarcely know,—being a little dull of apprehension, compared with
thee, as to who is the scoundrel when people fall out, and whether there
must be one. However, I can tell thee this;—that there is a great empty
waggon, with five horses in it, at the rectory gate, and Peterson is
making a show of it; and George Mackintosh stands at his garden pales,
trying how provoking he can look, as it seems to me. The people are
gathering, and the quarrel runs high. If thou canst bring either to a
soft answer, thou wilt do a good deed. But, Byrne,” (calling after him,)
“I assure thee they are ready enough with the word scoundrel already. Do
not thou help them.”
Alice flew after Byrne. Mrs. Byrne thought it necessary to follow Alice;
and Mrs. Lambert had been on her way to Mr. Mackintosh on business, when
the gathering of the crowd made her turn back. She therefore walked down
the road once more, hoping that her landlord would soon be able to
listen to what she had to say.
All was in uproar at the rectory. The garden gate was laid by itself on
a bank in the road. The heavy waggon was making deep ruts in the grass
plat, which the feet of the five cart-horses had already torn up. The
tithe of grass was being thrown in, amidst the laughter of the
spectators, any one of whom could have carried it home in a well-packed
wheelbarrow. The housekeeper was crying at one window, and her master
was standing at another, with his hand in his bosom, no word on his
tongue, but awful threatenings of the law on his brow. Byrne was
evidently in a fury, though a sign from Mr. Mackintosh positively
forbade his offering any opposition to Peterson and his team. He struck
his toe into the cut turf, as a bull would have struck his horns; and
like a bull, threw up clods into the air.
Peterson coolly expounded the law, the whole time, though none seemed
disposed to take note of it, unless it was the horses, who certainly
strained their muscles more zealously, and struck their hoofs deeper,
and jingled their harness more emphatically, when he cracked his whip in
the pauses of his lecture.
“I have spared you some of the trouble I might have given, if I had
enforced my right,” said he. “By common right, the tithe grass may be
made into hay upon the spot, and I might have turned in labourers to
work on the ground for a couple of days. And then, again, I have not
suffered my horses to touch a blade of your grass, Mr. Mackintosh.”
Somebody observed that he would have had to answer for it in law if he
had permitted his horses so to act.
“By no means,” replied Peterson. “What does the law say?” (Reading.)
“‘And when he comes with his carts, teams, or other carriages, to carry
away his tithes, he must not suffer his horses or oxen to eat and
depasture the grass growing in the grounds where the tithes arise; much
less the corn there growing or cut. But,’” (with emphasis,) “‘if his
cattle do in their passage, against the will of the driver, here and
there snatch some of the grass, this is excusable.’”
“Against the will of the driver,” repeated some. “No thanks to you,
Peterson.”
“It seems to me that making little laws like this is quite fit work for
the pharisees,” thought Mrs. Lambert. “The weighty matters of the law
seem to find no room here, any more than among those that were so busy
with their mint, and anise, and cummin.”
Peterson proceeded. “‘If any person do stop or let the parson, vicar,
proprietor, owner, or other of their deputies, or farmers, to view,
take, and carry away their tithes as above said; he shall forfeit double
value, with costs; to be recovered in the ecclesiastical court.’ 2 and
3, Edward VI. c. 13. s. 2. ‘And if the owner of the soil, after he has
duly set forth his tithes,—’”
“I wish the devil had taken me before I set out the tithe, let the law
say what it will,” thought Mr. Mackintosh. “I wish I had bid defiance to
the law and the fellow at the same time.”
“‘Will stop up the ways,’” proceeded Peterson, “‘and not suffer the
parson to carry away his tithes, or to spread, dry, and stack them upon
the land, this is no good setting forth of his tithes without fraud
within the statutes; but the parson may have an action upon the said
statute, and may recover the treble value; or may have an action upon
the case for such disturbance; or he may, if he will, break open the
gate or fence which hinders him, and carry away his tithes.’ Which is
what I have been and am doing, Mr. Mackintosh.”
“So I perceive.”
“Well, sir. What do you say to what I have just read?”
“That you shall hear in court.”
“You cannot say that I have not, in the words of my authority, been
‘cautious that he commit no riot, nor break any gate, rails, lock, or
hedges, more than necessarily he must for his passage.’ You cannot say
so, sir.”
“I have nothing to say to you,” replied Mr. Mackintosh, stepping out
upon his mangled lawn from the window. “Whatever I have to say relates
to your principal and to his church.”
“Take care how you blame my principal, sir,” said Peterson; concealing,
as desired by the vicar, the fact that these tithes had become his own
property. “My principal, sir, asks no more than his right: and if he is
guilty at all in the eye of the law, it is for requiring much less than
his due.”
“Well, if your principal chooses to live by such a right, let him. If he
chooses, for the sake of a mere life interest in such an institution, to
pay his rent of servility and dependence to the oligarchy, I wish him
joy of his contentment in his holy office. The church is the patrimony
of the oligarchy,—that is, the emoluments of the church;—and these
emoluments purchase support for the oligarchy. If your principal hopes
for salvation while he is helping his employers to confirm their own
corrupt dominion, for the oppression of the people, he is even a greater
simpleton than I take him to be. And so you may tell him, if you happen
to understand what I say.”
Everybody present understood that something was said about the vicar and
being a simpleton; and a smile went round. Byrne had no doubt that, so
much being true, all the rest must be very fine; and he was vehement in
his applause. Peterson turned round to him, and declared that he had
some business with him which he would not be long in disclosing. With an
air of defiance, Byrne invited the lessee to come and hear his opinions
on his own premises. Mrs. Byrne trembled for the consequences of the
proposed visit; and earnestly hoped that it would not take place till
the minds of both parties had cooled. She would do her utmost with her
husband to convince him of the uselessness of contending with the law.
If Mr. Mackintosh chose to go into court, that was no reason why a
labouring man should incur such expense and vexation. It would be far
better to pay tithe out of their garden, which was what Peterson was
going to demand, she supposed, than to run any risk by refusal. The
vicar had always paid her wages readily when she was a servant in his
family, and she should be sorry to make any difficulty about paying his
dues, now that it was her husband’s turn to recompense service.
The throng of gazers and mockers naturally followed the waggon. Byrne
and another labourer began lifting the gate, in order to set it again
upon its hinges; but Mr. Mackintosh desired that it might lie where it
was, till a legal opinion should have been obtained as to whether more
force had been used than the occasion required, and than the law could
justify. Presently, no one was left but the gentleman and Mrs. Lambert,
who was not disposed to leave her business to be propounded on another
occasion, merely because Mr. Mackintosh had lately been in a passion,
and was now out of humour.
“I thought thou hadst been wiser,” observed Mrs. Lambert, in her plain
way, “than to cause thyself all this mischief. It seems to me a pity to
spoil a pretty place in this manner, without doing any good that I see?”
“No good! It is doing good to resist paying tithe.”
“I agree with thee there. We Friends think it not lawful to pay tithes.”
“No; you let the parson come and seize them. This is a degree better
than paying them; but what good has been done by such a resistance as
that?”
“I might ask what good has been done by your resistance. Here is your
little lawn spoiled; and ill-will confirmed between the vicar and his
people. It will not affect thee so much as me, perhaps, that there has
been a scandal to religion, too. Ah! I see thee smile; and I am far from
thinking that there is religion in taking tithe: but the man who
preaches religion in this parish has been held up to scorn; and I fear
the contempt may spread to what he preaches. Thou wouldst not object to
this? Well, now, if thou wilt let me say so, I do wonder that one who
talks of liberty as thou dost, should be so unwilling to allow liberty
of judgment to others.”
Mr. Mackintosh protested that the one thing he was always striving after
was to emancipate people’s judgments from the monstrous superstitions,
the incredible follies which they called faith and religion, and so on.
He was for ever trying to set people’s judgments free.
“Rather, to make them think like thee, shouldst thou not say? There is a
contempt in thy way of speaking of Christians, and others who differ
from thee, which I should be apt to call oppression, dost thou know? No
person hinders thee from saying what thy own opinions are, and where
other people’s are wrong; and, therefore, what occasion is there for
trying to persuade thy neighbours that their clergyman must be a bad
man, if he be not a fool. I think thee wrong in doing this, and I say so
when opportunity offers, though I have no better an opinion than thou of
his clergyman’s gown, and of all the forms which he mixes up with his
public worship.”
“Then you must let me declare you wrong.”
“That such is thy opinion. Certainly. But I wonder thou art easy in
making thyself answerable for mixing up with Martha Lambert’s follies
some things which are of graver importance;—things which, true or false,
make or mar a great deal of happiness, and cannot, therefore, be whiffed
away, like trifles, with a joke. Thou wert free, last Sunday, to go into
the fields instead of the church, and to tell every one that passed why
there should be, as thou thinkest, no church going: but I do not see
that it was more proper for thee to point at thy neighbours of the
church and the meeting, and say that they differed only in going to see
Punch in a wig and Punch in a broad-brim, than it would be in the
Lamberts to say that thou desirest the perdition of mankind because thou
dost not worship as they do.”
“Whoever told you of that speech of mine should have added what I said
besides;—that the Quakers are the only Christians I respect, on account
of their——”
“That is all very well in its way: but I do not ask for compliments to
the Friends, but for justice to everybody. I could wish to see thee go
to law, (as thy conscience allows it,) rather than hold up the good
vicar to scorn. Thou wilt allow the suggestion.”
“Ah! you have not that resource. The Friends do not go to law when they
believe themselves wrongfully tithed.”
“Their reference is to the divine, not to human law. Their pleas against
tithe are three, which would avail nothing in a court of law;—that the
interference of civil governments with spiritual concerns is
unauthorized and unholy——”
“True, true.”
“That the tithe system is a return to the Levitical law, which can have
no place under a profession of Christianity.”
Mr. Mackintosh smiled his utter contempt of both Judaism and
Christianity.
“And that religion can never be lawfully made a trade; the rule of the
case being the precept, ‘Freely ye have received; freely give.’ If thou
dost not agree in this last, but thinkest, as the generality do, that
the setting forth of spiritual things deserves hire in the same way as
the teaching of the mathematics, and other things that belong to the
mind, there is the less reason for thy pronouncing that the vicar must
be a bad man or a simpleton for requiring the maintenance that the law
allows him.”
“It is an infamous practice! The oppression is intolerable. The
injustice is what nobody ought to endure. That we should have the church
of Rome over again at this time of day! Your favourite vicar may be just
such a simpleton of a priest as one might find in the old Popish days,
in country villages: but what a poor wretch to set to teach the people!
“Suppose, then, we try to mend the law that displeases us both so much.
If the law makes the vicar do and expect what thou thinkest folly, a
wiser law might enable him to conduct himself more wisely in thy eyes.
My sons will be happy to conduct thee to affix thy name to a petition of
the Friends against tithes, which is lying for signature in the next
town.”
Mr. Mackintosh would have a petition of his own, whenever he signed one
for such a purpose. He would not mix himself up with Christians in any
way. He should petition at once for the overthrow of all superstition in
this country.
“And, of course, that thou shouldst be appointed judge of what is
superstition, and what is not; for I fear thou art not else likely to be
satisfied. Meantime, I fear thou wilt not let the Quarry Wood farm to
superstitious people.”
“Not unless I were sure that their superstition did not make them
cheats: as superstition generally does.”
“Have the Lamberts cheated thee in their management of the Abbey Farm?”
“No. I had rather let your sons have the Quarry Wood farm than any soft,
sneaking tithe-payer. Every man that is a slave to the church is an
enemy to me.”
“And all who pay tithes are slaves to the church. I am sorry for thee,
George Mackintosh, for I think, at this rate, no man has ever had so
many enemies. I presume that thou, as a scholar, hast as long a list of
the tithe-payers of all the world from the beginning, as the vicar
himself. He would make one believe that the Friends alone are, as thou
sayst, not slaves to the church, and therefore thy allies.”
“I offered the Quarry Wood farm at a very low rent, if I could find a
tenant that I approved,” said Mr. Mackintosh. “Your sons shall have it
at that low rent, in consideration of—of——”
“Of their opinions on one point happening to suit thy own. This is the
principle by which thou wouldst secure perfect liberty of thought and
speech. However, I shall be glad if my sons can come to an agreement
with thee in time to prevent any one from professing himself an infidel
in order to obtain thy farm at a low rent. It is creditable to the
public that thy advertisement to such persons has not already answered
to thy satisfaction.”
Superstition was too strong and too popular yet for individuals, Mr. M.
replied. Most men had not the courage to put themselves in a position of
defiance, such as he had in this case offered.
“Thou wilt now withdraw thy advertisement,” urged Mrs. Lambert. “There
is no fear of my sons being taken for any thing but what they are by
those who know them: but I should be sorry they should be obliged to
disclaim in the public papers any character that thou mightst seem to
fix upon them.”
Not only was this promised, as a matter of course, and an arrangement
made for an interview at the Quarry Wood farm, when all the terms might
be discussed; but Mrs. Lambert obtained permission to call upon the
crying housekeeper, and the gaping foot-boy, for aid towards securing
the pretty garden from the intrusion of pigs and other trespassers.
Before sunset, the gate swung once more on its hinges; and the grass was
rolled and rolled again till half its disasters were repaired. It was as
much a labour of love as teaching in a school, or cooking broth for a
sick neighbour; and when Mrs. Lambert found she must go home, the
foot-boy ran before her to open the gate; the housekeeper blessed her;
and even Mr. M. sent a message after her to beg that she would not go
till she had rested herself.
CHAPTER IV.
HERESY.
Peterson was not long in performing his promise or threat of visiting
B.’s cottage. Indeed, he had so much to do now that it was necessary to
fulfil his engagements as they arose, if he meant to discharge them all.
He was not only the lessee of the vicar’s tithes, which cost him no
small trouble to gather in. He was also the collector of Sir William
Hood’s; and the time approached for making the usual valuation of the
crops before harvest. Some of the land was, as has been said,
tithe-free. A small portion besides, which seemed to lie within the
verge of the parish, caused him no trouble. It had never been included,
with certainty, within the bounds of any parish; and the tithe thereof,
being extraparochial, was the prerogative of the king, with whom
Peterson had nothing to do. A composition had been agreed upon for the
tithes of other lands, for a certain number of years; but there still
remained a large extent of ground on which the great tithes had either
to be compounded for on a valuation, from year to year, or where the
contribution to the parson was to be levied in kind. His own property by
lease, the small tithes and hay which he rented from the vicar, he
determined to levy in kind: and his first step was to study the precise
extent to which they were due, and to levy them to the utmost. Of the
prædial tithes,—those which arise merely and immediately from the
ground, the grain and wood had to be valued in order to a composition.
The hay, being the vicar’s by special endowment, had to be levied in
kind with the other prædial tithes which came under the denomination of
small tithes; viz.: fruit, vegetables, and herbs. He had not only been
the round of the hayfields, but was looking into all the gardens, and
casting a calculating glance over the orchards, in anticipation of a
tenth of their produce. Then the mixed tithes gave him much trouble;
tithes of produce which arises not immediately from the ground, but from
things immediately nourished by the ground, and which, according to the
murmuring parishioners, paid tithe twice or three times over. When they
had paid tithe of grass, they contended, it was hard to have it to pay
again in the shape of a calf, and again in that of milk. In like manner,
the grain on which their poultry fed paid tithe; and then the poultry;
and also eggs. In like manner, the sheep pasture paid tithe; and then
the tenth lamb must be given; and lastly, the wool. Endless disputes
arose out of the lessee’s claims, and he was perpetually sent to his
tithe gospel, as he called his law-book. There he found a provision by
which he might annoy Byrne, and every parishioner in Byrne’s rank of
life. There was another kind of tithe, besides the prædial and the
mixed;—the personal tithe, which might be made, if possible, more
offensive than the mixed. He knew that by a claim for this kind of
tithe, at least, he could punish Byrne for his partisanship with Mr.
Mackintosh in the morning.
When he arrived at Byrne’s, both the labourer and his wife were occupied
in helping Alice to feed her little birds, the twelve young partridges
which bore testimony to the efficacy of flannel and fire in June. Byrne
did not trouble himself to look up when his foe entered; but observed,
while guiding an infant beak to the mess which was prepared, that
Peterson need not flatter himself that he would be permitted to carry
away any of Miss Alice’s birds. The little girl’s own father should not
rob her of her pleasures. Peterson thought it a pity such a defiance
should be wasted; but he really never thought of such a thing as tithing
wild birds. Pheasants and partridges are decided by law to be _feræ
naturæ_, and therefore not titheable. Though their wings be clipped,
they would still fly away if they could; and if they should breed, their
young, though imprisoned, are still wild, and therefore not bound to
support the clergyman. Alice’s pleasures were safe.
“O, I am so glad!” cried Alice; “and now we need not be afraid about the
bees either, I suppose.”
“Ay; your bees, Mrs. Byrne,” observed Peterson, smiling. “You need not
twitch the young lady’s sleeve, Byrne; I thought of the bees before;
and, in fact, they made part of my errand. I see you have a fine range
of beehives at the south end of your garden; and that spreading
jessamine, and the thyme bed, and the tall honeysuckle must yield plenty
of wax and honey. You must keep my share for me, remember.”
“If partridges are wild, so are bees, I should think, Mr. Peterson.”
“So the law says: and I am of opinion the law is therein defective:
since, though bees can fly away individually, they are stationary, as a
swarm, when once fixed in a hive. I should recommend that every tenth
swarm should be set apart for tithe: but the law does not so ordain. The
wax and honey, however, do not fly away, and it is of them that I spoke
when I said you must remember the vicar’s share.”
“The vicar would have been sure enough of his share,” said Mrs. Byrne,
somewhat heated, “if you had let me alone to offer it. Miss Alice will
tell you that every year she has had much more than a tenth of my honey;
and so she would still, without your interfering to make that a debt
which was much more precious as a grace.”
“Mr. Peterson shall not bring me my honey,” protested Alice. “I won’t
take it, unless you let me carry it home myself, Jane.”
Peterson wondered what would become of religion, if it was to be left to
be supported by free will, instead of by dues.
How little was he aware what was included in this question! How little
was he aware with whom he identified himself while asking it! This has
been the faithless question of all the perverters of the quenchless
religious principle in man, from the beginning of time,—of all the
priests of all the trinities that the world has known. This is the
question asked by the wise man of the Egyptian temple, when he unveiled
the hawk-headed Osiris, and the swaddled Orus, and the crocodile-shaped
Typhon, and told the prostrate people what to pay for housing the triad
of creators that they came to adore.—This is the question asked by the
ancient Hindoo priest, when he finished his evening meal of rice in the
echoing recesses of the rocky temple, and waited only for the departure
of the last impoverished worshipper, to go and see how much wealth was
deposited for Brahma, and how much for Vishnu, and how much for Siva,
and how many bribes were offered for admission into each of the seven
paradises of the seven seas. This is the question asked before the Greek
altars, when goats and horses and black bulls were sacrificed there, to
the gods of the earth, and the sea, and the infernal regions, and tithe
was demanded to be yielded to the one on his ivory seat, and another in
his car of sea-shell, and the third on his throne of sulphur. This is
the question asked by the skin-clothed ministers of the Gothic deities,
Odin, Vile, and Ve, when they called upon their barbarian brethren to
offer the hides of wolves, and the flesh of boars, in homage to the
three sons of the mysterious cow. This is the question asked by the
Mexican priests of old, when they forbade the feathered and jewelled
warrior companies to come empty-handed to the sanctuary of the
father-sun, the brother-sun, and the son-sun; the trinity of
unpronounceable names. This is the question asked by the monastic orders
of the Catholic church, when they ordained, as penance, that the
children’s inheritance should be made over to the church, to the glory
of the Gnostic triad which they enthroned on the Seven Hills, and to
which they dared to invite adoration in the name of Christ. This is the
question now asked by our Episcopal preachers of the three-fold deity,
the Avenger, the Propitiator, and the Sanctifier; and enforced for the
support of their tri-partite form of religion, compounded of Heathenism,
Judaism, and Christianity.—This is not the question asked by Jesus, when
he sent forth the Seventy, bidding them have faith that they should be
supported by free-will offerings better than by dues; or when he
cleansed the temple from the defilements which but too soon returned to
harbour there; or when he sat on the well in Samaria, and declared who
it was that the Father sought to worship him; or when he strayed in the
wilderness, despising the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them,
and asking instead, the heart of man; or when he sat on the
mountain-side, gazing on the temple towers which were bathed in the
evening light, and telling of the time when the young pigeons should try
their first flight from the summit of Moriah, instead of fluttering in
death on the altar of sacrifice; and when the husbandman should plough
up the foundations of the sanctuary, finding, through the gospel, that
his own heart was a holier place.—What is included in this question,—
whether religion can be supported by free will, and not by dues? To ask
it is to doubt whether God has vivified the human heart with a principle
of faith, and whether man be not really made to grovel with the beasts
which perish, or, as the only alternative, to pursue shadows till the
grave swallows him up like a pitfall in his path. It is to suppose that
by mere accident alone has the northern barbarian been found watching
for signs in the driving clouds; and the western Indian looking abroad
over the blue Pacific; and the Persian hailing the sunrise from the
mountain-top; and the Greek lawgiver waiting upon the voice of the
oracle; and the Christian child praying at the knee of its parent. It is
to question whether there be more in a sunrise than yellow light, or in
a pestilence than so many dead, or in a political revolution than a
change of actors in an isolated dramatic scene, or in the advent of a
gospel than the issuing of a new and fugitive fiction. It is to deny
that every man needs sympathy in his joys, and consolation for his
sorrows; that he ever questions whence he came and whither he must go;
that he ever feels the weight of his own being too vast to be sustained
without reposing on Him who called it forth. It is to question whether
there be faith on the earth, except within the pale of two or three
churches; whether, for the rest of the world, the sea does not raise its
everlasting voice, and the starry host hold on their untiring march in
vain. It is to question whether the decrepid can truly worship in the
aisles of our churches; or the lordly care for the things of the Spirit,
unless those things are joined with worldly pomp. It is to pronounce the
apostles profane in their fishing and tent-making, and foolish in their
fully-justified reliance on the faith and charity of their disciples. It
is to declare Jesus wrong in saying that to the poor the gospel is
preached, and that his kingdom was not of the old world,—belonging to
the formal Judaical dispensation. It is to put his gospel for correction
into the hands of the prelates who legislate for its security, and who
predict its permanence, if it be sustained by the means they prescribe,—
by gifts and offerings wrung from the reluctant; by endowments, by
bounties of first-fruits and tenths, by tithes and oblations. To
question whether religion can be supported by free-will instead of by
prescribed dues is to libel man, to doubt the gospel, and to stand with
a sceptical spirit amidst the temple of God’s works.
Would that the vicar had had sufficient faith in the gospel he preached
to believe that it might be supported without exactions which it does
not sanction! Would that he had been wiser than his tithe-gatherer, and
had foreseen the consequences, as well as been aware of the guilt, of
alienating the spirits which it was his express office to win! He looked
very grave at his little daughter, when she loudly complained that
Peterson wanted to take away some of Jane’s honey for him, when she knew
he had much rather that Jane should give it him herself. He told her
that she must not speak of matters that she did not understand:—a rebuke
which astonished Alice more than all the rest, as she thought she had
never heard of anything more easy to be understood.
There was little show of respect to the vicar, this evening. When he
entered Byrne’s cottage, Peterson was traversing the garden, making
notes of potatoes, turnips, and cabbages, of onions, parsley, and sage.
He counted the currant bushes, and looked up into the cherry-tree. Mrs.
Byrne attended, in terror lest there should be a quarrel. She tried to
persuade her husband to go and make his bow to the vicar; but Byrne
would do no such thing. He dogged the tithe-gatherer’s heels, disputing
where he could, and threatening where he could not dispute. He did not
mean to pay tithe these seven years, for the new bit of garden which he
had just taken in. He would contest it to the death. He hoped the
turnips would prove tough enough to choke the tithe-gatherer. He would
not gather his cherries at all, if he must pay tithe of them. They
should be left for the birds, and for any village children who might
come to take them.
“That is all very fine talk,” replied Peterson: “but I can tell you
this. If your fruit is taken by the birds, or other downright thieves, I
must bear the loss with you: but if it be taken with your knowledge and
consent, whether by school-children or anybody else, you must pay me the
tithe of what was taken: and if left to drop from the tree, I must have
the tenth of what so falls. Pray, are these peas and beans for sale, or
for domestic use?”
Byrne could not tell till they were gathered; and his wife did not
pretend to have made up her mind, any more than he.
“Well; if you won’t tell me, I must be on the watch to see whether your
hog touches any of them, and how many find their way to other people’s
tables. And then, you will have no right to call me prying, remember. I
asked you the fair question, which you would not answer.”
Byrne thought he might as well live under Bonaparte, or any other
tyrant, at once, as be liable to sow and tend and reap for another, in
this way; and to be watched by a spy, as if this was not the free
country it prided itself on being.
“What would you say if you were a farmer?” cried Peterson, with a smile.
“Here you have only to pay a little honey, and a few vegetables, and a
little fruit, and—one thing more, for which I find the vicar has
strangely omitted to charge you hitherto. See here,” producing his
law-book. “By a constitution of Archbishop Winchelsea, and the statute,
2 and 3 Edward VI., c. 13., tithes are payable for profits arising from
personal labour or merchandise. They are payable, you see, where the
party hears divine service, and receives the sacraments; but only the
tenth part of the clear gain, after all the charges are deducted. Now I
find your wages are per week——”
“Do you dare to want to strip my husband of his wages?” cried Mrs.
Byrne. “I will call the vicar to put an end to this.”
Peterson’s triumph was complete. The vicar was full of concern that
anybody suffered pain or inconvenience about the matter: but it was not
for him or his parishioners to alter the constitution of the church. His
duty to his church and to his successor required that the ecclesiastical
law should be obeyed in all its provisions. Two or three zealous
clergymen had lately revived this claim, after it had lain dormant for
very many years, throwing into gaol the labourers who opposed
themselves; and he would support them through evil report and good
report.
“Then you may throw me into gaol,” cried Byrne. “As for attending your
services, neither I nor mine will ever do it more, Mr. Hellyer: and I
never wish to see you within my gate again, sir.”
“O, John!” cried the terrified wife.
“I am not going to be angry,” said the vicar to her, with his usual air
of quiet complacency. “I have long feared that the infidel who has come
among us would corrupt your husband, and I see he has done so
completely. Nay: do not cry so, Jane. All our hearts are in the hand of
God: and you should trust, as I do, that he will sustain his church
under the attacks of the unbelieving.”
“Not if such as you have the management of it,” cried Byrne. “You talk
of Mr. Mackintosh: but I tell you that nothing that I ever heard him say
turned my heart from you and your religion as you yourself have done
to-day; and I rather think that Mr. Mackintosh owes to you much of such
power as he has. We shall soon see that. Send the labourers of this
parish to gaol for their tithe of wages, break gates, and pry into
gardens, and you will see what a congregation Mr. Mackintosh will have
on his lawn, to hear what he has to say about a religion that teaches
such oppression.—Be pleased to hold your tongue, sir, and walk out of my
garden.—Hush, Jane!” he cried to his weeping wife. “There is nothing in
their tithe-law that prevents my saying that.—Go, go, and milk the cow.”
And he turned over the pail, which still stood with milk in it, as in
the morning. He declared that he knew something of tithe-law as well as
Peterson, and therefore claimed the liberty of spilling the milk which
had not been removed, after due notice, so as to restore the pail in
time for the afternoon milking. Peterson could not deny the correctness
of Byrne’s law.
“Well; but, why not come to church?” mildly inquired the vicar.
“To hear you thank God that you are no extortioner, I suppose. I am sick
enough of that.”
“But, John,—do listen, John!—He can’t help it: it is no fault of his: he
only asks what the law gives him.”
“Then let the law leave off making a man contradict in the pulpit on
Sunday all he has been doing during the week. ’Tis a hypocrisy that I am
sick of, and I’ll never enter the church door till there is an end of
it. You see the gate, sir. You are welcome to go away as soon as you
choose.”
There was nothing for the vicar to do but to walk away, however Mrs.
Byrne wished to detain him till her husband had cooled. Peterson had
found his way over the fence, rather than cross the path of the angry
man. Byrne saw this, and shouted after the vicar, loud enough for
Peterson to hear,
“You are mightily afraid of a deist, Mr. Hellyer: but if you care for
your church, look to your tithe-gatherer.”
“Run after your papa, my dear,” said Mrs. Byrne to Alice, who was
contemplating the spilled milk: “never mind your birds; I will put them
under a coop till you come again.”
“Papa looks so odd!”
“The more reason you should go. Run after him, and talk about every
thing you can think of.”
Alice hopped and skipped down the road, while Jane wept as if her heart
would break. Her grief could scarcely have been greater if she had known
the truth that time revealed,—that from this hour, her husband hated the
vicar with an intense hatred.
CHAPTER V.
EXTORTION.
Before two years were over, the experiment of a close exaction of tithes
was considered by good judges to have been fairly tried, and to have
produced consequences as apparent as could be expected to arise in any
given case.
First. There were three law-suits.—The vicar was plaintiff in a cause
where his late friend, Sir William Hood, was defendant. He claimed tithe
for the produce of a portion of the Abbey Farm; (or suffered under the
imputation of doing so, from still keeping the secret of having let his
rights to Peterson.)
The Lamberts were not a little astonished at such a claim being made on
their tithe-free farm: but the vicar alleged that the exemption ceased
when the land was turned to other uses than those which prevailed when
the exemption was granted. The prescription was at an end, he contended,
when, as in this case, land which was in a state of tillage when
exempted was converted into pasture land. Much trouble was given to the
Lamberts, at the same time, by their being called upon to show the
requisites for the exemptions which had never been disputed;—that the
lands they held had been really abbey lands, and that they had been
immemorially discharged of tithes. Another suit was instituted against
Mr. Parker, to set aside a modus with which all parties had hitherto
been pretty well satisfied. By this modus,—or composition whereby the
layman is discharged from rendering his tithes, on his paying in lieu
thereof what immemorial custom, or the custom of the place, directs,—Mr.
Parker paid fourteen pounds for produce which, paid in kind, would have
yielded twenty. He had often thought himself unlucky in his bargain in
comparison with some who had a good bargain of their modus, paying
two-pence an acre, as their ancestors had done; or a fowl instead of the
year’s tithe of eggs: but he had little expected that the vicar would
lodge a complaint in a court of law of the modus being too large. It
accorded with six out of seven of the rules which constitute a good and
sufficient modus; but it violated one. It was certain and invariable: it
benefited the tithe-taker only: it was different from the thing
compounded for: it did not discharge from the payment of any other
species of tithe: it was, in its nature, as durable as the tithes
discharged by it: and it was immemorial without interruption; that is,
it had existed from the beginning of the reign of Richard the First,
which is the period fixed by the law as “the time of memory.”
All this was indisputable; but the seventh condition was, that the modus
should not be too large;—that it should not be a rank modus. If Mr.
Parker had been paying four shillings, instead of fourteen pounds, the
modus might have been held a good one; but this was so doubtful as to be
supposed worth contesting, according to the decision, “the doctrine of
rankness in a modus is a question of fact to be submitted to a jury,
unless the grossness is obvious.”
The third suit was of more consequence than either of the other two. It
had always been believed in the parish that the glebe land, which was
now annexed to the vicarage, had been once upon a time offered and
accepted as a substitute for the lesser tithes of a farm at present
occupied by one of the most respectable of the parishioners. Now,
however, for the first time, Mr. Pratt was called upon, either to show
evidence of such a bargain having taken place under all due formality of
circumstance, or to pay full tithe. Mr. Pratt was indignant when he
ceased to be astonished, and refused to pay the tithe unless he had the
glebe land back again. This was refused; and the law, as of course, was
made the arbitrator between the parties.
Every body in the parish who paid a composition, now began to hunt up
the evidence of the ordinary having consented to it; of its being old
enough; and of its not having run on for a longer term than twenty-one
years, or the lives of three parsons.
These proceedings did not improve the influence of the clergyman in the
parish. One after another of his flock wandered away to the Friends’
Meeting house. There was talk of encouraging the methodists to build a
chapel, though an attempt to do so had failed three years before.
Subscriptions were withdrawn from the parochial library which the vicar
had set up: and in proportion as the law-suits were discussed, did the
respect with which he was once regarded change into rudeness. Few heads
were uncovered before him. Men turned their backs at his approach, and
the women did not look up from their work when the children gave notice
that he was passing by. He bore this, as he said, very patiently;
praying to God to turn the hearts of the flock once more to true
religion and reverence for the church. He declared himself resigned to
having fallen on evil days, and could wait till his parishioners should
repent of their treatment of him. He heroically adhered to his habits,
amidst the change of times; taking his walk past the houses which were
chalked with maledictions on him, and over the green where every one put
on a solemn look as soon as he came in sight. Alice could never prevail
on him to go round by the back lanes, though is was evident that she
suffered much pain, if not absolute terror, whenever she was his
companion amongst his alienated people.
Those who suffered most, next to the vicar and his daughter, were
perhaps the Lamberts. Through the exterior of calmness which they
considered it a religious duty to preserve, it might be discerned that
their lightness of heart was gone. No lads could well be merrier than
Charles and Joseph used to be; and their mother’s influence was formerly
more frequently exerted in mildly chastening their mirth than in any
other way. When they had masqueraded, under pretence of amusing Alice,
or from singing a ‘ditty’ in the farm-house parlour had advanced to some
high thoughts about the cultivation of music, she had told tales of the
sobriety observed in her young days. Now, her endeavour was to cheer
them when they came in dispirited from their farm. She now asked for ‘a
ditty,’ and taught them two or three which their father used to sing to
her before they were born. She encouraged Joseph to use his pretty
talent for drawing, and was always ready to be read to when Charles
seemed disposed to take up his book in the evenings. It was the least
she could do, she thought, to keep up their spirits as well as her own,
since she had sanctioned their taking the Quarry Wood farm, which seemed
likely to run away with the gains they had made on the Abbey Farm; and
with more besides, if this season should turn out one of as great
scarcity as was apprehended. It was the least a mother could do, while
discouraging Charles from marrying Henrietta Gregg till his prospects
should clear, to make his home as little irksome as possible, and occupy
his thoughts with other things besides his love and his disappointments.
Some people thought (and they declared the vicar to be on their side)
that the ill success of the Lamberts on the Quarry Wood farm was no more
than might have been expected from their having any thing to do with
such an infidel as Mr. Mackintosh; and they had little pity, in some
quarters, for their failure: but they thought the whole might be
sufficiently accounted for without supposing that a special judgment had
overtaken them. Thus much, at least, was true: that no disasters had
befallen them in their management of the abbey farm, though Mr.
Mackintosh was their landlord; and that the Quarry Wood farm might have
been made to answer if it had been tithe-free. The natural conclusion
was that the tithes of the church were to blame, and not the infidelity
of Mr. Mackintosh.
The rent of the Quarry Wood farm was low; and this had been the chief
temptation to the Lamberts to take it. They were aware that it required
much improvement, and were prepared to lay out a good deal of capital
upon it. The composition for tithe which had been formerly paid was very
moderate, and every body had supposed that it would, as a matter of
course, be continued. But the new tenants had not been in possession
half a year, before Peterson found means to set aside the composition,
and gave notice that he should demand tithe in kind. They hoped that, at
least, their improvements would remain exempt for seven years, according
to the statute:—a vain hope; as it was proved that the land, though long
left in wild condition, was not what the law would call barren. The
tithe seized the first year swallowed up so much of the returns as to
leave by far too little to pay for the enclosures. There was, indeed, so
much capital thus locked up that the young men declared they should have
let the land alone if they had known how they were to be taken in about
the tithes. The same was the case with an extent of woodland which they
had stubbed and grubbed, and made fit for the plough. As it had borne
wood, it was not ‘barren’ land, and it came under the tax. Of course,
the improvements were put a stop to presently, amidst many regrets that
the money had not been employed on some far inferior land on the
tithe-free farm. It had better have lain idle in their iron chest than
have been thus expended to a loss. If they had known more than they did
of the history of tithes, they would have been better aware of the
policy of idleness under such a system;—that idleness, both of labour
and capital, on which tithes offer a direct premium. They would have
known that the cultivation of flax and hemp in Ireland was suspended
till a low modus was fixed by law, under which it has flourished ever
since. They would have known that the production of madder was long
confined to the United Provinces, which, being Presbyterian, offered no
ecclesiastical tax on its cultivation; and that its growth in England
began from the time when, by a special provision, 5_s._ per acre were to
be taken in lieu of tithe of madder. They would have known that the
reason why Edward VI. exempted barren land from tithe for seven years
was, because, without this provision, the land would never have yielded
at all, either to the public or to the church. They would have known how
tremendous is the waste, to the public, to the farmer, to the landlord,
and eventually to the church, by a method of taxation which causes worse
land to be cultivated while the better lies waste—by a method of
taxation which reaches land untouched by rent, and which, by absorbing a
larger and a larger share of profits which are perpetually decreasing,
raises prices to a degree quite inconsistent with the prosperity of all
the parties concerned. If the Lamberts had duly studied the tithe
question, they would have foreseen the disasters which must arise,
instead of being taught by bitter experience. Their case was just this;—
and it is a fair specimen of what is taking place wherever the tithe
system is adopted.
The best land on their two farms yielded an equal produce. As the Quarry
Wood land paid tithe, they would have been obliged to raise the price of
their corn so high as to cover the cost of the impropriator’s share, as
well as the expences of cultivation, if this had not been already done
by the body of tithe-paying corn growers. Corn was already dearer in the
market, by the parson’s share, than it would have been if the parsons
had had no share. The produce of the abbey farm brought in a larger
profit through this elevation of prices; but this circumstance had been
considered in fixing the rent; and the surplus profit went, not to the
Lamberts, but to their landlord, in the shape of higher rent. Thus far,
they neither lost nor gained. The consumers of corn lost, and Mr.
Mackintosh gained. The same took place on a few inferior kinds of land.
But there was soil which would have paid profits of stock as well as
rent, if there had been no tithe, but which should have been left
uncultivated (because tithe would swallow up the profits) if the
Lamberts had been aware of the claim which would be advanced by the
parson. On this soil their labour was lost: landlord and parson being
paid, nothing remained for them. This land, therefore, was to be let out
of cultivation; and the capital and labour employed upon it were
transferred to an inferior kind of land on the tithe-free farm, which
required a much larger expenditure to produce an equal return. In this
case, the Lamberts lost by their unprofitable expenditure of labour and
capital; and nobody gained. A yet lower quality of soil was next taken
into cultivation, requiring a yet larger proportionate outlay of capital
and labour, and yielding a sufficient return to the cultivator only
because it was exempt from rent as well as tithe. The rise of price,
caused by the relinquishment of the better land for the sake of
cultivating the worse, was injurious to all the three parties, and
particularly to those—viz., the Lamberts—who had to pay the most wages.
It would have answered incalculably better to have paid over to the
church the capital which was arbitrarily buried in the lower soils, than
that portion of produce which caused it to be so buried. Rent would have
been equalised between the two estates; prices would have kept their
natural elevation; the better soil would have been tilled, and the worst
let alone; the parson would have had as much gain and cheaper bread; the
landlord would also have had cheaper bread, and a larger rent for the
one estate, as well as a smaller for the other; and the Lamberts would
not have lost on the one hand by being deprived of their profits, and on
the other by the rise of wages. The only persons anywhere who had ground
for unmixed rejoicing in this state of things were the landlords of none
but tithe-free estates. By the rise of rent, they gained, and they
alone: and their gain was by no means in proportion to the collective
loss of the other parties. But it was a curious fact that, while the
church was complained of (and justly) on all hands, for the tremendous
injury occasioned by its tithe system, the benefits of it went into the
pockets of landowners amidst the hills and dales of Scotland, where a
commutation long ago placed them beyond the hazards of the desperate
game; and of all who could take their stand on abbey lands, or on some
lucky ancient modus, or equally happy modern composition.
From the circumstances of the case, the Lamberts suffered all the
injustice which must accrue upon the first institution of this most
pernicious tax. When it has been long enough paid to become calculable,
it is allowed for in the rent, and falls next, like other land taxes, on
the landowner—the person most able, from the perpetual tendency of rent
to rise, to bear the burden. But it is not long a burden to him, except
as a consumer; for, as it operates in increasing the expense of
cultivation, it raises prices; and the consumer ultimately pays. The
hardship of a new institution, or, as in this case, of a revival of
tithe, is very great upon the tenant, and is a sufficient exponent of
the pernicious nature of the impost. The lease of the Quarry Wood farm
had not many years to run; but the experience of the first two years,
and the opening of the third, left the prospect of the young farmers
anything but bright. The present spring had been most unfavourable to
the crops. The doubt was whether so much rain was not rotting the
vegetation in the ground. The view from the summer-house was dreary,—of
sodden fields, and lanes lying under water. The very wall-flowers
languished for want of sun, Mrs. Lambert found when she one day climbed
the hill: but they did not droop like her poor son Charles, whom she
found there, looking out of the window, with his head leaning on his
hand, and listening to the patter of rain-drops which again began to
fall, and to drop from the broad thatch into the little dell over which
the summer-house projected. It was a dispiriting thing to wander over
the lands of Quarry Wood farm, and see enclosures deserted when half
finished, and fields from which golden harvests had been anticipated,
grown over with briars and thistles. It was in such a place that Mrs.
Lambert met Joseph, one April afternoon, when the twilight was settling
down.
“What hast thou got there, mother?” said he: “A heavy load for thee to
carry.”
“Not so heavy as large. These stringy, branchy roots make a fine blaze
to drink tea by; and I thought it a pity this one should lie and rot
yonder. But thou hast thy hands full, seemingly. Where art thou taking
that poor thing to?”
It was a ewe, very near its time of yeaning. Joseph explained that
Peterson’s eagerness about where the ewes couched and fed had put into
his brother’s head and his own a device which it was very well to have
thought of. In the next parish, tithes were only half the amount that
they were in this; and Charles and he had prepared the bit of land they
had in that parish for their ewes. The animals were now being
transferred thither, gradually and quietly, lest Peterson should set up
a plea of fraudulent removal. The lambs would remain there till the
tithing was over: and it was much to be wished that there was room for
all their flocks till shearing time should have also passed.
“But I am afraid we must go a long circuit, before we can get to the
ground,” continued he. “This field is too deep in wet for the poor thing
to cross. ’Tis like a ditch, from end to end.”
“I should not have thought there had been rain enough of late to soak
the meadow in this way,” observed the widow.
“Except by filling the drains,” replied Joseph. “They are choaked up,
too, from our having left the whole concern hereabouts to itself, this
year. But how in the world am I to get this animal over? She will make
herself heard with her bleating after the flock.”
“These are strange times, surely, Joseph, when a ewe may not bleat her
own bleat, and when a son of mine skulks under a hedge on his own farm.”
“And the cause is full as strange, mother,—fear of man. I little thought
to fear men; but there are two that I would go a mile round to avoid.”
“And they would say it is because thou art trying to cheat them;—in the
very act of carrying thy ewes to yean out of their dominions.”
“Let them say so. It is not such a charge that I fear. Disclaiming, as
we do, the ordinance of a priesthood altogether, my conscience leaves me
free to put my beasts to couch and feed where it is most convenient,
without regard to the parson. My fear is that I should hate those men.
They injure me, and I cannot resist; and I have lost patience of late. I
would rather walk close under my own hedge, and keep my ewe from
bleating than speak, even to myself, as I hear some speak of the
collector, and of the vicar, who countenances him in his strictness.”
“I sometimes think that if the vicar’s wife were still living, she would
be rather uneasy about his terms with his people. She would hardly like
his being much from home after dark.”
“So, that has struck thee too, as well as Charles and me. It was only
this morning that I was saying to Charles, that perhaps it is a blessing
that Alice is too young to have such fancies as she may live to suffer
from. I suppose she is in bed and asleep when he goes and comes through
that lonely lane at the back of the vicarage, as he visits his brother
of an evening. That lane is hardly the place for a man who has so many
enemies.”
“I trust thou hast no apprehension of anything worse than a few insults;
or at most a beating, to show contempt.”
“Indeed, I thought of something much worse. There is less contempt than
hatred of this man. He is so persuaded that he is right in all that he
does that it is impossible to despise him as if he defied the inward
witness: but he is the more hated as people see no end to their troubles
with him. If I am not mistaken, there are some in the parish who have
diligently inquired his age; and not precisely for the purpose of
wishing him many happy birth-days.”
“Is the ewe by thy side?” asked Mrs. Lambert, in a low voice, and
peering through the gathering twilight; “or was it something else that I
heard stirring in this ditch?”
It was not the ewe, but Peterson, who had come, as he said, over a gap
in the hedge. In the darkness, it would have been impossible to make out
whether he had heard anything of what had been said. Mrs. Lambert
therefore asked him.
“Friend, didst thou hear what we were talking about?”
“Tones of voice tell as much as words, mistress: and I wonder at a plain
spoken person like you calling me ‘friend,’ when both you and I know
that you hate me like the devil. However, I am going to make you hate me
more still, I fancy. Mr. Joseph, you have let this land go to waste in a
very sad way; and a field yonder, too. The water stands a foot deep in
this meadow; and my children play hide and seek among the whins yonder,
where you might have corn growing, if you would.”
Joseph supposed he might do as he pleased with the land till his lease
was out.
“But my employer is not to suffer for your neglecting your land. The law
makes a distinction between land that is really barren, and that which
is needlessly inundated, or overgrown with briars. ‘The field of the
slothful,’ you know. My eldest girl got her frock so torn with your
briars, that she brought a pretty scolding upon herself, I can tell
you.”
“Send her up to me, and I will mend her frock,” requested Mrs. Lambert.
“I will give her a new one if thou wilt let my son alone as to whether
there shall be briars or anything else in his field.”
“No objection in the world, ma’am, if he pay the due tithe.”
“I’m sure thou art kindly welcome to a tenth of the water in this field,
and of the stones in the one above,” observed Joseph. But this offer was
declined, and the old composition for these two fields proposed instead.
Before there had been time for the dispute to proceed further, a strange
sound from the church tower arrested Peterson’s attention. The bells
seemed about to be rung, and Peterson was gone.
What the occasion of rejoicing could be, the Lamberts did not know; nor
did they very much care. They had grown listless about good news, and
were now most anxious to conclude the business of the evening. As
Peterson had crossed the meadow, it must be possible for them and their
charge to do so too. The little ridge which stood out of the water was
found, and, one by one, several of the teeming ewes were removed and
penned into their new inclosures before Joseph went home; and no
tormentor appeared.
Joseph told his mother that the labourers who had cut the osiers for
hurdles had been questioned whether the article was intended for sale or
gift, or for use on the farm. The labourers were glad to be able for
once to repulse the tithing man, whom they were weary of having for ever
at their heels. There was no small pleasure in seeing the meek animals
comfortably provided for on the outskirts of the farm; as if they were
as conscious as their owners of the inhospitable character of the parish
whose bounds they had crossed. It does not appear that lambs know a
tithing-man by instinct; but Joseph put expressions of pity into his
farewell for the night which might seem to imply that he felt them to be
fellow-sufferers with himself under the rule of the parish tyrant.
After running home in the dark, with sleet pelting in their faces, the
mother and son liked the aspect of their house, with its old-fashioned
windows lighted from within.
“See what it is not to wear curled hair,” cried Mrs. Lambert, wiping the
cold drops from her short, grey locks, combed straight down on her
forehead. “If I had had such ringlets as some fine ladies, now, what a
figure my sons would have thought me all this evening, with hair as lank
as a melancholy queen’s in a tragedy! I call it neat as it is.”
Joseph had not observed his mother’s hair, he was so taken up with
examining a letter which had lain among the tea-things on the table. He
guessed its contents; and they were indeed such as would have damped a
far greater cheerfulness than could arise from the aspect of a warm
parlour on a chilly evening. Mrs. Lambert’s only sister, a widow, was
dead, and had left five children with a very inadequate provision, if
any.
When Charles entered, a short time afterwards, he knew from the first
glance at his mother, sitting with crossed hands and a countenance of
placid gravity, that something was the matter. Joseph was standing in
the chimney corner, gazing into the fire. Charles looked from one to the
other. His mother roused herself.
“We are not made to choose our own duties, son,” said she. “I know that
it is thy wish to be a husband, Charles; and Joseph and I wish it for
thee. But here are thy five cousins left helpless. Their mother is dead;
and while I live, they must be my children, as much as you. I must take
them into this house, and let them eat at my table.”
“And do you think we will not help you, mother? I will go to-morrow and
bring them; and if it shall please God always to disappoint me, I must
bear it as well as I can.”
“I hope he will let it be with thee as it has been with me, Charles. All
the worst troubles that I have known have been unlooked for; and every
thing that I have particularly dreaded has turned out better than I
expected. I know that this is a blow to thee, though thou bearest it
well at present. I hope that thou wilt not have to wait so long for
Henrietta as we now expect.”
“I wish thou wouldst not speak of me, mother, when I know that this
death is a matter of great concern to thee. When my aunt was last here,
and every one said that she looked more like thy daughter than thy
sister, we did not think that we should not see her again.”
The crossing of the hands again, and the slight change of countenance
showed that this subject was very painful. Next to her sons, there was
no one in the world that Mrs. Lambert loved so much as this sister—many
years younger than herself, to whom she had been, in early life, as a
mother.
Presently she moved about, much as usual, doing all that she would have
done if no bad news had come,—only with somewhat more gravity and
silence. She did not forget to put on the dry root to burn; and it
blazed and crackled as busily as if it had been ministering to the
comfort of the merriest tea-party in the world.
“There are the bells again!” cried Charles. “I thought I had stopped
them. I wish thou wouldst go down, and try to stop them, Joseph.”
There was an odd reason for the ringing of these bells. A stranger who
had been seen loitering in the parish for a day or two was supposed to
be the person who had told the publican that the vicar had received a
remonstrance from his ordinary respecting his strictness in the exaction
of his tithes; and that it was probable that he might be removed ere
long, to give place to some one more acceptable to the parishioners. The
publican had made the most of the news; and some of his customers,
warmed with his good ale, had sallied forth, and found easy means of
setting the bells ringing. Peterson was trying in vain to silence them,
when Charles went down to enquire; but Charles had prevailed where the
tithe-gatherer had met with only defiance. The bells, however, were now
ringing again.
Joseph thought that enough had been done. In a better cause, he would
not have regarded the sleet and the north wind that he must encounter in
his way to the church; but he now preferred sitting in the chimney
corner, hearing the merry peal by fits, as the gust rattled at the
window and passed on. Besides, his mother wanted him to help to lay
plans for these orphan children.
When the Lamberts had been more prosperous than they were now, they had
planned an enlargement of their house, which was scarcely large enough
for themselves, and would have required an addition on Charles’s
marriage, if only from respect to Henrietta. It was particularly
conveniently placed for receiving an addition of two or three rooms on
the south side; and a pretty parlour, with a bay-window, was to have
ornamented the dwelling. Prudential considerations had caused the scheme
to be given up; but this evening it was revived. Charles produced the
plans which his brother had drawn, and which he had hoped would next see
the light in Henrietta’s service. He suppressed a sigh when his mother’s
decided pencil scored out the bay-window; and he roused his best powers
of judgment to discuss the necessary questions of convenience and
economy.—There was some good brick clay in one corner of the farm, and
timber enough for their purpose; and the young men thought that, by dint
of their working like labourers, and their mother’s superintending
during their unavoidable absence, the enlargement of their dwelling
might be effected without any very ruinous expense. The brick making was
to be set about immediately, if the weather should but prove fine
enough. Bricks were very dear this wet season; and the supply now wanted
must be made at home, if possible.
CHAPTER VI.
COMMUTATION.
The bells, or the rumours of them, made themselves heard beyond the
parish. The vicar was little moved by them; but uncle Jerom was seen by
Alice, the next morning, approaching in a state of sad perturbation. As
he could not prevail upon his brother to modify his system through a
consideration for his personal safety and dignity, he now tried a
different kind of appeal. He asked whether it was not a deplorable
scandal to the church that there should be bell-ringing at the prospect
of a clergyman being taken from his flock.
“It was less that than the belief that I had been rebuked by my superior
which caused the exultation,” quietly replied the vicar. “But you know
that neither the one nor the other is true. I will not, by yielding my
own claims, give occasion for the supposition that my superior yields
those of the church.”
“But if you allow proprietors to buy up the tithes on their own lands,—
Parker for instance,—you will cease to have such for enemies; and it
will be a very different thing from selling the dues of the church to an
intermediate layman.”
“Ah! Jerom, there you touch my conscience in the only tender part. I
have long repented letting my tithes to Peterson, as you recommended. It
was bad advice, Jerom, as is all advice to rate at an average a revenue
for sacred objects, of which revenue it is the primary quality that, as
God’s seasons vary, it must vary. Jerom, yours was bad advice.”
“Indeed it seems to have been so, by the aggravation of your troubles
since Peterson became your lessee. But I find from him that Sir William
Hood is about to allow the great tithes to be bought up, in order to put
a stop to the deterioration of husbandry in the parish; and I really
think you could not do a better thing than follow his example when so
good an opportunity offers.”
The vicar spread both hands before his brother, in emphatic refusal.
“Papa,” said Alice, “I wish you would do as you are bid, sometimes, as
you are always telling me to do. Why don’t you mind what uncle Jerom
says, and what every body says? Well, it may not be every body’s
business; but I know what Jane says; and I am sure she is as fond of you
as any body can be.”
The being fond of him argued such a right mind towards the church, that
the vicar was immediately prepared to hear what Mrs. Byrne had to say.
“She says that she is frightened to hear how people talk; and that she
shall never be easy to see you out walking till you have somehow put
other people into your place about collecting the tithes. If there must
be tithes, so that Mr. Parker must always look out of humour, and the
Lamberts grow sad, and Mr. Byrne give up more and more things in his
garden, the blame ought to go where it is due, she says; and that is to
the church, and not to you. And it would be so, she thinks, if people
all bought their own, and there was an end of the quarrelling that there
is now, twice a year.”
“I wonder who suggested the idea to her,” observed the vicar. “If I
thought it was Mr. Mackintosh——”
“I think it was not Mr. Mackintosh, papa. I think it was the man that——”
“I know whom you mean,” said Jerom; “the stranger who has been hanging
about the parish lately,—no one can tell why. Some of my people suspect
that he is an agent in the rick-burning plot. I am sorry that Byrne lets
him within his doors.”
“And so is Jane, I think,” said Alice. “She always tries to prevent my
seeing him, if he happens to be in the cottage; and once I observed her
cry the moment she saw her husband bringing him up the road. Perhaps he
will go away, papa, if you will do as they wish you should.”
This was not the very best kind of appeal that Alice could have used. He
yielded so far, however, as to allow his brother to bring him word how
the bargains for the great tithes between Peterson and the payers were
framed, and what effect they appeared to produce on the minds and
manners of the discontented. He would determine accordingly as to
revising his scruples, or dismissing the matter entirely from his
thoughts.
Of course, those who were visited by Mr. Peterson and his companion
varied in their eagerness to buy up their tithes, in proportion to the
duration of their interest in the land. A farmer who had just entered
upon a long lease offered a twenty years’ purchase at 7_l._ per acre,
all round,—arable and pasture. Others who were near the end of their
lease, and were discouraged by the unfavourable aspect of the season,
desired to buy up their tithes year by year, if they could but be secure
against competition. Mr. Parker was willing to make a liberal thirty
years’ purchase, in order to free his own estate, and leave himself at
liberty to improve it without discouragement, or bequeath it to his son
without disadvantage. The sum demanded from him, as a hop-grower, was,
however, so enormous, that he declared he would rather give up growing
hops, as others had done before him, than pay such a merciless impost.
Peterson asked him what he would have; and showed him that other
people’s hop-grounds had yielded at the rate of 3_l._ per acre. Mr.
Parker wished to proceed upon the basis of an average of the last five
or seven years; but this was declared to be the most fallacious of
guides. Peterson contended that the seasons had been peculiarly
unfavourable, and that the modes of management had so varied within six
years as to leave no reasonable average. He proposed to value the land
and the tithe, deducting the poor-rate and a per centage for the owner’s
trouble in stacking, thatching, and threshing his farm produce, and
carrying his hops to market. He considered it very liberal to offer a
further reduction of 20 per cent. in consideration of the security of
the impropriator from the accidents of chance and change: but Mr. Parker
hesitated and grumbled, and treated Peterson’s companion with nearly as
fine a lament over the assimilating qualities of the church as Mr.
Mackintosh himself could have offered. He related that he had a pretty
farm near town which had never before been let by him for less than
5_l._ per acre. It was with difficulty that he could now get 3_l._, on
account of the enormous tithe. It was bad enough to have the poor’s-rate
as high as 13_s._ per acre, and the sewer’s-rate perhaps 7_s._ or 8_s._
more; but the amount of tithe paid in addition was intolerable. The
three rates together amounted to nearly 3_l._ per acre over the whole
farm. He hoped Mr. Hellyer thought he contributed his share towards
promoting the piety of the nation, when his land thus paid 3_l._ per
acre to maintaining a single clergyman.
Peterson wished to know in what proportion the different kinds of
produce yielded. Mr. Parker was remarkable for a good memory as to the
several amounts of tithe.
Wheat paid 20_s._ per acre.
Barley and oats 16_s._ ”
Clover 24_s._ ”
Tares 16_s._ ”
First crop of potatoes 25_s._ ”
After which (on the same land) turnips 16_s._ ”
Second crop of potatoes 20_s._ ”
Hay 8_s._ ”
Onions 40_s._ ”
Collards 16_s._ ”
A sow 10_s._ 6_d._
A cow 15_s._
And garden and farm-yard poultry according to circumstances. A certain
amount was to be paid for all small tithes, whether the tenant produced
the titheable articles or not.
“There are plenty of men like you,” observed Mr. Parker to Peterson,
“who talk of an average of a few years on each separate estate,—five or
seven years,—and would have any commutation that is proposed proceed
upon such an average. Now, here is a case which shows you the injustice
of such a principle. My interest in my land would be almost annihilated
if I allowed it to be calculated to yield 2_l._ per acre to the church.
To perpetuate such a charge as this would be to ruin the owners of land
near London, and in many other situations. They say the price of produce
would rise accordingly; but before it could rise enough to repay me for
such a sacrifice, the people would be boiling acorns and stewing nettles
for food.”
“And it would ruin the church in some other districts,—” Jerom was going
on to say; but Mr. Parker interrupted him with,—
“Not so completely as the present plan, sir. The worst enemy of the
church,—Mr. Mackintosh himself,—could not desire more than to see the
church consuming the state, as it is doing now. As for men that we think
wiser than Mr. Mackintosh, they are of opinion that religion was given
us to bless our bread, to prosper us in basket and store, and not to
devour our plenty. The people cannot but see that the reverse is the
case with the established religion of this country;—that in plentiful
seasons, the clergy take much, (legally, I allow,)—and that in bad
seasons they take more, (legally, and therefore the more gallingly.) The
people cannot but feel that as the net produce of the nation grows
smaller in proportion to the gross, and as the clergy seize a larger
proportion of the net produce, the question must come to this,—whether
the people shall have state-priests or bread. How the clergy are likely
to fare in such an alternative, I leave it to you to guess.”
“So, you allow that this is a question pertaining to the people. You
allow that the landlord does not alone support the church.”
“Look at the owners of tithe-free lands, and see the folly of such a
question. They are getting rich under the operation of our precious
system of inequality. And how? Not merely because their farms are in an
universally better condition than the tithed: not only because the abbey
farm is better worth 20_s._ per acre rent than the Quarry Wood farm is
worth 13_s._, for the reason that the one does not pay tithe and the
other does,—and so on, through all farms that bear this distinction; but
because these landowners are profiting by the high prices of produce
which must cover the sacrifice of the tithe-payer. No, no: landowner as
I am, I never was heard to say that the landlord pays the tithe, in a
general way, any more than the farmer. They both have their grievances,
and their occasional losses under the system;—they are vexed from month
to month, and eat dear bread and meat in their own families, and pay
high wages to their labourers; but these sacrifices are made by them in
their character of consumers; and it is the people who pay the tithes;
the poor Stockport weaver in his garret, and the half-starved
apple-vender in her cellar, as truly as the Lamberts and myself.”
“You would sweep away tithe, at once and for ever, I suppose, in pity to
these poor people; and set your vicar and myself to weave in a garret,
or sell apples in a cellar.”
“No; it may be left to Mackintosh to preach up such a scheme of
spoliation as that. If the clergy alone were concerned, I might be
willing,—not that they should weave and sell apples,—but that they
should obtain their support, like other servants of society, from the
hands of those whom they serve. But tithe property has become so
complicated with other property as to be equally sacred with that other
property: and I should cry out as vehemently against its abolition
(without compensation) as against reducing the interest of the debt. No
wise man—no man of honour—can advocate either kind of public robbery.”
“Since there is this complication of tithe with other property, it had
better be let alone. You can no more disentangle it than you can pay the
debt. You will never achieve a scheme which will satisfy both tithe and
land owner.”
“Probably. It would be strange if a perfectly unobjectionable plan could
be formed to lead us out of the mischiefs of a pernicious system whose
evil influences have been accumulating for centuries. But, if the church
and the landowners understand anything of their own state and prospects,
they will be anxious for a final settlement of their accounts within a
defined and early period. Such a settlement must take place, sooner or
later, since this tax involves the very principle of perpetual growth.
Nothing but absolute transformation can prevent it enlarging till it
swallows up everything.”
“I am sure my brother and I do not find it so.”
“Because you cannot recover your dues; but the farmer can instruct you
here. My father had a favourite little farm of a hundred acres, which
was left to him in 1791, and came into my hands in 1812. When he first
let it, the rent was 80_l._, and the tithe 14_l._ 9_s._; in 1798, the
tithe had risen to 17_l._ 12_s._; in 1805, rent was 95_l._, tithe 23_l._
7_s._; in 1812 the tithe had risen to 29_l._ A farm of mine, which let,
a few years ago, for 240_l._, then paid 30_l._ in tithes. It now lets
for 689_l._, and the tithes are 140_l._: that is, the tithes are nearer
five-fold than the rent three-fold what was paid before. And, in like
manner, there must be an increase all over the country, since the same
proportion of the gross produce must be paid in tithe, through every
increase of the expense of such production. Therefore, above all things,
let us know, in rectifying our tithe system, that we really are to have
done with it by and by; and when.”
“And how do you propose to reconcile the clergy to the tithe system thus
being brought to an end?”
“Those of them who understand their own position see, like other men,
the folly of the clergy stickling for tithes. The clergy have only a
life-interest in tithes; and the possession of a certain income is the
circumstance which is of most consequence to them. Some contend for
tithes as if they were the most secure source of income in the world, or
as if they were an inheritance for a future generation; but many more
would be glad to depend on a fund less precarious, and less odious in
the collection.”
“Do you allow nothing for attachment to ancient ecclesiastical
institutions?”
“In your simple brother: but there are faithful churchmen, just as much
attached as he to ancient ecclesiastical institutions, who have eyes to
see the different effects of the tithe systems of Ireland and Scotland,
and who reason from them. They see how, in Ireland, the farmer becomes a
peasant, and then is hunted out of house and home by the proctor, and
then turns on the proctor to maim and murder him; while in Scotland, the
farmer carries home his harvest without interruption, and looks with
compassion on his English brother. In the first case, appears an
aggravated repetition of the abuses of the English system; in the other,
the tithes are drawn with comparative harmlessness, whether by the
crown, the clergy, or laymen, in the form of a fixed rent. So long ago
as Pitt’s time, there were not wanting bishops to approve of the church
being supported by a civil fund. It is true, the plan would have been
all for the benefit of the clergy, in the very point in which it is most
important to obtain relief.”
“In that of the perpetual increase of which you complain?”
“Yes. When the tithe should have been bought up, in the same way that it
was intended that the land-tax should be, and the proceeds invested in
the funds, the people were not to flatter themselves that they had done
with the tax. The income was to be so adjusted as to admit an increase,
from time to time, in proportion to the rise in the price of grain. The
bishop who recorded this scheme breathed no syllable about the
desecration of the church by this mode of augmenting its funded income:
and the objections of his brethren were of a different cast.”
“As different, probably, as mine from my brother’s, when we sit down to
talk over the prospects of the church. I have not the least objection,
as he will tell you, to an alteration in the source of our incomes, if
the change could be innocently brought about; but I never could see how
injustice and tyranny, towards one party or the other, are to be
avoided. It is tyranny to the landowner to compel the universal and
immediate purchase of the tithe; and it is injustice to the clergy to
prohibit that natural increase of their revenue which they consider to
have been guaranteed to them by the very institution of tithes?”
“Suppose a plan which should contain an alternative by which both these
objections should be answered. Suppose a scheme of commutation under
which a tithe-rate should be instituted, subject to increase upon a
demand for a revaluation of land, from time to time; while an option
should be given to the landowner, to be subject to this increase, or to
make a twenty or thirty years’ purchase,—that is, a final purchase of
the tithe. I think there might be such a plan.”
“And then those who paid the most tithe would be the first to redeem.
But how would you set about ascertaining a _tithe-rate_, afraid as you
are of taking an average of a few years as a rule?”
“That objection applies only to perpetuating the limited average of an
individual estate. If the average is extended over a parish, or over a
county, the calculation becomes a much fairer one. I see no other
principle to proceed upon than that of taking an average; and the
question of fairness lies between taking in a longer period of time and
a larger extent of space. I feel that it would be hard upon me to
perpetuate the tithe of my farm near town at 2_l._ per acre; and though
it would be fairer to take for a basis the average of tithe which it has
paid for fifty years, a better plan still would be to find out the
proportion of tithe to yearly value of land all through the county, and
to fix the tithe-rate according to this proportion.”
“You could never get such a valuation made fairly. When you meet with a
modus, what are you to do with it? And how are you to settle what is
arable land and what pasture? And every farmer will protest against some
kinds of produce that are particularly profitable being no more taxed
than others. There would be complaints of you,—a hop-grower,—being let
off as easily as a grower of corn.”
“All these matters of detail might be settled when once the general
principle is agreed upon. If hop-grounds now pay considerably more, from
the nature of their produce, than other lands, let them be subject to a
fair extra charge. Let a term be fixed,—five years, perhaps,—within
which the tillage of lands shall cause those lands to be called arable.
And what is easier than to deduct any modus from the tithe-rate? Give us
the principle of a good scheme, and its application will not be long
delayed by difficulties about these minor matters of detail?”
“Your plan would be to have an ascertainment of the annual value of the
land, and of the tithe, upon an average of a few years. You would settle
their relative value, and declare it in the form of a poundage upon rent
for the county. You would allow a periodical revaluation on the
application of the tithe-owner——”
“Or of the landowner.”
“Of either party, of course. So the tithe remains liable to increase or
decrease——”
“It would be increase. The nature of the tax insures its perpetual
increase. But the bad effects of this increase would be guarded against
by obliging the tithe-taker to accept from the tithe-payer a twenty-five
years’ purchase of the tithes, as a final redemption of his land from
tithes. If this tax be really the grievance it is declared to be, the
permission to redeem will be made ample use of. And the church——”
“Ah! how do you propose to reconcile the church to the extinction of
tithes?”
“To the perpetuation, I suppose you mean. If you should happen to live a
few years longer under the present system, you might chance to be taught
a little more correctly what extinction is. If you now find it
impossible to collect all that is due to you, you may have no chance of
collecting any thing twenty-five years hence. The church may be very
thankful to have its present amount of revenue secured to it, and to be
allowed the opportunity of making a permanent property of it. My great
doubt is——”
“Under what agency the commutation is to be effected so as to satisfy
the parties. Who will undertake it?”
“Agents so various as to secure impartiality. Royal Commissioners,
perhaps, might make the original valuation: and they might be followed
by arbitrators who should settle disputes. Then the mechanical part of
the business,—the ascertainment of the tithe-rate,—might be done by the
justices. The business which most nearly concerns the church,—the final
bargain with the landowner, and the investment of the purchase-money
either in land for glebe, in the funds, or in mortgages, might be
managed by a corporation of churchmen.”
“But how many landowners who may wish to redeem will be ready with the
cash?”
“Why must the church be paid in cash? A mortgage on the land to be
redeemed, with a good rate of interest,—say 4 per cent.,—would suit the
convenience of all parties. A small per centage on the tithe-rate
collected would defray all expences.—I do not see how any difficulties
which can attend a scheme like this can be shown to bear any comparison
with the evils daily endured under the present system. The doubt I spoke
of is whether the great body of the people would not complain of the
church being too well treated, its chances of existence being too
favourably computed, under such a scheme as I have given you an outline
of. I, for one, should say so, if I supposed that the church must either
retain its present form or perish. But, believing that there is an
alternative, I am willing to do my part in such a compromise as I have
proposed.”
“What kind of an alternative?”
“The transformation of the church, so that it may fulfil the original
purposes of its establishment. When the church was established for the
promotion of religion, religion was the only kind of education which
could be given to the people. The time is come when not only must the
church be made an educational institution, in order to fulfil its
original design, but the religion which it professes to protect cannot
be supported without the aid of education. If it could be, it would be
superstition, and not religion.—Yes, the days of the present mode of
existence of the Church of England are numbered. Religion flourishes so
much more eminently, so much more extensively when supported by the
free-will of the worshippers, and has been so indisputably proved
incapable of an incorrupt union with the state, as to leave no doubt
that the Church of England, already a very minute sect among the
worshippers of christendom, will soon become too insignificant and weak
to maintain its place, unless it quits the ground of its present
monstrous assumption, and takes its stand on the cultivated reason of
its supporters. I do not know why you,—a clergyman as you are,—should
look surprised at what is far from surprising to those who are not
clergymen. Look at the map of christendom, and see what space is
occupied by our church. Look at Great Britain alone, and mark what
proportion the dissenters bear to the church. Observe how many are
coming forth from her,—and those the zealous and the dissatisfied,
while, from the very nature of the case, the lukewarm and indifferent
remain in the bosom of the establishment. Mark the certainty that the
worldly and careless will go over to the dissenters from the moment that
dissent reaches the point of ascendancy over conformity, and then say
whether there be any other alternative than this,—that the Church of
England must enlarge its office, and improve its ministrations, or
fall.”
“My brother will preach against you for a person as dangerous as Mr.
Mackintosh.”
“He will not make Mr. Mackintosh less dangerous, but more so, by
preaching against him; and as for me, he might perhaps do more wisely in
hearing me than in marking me out to be questioned by those in this
parish who do not love the church as they once did.”
“And you would tell those questioners that they must not love their
church any more till it is no longer a church, but a school.”
“Till the vices of the institution are exploded,—till the clergy cease
to be the organs and tools of the oligarchy, for whose purposes the
corrupt system of church patronage is kept up. If the clergy were paid
according to their services by those whom they serve, instead of being
made the pretext for keeping up an ecclesiastical fund useful for
filling the pockets and disposing of the younger sons of the
aristocracy, there would be an end of the overgrown wealth of some of
our dignitaries, and the disgraceful poverty of too many of our working
clergy. There would also be some chance of the clergy ceasing to be
below every other class of men in a reputation for moral and political
independence.—‘By teaching, we learn;’ and there may yet be hope that
such of the clergy as shall be qualified to begin imparting the elements
of the morals required by an advancing age, may be able to bear the ark
of christianity through the troubled waters which they must soon
encounter. Such of them as are unfit for this office will sink, and,
while sinking, will cry that the ark has perished. But there will not be
many to believe it.”
“God will support his own church.”
“God will support the true faith; and his support must be looked for in
the usual mode of manifestation,—in the support of man,—in the
recognition by man of what is just and right.”
“Your proposed method of commuting some of the property of the church is
to be recognized as just and right, I suppose.”
“I believe it has a pretty good chance of being so, if one great
consideration be attended to in time;—a consideration which is at
present by far too little regarded. This measure can hardly be called
just to the people at large, unless it be followed up by another.”
“Ah! that is the way. Every innovation brings another after it.”
“How else is the race to advance? You yourself believe that the great
innovation of christianity brought many others after it; and, you may
believe me, these of which we are speaking form part of the sequence.
Justice requires that there should be an alteration in our corn-laws, to
meet the enlargement of demand that must follow upon the relief of land
from the burden of tithe.”
“You do not mean that the clergy now eat more corn than they will eat
then?”
“No; but the price of corn is now higher than it will be then. No one
knows better than you, as a clergyman, that not above one half of the
sums drawn out of their natural channel under the tithe system goes to
the clergy. Half of it goes into the pockets of the owners of tithe-free
land, in the shape of increased rent. This rent would fall; and after
it, the price of produce; and the fall of price would be followed by an
increased demand; and this demand would be supplied,—not only by
increased importation, (the import duties having previously risen with
the fall of prices at home,) but by the cultivation of inferior soils,
now no longer subjected to the burden of tithe. A quantity of the
capital of the nation must thus be buried in inferior soils, and tend to
increase rent,—_i. e._ to enrich the landlord, and, once again, the
church, at the expense of the people.”
“But the great obstacle to the repeal of the corn-laws at present is the
amount of capital which is invested in inferior soils.”
“The very best reason for not tempting or compelling a further
investment of the same sort. The whole benefit of the commutation
depends upon this. If the import duties be so lowered as to admit of the
usual supply from abroad, our people will obtain the desired relief from
the change of system. If not, it will matter little to the weaver and
the apple-vender, at the end of five years, whether they pay their tax
to the clergy, or to the barrenness of the ground. It should not, in
this conjuncture, be forgotten that the plea of landlords for
maintaining the corn-laws has always been the taxes upon agricultural
production,—and tithes above all the rest. If, when tithes are commuted,
the landlords should change their plea, and declare that it was not they
who formerly paid tithes, but the public, and that they therefore need
the protection of the corn-laws as much as ever, I trust the legislature
will perceive that the corn-laws ought not to have been kept up thus
long, instead of fancying that they must be maintained yet longer.”
“You are hard to please,” observed Jerom, with a grim smile. “Though a
landowner, you are no more fond of corn-laws than of tithes.”
“I grant that you and I should find it difficult to settle which is the
worst,—for ourselves, and for the people at large. I only wish I could
make you, a clergyman, as discontented with tithes as I, a landowner, am
with corn-laws.”
“Some people,” observed Jerom, “complain of tithes as being bad in a
deteriorating country; but you have been murmuring at their operation on
your father’s improving farm.”
“For the good reason that tithes are injurious in the extreme, in either
case. In an improving country, where there is capital ready for
application, tithes are bad as discouraging the application of that
capital. Witness that pretty field of mine which must lie waste till I
can cultivate it without having all my profit swallowed up by the
church. In a deteriorating country, the tithe is bad, because it tempts
to the cultivation of inferior in preference to superior soils, and
raises wages, and augments, both in value and amount, with scarcity.
Witness its effects upon the Lamberts,—the poor ground they have sown
this year, and the better that they have let alone, and the general air
of deterioration caused by the higher price of labour. I am afraid
Peterson is plaguing them again about some new claim or another. He left
us long ago, and walked that way. He is fond of doing business with
them, because, as Quakers, they can offer no resistance. Shall we go and
see?”
As was anticipated, Peterson was found worrying the Lamberts. Wherever
the axe and mattock were heard, there, as a matter of course, was
Peterson; and his quick ear had caught the sound of the chopping of wood
while Mr. Parker and Jerom were arguing. The Lamberts’ labourers were
busy in making faggots of a good deal of wood which had been cut some
time before; and of these faggots Peterson was claiming his share.
“Do look at him!” said Parker. “He is going to measure trees, I do
believe, to see if they are of the required twenty years’ growth. He
carries his measure about with him, as a surgeon does his lancets.”
“If thou wilt only go and ask any lawyer,” said Joseph, who was much
heated, “he will tell thee that thou hast no more right to the tops and
lops of our pollard oaks than thou hast to the tenth chamber of any
house. With all thy boast of law, thou mightest know that, I think. The
loppings are exempted as much as the bodies.”
“We shall see that, friend. Meantime, I shall take leave to measure what
I call, in a legal sense, underwood, and you timber. You will please to
show me the beeches from which all this wood was cut.”
“Thou mayst try and find them out. But, friend, I give thee notice that
it will do thee no good, if thou shouldst chance to find the right tree,
and that it is twenty-five inches in the girth. Thou hast apparently
forgotten some purposes that wood may be cut for.”
“By no means; but you cannot deny that these ash-poles are for sale to
Mr. Parker for his hops, and these faggots for the market.”
Mr. Parker denied that he meant to purchase any ash-poles of the
Lamberts; and Joseph declared that the faggots were for use on the farm.
Peterson would not believe it, so great as the quantity was. Was he to
believe that these half-dozen men, all chopping and binding, as if to
supply the parish with fuel, were merely preparing wood for farm
purposes?
“Yes: we have to burn bricks; and, in this rainy season, there is no
time to be lost. And now, friend Peterson, art thou satisfied?”
“By no means, till I know what the bricks are for. They may be for
sale.”
“They are for enlarging our house on the Abbey Farm.”
“Enlarging. Hum. Not repairing. If it had been mere needful reparation,
the wood for burning the bricks would not, as you say, have been
titheable. But enlarging is a different matter, as my book will show
you. You must set out tithe of this billet wood, and these tops and
lops.”
“I assure thee, it is not for our pleasure, or for any purpose of
vanity, that we are going to enlarge our house. Indeed, the times are
not suited to such an intention. We are merely preparing to receive a
family of orphans who have no other home to look to.”
Peterson had nothing to do with this. Sir William Hood was not to suffer
for there being orphans in the parish.
“Cannot you contrive, now,” asked Mr. Parker, “to tithe these orphans,
as well as the wood that is to burn the bricks that are to build them a
dwelling? If there happen to be ten of them, I dare say Mrs. Lambert
will not grudge one of them to the church.”
Joseph could have made a long and eloquent reply to this; but he was
particularly anxious not to detain the tithe-gatherer, lest any accident
should lead the conversation round to his precious ewes, so as to put
Peterson upon missing them from their accustomed places. He briefly said
that he and his brother should, as usual, decline to set out tithe of
wood; and if the agent chose to seize it, the proceeding must be at his
own risk. He took up a hatchet, and made noise enough to show his
troublesome visitor that no more conversation was desired. There was no
use in entering with the Lamberts on the subject of a sale of their
tithes, as their principles forbade their admitting the right to levy a
tax for the support of religion.
Mr. Mackintosh could not bend his spirit to a compromise. His tithes
must be taken by seizure, if at all, so long as he remained at the
rectory. Others were more ready to compromise,—particularly those who
wished to free land of their own from an interference which made them
feel very much as if the land was not their own; but there was so much
trouble in settling the averages, in agreeing about the deductions, and
determining the proportions according to the longer or shorter term of
years for which the purchase was to be made, that, before it was over,
all parties began to wish that some principle had been established for
general guidance;—that, in a case so peculiar, the negociators could
have been assisted and protected by government sanction.
There was no hope of the vicar’s becoming such a negociator, when a
reduction of 20 per cent. in consideration of contingencies, had once
been mentioned as one of the grounds of an agreement. He would never
consent to surrender any of the dues of the church,—more especially as a
letter from a lawyer this day gave high hopes that the authority of the
church was about to be vindicated by the issue of his lawsuits with his
parishioners being in his favour. This was an encouragement to his
firmness and zeal which he could not disregard.
CHAPTER VII.
DIMISSION.
Two of the law-suits were soon decided. The vicar lost that which
related to the Abbey Farm, and gained that which disputed the reality of
the composition by which the defendant declared the glebe-land belonging
to the vicarage to be held. The defendant firmly believed that the
evidence of this composition existed; though, from its never having been
disputed before, it had been taken no care of; and to lose the cause and
pay the new claim of tithe would, he found, be a less expensive process
than recovering the evidence on which his defence must be based. He
declared that he should assert to his dying day that the vicar, like
many another litigious priest, paid himself twice over, keeping the land
and taking the tithe. The parishioners only waited, it was said, for the
decision of the third cause, to toll the bell, and give their pastor his
second warning of the consequences of making war against his flock.
There were now, however, some peace-makers in the parish,—five little
peace-makers, who might be seen on a Sunday, walking hand in hand, all
in a row; three of them in sleek brown coats and overshadowing drab
beavers, and two in plain white frocks and close straw bonnets. The
parties between whom quarrels ran highest were united in showing
kindness to these orphans. The new rooms at the farm being yet scarcely
begun, many friends of the widow Lambert wished to take in the children
till she could comfortably accommodate them. Mrs. Byrne begged hard for
one of the boys, if he would not mind sleeping in the little bed that
Miss Alice had had good rest in, many a time. It would be an amusement
to her husband, who had been much out of spirits of late; and the little
gentleman would be a companion for Miss Alice when she came to watch the
bees, and do what she liked with the garden. Mrs. Beverly thought that
she and her maid could make the two girls happy, by setting them to work
upon some extraordinary patchwork, and to play with the baby-house which
had been Mrs. Beverly’s amusement on birth-days when she was their age;
but Mrs. Beverly spoke too late; the girls were already promised to the
vicarage.
Well; she and her maid would have liked the girls best; but, since they
were engaged, they thought they could manage the two little ones,—the
youngest now running alone very prettily. But Mrs. Lambert could not
part with them all; and those she kept must be the two little ones, who
could sleep in her room. With her they therefore staid; and whenever
they had the rare luck of a fine morning, this rainy season, they might
be seen, the one trotting at cousin Joseph’s heels, in loving company
with the dog, and the other riding to the field on cousin Charles’s
shoulder.
“Mother,” said Charles, on the day of their arrival, when he had
succeeded in stopping Rachel’s tears,—the tears of the stranger,—by
employing her to sew a button upon his gaiter,—“Mother, dost thou not
think that people may be too tender-hearted sometimes?”
“Is thy mother too tender-hearted? Then I am afraid thou art too like
thy mother, Charles.”
“I should not have been like thee to-day. If it is really right that
Rachel and Margaret should go to the vicarage, I am glad that the vicar
did not fall in with me on his way here. I should have refused his
offer; and, I really think, so wouldst thou, but for the thought how the
children would enjoy one another’s company.”
“I do not see what harm can befal them at the vicarage. It is a very
sober place. At least, I never heard of any dissipation that was going
on there; and the vicar reads the Bible in the family every day. They
will not have any gaiety beyond gardening with Alice, and playing with
her old doll. Will they?”
Charles was thinking of something quite different from this. He could
not have brought himself to accept a favour for these children from one
who had conducted himself as the vicar had done.
“Well, now, son, I do not see much reason in that speech of thine. If
the vicar has done ill by us, why should we hinder his doing better by
somebody else? I am afraid there is a little pride in thy objection.
What dost thou think?”
“Perhaps there is some pride; but I do not much value the kindness of
one who can be so hard as he has shown himself in many instances. I
should be apt to think it flattery.”
“Not in this man. He cannot flatter; and where he has been most wrong,
he thinks himself right. Ay; it is a strange delusion; but I think him
as sincere as he thinks me,—and thou knowest what reason he has to think
that. Dost thou know, I felt glad of the opportunity of letting his
people see how well he means, and what kind things he does when he is a
Christian; that is, when nothing puts him in mind that he is also a
churchman.”
Charles was once again surprised at the deceitfulness of the human
heart. He was actually wishing to return evil for evil when he thought
he was consulting the dignity, (or other welfare,) of the children. He
would take them down himself to the vicarage, and go in to make his
acknowledgments on their behalf to the vicar.
No children could be happier than Rachel and Margaret during their
stay;—patronised by Alice, stroked on the head by the vicar, kept in no
more than due order by Susan, visited by aunt Martha, invited by Mrs.
Beverly to make patchwork and play with the babyhouse; smiled at by Miss
Fox and all her school when they passed in the lanes; and allowed to
gather peas for Mrs. Byrne, when they went to her cottage to see
Jonathan. A long-expected day was, however, approaching, which was to
throw into shade all other days of delight.
Alice had not yet been permitted by Mr. Mackintosh to make hay on his
lawn. Last year, indeed, she had felt herself too old and too proud to
ask the favour. Finding herself, from her parentage, shunned by other
people in her neighbourhood who were liable for tithes, she had not yet
attained her wish of once more handling a rake, and tedding the
sweet-smelling grass. This year, however, there was a prospect,—if the
sun would but shine so as to give the grass a chance of being dried. Mr.
Pratt, whom her father had conquered at law, was to pay his dues to the
vicar direct, and not through Peterson; and Alice persuaded her father
to prefer the tenth haycock, to be prepared and carried at his own cost,
to the twelfth, delivered at the loft. She and her five little friends
could almost make the hay: and O! the anticipations of the day! Rachel
and Margaret could never be sufficiently instructed and enlightened as
to what they were to do and to expect; and Susan had no rest till she
had promised buns and a bottle of cider, to be eaten and drunk upon a
haycock. The farmer took them by surprise with his notice at last, and
no buns were ready: but Susan promised that the young folks should not
die of famine in the hay-field, but that something eatable should follow
them at noon. She shrewdly perceived that this would be the more
necessary, as the children could eat but a small breakfast. They sat
still, and looked calm, as little quakers should: but they had not much
appetite.
“How hot the sun is here!” cried Alice, laying her hand on the
window-shutter, which had been but too little noticed by the sun this
year. “Come and feel, Rachel! That sun will do for hay-making, if any
will.” And she stood on tip-toe, peeping over her papa’s shoulder, to
see how much tea he had forgotten to drink while absorbed in his book.
She whispered to her companions that they might go and get ready, and
that they should not have to wait for her long. Because she whispered,
her papa heard her. He looked round him, and particularly at the room
door, as if wondering whether that slam was its own: then gulped down
his tea, and desired the dear child to go and make herself happy.
“But, papa, you are going with us.”
Impossible! What could the dear child be thinking of? There was an
absolute necessity for his clearing up a doubtful point which he had
promised uncle Jerom to solve; and he expected letters——
“Ah! about that law-suit that makes everybody so rude to you! I wish you
would not have any more of those law-suits. People would like you much
better if you would go and make hay. Let this be the very last law-suit,
papa.”
She could not wish this more than he did. If his people would only not
fail in their duty to the church, he should be the last person in the
world to resort to law.
“Well, but do make hay, at any rate, papa.” And before her long string
of good reasons was fully drawn out, Rachel and Margaret were standing,
side by side, before the vicar, ready to say—
“We wish thou wouldst go.”
The vicar had seldom known Alice so eager and urgent; and if it would
really spoil the dear child’s pleasure that he should be absent, he
would put off his gown, and put on his coat, and go. It was particularly
inconvenient. He thought he must carry his book in his pocket, and read
in the shade
“But thou wilt let us topple thee,” remonstrated Margaret.
This might be determined in the field. He supposed this was Alice’s
inducement to press him so earnestly to go. Here his opposition ceased.
He remembered how perpetually he was thwarting his daughter’s desire
that he should stay at home after dark, and resolved to gratify her much
more reasonable wish that he should walk abroad in the morning sunshine.
He was ready nearly as soon as she, and only stipulated for being
allowed to go whither he pleased, when he had been “toppled” to their
full satisfaction.
It was indeed a glorious day,—a day of more genial sunshine than had
been seen during the season,—the first day which a kindly shepherd would
acknowledge to be warm enough for the washing and shearing of his flock.
“Look, look!” cried Rachel, who had run on before the rest of the party.
“What are those cruel people doing to the sheep? I do believe they are
going to drown the sheep in the pond! Canst thou not make haste and
prevent them?”
Alice looked rather contemptuously on the town-bred child, and was
anxious to lead her companions round by another way;—not that any one
could enjoy a sheep-washing more than she; but she dreaded that further
disputes about tithe, and more hatred to her father might arise out of
his being present at the shearing. She need not have hoped to prevail,
however. Her father stalked on, unconsciously resuming his official air;
and the little girls were too anxious to know what became of the sheep
to think of staying behind.
It was a great relief to discover that the sheep came out safe at the
other side of the pool; and that the dogs, however much noise they might
make, did not eat the poor animals. The men and boys, too, looked merry;
and presently Charles was seen giving his baby cousin a ride on a
sheep’s back into the water; which feat would hardly have taken place
amidst any desperate intentions towards the flock. Margaret next
concluded that all this was pure play.
“I am sure cousin Joseph told me that old Sam had no time to play with
me, and that nobody had time to play at the farm till afternoon; and
there they are,—cousin Joseph, and old Sam, and plenty more, playing
with brothers, though they will not with us, Rachel.”
“I don’t think it is any fun to the sheep,” observed Rachel. “They bleat
as loud as the dogs bark. But I never saw such large sheep in my life.
Look at that big thing, standing dripping on the grass! Didst thou ever
see such a fat creature, Margaret?”
“It will be thin enough presently,” said Alice, “when the shearers have
cut off all that load of wet wool. Come, now, you have seen all you can
see. Let us go over this slope, where we can get as many cowslips as we
please, instead of passing all those people.”
The little girls had not, however, seen half as much as they wanted.
They wished to make out whether there was any soap in the pool to wash
the wool so white; and they were willing to take the chance of a ride
into the water; and desired to persuade their brothers to go on to the
hay-field with them. Alice perplexed them with signs that she wished to
pass on.
“Thou squintest thy eye,” observed Margaret. “What dost thou mean?”
“Never mind now,” replied Alice, somewhat sharply. “It is too late now.
If you had minded me a little more than the sheep, papa would not have
thought of anything but going straight on.”
“Art thou afraid of that man? He is not gaylooking,” remarked Rachel.
“He would see much better if he would come on this side the hedge,
instead of prying.”
Alice now saw the man whom Mrs. Byrne disliked as a companion for her
husband, peeping through the hedge, and evidently watching the vicar,
while he handled the fleece of one and another of the flock, and looked
on more like a proprietor than a spectator. She ran down to tell her
father,—she scarcely knew why: but he was then too busy to attend to
her.
“Halloo, parson, what are you about?” cried one of the many who had long
ago put away all pretence of respect in addressing their clergyman.
“There is nothing about them sheep belonging to you.”
“How so, friend? You are going to shear the flock, I see.”
“Ay: but this flock belongs to another parish. They are only brought
here to be washed. You will find, for once, that some things are out of
your reach.”
The vicar argued the point for some time; could not understand the case;
must send Peterson to see into it; had been struck with the
non-appearance of his tithe of lambs this season; and should expect the
Lamberts to reconsider the matter, and employ somebody to set out the
tithe of wool before he should pass that way again in the evening, if
they would not do it themselves. He should be firm, as they had found,
on other occasions, he could be.
Alice persuaded him to leave the rest of his argument to be finished in
the evening, and ventured to tell him, as soon as he began to walk away
with her, that she thought, and so did Mrs. Byrne, that the Lamberts had
taken that bit of land in the next parish for the very purpose of
putting titheable produce out of his reach. If he would ask no more than
was asked in the next parish, he would not be altogether cheated of his
lambs and his wool in this way. As usual, she was told that she knew
nothing about the matter. She was sorry for it. She wished she could do
some good. It was much wanted. When she now looked behind her, she saw
that many were laughing at the Lamberts’ victory, and some sneering at
her father; and the renewed shouts and barkings and bleatings seemed to
have something of mockery in them.
No one was to be found behind the hedge when Alice would have pointed
out the peeper: but the grass of the dry ditch was laid in a way which
showed that some one had been stretched at length there. The vicar was
not surprised. Bread was so dear, this year, and wages in consequence so
high, that a great many people were out of employment. He had never
before seen so many idle people lying about in the fields on dry days,
and under sheds in wet weather: and Alice was aware that in no former
season had the vicar’s alms been so liberally distributed.
“O dear! they have half made the hay, I do believe. See how busy they
are!” cried Alice, when her party came in sight of the gay scene where a
long row of men and women were tedding the grass; the women with their
gowns tucked up, and their arms made bare, and the men uncoated, and
frequently resting their rakes against their shoulders to wipe their
brows. The usual pastimes of the hayfield were going on. Children were
shouting with delight, and rolling one another in the grass, or
pretending to make hay with rakes far too unwieldy for their strength;
while the bigger girls who were sitting under the shade of the hedge
with babies on their knees, looked on enviously, and began to wonder
whether their charge would not be very safe sprawling on the ground.
Baskets and cans helped to make a show in the corner with the discarded
coats, and the dog that sat as guard, perking its head at every noise,
and looking fully satisfied with its own importance.
This dog alone seemed to undergo no alteration when the vicar entered
the field. The first hay-maker who saw him sent the news along the line,
and laughter gave place to instant silence. It came full into every
one’s recollection that this gentleman would claim a tenth of the fruits
of this day’s toil. Byrne was only one of many whose wages were tithed.
The children got up from among the hay, and stared at him,—each with
thumb or finger in its mouth. They had seen a pretty little chicken, or
a yellow gosling taken from the rest of the brood, in the vicar’s name.
The boys stood in greater awe of him than the girls; for some wag had
told them that they had better take care how they played when the vicar
was abroad, lest he should tithe their marbles. The deputy nurses under
the hedge elbowed each other, and laid their heads together to whisper.
They were telling how grandfather taught them where to put the eggs they
found among the nettles, and never, on any pretence, to count them; and
how uncle forbade them ever to tell how many pigs the sow farrowed of;
and how it was a shocking thing for a gentleman to pretend to give
charity, when all he had to give came, mammy said, out of the labour of
people quite as poor as some he gave to.—The party from the vicarage
soon saw that there was no fear of the vicar’s hay being made for him.
There lay the grass, untouched. Moreover, it might be observed that no
hay was allowed to remain where the vicar walked. As soon as he
approached, the labourers turned a shoulder or back towards him, and
whisked away the hay, so as to leave him standing alone. He could not
help feeling this, and, as usual, he tried to conciliate by kind words:
as usual, he received impertinent answers, and, as usual, comforted
himself with the thought that he was suffering for conscience’ sake.
In these circumstances, it would not do to let himself be “toppled.”
Rachel and Margaret were told that they must not expect it. They,
therefore, began to look about for rakes, in order to obtain the second
best amusement in their power.
“Papa, what shall we do for rakes?” asked Alice. “The last time I made
hay, Byrne lent me a rake, and I thought we should certainly find rakes
with the hay.”
“Dear child, we should have thought of that. It is a negligence of ours;
for the fair construction of the law is that the parson, or endowed
vicar, should, in making his own hay, provide the instruments necessary
for making it. But these people have doubtless rakes to spare, and will
lend them.”
He tried whether it was so. He was sure the labourers must have rakes to
spare.—They looked at one another, and nobody made answer.—He was sure
they would not let Alice be disappointed;—Alice came to make hay.—No one
looked up.—That little boy appeared very tired with trailing his long
rake; perhaps he would lend it to Alice till he had rested himself.—The
child began, at his mother’s bidding, to make hay more diligently than
ever.
“See, dear child——” the vicar was beginning to say, when Alice came up
to entreat him to ask no more favours. She had far rather not make hay
to-day: indeed, she did not wish it.—This was more than Rachel and
Margaret could, for their part, aver. There is no saying what aunt
Lambert would have thought, if she had seen how nearly they were crying.
The vicar perceived it, and, advising them to sit down and rest
themselves during his absence, said he was going in search of rakes, and
would bring some from the shop, if not from a nearer place, within an
hour.
They did not rest themselves so much as a minute and a half. They began
showering grass upon one another: but, the very instant that the vicar
disappeared from the field, more rakes were offered than they could use.
“Papa! Papa!” cried Alice, in hopes of bringing her father back: but one
of the women held up her finger in a very forbidding way; and Alice saw
that if she was to hope for hay-making, she must leave papa uncalled
for. She almost wished now that he would not return.
He did return, however, when the work was far advanced. Upon his own
shoulder he brought three rakes, which he offered,—not to the Quaker
boys, who had arrived and were eager for them,—but to the labourers or
their children who had accommodated Alice and her friends. But they lay
disregarded till the Quaker boys were allowed to take them up, because
it was clear that no one else would.
The little folks had been offered some of the contents of the baskets
and cans; but had declined eating and drinking till they should have
made something like a haycock on which to sit and refresh themselves.
Just in the right point of time, appeared a messenger from Susan, with a
savoury-smelling basket, and two cool-looking green bottles.
“I am sure we may make our cock now,” said Alice. “These people have
made some of theirs, you see, before they sat down to dinner.”
“And we can spread it out again afterwards, if it is not dry,” Margaret
observed.
“Dost thou find thyself hungry with seeing those people eating in the
corner?” Rachel inquired.
So the basket was unpacked by some, while others drew the grass together
near the hedge, and piled it up till it appeared the largest in the
field.
“One, two, three,—seven,—nine,—yes, papa, ours is the tenth haycock. Do
not you think there will be another for us to make? Do not you think
there will be ten more at the other end of the field?”
The vicar feared that the remaining grass would be made into seven,
eight, or nine cocks, to avoid paying the church its due.—Alice was
immediately anxious to change the subject; and she made a prodigious
bustle,—calling one to sit here, and pushing down another there, and
raising the youngest little fellow, in the nankeen frock, to sit on the
top of the haycock, as on a throne. While she was carving the pie, the
child called out “Man! man!”
“Yes, dear; a great many men, and a great many women too,” said Alice,
over her task, supposing the child was amused with the circle of
labourers.
Her father had not sat down. He was contemplating, perhaps calculating,
the size of the field. His back was therefore turned to the party of
merry children. The next moment came something which stunned them like a
thunder-bolt,—the report of fire-arms as if among them,—as if out of the
haycock. They sat immoveable, for a second or two, till the vicar, who
seemed to be balancing himself on his feet, staggered, fell sideways,
and rolled over on his face. None who heard Alice’s shriek ever forgot
it. She alone started up; her companions sat mute; the haymakers were
all looking, but they did not come. How the poor thing pulled her
father’s arm, in the attempt to raise him! How the complaining sound “I
can’t! I can’t!” went to his heart,—which had not ceased to beat. He
tried to turn himself, and did so.
“Turn me, dear child; do not raise me,” he said.
“Come, come! O, why don’t you come?” cried Alice, waving her arms
towards the haymakers. Her companions joined her in shouting for help;
and, at length, several men came forward. Nobody asked who had done
this; but one offered to go for the doctor, and another for her uncle
Jerom, and a third for Susan. Her father himself settled what should be
done. His brother and the surgeon were to be summoned, and he would not
be removed till they came; only propped up with hay, so as to breathe a
little more easily. He asked if any one knew who had done this?
“It is more like you can tell than I,” observed the man he seemed
particularly to address. “Perhaps you may recollect having offended
somebody.”
Alice sprang to the child on the haycock, and asked where he had seen a
man just now. The child pointed to the other side of the haycock.
Somebody had been crouching there; and he must have entered and departed
through a hole in the hedge, which seemed to have been made for the
purpose.
Half a dozen of the haymakers passed through this hole; but they all
came back with the same story,—that no trace of any person was to be
found in the next field. Alice believed, in her impatience, that she
could have found the murderer if she had been the pursuer; but who but
she would chafe her father’s clammy hands, and pass an arm beneath his
head, and fan him as his faintness increased? While listening, in hope
that he would speak, a distant sound smote her heart,—the tolling of the
church-bell. Her father felt the throb of her heart, and smiled as he
said,
“It is not so, dear child. They are not tolling for me before I am dead.
It is the lawsuit—I was aware—I expected a letter to-day, you know.”
“O yes; and I brought you out. I made you come here when you wished to
stay at home,” cried she in agony.
“My dear child, it would have happened to-morrow if not to-day. It would
have happened in my pulpit if not in this hay-field, Alice. Times and
seasons are not in our hands, my child.”
The surgeon soon came, and pronounced that his patient had judged
rightly in refusing to be removed. There were several hours of daylight
left.—Every one felt that this was the same as saying that the vicar
could not live till sunset.
Half the parish were in the field before Jerom appeared. Every one
looked grave, and some changed countenance on witnessing Alice’s
despair; but there was no expression or semblance of grief for the
approaching departure of their pastor. Everything was done that could be
done; but more as an office of humanity than of affection. This was not
lost on the dying man, and must have caused him the keenest pang of
all.—He eagerly welcomed Jerom; for he had much to say to him.
“This is a sad ending of my ministry,” said he; “but it is by no means a
new thing for Christ’s ministers to die in upholding the rights of his
church. God knows I have always been willing; but I grieve, (may he
pardon me!) that he has seen fit to make crime the instrument.”
“Can we forgive the criminal?”
“I do from my heart, and have long done so. Yes. I thought it would end
in this way, and prepared for it, as you will see when you come to
undertake the charge of Alice. You will go home with her, Jerom, and
stay till she has to leave the vicarage. See that she has her full
right,—that she stays till she has fulfilled the month’s warning of my
successor, after his induction. Do not let her remove a day earlier than
the law obliges her. I am urgent about this, because I believe the
people will run riot against the church as soon as I am gone; and I am
anxious that all decencies and proprieties should be observed.”
Jerom promised.
“I have left enough, I trust, for her support; and I bequeath to you the
corn and other crops in the ground. If my successor should be inducted
before the severance of any crops in which he has an interest, you will,
of course, aid him in recovering his dues, as you would aid me. If not
inducted till after severance, he may be spared the battle till next
year. But, Jerom, be mindful that the clergy must fight, side by side,
like brothers, in the present fearful state of the church, when its
rights are evaded, and its claims mocked at, and its ministers murdered
in the scene of God’s bounties!”
Jerom checked his vehemence; and the dying man presently declared
himself willing to leave the care of the church in the hands of Him who
founded it. He died without one suspicion that the church for which he
had sacrificed himself was not indeed the church of Christ in all its
parts, as much as in the name which it has dared to assume. Not a doubt
entered his mind that his devotion to his office and its claims was not
of the true apostolical character. It never occurred to him, that he or
his church might be answerable for the degradation of Christianity and
the deterioration of morals in his parish.
He died,—just as the sun was declining over the scene of God’s bounties,
as the vicar had truly described this place. There was a joyous
twittering of birds in the hedges, and the light breeze which fanned the
hair of the dead man brought sweet scents to those who surrounded him.
The cattle in the meadows rose from their grassy couch, and moved
homewards as the shadows of the willows lengthened. The sheep that had
been shorn stood bleating on the slope, or beside the pool, as if
wondering why the shearers had left them alone after stripping them of
the fleeces that lay strewed upon the grass. The old church looked
beautiful, dressed in ivy, and brightened with the latter sunshine, and
overshadowing the tombs around it. Yet this fair scene was one of
misery. The very church-bell was tolled in malice. The hedge concealed a
murderer. The milk-maids and the shearers were gone to gaze with more
awe than love on the passing away of him who should have taught them a
better evening thanksgiving than this. If there was any acknowledgment
of God and his bounties, it was in one or two who made it in humiliation
rather than in joy. What kind of Christianity could have been here
taught, producing such a result as this?—a Christianity mixed up and
defiled with superstition and worldliness; and which could therefore no
more bring forth the peaceable fruits of righteousness than a sun in
eclipse can shed broad day.
As the body was carried home, all the people who had not been in the
field came out of their houses. Mr. Mackintosh was seen standing at his
gate, looking grave, but unmoved. He had something to say on the
occasion, though there was less of triumph in his tone than some who
knew him would have expected.
“This comes of making a clergyman a revenue officer,” he muttered. “Poor
Hellyer might have made a very good clergyman, or a very good revenue
officer; but it is beyond any man’s power to be both, without betraying
the one trust or the other.”
His housekeeper appeared,—tearful,—to ask leave to bring Miss Alice into
the house. She ought not to be in such a crowd as that, in all her
grief, and none of her friends with her.—Leave was eagerly given: but
the housekeeper hesitated.
“Why don’t you go? Do not lose a moment.”
“If I was sure, sir——if you would promise not to be very ready to tell
Miss Alice that there is no chance of her meeting her father any more——”
“Certainly not. Certainly not. I am not clear on the point myself, and
never professed to be so. It is only when they build up upon their
absurd superstitions——But go.”
Alice was brought in, and was not long without a friend by her side.
Mrs. Lambert, who had been too far off to hear the news, had observed
from the high summerhouse the crowd just leaving the field, and moving
along the road. She had hastily descended, and had joined the people
just as they were passing the church,—just in time to hear the remarks
upon the tolling of the bell.
“Ay; that’s for the gaining of his lawsuit,—and’ much good it will do
him now! They say he was loth to come abroad this morning, because he
expected good news of his lawsuit.”
“He did worse in beginning that lawsuit than in coming abroad this
morning. “’Tis my opinion that it was that lawsuit that killed him.”
“Did ye hear his order about the wool-tithe, as he went by the pool this
morning? So proud! He desired it might be set out for him against he
came back.”
“I hope, friend,” Mrs. Lambert had observed, “that thou art observing
these things rather as a lesson on the frailness of life, than as
taunting the departed.”
The man thought that if the vicar had been paid like the dissenting
ministers of the next town, and had given himself up to his office,
without extorting tithes, his life would have been no more uncertain
than any other man’s. He should not say this the less now that the vicar
was being carried dead before him, than he had always said it when the
vicar was standing up in the pulpit on Sundays, or handling fleeces on
Mondays.
Where were all Alice’s friends?—Uncle Jerom was following the body. Mrs.
Byrne was nowhere to be seen. It was many days before she visited Alice;
and when she came, she could do nothing but weep. Mrs. Byrne was
remarked by every one to be an altered woman from that day.
Byrne was in the crowd; but Alice was afraid of him, and always kept out
of his way. Charles and Joseph were in pursuit of the murderer,—whom,
however, they could not find. It is believed to this day, that he was
harboured by some one in the neighbourhood; or he could not have evaded
the strict search instituted by the magistrates, as soon as the event
became known to them.
“I am glad you are come, Mrs. Lambert,” said Mr. Mackintosh, when she
made her appearance, after delaying a moment to recover an appearance of
calmness. “I am glad you are come. We do not know what to do with this
poor child.”
“Thou hast not the heart to attack her faith at such a moment; and thou
dost not know how to speak on matters of faith, but in the way of
attack. Is that it, friend Mackintosh?—I agree with thee, that there is
no worldly comfort which will to-day soothe this poor child.”
“All you say about my fondness for attack may be very true; but see
whether it has half the effect in this parish of the superstition of its
pastor,—or of the system which made him its pastor:—I care not which may
claim the honour of doing most mischief.”
“I grant that thy principles have led to no murder here, and that the
vicar would have been wise to ask himself, while censuring thee, whether
he was not playing thy game for thee better than thou couldst do it for
thyself. But, friend, that is no excuse for thy being as intolerant to
others as the church has been to thee. Between you, religion (or, as
thou wouldst say, morals) has had so little chance, that I would not
advise either of you to boast of the other’s delinquencies, lest the
argument should end in the display of thine own.—I will only just
mention the name of Byrne, as a sanction to my charge.”
“You do not think he is the——” And Mr. Mackintosh’s countenance now
showed some emotion.
“I have heard no one named as the murderer,” Mrs. Lambert quietly
replied.
Mr. Mackintosh presently repented having allowed Alice to be brought in.
It made him completely wretched. Whether her grief was ungovernable, as
at first, or mild and reasonable, as it was when Mrs. Lambert had been
with her awhile, it was equally painful to him. He could do nothing with
minds but question and taunt them; and here, where the mind was too
childish to be questioned to any purpose, and too much harassed to allow
of taunting, there was no inducement to him to bear to witness the
suffering. When he was tired of being first ashamed of his own
helplessness, and then of being cross with his housekeeper, (who would
not quarrel with him, because she saw he was trying to carry off some
troublesome tenderness) he seized his hat, and walked out.—Mrs. Lambert
observed, that he went in the direction of Byrne’s cottage.
CHAPTER VIII.
BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
Sir William Hood (who was travelling abroad) supposed, like everybody
else, that the vicar was alone to blame for what had happened. Nobody
but those on the spot,—none but the sufferers,—dreamed of finding fault
with the system under which precisely the same grievances might recur.
They saw but too well that the virtues of the clergyman must, under such
a system, injure himself or them. If his virtues were like those of the
late vicar, centring in zeal for the church, he would oppress the parish
as the late vicar had done. If they consisted of disinterestedness and
mercy, they must injure himself in his worldly interests. The same
temptations must also again beset the parishioners;—temptation to
withhold the extreme dues of a moderate pastor, and to defraud a strict
one. The sufferers agreed, in short, with him who said of the tithe
system, “It has made the clergyman’s income to fall with his virtues,
and to rise with his bad qualities; just as it has made the parishioner
to lose by being ingenuous, and to save by dishonesty.”—They mourned
over their liability to a repetition of their grievances; and their only
comfort was in the hope that Peterson would not be again appointed to
rule over them.
In this hope they were not disappointed. It was thought fitting by the
ordinary and impropriator, that the circumstances of the scene should be
changed as much as possible, in order that future irritation might be
avoided; and Peterson received notice that his services would not be
required by the future incumbent. He quarrelled with the vicar’s
executor, before going out of office, respecting the amount of rent due
for tithes received up to the day of the owner’s death, which
unfortunately left room for a dispute of this kind, from not having
happened on a quarter-day. The vicar’s tithes were collected in kind by
the churchwardens, for the benefit of the future incumbent, the services
of the curate being meantime paid out of the fund. Sir William Hood
appointed another agent to collect his tithes.
During Jerom’s residence at the vicarage,—that is, during the few weeks
which Alice’s friends thought long enough for the assertion of that
dignity on which her father had bestowed some of his last thoughts,—it
occurred to many people that Jerom would like very much to be the future
incumbent of this vicarage.—Jerom did indeed wish it. The allotment of
new land, in which he had invested his share of the bounty, did not
answer. The tenant did not, he thought, cultivate it properly; and he
had no influence over the tenant, whom he had allowed to build on the
ground, and from whom he had no means of purchasing the new erections.
He was almost as poor as before he obtained the bounty; and could not
well have got through the year but for his brother’s legacy of the
little crops that were in the vicarage-ground.—He must get on, however,
on this little wealth, as well as he could; for the parishioners had no
intention of allowing anybody connected with the late vicar to be their
pastor. They gave Jerom to understand this very plainly.
That wealth of his was indeed but small. The season turned out even
worse than was expected; and so generally, that its effects were felt by
every class in society. Wages had been rising all the year, and this
occasioned a further rise in the price of produce; and these things all
together proved to such as had eyes to see, the essential vices of the
tithe-tax. Never had there been a greater outlay with a smaller per
centage of gain to the cultivator than this season: never had tithe been
so expensive to him as this year, when he could least afford it: never
had the labourers, whose increased wages would not suffice to buy them a
sufficiency of bread, so enviously regarded the increase in the revenue
of the church;—an increase which arose from the same cause as their
privations. Many were now convinced who had not been convinced before,
that the bread-eaters of Britain pay a capitation tax to the church. The
average consumption of grain being commonly allowed to be equivalent to
a quarter of wheat a head, wheat pays a shilling a bushel as tithe, when
wheat sells at 80_s._; so that, at that price, the church exacts a
capitation-tax of 8_s._; it being clear that 72_s._ would be a
remunerating price to the grower, if he had no tithe to pay. Many now
allowed, who had not been fond of the subject before, that it is unjust
that the religion of little more than half the nation should absorb a
larger portion of the national resources, in proportion as these
resources fail. Many now hinted, that if the preachers of the gospel had
no power to feed the hungry with loaves in the wilderness, they ought
not to be entitled to exact larger tribute from their hearers, the more
their hearers hungered.
There were many dreary days this autumn; but it was on one of the very
dreariest that Joseph ran out of the farm-house to invite his landlord
to shelter till the storm should be over. “Indeed,” he added, “we wish
particularly to speak to thee on a matter of some importance.” Mr.
Mackintosh was not so fond of a pouring rain as to be unwilling to let
his horse be led to a stable, and himself to a crackling wood fire, from
which orderly children moved away to make room for him.
“I hope you have not heard of another suspected murderer,” said he. “I
am quite tired of receiving intimations on that head, convinced as I am
that we shall never be any wiser.”
“We have nothing to say to thee of any new suspicion: but why shall we
never be any wiser?”
“Because we all have a pretty clear notion that there are many who could
tell if they would: and if they have not told yet, notwithstanding the
fair opportunity that has been given them, and the high reward offered,
it is scarcely likely that they will change their minds now. Every new
information is meant to put us on a false scent, depend upon it. I hope
the people will leave off playing such a farce. We have all our own
guesses, I dare say, as to which was the fellow, and where he might have
been found the next night, and why a stranger should have been the one
to deal the blow. He considered himself perhaps, as others have done
before him, as filling an office like the hangman’s,—putting the finish
to a criminal.”
“I call this unprofitable talk,” observed the plain Mrs. Lambert. “Wilt
thou hear the favour my sons have to ask of thee?”
Mr. Mackintosh was not fond of being asked favours; but he could not
refuse to listen, in return for shelter, warmth, and good ale. The young
men were very urgent to be released from their agreement about the
Quarry Wood farm. Three years only of their lease had run; but their
losses had been so great that they earnestly desired to give it up.
Mr. Mackintosh thought he had great reason to complain;—so much reason
that he did not feel himself bound to consider the interests of the
Lamberts in any such way as this. Was it not a subject of complaint that
the land was ill-managed? Might not any one see at a glance how far
inferior its condition was to that of the Abbey Farm?
“And whose fault was that?” Charles asked. “Did it not arise from the
one being titheable, and the other, tithe-free?”
“Which was known to thee when thou gavest thy money for it, I suppose,”
added the mother.
“I would really advise thee,” interposed Joseph, “to find another tenant
who does not labour under our scruples regarding the tithe, and who has
therefore a better chance of making the undertaking answer.”
“You seriously advise me. I really am much obliged to you, Mr. Joseph.”
“I seriously advise thee,—for this reason: that if we do contrive to pay
thee rent, it can only be by cropping and exhausting the best land on
the farm in a manner which will not please thee, but to which we shall
be driven. Therefore, if thou canst find a capitalist who will
diligently set himself to contend about the tithe in a way which we, for
conscience sake, cannot do, it may be equally for thy interest and
ours.”
“If you choose to find such an one, perhaps I may listen to what you
have to say.—But I won’t promise.”
“Why? does it give thee pleasure to hold us to a bad bargain?”
“Or to have my sons for tenants, perhaps,” said Mrs. Lambert, who
sometimes accused herself of being a partial mother.—Mr. Mackintosh
nodded at her, and said he had so little to complain of with respect to
the Abbey Farm, that he would offer this much;—to let the young men have
the Quarry Wood Farm rent-free for the remainder of the lease, they
bearing the charges on the land.
They were obliged by this offer of compromise, but as far from hopeful
as ever. They had much rather give up the undertaking altogether: but
Mr. Mackintosh would go no further. He had every reason to believe that
the farm would not let rent-free, on condition of the tenant paying the
taxes, civil and ecclesiastical.
The lease must run out before it changed hands, even at the risk of its
being left in bad condition,—half neglected and half exhausted.
“Come, cheer up, sons!” said their mother. “Gloomy faces are not
becoming in us who profess to be more free of the world than some
others. You know I never encouraged high notions in you when we thought
we were growing rich; and I will not praise you for being low-spirited
while you are doing your best——”
“For these children, as well as yourselves,” observed Mr. Mackintosh.
“These children will grow up to take care of themselves, and help us in
turn, if we want help. And before that time, let us hope, other
Christians will find, as we do, that they can worship without taking the
bread out of one another’s mouths. There will be more people willing to
worship then, I fancy. My sons may live to see the gospel esteemed as
able to support itself as when Christ preached it.”
“And you may live to see it, ma’am. It is an experiment which cannot be
very long delayed in this country,—as I believe a large majority of
thinkers agree in deciding, however they may differ as to what is
superstition and what is not.”
“Thou wilt not find many who will agree with thee, friend, that there
must be superstition in believing in things unseen;—no, not if thou
shouldst live a thousand years. But thou art pretty secure of good
company in declaring some things to be superstition which were so a
thousand years ago,—such as asking in God’s name for gifts that are not
gifts, and setting up a priesthood in Christ’s name, when, if Christ
said one thing more plainly than another, it was that there should be no
more priesthoods.”
“And to suppose that men will care for any matters of faith, be they
what they may, when the bread of these men is taken to uphold that
faith—it is folly!”
“Worse folly than any faith can be, I agree with thee in thinking. This
is what we call shutting up the kingdom of heaven against men. It occurs
to me, friend, that though thou hast a taste for being singular, thou
art of the same mind with some who took these matters to heart very long
ago. I ask thy pardon for observing (I know thou dost not like to agree
with any thing in Scripture,)—that some one said before thy time and
mine, that the Lord is not pleased with offerings, such as thousands of
rams and calves of a year old. He had rather have justice and mercy. I
wish the church could be persuaded to go back to this old Scripture.”
------------------------------------
London: Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES, Duke-street, Lambeth.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
OF
_TAXATION._
---------------------
No. III.
THE
JERSEYMEN MEETING.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
LONDON:
Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES,
Duke Street, Lambeth.
THE
JERSEYMEN MEETING.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
1. A Phenomenon 1
2. A Legacy 18
3. Life in Lambeth 40
4. The Phenomenon again 61
5. An Economical Project 76
6. Lessons in Loyalty 93
7. Harder Lessons in Loyalty 109
THE JERSEYMEN MEETING.
CHAPTER I.
A PHENOMENON.
The moral sense of some people is shocked by the sentiment that it is
pleasant to stand in safety on the shore to watch the effects of a storm
at sea; but perhaps none were ever found to dispute the pleasantness of
standing idle on the heights above a shore to watch the proceedings of
busy people at sea. There are parts of the coast of Jersey where this
luxury may be enjoyed in absolute perfection; where not only the
features of nature are full of beauty, but where the spectator is
unmolested by the presence of any less happy than himself, and where the
industry which he witnesses is sure of its due reward.
Such a station is the height of Anne Ville, which overlooks the thriving
village of Gorey in Jersey. It is luxury to sit on the remains of the
Druidical temple there, and think of nothing less animating than the
congregation of objects near; the bay of St. Catherine behind, where
green lanes lead from the very brink of the tide, each to its own snug
farm-house and blossoming orchard on the hill-side, and the solitary
tower of Archirondel, surrounded on its rocky station by the blue waters
of the bay: close at hand, Geoffry’s rock, from which, instead of
criminals being cast into the sea, as it is said they once were, white
sea-birds take their flight, scared by the laughter of children near
their haunts: the noble castle of Mont Orgueil overhanging the waters,
and casting upon them the shadow of its ruined battlements, while its
mantle of ivy waves in the evening breeze:—the fishing village below,
sending out and receiving back the oyster boats which throng about the
pier in the season;—the villages on the distant coast of France, when
the western sun lights them up into brilliant contrast with the
intervening expanse of dark blue; and far beyond these, on the extreme
horizon, the dim cathedral of Coutances. To spend a May evening in the
centre of this scene is a luxury to a stranger whose heart is not, like
that of a native, in one of the farmhouses in the interior, or among the
oysters on the beach below. A stranger is pretty secure, however, of
having this Druidical seat to himself on a May evening. So many repairs
are wanted for the boats, so much sail-cloth and cordage is called for,
and so large a portion of supplies is required for the little market of
Gorey, towards the close of the oyster season, that the men are more
likely to be guiding their creaking carts through the bowery lanes, and
the maidens carrying down the hills the produce of their far-famed cows,
than to be looking abroad from the heights of Anne Ville.
On such an evening, however, a few seasons ago, some one might be seen
keeping a look-out from the poquelaye, (as the Jersey people call a
Druidical remain like that at Anne Ville,) whom no one could doubt to be
a native. He was a young man of about twenty, whose sallow face bore
testimony to his diet being that of a Jersey farmhouse, while his
knitted garments pointed him out as the son of one of the thrifty dames
of the island who look suspiciously on all manufactures which threaten
to supersede the work of their own hands. Aaron le Brocq looked indolent
enough as he leaned with his elbows upon the great stone, and his dull
eye wandered over the ocean, never once lighting up when a sail caught
the yellow ray which slanted from the west: but Aaron came hither on
business. Never was cordage so much wanted as now; and Aaron’s stock of
hemp was exhausted; and day by day he came hither to watch for the
arrival of some one of the friendly vessels which must be on the way to
supply his need. There were barks innumerable within sight; but even
Aaron’s dull eye could perceive, almost at a glance, that none of those
near were what he wanted. Besides the native-built boats, there were
many English vessels sailing hither and thither. Several which had been
accustomed to navigate the broad, smooth Medway, were now tossing and
turning in the currents and eddies caused by the ridges of low rocks
which nearly surround the island, and have proved its surest defence
during the wars of the two countries between whose grasp it seems to
lie. French homeward-bound vessels were gliding between the shores; and
a few of other countries, bringing supplies as much needed as hemp, were
crossing Grouville Bay on their way to St. Heliers. Aaron would go to
St. Heliers too, in the morning, if he saw no vessel before dark which
might be supposed to come from the Baltic. He would go and learn what
other people thought of this scarcity of hemp.
It is to be supposed that Aaron fell into a reverie about this projected
trip to the port, and that he was thinking more of the market-place or
custom-house of St. Heliers than of anything within ken on sea or land;
for he started as if at the touch of the conjuring rod that he was
taught to fear in his childhood, when his friend, Charles Malet, laid
one hand on his shoulder, while with the other he pointed southwest,
saying,
“There will be no time for growing drowsy at the poquelaye after sunset
to-morrow, if yonder vessel be from Riga, as they say she is. She will
be in port as soon as we can get there, and perhaps we may find her
cargo all gone in the scramble.”
Aaron was on his feet in a moment, wondering how his thoughts could have
wandered away so far from the Baltic as to let a sail from that quarter
cross the wide bay, and almost disappear behind La Roque Point
unperceived by him. But there were many things besides hemp which this
ship might be bringing to Jersey; tallow for the candles, or oil for the
soap which some of the islanders were enabled to manufacture for a far
larger market than their own; or corn for home consumption, while they
sent their own to England. This may seem to some an ingenious project,
designed to benefit the shipping interest. To permit ships from Russia
to sail by the coasts of England, and land their corn in Jersey and
Guernsey, from whence an equal supply has at last to be brought to
England, seems like a benevolent scheme to give employment to some who
would otherwise be paupers. It looks like an approach towards the
fulfilment of the aspirations of the ship-owner, that every
merchant-vessel should be permitted to sail three times round the island
of Great Britain before landing its cargo. But, for whomsoever the plan
was first devised,—whether for the ship or land owners of Britain,—its
effect is to enrich the inhabitants of Jersey and Guernsey at the
expense of the bread-eaters of England. These islands are exempt from
the bread-tax, as from all the bad taxes of Great Britain, except
tithes. Their inhabitants, being allowed to buy wheat, without
restriction, wherever they please, can purchase it at 45_s._ per
quarter, while that which their fields produce is bought by the English
labourer at some price between 60_s._ and 70_s._ The benefit which
accrues to the Jerseyman is the difference between the price he pays,
and that which he receives when the amount of duty is deducted;—a
benefit marked enough to induce him to call for supplies from a distant
shore, and to retain the merchants of his own port in his service. No
wonder that any foreign vessel which passed within sight of the heights
above Gorey might be supposed to be bringing corn to the port of St.
Heliers. No wonder that Aaron was bewildered in a manner which would
have stamped him a half-idiot in England, when a perfectly new incident
presently occurred.
As soon as the sea became dusky in the twilight, the two friends turned
their backs upon it, in order to pursue their way to the dwelling of
Aaron’s father,—a small farmhouse in the valley on the other side the
first ridge of hills which stretched north and south. They had not
proceeded far over the down when they were accosted by a person whose
appearance excited their wonder, while his business surprised them yet
more. Scarcely half-dressed, and unattended, though he was blind, he was
a mystery to Aaron.
“What sort of charity do you wish me to show you?” he asked, in answer
to the beggar’s petition.
“What you please, sir,” replied the beggar: “but I have not had a morsel
to-day, and I have no place to lay my head in to-night.”
“How happens that? I’m afraid you have displeased Mr. De la Mare?”
“Mr. who, please, sir?”
“Mr. De la Mare, the hospital governor. You don’t know who he is? How
came you here, then?”
Malet had seen more of the world than Aaron. He suggested that the
beggar might have come over in some of the oyster vessels from Kent,—
perhaps even from London; and that he might never have set foot in St.
Heliers.
Would he get into the hospital among the blind? Aaron would take him to
St. Heliers the next morning, and try to procure him admission. Stephen
did not exactly wish this. He could find his way about, and did not like
being shut up. If the gentleman would only bestow a little charity, that
was all he asked;—by charity, he meant a little money for present use.
“But what will you do when it is gone?” asked Aaron. “You cannot work, I
suppose, without the use of your sight.”
Stephen (for so the beggar called himself) had not been able to do a
stroke of work these ten years. He trusted to the charitable and humane
to take care of him.
“But you will not take their charity. You refuse the hospital! I don’t
see what you would have.”
“He would live by begging, I dare say,” observed Malet, by way of
elucidation.
“What! by asking every day for bread! I never heard of such a thing.”
Charles Malet had once been told that this was a very common thing in
England. Besides the number of poor who were admitted into charitable
houses, like those at St. Heliers, there were many who did not know, any
morning of the year, where they should rest at night. Aaron thought this
a miserable lot; but Stephen the beggar seemed wonderfully cheerful
under it. He did not look ashamed, as a native would have done, of his
being only half-clothed;—perhaps the not seeing his tatters had
something to do with this. He had certainly been humming a tune, as he
ambled along, when the young men were approaching him; and even now,
though he spoke of hunger, he seemed ready to break out into singing or
joking in the intervals of the piteous looks he assumed. Aaron, as a
matter of course, took him home, but felt rather uncomfortable in doing
so. He was afraid that his father might be displeased if it should turn
out that the beggar was playing off a hoax; and that his mother might be
alarmed if Stephen should prove a halfwit, or to be under a spell; and
Aaron could scarcely doubt the one or the other to be the case. He took
Stephen by the hand, however, and led him on; not failing to remark how
marvellously his charge happened to escape hurting his ill-shod feet
against the large sharp stones which lay in the road.
An opportunity occurred of introducing the stranger to a part of the
family before reaching the farmhouse; an opportunity which Malet was the
first to discern. Jersey is a land of trotting brooks. As every dwelling
has hills somewhere near it, every dwelling has a stream within reach.
There was one at the bottom of Le Brocq’s orchard; and there were the
women of the family assembled this evening, when the young men crossed
the ridge and descended into the valley—assembled on an occasion of
great importance. It was the first day of washing week; and as washing
week came but twice a year, it was sure to be a busy time. The profusion
of snow-white caps spread on the grass formed the chief light in the
landscape, for the grey stone farmhouse, roofed with dark thatch,
nestled dimly among the trees; so that even if all had not been alike
mantled with ivy, the dwelling would scarcely have been discernible. The
brook was more heard than seen, and the high ferns on the opposite side
presented the appearance of a smooth green carpet. But few blossoms
remained in the orchard to distinguish it from the oak copse which
sheltered it towards the east. Little could be distinctly seen but the
heaps of linen on the bank, and the moving figures beside it. They were
the two daughters of Le Brocq, and a damsel, the servant at the
farmhouse. They were finishing their work for the night; and when Malet
ran down to them with a lover’s speed, he found Louise rising from her
knees beside the little pool which had been her station all day, and
declaring that she could see no longer, and that it was time to go home
to supper. Anna was meanwhile spreading more linen on the ferns, where
it might be bleached by the morning sun; and Victorine, the maid, put
the materials of their next day’s work in an appointed place, among the
roots of an old oak. The brook, meanwhile, rippled and splashed,
carrying down the defilements of soap which had offended it all day, and
washing out the pools in which the work had been performed. Stephen made
bold to ask his conductor what all this was about, and to declare what
shameful waste it would be thought in England to wash linen in a running
stream, where as much soap would be lost as would buy much of the linen.
Stephen was right; but this was a consideration which the Jersey people
had little occasion to regard. Their soap was not taxed either in its
materials or its manufacture; and few articles can be obtained with more
ease or less cost than soap, when this is the case. Any person in Jersey
was at liberty to buy oil or tallow direct from the Baltic ships in the
ports, without asking the leave of any custom-house officer. If he chose
to buy the cheap potash furnished by the interminable Russian forests,
he had no duty to pay. If he found sea-weed enough on the nearest shore
to supply this as well as other purposes, he was subjected to no other
interference than the injunction to cut it at the right season. He might
make his soap when and where, and in whatever quantities he pleased; and
the cost of it was next to nothing. No one there was obliged to sigh
either at his children’s dirt, or at the cost of keeping them clean. The
amount of soap used was little more thought of than that of the water
which ran past his own door.
Stephen seemed much disposed to join the group beside the brook,—another
proof to Aaron that he was not aware of the state of his costume. He was
not allowed to descend, as he wished; but must submit to be led across a
back field, and through the orchard, that he might reach the house, and
be clothed before he was presented to the family. Aaron could not think
of showing him in a state of such degradation as that in which he had
found him.
“Who is this?” inquired Le Brocq, who was drawing cider from the cask
which was niched near the door. “How can De la Mare let any one come to
such a pass?” Then, as Stephen came within hearing, the farmer told him
he should be welcome to supper and shelter for the night, and that he
might depend on being forwarded to St. Heliers the next morning. In an
aside, he desired his wife to fetch an old garment of his, wherewith to
clothe Stephen, instead of using any of Aaron’s good clothes for the
purpose.
Mrs. Le Brocq wanted to know when the girls were coming. It was too dark
for them to see what they were about; and the soup was ready; and she
was sure Louise would be over-tired if she staid at her work so long.
She was comforted with the news that they would presently come in, and
that Malet was with Louise, to take care of her.
By the time that Stephen was dressed, and seated somewhat nearer than he
liked to the great fire of vraic (a sea-weed which is used, first for
fuel and then for manure, in Jersey), the young washerwomen appeared.
Mrs. Le Brocq and Anna took charge of the supper table, while Louise,
who was, or was fancied to be, rather delicate, was tended by her lover,
and Victorine was at every one’s call, besides having to lay down a bed
for Stephen, as the hour of rest approached.
Stephen seemed less disposed for mirth at the supper table than when he
was first met in his destitute condition. Hungry as he was, he could not
eat the soup, made of lard and cabbage, which the rest of the party
seemed to relish as if it had been made of gravy meat, and peas. After
many attempts, he gave it up; and was so nauseated that he had little
relish left for the bread, cheese, and cider with which Mrs. Le Brocq
compassionately supplied him. He was sensible of the incessant motion of
knitting needles all around him, in every interval of eating. All the
four women were indeed knitting when doing nothing else; and Stephen
felt rather awkward in the midst of so much industry. Nobody was very
merry; there seemed to be some cause of discontent among the party,
though Aaron showed that he was well pleased at the prospect of
obtaining on the morrow the materials which would enable him to supply
his customers with ropes.
“I am glad some luck has befallen you,” observed the mother, “since
Charles is never to have any. I wonder whether there be another lad in
the island so shiftless as he; to have courted my Louise, and not have a
home to take her to.”
Le Brocq shook his head and muttered; Charles looked abashed, and Anna
said, hesitatingly, and only loud enough for her sister and Charles to
hear, that such ill-fortune could not, she trusted, last long. Such a
thing had never happened before, she believed, as a sober man being
disappointed of a settlement three times over. She hoped it would please
God that the hand of the diligent should make riches, and that Charles
would not lose heart.
Charles had lost heart many times lately; and now he left his supper
unfinished, and sat pondering the charms of the various cottages of
which he had missed the acquisition. He was not in poverty, being
employed with Aaron in ropemaking, but the parents of Louise would not
let him have her till he could take her to a home as comfortable as that
which she must leave. He began sometimes to fear that he should be sent
about his business, as being no proper match for Louise. Stephen made
such advances of sympathy as the little conversation enabled him to do.
He took up his glass of cider, and turning to Malet, begged to drink to
the young man “finding something to set his hand to,” and to his
“carrying the day with his lass, at any rate,” and he should be pleased
to be at the wedding.
Malet thanked him kindly; and Stephen went on to suggest that it was a
thousand pities to lose heart and let the time go by. Charles should do
as people in England did, marry when the young lady was in the mind, and
see what would come of trusting.
“And what comes of it in England?” inquired Malet, lending an attentive
ear.
Stephen made rather a lame story of the happy consequences of this sort
of trust, except on the point that he was quite sure of,—that there was
always the parish to depend on at last. He helped out his explanation
with a song about love and banishing care, which Malet would have
ventured to praise very highly, but that Mrs. Le Brocq began to look
angry. She muttered something about seeing Charles, some day or other,
borrowing another man’s coat and craving another man’s supper, and then
singing songs about not caring.
Charles showed by a gesture that there was the main difference between
Stephen and himself, that the one was blind and the other not. Le Brocq
was offended by his wife’s gross breach of hospitality; Louise was
crying; and all went wrong. Stephen took the liberty of beginning
another song by which he hoped to make every body laugh and grow
good-humoured; but before it had had time to operate, he was obliged to
break off by the entrance of some person whose horse he had heard stop
before the door.
“If you are come to supper, Mr. Janvrin,” observed Le Brocq, “I am
afraid you will not enjoy yourself as we could wish. If you had come
half-an-hour earlier——”
“I am come on business; and when I tell you that I was at St. John’s
this morning, and am now come from St. Martin’s, you will guess what I
am here for.”
“Well; out with it! What is in hand now?”
“Why, you know very well. You heard of the rate laid upon you and your
neighbours, for the help of the government in the new improvements.”
“But I offered horse and cart and man for a week. That is enough for my
share, surely.”
“For the new road. Yes. But the States call for money, too, as you must
be aware: and here is what you must pay,” showing his list.
Le Brocq said something about the many calls on people for money in
these days,—what with daughters marrying, and governments making new
roads. Nevertheless, he sent Aaron for his money-bag, and counted out
the sum, while the tax-gatherer refreshed himself with the remains of
the supper. When Stephen heard the clink of the coin, he observed that
the people in his country would never submit to pay taxes in this
manner. It would be as much as the tax-gatherer’s life would be worth to
ride about the country, taking money out of people’s pockets like a
footpad. Janvrin wondered what the gentleman could mean; and Aaron
inquired whether the English paid no taxes.
“Pay taxes! to be sure they do. How should such a fine country get on
without taxes? But, bless your soul, paying taxes there is the easiest
thing in the world. There’s no trouble whatever in it. The government
takes all the trouble, and the people don’t so much as know when they
are paying taxes.”
The family all thought this must be charming; and Aaron whispered to
Malet that, after all, it might be better for him to go to England: for
taxes were a consideration to a man who was going to marry. But Malet
wished to hear a little more first. How was it that taxation was such an
easy matter in England?
“O, I only know I never paid a tax in my life. I have not paid a tax
these ten years. Why, yes: some people pay them; but it is only by
giving a trifle more,—nothing worth speaking of,—for things that they
buy.”
“Like our duty on spirits,” observed the collector, nodding to Malet,
who was all ear.
“That is a very good plan,” observed Le Brocq. “I always liked that plan
of laying a tax on spirits.”
“Well you may,” observed the collector, laughing: “for I believe you
have never had a gallon of spirits in your house since its roof was on.”
“O, it’s a wise tax,” replied the farmer. “So the government in England
is kept up by a tax on spirits.”
“They must drink a deal of spirits,” said Malet, “or there must be other
dues;—harbour fees, like ours, or the like.”
Stephen did not deny that the spirit-tax was not the only one: but
whatever the others might be, it was only laying a farthing or two here
and there which nobody minded paying; and which, indeed, none knew that
they paid. What were the taxed articles? Malet inquired.—O, there were
several. Lace and silk stockings, he had heard: and a gentleman in Kent
was saying that hops paid some sort of charge. Malet and Louise looked
at each other. This would suit them exactly. They had never seen silk
stockings or lace, except in the shop-windows at St. Heliers; and they
drank cider.—Well: anything else? Any common articles? Mr. Janvrin
asked. Bread or sugar, timber or linen, soap or tobacco? Any of these?
Why, some of them: but the merest trifle! and it was uncommonly pleasant
to live in a free sort of way, without any tax-gatherer to come to the
cottage-door, and ask for so many shillings out of the poor man’s
earnings.
“Uncommonly pleasant,” repeated Le Brocq, with a sigh, as Janvrin
pocketed the money on the table, and made an entry in his book. “I think
I shall ask one of the Constables to speak to the Bailly, and try
whether we can’t get the States to think of taxing us as easily as the
English. An uncommonly pleasant way it must be, to be sure.”
“Uncommonly pleasant,” observed Janvrin, “if the poor man does not pay
pounds without knowing it, instead of shillings when he is asked. Your
guest said something about footpads: but I had rather be robbed by a
footpad than by a pickpocket.”
The girls asked their mother what was a footpad, and what was a
pickpocket. She frowned, and whispered to them not to ask: it was
something very bad indeed. They blushed, and could only hope that nobody
had heard their question.
Upon Stephen’s half-smiling and saying, with a turn of the head towards
Janvrin, that every man was in honour bound to defend his own
occupation, but that he was proud to say, the English had no relish for
getting out their money-bags when the government bade them, and
preferred paying their little matter of tax their own way, the good-will
of the family towards Janvrin was visibly overclouded. Nobody pressed
him to stay; and when, on his departure, he once more mentioned that Le
Brocq’s cart and horse would be expected to appear on the new road the
next Monday morning, the farmer looked very grave in giving his assent.
Stephen was abundantly questioned about England before he was allowed to
go to rest: and when, at length, Aaron led him to the corner where he
was to sleep, and promised to leave no stone unturned to get him into
the hospital, Malet was mourning with Louise that he had wasted so much
time in seeking an establishment in Jersey; and the farmer determined
that he would not close his eyes till he had calculated how much money
he had paid over to the States since he began housekeeping, without
reckoning the use the island had had of his horse and cart, as often as
improvements had been carried on in his parish.
CHAPTER II.
A LEGACY.
When Aaron stole to the bedside of his guest, early the next morning, to
rouse him for his journey, he was surprised to find nobody there. Not
only had the guest disappeared, but half the bedding,—the whole of which
would not much encumber a strong man. The only supposition that could be
entertained was that Stephen had gone out, with a blanket in addition to
his scanty clothing, to please himself with the morning sunshine; an
amusement to which there was no impediment of locks and bolts, in this
any more than in the neighbouring farmhouses. But Stephen was not to be
found in orchard or field; nor did he answer when his name was called,
though everybody in the house was wakened by the shout. Louise appeared
with her milk-pails, and Anna tripped down to the brook. Mrs. Le Brocq
appeared at the window, knitting, and the farmer came out to harness his
team, while Victorine swept the kitchen, and prepared to light the fire.
Everybody appeared but Stephen. A general admiration of his talents
prevailed when it was remarked as a singular thing that a blind man
should be able to find the door, and pursue his way over ground that he
had traversed but once. The fear was lest he should have lost himself,
got entangled in the copse, or soused in the brook;—or,—suppose he
should have fallen down the quarry! If he had escaped all these dangers,
he must be as acute about finding his way as he had shown himself about
taxation, and love and marriage. While this admiration was being
expressed, up came Anna from the brook, with a gentle reproof prepared
for Victorine, for carrying away the bleaching linen from the place
where they had been left the evening before. There was no place where
they could bleach more favourably, and Victorine had received no orders
to remove them. It was not long before the conviction was forced upon
everybody that the linen was stolen. The most valuable part of the
clothing of the family was gone. Nearly eighty of the best caps
belonging to the four women of the household were carried off, and so
many other useful things that the maidens might do nothing but spin,
knit, and sew, from this time till Christmas, and yet be obliged to have
three or four extra washes. It was a dreadful misfortune. Louise leaned
her head against the cow she was milking when the tidings were brought
to her. Let Charles be as fortunate as he might, her wedding might be
considered as deferred for an indefinite period. Anna hoped against hope
that some happy explanation would arise. It seemed impossible that any
one should be so wicked as to take, without payment, what did not belong
to him. Father and son and Victorine were off in different directions to
look for traces of thieves in the fields and highways. Not a cap was to
be seen dropped on the grass, nor any shirt frolicking by itself on any
bush. Victorine turned back panic-struck, only too well convinced of
what she now thought she had suspected all along,—that the guest of the
last night had arrived from a far more distant place than England, and
that he needed no ship to bring him over the sea. She trembled to think
what sort of feet might have been enclosed in her young master’s shoes,
and what might have been the effects of his eyes, if he had not happily
chosen to keep them shut. Aaron did not know that he could do better
than pursue his way to St. Heliers, where it was possible that he might
meet with either Stephen or the thief, if they should, after all, not
happen to be the same person. So he harnessed a strong little horse of
his father’s to the cart, drove to his rope-walk, wished that Malet
would not be so late in the mornings, but would be at his business in
time to help people with advice when they were in a hurry, and drove
off. He had not gone far when his sister’s voice hailed him. She was
running after him with a list of messages from his mother about articles
that he was to purchase in the market at St. Heliers, and with a request
that if he should be able to learn anything about the lost property, he
would take particular care to recover Louise’s share first, as poor
Louise was in sadder distress than anybody else.
“You will go to Gorey,” she suggested. “Some of the English may think
there is no harm in taking our caps, and will give you them back again.”
“Ask Charles to go there. It will be as much as I can do to make this
harness hold out, if I go as straight as an arrow and back again. I had
better have kept the last coil of cord I sold to young François; this is
as rotten as if the tow had never been twisted.”
It was provoking that the harness should break at this moment; and Aaron
showed that it was. He twitched the horse’s head in its straw collar,
knotted the rope rein with some very petulant gestures, told his sister
that she deserved to be run over for coming in the way of the long axle
of the cart, and finally urged on his rumbling vehicle without a word of
farewell.
His haste did not, however, prevent his pausing on some high ground,
where an opening in the ridge of hills afforded him a glimpse of the
sea, and a distant view of the pier at Gorey. The English oyster-boats
were departing for the season. A little fleet of them was standing out
from the bay; and in one of them might have been found, as Aaron
suspected, the lost property and the blind thief,—if blind he were. The
sight of such means of escape stimulated the youth to his pursuit, if
indeed it were yet possible to hunt out the guilty from any retreat
between Grosnez and La Roque, and bring him to justice.
No person in the least resembling Stephen was to be seen on any of the
quays of St. Heliers, nor in the pretty market-place. Mr. De la Mare had
not heard of any blind stranger being in the neighbourhood. The vessel
from the Baltic was in the harbour,—all safe, and bringing hemp, as
Aaron desired. As it was still too early in the morning for the
transaction of business on the quay, he thought it best to make his
purchases in the market-place, telling every person he met of the family
loss. Several people from the country had already taken their places
under the piazzas, and had set out their butter, eggs, and vegetables;
and the butchers’ carts were being unpacked in the centre. Every one was
soon in possession of the story. While the early housewife was arguing
with the butcher whether she should pay 3_d._ or 3½_d._ per lb. for his
prime beef, she stopped to shake her head over the depravity of the age,
in which an open theft had come to be committed in return for
hospitality. The maid-servant, who took in the tale with open mouth,
while the market-woman counted eggs at 4_d._ a dozen into her basket,
promised to mention the circumstance wherever she went. The townsman who
had risen early that he might have the first choice of fish, spoke of
alarming the magistracy and rousing justice.—Then, when Aaron stepped to
a shop or two within sight, to buy two pounds of three shilling tea (his
mother made a point of having the best tea), and a supply of fine sugar
at 4_d._, half the little boys that were abroad followed him, as if
expecting that the thief would be found under the counter or in one of
the canisters; and the shopman put on a countenance of concern; and the
head of the firm looked mysterious; and altogether the impression was
very profound.
All was known at the custom-house before Aaron betook himself thither to
inquire about the arrival and departure of vessels. Every man in the
establishment,—the principal, the comptroller, and the two
subordinates,—was eager to question Aaron as he approached with an air
of peculiar gravity. The unlading of Christiana deals upon the quay had
proceeded without their notice, while engrossed with the tale of the Le
Brocqs’ misfortunes;—not that it was any part of their duty to watch the
unlading of Baltic timber; for here the people were allowed to get their
timber from any part of the world they pleased, and to give no more than
the natural price. They were neither compelled to pay the King for the
liberty of using foreign timber at all; nor obliged, by the high duty
put upon Christiana deals, to take up with the inferior wood of Canada.
The custom-house officers looked upon the landing and sale of timber
with their hands in their pockets, and as if they had no more concern in
the matter than in a bargain about a bunch of asparagus.
Equally indifferent were they about the proceedings of the vessel which
brought hemp and tallow. Indeed, the bustle of the port of St. Heliers,—
a bustle which increases from year to year,—takes place altogether among
the buyers and sellers. Tax-gatherers have little concern in the matter.
When the harbour-master has collected the harbour dues, and the
custom-house officers have ascertained that no wine or spirits are on
board, or have levied that single tax, the government is satisfied, and
no further impediments exist. The Jersey people could not possibly stand
more in need of hemp than the English. Without rigging for her
merchant-ships, England is impoverished: without cables and sails for
her vessels of war, she is defenceless. How did she then supply this
great necessity? But little hemp is grown at home; and, in order to
obtain more, government adopted the means precisely adapted to defeat
the end. Instead of facilitating to the utmost the obtaining of an
article from abroad which is deficient at home, difficulties were thrown
in the way of getting it from abroad, in order to force the production
at home: a very high duty was laid on imported hemp. This made it less
expensive to buy sail-cloth and ropes ready made from abroad than to
manufacture them at home; and thus our manufacturers were ruined. It
also stimulated the use of iron cables, so that the government found
that there is a slip between the cup and the lip,—between laying on this
tax and receiving the produce. The result of the whole was that
government derived little from the tax; our manufacturers could not make
their business answer; and we employed foreigners to prepare our ropes
for us, while those at home, who would do the work cheaper, were
standing idle. If government would have admitted hemp free, the
multitude who were standing idle, and the larger multitude who paid for
the collecting of the tax and for the dearness of the article, would
have been thankful to subscribe the 70,000_l._ which was all that found
its way into the Treasury. It is but lately that the consequences of
such a policy have been recognised by the government and the country,
and the duty on undressed hemp repealed; but it is now fully
acknowledged that the country need never have paid the high prices
demanded for hemp manufactures from 1808 to 1814, or any of the burdens
which this absurd tax has imposed till now. It is to be hoped that this
conviction will lead to the repeal of other taxes as bad in principle,
and almost as mischievous in practice: but custom-house officers still
interfere between the English builder and the timber of the Baltic, and
demand so heavy a tax upon every cask of tallow or oil that is on its
way to the soap-boiler as to involve hundreds or thousands in the
factitious guilt of a breach of the revenue laws.
Aaron had a favourite phrase at his tongue’s end, whenever he was out of
his father’s sight. Le Brocq had carried his authority over his son a
great deal too far:—so far that Aaron was in a state of unremitting
bondage to one person, while he was apt to carry his freedom to an
extreme in every other presence. ‘What is that to you?’ was his
invariable reply when questioned by sister, friend or stranger;—an
expression which would never have occurred to him, if he had not been
racked with questions by the only person whom he could not refuse to
answer. His sisters were so well aware of his sensitiveness to the tone
of interrogation that whatever was uncertain was put by them into a form
of conjecture; and even Victorine appeared to be thinking aloud whenever
she wanted to know anything which she believed her young master could
tell. Custom-house officers cannot be expected to show such
consideration for individual peculiarities, and it would have been
scarcely safe to have allowed Aaron to go down to an English port to
transact business about hemp or tallow. Ladies going to France now find
it vexatious to be asked, “What have you in that bag?” “What do you
carry in this little box;” and gentlemen turn restive under the inquiry
what fills out their pockets, and whether they carry anything in their
boots. Such inquisition, intolerable as it is, is less vexatious by half
than that which the English merchant, priding himself on the dignity of
his vocation, has to undergo when the amount of his purchases, and the
value of his merchandise have to be investigated, and made known to
those who ought to have no concern in the matter, that they may watch
whether he discharges his duty to the state. These sufferers may not say
(what they are incessantly prompted to exclaim,)—“What is that to you?”
they may not make as free as Aaron did on the quays of St. Heliers.
The comptroller accosted him with,
“Your concern is with her,—yonder,—I see.”
“What’s that to you?”
“Why, no more than that I can tell you, within a minute and a half, how
soon she will be alongside the wharf. You won’t have to wait long, I
fancy; for there are half a score of people come in from the country at
the first news of her being moored off the old castle. You must have
found it a great vexation to be waiting for hemp when the time of the
fishery was passing away.”
“What’s she?” inquired Aaron, pointing to a vessel which was making her
way out of the harbour, before the anxious eyes of a group of men, now
resting from the toil of putting the finishing stroke to her lading.
“What’s that to you?” replied the comptroller, smiling. “I see you do
not like other people to take a fancy to your words. Well, then, she
carries stone to the port of London; and a fine voyage she is likely to
have with this wind:—a better one than the Riga vessels that have been
in the Channel this fortnight, I fancy, and cannot get here. They will
be all coming at once when you will want them less than you have done.
But you have always a good market for cordage in England, I suppose.”
Aaron muttered that whether he sent his ropes to England or anywhere
else, people in all places wanted cordage, and always would want it, he
supposed.
“No doubt; and when one hears of young men’s sisters being seen turning
the wheel in the rope-walk, and of young men themselves standing every
evening by the poquelaye to look for ships that bring hemp, one can’t
help, if one cares for the island, hoping that the manufacture is
prospering.”
“Certainly; if one is thinking of the island. But what is to become of
the island, if it is to be overrun with thieves? You heard of our being
robbed last night.”
“Yes. Some London rogue that came by an oyster-boat, no doubt. What have
you lost by him?”
“What’s that to you?”
“Why, really, Mr. Aaron, I don’t see how you are to find your property
again, if you have an objection to say what you have lost. I must leave
you to find the thief in your own way, and wish you good morning.”
“Well; but that is not what I meant to say,—if you think you can help me
to the thief.”
“Nobody could, if many were to take up your way of speaking. Only
conceive, now! ‘Pray, sir, have you any knowledge of the people that
came by the Medway boats?’—‘What’s that to you?’ ‘Have you happened to
see a blind man pass your way, Mr. So-and-so?’—‘What’s that to you?’
‘Where was it——?’”
Aaron half-laughed, and wished people would never be tiresome with their
questions, and then——
“And then you would not make it a great mystery whether the thief took
two pairs of stockings or six. Well, if I find Mr. Stephen and his booty
in an empty wine-cask, I will make bold to let you know, if you will
only allow me to ask whether the property belongs to you.”
Aaron gravely thanked him, when the comptroller began saying one thing
more before they separated.
“Just bear this hint in mind, Mr. Aaron. Don’t be tempted to go and
follow any business in England, till you have taken as great a fancy for
being questioned as you have now taken against it. This is the country
for you,—where nobody fingers your tow, or counts your strands or
measures your cables. Don’t be persuaded to go and live in England.”
Aaron stared. He had never had a thought of even crossing to England for
a week’s pleasure. Had his companion heard of any scheme——? What could
put it into his head to offer such a caution?
“What’s that to you?” answered the comptroller, laughing as he
retreated. “Only mind what I say.”
Aaron was not fond of minding what anybody said. He had had enough of
that kind of observance enforced by his father. He looked dogged; and if
any one had on the spot offered him a passage to England, he would
probably have gone, at all hazards.
The fancy possessed him all day. While engaged in the purchase of his
hemp, he made inquiries of the Russians whether they had been in
England, and how they were treated there, and after what fashion
purchases of hemp were made in the ports. He was in the midst of a
reverie, deciding that it could be no more really necessary to answer
impertinent questions in England than anywhere else, when he was stopped
on his way out of town by an officer of justice who wanted a description
of Stephen’s costume; and then by a housewife who had a
mysteriously-obtained cap to show, which she supposed might be one of
the missing stock. Over hill and over dale he jogged and jolted, letting
his horse carry the cart after its own fancy, while he reviewed in his
mind all the trades and professions he had heard of as being practised
in England; and recalled the countenances of two Isle of Wight men who
had looked far from being harassed to death. He was pretty sure it must
be very possible for him to live in England: and what the comptroller
could mean by so earnest a caution, given at this very time, he could
not imagine.
The first person he saw on his arrival in the neighbourhood of home was
Victorine. She was awaiting him on the orchard bank; and very sorry she
was that she could venture no further on the road by which he was to
approach; but the thief of the preceding night was as a lion in the
path. No one of the women had this day gone out of screaming distance;
and it was rather a stretch of boldness to have attained the orchard
bank. There had been terrors to be sustained;—a toad had made the grass
move in one place; and a large black bird, (Victorine did not look again
to see of what species,) had rustled in the hedge, and flown out before
her eyes; and a gruff voice had been overheard in the ditch on the other
side;—a voice which made her heart beat so that she could hear nothing
else, or she would soon have discovered that it was the grunting old
sow. The greatness of the occasion alone enabled her to take her stand,
notwithstanding all these alarms.
“Mr. Aaron,” cried she, “there is news at home. Mr. Aaron, the uncle is
dead.”
“What uncle? Whose uncle? Our uncle? What uncle?”
“Uncle Anthony is dead. I thought I would tell you, sir; lest you should
see the mother first, and fear something worse. Have you got news of our
caps?”
Aaron did not answer the last question, he was so busy trying to
remember who uncle Anthony was. He remembered having heard the name in
childhood, and believed that the person it belonged to lived somewhere a
great way off; but no passing thought of either name or person had been
in his mind for so many years, that he was ill-prepared to take the news
as it seemed to be expected that he should.
He found his mother moving about with a countenance of the deepest
solemnity, and the same step that she would have used in a sick-room. Le
Brocq was quiet and thoughtful, and Malet evidently in gay spirits.
“We have had a great loss, Aaron,” declared the mother. “You remember
our uncle Anthony.”
“Did I ever see him, mother?”
He was told that this was a very ungrateful question, for that uncle
Anthony had been his godfather. When it pleased God to send afflictions,
it became people to be more sensible of them than Aaron seemed to be. By
way of setting an example, Mrs. Le Brocq gave all the house-business in
charge to Victorine, and sat down with her knitting to sigh very
heavily, and look up reproachfully as often as any one spoke. Anna saw
Aaron’s perplexity, and its near approach to a sulky fit, and found an
opportunity of whispering a little desirable information.
“Uncle Anthony was father’s uncle, and he gave mother a tea-chest when
she married; and he was your godfather, and lived near London; and he
wants us to go and live there now.”
“But I thought he was dead.”
“So he is: but he left a letter, which I suppose father will tell you
about. I am afraid we do not know how to take this dispensation as we
ought: but pray God those may be supported that will miss him more than
we can!”
“What does father look so grave for? Is it sorrow? or is he thinking of
London?”
“Charles let drop that he should like to go to London; and he says ’tis
like a providence, after what passed last night. Such a business
offered! and so pressing! Father is turning it over, perhaps.”
“Why for Charles more than me? Everybody is thought of before me.”
“You would not have thought so if you had known how father was calling
for you, three or four times before you came home. Whatever he may be
thinking, he is not forgetting you.—But, Aaron, don’t be eager after
changes. We are over-apt to like changes; but see the grave faces that
we have had since this time yesterday, when our changes began!”
A change was meanwhile working to which Anna could not object, any more
than her brother. Her father’s heart was opening towards Aaron under the
influence of a strong excitement. He held out the letter at arm’s
length, with the encouraging command, “Read that.” Aaron read as
follows:—
“Dear Nephew—The reason why you have never heard from me for these
seventeen years past is because I had a son and daughter of my own, as
you know, to care for; and you were too far off to do me any good in the
way of attention, which I always remembered in your favour when in want
of it when my son turned disobedient. Also I remembered the overalls
your wife knitted for me, and always determined you should hear of them
again, sooner or later. But I had no mind to give up my business to
anybody else before I had done with it myself; and for this same reason,
though I am writing this letter now, I don’t mean that you should have
it till after my death. Never mind my missing being thanked by you! I
can fancy all you would say very well, and set it down to your credit.
“You are to come and take my business, instead of living in your
outlandish place any longer, which is only a place for such as are half
French in their hearts,—confound them! You have nothing like this
Lambeth neighbourhood, let me tell you; and the sooner you come and see,
the better. Indeed, the business can’t wait long for a master, though
Studley will do very well to take care of it for the few weeks after my
burial till you come. But make haste, lest you miss more than you think
for. There is little in the pottery business that you may not learn, and
teach your little boy after you, with Studley to help you: and it is a
very pretty concern, and one which it is a mystery to me that my son
should have sneezed at, and gone abroad, I do believe to get away from
me, where he is doing very well, they say, with his wife and family in
America; and so nobody can allege I do an unkind thing in showing my
displeasure against him by leaving my business to one who never
disobeyed me. My daughter, I should have said, died twelve years ago,
and is buried in the same churchyard with my wife.
“You may be thankful that I have lived to this time to get up a pretty
business for you. The stone pottery is a very different affair now from
what it was when I first came into it, forty years ago. Not but that it
was in one respect more flourishing twenty years ago than it is now;—
viz., in soda-water bottles, of which we used to send out a great number
till cut out in that respect by the glass, which is more secure of being
clean, they say, and does not sweat, as stone used to do, though we have
now cured the sweating. It is a pity, too, that glass is preferred for
beer that is sent abroad. I don’t mean ginger beer or spruce beer, both
which are bottled in stone, as being less apt to burst; and the people
in Van Diemen’s Land and other foreign parts are very fond of such brisk
drinks, as you will find to your profit. We made 130 cwt. with E X upon
them last year. But this is a poor test, since a bare twelfth of our
article is duty-paid. We send as many figured jugs to Ireland as ever;
and what we make for ink and blacking is prodigious. There is an
increase in spirit casks and large oil bottles; and the state of
chemicals has improved in our favour since I took the business; so that
I should scarcely have believed then what I should some time sell to
chemists, and also for filtering. So here, you see, is a pretty sort of
business, and only, I assure you, ten or eleven to divide it among them
in London, and only sixty-nine in all England: and if prices have come
down somewhat, it is quite as much because the clay can be got cheaper,
and coals are lower, as on account of the meddling of the glass-bottle
makers,—which you will perhaps wonder at my owning, considering what a
grudge we owe these last: but I am for fair play on all occasions. So
now you know what you have to expect, except about the house. It is a
pretty pleasant house, joining the pottery, and opening into the yard:
and there being only outhouses behind for some way, it is what I call
airy; and the furniture you will find just as I leave it. So all will be
ready for you to come directly.
“I think this is all at present. You may expect me to say something
serious, as people generally do when they are settling their affairs to
leave the world. But I am not particularly ill, though I have taken this
opportunity of writing this letter, and finished my 75th year yesterday;
and those things come time enough when the time comes: and my business
now is, being of sound mind, to arrange matters for you, in case of my
being cut off suddenly. So I shall just leave this open, in case of
having anything to add at any future time.”
It appeared that nothing had occurred to be added in any future time,
for this was all. Anna was sorry for it. While her father was talking
about the letter being that of a good, kind, old soul, she was turning
it round to find in some of its odd corners some word of relenting
towards his disobedient son. Aaron waited in silence an intimation that
Malet was to be presented with this “pretty business” in a country where
people paid the merest trifles in taxes, and without being aware of it.
The idea had even struck him that he would work upon Malet to let him
become a partner, and thus free himself from his father’s strict rule,
and settle himself where, as he grew older, no one would make him pay
down money for the use of the State.
Malet looked blank when Le Brocq announced his intention of going to St.
Heliers to-morrow, to inquire about a passage for England. The young man
was asked the cause of his surprise. Why should any time be lost?
“Do you mean to go?” asked all the family.
Certainly. What else should he do? Malet should rent the farm, and take
Aaron’s rope-walk, if he would. Aaron would be wanted at the pottery.
Malet would fain have discovered that he should be wanted too. No one
who had seen and heard Stephen thought anything so hard as to have to
live in Jersey, when there was such a place as England to go to. Even
with the certainty before them of being able to marry immediately, Malet
and Louise looked grave. Any one would have thought that their marriage
had been put off for a twelvemonth at least.
“You shall have the farm at a reasonable rate, in consideration of its
being a place for my wife and Anna to come back to, if anything should
happen to me before I have settled well in this business in London. You
shall have the six acres for 40_l._, and no other charges but for the
orchard; and you shall be married directly, that we may be gone. We will
settle about Aaron’s rope-walk to-morrow, when I have questioned him a
little more about it.”
Aaron did not slip away, as he usually did when there was talk of
questioning. He was too happy in the prospect of living in England to
throw any impediment in the way of getting rid of his rope-walk.
“And what are we to pay for the orchard, pray?” asked Louise,
repiningly. “I’m sure I shall have no time to make cider, if you all go
away and leave me.”
“Victorine will stay; and that will be just so much more help than your
mother had when we married,” replied Le Brocq. “I shall not ask above
3_l._ an acre for the orchards, and cider enough for our own drinking,
which I expect you will send us every year.”
“Anna and I shall make our own cider, I suppose,” declared Mrs. Le
Brocq, forgetting her solemnity in the interest of the topic. “It will
be a long way to send cider.”
Not farther than cider was sent every season, her husband replied; and
he doubted whether it would be quite convenient to make cider on the
premises of a Lambeth pottery; but as Mrs. Le Brocq was sure that,
wherever she went, she should have an orchard at the back of the house,
the point was left to be determined after their arrival.
There must now be entire silence, for the farmer was about to study over
again the letter from uncle Anthony’s lawyer in which the foregoing
epistle was enclosed. Louise therefore withdrew to meditate over her
milk-pail, and Anna to take in the linen from the green bank, lest there
should be a further theft this night. As she passed the hydrangeas at
the door, and the flowering myrtles that half-concealed the paling, she
felt sad at the prospect of leaving them;—at the prospect of leaving
these particular hydrangeas and myrtles, not of quitting the region of
flowers; for she never doubted there being a green path to the house in
Lambeth, and a vine growing up to the thatch, and blossoming shrubs
clustering on every side. She hoped they should all be happier when they
were rich; but she could scarcely see how: for Louise must be left
behind, and Victorine; and her mother’s head-ach and pain in the
shoulder might perhaps continue, however rich they might be. But if
Aaron should look lighter, and father be as kind to him as to Louise and
herself, they should certainly be all much happier; and perhaps the
being rich might bring this about. At any rate, it was God that raised
up as well as brought low; and so all must be right: but this was a dear
place to be obliged to leave. Aaron silently devoured his mess of conger
eel, stewed with milk and young green peas, and grew in his own
estimation every moment. When Victorine had done serving him, she placed
herself where she might watch the family party, and perhaps discover
what made her mistress sigh as she had never heard her sigh since the
late king died.
CHAPTER III.
LIFE IN LAMBETH.
It is needless to explain that there were neither myrtles nor vines
about the pottery-house. Not that there was any deficiency of scent
around the dwelling. A soap manufactory near obviated every charge of
this kind. It had given out its odours in full power at the moment of
the Le Brocqs’ first approach to their new abode, and had greeted them
just when they paused to admire the symbols which were erected on their
pottery wall. It was by uncle Anthony’s taste that the establishment
bore this refined character. It was he who had mounted a huge filterer
on one angle; and on another a ladle which seemed made to fish up Truth
out of a well. Uncle Anthony had done much. Would he had done one thing
more!—removed from the neighbourhood of the soap manufactory, or got it
removed by indicting it as a nuisance. But he had lived for fifty years
on good terms with this establishment, and never dreamt of hurting it.
Indeed, when he had been persuaded, on rare occasions, to give himself a
day’s airing at Hornsey, he relished the atmosphere of his native street
on his return, as the fuller’s heart leaps at the sight of the dust
about his mill, and the weaver’s at the sound of the click-clack of his
loom. Mrs. Le Brocq did not take it so easily, nor believe what she was
told of the certainty that she would enjoy the nuisance in time, as much
as her neighbours. Anna felt it a sad addition to the excitements under
which she had to labour from dawn till night. Every morning she was
startled from sleep by the workmen knocking at the gate of the yard; and
then came the peevish bell of the dustman, and then a gradual increase
of street noises. If it rained, the sprinklings of white earth in the
yard became mud; if the sun shone in, the dust danced thick in its
beams, and she felt as if she drew it in with every breath. At her
former home, little dust was to be seen, as everything was green around,
except the gravelly lane; but here no efforts to keep the furniture in a
seemly state availed anything. It would have been as easy to parry one
of the plagues of Egypt. There was a good deal to be admired, however,
when it was not boiling day at the soapery, or when the wind was south.
The river, as seen from the wharf behind the pottery, was not so fine,
she thought, as the channel between Jersey and France; but the bridge
was very grand, and nothing could be more beautiful than her father’s
finely arranged stock of stone-ware. Mr. Studley, the foreman, had
assured her that the process of the manufacture was in some parts very
elegant; but her father would not let her see it till Aaron should be
competent to the exhibition, on some holiday, or other occasion when the
men should be absent. Through the stock-room, however, she was allowed
to range; and her awe of London, as a place of civilization and wealth,
was much increased by what she saw there;—such beautiful jars and
pitchers, and so enormous a congregation of blacking bottles! Thither
she carried her knitting, when not wanted in kitchen or parlour. She
thought she must leave off knitting, as her mother could do all that was
now required. Nobody seemed to wear knitted smallclothes or petticoats
in London, nor even shawls. If it was really true that she must no
longer make her father’s and Aaron’s coats, she feared she should want
occupation: but it was difficult to credit that in a fine country like
England the men would condescend to such womanish work as tailoring. She
had no doubt she should find this to be a joke upon her, as a new comer.
She had, indeed, seen a young man sitting upon a table, and doing
tailor’s work; but he was very small and pale, and most likely permitted
to do this because he was fit for nothing else.
While deep in thought over her work, she was planning how to make her
mother more comfortable than she could possibly be at present. Mrs. Le
Brocq could not live without apples, and was very much discomposed at
having to purchase them; and when she went to the shop, or stepped out
after a fruit-woman in the street, the neighbours invariably followed to
stare at her costume. The butcher had given out that the new family were
preciously stingy people, eating meat only once or twice a week, which
was a sin and shame in the owners of a pottery. Mr. Studley cast a look
of disgust at her, the only time he had entered the house,—which
happened precisely at the moment when the dinner of lard and cabbage
soup was being served up. If Mrs. Le Brocq could not be made more
popular in the neighbourhood, it was to be feared that the possession of
a pottery would not insure perfect happiness to the family.
How different from Studley had been another visitor who entered at a
similar important point of time! “A gentleman,” who did not declare his
name, called to speak to Mr. Le Brocq, a few days after his arrival, and
walked in, as a matter of course, without waiting to hear whether the
person he sought was at home. He uttered a cry of delight at the
spectacle of the soup, and kissed Mrs. Le Brocq and her daughter, in
sign of being a countryman. Before he could be asked, he drew a chair,
rubbed his hands, and sang a verse of a song in the French of the
island,—the language which it refreshed their ears to hear. He had not
done when Le Brocq came in, expecting to find a customer for his
stoneware rather than his dinner.
“Ha! countryman!” cried the stranger. “Don’t try to remember me. For my
own sake, don’t try to remember me. There’s no use in looking back too
far, when all is done; but I could not slink away when once I had seen
the hem of your wife’s Jersey petticoat. My name is Durell: there is no
occasion to remind us all that you have heard it before.”
Mr. Le Brocq looked grave. A farmer, of the name of Durell, had
committed an assault on the King’s highway, in the neighbourhood of
Gorey, and had anticipated his sentence of banishment by making off in a
fishing-boat, within an hour of the information being laid against him.
Every one had been sorry for the offender, who was known to be of a
passionate temper, and to have received such provocation as would have
gone far to justify him. Every one was sorry that he had precipitately
given up his pretty farm, and compelled his wife and child to wander
after him to another land; but Le Brocq now wished to have some evidence
of the respectability of Durell, before he admitted him as a guest on
terms of familiarity.
“You should have such a love of country as mine, man, and then you would
not look so cold upon me,” cried Durell. “If you knew how my heart longs
for a word about the deep shady lanes, and those blessed little coves,
where the sea comes to kiss one’s feet, and slips away again! I have not
seen what I call a dell any where else; and the pastures, with a green
that makes one’s eyes water! Heaven keep them so! And how are they?”
“Did you come to hear this sort of news?” Le Brocq inquired.
“The devil take what I came for! that will do afterwards. Can’t you tell
me whether the doves coo as they used to do when the wind dropped? For
the soul of me, I can’t believe you are a Jerseyman! If I had not thrown
open my doors wider to poor Stephen, I should have doubted my being a
Jerseyman myself.”
“Poor who?” inquired Le Brocq, hoping to obtain something in the form of
a reference,
“A poor helpless body that lives with me, and tells me every night what
makes me dream that I am leaning against a mossy stone gate-post, or
throwing pebbles into the ivy to bring out the birdies. You shall see
him; and we will make ourselves all of a company.”
Le Brocq was going to rebuke this familiarity, when Studley put his head
in, and respectfully told Durell that all was ready for him when he
pleased to come. Durell’s air was immediately as sober and business-like
as that of Studley.
“I believe,” said he, “you have not told your principal what I am here
for. Ay, you think he must know by instinct; but let me tell you that no
more is heard of the excise in Jersey than there is here of knit
small-clothes. Had he told you to expect me?” he inquired of Le Brocq.
“He said something yesterday about sending a notice to the excise; but I
do not rightly see what the excise has to do with my manufacture.”
“That you shall see presently. We have only to visit you once a day, and
to see your bottles come out of the furnace, and make you count and
weigh them, if we choose, and measure them across the neck, to see if
they are of the legal size, and——”
“What is all that to you?” cried Aaron, who had just entered.
“In order to determine the payment we are to take from you.”
“Payment! What payment? People are to pay us for our bottles, I suppose,
and not we them, or I see little use in making bottles. What payment can
you mean?”
“The excise duty,—the tax on home manufactures. In your case——”
“But we were told that the people in England paid no tax, except a mere
trifle that they give without knowing it. Father, did not you understand
that the English pay no tax?”
“That is a little mistake,” averred Durell. “Their paying without
knowing it is partly true. What you are going to pay me, for instance,
is not the same kind of contribution as you have paid out of your own
pocket in Jersey, when the States wanted to erect a new pier, or other
public building. You will repay yourselves by putting such a price on
your bottles as will defray the tax, besides yielding you a profit; and
the buyers of your bottles will not know the amount they pay for the tax
from that which buys the bottle. You advance the tax for them, that is
all.”
“But that is very hard,” observed Aaron. “Why are we to be obliged to
advance money for hundreds of people that we do not know or wish to
serve?”
“Oh! you must pay yourselves by charging interest upon this advance.
Studley will tell you that you clap on a little more still upon the
price, as interest upon your advance.”
“Well, I think that is hard upon our customers, I must say. I don’t call
it any favour to them to take their money in such a way, instead of
giving them a choice whether they will pay directly, or wait awhile and
pay the interest too.”
“The buyer of your bottles pays no more for interest than he gains in
time. There is no cheat in making him pay interest upon this kind of
loan, any more than upon other kinds of loans.”
“But there is a cheat in not letting him know how the matter stands, so
that he may have a choice. It is like putting physic between bread and
butter for a grown man, who had, perhaps, much rather swallow a pill of
his own accord.”
“Well; every man has the power of looking between his bread and butter.
Every buyer may know how much duty is paid upon any article he buys.”
“But he is not able to choose between the pill and the powder. If he
won’t take the powder as it is spread, he must go without both physic
and bread and butter.”
“And I am far from sure,” observed Le Brocq, “whether our customers be
not cheated, after all. I was frightened enough when I came, as Studley
knows, to find what wages we have to pay. I set down the concern as ruin
when the first Saturday night came; and I like the plan but little
better now I find that these high wages are paid, in the same manner as
the tax and the interest, out of the price of the article. I believe
that the high wages are owing to this very tax. I must think so, because
our workmen are not nearly so well off with their high wages as our
Jersey labourers with only half the sum.”
Mrs. Le Brocq wondered that English labourers used so many stone bottles
as to make all this difference. Her husband explained that the same tax
was laid on other articles, more used by labourers than stone bottles—on
soap, and beer, and spirits, and tea. Now, if the tax made the articles
on which the labourer subsists much more expensive than they would
otherwise be, the labourer’s wages must be much higher to buy the same
comforts than they would otherwise be; and the wages being high acts
again on the price of the article made by the labourer; and so the buyer
pays twice over, and everything is put out of its natural course.
Le Brocq heaved a deep sigh, which was echoed by his son. They had
calculated, from the price of their wares, compared with the expense of
production, that they should be abundantly rich in a year or two. They
had been startled by the amount of wages; and now, when they found that
the price of their bottles was also to cover the tax, and interest upon
its advance, their golden visions began to melt into the twilight of
doubt.
The first object now was to finish dinner, and go over the premises with
the exciseman, to see what his visit was like. Durell declined all
further hospitality on the present occasion, declaring, with a look of
gravity very unlike what he wore when Studley came in, that though he
had tasted a favourite old dish for once, to show his goodwill, it was
but for once. He always avoided occasion of misinterpretation in his
office, and should therefore desire his visits to be strictly confined
to business. Considering how frequent they must be, it was necessary to
come to an understanding from the beginning, especially with strangers
who might not be aware of the strictness of the rules by which excise
officers must be guided. He requested Mr. Le Brocq and all his family to
take notice that it would be better to offer no kind of favour to him or
his excise brethren, since none could be accepted.
“So we are to have the pleasure of seeing you often?” observed Le Brocq.
“You will see me often,—one or other of us every day; but I advise you
not to call this a pleasure. It can never be a pleasure; but you may
prevent its being a plague by letting us go and come, and by being
perfectly correct in your conduct——Ah! I perceive you are offended at
the word; but when you have lived here a few months longer, you will see
that I mean nothing more than a friendly caution. Finish your dinner;
and I will go with Studley, and learn what your people are doing.”
Aaron was on the point of saying once more, “What’s that to you?” but
his father desired him to dispatch his meal, and follow as soon as he
could, to take a lesson in excise visitations.
“You may wonder now that you have not seen us before,” observed Durell
to Le Brocq, as they passed into the manufactory; but your predecessor
was on very good terms with us; and, from his long connexion with us,
could be trusted to send for us on all proper occasions, so as to save
himself from a daily visitation; and the same favour was continued to
Studley till we found that the management had gone into other hands. You
cannot do better than follow his advice. He will inform you of all that
is necessary in your dealings with us. Ho! ho! what a brickmaking here
is! For how many thousand are you going to account to us, Studley?”
“Sir, we do not sell bricks,” protested Le Brocq.
“Nor tiles. But those tiles that are now burning in every one of your
furnaces would have paid tax a few months ago.”
“What! tiles that are used only for our ware to stand upon while it is
burning! Bless me! are all these charges to be paid by the article when
sold? Our bottles may well be called dear.”
“Though I fancy you take a little off the price of the bottles, and put
it upon the jars which are not taxed. Hey?”
Studley observed that this was a very fair way of defeating the
intentions of the glass-manufacturers, to whose jealousy it was owing
that stone bottles were taxed at all.
Le Brocq was quite out of humour at being threatened with a charge of
5_s._ 10_d._ a thousand for his bricks. Was he to be expected to buy
bricks to build that upper story, while he had the clay on his premises?
He might do which he pleased, he was told: he was to pay the duty either
way,—in the price of bought bricks, or into the exciseman’s hand.
“By the way,” observed Durell, “that new upper story is not entered. How
comes that?”
“We keep that for articles that are not exciseable,” answered Studley.
“You have no concern with that floor. There is not an exciseable article
in it.”
“Take care that there never is, then. You may find that your walls have
tongues, if you give them anything to tell. You know, friend,” turning
to Le Brocq, “that for each and every of premises not entered according
to law, there is a heavy penalty. If you did not know it before, you
know it now; and heaven help you to keep out of my hands! Ah! here are
your tiles!—pitiful things to pay tax upon, indeed. I am glad to leave
you to your own devices about that article.”
Studley looked very impatient while the visiter went on talking, and
turning over the burnt tiles. When Durell next entered a kiln that was
cooling, and looked round at the streaks of glazing that the salt had
left upon the sides, and afterwards descended to the place where the
clay was being milled, and watered, and trodden, and conversed with the
blind horse, and joked with the boys, the foreman thought it time to
speak out.
“Pray, sir, do you know how long we have been waiting for you? Do you
please that we should proceed without you?”
“By no means. Are you going to fill the kiln, or draw?”
“You seem to forget our notice, sir. We drew five hours ago; and your
officer weighed the wares in due form. They are standing now for you to
weigh; and if you keep us here to the end of the six hours, it will be
too late to pack them off by the present opportunity. Another half-hour
is our last chance this week. I told you so before, sir,” continued the
vexed foreman, following as Durell skipped up the stairs, taking two at
a time. “If I told you once, I told you thrice; but that stinking
hotch-potch put everything else out of your head, I think.”
“You will pack off the larger articles, I suppose, Studley,” observed Le
Brocq, “whether the bottles are ready or not? You will get off all but
the exciseable articles to-night?”
Studley explained that the bottles were to be packed in between the
larger articles, as in the kiln, thus saving carriage in the one case as
they saved fuel in the other. If the officers meant to grow very strict
just now, it might become necessary to have a separate kiln for burning,
and a separate package, rather than keep eleven twelfths of the
manufacture waiting for the rites to be performed on the exciseable
portion.
The weighing was more a matter of show than use; for Durell was anxious
not to prevent the departure of the goods. He even tried his hand at
packing, and was not out of humour when plainly told that they could do
better without him. Studley hinted that he might be more acceptable
among the ladies, who had probably something to tell him about Jersey
cows and orchards; but Durell took his stand near a boy who was
beginning the practice of his art. The exciseman crossed his arms, and
leaned against the wall while watching and commenting upon the progress
of the lad, in shaping his little pots upon the wheel.
“Very fair! very fair, lad! Round it,—with a delicate rounding,—and coax
it,—and bulge it,—and draw it narrow. ’Tis as if it made itself, or grew
with a touch of magic. Pshaw! you have brought it off awry. ’Tis but a
slovenly piece, after all. I should think myself a clever fellow, too,
if I could come as near the mark as that. You are a lucky one to have
that kind of work under your hands.”
The boy looked up with an intelligent smile. He had lately been promoted
from turning the lathe, and the sense of his new dignity shone in his
countenance as the gentleman looked on. The gentleman still
soliloquized.
“Young thoughtless things like you see no more in such occupation than
making so much clay into so many pots, for so much wages; and, perhaps,
the pride of being a skilled workman. But those that have spent their
first years in the fields, and have wandered about the world since, see
much blessing to you in having beauty before your eyes, and growing up
under your hands. ’Tis well for you that there is something to keep you
fresh in all the dust of this place, and all the glare and noise of the
street. The spirit of beauty that hung the cloud curtains of God’s
throne may look bright down upon you, even here. Blessings on her, and
Him that made her!”
The boy’s rising colour seemed to show that he heard and partly
understood, though he proceeded diligently with his work.
“Did you ever go into the country, lad?” inquired Durell. “Did you ever
see a green field?”
“Not he, I’ll be bound,” answered the little boy at the neighbouring
lathe, who became impatient to be noticed. “My father took me to
Tottenham once, and I had some ale; but _his_ mother never lets him go
anywhere.”
“She does,” asserted Brennan, turning red again. “She lets me stay out
on the wharf till bed-time; and when I got a new coat given me, she went
all the way into the Park with me, one Sunday afternoon.”
“You saw some green grass, there?”
“Yes, Sir, and the swans.”
“And plenty of ducks?”
“I did not care so much about them,—just like soda-water bottles with
wings, when they are flying. But I made a swan, sir, when I came back.”
“What do you do out on the wharf till bed-time?”
“Look at the boats passing under the bridge, sir. And there are heaps of
things that look better as it grows dark.”
“What sort of things?”
“Baskets of things on the wharf, heaped up; and barrows and packages——”
The boy at the lathe interrupted his companion by laying an information
against him. There was not such a thing as a bit of slate ever found
upon the wharf that was not covered over with Brennan’s drawings of
barrows, and boats, and baskets, and sometimes Mr. Studley’s greyhound.
“I made a greyhound,” observed Brennan, looking up; “and when it was
baked, Mr. Studley knew it for his own.”
“When shall you have a new coat again?” asked Durell. “Confound the
question! just as if we could not get you a coat among us! You shall go
to a place, Brennan,—I will take you to a place where you will see
something prettier than that pitcher you seem to be admiring so much;—
something that I think you will like better than green fields.”
“On a Sunday, sir?”
“No; I believe not. Studley! The British Museum is not open on a Sunday,
is it?—No, boy; it must be some other day.”
“But I can’t go any other day,” said the boy mournfully,
“O yes; cursed be he that shuts out such as you from feeding your
genius,—from adoring God in using his gifts”
“Perhaps you would ask for a part holiday, sir?” suggested the boy.
“Will I? Ay——” But Durell remembered that he was an exciseman, and must
not ask favours. In a cooler tone, he promised the boy to remember him;
and desired that the greyhound and the swan might be ready for
exhibition the next time he came. He left the boy happy in devising an
opportunity for asking some of the wise men about the pottery what the
British Museum was. The information gleaned in the course of a week did
not give him any clear comprehension of what he should see that he
should like better than green fields. “There’s a monster of a wild beast
on the stair, as I’ve heard,” said one. “There’s a power of stones, laid
out in rows, as my own eyes saw,” attested another. “Gold and precious
stones! Lord bless ye! nothing like it. Only what you may pick up in the
road any day.” “You forget the skin of the head with the hair on it,”
observed another. “A wild man’s hair and the skin of his head.” The boy
could not conceive how any of these things could be prettier than swan
or greyhound. He could only wonder whether the gentleman was in earnest
about giving him a new coat, and would remember to take him to that odd
place.
The ware was precisely in time for the waggon. It was as near missing as
possible; and while Le Brocq wiped his brows after his toil and hurry,
he looked reproachfully at Durell. He found that no farming labours were
so fatiguing as waiting the pleasure of an exciseman, in the heat and
dust of a pottery.
“You look at me,” observed Durell. “You wish me a hundred miles off, I
see: but I can’t help the system; and I tell you, you are better off
than many of your neighbours. Only one-twelfth of your manufacture is
exciseable, and——”
“That is the very thing I complain of,” said Le Brocq. “To be worried
and watched for such a little matter!”
“I think it our business to complain of that,” replied Durell. “There is
some satisfaction in one’s supervision when one collects enough to make
it worth while—a hundred pounds or two. But it makes us feel like so
many fools to be trudging here, and riding there, to collect less than
would mend our shoes or feed our horses. In your business, there are but
nine men that pay more than a hundred a-year in duty; and of that, they
get back a third part when they export.”
“No more than nine?”
“In all England; and seven pay less than 1_l._ a-year. Here are we bound
to visit their potteries every day, and as much oftener as they choose
to call us, to collect fifteen-pence, or seven shillings and sixpence,
or a guinea a-year! ’Tis a farce.”
“I should think these people would pay three times the sum to have you
keep off their premises, every day of the year; and that would save your
salary;—for I suppose you have one.”
“To be sure; and hundreds more of us. How would you have the whole
kingdom watched,—every maker of glass, and soap, and beer, of bricks,
and paper, and starch, and spirits,—every grower of hops,—every maltster
and seller of tea and sweet wines and hides,—how would you have all
these people watched and made to pay their fines and forfeitures,
without an army of excisemen? and who will be an exciseman without pay?
You may talk of the church,(heaven preserve it!) but I know one thing
like it. The church has its hierarchy,—its gradation from the archbishop
to the curate, all salaried. The excise has its hierarchy, too,—from the
gentlemen that sit as judges in the court, with their messengers always
in waiting, down to the poor devils that are for ever tramping in the
outrides and footwalks.”
Le Brocq would not hear another word in the way of comparison of a
hierarchy which existed for the purpose of supplying the people with
religious aids, and one which levied a most vexatious tax. Durell could
not refrain from going on to magnify the body to which he belonged. He
told of the fifty-six collections into which England and Wales are
divided; and the subdivision of these into districts, each with its
supervisor; and the further division into outrides and footwalks, with a
gauger or surveyor in each;—as elaborate a spy-system, at the utmost
possible cost, as had ever been invented, his Jersey friend thought.
“By no means,” protested Durell. “The Customs beat us in expense, in
more ways than one. In one respect only, the difference is more than
180,000_l._ We excisemen can live in houses that were built for other
people: but the coast-guard must have cottages for themselves alone; and
this 180,000_l._ is what they cost. And then, if we have excise duties
that yield less than any customs, they have a vast number more that
yield but little. When 566 articles pay customs duties, and 510 of them
yield under 10,000_l._ a-year, the expense must be greater in proportion
to the gain than in any folly that the excise can practise.”
“They are not quite foolish enough yet, I suppose, to interfere with an
entire branch of trade, for the sake of raising a few shillings or
pounds here and there?”
“The two are pretty much on a par there. If we plague all the
stone-bottle makers in England for the sake of little more than 3000_l._
a-year, our brethren of the Customs pry into all the cordage that comes
into the kingdom for the sake of less than 150_l._”
Aaron could speak to the annoyance of having his cordage taxed at the
custom-house on the south coast, when he had two or three times wished
to sell in England such produce of his rope-walk as was not wanted in
Jersey. Yet, as a Channel Island man, he had been treated leniently;
being charged no more duty than would countervail what the English had
paid in tax before they could bring their article into the market.
“Well; I am gone,” said Durell. “I only stayed to show you Jerseymen
that we are not quite the worst set of tax-gatherers in the world. If
you are willing to be on good terms, so are we: but I must tell you, Mr.
Aaron, that it is not every man of our tribe that would bear to be
scowled at, as you have scowled at me to-day; nor could I always bear it
myself: for I do not boast of my temper. If you will consider your
interest——”
“What’s that to you?”
“Very true: so good bye till to-morrow. If you should want me sooner, it
may give you the least trouble to send to Finch’s glass-house, near at
hand. I am going there now; and one or other of us will be on the
premises till night. I wish you joy of that lad Brennan. If you make the
most of him, you may find yourselves in luck. Good day.”
CHAPTER IV.
THE PHENOMENON AGAIN.
Mrs. Durell was the only acquaintance Anna wished to have in the
neighbourhood of her new home. From what Durell had dropped about her,
and from her being a native of Jersey, it seemed desirable that the
women of Le Brocq’s family should know her. They gave broad hints to
this effect; and Durell frequently promised that his wife should come
and offer neighbourly assistance to the strangers: but she never came.
This neglect could not appear wonderful to any one who knew the parties.
Durell projected more achievements for his wife than she could have
executed if he had himself imposed no toils and cares upon her: and,
besides, she had long learned to distrust his opinions of new people,
and to dread his introductions to strangers; and for his sake as much as
her own, she deferred to the last moment the forming of any new
connexions, even of common acquaintanceship. She never reminded him,
otherwise than by distant allusion, of the delightful family whom he had
bidden her receive as friends, not thinking of doubting their honour
because some mystery hung about them,—the family of dear friends who
were afterwards all hanged or transported for coining. She never spoke
of the runaway apprentice who had been housed by them that he might have
the advantage of a fair trial on the stage, and who disappeared with his
host’s best suit of clothes, with which to figure on some other stage.
She allowed her husband to forget the scrape she had been brought into
when taken up as a receiver of stolen goods, because she had been daily
seen in company with the gipsies in whose society he delighted. She did
not trouble him by a recurrence to past misfortunes; but she naturally
grew more and more careful to avoid any future ones. On the present
occasion, she held back, partly with the desire that something should be
ascertained respecting the character of the Le Brocqs before she
involved herself with them, and partly that her husband’s quarter’s
salary might be in the purse before she was called upon to exercise
hospitality. As often as Durell extolled Anna as the sweetest and
softest of maidens, with a cheek which shamed the report that the lasses
of a Jersey farm-house blush yellow, and an eye whose timid glance never
fell before another, the wife assured herself that she should only see
one more of the multitude of divinities who had caught her husband’s
fancy without impairing his constancy to her. As often as he told her
what she lost in not witnessing the initiation of Le Brocq and his
partner into life in Lambeth, she felt that she could wait for the
spectacle of their peculiarities till she wanted that variety at home
which her husband’s caprices incessantly provided for her.
She was glad that his employment took him abroad during the early part
of the day, that he might escape witnessing the toils which he imposed
upon her. One morning, for instance, when she had evaded his question
whether she would go that day to see Mrs. Le Brocq and the blessed Anna,
she had to assist her maid in baking an extempore batch of bread,
because one hearty person after another had been invited in, the night
before, who had eaten up warm all that had just come out of the oven. An
array of glasses, with remains of spirit and water, stood to be rinsed
and put away. His coat lay craving mending in the flap, which had been
almost torn off by the snappish dog, brought home because he thought it
had lost itself. A beautiful piece of French china was to be put
together again, if possible, the child having broken it after warnings
duly repeated. Nobody could be more sorry for the disaster than Durell
himself. He seemed ready to weep over his mother’s favourite bowl; but
he really did not suppose the child would have let it down, and he had
not the heart to take away any beautiful thing from before its eyes. It
might please Heaven some day to take away the child’s eyesight, and then
who would think of the china being broken, while in the sufferer’s mind
it remained entire, an additional form of grace. It was impossible to
dispute this reasoning while such a sufferer sat in the chimney-corner;
and the bowl was carefully laid aside to be mended.
“Mother,” said Mary, “do let me take my work into the parlour. I can
stitch and wait upon Stephen too.”
“Stay where you are, my dear. Jack can wait upon Stephen. If you finish
your wrist-band in half an hour, you shall help to mend the bowl.”
Mary knew there was no use in repeating her request. She could only sigh
when she heard Jack’s bursts of laughter at Stephen’s droll faces, and
wish that Stephen would come into the kitchen, and make faces there.
When Stephen began to sing, all went well; for he could be heard, not
only in the kitchen, but across the street. Some time after the song had
come to an end, when two inches of stitching still remained to be done,
Mary heard a tinkling among the unwashed glasses, and looked up.
“O, mother,” cried she, “there’s Jack draining the glasses!”
The little fellow explained that it was in behalf of Stephen, who had
asked for these remains of spirit and water, because he was dry with
singing. Mrs. Durell shook the flour from her hands, filled a fresh
glass of spirit and water, and carried it herself to Stephen, requesting
him to be so kind as not to offer a drop to the child. If he would call
when he had done his glass, Jack should return to wait upon him. She
meantime encouraged the boy to talk to her, in order to prevent his
stealing back to Stephen before he was called. Jack was already as like
his father as an infant can be to a grown man; and it was undesirable to
give him any pleasant associations with a dram. Jack began with his
usual question,
“Why can’t Stephen see?”
He had been told by the maid that it was because Stephen had no eyes;
and he wanted to see whether this would be the reply now given. His
mother told him that Stephen’s eyes were not like other people’s. Jack
was now baffled. He had prepared his answer,—that Stephen had two eyes,
for he had walked round Stephen and counted his eyes.
“But,” said he, “if his eyes are not like ours, how did he see Betty
just going to let down the milk?”
“He never did, my dear. He never sees anything.”
“O, but he did: for he pulled away his coat tail, for fear the milk
should fall upon it. Besides, he has two eyes, for I saw them myself.”
Whether Stephen’s ears were as serviceable as his eyes were the
contrary, may be left to conjecture: but, before Mrs. Durell could
question the child as to what he meant about the milk, Stephen was
groping his way into the kitchen, and jokingly asking whether he could
not assist in the baking. He had kneaded bread in his day, he said, and
no one was more fond of the steams of the oven. He and Jack were
presently busy with blind-man’s-buff, while Mary made a finish to her
wrist-band with terrible long stitches, in order to put away everything
that might be knocked down, and join in the sport, till mother should be
ready to mend the china.
While she stood breathless to see what would become of Jack, now penned
in a corner, stifling his screams and stamping, as Stephen’s broad hands
seemed descending on his head, a tap at the door was heard, and Mary was
desired to open it. As Anna stepped in, with a gentle inquiry whether
she might speak with Mrs. Durell, Jack had an unexpected escape. Stephen
relinquished his search in the corner, and slipped cleverly into the
back parlour to search for his victim, though the child shouted,
“I am not there, Stephen: indeed I am not there. I am here.”
Mary pushed the noisy child into the parlour, and shut the door, that
her mother might be able to hear what the visitor had to say.
“I hope you will not take it amiss that I came, Mrs. Durell; but Mr.
Durell told us we might ask you anything we wanted, as strangers, to
know. Our name is Le Brocq.”
“A name I know very well, through my husband. Pray sit down, and tell me
if I can be of any service to you. Mary, set a chair.”
“Mr. Durell said you would come, or I should have come before,” observed
Anna. “He thinks as we do, that God makes men love their country that
they may help one another when they chance to be far away from it. That
is,—I don’t know that we can help you; but you may like to talk about
Jersey sometimes.”
“O, yes. We are very fond of thinking of Jersey. But can I assist you?
As new-comers, you may want to be put in the way of something.”
“Why, we do; and my mother thought you would tell us where you buy your
tea. We are sure they cheat us as new-comers, and I don’t know what we
shall do if it goes on.”
“You do not expect to get fine tea at half-a-crown a pound, I suppose,
as you did at St. Heliers.”
“We did not know—I don’t exactly see—Nobody told us there would be such
a difference.”
“The difference there always is where the king lays on taxes.”
“O, yes: but the taxes are such a mere nothing, we are told! And there
is such a difference between half-a-crown and seven shillings! The king
can never spend all that difference on all the tea that is sold;
especially as they say the Company get as much as they wish, selling it
at half-a-crown in Jersey and Guernsey.”
“The Company has not to keep excisemen in the neighbourhood of every
tea-shop, to take stock, and weigh the tea, and measure the canisters;
and to see that prosecutions are set on foot when the excise laws are
broken. All this cannot be done without money; and so the king does not
get all the difference we have to pay.”
“So you pay seven shillings a pound for tea?”
“We did; but now we find we must be content with a lower-priced tea. We
pay 5_s._ 6_d._, and we don’t take it three times a day, or make it so
good as we did in Jersey.”
“Ah! but my mother has no idea of any change from what we used to do at
home; and my father says we shall be ruined presently, if we go on
paying away money as we do now. Till we came here, we had seldom
anything to pay for but tea and sugar, and the tax; but now we have to
buy almost everything; and we get quite frightened. The tea cannot be
done without, on my mother’s account: but I must see whether I cannot
manage to make some things at home that we now pay high for.”
“That will hardly help you much; for if you happen to miss the tax on
the manufacture, you will have to pay the tax on the materials. In this
country, you can scarcely use anything that is not taxed either in the
material or in the making; and there is the difference between this
place and Jersey. But, to set against this, what you sell is dearer, as
well as what you buy.”
“But not in a way that profits us, my father says. If he reckoned only
the clay, brought from Devonshire, and the mill, and the wheel and
lathe, and the furnaces, and the salt, these would not cost enough to
prevent the ware from being very cheap. But the coals pay tax, and the
bricks pay tax, as well as the ware itself; and, especially, the men’s
wages are high, because all that those wages buy is taxed: and my father
has to pay all these taxes, and wait so long before he is paid again,
that it requires a great deal of money to carry on his business, just at
the time that we have to spend more for our living than we ever did
before.”
“Ah! my dear, you have not yet got used to the ways of living in
England. You never knew in Jersey, nor we either, what it was to fall
short of money, though there was never much more than enough for present
small purposes. Here it is the custom to receive larger sums, and to pay
away largely also: so that it requires very close calculation to avoid
being out of cash sometimes.”
“You find it so!” cried Anna, in a delighted tone. “Now, let me mend
that china bowl for you, while you tell me all about it.”
Mary put in her claim to be allowed to help; and while she worked the
cement, and Anna nicely joined in bit after bit of the fragments, Mrs.
Durell explained that she did not mean to say but that her husband was
very properly paid; but that in a country whose custom is to charge the
prices of commodities with a variety of taxes, the prices are not only
high, but high in different proportions; and the charges get so
complicated that people cannot at all tell how their money goes, and can
with difficulty frame their calculations of expense when they come from
a country where they have been accustomed to pay their contribution
direct to the state. The only certainty is, that the articles they most
need will bear the heaviest tax charge; because, in its choice of
taxable articles, government naturally fixes on those which must be most
extensively bought. And, as she shaped her loaf, she told how much
bread, yielding duty, had been consumed within those walls since
yesterday morning. Her husband had told her of a cruel method of
taxation in Holland, in old times, when so much was paid to government
for every loaf that passed the mouth of the oven. Disagreeable as this
method must be, she doubted whether it could be so costly as the
management by which the price of bread was raised in this country.
“Ah! I see you look surprised at the quantity of bread we bake: but my
husband likes to be hospitable.”
“Such a man must like it,” replied Anna.
“What kind of man do you mean?” asked the wife, smiling.
“Men that give their best attention to what is of most consequence,
instead of least. Mr. Durell looks very grave and attentive when he is
talking to Mr. Studley, and counting the pots that come out of the kiln;
but his mind is given to very different things from those. If Mr. Durell
had but the shoes on his feet in all the world, he would give them to
the first lame beggar he met, and go barefoot.”
“He would. You know him,” replied the wife. “He does as he would be done
by.”
“He would leave the gleanings of the field, and the missed olives, for
the widow, and the fatherless, and the stranger, if he lived in the
Scripture land,” continued Anna; “and the reason why is, because he had
rather see people happy than grow rich himself.”
“You should hear him when he speaks the piece of poetry that he loves
above all others, though he knows a vast deal. It is about mercy that
‘blesses him that gives and him that takes.’”
“That is Scripture,” replied Anna, gravely. ‘And how the Lord Jesus said
that it is more blessed to give than to receive.’”
“The one comes of the other, no doubt; but it is in poetry that he tells
it to me. He has mercy for ever on his tongue. It is a sort of rule of
his, in judging of other people. But people are very apt to say that
justice and mercy do not agree.”
“How can they think of God, then?” asked Anna. “But if such a man as Mr.
Durell is not always as just as he should be, it may be owing to
something else than his being merciful.”
“How do you mean ‘not just?’” inquired the wife, rather coldly.
“I am sure we have no reason to think him otherwise than just in the
business he has to do in the pottery,” replied Anna. “He is very strict
and honourable to the king; and when he seems hard on my father, we know
it is not his fault. But he speaks a little unfairly of people
sometimes——”
“Only when they do mean things.”
“Well: but still harshly; and if he puts more upon you than is quite
your share, and gives away money, now, don’t pretend to think such
things right——it may be owing to his having been badly taught, or more
sorely tempted than we are, and not to his tender heart.”
“I would not hear so much from another,” said Mrs. Durell; “but you mean
no pain to me, nor slight to him, I see. And so I will say that I am so
much of your mind, that I do not grudge baking bread even for those that
eat it only for the sake of the spirit that is to wash it down; and as
to the money we owe, God knows how vexed I am when I cannot pay it
without putting my husband in mind of it. There is a poor creature with
us now——”
“Here’s papa,” cried Mary.
Durell entered, looking not quite so full of mercy as Anna had sometimes
seen him. He asked his wife sternly, why she had allowed a stranger to
come and ask as a favour that which she ought to have offered?
“Well, John, I am sorry. I can truly say it. I am sorry I missed knowing
this young woman till now.”
Anna interposed with a piece of information that she had lately gained,—
that it was dangerous to make new acquaintances in London, without a
very precise knowledge who people were; and how should Mrs. Durell know
who they were?
“What more has she learned of that since breakfast?” inquired Durell.
Anna looked bashful while she acknowledged that Mrs. Durell had yet had
no further testimony than her own word for her respectability.
“But she has,” replied Durell. “The impress of truth upon the brow—God’s
own seal. She might have trusted me for knowing it at sight.”
“It having never deceived you, John,—do you mean to say? Ah! you are
going to protest that you knew all the time when people were cheating
you. I ask no more than that you should let me see for myself when there
is truth sealed upon the brow. I will not be so long in looking for it,
next time.”
“Mr. Durell,” said Anna, “Aaron has been with you this morning; did
he——”
“I beg your pardon. Your brother has not been with me this morning.”
“I heard him directed to go, and to give you notice of something. I was
going to ask whether he told you that Brennan is to be let off his work,
as you wished, for some reason,—I don’t know what. He said something
about it to Mr. Studley,—that you were going to get some new clothes for
him.”
“Did I promise that? O, I remember. The lad’s a genius, my dear,” (to
his wife,) “and we must find up a suit of clothes for him, in some way;
and then——”
Mrs. Durell shrugged her shoulders, while Anna explained that after the
clothes should come the holiday.
“I thank you much. I thank your father as for a favour done to myself,”
replied Durell. “My very best thanks to your father.——Jack, my boy,
what’s the matter now?” cried he, snatching up the child, who was
whimpering, and only wanted encouragement to burst into a loud cry.
“Stephen won’t let me go with him. Stephen is getting out of the window,
and he won’t lift me out that I may lead him.”
True enough; Stephen was found stepping out of the low parlour window
into the street.
“Poor fellow! what fancy has taken him now?” said Durell, running into
the parlour, followed by every body from the kitchen. “He is a singular
character,” he proceeded to explain to Anna. “It has pleased the
Almighty to lay a heavy hand upon him, and to permit us to lighten the
burden. I always held that this outward darkening of the man was like
the shrouding of the firmament in midnight,—making all that moves in it
the brighter and clearer; and, since I have known this man, I am sure of
it.”
“He is not blind,” said Anna, quietly. “We know him well; we have too
good reason to know him. He carried off half our stock of linen.”
“You are mistaken,” averred Durell, with sparkling eyes. “He has been
living in our house,—never out of our sight, ever since you came to
London.”
Anna explained that she referred to a time before her family left
Jersey. Mrs. Durell looked at her husband, as if appealing to him
whether Stephen had not proved himself familiar with Jersey.
“Damn your suspicious glances!” cried Durell. “You give glances that you
know the poor fellow can’t see, because you are afraid to speak your
thought in words that he can hear. Curse your cold-hearted way of giving
ear to every slander you hear!”
“Do not say slander,” replied Anna. “I charge Stephen before his face.
Let him say how he left our farm. Could a blind man, seen to his rest at
night, find his way through the kitchen and out at the door of a strange
house, and through the yard, and past the orchard down to the brook, and
over the narrow foot-bridge, before he could even get to the winding
lane, and then——”
“Stuff! All nothing to do with it!” cried Durell. “It was another man.”
“Even my Jack found out that Stephen could see,” interposed Mrs. Durell.
“Shame on you! Shame to oppress an afflicted man on the word—the fancy
of a child that has a fancy for marvels!” cried Durell. “God forgive me
for such a scandal happening in my house! As if it was not enough that
God’s blessed light is taken away, so that the afflicted cannot know his
country by its lying green in the midst of the blue waters,—as if it was
not enough that he must return daily thanks for daily bread to strangers
that bestow charity, instead of to God that rewards toil,—but he must be
insulted before those from whom he has his all! Have done with your sly
looks, and your hinting that he is not blind! Bring me a dumb man that
shall swear a perjured oath, and a deaf one that shall leer at a foul
song, and I will believe that this sightless creature is he that robbed
you. Then I will turn him out; but till then I will protect him. Sit
down, Stephen.”
“I must go,” said Anna. “I say nothing now, Mr. Durell, about protection
being every body’s right; and, as to insult——”
The tears sprang to her eyes, and she found it best to hasten away. She
did not think she could stand another fiery glance from Durell, or bear
to look again at Stephen, as he stood, the personification of resigned
meekness.
“You will come again,” said Mrs. Durell, anxiously, as she followed Anna
to the door.
“I don’t know, indeed. Mr. Durell would make one think one’s self wrong,
in spite of every thing. He means only to be generous. He almost
frightens me, lest I should have made a great mistake. I am sure, in
that case, I could not do enough to make up for it. But, if ever I was
certain, it is now.”
“There is no mistake, my dear, depend upon it. I have been suspecting,
for some time, that Stephen is not so blind as he seems. Do not fret
yourself about anything my husband said: but I am very sorry——the first
time of your coming——”
“O, don’t be sorry. If it had been you, I should have minded it much
more. Do you know, Mrs. Durell, I often wonder what would become of us
all, if women quarrelled as men do.——Well; I know it is said that
women’s quarrels are very sharp; it may be so, though I have never been
in the way of seeing any: but there is something so deep and awful in
men’s quarrels, that I can hardly fancy their being heartily made up
again.”
Mrs. Durell looked as if waiting for a further explanation; but Anna
caught another glimpse of Durell, and was gone.
CHAPTER V.
AN ECONOMICAL PROJECT.
Anna spoke from strong feeling when she reported ill of men’s tempers.
In her own family the maternal despotism had been very quietly borne;
and the paternal rule, however strict, could not materially interfere
with the objects and pleasures of the young women in a retired
farm-house. But Aaron had never been quiet in the yoke; and Malet
sometimes forgot the policy of the lover in resenting the dictation of
the father of his beloved. Since the removal of the family to London,
there had been frequent contests between Le Brocq and Aaron, each of
which was more bitter and more useless than the last. It was as absurd
in Le Brocq to treat his son as a child, as it was in Aaron to conclude
that every order given him by his father must be more or less wrong. The
effect of the mutual folly was to throw Aaron into league with Studley,—
a league which began when Studley smiled at Le Brocq’s instructions to
his son on matters which neither of them understood; and which was
strengthened in proportion as Le Brocq became discontented with
Studley’s assumption of authority in the establishment where he was only
foreman, after all. The proprietor was now frequently heard to say that
he had no power over his own workmen, and that his foreman and his son
carried every thing their own way; while Aaron had so far advanced in
his progress to independence as to refuse to answer every question
because it was a question, and to consult Studley before he acted on any
suggestion whatever. There was, in consequence, so much constraint in
every meeting of the household, such grave silence or painful bickerings
at every meal, that it began to be a doubt in the mind of each member of
the family, whether it would not be better for the father and son to
separate at once than to go on in the high-road to an irreconcilable
quarrel.
On returning home, Anna walked straight through the yard into the
manufactory, hoping that the emergency of the occasion would be a
sufficient excuse with her father for the intrusion. She gave
unintentional notice of her approach by jingling a pile of ware as she
passed.
“Here they come,” said one and another within hearing, as she advanced
to the kiln where some knocking was going on, and three or four persons
seemed to be busy. A man, who was holding a candle stuck in a lump of
clay, observed hoarsely, “Here they come.” “Here they come,” repeated
the treble voice of the boy who was receiving the blocks of baked clay
which had filled up the arch. “Are they coming?” asked the mounted man
who was removing the blocks, and letting out the hot air of the kiln.
“Let them come, if they can’t let us alone for once,” growled Le Brocq,
who was satisfying his sight with the piles of spirit casks ranged one
above another in the kiln, with each its four rims of brown ochre, while
jars and bottles were nicely packed in the spaces between, no one
touching another, but with scarcely room for a hand to pass.
“Back! back! Go in!” exclaimed Le Brocq, when he saw Anna’s timid face,
instead of meeting the bright brown eye of Durell. “This is no place for
you. You know I desired——”
“But, father, I have something very particular to say. I have seen
Stephen.—No, I have not got back our linen. I am afraid we shall never
get it back. Perhaps if you spoke to Mr. Durell——”
“I will—I will: when he comes this afternoon. Go in, child. Go!”
“But I rather think Mr. Durell is not coming this afternoon. He says he
has not seen Aaron, nor heard from him.”
“Not seen Aaron! Not had the notice! Bless my soul! what are we ever to
do at this rate? No more of him!” suspecting that Anna was going to say
something for her absent brother. “He shall know my mind when I see him.
Booth, do you think we may go on?”
Booth considered that it would be a vexatious thing to be informed
against for such a trifle. It was an ugly thing, too, to run the risk of
the penalty. He stood with the bar in his hand, ringing it against the
bricks.
“You can bear witness that I did all I could, by sending my son with a
notice,” observed Le Brocq. “I dare say we shall find it is some mistake
of Anna’s. It is too late now to defer the drawing.”
“As you please, sir: not that I can exactly say I witnessed Mr. Aaron’s
being sent with the notice; but I dare say it will be all safe enough,
sir. Shall I go on?”
“You could not draw all the large, and leave the duty-paid, could you?
No, no; I see that would not do. You may go on.”
Studley came up while the hot ware was being quickly handed from man to
boy, and from boy to the ground where it must stand to cool.
“So! No spies to-day! We are in luck. I thought Durell would oblige me
so far as to consider you, as I made a point of requesting that he
would. I congratulate you on having your premises to yourself, sir, for
once. I shall take care and thank Durell.”
“Speak for yourself, if you please, sir, but not for me. I am quite
capable of thanking any person that I feel obliged to.”
Studley made a ceremonious bow; and immediately asked Booth whether, in
his old master’s time, it had ever been allowed to place the ware for
cooling in such a manner as he now beheld.
“Why, no,” replied Booth; “but such are my orders.”
“Do you mean to talk to my men about their old master before my face?”
asked Le Brocq.
“A rather superfluous question, sir, if you heard what I said.”
“O, father!” interposed Anna, breathlessly. “How I wish you would take
us back to Jersey, and let Malet and Louise come here. My mother is
always talking about the cows, and——”
“And you want to be milking them again, child? Go away. Go to your
mother. Nobody can leave me to my own business, I think.”
“If you think so, sir,” said Studley, “perhaps we had better part.”
“With all my heart, Mr. Studley. I should not have made the proposal
first, as you are an old servant of my uncle’s; but since you offer it,
I am quite willing; and the sooner the better, if I may declare my
opinion.”
The work-people within hearing had all suspended their business to
listen to this amiable dialogue; and the having an audience determined
Studley to finish with dignity. He thought it a pity that Mr. Le Brocq
had not been more explicit. He would have conferred an obligation by
being so; for an office of high honour and profit had been within reach
of his humble servant for some little time past, which he should
certainly have accepted but for the promise he had given his old master
not to refuse his best services to the new proprietor,—with a sort of
understanding, moreover, that some acknowledgment in the form of some
kind of partnership would follow.
Out of the question entirely, Le Brocq declared. While he had a son and
a son-in-law——
Beside the question entirely, Studley averred. The son-in-law being in
charge of the Jersey farm (unlike all other farms, if the family report
were true), and the son being in course of establishing himself in a
distinct line of business, there could be no competitor;—not that he now
desired a partnership. He would not accept the largest share that the
nature of his services could be supposed to authorise; the office he
spoke of being, to a man of ambition like himself, so far preferable. He
would take leave to commence his canvas immediately; explaining to all
his friends (meaning no offence) the reasons of his appearing so tardily
in the field.
A pang shot through the heart of Le Brocq at the intimation that his son
was about to leave him. He made no inquiry, and had the resolution to
avoid showing that the intelligence was new to him. While he commanded
every man to resume his employment, Studley stalked out of the
manufactory by one door, while Anna stole back by the way she had come.
In the yard she met Aaron. Her immediate object was to prevent his
meeting his father at present. She wanted to know whether he had
delivered the notice a sufficient number of hours before. No: he had had
something else to do first. He meant to go presently. When told that it
was too late, he supposed that it would not signify, but did not see why
there should have been such a prodigious hurry about drawing the kiln.
He was sure Studley could not have authorised it.
Anna had so much to ask and to tell that she wished Aaron would now go
with her, as he had promised, on an expedition which must not be much
longer delayed. It was time to be thinking about a washing of clothes;
there having been none since the unfortunate one which Stephen had
turned into an occasion of disaster. Anna and her mother knew nothing
yet of English society which could lead them to suppose that there was
anything peculiar in their methods touching the purification of their
apparel; but as their stock had been somewhat circumscribed since the
trespass of the thief, Anna began to think of arranging the
circumstances of time and place; and in a few minutes, when she had
accounted to her mother for her proceedings, her brother and she were on
their way in search of a clear stream where the operation might be
conducted after the only method she had yet heard or conceived of.
It seemed a pity to wander so far from home, when a prodigious river was
running near the back door: but Anna had watched the Thames, through all
its moods, for a fortnight, and had never found it sufficiently pure for
her purpose. Besides, there were so many people always about that she
should not have courage to sing at the pitch which was necessary to
insure good washing. Her having seen no washing in the river since she
came was a strong presumption that the Thames did not afford the proper
bath. It must be some pure brook between two green hills, with alder
bushes on which to hang the linen to dry, and some quiet nook where it
might be deposited for a night or two in safety. Such a brook were the
brother and sister now in search of, on a hot day in June, when alders
and green banks would be peculiarly refreshing. They were prepared for
having some way to go, which was very well. They were in no hurry, and
promised each other not to return till they had accomplished their
object. They little knew what they promised; for, though they were cured
of the fancy of myrtles before the house and an orchard behind, they had
no doubt whatever that “country” meant hill and dale, wood and stream.
When they arrived at Kennington Common, they stood and laughed at the
entire absence of trees, quite as much as from the pleasure of seeing an
expanse of green once more. While panting with heat, they wondered that
the Kennington people did not prefer high banks with overhanging hedges
to white palings which fatigued the eye under a summer sun. The stream
which flanks the Brixton road was the first thing they saw which could
at all answer their purpose; and this was decided to be too public. On
they wandered, tempted by the sight of rising ground, to some lanes near
Herne Hill and Dulwich; and in these lanes, and the fields which
bordered them, Anna found something at last which nearly satisfied her
heart. There was a carpet of daisies under foot; and wild roses, some
blushing and unfolding, others flaring and bleached in the sun, bloomed
in the hedges. There were no sleek Jersey cows, with their delicate
taper horns and countenances more refined than ever cows had before; and
Anna was disappointed as often as she unconsciously looked for the blue
sea through a gap in the hedge: but the smell of hay came from some
place near, and a thorn which stood in a damp nook had still blossom
enough to remind her of an apple tree. This thorn suggested a happy
thought; and Anna was glad to perceive, on looking round her, that
thorns were abundant in the neighbouring field. She had heard something
of thorn leaves being dried to mix with tea. The most terrifying of the
many fearful household expenses of the Le Brocqs was tea; and it would
be a great relief to lessen it one-half by mixing a large proportion of
English tea with the foreign.
“And there is the kiln to dry it in,” suggested Aaron. “The frying-pan
full can be dried in no time; and I will look to the shaking the pan, if
my father does not like that you should have anything to do with the
kiln.”
“And if we find it really good tea, I may perhaps mix some for sale, and
get enough profit to find us in tea. I am sure that would please my
father; and my mother might drink as much as she likes.”
Anna lost no time in spreading her shawl on the ground, and plucking
leaves from the lower boughs, while her brother climbed somewhat higher,
and chose the most juicy sprouts from the youngest shoots. They agreed
that some good might arise out of the extravagantly high prices which
prevailed in England. In Jersey, where they paid for tea only one-third
what was charged in London, they should never have thought of making use
of the leaves of the thorn; and they supposed that, as they had been
made inventive in this one particular, the people of England might be
generally ingenious in a similar manner.
Several persons passed through the field before the green heap on the
shawl had grown very large. A woman with a basket on her arm and a
little boy at her heels looked back again and again, all the way to the
stile, and then had to return to fetch away her child, who stood
staring, as if longing to help.
“You have a basket, I see,” said Anna, smiling. “If you like to carry
away any leaves, pray help yourself.”
“What may they be for?”
“To mix with tea. Tea is so very dear now! I suppose you drink tea?”
“O, yes, ma’am, we take tea,” said the woman: but, instead of filling
her basket, she shook a handful of leaves from her child’s grasp, and,
disregarding his roaring, took him up on one arm, and her basket on the
other, and carried him till he was fairly past the stile.
Presently came two men, bustling along, as if it had been the coldest
day in January. They halted, however, near the bush.
“I say,” cried one of them, after a whisper from his companion; “what
are ye arter there?”
From out of the bush, Aaron made the same answer that his sister had
before given.
“Smash me! if that baint a good ’un!” cried he, looking at his
companion; and all the way as they proceeded, they were evidently
talking of what they had seen.
Next approached a stooping old labourer, in a smock-frock, and with a
scythe over his shoulder. He walked painfully, and stopped near the
thorn to wipe his brows.
He kindly warned the young people to take care what they were about. He
considered them very bold to do what they were doing by broad daylight,
in a field which was a thoroughfare.
“We have just done,” replied Anna, colouring. “We are going away
directly.” And she drew close to Aaron, to call him away, and tell him
her fears that the owner of the thornbush would not like their gathering
the leaves, if he knew of it. They had better go somewhere else for as
many more as they wanted. As they tied up the shawl by the corners, and
sauntered away, the old labourer shook his head at them several times;
but was silent as an unquestioned oracle. There was no disturbance of
the kind when they had transferred their exertions to a more private
inclosure; and they obtained as large a supply as the shawl could
possibly hold before they stopped to rest.
“Now, let us sit down, and I will tell you something,” said Anna.—Aaron
stretched himself out at length on the grass, using his bundle for a
pillow.
“You must not go to sleep,” continued Anna. “I have been to Mrs. Durell
this morning,—(what an odd thing that she did not put me in mind of this
way of getting tea, when I was complaining of the price!)—and there I
saw somebody else, besides Mrs. Durell and her husband. I saw Stephen.”
“Stephen!” cried Aaron, starting up, now in no danger of going to sleep.
“You silly girl, why did not you tell me that before?”
“Because I was afraid you would go and be in a passion with Mr. Durell,—
as I am afraid you will be when I have told you all he said,—though, I’m
sure, I am very willing to excuse him. But, Aaron,—do sit down, Aaron.
It will do just as well when we get home again.”
As if a man who had escaped once could not escape again! Aaron said. If
Stephen was above ground, he would get hold of him,—not only because he
had betrayed hospitality, and stolen the linen, but because he had told
lies about the ways of going on in England,—with all his talk of nobody
paying taxes in England, or merely such a trifle that they never found
it out.
“But indeed he will not get away,” declared Anna. “Mr. Durell said he
should keep him, and was so angry with me for being sure that it was our
Stephen, that I quite expect Stephen will stay and brave it out. We will
go together, and try what we can do to get back the linen, if——O, Aaron!
if you will but try to keep your temper. But, indeed, Aaron, I had
rather lose all the clothes I have left,—everything I have in the
world,—than see you lose your temper as you do sometimes.”
“What is it to you?” asked Aaron.
“You have asked me that very often before, and I have always told you——”
“Yes; I know—I know. But I am not half so likely to be surly even to
Stephen as to——I tell you, Anna, you have no idea what it is to be under
my father, every hour of the day.”
“Have not I? I think I have; for, though I do not want more freedom
myself, I know what it must be to you to want it. It makes me turn
sometimes hot and sometimes cold when I hear him answer for you to
strangers, as if you were a child, or settling all your little matters
at home, without so much as ever looking in your face to see how you
like what he is doing.”
“Really! Do you always see that? If I had known that——”
“You might have known it. You did know it; for I have told you so a
hundred times.”
“But one can never be sure of it at the moment; and you always keep your
head down so, when my father and I have any words.”
“Because I am always thinking what a pity it is that neither of you is
ready with a soft answer; and I must say, you ought to be the readiest,
from your being the son. But is it really true that you are going to
leave my father?”
“Who said such a thing?”
“Mr. Studley told my father so, before several of the men, and they must
have seen that he did not know it before.”
“My father must have put him into a passion, or he would not have let it
out till next week. How much more did he tell you?”
“Nothing; but you must let me know all now; and my father as soon as we
go home.”
“There is no reason for its being a secret, further than that the plans
are not all settled yet. Studley happened to know of a glass-bottle
work, where they will be glad to take in an active young partner, with
the prospect of his joining the stone-bottle making with it, by and bye.
Now, you need not look so shocked, as if anybody was thinking of making
away with my father. The thing is this;—that Studley is sure my father
will soon be tired of carrying on his pottery business by himself, and
will be off for Jersey again; and then the business will come to me: and
no two businesses can be more fit to go on together than the black-glass
and the stone-ware. Studley says I shall be one of the first men in
London, some day.”
“But where is it? Who taught you to make glass? What can you know about
it?” asked the alarmed sister.
“If I told you I was going to break stones for the roads, I believe you
would ask who had taught me. Why, it is not so difficult to make
bottle-glass as our fish-soup. Put river sand and soapers’ waste into
the furnace, and there you have it;—or, if you like it better, common
sand and lime, with a little clay or sea salt. What can be easier than
that? And where is the risk, with materials that you may pick up from
under your feet almost wherever you go?”
“If that were all;—but there are so many things besides the making and
selling that have to be attended to in this country!”
“Why, that is true; or I fancy we should see twice as much glass in
people’s houses as we do. Everybody thinks glass beautiful, and
everybody who has tried it finds it convenient; and yet, I hear, though
there are nearly twice as many people to use it, and twice as much money
to buy it with, there is less glass used in this country than there was
fifty years ago.”
“Then I am sure I would have nothing to do with it.”
“I would not, unless I saw the reason, and was pretty sure that the
state of things would change. ’Tis this meddling of the excise that
plagues the glass-makers, and makes them charge the article high,—far
higher in proportion than we have to charge our stone bottles.”
“That is what I meant when you laughed at me for being afraid. I did not
doubt that you might melt sand and the other stuff properly; but I
thought you might not understand all about the taxes.”
“Why not as well as another man? to say nothing of a particular good
reason I shall have for knowing. O, I shall only have to give notice of
drawing out bottles; taking care that the notice is given between six in
the morning and eight in the evening; and that the pots are charged with
fresh materials while the officers are by; and that the material is
worked within sixteen hours after the time mentioned; and that I put
down the right number of bottles when I write the declaration, for fear
of being taken in for a fine of 100_l._; and——”
“Why, this is worse than what my father has to attend to!”
“But not so bad as if I were going to make other kinds of glass besides
the common black article. There are thirty-two clauses in the Act that
the glass-makers have to work by; and several of them will not concern
me.”
“I should think that is very lucky; for, you see, you don’t always
remember to give notice, when you are sent on purpose.”
“I declare I did not forget it. I had something else to do first, that
was all; and my father was in one of his hurries. However, if any
mischief comes of it, I will bear the blame and the cost; and no man can
do more.”
“I doubt that: I mean that you might be careful not to ruffle another
mind as well as your own. I am sure, Aaron, if you were standing on our
poquelaye, as you used to do, and could with a breath bring up or blow
away thunder-clouds that were ready to blacken the old castle, and set
the seafowl screaming, and throw a gloom over the wide sea and the green
land, it would be your pleasure to keep all bright, and send the ugly
shade down the sky; and yet, if my father and you find each other ever
so calm——”
“What does it signify? The blackest clouds are soon gone, one way or
another.”
“But it is not with our minds and our passions as it is with the sky and
the sea. It is God’s pleasure that when the sky is cleared, the face of
the earth should be brighter than ever: but when a quarrel has
overshadowed kindness, the brightest of the sunshine is gone for ever.”
Aaron found it convenient to look up into the actual sky for something
to say; and he declared that it was well he did, for some such clouds as
his sister had described were making their appearance above the
tree-tops which were beginning to rustle in the rising wind. They lost
no time in returning, resolving neither to look for more streams, nor to
turn aside to call at the Durells’.—Before they reached home, the
streets were as plashy as any lane in Jersey, (which is saying a great
deal,) and the wind roared among the houses like the fiercest furnace
which was to be under Aaron’s charge. The wet was dripping from all the
corners of the bundle they carried; and Aaron undertook to spread out
its contents in the manufactory to dry, while his sister hastened into
the house.
CHAPTER VI.
LESSONS IN LOYALTY.
In the house sat a merry party;—a really mirthful set of countenances
surrounded the table. Anna wondered for a moment what could have called
up a hearty laugh from her father, this day; but when she saw that
Durell was present, there was no longer any mystery. He and a companion
seemed in a fair way to demolish a pie which Anna knew her mother made a
great point of for to-morrow’s dinner; and (of all odd companions) he
had seated beside him Brennan, the poor boy who wrought at the wheel.
Brennan sometimes made a little progress in diminishing the savoury food
which his patron was heaping on his plate; and then drew back behind
Durell’s broad shoulders, to hide the laughter which he could not
restrain when jokes went round. Master Jack was upon the table, on hands
and knees, looking into the pie and the ale pitcher by turns. Mrs. Le
Brocq was plying her needle with all imaginable diligence, only stopping
when an agony of mirth shook her ponderous form. Le Brocq himself had a
glass of ale in his hand, and a twinkle of good humour in his eye. What
could all this be about? Durell had been applying some of his natural
magic to kindle hearts and melt resolves. He had so vehemently thanked
Le Brocq for consenting to spare Brennan for a few hours, that he had
obtained possession of the boy for this evening as well as to-morrow;
had set Mrs. Le Brocq to work to diminish some hoarded clothes which
Aaron had outgrown before they were worn out, and which would now be a
treasure to Brennan; and had caused dull care to vanish before the
spirit of genial hospitality in Le Brocq’s own heart.
“Hey, Anna!” cried he. “Look at her, dripping like a fish! Get yourself
dry and warm, my dear, before you sit down. We wondered what had become
of you. I fancied you were up in the clouds somewhere; and, I suppose,
by your look, I was right.”
“Have you been up in the clouds?” demanded Jack, opening his eyes wide
upon her.
“Not to-day, dear: but I was once in the middle of a cloud, Jack.”
“Were you? How? Where? Had you a ladder? Did you climb? Did you fly?”
A burst of laughter followed, which amazed poor Jack. His father stroked
his head, and bade him not be ashamed. The last was a good guess,
whatever might be thought about the ladder.
“I was on a high hill,” said Anna, as soon as she could be heard; “and
the cloud came sailing——”
“Was it all golden and bright? Did it make you shut your eyes?”
Before Anna could answer, her mother sent her to change her clothes and
bring her work-bag, undertaking to satisfy the child about the cloud.
This she attempted in the antique method,—that is, by saying some
brilliant things that were not true. She appended an account of such a
thunder-storm as had just happened;—how two angry clouds ride up against
each other, and when their edges touch, they strike fire, which is the
lightning; and then one rolls over the other, and makes a great
rumbling, which is the thunder. The frowning child, with his mouth open,
took it all in, and might have got a desperately wrong notion of a
thunder-storm for life, if his father had not interfered.
“Bless my soul, madam, what do you mean to tell the child next? That the
clouds open and let down dogs and cats to worry naughty boys, I suppose?
I will not have my boy made sport of, I can tell you.”
“Sport!” exclaimed the perplexed old lady. “I am sure I only meant to
tell him what my mother told me.”
“Tell him nothing of the kind, if you please. Fairy tales, if you like,—
as many as you like,—pretty allegories of God’s doings, which will speak
one kind of truth to him in proportion as he finds they have not the
kind of truth that he thought. But no lies, madam;—especially, no lies
about God’s glorious works. Jack, you are not to believe a word the lady
has told you. She was only joking with you, boy. When you have forgotten
what she said, I will tell you a true story about a cloud.”
Jack looked offended at being thus at the mercy of two people who
contradicted each other. Mrs. Le Brocq, who did not clearly understand
what was the matter, not knowing any more about an allegory than about
an alligator, and seeing no great difference between a fairy tale and an
embellished fib, hung her head abashed over her work. This showed Jack
which way his vengeance should be directed. He gave a sort of kangaroo
leap, which brought him in front of Mrs. Le Brocq on the table, seized
the top of her cap (the high Norman peasant cap), and pulled at it with
all his might; albeit he held a handful of hair with it. Brennan was the
quickest in rescuing the complaining lady. Durell caught up Jack,
crying—
“Bravo, boy; thou’rt as like thy father! Never take a lie quietly, boy.
But, Jack, you have hurt the lady; ask pardon for hurting her, Jack.”
Jack asked pardon; but he would not kiss Mrs. Le Brocq. Instead of
urging the point against the child’s evident dislike, Durell made the
propitiation himself. He respectfully replaced the cap, delicately
stroked the hair on the forehead, and kissed the cheek;—precisely at
which moment Studley entered the room.
He professed that he was extremely sorry to disturb the party, whom he
perceived to be very agreeably engaged; and particularly as it happened
to be a little affair of his own which brought him into their presence.
The fact was, he had been a long round in search of Mr. Durell, who
would be found, Mrs. Durell had told him, in the prosecution of his
duty, as usual.
The office which Studley had referred to in the morning as being his
object of desire in preference to remaining with Le Brocq, was that of
Messenger of the Excise Court, with a salary of 78_l._, to which he
added, in his own imagination, certain ‘advantages.’ He knew that the
Court prefers candidates who are experienced in the manufacture of
exciseable commodities; and he flattered himself that, in conjunction
with other circumstances, his having been concerned in the glass and
stone bottle manufactures, and having mastered the secrets of
soap-making, might be powerful recommendations. In the excise, as in all
spy systems, the rule of action is, ‘set a thief to catch a thief.’ None
are found so apt at detecting revenue frauds, and so eager in informing
against and punishing them, as those who, in their day, have defrauded
the revenue. Studley’s pretensions were excellent, in this point of
view; and he believed that if he could make sure of the interest of two
more high personages, besides those whose good word he had already
solicited, he should be pretty secure of the appointment.
“I have merely to ask one little exertion from you, Sir,” said he to
Durell. “Everybody knows what interest you have with the gentleman who
befriended you,—who procured you your appointment.”
“Everybody but myself and he, I suppose. Well, Sir.”
“Your influence is undeniable, I am well assured. I believe I am
tolerably certain of being made messenger in the place of poor Haggart;
but it would set my mind entirely at ease if you would speak in my
favour to the gentleman in question.”
“Nobody can be more ready than I am, Sir, to set people’s minds at ease,
when I can; but let me tell you, from the day you get this office, you
will never have a mind at ease.”
“Ha! ha! very good! That is my own concern, entirely, you perceive. As I
was going to say, you can speak to my fitness for the office, I am sure.
As to politics, for instance, though I should never think of meddling,
you are aware, (which a servant of the government is understood never to
do,) yet I am decidedly a government man. Decidedly so. You remember the
part I took in Gardiner’s election?”
“Perfectly well; from the pains I took on the other side to counteract
you.”
“Well, well; that is past and gone. You will not object to a government
servant being of government politics, or to bearing testimony that he is
so. Your known liberality——Your humble servant, Miss Le Brocq,” setting
a chair for Anna, as she appeared with her work-bag. “Let none
depreciate the air of Lambeth who looks upon you, Ma’am.”
“I won’t detain you, Mr. Studley, to discuss my liberality or any thing
else, now your time is so precious. I have no doubt, Sir, of your
qualifications, from the little I have seen of you; and it gives me
pleasure to serve my neighbours; but it is against my principles that
one officer in an establishment like the Excise should stir to procure
the appointment of another. A man should enter his office unfettered by
obligation to any of the parties with whom he will have to do. This has
been my reason before for declining to interfere in similar cases; and
it is my reason now.—And now, Miss Anna, I have humbly to ask your
pardon——”
“Excuse my interrupting you,” said Studley; “but I trust, Sir, you will
let the matter remain in your mind, and think better of it.”
“My decision is final, Mr. Studley. God knows there is so little
opportunity of acting freely on one’s principles in such an office as
mine, that I am little likely to give up my liberty of conscience when
by chance I can use it.”
And he turned to Anna, to seek forgiveness for his vehemence of the
morning. His soul was so sick with the sight of oppression, that he lost
his self-command (if ever he had any) at the remotest appearance of
bearing hard on the unfortunate. He really had great confidence in
Stephen. He would lay his life that Stephen was an honest fellow; but he
admitted this to be no reason why he should have behaved like a brute to
a lady, who had spoken under a mistake. Studley meanwhile had turned
smilingly to Le Brocq.
“I shall have better success with you, I fancy, Sir. There is one little
requisite, perhaps you are aware, which I believe I must be indebted to
you for. This office of messenger is an office of trust. Infinite
quantities of money pass through the hands of the messengers of the
Court——”
“Though taxation is a mere trifle in England.”
“When I speak of infinite quantities of money, I do not, of course,
intend to be taken literally; but the recovery of common charges, as
well as of fines and penalties, is committed to the messengers; and
theirs is a situation of infinite trust,—requiring security, of course;—
small security;—not above 500_l._ Now, where should I look for this
security but to the respectable house which I have served,—I will say,
faithfully served, for so many years?”
“To any place rather, I should think. To say nothing, on my own account,
of the doubt whether the extravagance of living in England will leave
500_l._ at my own disposal, it is a clear point that an officer who has
to levy charges should not be under obligations to a man who is subject
to such charges. You must know, Studley, that on the first disagreement,
you must betray your duty to government, or do an ungracious thing by
me; and if——”
“O, we shall have no disagreements.”
“I was going to say that if we have no disagreements, we lay ourselves
open to the suspicion of collusion. If Mr. Durell is clear on his point,
I am doubly so on mine. I cannot be your security, Sir; which I am sorry
for, as I should be happy to show that I bear no malice on account of
what passed this morning.”
“Bear no malice! you do,” exclaimed Studley, unable any longer to keep
his temper. “Collusion, indeed! You talk of suspicion of collusion, when
here I find you heaping favours upon favours on the surveyor,—a man you
never heard of till you were in his power! Suspicion won’t be the word
long.”
“What does the fellow mean?” asked Durell, his eyes lighting up.
“I mean, Sir, that here is an empty pie-dish, and an empty ale-jug; and
that this is not the first time I have seen you feasting in this house;
and that the very working boys are taken from the wheel, and dressed and
feasted too at your request; and much besides, Sir. Little things, Sir,
which you may call trifles, Sir, are indications,—are symptoms of great
things, Sir——”
“Nothing truer,” said Durell, contemptuously. “Paltry things like you,
Studley, are indications how despicable must be the little-great system
to which you will presently belong. A writhing maggot is a symptom that
the carcase is stinking.
“O, Mr. Durell! Don’t provoke him,” cried Anna. “Do think of the
consequences!”
“’Tis such angel-tempers as yours, my dear, forgiving rough men’s
brutality, as you forgave me this morning, that encourage us to be
brutal again. Don’t let me off so easily next time, if you wish me
well.”
And he turned to Studley, as if about to apologize for the offensiveness
of his language, when Studley observed, trying to conceal his passion,
“It is very kind of you, Madam, to bid him think of the consequences. He
will not have long to wait for the consequences, if he blazes abroad his
disaffection in this manner.—Disaffection! yes.—Do you suppose, Sir,
that your exertions in favour of a certain anti-ministerial candidate at
a late election passed unnoticed? We don’t want to be told that you
could not vote; but there is little use in denying that you declared
your opinion,—daily, hourly, wherever you went,—your opinion as to which
principles ought to be supported. Join this with your avowed contempt of
the establishment in which you serve, and what is the inference,—the
clear inference? It is in vain, Sir, to deny the part you took in the
election I refer to.”
“Deny it! I glory in it!” thundered Durell, who had started up in the
midst of this attack upon him.
“Indeed!” muttered Studley, quite perplexed.
“Indeed! yes, indeed! What should a man glory in but in the use of that
which God gave, and which men dare to meddle with only because they know
too little of its force to dread it. When men once talked of shutting up
the four winds in a cave, it was not from dread of their force, but
because it was mortifying not to know, when those winds were abroad,
whence they came and whither they went; and so when our masters would
put a padlock upon our opinions, it is not because they guess the danger
of shutting in what is for ever expanding, but because they covet the
power of letting them fly this way and that, to suit their own little
purposes, and puff away their own petty enemies. But this flying in the
face of God Almighty is such child’s play, as well as something worse,
that perhaps He may forgive in the infant what He would sorely visit
upon the answerable man.”
“What is all this?” asked Le Brocq, while the countenances of those
present corroborated the question.
“Why, just this,” replied Durell, putting a restraint upon himself, and
stopping his rapid walk through the apartment. “The object of taxation
is to support government. The object of government is to afford liberty
and security to every man that lives under it. Yet those by whom the
taxation of the people is managed are to be abridged of their liberty,
if they mean to keep their security. In the most important point of all
others,—in the choice of those who are to govern, they are to have no
liberty of action, and their very thoughts and speech are to be
prescribed. We excisemen are to do nothing towards providing that the
oppressed shall be set free, and the industrious rewarded, and the
ignorant enlightened, and an empire blessed:—we are to do nothing in the
only way in which we could do much. Not only must we surrender our
political rights while receiving our bread; but we must not stimulate
others to do what we must leave undone. Even this is not enough: we must
hush to sleep the will that has been wakened within us, and seem to
believe that which we hate as falsehood, or hang on the foul breath of a
spy, like that fellow, for our bread and our good name.—But, so be it!
We are spies; and it is fitting that we should be at the mercy of a
spy.”
“But why?” interposed Anna. And Jack seconded the question with, “Why
are you a spy, I wonder?”
“You may well ask, boy. However, they shall never bind my thoughts, and
chain my tongue,—come of it what may. They heard no complaint from me,
from first to last, about the surrender of my right to vote; but if they
think to prevent me from avowing who is the people’s friend and who the
people’s enemy,—if they suppose I will submit to have it thought that I
am with them when my heart is against them, I will fling back in their
faces the mask they would put upon mine; and go with an unveiled front
where God’s works are for ever drawing out their long tale of truth to
shame man’s falsehoods.”
“Take me with you then, papa. Do take me with you,” cried Jack.
“The little master had better make sure of what sort of place he would
have to go to,” observed Studley. “He might not altogether like a jail.”
“A jail!” cried every body.
“I mean no more than this,—that the penalty for certain excise offences
is 500_l._; and all people are not always ready to pay 500_l._”
And Studley went out, now the confirmed enemy of the whole party he left
behind.
“I am not going to justify that man’s spying and threats,” observed Le
Brocq: “but I really do not see why the government should not make a
point of its own servants being of its own political opinions; and, as
for their not voting at elections, it is a favour done to the people, I
conclude, from the consideration that so large a body of persons,
supposed to be biassed by their dependence on the government, would
often turn the scale in a close contest.”
“And where can there be a stronger proof of the badness of the system?
Is there no better way of the people paying for government than by their
supporting a host of tax-gatherers, who are first compelled to harass
their supporters by daily ill offices, and then become the slaves of
rulers in proportion as they become hated by the ruled? Let the people
of England come forward like men and Christians, asking to have their
state-subscription levied in the form of a periodical contribution,
rather than wrenched and filched from them after the manner of a theft,—
so that the gang of wrenchers and filchers, of whom I am one, may
support themselves by a more honest labour, and once more become men in
their social rights and their liberty of speech.”
“Do you mean to remain in your office till that day?”
“If they will let me exercise ordinary freedom of opinion. Yes: while
the system exists, it is the duty of those who feel its evils to soften
their operation as much as possible. If I resigned to-night, the next
best-drilled spy would take my place, and in some lower rank there would
be room made for some mischief-loving, shabby-souled tyrant;—for who but
such would accept the most hateful of offices with the meanest of
salaries? Frightful as is the sum which Englishmen pay for their
standing spy-army, the forces are so numerous that the pay of each
(considered in connexion with the odium of the office) is not enough to
command the services of honest men. But if you had seen the half of what
has come before my eyes, you would value the blessing of a tender heart,
here and there, among such a tribe as hold the tyranny of the excise in
their power; and you would entreat such an one to keep in his place for
love of the widow and the fatherless, and the poor, and such as have
none to help them.”
When Durell was persuaded to sit down again, and fill his glass, and
Aaron had been summoned by his sister to come and listen, there were no
bounds to the interest with which the surveyor’s tales of sorrow and
crime were listened to. He set out with declaring that there was
scarcely a possibility of a trader’s escaping persecution, loss, or even
ruin, if the excise officer who was over him happened to be his enemy.
He unfolded such scenes of strife, fraud, hardship, and bitter woe, as
terrified the tender-spirited women, and made even Aaron look grave at
the thought of committing himself to be acted upon by such a system. He
trembled at tales of masters being betrayed by faithless servants; of
false oaths taken by men who appeared weekly at church in a frame of
decent piety; of fathers selling their children’s beds from under them
to pay arbitrary penalties innocently incurred; of a widowed mother
following her only son to prison, eagerly explaining to all who beheld
his shame, that it was not for any “real fault,” but for a factitious
offence,—a boast alas! never repeated; for it is they who are imprisoned
for factitious crimes who come out broken-hearted and reckless, apt to
become, first smugglers, and then felons, like the youth whose tale
Durell was telling. The more he told, the more he had to tell,—the more
impassioned became his speech, and the more eager his recourse to his
glass. Brennan had not yet moved from his attitude of fixed attention,
and even Jack was still frowning and gazing in his father’s face, when
Le Brocq perceived that his guest was no longer in a state to be
listened to as one who knew what he was about. Perhaps he was overcome
as much by intense feeling as by what he had taken; but he slid from his
tone of solemn and reasonable denunciation to senseless invective, to
ridicule, to mirth, to nonsense, till his friends could bear the
humbling scene no longer. Anna hastened, in an agony of fear and shame,
to tell Mrs. Durell that Aaron and his father were bringing her husband
home. It was the only thing that could be done with him; for he had
taken some imaginary offence, and would not remain in their house for a
moment longer, and was too riotous to be kept on any other part of the
premises.
“I know what you are come for,” said Mrs. Durell mournfully to Anna. “It
is not the first time by many, since he was made an officer. If he
should be cut off in his drink, I shall always say his office was
answerable for it.”
Anna could not leave the unhappy wife when Durell was lying in the next
room, breathing hard, and angrily muttering in his drunken sleep.
“You must not be too hard upon him to-morrow,” said she, thinking that
she saw signs of wrath in the burning tears which could not be
repressed. “You have reason to know the tenderness of his heart; and it
is my belief that it is that tenderness that betrays him.”
“To be sure it is. Every day of his life he crosses somebody that he
wishes well to, and feels that he can do nothing for others that he sees
oppressed, and that as often as he shows mercy, he is betraying his
trust. Hard upon him! When he begins to make light of God’s providence,
and to slight the sorrows that he sees, I will be hard upon my husband.”
“You deserve to be the wife and the comforter of such a man.”
“Thank you for saying so while he is lying there!” exclaimed the wife,
looking up through her tears. “You and I know that he is more fit to
hold some friendly rule over the people than to dog them as an enemy.
Some would laugh at such a thought, and say he cannot rule himself. But,
depend upon it, if it were not for the misrule that is every day before
his eyes, he would govern himself like the most moderate of them all;
and then he would never be so wretched in his shame as he will be
to-morrow.”
“Do you think Mr. Durell will be better to-morrow, so as to take me
where he promised?” asked Brennan, who had silently followed into the
room, and was now watching the rain-drops chasing one another down the
window-panes.
Mrs. Durell shook her head, and the boy’s heart sank at the sight. He
was told that he might sleep here to-night, to take the chance. It was
not very likely that Stephen would come back to-night, having been
abroad since he slipped out by himself in the morning. Anna did not now
ask any question about Stephen, fearing that it might seem like
reminding Mrs. Durell of her husband’s roughness on that subject when
she was last within his doors.
“Will you please to come here, ma’am?” said Brennan, beckoning her to
the window.
She saw Studley standing under a gateway, as if for shelter, but
laughing, and pointing very significantly at Durell’s house. Brennan
whispered that Studley had met master and Mr. Aaron when they were
trying to make Mr. Durell walk straight; and that he had followed them
all the rest of the way, talking about fair traders’ luck in choosing
their time for making surveyors drunk.
CHAPTER VII.
HARDER LESSONS IN LOYALTY.
While Durell, as much ashamed of himself the next morning, as his wife
had foretold, made an exertion to perform his promise to Brennan,
notwithstanding a desperate head-ache, Anna was making experiments with
the new tea her brother had helped her to manufacture. It was so good as
to make her wonder why all but the wealthier classes in England did not
mix a larger or smaller proportion of those leaves with the genuine tea.
She resolved to try a variety of herbs for the same purpose; and hoped
that when she had satisfied herself that she had obtained the best
article in her power, she might make a profitable little business of her
manufacture. Perhaps the reason why she did not hear of others doing so
was that few had the advantage of a kiln in which to dry the material
quickly, equally, and in large quantities. Meantime, there seemed to be
customers ready before she asked for them. A woman, whom somebody
pronounced to be Mrs. Studley, came to inquire, and carried away a
pound, which she insisted upon paying for before she tasted it. The
example once set, several of the people on the premises, or their wives,
made similar purchases in the course of the next few days.
Aaron meanwhile recovered from the temporary alarm about his new
business connection into which Durell’s disclosures had thrown him. He
trusted that the perils of glass-makers had been exaggerated in the
heated fancy of the surveyor; and would not believe Anna when she
averred that Durell was perfectly sober when he told of the extent to
which glass-masters are dependent on their servants. He had made a clear
distinction between the present and the former times of the manufacture;
showing how the present are an improvement upon the former, though
restrictions and hardships enough remain to account for the manufacture
being stationary while all circumstances but the interference of the
excise are favourable to its unlimited extension. Durell had told a
story of a respectable glass-manufacturer who had suffered cruelly, some
years ago, from having accidentally affronted one of his men. The man
put material into several of his master’s furnaces, and then went and
laid an information against the proprietor for charging his furnaces
without notice. The consequence was, that George the Third, by the Grace
of King, &c., greeted poor Mr. Robinson, and “commanded and strictly
enjoined” him (all excuses apart) to appear before the Barons of the
King’s Exchequer, at Westminster, to answer his Majesty concerning
certain articles then and there, on the king’s behalf, to be objected
against Mr. Robinson. These articles of accusation were thirty-one! No
wonder the king wished to know what Mr. Robinson had to say. There was,
besides charging the furnaces without notice, a long list of other
offences, (all, however, committed by the workman without his master’s
knowledge,)—putting in metal after gauge, unstopping a pot without
notice, taking down the stopper without notice, filling five pots each
day for fifty days without notice, omission of entering five hundred
makings, and so on. Who can wonder that the father of his subjects was
grieved at such a want of filial confidence? The king, however, had less
reason to be grieved than Mr. Robinson; for the penalties on the
thirty-one offences amounted to 138,700_l._ His Majesty, through his
Barons, had compassion; or rather, perhaps, it might be evident to them
that to throw a man into jail for the rest of his days, after stripping
him of all that he had, for such a crime as his servant beginning to
make glass without his knowledge, might be going too far for even
excise-ridden England. They made him answerable for one only of the
accusations, and let him off for 50_l._—liable, however, to a repetition
of the same misfortune, unless he chose to stand day and night beside
his furnaces, to see that none of his people violated the law touching
glass. Matters have mended since that day. Absurdity and hardship do not
now reach such an extreme: but the principle remains. The tyranny of
interference still subsists. The morality of glass-making is still an
arbitrary morality,—complicated and annoying in its practice, and
mercilessly punished in its infraction. There was still enough of peril
and disgust to make Anna wish that her brother would think again before
he entered upon glass-making. She prevailed no further than to induce
him to bespeak a short trial of the business before committing himself
irrevocably as a partner. She heard so much more of the ingenuity and
taste of the manufacturer he was about to join, than of his experience
in business, that she was in perpetual fear that the firm would not long
be able to escape the clutches of some of the revenue laws, which seemed
to be lying in ambush everywhere to entrap the unwary. Her father, too,
was for ever prophesying that the wilful youth would fall into some
scrape, and get into jail, sooner or later.
Mrs. Durell observed her husband to be particularly gloomy one evening,
when he desired to have his supper earlier than usual. He sat looking at
the wall, as he always did when his mind was full of something painful.
He seemed relieved when Stephen left off singing in the next room,
though he would not have taken such a liberty with a dependent guest as
to interfere with his singing when he was in the mood. When the
spirit-bottle was put down near him, he pushed it away. This was good as
far as it went. He was not going to drink away his cares, whatever they
might be.——A knock at the door.—
“Let him in. It is the constable,” said Durell.
“O, then, I know. You are going to watch,” said Mrs. Durell, being aware
that entering premises by night could be done only in the presence of a
constable. “I am afraid, love, you are going to distress somebody that
you wish no ill to.”
“I wish ill to nobody but that cursed race of informers that is as much
cherished in this country as if we had a Nero over us.”
“Only about the taxes, love, surely.”
“Only about the taxes! Well, what would you have, when almost everything
that is bought and sold is taxed?—Sit down, Simpson. Have you supped? We
may be detained some time.”
The wife probably still showed anxiety; for he said, while buttoning up
his coat,
“You have no acquaintance among the soap-boilers, my dear, that I know
of.”
“Oh, is it soap-boiling that you are going to watch?”
He nodded, kissed her, bade her not sit up for him, and left her
relieved.
It was true that the first errand was to a soap-boiler’s,—a man who kept
a chandler’s shop, and professed to do nothing else, but who had long
continued to carry on an illicit trade in soap. His candles bore the
blame of the scent with which his near neighbours were sometimes
incommoded; and his being possessed of two handy daughters saved the
necessity of his having servants who might betray him, protected by that
odious clause of the Act which provides that participators in the
offence shall be rewarded instead of punished, if they will inform
against their masters or companions. This man found that he could make,
very cheap, a particularly good soap, as long as he could evade the
excise; and he had, of course, no lack of customers. In his shop, he
sold none but dear, duty-paid soap; but nobody knew but himself how many
packages went into the country from the back of his premises. The
temptation was enough to overpower any man who had his opportunities.
His privacy afforded him the means of trying experiments to improve the
article,—too expensive a practice for makers who cannot return the
material to the coppers, in case of failure, without the sacrifice of
the whole duty upon the portion so returned. Relieved from the duty, he
could use better and more expensive materials than the regular
manufacturer can employ. Instead of barilla, or the still inferior
article, kelp, he could use common salt, which requires much less labour
in its application to use, and, from its smaller bulk, might be smuggled
into his premises and kept there with greater safety. Besides this, he
liked to be able to take his own time about the production of the
article, and to use such vessels as might be best fitted for his
purposes, instead of having an exciseman standing over him to see that
his soap was ready by a certain time, whether it was properly made or
not; and that his utensils were of the shape and size required by law;
whether or not the having them of that shape and size caused waste of
the material. The mere circumstance of being able to discharge the
alkaline lye from the copper by a cock inserted near the bottom, instead
of by pump and hand, as ordered by law, was of no little consequence,
regarding as it did an operation which was perpetually occurring. This
chandler had, with an easy conscience, made a pretty little competence
by his illicit manufacture; but his day of prosperity was over. Some
keen nose or eyes had made the discovery, and the consequence was that
the constable visited his premises by midnight.
How the girls started at the first gentle tap at the door! How relieved
were they when, having called from the window, they were told it was
only a neighbour wanting to light his lamp! How dismayed again, when
four men rushed in, the moment the door was opened, and made their way
direct to the place where the sinner was pouring off his curdling soap
into the troughs! There was nothing to be said,—no license to produce,—
no tokens of having paid duty. The whole apparatus and product must be
seized, and the man taken into custody, and the daughters left to
comfort themselves, and explain the matter to the world in the best way
they could. They dreaded the loss of money far more than the loss of
character, which could hardly be great in a country where the population
professes (judging by the duty) to use no more than 6½lbs. a head per
annum; while it is well known that half a pound a week each is the
lowest quantity actually consumed. In a country where three-quarters of
the soap used is not duty-paid, there can be no very deep or extensive
horror of the sin of illicit manufacture. It is far more likely that the
ignorant poor should be thankful to him who, in their inability to make
soap at home, enabled them to buy for 1½_d._ what the law would prevent
their having for less than 6_d._ Even some rich might be found who would
pronounce it a monstrous thing that, while the cost of making soap is
only 12_s._ per cwt., the duty should be 28_s._, and the expense of
excise interference 16_s._ more; but the rich are not concerned like the
poor in this matter. Not only is cleanliness,—and so far health,—less
difficult, less a matter of question to them, but they pay a much
smaller proportion of the duty than the poor. The duty amounts to
two-thirds of the price of the soap which the poor man buys, while it
forms only an inconsiderable portion of the cost of the refined and
scented soaps of the luxurious. While these things are so, who can
wonder at the reliance of the illicit trader on the support and good
will of society, and his expectation of being blamed for nothing worse
than imprudence in carrying on his work in a place liable to detection?
When the daughters had watched their father down the street, after
helping to cleanse him from the tokens of his late toil, and had gone
crying up to bed, knowing that a guard was left on their premises,
Durell and the constable proceeded on another errand, much more painful.
Durell had received a hint from his superiors that all was not right on
the premises of the glass-bottle maker, with whom Aaron was becoming
connected. It was his belief that Studley had been the informer, both
from the date of the occurrence, and from Studley’s knowledge of the
concern. Whether it was his design to implicate Aaron, could not be
known yet; but, if he really believed Le Brocq to be a rich, close, old
fellow, it seemed very probable that he might adopt this means of
squeezing a little money out of him; or, possibly, he might nourish
revenge against more than one of the family because Le Brocq had refused
to be his security for the office for which he was still waiting in
uncertainty. However these things might be, Studley was with the men who
stealthily let themselves in at a side door, during the twilight, and
hid themselves behind some planks which happened to be set on end
against the wall. He was with them when they skulked about, after the
workmen were gone, peeping into the closets where the stock was placed,
and whispering as often as they met with anything which could possibly
be construed into a token of fraud. He was the one who called them
hastily back to their hiding-place when steps were at length heard
approaching. He watched and followed the proprietor when he hastily
passed through, with a flaring candle in his hand, as if about to light
himself to some dark place. It was Studley who beckoned the men to
pursue, and burst into the portion of the premises which had been so
contrived as hitherto to elude the notice of the excise. There they
found the proprietors, Aaron, and a trusty servant of the establishment,
all at work about a small furnace.
Studley stood afar off, and was left to his own reflections, when the
door was shut. Durell and Simpson presently afterwards arrived.
“Has this apartment been duly entered?” inquired Durell of the
offenders. Nobody answered.
“Has this furnace paid duty?”—No answer.
At length, the elder partner began to explain.
“The fact is, we think we have devised an improvement in our
manufacture; and nobody knows better than you, Mr. Durell, that it is
impossible to keep any secret to ourselves in our business, while the
same excisemen who watch us, see half a dozen other establishments of
the same kind in a day. There is really no possibility of improvement
but in doing what is constantly done,—working a little in private before
we make known our discoveries to the excise.”
“The expense, too, of wasting material, which must pay duty whether we
obtain the desired product or not, is an insurmountable obstacle to
improvement,” observed the other partner. “You will not deal harshly
with us, sir. If you do, we shall suffer for the patriotic attempt to
advance our manufacture.”
“I am certain,” declared the first, “that government will gain more by
allowing us to complete our experiment, than by fining us to our last
shilling.”
With all this Durell had nothing to do. His office was plain. His
accustomed duty lay before him,—seizure of the goods and custody of the
offenders. He was grieved that his friend Aaron could not escape, though
he was not one of the partners. Studley was again at hand to insist that
Aaron was liable to fine or imprisonment for being found working on an
exciseable product in unentered premises. The informer (for so he was)
was very unwilling that Aaron should be permitted to return to his home
for the night. He hoped to have seen him marched through the streets to
some place of confinement. But Aaron’s peril was not such as could
induce him to abscond; and he was dropped at his father’s door, after
having given his promise to appear when summoned before the court.
Studley need not have grudged him his home. There was little comfort in
it. Before he had well finished his tale, the next morning, and before
his father had well begun the series of reproaches which must be
expected to follow, a messenger from the Court appeared, summoning, not
only Aaron, but Le Brocq, to answer for drawing his kiln without notice,
and Anna for an illicit adulteration of tea.
Le Brocq replied only by flinging the summonses under the grate, and by
a deep curse upon Durell. Anna, who had sunk into a chair, exclaimed,
“O, father, why is he to blame? How has he wronged us?”
“Never tell me that this is not all his doing;—or, at any rate, that be
might not have prevented it all, if he had pleased. What is his office
for,—what is his power worth,—if his best friends and his countrymen,—
strangers that he ought to protect,—are to be persecuted in this
manner?”
“I will answer for it, he is more sorry for us than we are for
ourselves: but he must do his duty, father.”
“I should like to know what way of doing one’s duty would please my
father,” observed Aaron. “Whatever may happen is sure to be somebody’s
fault.”
“Whose fault was it, pray, that my kiln was drawn without notice?”
“O, father! Aaron! all this cannot be helped now. Do not let us quarrel
now. We must think what must be done.”
“We must go to prison,—that is clear,—unless my father can pay the
fines,” said Aaron.
“If anybody goes to prison, it must be you, Aaron. My first duty is to
your mother, and my next to your sister, who has never been a
disobedient child to me.”
“Pray, father, don’t,” cried Anna. “Perhaps we may none of us have to go
to prison.” Her voice faltered at the last dreadful word.
“It is my belief that I can never pay the fines,” replied Le Brocq: “and
if they throw me into jail, I shall find some means of telling the king
that they give him bad advice who encourage him to use such means as his
of getting his taxes. I would willingly have paid him three times as
much as he has yet got from me for leave to follow my business in peace.
There is that fellow Durell skulking about before the window now!—to see
how we take our troubles, I suppose.—Anna, come back! I won’t have you
speak to him. I forbid everybody belonging to me to speak to him.”
“Your own countryman, father!”
“What does it matter to me whether he was born in Jersey, or any where
else? He is an exciseman, and that is enough. How in the world to tell
your mother of all this!”
“Perhaps we shall not be hardly used, when they find that we are
strangers, coming from a place where nothing is known of the excise,”
said Anna, trying to command her voice. “Perhaps the king will be
merciful when he hears all we have to say; and I still think Mr. Durell
is our friend. Perhaps we may not all have to go to prison together;
and, at any rate, I suppose we shall soon know the worst.”
END OF THE FIRST PART.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
OF
_TAXATION._
---------------------
No. IV.
THE
JERSEYMEN PARTING.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES,
Duke-street, Lambeth.
THE
JERSEYMEN PARTING.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
1. A Busy Man at Leisure 1
2. Knitting and Unravelling 20
3. A Mate for Mother Hubbard 44
4. Friend or Foe? 51
5. The Darkening Hour 79
6. The Land of Signals 96
7. Welcome to Supper 117
8. A Wanderer still 133
For some of the materials of this and the preceding No., I am indebted
to Mr. Inglis’s very interesting volumes on the Channel Islands.
The next No. will conclude my work.
H. M.
THE JERSEYMEN PARTING.
CHAPTER I.
A BUSY MAN AT LEISURE.
There are but too many people in London who look upon a prison very much
as they look upon any other building: but of such people few are from
Jersey, or from any place where, as in Jersey, the inhabitants are
prosperous, and the temptations to crime are therefore few. The family
of Le Brocq had not been accustomed to see a sentence of death lightly
received as implying nothing worse than a gratuitous removal to a
country where, whatever other hardships there may be, there is no
difficulty in procuring food and spirits. They had not been accustomed
to the language of penal justice in England, where “transportation” may
mean nothing more than removal to Woolwich, to sleep in a stationary
vessel at night, and rest upon a broom in the dock-yard during the day,
in the intervals of being watched. They had not been accustomed to see
convicts adjusting their leg chain in the presence of strangers, as if
it had been a boot or a gaiter; nor to hear the merriment of the
disgraced; nor to witness calculations as to the economy of living in a
prison for a while. To have seen an offender after conviction was to
them a rare circumstance; and when such a chance had befallen, there had
been a conflict of feeling between their extreme curiosity to see any
one in circumstances so peculiar and interesting, and their fear of
insulting the fallen.
Durell, though a Jerseyman, had lost some of this feeling through the
familiarity with jails which was induced by his office. The idea of
depriving a man of his natural liberty, of using force upon him in any
way, was as repugnant to him as it will be to everybody a few ages
hence; but, the outrage being an actual fact, the attendant
circumstances had lost some of their power. If it had not been so, he
would not have pronounced that Aaron might go home for the night of his
arrest, as his peril was not such as could induce him to abscond. He was
wrong. Aaron’s peril for working on unentered premises was of being
taken before two magistrates, and sentenced to three months’ hard labour
in prison. Whether three months, or three years, or three hours of hard
labour, it would have been much the same to Aaron, if within the walls
of a prison. Before daylight he was on the cold, foggy Thames, hastening
he knew not well whither, and cared little, so long as he was out of
reach of the arm of the law.
His father did not abscond, because he had a wife and daughter; but
never was any man more perplexed how to choose between two dreadful
evils than Le Brocq. Equal to a Jerseyman’s horror of a prison is his
repugnance to pay money. Having at home but little money and an
abundance of all that he really wants, he will make any shifts with his
materials rather than buy. He will first impoverish his live stock
rather than go to market to purchase proper food for them; and then, his
live stock failing, he will impoverish his land rather than pay for
manure. Thus, Le Brocq’s grand inducement to come to England having been
the supposed exemption from paying taxes in money, he could not endure
the idea of laying down a heavy sum as a fine, while any alternative
remained. He persuaded himself, and declared to the court, that he could
not raise the money; and went to prison. This was against Durell’s
judgment, and in the firm persuasion that Aaron would appear in a day or
two, to conduct the business and take care of the women. It seemed to
him so utterly ridiculous to consider Aaron’s accident of working on
unentered premises as a punishable offence, that there could be no
danger of the young man’s being inquired after when he had been found
“not at home” for twenty-four hours.
He also was wrong. Anna was alone when she drew near the prison to visit
her father, after a few days’ confinement. She had never been out on so
painful an errand. She walked past, two or three times, in hopes that
the disagreeable-looking people about the gate would have gone away and
left a clear path for her: but they stood a long while, leaning against
the wall with folded arms, some chatting and laughing, and others
abusing the powers within for keeping them waiting. Before they had
disappeared, more came; and Anna saw that the time during which she
might obtain admittance would pass away if she waited to go in alone.
Nobody seemed to mind her, after all, and the turnkey was civil enough;
so civil, that she found courage, after a moment’s struggle, to do what
she considered justice to her father, and assure the turnkey, as he
showed her the way, that it was for no crime that her father was there,
but only for a mistake about a tax. The man seemed to think this no
business of his; and indeed there was nothing in his manner to any of
his charge to indicate that such a distinction signified at all.
It was a great disappointment to Anna to find that she could not see her
father alone. Two persons were in the same apartment with him,—a dingy,
close room, where it must be extremely irksome for three people to pass
the day without employment. Anna saw at a glance how irksome it really
was. Nothing but the extreme of ennui could have placed her father in
the position in which she found him,—trying to play at cards with his
companions. Such cards! such companions! and he, ignorant as he was
known by Anna to be of modern card-playing! He had borne his part in a
single ancient game of cards (though he preferred dominoes) on the gay
nights of Christmas or New Year in his Jersey home, when the punch-bowl
was steaming and cakes were heaped on the hospitable board round which
he had gathered his family and neighbours; but his game and his
card-playing notions were little suited to his present place and
companionship. It was a dismal amusement here, in this cheerless room,
with sordid accompaniments of every kind, and two of the players
impatient at the incompetency of the third. Their voices were none of
the most harmonious when first heard on the opening of the door; and
when it appeared that Anna came to interrupt, Le Brocq’s partner threw
down his cards in a pet. Le Brocq cast away his, exclaiming—
“My dear, what are you here for?”
“Only to see you, father. But I am in the way, I’m afraid,”—looking at
the peevish man opposite.
“Never mind him,” replied her father. “We have time enough and too much
for that sort of thing. Why did not you send Aaron, instead of coming
yourself into such a place? You know I do not like——”
“I knew you would be vexed with me for coming; but my mother was so
unhappy about nobody seeing you. When Aaron comes home——But, father, we
have not seen him yet.”
“Not yet! Do you mean that he has never come back at all?”
“Never.”
“Nor written? What can the lad mean? Whenever he does come back, he
shall learn——I will teach him what he may expect by playing such
pranks.”
He saw by Anna’s downcast eyes that she thought such threats, if they
could be overheard, were not the most likely means of bringing her
brother back again. They put her too much in mind of the scolding
mother’s address to her offending child, which she had overheard in the
street,—“Come here, you little wretch, and let me flay you alive.” Le
Brocq added more gently,
“You are not afraid of any harm having happened? Have you asked
anybody?”
“Mr. Durell says——”
“Durell! That you should go and disgrace our family before that man, of
all people! What has Durell to do with us, beyond getting us into
mischief?”
“My mother asked him, because we thought he knew most about what people
do when they get into trouble with the Excise.”
“Not he. He thought I should pay the fine rather than come here. That
shows how much he knows. But what does he say?”
“He does not think Aaron will come back,” said Anna, with a faltering
voice.
“He has enticed him away somewhere, then. What should make the lad stay
away?”
“When they run away, they get disgusted with the law, Mr. Durell says,
and set themselves against it. Too many, he says, turn to secret
distilling, or to braving the law in some other way. And that is what we
fear for Aaron.”
“Nonsense: he is safe enough with Malet by this time, I have no doubt.
He has been ropemaking there this fortnight, depend upon it.”
“He was not there four days ago, as we learn by a letter from Louise
this morning. We were so glad to see the letter! But there is nothing
about Aaron, except their supposing that he must be managing the
business while——”
“I don’t think I need read the letter,” observed Le Brocq, pushing it
away from him. He was afraid of the pain of seeing what his daughter
might say about his being in prison. “Your mother is happy for to-day, I
suppose, now she has heard from Louise?”
“Not very,” answered Anna, with a tear or two. “Father, she is always
crying out for Louise to come. She seems as if she thought everything
would be right if Louise was here. But I am sure I dare not think of it.
It is something to think that one of us is safe; and why should Louise
be more safe than anybody else, if she came? There are other snares yet,
Mr. Durell says; and where no stranger can do anything hardly without
falling into a snare, is not it much better that Louise should stay
away? Is not it, father?”
“To be sure. It was mistake enough for us to come.”
“Then, you will let us go away again? May I tell Louise so?”
“O, yes. Tell her that, as soon as you hear of my being buried, you
shall see if you can raise money enough to get back to Jersey; and that
I charge her——”
“Buried! father.”
“Yes. I am very ill, and it is my belief that I shall die here. So your
mother is very unhappy?”
“Yes: but you don’t mean that you are really going to die? I am sure
something might be done to persuade the king to take some of your
stone-ware, if you have not the money. I am sure they would let you out
in that way. And my mother is so miserable! Every footstep that I am apt
to take for Aaron’s, she thinks must somehow be Louise; and then she
thinks of how proud it would make her to see Louise’s husband setting
all right, and——”
“Poor child! She taunts you with having no lover here! No wonder you
look for Aaron back! She finds fault with you again for sending away
poor François, who would indeed have been a great help to us now. But no
wonder you look for Aaron back!”
“It was such a disappointment last night, father! There was a soft tap
at the door, just before we went to bed; and we never doubted its being
Aaron. I told him through the key-hole that I would open the door in a
minute; and when I did, it was Mr. Studley. And now he will have it,
from what I said, that Aaron is with us sometimes; and he would stay——”
“Your mother would not let him in, to be sure? She would not let the
rascal in?”
“She could not lawfully prevent his coming in; but she would not allow
him to stay there. I never saw such a spirit in her before. But we heard
him outside for three hours after. If I could have persuaded my mother
to go into the back room, so that he could not have heard her cry, I
should not have minded it so much.”
“What! has the fellow overheard our lamentation? I thought your mother
had——That should never have happened if I had been at home.”
“Then I wish you would come home, father. Never mind the loss. Never
mind the ruin, if it must be ruin.”
Le Brocq answered doggedly, as he had always done before, that he had
not the money. If any body had told him, when he took the business,
that, independently of his scrape with the Excise Court, he should now
be without money, he would not have believed it, after all that had been
held out to him about the quantity of money he should make. It was not
from spending. He had pinched and toiled more than he had ever done in
Jersey; and all to plunge himself deeper. If he had been out of
business, dressing his wife in velvet, and feasting on foreign fruits
and claret, he would have paid less to the state than he had done as an
employer of workmen, denying himself and his family, meantime, anything
beyond the commonest comforts of life. It was the paying several times
over that was enough to ruin any man. The workmen could not pay the
taxes upon everything that they ate, and drank, and wore. Their wages
were raised in proportion; so that their masters paid. No man should
judge of his fortune by his returns till he knew what he had to pay in
wages. O, yes; he charged these wages in the price of his bottles, so
that the bottle consumers paid in their turn: but he, as a consumer of
other things, paid in his turn, in like manner; till, among so many
outgoings, he had no money left. And all for what? To contribute his
share towards the expenses of government, which he might have paid, if
he had been properly asked, at half the cost, and a hundredth part of
the pain and trouble!
“But you did not like that way of paying when you were in Jersey,
father.”
“Because I was told there was a better, and was fool enough to believe
it. It is the most shameful hoax, the making me pay as I have paid since
I came here! You need not look so frightened, as if I was talking
treason,” he continued, seeing that Anna was uneasy at his being
overheard complaining of being hoaxed in state matters. “I am saying no
harm of the king; for he loses more than I. If I am hoaxed, he is
double-hoaxed, as I could easily prove.”
“Could you? Then perhaps,” said Anna, timidly, “perhaps, if you told him
so——”
“Ay; I could set the case plainly enough before him, if I could see him;
but there’s the difficulty.”
“I will ask Mr. Durell, and he will ask the Board, I dare say,”
exclaimed Anna. “We could say that you would not detain his majesty very
long,—not more than half an hour, perhaps.”
“Not so much; but I am afraid that would not do. If you consider how
many hundreds of people are in prison, or otherwise ruined by the
Excise, it seems hardly likely that the king should give half-an-hour to
each.”
One of the inmates of the apartment, who was keeping himself awake with
playing Patience with the dirty cards, while the other dozed, here put
in his word.
“If his majesty gave his time to every body that is injured by the
Excise, there would be no time left for any other business; and you are
simple people if you do not know that.”
“There is another thing,” observed Le Brocq. “If the king was on our
side, there are his ministers to convince. Now, it seems to me that his
majesty might not exactly carry in his head all I might say, to repeat
to them; and it would be as well that he should have it in black and
white.”
“O, a letter to him!” cried Anna, brightening. “Let me write down to
your speaking, father; now, while I am here; and I can put it into the
post-office as I go home. They say letters are most sure to reach people
when they go through the post-office.”
Anna laid aside her bonnet, put her hair back from her face, and looked
round for something wherewith to dust the shabby, rickety table. The
card-player picked the pocket of the sleeper of his handkerchief, and
handed it to Anna, who used it without scruple, rather than that the
king should have to open a dirty letter. But where was the paper? If she
went out to buy a sheet, perhaps they would not let her come in again;
and her father had none. The card-player again offered to be their
resource. He proposed to let them have a sheet of paper, and the use of
his ink, pen, and penknife for a shilling.
“Money again!” exclaimed Le Brocq. “The English go on ruining one
another, even in jail, with asking for money, money, for ever. I shall
pay away no more money, I assure you, sir.”
“Well, then, money’s worth will do as well. That young lady has brought
something for you in her basket, I believe?”
“I have, sir. I have brought something for my father, as you say; and
for no one else. When we lived in Jersey, it was a pleasure to make and
bake for those that wanted it, and to give it even before they asked for
it. But what I have brought is for my father’s eating, and not to pay
away for a sheet of paper, when it happens to be his need to write a
letter. Father, I like this place less and less for you. I did not think
there had been a place, even a prison, where people who sit at the same
table would so take advantage of one another’s wants.”
“Even a prison!” said the man, smiling; “why, ma’am, I hope you don’t
think the worst people are found in prisons? Let me tell you that those
whom you would call the worst have the sense to keep out of prison. If
you had lived in London as long as I have, you would see how a prison
has lost its bad name; as it ought to do, if it is to be judged by the
people it holds.”
“I should be afraid it would give a bad name to the people it holds,
instead of getting a good one to itself,” observed Anna, sighing.
“No, no. You Jersey people know nothing about our English prisons. In
your island, a man must be a really bad man, or have done some one very
bad deed, to get himself shut up. But here, what do you see? Almost all
the prisoners are in for debt, or for crimes against property, or for
revenue offences. The first and last are not reckoned crimes in a
country where it is so difficult to a great number to keep clear of
money entanglements and of tax-gatherers; and under the other head come
those who would not have done worse than their neighbours, but for such
want as you do not see in Jersey. In our prisons, you meet more of the
poor and the ignorant than of the guilty; and, this being seen, prisons
are losing their bad name, as I said, among the people. You will hardly
speak ill of them, from this time forward, your father having been in
one, and hundreds more as good as he.”
Anna saw that there must be something very wrong about all this. It
perplexed all her notions about guilt and punishment. She had till now
looked upon her father as an injured man, and regarded him as an
innocent person, detained by mistake in a horrible place, and among vile
companions; and now to be told that the only mistake was in her notion
of a prison, and that her father was no more than an ordinary inmate,
dismayed her so that she desired to hear no more. She spread out
Louise’s letter, and proposed to write on it in pencil what her father
had to say to the king; and to copy it out fair at home. The card-player
found it to no purpose to reduce his terms. His first overcharge had
deprived him of a customer for his dingy paper and dusty ink. The letter
was as follows:—
“I, John Le Brocq, have something to say to your majesty which may
prove of equal consequence to us both, and to many more. I am sure
your majesty cannot be aware how much harm is done by the way in which
your majesty’s taxes are collected. I really think that if any one had
set himself to work to devise a way for taking as much as possible
from us people, and giving as little as possible of it to you the
king, and hindering manufactures and trade at the same time, he could
not have hit upon a cleverer scheme than that of the excise system of
taxation. As for myself, I have only to say, that I would rather have
paid twice over as much as your majesty has received of my money, than
have been deluded and cheated as I have been; of which, however, I beg
to add, I believe your majesty entirely innocent. The fault is in the
system, sir; and I believe you did not make it. But here I am in
prison. My son is gone away, we do not know where; and my daughter is
under prosecution, having (as I will say, though she holds the pen)
never had an evil thought of your majesty in her life. All this is
from our having fallen into mistakes about taxes which I am sure we
never made any difficulty about paying. Not having been told what a
large capital I should require for advancing the tax on the
stone-bottles I make, and for paying the high wages my men must have
to buy taxed articles, I should have found it difficult to get on,
even if I had not been fined for breaking laws which I defy any man to
learn in a day; and which, I must say, do not tell much to the credit
of those who made them. And how much of this goes into your majesty’s
pocket, after all? for that is the chief point. I, for one, know of a
crowd of fellows that have to be paid out of the money in question for
spying and meddling about our premises in a way that hinders our work
terribly. One in ten or twenty,—ay, one in fifty of these men would be
enough to collect what we should have to contribute, if we each knew
our own share, and might pay and have done with it. And these men are
not all that profit by the plan. It affords a good excuse for making
people give higher prices than the tax of itself would oblige them to
give. Your majesty may have heard what the tavern-keepers did when a
tax equal to twopence a bottle was laid on port wine? They clapped on
sixpence a bottle directly; something in the same way that we put a
higher price on our stone pots, which are not taxed, to make them more
nearly equal with the bottles which are taxed. This saves us in part
from the spite of the glass-bottle makers, who, I fancy, were the
parties that got our article taxed; but it has the effect of stinting
the use of them. Your glass-bottle duty brings you in a very little
more than 100,000_l._, and that on stone-bottles little more than
3000_l._ a-year; while, if there were no such duties, there would be
so much traffic in foreign mineral waters, and other liquids that
people cannot get on account of the duty, as would much improve the
affairs of the shipping, and the wealth of your majesty’s subjects,
who would then easily make you welcome to more than the sums named
above, if you could not do without them. Then the army of excisemen
(who can hardly be a sort of persons much to your majesty’s taste)
might be employed in helping instead of hindering others’ business.
Then again, please to think of the injury to thousands of men from
trade being cramped and put out of its natural order. To make soap and
glass and my particular article, there is much coal wanted; and for
paper-making, iron machinery; and for all, houses, and furnaces or
coppers. Now, if the trade in each were not cramped by the dearness of
the article, there would be more work for the woodcutter and the
carpenter, for the miner and coal hewer, for the brickmaker and the
shipmaster, and a great number more. O, your majesty may depend upon
it, however much may be said about the riches and glory of this
kingdom, it might be richer and more glorious, and far happier, if
your people were allowed to pay to the state in a less wasteful and
pernicious way; while you would find your advantage in it before the
year was over. If you should please to consult your ministers about
this, and to order them to let me out, I think I could engage to show
them the difference, as far as my own share is concerned: though the
experiment is by no means a fair one when tried on only one article.
If your majesty thinks of travelling, perhaps you may manage to take
Jersey in your way; and there I think you will own that the advantage
of steady natural prices and a free trade are very evident in the
comfortable condition of the people.”
“Had not we better stop here?” asked Anna. “I am afraid if we make it
longer he will not read it.”
Le Brocq was sorry to leave off just when he was about to describe his
own country; but he acknowledged the propriety of doing so. Anna just
slipped in a postscript of her own.
“Perhaps your majesty will consider the mischief of a man like my
father being shut up and treated like a criminal, in such a place as a
prison, where he can only play cards to pass the day, (and that with
disagreeable people,) instead of being industrious in his family, as
he would wish. Perhaps this may lead you to take pity on my mother,
who, for all her Bible can say, is worn down with grief; and on my
brother, who is a wanderer from fear of a prison; and on me, who am in
the like danger. Next to Him who bindeth and looseth, your majesty is
our only hope,—not only for present pardon, but for altering the laws,
that we may not fall into the like trouble again.——Your obedient
servant,
”ANNA LE BROCQ.”
“How much of that letter do you fancy the king will ever read, if he
gets it?” asked the card-player, smiling.
“It is hardly long enough to tire him much, if it is nicely copied; and
ours is very good ink,” replied Anna.
“But I mean, do you think he will find it worth attending to?”
“They say he used to write frequent letters to his father and mother
when he was young; and so he must know that when people write a letter,
they like to have it attended to.”
“Then, if I write to you, ma’am, I shall expect an answer.”
“You can have nothing to say to me which you cannot say now to my face—
an opportunity which we have not with the king,” replied Anna, quietly.
She then turned to her father, and offered to bring him dominoes, which
she thought he would like better than those cards. She also hoped she
could borrow a book or two from the Durells. Permission was given to
try; but she was warned that her request might be refused if it was
really Durell’s doing that the family were persecuted and distressed.
She knew that this was so far from being the case, that Durell himself
was under extreme vexation from an imputation of Studley’s, that he had
allowed himself to be bribed in his office by the Le Brocqs; but there
was no hope of persuading her father yet that Durell was not an enemy.
She succeeded better in another direction. She got leave to consult with
her mother, and see whether the fine could not be raised. Le Brocq
really looked and felt very unwell; and the unlimited prospect of
confinement, dust, disagreeable companionship and dominoes, was far from
cheering.
The sun now shot its level rays upon an opposite roof which glittered
back into the apartment.
“This is just the weather and the time for seeing Coutances Cathedral,”
observed the prisoner, as Anna was about to leave the room. She also was
just thinking of Jersey, its wide views and pure atmosphere; but she had
said nothing to tantalize him who was confined in a space of twenty
square feet.
“You may leave me Louise’s letter, after all,” said he, forgetting what
was written on the back. He was chafed at the circumstance, but would
not read the epistle before witnesses. He would wait till Anna’s next
visit; but, as soon as she was gone, he gave away the supper she had
brought him, and rejected all amusement in his pining for news of his
blossoming orchard, and of the fruitful pastures of his native island.
While he settled within himself that Anna was an unexceptionable
daughter, his mind’s eye was occupied with Louise, hailing her graceful
kine, or pacing on her pack-horse through the deepest of the lanes. When
he looked round him, he wished that it was dark, that he might fancy
himself there.
CHAPTER II.
KNITTING AND UNRAVELLING.
The pottery business was not brought quite to a stand in consequence of
the master’s absence. The women could not undertake to carry it on as
usual; and there was not money enough coming in to pay the people’s
wages: but Anna was on the spot to read the letters that came; it was
thought a pity that the horse should either be sold or stand idle; and,
what was more, the boy Brennan seemed to have gained ten years in spirit
and wisdom since he had been taken notice of by Durell. One of the
workmen, who had been on the premises a good many years, and who
cordially disliked Studley, was willing to do his best to keep the
concern going, either till Aaron should appear or Le Brocq be released.
The little fellow at the lathe remained, and one furnace was employed,
just to execute the most pressing orders, and preserve something of the
credit and custom of the establishment. Nothing more than executing
orders was attempted; for it was very undesirable to add to the stock.
Anna’s wish was to dispose of enough of this stock to pay her father’s
fine and the law expenses, which together made no small sum: but,
whether from a suspicion respecting the fair dealing of the family,
arising from Le Brocq’s imprisonment, or from the absence of all the
parties who could push the business, no sales could be effected. Durell
put her in the way of advertising in the newspapers; from which nothing
accrued but the expense of the advertisements. Brennan exerted all his
ingenuity to embellish his handy work; but his endeavours brought no new
customers. He was chidden by the man under whom he worked for his
fancies about new patterns. He was grumbled at by his comrade at the
lathe for keeping him after working hours, to finish some fresh device.
He was gravely questioned by his mother about spending a portion of his
hard earnings in buying some new runners which formed a remarkably
pretty ring-pattern for his jars; and, after all, nobody bought a jar or
a flask the more. Hour after hour, Anna sat amidst her stock, growing
nervous over her work in listening for footsteps. Day after day, she
came in to dinner, without any news for her mother, and almost afraid to
meet her inquiring eye. The stock was offered at a low price. If she
could have sold the duty-paid part of it, her father would have been
injured by being compelled to sacrifice his interest upon the advance of
duty he had made for his customers. As it would not sell, he was more
injured still. He could not get back the principal of this advance. It
seemed as if Le Brocq could not escape in any way from being injured by
this excise system. So it was; and so it is with all who in this country
buy any thing, or make any thing, or live in any less primitive manner
than Robinson Crusoe or Little Jack.
There was another reason for Anna being nervous over her work, besides
listening in vain for customers. The affair of the tea had never come to
an end. From the quantity of business before the court, and from other
circumstances, it had been postponed; and one or two of Anna’s friends
had tried to persuade her that she would hear no more of it. But she was
too anxious to be easily comforted. She knew Studley too well to believe
that he would stop short of injuring the family to the utmost. She found
that she was legally guilty; and she suffered little less than if she
had been morally guilty. Day and night was the idea of approaching
exposure and punishment before her. There were but few people,—not
half-a-dozen of her nearest neighbours,—who would believe in her utter
ignorance of the excise laws; and her character for fair dealing would
be gone. If Aaron had not run away, she almost thought she should. She
could now fancy how people might be driven to destroy themselves. The
old feeling which had embittered her childish disgraces now came back
upon her,—that if she could but get out of this one scrape, she would go
somewhere where she could never get into another. If she forgot her
apprehensions for an hour in her concern for her parents’ troubles, they
came back to plunge her into redoubled misery. It may be doubted whether
many criminals suffer so much in the prospect of their trial and
punishment as did this innocent girl from the consequences of a
factitious transgression. They who prepare the apparatus for such
transgression can little know what demoralization and misery they are
causing, or they would throw up their task.
She knew Studley best. She was the least surprised, though infinitely
the most dismayed, when the crisis came at last. She heard her mother’s
heavy tread in the shed below, and could trace her progress to the foot
of the stairs by the jingling among the wares.
“Anna! Anna, child!” exclaimed the old lady, out of breath with her
exertions. “Here is Mr. Studley! you must come down; he won’t leave his
business with me.” After an interval, “Anna, child, do you hear?”
“Yes, mother.”
“Then, are you coming?”
“Yes, mother.”
“Well, make haste.”
Studley was there in his capacity of messenger. His errand was not, to
his taste, so good as if he had come with a levy warrant, or a body
warrant;—a summons was but a poor infliction; but, such as it was, he
enjoyed it.
“When must I go, sir?”
“To-morrow, at eleven. You must be at the court by eleven precisely,
remember.”
“And may I take any body with me, sir?”
“Do you mean as counsel, or merely as a support to your spirits?”
“I have nothing to defend, sir. I have no other excuse than my not
knowing the law; and I can as well say that myself as get anybody to say
it for me. I only mean that I should not like to be quite alone, if the
law allows me to take any friend with me.”
“O, if you can persuade any body to appear with you, I have no idea that
the court will make any objection.”
“Will you please to stop a moment, sir? Is it the same court that my
brother was to have appeared in, or some other?”
“Bless me, what an idea! You do not take me for a servant of the police
magistrates, I suppose? It was before two police magistrates that your
brother was to have gone; and I summon you before the Excise Court of
Summary Jurisdiction. There is all the difference in the world.”
It might be so; but to Anna’s ringing ears and bewildered comprehension
they were much alike. Studley applied himself to explain. The police
magistrates were, according to him, far less awful personages, inasmuch
as they tried all sorts of people for all sorts of offences; while the
Commissioners deputed from the Excise Board to sit as judges in the
Court of Summary Jurisdiction concerned themselves in nothing but excise
offences or complaints. They had a vast deal of business to do, and sat
twice a week for nine months in the year.
“Then I think,” observed Mrs. Le Brocq, “there must be more breaking of
the excise laws than of any other kind of law.”
“There is a great deal of that sort of thing. Miss Le Brocq will find
herself by no means solitary. The court settled eleven hundred cases
last year, do you know?”
“Well, if I were the king,” said the mother, “I had rather go without
some of my money than have eleven hundred of my subjects brought into
one court in one year, for not paying me properly, through mistake or
otherwise.”
When Anna could think, she remembered her former determination to ask
Mrs. Durell to go with her before the court. She lost no time in
proceeding to her house to make the request.
“Sit still, Stephen,” said she mournfully, when she saw that Stephen was
trying to shift out of sight, as was his wont when any of her family
were known to be near. “Sit still, and put away your meek look before
me. You have nothing to fear from any of us, even if I held proof in
this right hand that you had done what we thought you did. We are ruined
now. We have no heart to defend ourselves, or to try to punish our
enemies.”
“Pooh, pooh! this is all about the tea. They have been troubling you
about the tea,” said good Mrs. Durell; “and so you can see nothing but
what is dismal this afternoon.”
“Indeed, Mrs. Durell, it is too true,” replied Anna, struggling with her
tears. “I just came to ask you to go with me to-morrow morning—to be at
the court by eleven o’clock.”
“I have no objection in the world, my dear, but this. It might not be
thought well for the surveyor’s wife to be with you, perhaps. It might
give occasion for something being said. Is there no other friend who
might do you more service?”
Anna had no other friend. She could not think of taking her mother into
a place so strange to her, and to see such a sight.
“Such a sight! Why, what sort of sight? How my husband would laugh at
you, if he were here! One would think you were going to be tried for
some foul crime. You will be surprised to find what a simple, easy thing
it is, after all you have been fancying. O, I will go with you, my dear,
if you can’t find a better person.”
“I do not think we need mind your being a surveyor’s wife,” said Anna,
“when we consider how the court is made up of people that are connected
together. The people of this court accuse me; and the people of this
court summon me, and bear witness against me; and the people of this
court judge and punish me. I never heard of such a court before; and I
cannot say I think it a just one.”
“There you are only of the same mind with everybody else, Anna. It is a
kind of court which might better suit some slavish country than Great
Britain. Without finding any fault with the gentlemen who sit in it, one
may venture that much. The gentlemen understand their business very
well, people say; and there is great convenience, in so complicated a
system, in our having a place where excise matters may be settled
speedily and cheaply, in comparison with what they might be under some
other plan: but all this does not mend the principle of the court;
through which the court might, if it chose, ruin half the traders in
London. It is too great a privilege for any set of men to have,—that of
meddling with thousands of traders in the heart of the empire, and
taking the accusing and judging and punishing all into their own hands.
There now! there’s a sigh! as if they were conspiring against you. If
you will believe me, it will be over in a few minutes; and everybody
will forget all about you the moment you have turned your back, and a
new case is called on.”
“No; not Mr. Studley.”
“O, yes: Mr. Studley too; and, what is more, you yourself. You will have
forgotten what took you there by the time you come away again. At least,
I never went there without seeing or hearing something that took me out
of myself for the whole day after.”
There was not much comfort in this; and Anna found she must wait till
the next day to know fully what it meant. Mrs. Durell’s next piece of
advice undid all the little good she had done by making light of the
occasion. She thought the intended visit to the prison had better be
deferred till to-morrow afternoon, or the day after; as Le Brocq would
perhaps lose his night’s rest in thinking about what was to happen in
the court. This proved to Anna that she was not the only one who saw
something serious in the affair.
How should she dress? If she wore her best, it might be taken for
defiance. If her everyday dress, (now shabby,) it might look like
wishing to attract compassion. Mrs. Durell assured her that there would
scarcely be time for any one to note her dress; but she did the kindest
thing in inducing Anna to look altogether Jersey-like, so that her true
account of herself and her error might be corroborated by her costume.
“Did not your mother say kindly that she would teach Stephen to knit?”
said Mrs. Durell.
“Ay, who should forget old quarrels, if not such good people as you? And
think of the benefit to Stephen to have such a resource! to have
something to employ his hands upon in rainy weather, when my Jack is
gone to school! It would be a good time to begin this evening, I think,
if you like to take him home with you. Stephen will be glad to do his
part towards the forgiving and forgetting, I have no doubt.”
Anna saw at once what a happy thought this was. Her mother liked nothing
so well as teaching people to knit; and if a blind person, so much the
better;—it took twice as long. It would help off this heavy evening, and
save Anna from the _tête-à-tête_ with her mother which she dreaded
nearly as much as what was to follow. Stephen seemed on the eve of a
yawn at the proposal; but he knew his own interest too well not to seize
this opportunity of placing himself on good terms with the Le Brocq
family; and he consented to accompany Anna home.
He made himself particularly agreeable, and fancied that he might have
been more so if they would but have invited him to sing: but he did not
choose to offer it, remembering where he had once volunteered a similar
service before. As he could not sing, he told some of his adventures, by
bits and snatches, in the intervals of letting down stitches and waiting
to have them taken up again. The reserve of the old lady melted away
under the glow of conscious benevolence, while imparting her own
favourite accomplishment to another; and Anna relented as she saw her
mother cheered; and the faster in proportion as she became so herself.
“Nothing is so strange to me,” she said, after a pause, when the evening
was far advanced, “(and I cannot help thinking that it is a thing too
strange to last,) how people shut their minds up,—how much they hide
from one another, when they are brought as close together as face to
face in water.”
“Ay, mistress, there you have Scripture for its not being so for ever.”
“And other signs, too, besides that Scripture saying. But, for an
instance of what I mean, Mr. Stephen, here are you sitting between my
mother and me; and for want of a window in your breast, we know no more
of what we want to know, and of what you could tell us in two minutes,
than if you were at one end of the world and we at the other.”
“I thought of that,” replied Stephen, “when I saw John Baker standing to
take his trial for murder, when he had been beside me, and both of us
like brothers, for a month. There, thought I, stands the man, with the
secret in him: and when he was questioning and cross-questioning one and
another, it seemed a ridiculous beating about the bush, just for want of
a window in his own breast, as you say. But I wonder what makes you
think it will ever be otherwise. If men were all made alike, I grant you
there would be a chance of all being known; for they are the fewest, I
fancy, who can never be melted into telling everything. I am sure when
an old comrade gets me beside him under a sunny hedge, or when Mr.
Durell and I are over our spirit and water, there is nothing that in
some moods I can keep to myself.”
Anna inwardly wished that it might be so when he was sitting between two
knitters, sociably learning their art.
“But,” continued Stephen, “there are, and always will be, men whose
taste is for secrecy. There will always be men who will no more make a
clean or an open breast than they would pull their hearts out.”
“They will be read, like others, for all that,” Anna said. “The longer
men live together, and the more their eyes are turned upon each other,
the more they learn to gather from signs. See how much doctors learn
from marks which signify nothing to us, and the deaf from countenances,
and the blind from tones of voice, and then tell me whether, if we were
as observant as all these together, we might not read more of a man’s
mind than we now think of. And if we also study the make of the mind as
some have learned to do, we may get to know of things unseen, something
in the way of the wise men who can tell us, years before, when a comet
is coming,——”
“Or of the common man who knew the exact spot where a lion was, miles
off, before it could be either seen or heard.”
“How was that?” asked Mrs. Le Brocq, with some scepticism in her tone.
“He saw a large bird of prey in the air, so far off that it seemed but a
speck. It hovered, which showed that there was a prey beneath; and it
did not drop, which showed that something was beside the prey which
prevented the bird from seizing it; and, from the nature of the country
and of the bird, that something could be nothing but a lion; and a lion
it was. It was by putting things together that the man knew this; and it
is by putting things together that men will be known, if ever they are
known.”
“I am sure it is much to be wished that they should be,” sighed Anna.
“Well, now, I don’t agree with you there. I think half the fun in life
lies in men puzzling one another, and watching one another in their
puzzle.”
“It has been the amusement of your life, we have some reason to think:
but we have only too much cause to wish that hearts could be laid open
to man as they are to God, The greatest support that we have in God is
in being sure that he knows all; and if men could read us as thoroughly,
and be sure that they read aright, there would be an end of our
troubles. My father would be seen to have meant no mistake, and I to
have never had such a thought as cheating the king; and we should know
where Aaron is, and exactly why he went away. It seems to me that men
make almost every sin and trouble they suffer under; and that it is done
by making mysteries and laying snares for one another.”
Mrs. Le Brocq had hitherto looked rather less solemn than had been her
wont since the afflictions of the family began: but now her tears were
falling on her knitting needles, and Stephen overheard a little sob. He
entreated her not to vex herself, and to hope that all was well with
Aaron, and so forth. But this is not the kind of consolation which will
satisfy any mother’s heart; and Mrs. Le Brocq said so.
“If you would comfort me,” said she, “you must tell me where he is. How
should I believe that all is well with him when there is the sea where
he may be drowned, and the workhouse where he may find his way as a
beggar, and plenty of prisons where he may be shut up, and snares spread
every where for him to fall into? I never hear of any evil happening but
I think that he may be in it; and when I pray——”
“O, mother, hush! Don’t speak so, mother.”
“I say, child,—it may be a sin, but I can’t help it,—I have often lately
in my prayers fixed a time when I will despair of God’s mercy if my boy
does not come or send: and always as the time passes away, I do the same
thing again; and cannot set my mind either to give him up, or to hope
with any certainty to see him more. You are a good child to me, Anna;
and all that you say about trusting is very right; and I dare say it
comforts you, though I have overheard you crying in the night oftener
than you know of. But for myself I say, if you wish to comfort me, tell
me where Aaron is.”
“Well, then, I will tell you where he is,” cried Stephen, throwing away
his handywork. “I don’t know what I may get for it; but I can no more
help it than I could help telling anything to poor John Baker, when we
sat under a hedge, as I said, and he kept all his own secrets while I
was telling him all mine.”
Neither Anna nor her mother spoke a word. It had never occurred to them
that Stephen could know more of their nearest concerns than they did
themselves.
“I will tell you where he is,” continued Stephen, “and you may trust me
for knowing; for it was I that helped him off, and put him in the way of
a flourishing business. But you must promise me to tell nobody what I
say. That is, I suppose you must tell Le Brocq, but not till he has
engaged to let it go no farther.”
The promise was readily made, and then Stephen told that, so far from
its being reasonable to expect Aaron when any one approached the house,
Aaron was far off on the sea. He was plying in a smuggling vessel
between one of the Channel islets and the south coast of England.
“Aaron a smuggler!”
“Yes; and with all his heart. He had very little reason to like the law,
while he was within its bound; and was not at all sorry to get out of
its bound. Would it not be just the same with your father, now, if he
could get away? Has he any reason to like the law? and do you think even
he, though he is an orderly man enough, would hold it any great crime
for a persecuted man to go beyond its reach?”
“I call it coming within the reach of the law, not going beyond it,”
said Anna, mournfully. “The way to get out of reach of its oppression is
to go back to Jersey; and that is what I trust my father will do. O, why
did not Aaron do that?”
“He was afraid of being laid hold of either by the law or by your
father,—and Aaron has no taste for tyranny, either way. The open sea,
with a lawless calling, is much more to his mind. While he was here, he
had no more chance for freedom than a midge in a field of gossamer; and
now, he is like a roving sea-bird, lighting on a rock to rest when he
likes, and then away again over the waters.”
“You will not deceive us any more, Stephen, by your way of hiding ugly
things with fine words. The plain truth, dress it up as you will, is,
that Aaron is living by braving the law. You know that he cannot show
himself fearlessly among men: you know that he comes abroad at night
because his works will not bear the daylight. You must have taken
advantage of him in his distress, or he could never have thought of such
a step. But I think no distress that I could ever fall into would make
me follow your bidding, seeing how you have already deceived us to our
ruin. O, why did not Aaron go back to Jersey?”
“I wish, mistress, you would be a little less hard upon me. I did the
best I could think of for your brother. When he came to Mr. Durell’s to
learn what was likely to befall him, I thought it only kind to tell him,
as soon as Durell had turned his back, that there were means at hand for
getting away, and leaving the tread-mill far behind him.”
“So far we are obliged to you, I am sure,” observed Mrs. Le Brocq. “I
should not have liked to see my boy on the tread-wheel.”
“So I knew, and I asked no reward beyond what it cost him nothing to
give. I went with him myself, and introduced him on board a boat that
you may have chanced to see off Gorey in the season. It is all very well
to go and get oysters; but there is another more profitable sort of
business to be done in those seas,—and will be, as long as the Customs
duties of this country remain as they are. So, Aaron was off with a fair
wind and tide; and I suppose he may now be cooling himself in a
sea-cave, without leave of the law, since the law took him off from
broiling himself beside a glass furnace.”
“Does Mr. Durell know where he is?”
“He never asked me; and, depend upon it, he will never ask you.”
“And what was the reward you desired of Aaron that it cost him nothing
to give?”
“Only just a promise that I should hear nothing more of certain caps and
handkerchiefs that you lost, once upon a time. You will have a letter
from Aaron, (when he can send it so that you shall not know whether it
comes from east or west,) to ask you, for his sake, never to mention
that matter more.”
“So you did take them! I do believe you are a smuggler yourself,”
declared Anna. There was a tremor in her voice which showed Stephen that
she was more or less alarmed at sitting next a smuggler and a thief.
“Don’t be thinking of shifting your chair, Miss Anna. My pranking days
are past. A cursed bitter wind, one cold night, inflamed my eyes, and
brought me to the pass of being scarcely able to tell bright moonlight
from pitch darkness; and then I could be of little use on the sea. I
tried what I could do for our company on land, by discharging an errand
or two for them, one of which was at your farm. But the hue and cry you
made after me through all the island spoiled my game; and there was
nothing for it but giving up and coming here, that I might not hurt
those I could not help. So my pranking days are over.”
“Then you are only half blind? Where is our linen? How did you get
away?”
“I shall tell you, because you cannot recover the goods, in the first
place: in the next, your credit is none of the best, just now, and would
not overbalance my denial in any court; and lastly, I consider that I
have paid off my debt in saving your brother. Come, come: no sighing
over my plain-speaking, or I shall leave off speaking plain. I am full
three quarters blind, and so only one quarter a knave. I can see the
candle on the table; but I should not know you from your mother, except
by the walk and the voice. I can see a field from an orchard, but I
could not have found my way if your brother had not first guided me. As
for your linen, I did not steal it to make money by. It is bleaching on
certain rocks beside the sea, or worn by some of the sun-burnt damsels
that Aaron knows by this time,—who can keep watch as well as any
coast-guard, or broil a fish handily when there is notice that the boat
is creeping home through the land-shadow. They wanted a supply of such
things; and I promised to bring some ready-made: but I went to the wrong
place. In England, one may carry off a crammed washing basket, and
nobody thinks it much of a wonder; but in Jersey, one might almost as
well steal the island charter, to judge by the hue and cry that was made
after me. I never saw such simple people.”
“That comes of not making crimes of things that are innocent in
themselves,” said Anna, proud of her native island. “If it was treated
as a crime to make soap or burn glass in one way rather than another,
people would soon grow careless of so common a thing as crime, and make
much less difficulty about breaking the law whenever it suited them.
They are the most moral people who know of no crimes but those which God
has called such, and who, while they pray ‘lead us not into temptation,’
take care to add none to the temptations that God thinks enough for
their strength.”
“But how did you get away?” asked Mrs. Le Brocq. “I was awake a long
while that morning, and I never heard you stir.”
“That was because I was gone, I suppose. Knowing that it would take me
some time to get down to the shore, I only waited till you all seemed
sound asleep. The finding the latch of the door was a long job, wishing
as I did to make no noise. When it was done, I expected to have come
back again, for I made a great stumble on the threshold.”
“I wish you had done it as you came in,” observed Mrs. Le Brocq. “It
would have been a token to us to look more closely after you.”
“If you had dogs,” continued Stephen, “they were so obliging as to be
very quiet. There was only one creature that made a great noise,—and
that I had no objection to,—an owl in the ivy about your chimney. I
could not for the life of me help standing to shriek like an owl, to
keep it up. I have often thought since how I stayed leaning over the
palings, hooting, when my proper business was to slink away. Well, when
I had got down to the brook-side, it took me some time to gather the
linen together.”
“We have often wondered how you managed to carry it all away.”
“It was a heavy load for some way; but I left the half of it on the
ridge, when I was once clear of your place,—left it for my comrades to
fetch when I had got down to the boat, and told them where to go for it.
Luckily for me, you had been washing a large bag——”
“My wool-bag!” exclaimed the old lady, piteously.
“Your wool-bag, was it? I am glad it had wanted washing that time. I
crammed it full of the smaller things, and the rest made a great bundle
tied with a coil of Aaron’s cord which I found in his coat-pocket. You
remember I had his clothes on?”
This was a fact not likely to be forgotten.
“I went down with the bag, and left the bundle just on the off-side of
the ridge. The boat was dawdling within hail, all as it should be,
though they had nearly given me up; for I had been so long groping about
that it was nearly time for you early Jersey people to be up and out of
doors. Two of our comrades went up for the bundle, and carried——I dare
say you will not believe what I am going to say now?”
“Why not?”
“Because in Jersey you are not up to the smuggling ways which are well
enough understood everywhere on the south coast of England. We expected
that you would do as the people do there;—if your horses were found
tired in the morning, or any convenient thing taken away, look round to
see what was left in exchange, or trust that something would come, and
hold your tongues about the trespass. Supposing you understood all this,
we sent up a choice cask of spirits and a package of tobacco, and some
prettier things for you ladies than any we took away. These were to have
been left for you on the ridge; but we soon saw it would not do.”
“We should never have guessed,” said Mrs. Le Brocq; “and indeed I do not
well understand it now. But how do you mean that it would not do?”
“By the fluster you made, our people saw that it would not do,—that you
would have us followed, if we left any sign of who we were, and what
part of the coast we had been upon. It was easy to see that you were not
the folks who could take a hint. There were your fowls fluttering, and
men’s and women’s voices shouting, and Le Brocq thumping with his great
stick, and one of the poor young ladies leaning her head against her cow
to cry.”
“Did they see Louise do that?”
“Miss Louise, was it? Yes, they saw it; and very sorry they were when
they found how the thing was taken; but it showed them that it was time
to be off. So they crept round under the rocks till they could stand out
among the boats from Gorey, being pretty sure that they would pass
unquestioned through the Thames and Medway men, who know something of
what must happen on the Channel waters while the Custom-house interferes
between the French and English as it does. Now, Miss Anna, let me have
the pleasure of hearing that you believe my story,—that you perceive
that I am not a common thief, and that you will fulfil your brother’s
wishes in sparing me all future allusion to my Jersey adventure.”
“I cannot help believing your story, Stephen; and I only wish the King
and his Ministers could hear and believe it; and see how, through their
way of taxing, a man that scorns being a common thief is proud of being
an uncommon one. Yes, Stephen, you are a thief, and you have helped to
make Aaron one. You were a thief towards us, and Aaron is one towards
the Government, getting his living as he does by robbing the State of
some of its dues. God pardon those that made dishonest men of you both!
I had rather see Aaron on the tread-wheel for an offence of mere
heedlessness than out on the free waters on a guilty errand. You have
done him no real good, Stephen. Boast no more of it.”
“I swear that I have,” said Stephen, with his usual good humour; “and
I can do more: I can make the good extend to you. I know you want to
get rid of some of your stock; Durell told me so. I can put you in the
way; but Durell need not know that. It is a pity that your bottles,
and your pretty stone spirit-casks should stand piled upon one another
here, of no use to anybody, while Aaron and his party are bringing over
liquors——”
“Now have done, Mr. Stephen. One might think you were a tempting spirit,
sent to try us. You would sink my mother and me next, I suppose?”
“Not sink, but raise you, my dear;—get your father out of gaol, your
fine paid (for I suppose it will end in your being fined to-morrow)——
Plague on it! here is Durell,—come for me, I suppose. Very kind of him
to come himself! Always kind, I am sure: but if he had left me another
half hour.——Not a word before him, remember.”
“I was afraid you would find Stephen a bad scholar, Mrs. Le Brocq,” said
Durell, taking up the knitting from its dangling position over the side
of the table. “Offer to give Stephen a lesson in anything, and it always
ends in his giving you a story instead.”
“That is what I have been doing to-night, indeed,” replied Stephen. “But
you never saw two people more in need of a story than these ladies. They
are as frightened about this little matter of to-morrow——”
“My wife sends her love to you, Miss Anna,” said Durell, “and she has
been thinking, ever since you saw her, about going with you to-morrow;
and she has made up her mind that it will be against your interest, that
she, a surveyor’s wife, should appear with you. She adds that if you
still urge it——”
“By no means,” said Anna, quickly. “I can go alone. If it is God’s will
that I should have no friends, I trust it is His will that I can do
without them.”
“You will never be without friends while my wife and I live,” replied
Durell, calmly; “but I was going to add, for my own share, that I could
not think of any member of my family appearing in that court as the
friend of any offender. We know perfectly well that you are as innocent
of any intended offence against the Government as my boy Jack; but the
offence is real in law. I owe duty to the Government, and it would
disgrace me in my office, it would be a failure of duty to appear to
countenance any transgression of the law which it is my business to
enforce. One of the penalties of such an office as mine is to have to
speak and act in this way to a friend,—to one whose offence is merely
legal, not moral—but you see——”
“I see.”
“Well: you shall not go alone. Brennan’s mother is a very decent good
woman; and she is so obliged to your family for your kindness to her
boy, that she will go with you with all her heart.”
“Do not say ‘with all her heart.’ Say rather because you asked her,”
said Anna, feeling the humiliation of owing this kind of obligation to a
stranger.
“Nay. Hear from the boy himself, if you will, whether his mother is not
pleased to be of use to you; and if there is anything, my dear, that we
can do for you without compromising my duty, only send for me. If you
want any more law knowledge, I may be able to help you, knowing how
little is learned and wanted in Jersey; and if you should happen to fall
into further trouble, you may look far and wide for a better comforter
than my wife. Come, Stephen, are you ready?”
Anna’s heart sank as they closed the door behind them. She and her
mother looked at one another without speaking. They had been beguiled
for a time by Stephen’s strange stories; but, this being over, they now
found that the best thing they could do was to go to bed.
CHAPTER III.
A MATE FOR MOTHER HUBBARD.
Do criminals feel glad or sorry when they wake and find it broad
morning, two hours before their execution? Are they thankful to have
been beguiled with sound sleep, or had they rather have had broken
slumbers, finding again and again that it is still dark, or only just
dawning yet? To those who love their beds, and dread the coming of the
hour of rising, and nothing worse, there is something pleasant in being
thus repeatedly reminded that it is not time to get up; but how it may
be when a worse evil impends has perhaps never been told. Anna’s
experience (and she felt that her case was very like a going to
execution) could not throw any light upon the matter; for she did not
sleep at all.
Breakfast was as much out of the question as sleep. She did not pretend
to take any, even to please her mother, for she had something to do
which would occupy her whole time till Mrs. Brennan came for her. During
the night it had occurred to her that there could be no harm in carrying
with her a copy of her father’s letter to the King, lest that which she
had put into the post-office should not have reached its destination.
The employment was good for her. It prevented her being in quite so
disagreeable a state of palpitation and thirst as she might have
suffered if she had been quite at liberty for watching the clock. The
Brennans came at last before they were expected.
“Your boy with you, Mrs. Brennan! Do you mean him to go too?”
“He is so very anxious, ma’am, to be of use to you; and it struck him
that you might wish, in the middle of the business, to send for
somebody, or to have some kind of messenger at hand.”
Anna shook her head. Whom could she send for at her utmost need?
“I wonder,” said Anna, when she had put on her shawl, and was casting
her last fluttered look around her,—“I wonder whether I should take a
pound or two of that tea with me. The gentlemen may require to see it.”
“I should be disposed, ma’am,” said Mrs. Brennan, “to leave it to the
informers to show the article that they complain of. It is not your
part, I should think, to be aiding their cause.”
Anna had opened the door of the cupboard where her packages of
adulterated tea were ranged as neatly as every other article which the
house contained. She now quickly closed it, and seeing that there was no
further pretence for lingering, solemnly kissed her mother and departed.
As they walked, Mrs. Brennan showed herself to be a partisan of Anna’s.
In this leaning towards the defendant she was only like other people.
Where the King is prosecutor, not paying for his law, the popular
inclination is usually against him; and especially when he sues for his
moneyed rights. This indicates the policy of contracting instead of
multiplying such proceedings to the utmost.
“I am afraid the judgment will go against you, ma’am,” said the good
woman, “and it is the best kindness to tell you so beforehand. There is
little hope for you against the King, especially when he makes other
people pay his lawyers. A gentleman that I knew was fined 50_l._ and the
costs came to 500_l._ In this court, however, there are often no costs,
and the business is done pretty quickly and cheaply,—which does not, as
I say, make it the less a pity that it should have to be done at all.
You are lucky, too, ma’am, in not having to do with a jury, as juries
were, on excise cases, some time ago. Ma’am, the jury used to have two
guineas and a dinner when they found a verdict for the Crown, and only
one guinea, and no dinner, when they found for the defendant. You may
suppose the accused seldom got his cause.”
“And yet juries seem generally to be thought good things for the
accused,” observed Anna.
“Some people consider it a great stretch of power to do without them in
excise cases, ma’am; but, dear me, there would be no end of trials by
jury, if all that are informed against were so tried. The court would
have to be open all day from the first of January to the last of
December, and a thousand people a year would be ruined for law expenses.
Besides, they say that the quick judgments given by these gentlemen, on
the information of their own servants, strike a wholesome terror into
folks, without which the laws would not be observed.”
Anna could answer for the terror. Whether it was wholesome was another
question.
How she reproached herself for her terrors about her own fate when she
witnessed some of the cases presented this day in court! She could have
been amused at some, from the apparent frivolity of the charges, if the
consequences had not appeared more grave than the accusations: but there
were others which could be viewed only with intense commiseration.
What had Dennis Crook done that he was called upon to pay 4_l._ 15_s._
4½_d._? Dennis Crook was a paper-stainer, and had neglected to pay the
duty of 2_l._ 7_s._ 8¼4_d._, and he was therefore called on for the
double duty in order that the single might be recovered, with costs.
Poor Dennis declared that he had told the collector that he would pay
the duty, and the costs with it, the first day that some money which was
due to him should come in. It was very cruel of the collector to bring
him here, knowing that he had no wish to evade the duty, and that the
bringing him here was enough to ruin his business. It had got abroad
already, and he had lost two customers by it. God forbid that he should
be so inconsiderate to the person who had brought him to this by not
paying him to the day! Dennis could not pay the penalty till this person
yielded him his due,—not a bit the more for being brought here; but that
person should not be exposed by him as he was exposed in this court, to
the destruction of his business. If he should never pay another shilling
of duty to the king, the court might ascribe it to his difficulties
being laid open in this way,—difficulties which might have been got over
easily enough if the court had not stepped in between him and his
customers.—The court did not see what it had to do with all this. The
single duty, with a small increase for costs, was squeezed out of poor
Dennis, who went away, pulling his hat over his eyes, and saying that
this would be the signal for his landlord to turn him out of the little
shop in which he had carried on his business for many years; and God
only knew where he was to establish himself next.
What could have brought hither that respectable elderly woman, who
looked as if she could never in her life have broken a law or a rule?
She came to save her son from a prison, if it might be within her small
means to do so. On his coming of age, she had given up to him the small
tenement she possessed. She had better have kept it till her death. He
had been seduced into a “speculation,” and had set up a private still.
The still and all the spirits on the premises were seized, and the
mother was now here to pay the penalty of 100_l._ which was just half of
the little portion she had destined for her daughter. She knew that it
was more likely that she should have to maintain John than that he would
ever repay this 100_l._, for his character was gone. She cast down her
eyes while she held out the money, with a trembling hand, and did not
speak to John as they went away, though he looked as if he longed above
everything for a word from her. Mrs. Brennan found that much explanation
was necessary before Anna could believe that all this ruin was caused by
the act of distilling spirits without the leave of the government
A widow, in shabby mourning, with a babe in her arms, was quietly crying
in a corner. She had sold her furniture by auction, and had neglected to
get a license. She had better have kept her furniture; for the penalty
swallowed up nearly all the proceeds of the sale. Anna thought this the
most cruel levy of a tax she had ever heard of; for this poor woman
would not have sold her furniture if she had not been in want. To be
compelled to pay for permission to do what was in itself a hardship, was
a stranger piece of oppression than Anna had witnessed yet,—much as she
had seen. She followed the widow, to make sure of the facts, and found
that the poor woman had been on the point of setting up a little shop,
and sharing a cheap lodging with a brother: but now that her money was
almost all gone, she could see nothing before her but selling fruit in
the streets; but, in that case, she must look about for some one who
would take care of her baby, while the other two little ones must tramp
the streets with her. If she had but sold her furniture in any other
way! But her brother advised an auction, and had taken upon himself to
be auctioneer; and how could she suspect what would happen?
The wonder was how those to whom the public money came at last could
enjoy it if they knew of its being wrung in ways like these from the
ignorant, the simple, and the distressed. The old and obvious question
recurred,—why not ask the nation for the money that is wanted, instead
of filching it? Why not settle openly how it is to be paid, and take it
directly, as rent is taken, or as contributions for any other object are
collected? Surely no objections to this simple method of taxation could
long stand when our great nation of buyers and sellers had once found
the comfort of natural and regular prices, of wages not arbitrarily and
uselessly raised,—the luxury of being rid of the oppression of
Custom-houses and Excise courts, and of the plague of a spreading host
of revenue spies. Little could be said of the dignity of the
circumstances out of which the State funds arise by any one who had seen
others of the cases which Anna witnessed, and which really amused her,
and beguiled her of her apprehensions for a time. It seemed ridiculous
that the king should, by his officers, be seriously complaining of being
injured by one man selling pepper without a license, and another
removing wine without a permit, and a third having more brandy in his
cellar than he declared he had, and a fourth having rum under a certain
strength among his stock, and a fifth forgetting to keep an entry-book,
and a sixth tying up his pasteboard in a wrong way, and a seventh having
neglected one night to put down how much black tea he had sold in small
quantities. It did not seem very dignified in any government to concern
itself and worry its subjects about such matters as these. Anna could
have laughed once, when the mention of black tea brought her back to a
consciousness of her own awkward predicament.
What she had seen had much abated her horror, however. She was able,
when called upon, to say that she found she had committed an illegal
act, but that she was not the least aware, at the time, that she was
doing anything improper, as was shown by her offering some of her thorn
leaves to persons who were passing through the field. She could not
think it very kind of those persons to pass by without giving her
warning of what she was doing. She saw, to be sure, that they looked
grave upon her; but how was she to know why, unless they told her? In
Jersey they would not have treated a stranger so.
“And pray do they make tea of thorn leaves in Jersey?” asked one of the
gentlemen.
“Very rarely, because tea is so cheap there that it would not be worth
while; but anybody may do it that likes. I should not have thought of
doing it here but for the dearness of tea; and I never could have
supposed that the custom of the country was first to render tea so dear
as to tempt us to make it for ourselves, and then to punish us for so
making it;—a thing we should never otherwise have thought of.”
Studley, on whose information, supported by witnesses, the whole
proceeded, smiled maliciously, and said that the young woman showed what
family she belonged to by her enmity to the Excise. It went in the
family; her brother having absconded to escape an excise charge, and her
father being now in prison in consequence of one. This statement made
the expected impression. How could the gentlemen do otherwise than think
ill of such a family of delinquents? Studley followed up the matter by
declaring what trouble the Excise had with the Le Brocqs. There was no
other set of people that he had had to watch so closely; no other
premises that he had been obliged to enter so often.
“It is very easy to watch people, Mr. Studley,” said Anna, “without
showing that they have done wrong; and entering premises by day and
night, week after week, does not prove that anything amiss is found
there.”
“It answers another purpose, if I may say so, gentlemen,” interposed
Mrs. Brennan. “If an excise officer has a spite against a family,
nothing is easier than to take away their character by frequent search,
which I believe is what Mr. Studley is trying to do with this family. I
wish, gentlemen, that you would ask Mr. Studley what he has found in any
of his searches from the day that Mr. Aaron went away.”
“Impossible,” said one of the commissioners. “We have nothing to do with
the character of these people; as you, Studley, ought to have remembered
before you entered upon matters with which we have no concern. The
charge was admitted. That is all we have to do with.”
Studley was ordered to recover a fine,—a small one, for the gentlemen
saw something of the nature of the case,—and to destroy or see destroyed
the adulterated tea. Anna humbly listened to the unnecessary admonition
not to repeat the offence, and then begged the gentlemen to let her
father out of prison, where his health was suffering materially from the
confinement. This kind of petition must be sent to the Board,
accompanied by a medical certificate of the state of the prisoner’s
health, one of the gentlemen was informing her, when Studley interfered
to allege that Le Brocq was well able to pay the fine,—better able than
a hundred men who had petitioned the Board in vain for their release.
“If that be the case,” said a commissioner, who had a little attention
to spare from the case which his colleagues had now called on,—“if that
be the case—Is it the case, young woman? Tell me the truth.”
“If my father’s stock could be sold, he might pay,” Anna declared: “but
nobody comes to buy; and nobody will come now that Mr. Studley has taken
away our good name by following us for evil as he has done.”
“He must do his duty. I can hear no complaints against him for doing his
duty. If he has given you cause of complaint, you can have redress by
applying in the right quarter.”
“But, sir, what can I do about the fine? My mother and I are willing to
work night and day to raise the fine, if we knew which way to turn
ourselves: but there seems to be so much danger in employments here that
we are afraid to begin any new ones.”
“O, any one will tell you the law, if it is that you are afraid of. What
sort of employment were you thinking of?”
“My having been asked for so much of my own tea made us think of selling
tea and groceries: but I have seen people fined to-day for selling
pepper without leave, and having tobacco in a private room, and
forgetting to set down at night what they sold in the day, and also for
finding that they had more on hand than they had given an account of. I
should be afraid, sir, to sell groceries. But there is another thing
that was partly put into my head, and partly thought of by myself, owing
to our having a great quantity of duty-paid bottles unsold. My mother
and I have always been used to make cider, and some kinds of sweet wine.
There is talk of a great deal of ginger wine being likely to be drunk
this year, for fear of the cholera. We might make it at little risk, as
ginger is so cheap an article, and we have the bottles.”
“Well: you can but try. You are aware, I suppose, that ginger is not so
cheap here as you can get it in Jersey? Ginger pays duty here.”
“And sugar is taxed too, and so is your little matter of spirit, ma’am,”
interposed Mrs. Brennan. “You must not go to work, reckoning the cost of
all your materials at what you might get them for before you came here.”
“She may easily learn the prices of things,” said the condescending
commissioner; “and then she has only to take care to give in her name
and place of abode, and of her rooms and utensils; and to renew her
license (which will cost two guineas) every year; and to give notice
when she intends to draw off her wine; and to be careful not to send it
out in less quantities than a whole cask containing fifteen gallons.”
Anna looked dismayed, and asked,
“And should we have anything to do with Mr. Studley in that case, sir?”
“If his superiors find that he has reason for suspicion, he may enter at
any hour, provided he takes a constable, at night. He may also break
walls and pull up floors, if he believes that anything improper in his
line is concealed there; but you would be careful to avoid dangers of
this kind, and get yourself visited daily, according to law, to obviate
suspicion.”
“Every day, sir!”
“Yes; if you make wine. If you only retail it, once in twenty-eight days
is all you are subject to; and the annual license for mere retailing is
only a guinea, the notices and entries being of the same kind required
of makers. If you combine the two——”
“I cannot, sir. I dare not. Your gentleman would be bringing me up and
fining me once a week, sir.”
“O, you could not get very deep into any scrape, I assure you; the state
gets only between two and three thousand pounds from all the sweet-wine
makers in the kingdom. There are four who pay less than 1_l._ a year,
and no more than six who pay above 100_l._; and only twenty-three makers
altogether. Even the retailers are under nine hundred in number. It is
an insignificant concern altogether.”
“To the king, perhaps, sir; but not to me, if I have to pay tax upon
what my wine is made of, and a tax for making it, and a tax upon the
bottles that hold it, and a tax for selling it; and if I am liable to be
watched and tormented by Mr. Studley, or men like him. I think, sir, the
government might really give up such a vexation, if it brings in so
little—so very little.”
“And employs a good many people like Mr. Studley, at a hundred a year,”
added Mrs. Brennan. “I think, ma’am, you must give up your idea of
making wine.”
“Yes, indeed,” replied Anna. “Perhaps, sir, as it is for the king’s sake
that I am prevented getting money for my father, as I otherwise might;
and as you are one of those who manage these affairs, you will not
refuse that this letter should go to his majesty. It is from my father,
sir, copied by me, and asking no charity at all, but only consulting
about what is best for both.”
The commissioner was unwilling to let such a curiosity escape. The
letter was wafered, so that he could not ask to glance his eye over it.
He would fain keep it, but did not like to deceive the poor girl with
false hopes. Anna was pleased to see him hesitate. Studley stopped his
laugh of ridicule. Mrs. Brennan could scarcely refrain from nodding
triumphantly at him. The commissioner turned from them to say a few
words to his colleagues, so that Anna could not see his face. He soon
returned, quietly saying,—
“I am not sure that I can get this letter into the king’s hands; but you
may leave it with me; and if your father cannot pay his fine by this day
week, you may come here again, and we will consult upon his case.
Studley, the fine to which this young woman has made herself liable is
remitted. It is clearly a case of remarkable ignorance. The adulterated
tea must be destroyed, of course. You will see to it; but treat her
gently, if you please.”
The commissioner then explained to Anna that all who were discontented
with any decision of this court might seek redress in the Court of
Appeal. Anna found it difficult to understand exactly what was meant.
The only clear idea she carried away was that nobody ever applied to
this Court of Appeal; so that most people began to wish that it might be
done away as one of the useless burdens of the Excise. She was sure that
she should not be the next person to appeal. The court might be done
away for anything she had to say against it. Its being seldom or never
applied to seemed to show that the court she was now in was thought to
conduct its business well; but it appeared to her that it would be a
happy thing to sweep away both, and all excise jurisdiction whatsoever.
“Where is Brennan?” asked Anna, when she and her companion had made
their low curtsies, and turned round, with lightened hearts, to go away.
“He was off some time since,” Mrs. Brennan replied; “to run and tell
your mother how matters were going, I dare say. They have been merciful
to you, ma’am; and I give you joy.”
“O, Mrs. Brennan, I think I never will dread anything again. I have
often said so before, finding what I most dreaded come to a very little.
I never was so frightened in my life before; but I really will try never
to be afraid again.”
She spoke a moment too soon.
“And what do you want with us pray, Mr. Studley?” inquired Mrs. Brennan,
perceiving that that person walked close to Anna, as if he regarded her
as more or less in his custody.
“Going to discharge my duty,” replied Studley. “The adulterated tea is
to be publicly destroyed, you know, as bad books are burned by the
common hangman.”
“Publicly!” repeated Anna, in consternation. “Where? How?”
“In your father’s yard. There cannot be a more convenient place for a
bonfire.”
“Do you mean to burn the tea in sight of all the neighbours?”
“That depends on whether they choose to look. I shall certainly not try
to hang up any sort of blind.”
“I wonder at you, ma’am,” said Mrs. Brennan, “that you go on asking him
questions, just to give him the pleasure of making sharp answers.”
Anna said no more. She was thrown back into her former state of
trepidation. It was as much as she could do to walk straight. Mrs.
Brennan seemed to think it a waste of time (or perhaps she considered it
bad for Anna) to keep silence for so long a space. She began talking of
her boy, and fished for a few compliments for him; but her companion
seemed strangely careless of what she was saying.
“What a smell of burning!” Mrs. Brennan exclaimed when they drew near
the pottery-yard. All three looked round for tokens of fire; and Studley
observed that one might have thought the furnaces were all employed, as
they had been in his time. Smoke was coming out of the window of the
kitchen, and even oozing from under the door. Anna really believed that
the place was on fire, and exclaimed accordingly; when Brennan put his
head out at the window, and Mrs. Le Brocq opened the door. Both seemed
terribly heated, and made a display of scorched cheeks which would have
done honour to a Christmas fire. It was evident from their looks that
nothing was the matter.
“Let me in,” said Studley, in a voice of authority. “Clear a space in
the yard for the fire. Boy, call the workmen (if there be any
now-a-days) to clear the yard for the burning; and if nobody is on the
premises, fetch some of the neighbours.”
“What may you be pleased to be going to burn?” asked the boy, briskly.
“My tea,” faltered Anna. “Come this way, Mr. Studley, and I will show
you the cupboard where every grain of it is; and if you have any
kindness in you, you will be quick with the job, and finish it before
the neighbours can gather about us. Mother,” continued she, as she
entered the kitchen, whose atmosphere was rapidly clearing, “what have
you been about? The hearth is piled up with ashes as high as the grate,
and the grate is heaped half way up the chimney; and you look ready to
faint with the heat and the vapour.”
“Mistress won’t mind it, since we have got done in time,” observed the
boy, cheerfully; and then he began humming a tune. Studley had meanwhile
advanced in slow dignity to the place which Anna had indicated to him.
There was nothing in it. While he took an astonished survey of the
shelves, Brennan went on from his humming to singing, and his words were
some that every child is familiar with,—
“And when she came there,
The cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none.”
“The poor dog, ha, ha!” repeated Mrs. Brennan, laughing. “And so the
poor dog had none! So he put his tail between his legs, and slunk away,
I dare say. Did not he, my dear?”
Studley was now obliged to do something very like this. The boy had been
quick. The moment he heard the tea condemned to destruction by the
court, he ran with all speed to discharge Studley’s errand for him. The
last packet of tea was smouldering when he heard Anna’s exclamation that
there must be a fire somewhere. Studley would have Mrs. Le Brocq’s
tea-caddy brought down; and he fingered and smelled the contents. They
were perfectly unexceptionable; and nothing remained for him but to go
away. He felt to his back-bone the slam of the door behind him, and to
the bottom of his soul the significance of the buzz of voices that came
through the open window as he passed it. That Anna should escape thus
easily was the last thing he had designed. And what an impudent little
wretch that boy was, to be insulting him,—so lately his superior at the
pottery,—with his nursery rhymes! All day, nothing would stay in
Studley’s head but
“The cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none.”
CHAPTER IV.
FRIEND OR FOE?
Though Anna’s adventure in the court had ended much less unpleasantly
than she had expected, she had no strong inclination to appear upon the
scene again. The words “this day week” were for ever on her mind; and
hour by hour she revolved the possibilities and improbabilities of her
father being able to discharge the fine within the time specified. The
first day passed over pretty well. Her mother and she were full of the
satisfaction of her own escape. On the second day, they consulted about
advertising their stock again, and wished they had done it yesterday.
Anna went to get the Durells’ opinions; but nobody was at home except
the maid, who could or would give no account of her master and mistress,
and was not over civil in her manner. Night came before the question of
advertising or not advertising was settled; and the next morning, Mrs.
Le Brocq seemed rather disposed to have an auction, at which the stock,
the household furniture, and the pottery business might be all sold
together, so that the family might be off for Jersey the moment Le Brocq
should be released. Anna was alarmed at the idea of an auction, fearing
some difficulty or danger about the duty. Mr. Durell had offered to
assist her with his knowledge of excise law, in all cases of need; and
once more she sought him. This time the Durells were at home: but the
maid scarcely opened the door three inches, and was positive that her
master and mistress could see no person whatever, even for two minutes.
Jack’s face was visible for an instant, peeping under the maid’s arm;
but, on being spoken to, he disappeared behind her skirts, and would not
be persuaded to show himself again. Mrs. Le Brocq was more bent than
ever on having the auction when her daughter came home bringing no
opinion against it. She had got a glimpse of the prospect of seeing her
Louise again, and had much to say that had been said often before on the
hardship of not having seen poor Louise ever since the first week of her
marriage. Who could tell whether, if this auction should go off well,
she might not, even yet, be with Louise before her confinement? She was
not sparing of her reproaches to Anna because she would not begin her
preparations this very evening: but Anna would do nothing without
consulting her father, whom she could not see till the next afternoon;
and so the third day passed without progress being made towards paying
the fine, and there was every prospect of the fourth elapsing without
any further advance than the formation of a plan. Her mother hurried her
away, when the time drew near for her visit to her father; and so did
her own inclination; though she hardly expected that the prison-doors
would be opened any sooner on account of her impatience. Her mother and
she had better have been more reasonable. She had not been gone more
than four minutes, (and she had to wait ten at the prison gate,) before
a stranger arrived on business. He came from the Board of Excise, on a
little affair which would be easily transacted,—over in a quarter of an
hour; there was no occasion to trouble any of the family further than
just to show him the way to the stock-room. His people were behind with
the cart; and he had desired them to be as quiet as possible, and give
no trouble. He was an excise officer, come for the purpose of levying
the fine for which Mr. Le Brocq was now imprisoned.
Nothing could exceed the old lady’s consternation. Her first idea was
that it would be politic to carry herself high. She therefore declared
that she could not think of admitting a stranger on any such errand. Mr.
Durell was the gentleman they always employed on this kind of occasion.
The officer half smiled while he explained that it was the Board, and
not traders, who were said to employ officers on excise business; and
the Board must choose what officers it would send on particular pieces
of service. He was aware that Mr. Durell was an intimate friend of the
family; but Mr. Durell would not be seen by them on this occasion.
“And now, ma’am, here come our people. If you will just show us the way,
as I said, we will not trouble you to stay. You may trust the affair to
me. I have orders to be considerate; and you shall have no reason to
complain. I will look in upon you when we have done, and leave with you
the order for release, which you will allow me to wish you joy of.”
No such thing. Mrs. Le Brocq saw no joy in the affair. Here was Studley:
there was the cart with another attendant; and her husband’s beautiful
jars and filterers were being handed into it, to be carried off. She
declared she would appeal to the neighbours. She would raise the
neighbourhood.
“Let me advise you not, madam. I have desired my men,——Studley, be more
quiet, will you?——I have desired my men to make no disturbance: and, if
you make none, the neighbours will take us for customers, and you will
be spared all disagreeable remarks. Be quick, Studley!”
Mrs. Le Brocq loudly exclaimed that they might well desire quietness
when they came like thieves to carry away her property. They had good
reason to fear being mobbed; and mobbed they should be. The officer
quietly and civilly showed his warrant, and cited that clause of the Act
which provides that all persons who oppose, molest, or otherwise hinder
any officer of excise in the execution of his duty, shall respectively,
for every such offence, forfeit two hundred pounds. The good woman dared
do nothing worse after this than turn her back upon the trio and their
occupation, and shut herself into her house. There she sat, rocking
herself in her great chair, and not even knitting, when, in less than a
quarter of an hour, the officer tapped at the door, and requested
admittance. At first, she would not hear; and when she dared be deaf no
longer, she became lame, and made him wait, on account of her
rheumatism, as long as she possibly could. It gave him pleasure, he said
good-humouredly, to deliver to her the order he held in his hand, his
little business being now finished. Her hands were too busy, as she
pretended, fumbling under her apron, to be at liberty to take the note.
She bade him carry it back to those that sent it; and when he declined
doing this, she sullenly nodded towards a table where he might lay it
down. He obeyed orders, touched his hat, and departed.
She was still rocking herself in her great chair when Anna returned.
“O, mother, what has happened now?” cried Anna, seeing that matters had
gone wrong during her absence. “Mother, speak! Have the Excise been upon
us again?”
“To be sure: carrying off all we were going to sell by auction. They
want to put me into prison, too. I shall never see Louise more.”
“O, mother, did they say so?” cried Anna, sinking into a chair. “I hope,
at least, they will put you beside my father;—and me, too,” she
faltered, as the idea crossed her of her being left alone on the
premises, her parents in prison, and the Durells, from some cause,
inaccessible. “Mother, how could they have the heart to tell you that
you must go to prison? Was it Studley? I suppose it was Studley. And
when, mother? When——”
Her mother let her go on tormenting herself till the frequent repetition
of the question “when?” compelled her to admit that nobody had exactly
said that she was to go to prison. But they could mean nothing else by
robbing her of all that she had left. By degrees it came out that
Studley had been very quiet, and in fact had said nothing at all; that
if he had, it should have been the worse for him; that the officer who
was set over him would not soon forget his visit, for Mrs. Le Brocq had
shown him, when he offered that bit of paper (lying on the table there)
that she would not touch with a pair of tongs anything brought by him.
Without the intervention of a pair of tongs, Anna took up the paper.
Minute after minute, she stood with it in her hand, her mother not
condescending to take any notice. She leaned against the table, and
again began to ponder it, the intent of the whole proceeding opening
upon her more and more distinctly.
“I could wish, mother,” said she at length, “that the gentleman had
asked you to read this paper, or had told you something of what it
means, that we might not seem to the Board to be ungrateful. As far as I
can make out,—I am pretty sure,—our fine is paid, and my father may come
home directly.”
Mrs. Le Brocq was in due amazement: but, when she had taken out her
spectacles, and read the order for the release of her husband, his fine
being paid, she comforted herself about her own manners by observing
upon the improbability of her receiving any civility from the Excise;
and that, after all, there was no occasion to thank them for letting her
husband out of prison, when they had done him such a wrong as ever to
put him in. She now found that it was possible for her to get as far as
the prison; a thing hitherto not to be thought of. Anna would gladly
have left her behind, so impatient was she of every moment which must
elapse before her father could know of his release. Her mother was
terribly long in getting herself ready for her walk; and such a walk
Anna had never undergone, except in a dream. At last the moment came
when the door of the well-known apartment was opened before her.
She had hitherto seen her father only at an hour when she was expected;
and then he was always sitting at the table, or pacing up and down the
room. She now found him lying at length along a bench, his face resting
on his hands.
“He is ill!” cried Anna, pressing forward.
“Far from it, ma’am,” said the man who had offered to sell her a sheet
of paper. “No worse than usual, ma’am. That is the way that he spends
most of his time, except when he is expecting you; and then, who could
look doleful?”
Le Brocq had started off his bench on hearing Anna’s voice, and shaken
himself, to get rid of his sloth or his emotion, whichever it might be
that kept him lying there. When he saw his wife, he was sure that
something remarkable had happened; and most probably of a disastrous
nature: for Mrs. Le Brocq’s leading taste, next to knitting, was for
telling bad news. He was not sorry, however, to find that good news
would serve her turn when there was no bad to be had.
It is surprising how people get good manners without teaching,—some very
suddenly, on particular occasions of their lives. Le Brocq had been
considered by his prison companions an under-bred, churlish sort of
person: but now he was full of courtesy, from the moment he knew that he
was going to leave them. He hoped they would find the improved space and
air they would have in consequence of his absence a great advantage. He
sincerely trusted that nobody else would be put there to intrude upon
them as he had done. He was flattered at the groaning sigh and
melancholy look with which this was received, not suspecting the nature
of the regrets felt by his comrades,—regrets after the dominoes which he
had not forgotten to pocket, and after the relief they had enjoyed from
the irksomeness of double dumbie, if they played whist at all. They
would now have willingly buried in oblivion all the faults of his
playing, for which they had often pronounced him to his face
incorrigibly stupid,—all would they gladly have forgiven and forgotten,
if he could but have stayed to save them from double dumbie. But it
could not be. Le Brocq was on the point of saying that he should be very
happy to see them if ever they should chance to be travelling near his
place in Jersey; but he remembered in time what was due to his family,
and what had arisen already out of the visit of one questionable
personage. He was sorry now that he had beguiled some irksome hours with
exact accounts, perhaps too tempting, of his farm, and of his mode of
life in Jersey, with all its advantages; and when his prison-mates asked
what he meant to do with himself now, he gave an answer implying an
intention to remain in London,—not a little to the dismay of his wife
and daughter.
He seemed, when he came out, to be suddenly smitten with London. Brennan
was waiting outside, with a smiling face. He had come, thinking he might
carry his master’s clothes-bag. Le Brocq was sure there was no such
place as London for having little services done for you, almost before
you can wish for them.—The party crossed one of the bridges. Really, he
believed there could be no such river in the world as this river in
London; and he defied anybody to match St. Paul’s as he saw it now.—What
a beautiful sunny evening it was! How the sun glittered on the water!
His wife, who was puffing and blowing, wished it was not so hot; and
Anna ventured to hint that he might perhaps think the more of these
things from having been shut up so long. For her part, she liked a
strait of the sea better than any river. This hint threw her sober
father into an ecstacy about a strait of the sea; notwithstanding which,
it was still difficult to get him off the bridge. When this was
accomplished, however, the shops and carriages did as well; and a bunch
of fresh flowers at a greengrocer’s made him mentally drunk. Anna,
thinking him now in the best mood for friendship, paused when they came
to the turn which led to Durell’s house, and proposed that they should
go round, and tell their friends the good news.
“Ay, to be sure,” replied her father. “It would be a pity to go home
yet,—such a fine evening as it is.”
Brennan observed that he could still carry something more, now he was so
near the pottery. If Miss Anna would trust him with the basket, he would
step on with the things. Anna gave him also the key of the house-door,
and asked him to see that the kettle boiled by the time she should
arrive to make tea. She saw by her father’s countenance that the very
words were delicious to him, and he owned as much as that nothing gave
such an appetite as the fresh air.
“But I am sure Mrs. Durell is at home,” said Anna, when the little girl
once more declined letting anybody in. “I saw her cap as I passed the
window. Tell her, my dear, that if she is offended with us, we wish she
would tell us why; and, whether she is offended or not, I should like to
see her for two minutes, to tell her something that I am sure she would
be pleased to hear.”
The little girl looked behind her, and Mrs. Durell appeared, thin, and
anxious-looking. She cast a glance up and down the street before she
spoke, and then merely said that there was no quarrel; that her husband
was ill and out of spirits; she would thank them to be so good as not to
come in now; and as soon as she could, she would call in upon them, or
send to know if Anna could spare her a quarter of an hour. But not now.
“We could not now, Mrs. Durell. Here is my father—going home with us to
tea, you see. We have a great deal to tell you; and perhaps we shall
have but a short time to tell it in. You must come and talk with us
about Jersey. But I am sorry Mr. Durell is ill. Is it only just to-day?
or has he been ill long?”
“He has had enough to make him ill these ten days. God knows what will
become of us all! But he has done nothing wrong, Anna, if you will
believe me. Good bye, my dear. I cannot tell you any more now.”
“Poor Mrs. Durell!” sighed Anna, as she left the door. “I wonder what
has happened now. I am sure it is something very terrible. But I knew
she could not have quarrelled with us.”
“Poor woman!” said Le Brocq, complacently. “This evening would be hardly
the time to quarrel with us, however it might have been while I was
away. They will keep on good terms with us now, I dare say. Poor woman!
She looks very pale. She looks as if she had been shut up. She cannot
have been much out of doors lately, I fancy. Ah, ha! Here we come near
the soapery. We are near home now. There is the great ladle still! You
have let the ladle stand, I see.”
“I hope it will stand there long after we are gone out of the way of the
soapery and the pottery, and all the places here,” Anna ventured to say.
What could be the reason that they could not get into the house? Brennan
was not visible and the door was locked. On looking through the window,
the clothes-bag might be seen, and the fire was blazing, so that he had
certainly been home. What could have become of him and the key? It was
impossible to be angry with anybody this evening; so Anna found a seat
for her mother in the yard, and she and her father went to the rear to
look at the river from the wharf. There was so much to see and admire as
the boats put off and returned, so much wondering how that wooden-legged
waterman would manage to keep his footing, so much speculation as to
whence such and such vessels came, and whither they were going, that tea
was forgotten, after all, till Brennan came running to tell them that it
was ready.
“There, now; this is what I call comfortable,” declared Le Brocq, as he
entered the parlour, and saw, not only tea, but a pile of hot cakes and
a jar of flowers. “How in the world do you get such flowers here? They
might have grown in a Jersey meadow.”
“They seem to me the same that you admired in the shop as we passed,”
said Anna. “And I know the pattern of the jar. It is one that Brennan
has been making after his own fancy.”
Le Brocq could not but have thought this jar a very beautiful one, in
any of his moods. This evening he was disposed to pronounce it the most
elegant that had ever proceeded from any pottery; but Brennan modestly
disclaimed this. It did not come up to the one that put the idea of this
into his head,—one that he had seen at the British Museum.
“Bring the other one that you made after this,” said Anna; who explained
to her father that there was one other jar which Brennan himself thought
superior to this; and that a third had come off the wheel this morning
which was likely to be the best of all. These jars were all the boy’s
own property, as he had paid by extra work for the clay and the use of
the apparatus. The boy did not bring the second jar, for the good reason
that it was no longer within reach. He had parted with it to the
green-grocer for the flowers, and money enough to buy these hot buttered
cakes.
It was difficult to make the boy sit down to table near his own flowers;
and then he was too modest to be easily persuaded to taste his own
cakes. It was not for himself that he got them, he said.
“Did you ever get anything for yourself?” Anna inquired of him.
“O, yes, ma’am; many a time.”
“What was the last thing you got for yourself?”
“Some new runners for the jars. If you please to look, ma’am, this here
is a new pattern quite.”
“If you had a great deal of money, what would you do with it?”
“I would belong to the Mechanics’ Institution, and learn to draw; and
then I might get the prize,—a good many guineas.”
“And what would you do with those guineas,—help your mother, or marry a
wife, or what?”
“I would get some marble to cut. Marble is very dear, they say; but I
saw a good many marble things in the British Museum.”
Le Brocq, always ready with a word against Durell, wished he had taken
the boy anywhere but to the British Museum, if he must meddle with him
at all. He had heard the proper place to take boys to for a holiday was
Sadler’s Wells. If he had gone there, Brennan would have had no
extravagant notions about getting marble, or anything else that would
come in the way of his being a good potter; and he reminded Brennan that
the Scripture told of a potter at the wheel.
Anna looked at the jar before her, and wondered whether it would have
been produced if the boy had been taken to Sadler’s Wells instead of the
British Museum.
“You had better be a journeyman potter, boy,” said Le Brocq. “You may
make money by informing against your master, if you watch him closely
enough.”
Brennan coloured indignantly, and only said he should like to cut things
in marble, because the excise had nothing to do with that, he believed.
When the marble was once paid for, duty and all, there was no more
meddling from anybody.
“You had better go with us to Jersey, then, if you don’t like the
excise; and there you will be free of the customs too. There you may get
what you want, without paying even duty. You had better go with us to
Jersey.”
Neither Anna nor her mother attempted to conceal her delight at the
mention of going back to Jersey; whereupon Le Brocq put on a grave
countenance of deliberative wisdom, and, premising that he had no wish
to exclude so discreet a boy as Brennan from hearing what he had to say,
went on to declare that his conscience had long been uneasy about uncle
Anthony’s son Anthony. He could not approve of parental displeasure
going so far as to deprive an only son of his father’s flourishing
business, and leaving it to comparative strangers.
“O, father, that is the best word you have said since uncle Anthony
died!” exclaimed Anna, with clasped hands. “That is,” she continued,
recollecting that she had uttered a speech of extraordinary freedom, “I
have wished, this long while, that you might be thinking sometimes of
how we came into this business, and whether it did not rightfully belong
to another.”
“One could not see in a day what kind of a legacy it would prove,”
observed Le Brocq; “and I have no doubt that, though it is not exactly
the thing to suit us, it will be as fine a business to those who have
been brought up in a taxed country as uncle Anthony said it was. Uncle
Anthony did very wrong in leaving away his property from his only son.
The wonder would have been if, being so bequeathed, the business had
prospered. The proper thing to do next is to find out where the young
man is, and to write directly to him to come and take possession.”
“And if he will not come?” said Mrs. Le Brocq, dreading delay.
“If he will not come, he must dispose of the business in his own way.
That is his affair, not mine.”
“Then you do not mean to wait till you can hear from America? I am very
glad,” observed Anna. “It would take some months to settle all about the
giving up the property, as the owner is so far off. I am very glad you
do not mean to wait.”
“I cannot think of waiting for him; or any longer than to settle two or
three little affairs. Brennan, what has been done about those bottles
that are to go abroad? that large order for bottles, you know.”
“They are almost ready, sir. We have been doing our best for them with
the few hands we have: and they may be got off this week, if you so
please, sir.”
“Very well. I shall just finish that and one or two others of the larger
orders before I date my letter, and make an auction of the furniture;
and then write my letter and be off.”
“Of this furniture?” said Anna, looking round her.
“To be sure. Then this boy’s mother, or somebody, will either come in,
or agree to look after the place till the young man arrives or writes.”
“But,” said Anna, timidly, “if the business is rightfully his, are not
the orders and the furniture his too? I thought we should have to pay
him, if he requires it, for using his right so long.”
Le Brocq muttered that he ought rather to be paid for all that he had
gone through with the pottery business, though he could not fix the
payment which would compensate to him for what he had suffered. But he
had no doubt, as he said before, that the young man would make a fine
thing of it; and the young man should have it.
“Then we shall go very soon indeed, shall we?” said Anna. “Brennan does
not like to hear us say so.”
The boy did indeed look grieved. He was too modest to interrupt their
deliberations with the question what was to become of him; but it was
struggling in his heart. Perceiving him just about to give way, Anna
asked him to see whether it was a dog that was making a little noise
against the door. Before he could get to the door, there was a shout
which informed them that it was not a dog but a child. Jack Durell was
not tall enough to reach the knocker, and he had tried pushing and
tapping in vain; so now he shouted,
“Father says you are to come directly, and hear the damned bad treatment
the people have given him.”
“Hush, my dear! hush!” cried Anna. “That is not the way you should ask
us to go.”
“That was what father bade me tell you,—that you are to come directly,
and hear——”
“Well, well: we will come. Did your father mean all of us, or which of
us?”
“You are all to come directly. Father says every body shall know.”
“’Tis his turn with these fellows now, I suppose,” Le Brocq observed,
looking rather pleased than otherwise. “Come, wife.”
Mrs. Le Brocq was still sipping her tea. As she cast her eye over the
table, and saw how tempting the remnants of the cakes looked, she felt a
distaste to moving away. She sent a long apologetic message to the
Durells about being very tired after the agitations consequent on her
husband’s release, and was left behind, much to her own satisfaction.
CHAPTER V.
THE DARKENING HOUR.
How strange it is that the inanimate objects with which people surround
themselves appear, even to strangers, to put on a different aspect
according to the mood of those whom they surround. It is quite as much
the case with the scenery of a house as with that which is not filled
and arranged by the hand of man. The natural landscape varies in its
aspects from other causes than the vicissitudes of clouds and sunshine.
There may be a human being sitting in the midst, through sympathy with
whose moods the observer may find the noon sunshine oppressive, or may
feel his spirit dance with the brook, or carol with the birds under the
murkiest sky. An infant’s glee at the lightning may almost make the
thunderstorm a sport; and the full moon may shed no light into the soul
of one who is watching with the mourner. So it is with the artificial
scenery of our houses. There are ague-fits of the spirit when the
crackling fire imparts no glow of mirth: and the coldest and dingiest of
apartments may, when illuminated with happy faces, put on something of
the light and warmth of a palace. Durell’s dwelling had always appeared
to Anna a very cheerful one,—with the employments of an active mistress
and a willing maid; Mary’s work-bag on the table, or its contents
scattered under a chair, as it might be: Jack’s toys heaped up in one
corner; drawings by the hands of many fair friends hung round the room;
and Durell’s flute lying with his music books and a few of the poets on
the book shelves. Thus were they arranged this evening; and there was a
small clear fire, and a sufficiency of light; and yet the aspect of the
apartment struck as deep a sense of gloom on Anna’s heart as the scene
of her father’s imprisonment had ever done. The children were not there;
Mary keeping by Betty’s side in the kitchen, officiously helping, in
order to escape being called to her work in the parlour; and Jack
slinking away as soon as his errand was discharged, to look for Stephen,
he said. There were only Mrs. Durell, hovering about her husband, with a
countenance in which there was as much terror as grief; and Durell
himself, in his easy chair, looking so wasted, and even decrepit, as to
make the Le Brocqs doubt, for a moment, whether he was the man they came
to see. Anna did not attempt to conceal that she was shocked, and asked
Mrs. Durell why she had not sent to their house for aid.
Her husband’s illness had come on so rapidly, she said, that she had
scarcely known what to do: and he had been so unwilling to see any
person whatever! Besides, it was only within a few hours that he had
sunk to what they saw him now. Every ten minutes lowered him; and,
notwithstanding what the doctor said, she did not know how to disbelieve
her husband when he declared himself that he was dying.
“His eye is not the eye of a dying man,” said Anna,—the only consolation
she could give. “Unless it has lighted up with our coming in——”
“It is not so,” replied her friend. “His eyes have been as bright as
diamonds all to-day; and, I think, quite unnatural. O, my dear, if you
could help me to find out what should be done for him——His heart is
quite broken——”
She could not go on.
“I was afraid, by the message he sent——”
“O, my dear, that was nothing to what I have seen him go through. If you
had been here when he threw himself on the floor because they told him
he would never be allowed to serve the king or his country in any way
again; if you had heard his prayer for those he must not serve, you
would not wonder at his being as you see him now.”
“I am sorry to find you looking poorly, sir,” said Le Brocq, feeling
that he was making a stretch of complaisance, but having in his mind
something about not trampling on a fallen enemy. “I suppose these excise
devils have been plaguing you as——as——”
“As I used to plague others, you were going to say, sir. Yes: I have
had a few messages from the Board—a few gentle messages. They sent me
word——”
He seemed scarcely able to speak, and Anna interrupted him with
“Perhaps, as you are so hoarse, Mr. Durell, you had better leave telling
us that till another time.”
“No!” cried he, forcing his voice. “I can tell you, and I will, what
their messages were. The first was that my business was to act and not
to think; and that, whatever may happen, my part is to be silent and
obedient. There’s a pretty message to a free-born man! That came out of
what I said at the election where I could not vote; and of my defending
it afterwards at your house.”
“O, dear! that is a great pity.”
“Not at all a pity, sir, I don’t repent a syllable I said there. I am
only sorry (as sorry as they are), that they did not hear of that
election affair before three months were over.—Why?—Because then they
could have done worse with me than sending me a reprimand. They could
have thrown me into prison for a fine of 500_l._, and declared——But they
kept that for their next message. They could then have made a martyr of
me, sir; such a system must have martyrs: and I had rather have died in
jail, so that a few people would have asked why, than just be carried
from my own door to my grave without having my revenge on those devils
in power,—without any body supposing any thing but that I died, as other
people die, in their beds.”
“But you will not die yet. You are almost a young man. You must not
think of dying yet.”
“Only with a hope to live,” interposed Anna, to whom it was painful to
hear people told that they must not think of dying.
“Hope to live!” exclaimed Durell, contemptuously. “What should I hope
for? The only prospect that could ever have tempted me to make myself
one of their vile crew, they have blighted and blasted. They took care I
should know, after that election business, that I should never rise any
higher,—that the best I had to expect was to be graciously allowed,—in
return for promising not to think, but to be silent and obedient,—to go
on being a king’s spy and a trader’s tormentor for life,—to keep my wife
and children alive with scanty bread soaked in the tears of my degraded
and broken manhood. This is what they offered in return for my promising
not to think, but to be silent and obedient.”
“They little knew whom they were speaking to, indeed,” observed Anna.
“Did not they know they were speaking to a man? There are some men that
would sooner watch an ant-hill than a hidden distillery, and that think
of a lark’s nest when they wake in the morning, and are apt to be
looking out after the stars when they should be asleep: and there are
others that are never so happy as when they are smelling out soap, and
sending a panic before them. The rulers have nothing to do with these
men’s different tastes, as long as the poet and the meddler both do
their work. But both these, and all between them, are men: and it is a
foul crime to strip them of their sight and their strength,—of their
reason and their will: and if it be true that the service they are on
requires such outrage, it only follows that the service itself is foul.
If it would but please God to restore me my strength for a little while,
I would find a way yet to pull down their despotism upon their own
heads.”
He made an effort to rise, but the ground seemed unsteady beneath his
feet, and he sank down again.
“They have struck me a deeper blow still,” said he, “or you would not
see me as I am now. They have believed in my dishonour, on the
information of a scoundrel. They believe that you have bribed me.”
“That was the reason why my husband could not think of seeing you
before: the only reason,” Mrs. Durell was in haste to explain. “But it
is over now. They have turned him off, on what Mr. Studley said; and now
they want him to be thankful that he is not fined 500_l._ Thank God we
have done with them, I say. We shall be able——”
“We have not done with them. We shall not be able,” cried Durell. “The
hounds can hunt me out of my rest wherever I may choose to seek it. They
boast that they can. They give me notice that if ever I make an attempt
to serve my country, they shall bring out their evidence to prove me
incapable of ever holding any office or place of trust under the king.”
“But if they cannot do it, Mr. Durell?” suggested Anna.
“They can. Ay: you look surprised: but they can. I never forgot my
honour. I never took a bribe; for you know that your Jersey pie and ale
were no bribe. But they can prove against me some things which they can
no more pardon than I can pardon certain of their practices. If a base
wretch joins a better man in evading the law, and then turns traitor, he
is excused and rewarded: but if a man with a heart in his bosom gives a
friendly warning to the careless, or passes over the first offence of
the widow that toils for her little ones, he is under ban, and can never
again serve his king. Such things they may prove against me.”
“I doubt whether you may not still serve the king better than you have
done yet,” observed Anna. “I cannot call it doing the king any service
to make the people hate their duty to him, and to teach them to defraud
him. People should love their king very strongly, for instance, to wish
to yield him their cheerful duty through all that my father has
undergone in paying his taxes. If you do not collect the king’s money
any more, there are other ways of doing him service, which must be open
to such a man as you are. Whatever makes his kingdom a more honourable
and a happier place; whatever makes his subjects a better or more
contented people, is, in my mind, a true and faithful service of the
king.”
“That is what I have been saying,” observed Mrs. Durell.
“And what was my answer?” said her husband: “that not all that the
wisest and the most true-hearted of the people can do to promote
science, and public and private morality, can make any stand against
what these——”
“Pray do not call them names,” entreated Anna. “They are men,—men said
to be of honour and principle, whose lot it is to administer a bad
system which they did not make. Do not let us blame them till we see
that they take no pains to alter that which they cannot approve.”
“Well: call them men or devils, or what you will. They administer a
system which is enough of itself to keep us back in knowledge and art
till all the world besides has passed us, and to do worse for our morals
than all our clergy can cure. I can prove it. As for knowledge, only
look at the paper tax, keeping books and newspapers out of the reach of
those who want them most, and stinting the class above them of their
fair share of that which God has given every man as free a right to as
to the air of heaven. As for art,—when was there a nobler triumph of it
than when man fixed a yellow star out above the sea, to gleam on the
souls of thousands of tempest-tost wretches, like the gospel they
trusted in, and to give the wanderer his first welcome home?”
“Indeed we can say that,” said Anna. “Such a light through the fog was
the best sight we saw in all the sea, in coming; and I never shut my
eyes to sleep now but I could fancy I see that light, hoping to pass
under it before long.”
“Well: there might now be a light far better than that, or any light
that yet hangs above the sea; a light that would shine through the
thickest fog, like a morsel of the copper sun that rises on an October
morning,—a light that would save thousands of poor wretches that must
now go down into the deeps with the moans of their orphaned little ones
in their ears; and this light we may not use.”
“Because of the excise?”
“For no other reason. Glasses of a new construction would be required
for the light-houses: and this new construction is not such as is set
down in the excise laws. No glass-maker dares venture it, and the only
hope is that we may get some foreign nation to do it for us.”
Anna thought it was a poor way of serving the king to drown his
subjects, and employ foreigners to work upon discoveries made at home,—
and all under pretence of taking care of the money of the state.
“This is only one instance out of many,” Durell declared. “As for what I
said about morality, I know of cheats enough to fill a jest book.”
“A jest-book!” said his wife, in a tone of remonstrance.
“Nay, my dear, it is their fault, not mine, if, when they have sharpened
wits to cheat, the witty cheats are laughed at as good jokes. Last year,
a very good joke was spoiled. The wits who made it laughed in their
sleeves as long as it went on; and when it came out, every body else
laughed, the excise and all, though the crime is really as great as
robbing the widow of her mite, since the widow’s mite must go to make up
for the fraud. There is no duty on soap in Ireland; and some cunning
Englishmen, who had made soap without paying the duty, packed it up for
Ireland, got the drawback of 28_l._ a ton, just as if they had paid the
duty, and sent it off, smuggled it back again, packed it afresh, got the
drawback again, and sent it off, and again smuggled it back; and so on,
four times over. Now, for the idea of this cheat, for the lies that were
told, for the false oaths that were taken in carrying it on, and for the
making a sordid crime into a joke, the excise is answerable. And this is
what the excise does for morality.”
“And this is the way the money of the people is managed,” observed Le
Brocq; “wrenched from the honest working man with one hand, that it may
be given away to the fraudulent great trader with the other!”
Mrs. Durell had been well pleased at the turn the conversation had
taken, seeing that, while her husband’s attention was occupied with
matters of detail, he resumed more and more of his usual countenance,
voice and manner. There was less fierceness in his eye, less effort in
his speech, and he sat almost upright. But Le Brocq spoiled all.
“I cannot but wonder at you, Durell, especially as you are a Jerseyman,
that you, knowing the system so well, should have left it to the
gentlemen to turn you out.”
“Wonder at me!” said Durell, after a pause, during which he could not
speak. “Wonder at me! Why don’t you curse me and loathe me for being an
abject wretch, for the sake of my children’s bread? I thank God for
taking their bread from them before my eyes, if it teaches them to
despise their father and their father’s business.”
“O, husband!” cried Mrs. Durell.
“I mean what I say,” he continued, with a forced calmness of voice and
manner. “I am going to leave them—to leave them in your charge; and I
command you to bring them up in horror of everything that is dishonest,
and vile, and cruel; and if you bring them up to abhor everything that
is dishonest, and vile, and cruel, you must bring them up either to
forget their father and his employments, or to despise him for being so
employed. I give you your choice, and only pray God that I may hide
myself in my grave before either comes to pass.”
“Don’t listen to him. Don’t believe him,” cried the wife, turning first
to Le Brocq, and then to Anna. “You see he is not himself; you see he is
talking like——”
“Like a man who is waking from a morning dream,” said her husband, whose
excited senses caught looks and words which were not intended for him.
“I am not drunk, Le Brocq, though I have no right to complain if you
fancy me so; and I am not mad.”
“But angry,—very angry,” Anna ventured to interpose.
“Well; if I have been angry, it has nothing to do with what I am going
to say, which is about you and yours, Le Brocq, with whom I have no
cause to be angry. I am like a man waking from a dream; and I see many
things that I wish it had pleased God that I should see long ago.”
“You cannot say you have no cause to be angry with us,” cried Le Brocq,
moved by a sudden impulse of sensibility; “that is, with me. Anna has
always been your friend; and if my wife has not, it is only because she
has copied me. I have doubted you all along till now; and I am very
sorry for it.”
“Doubted my honour?” asked Durell, bitterly.
“Doubted your being the friend you professed yourself. I thought that
you might, with the power of your office, have prevented some of the
misfortunes that have befallen us. But now I find——”
“Now you find that I have been a slave, obliged to stand by, and see
those punished that I would fain have saved. Now you find that an
exciseman must choose his friends by their trades, if there be any
trades that the curse of his employment does not light upon. We used to
think that God has shown how friendships should arise,—shown it by the
meeting of the eyes that glance sympathy; and the grasp of the hands
when men find that they had the same birth-place. But the power that has
stepped in between us has set aside God’s arrangements altogether. You
and I gathered nuts, as children, in the same deep lanes, and played
about the same poquelaye; but as soon as I would have grasped hands upon
this, what happened? You believed it the grasp of a traitor, and our
enemies said we were giving and taking a bribe; and between you both, I
am sunk to perdition, body and soul.”
“But that is all over now. Nobody will think any more——”
“It will never be over. The stain will be as lasting as the record of my
name in the creation. When people shall see me carried to my grave, a
few days hence, they will remember how they saw me last carried through
the streets,—a brute, lower than the lowest of all other brutes. When
they meet my wife in her weeds, they will look into her face to see if
there is not joy hidden under it, because her torment of a husband is
gone.”
“Do stop him. I cannot bear it,” said Mrs. Durell, putting her hands
before her face.
“You will bear it very well, my dear. It is true, you will have no bread
to give your children; and when you beg it, people will stop to consider
whether they ought to help the children of the dissolute exciseman; but
all this will not set against the relief of having got rid of the wretch
himself. Ah! you don’t think so now, because you pity me, as you would
pity a sickly child;—you pity me for sitting drooping here, with a
perishing carcase and a worn-out spirit. But I don’t want your pity. I
won’t be treated like a child—I say——”
He rose from his chair, and took a few strides towards his wife,
evidently in a state of delirium. The urgency of the occasion seemed to
inspire Le Brocq with the very sentiment which suited the moment.
“I say, Mr. Durell,” said he, “no man likes being made a child of; and I
like it no better than other men; so I am going back,——come, you had
better sit down again; take my arm;——I am going back to Jersey. Have you
any messages for your old friends there?”
“To Jersey: ay; you are right there, Le Brocq. That was what I was going
to say. Don’t stay here, where there is more misery caused by mere
paying taxes than there is in Jersey by all God’s dark providences
together. Go and tell them, whatever they do,” he continued, settling
himself in his chair again,——“tell them, whatever they do, not to dare,
for the sake of raising money for the state, to crush the simple and
high-minded, and exalt the mean and crafty——”
“Ay; Studley! How that fellow is flourishing at the expense of us all!”
cried Le Brocq.
Anna marked the flashing of Durell’s eyes at the name, and interposed.
“We shall soon be settled in our farm again, Mr. Durell; and perhaps you
will be well enough to come and see us by the time we begin shaking the
trees in the orchard.”
“Shaking the trees in the orchard,” repeated Durell slowly, as if the
words revived some intensely pleasurable recollections.
“Your old friends were very sorry when you went away, and they will be
heartily glad to hear you are coming back. You will come and see us, Mr.
Durell.”
“Come, my dear! ay; that I will,—in body or in spirit. I will be at your
apple-cropping. I will pelt you with apples; and if you cannot see where
they come from, remember who promised you this. I will echo you when you
go to call home your cows. I will rustle in the ivy when you pass the
Holy Oak;—(that old oak is the first place I shall go to.) I will walk
round and round you as you sit on the poquelaye; and if you feel a
sudden breath of air upon your face, remember who it was that said he
would haunt you. God will hear my prayer, and let me see Jersey again,
whether I die first or not.—Jack! Come here, Jack!”
His feeble voice could not make itself heard further than half across
the room; but Jack came in from the kitchen, in answer to Le Brocq’s
effectual call. His father desired him to bring down the flute from the
book-shelves; and his manner of obeying,—as if he was by no means sure
whether he had to do with his father or with a ghost,—did not help to
recover Anna from the chilly fit into which she had been thrown by
Durell’s promises. She did not think she could ever go out to call home
the cows, or pass the Holy Oak or the poquelaye. She had never feared
Durell till this night; but he was strangely altered; and she thought
that the impression of this night would be stronger than that of all her
previous acquaintance with him.
“Stand here, boy; don’t go away,” said Durell to Jack, who was most
unwillingly pinned between his father’s knees to hear the flute. Durell
began an air which is sung by the common people in Jersey every day of
the year; but his breath failed him directly; and he allowed the
instrument to be taken from him.
“Then I may go,” said Jack, gently struggling to escape.
“Yes, my dear,” said his mother. “Your father is tired now; he has done
enough for this evening.”
“No, no,” said Durell. “I must tell him what he is to see at home.
I must tell him what little boys do in Jersey. When I was your age,
Jack——”
“To-morrow, love,” said his wife. “You can tell him to-morrow.”
“I should like to hear what boys do in Jersey,” declared Jack, his
confidence returning.
“And so you shall, my boy. Sit still, Le Brocq. I shall want you to help
me. When I was your age. Jack——”
And then he proceeded to tell how in his childhood he went out through
thickets of the blue hydrangea to the dells where he spent the whole day
in birds’ nesting; and of the hatfull of wild flowers that he treated
himself with before he began to climb the trees whose ivy was his
ladder. Not two minutes after he had soothed himself into a state of
calmness by these recollections, he began to speak indistinctly, and to
appear drowsy. Jack was admonished by gesture not to ask for any thing
over again; not to be impatient for what was to come next. This was a
hard admonition; and when his father sank back asleep, and he was gently
withdrawn from between the knees which no longer held him, the poor boy
was quietly weeping at having to wait for the rest of the story. Not
even his mother suspected how long he would have to wait.
The Le Brocqs stole away. Jack was put quietly out of the room. Mrs.
Durell hung a shade upon the lamp, fed the fire with the least possible
noise, and sat down with her work opposite her husband, trusting that he
was dreaming of the meads and coves of his native island, and that he
would thus sleep on till morning. Long before morning, she had
discovered that he would wake no more. The Le Brocqs were called up
early by Stephen to be told that they had heard the very last words of
him who had died of a broken heart.
It was a great blessing that his last words were words of peace. There
was no need for Anna to implore little Jack to treasure up what his
father was saying when he fell asleep. When Jack was grown up into a
man, it was still a matter of mourning to him that he had not heard the
whole of what his father had to tell about birds’ nesting in the dells
of Jersey.
CHAPTER VI.
THE LAND OF SIGNALS.
The Le Brocqs were more anxious than ever to leave London when they had
seen their friendly countryman laid in the ground. In order to repay
himself as far as he could for the troubles he had incurred in business,
Le Brocq determined to carry with him to Jersey as much as he could
convey of his manufactured article. The cider-makers of the islands
would be very glad of his bottles, he knew, if he could sell them cheap
enough; and he believed he could sell them cheap, and yet secure a
profit by obtaining the drawback on exportation allowed by law. After
all the experience he had had of the duty-paying in England, it still
did not occur to him that there might be difficulty in recovering the
duty which the law professed to restore. Nothing can be more evident
than that when a tax is imposed on the consumption of any article, and
is advanced by the maker of the article, the maker should be repaid what
he has advanced when the article goes to be consumed by the people of
another empire, or by those in some other part of the same empire who
may be particularly exempted from the payment of the duty. Le Brocq
imagined that all he should have to do would be to show how much duty he
had paid upon the ware he wished to export, and to receive the sum back
again. He even speculated on whether the government would allow him
interest on the money he had advanced. He considered it his due; but he
would not delay his departure on account of any disagreement of this
kind. He would not put off till another day the conclusion of a business
which he supposed might be transacted in ten minutes. He little thought
that the keenest and most practised exporter would laugh as much at the
idea of finishing the affair in a few minutes as at that of receiving
interest for the duty advanced. It might be that because he was
discovered to be a novice, he was more strictly dealt with than those
who are acquainted with the regulations of the excise and customs; but
he found himself much mistaken in his calculations. It is not for the
benefit of the king’s interests, or for the credit of his service, that
practised persons are comparatively little watched, while novices are
well nigh persecuted under the perplexing system of the excise and
customs. It is unjust and injurious, but perfectly natural;—natural,
because no human patience, industry, and vigilance can be expected to be
always equal to the disgusting labour of spying and detecting. It is
natural that those who have been made fully aware of the dangers they
incur by fraud should be left under the influence of fear to swear truly
and pay duly, though unexamined. Honour is a word out of use upon these
occasions; or is employed merely as a word. Fear is the influence to
which his majesty’s officers trust, when they leave a practised trader
to declare his own claims and responsibilities, and show how he wishes
his business to be managed. Fear is the influence they invoke when they
impress the inexperienced with awe, or worry him out of his temper, with
a view to saving themselves future trouble. Fear is the influence above
all unfavourable to the interests of a king, and the security of a
government; and that which should be used, not for the levying of its
support, but only for the deterring of its subjects from crime, against
which all other precautions had previously been taken.
The officers succeeded in inspiring the Jerseyman with fear, insomuch
that he presently doubted whether he could at last get away without
leaving his bottles behind. While others, happier than he, paid down
small sums with one hand, and received larger with the other, after
gabbling over oaths which none but the initiated could understand, and
witnessing certain entries made on their own declaration, Le Brocq had a
much longer ceremony to go through. He had to swear that the bottles he
wished to export were none of them under the weight of three ounces;
that he had given due notice to the officer of excise of his intention
to ship his wares; that the contents of the package corresponded with
the document signed by the excise officer; that they were all marked
with an E X; that none were broken; that none had been used; that no
prohibited article was in the package; that the wares were packed
according to law, without vacant spaces or other improprieties; that
they were believed to be entirely of English manufacture, and that they
had paid duty; and so on. He was next told, as a friendly warning, that
if the package was not properly prepared for sealing, (_i. e._ with a
hollow scooped out for the purpose,) the goods would be forfeited: if
any brand or mark was erased, the goods would be forfeited, and the
offender would be fined 200_l._: if the package was not on board within
twelve hours from the time of branding or sealing, it would be
forfeited; and so on. Moreover, the searcher had power to open and
examine the package; and if it was found that the exporter was not
correct in every tittle of what he had sworn, he would be indicted for
perjury. Le Brocq had as much horror of a false oath as any man; but he
now felt how easily a timid or a hasty man might be tempted into one,
for the sake of escaping as soon and as easily as possible from the
inquisition of the excise. He felt the strength of the temptation to a
trader to swear to the legal preparation of a box, the packing of which
he had not superintended.
In the next place, he found that, so far from obtaining interest upon
the duty he had advanced, he must be at some expense to recover the
drawback. The debenture, or certificate of the customs officer that he
would be entitled to the drawback, is on a ten-shilling stamp; and he
who would recover the amount of one tax could do it only by paying
another. To recover an excise tax, he must pay a stamp tax. The dismay
of the Jerseyman, thus haunted by taxes to the last, was highly amusing
to a fellow-sufferer who stood by, and who proclaimed his own worse
fate. He was receiving back the duty upon four packages of goods, and
each debenture cost him 11_s._ 6_d._; making 2_l._ 7_s._ the cost of
recovering 10_l._ But this was not the last discovery that Le Brocq had
to make.
It appeared finally that, as the goods were intended for the Channel
islands, the drawback could not be allowed till a certificate of the
landing of the goods could be produced, signed by the collector and
comptroller of the customs on the island where the ware was landed. Le
Brocq was not the less disconcerted by this news for its being made
evident to him that such an arrangement is necessary under a system of
taxation by excise and customs. It was clear, as he acknowledged, that
without such a precaution, the drawback might be obtained upon goods
which were not really destined for the Channel islands: but the
arrangement did not the less interfere with his private convenience.
What was to be done now? He had no inclination to leave the goods, or to
forego the drawback; and there was no one here to whom he could commit
his affairs. After a long consultation at home, it was agreed that Le
Brocq should, after all, stay till cousin Anthony, or instructions from
him, should arrive; and that Mrs. Le Brocq and Anna should proceed to
the islands, conducting and conducted by Stephen. Stephen was not
exactly the kind of escort that the family would have thought of
accepting, some time before: but circumstances were now changed. He
could guide them to Aaron: he could secure for them, by ways and means
of his own, a remarkably cheap passage. He was now adrift, there being
no longer a home for him at Mrs. Durell’s; and he promised, for his own
sake as well as that of his companions, to make the most, instead of the
least, of such sight as he had left. As he could not expect to meet with
another Durell to house and cherish him, it was his interest to find his
way back to his old comrades, and see what they could do for him. While
offering his parting thanks and blessing to Mrs. Durell, he intimated to
her that, though he could not see to write, she should hear from him in
a way which he hoped would be acceptable;—an intimation which she
received with about the same degree of belief that she had been
accustomed to give to the protestations of others of her husband’s
protégés.
Mild were the airs, and cloudless was the sky when the vessel which
conveyed the Le Brocqs and their escort drew near the Swinge of
Alderney, and when the Channel islands rose to view, one after another,
from the sunny sea. The stupendous wall of rock which seems to forbid
the stranger to dream of exploring Alderney, rose on the left; the
little russet island of Berhou on the right; and, beyond it, the white
towers of the three Casket lighthouses, each on its rock, and all
gleaming in the sunset, rose upon Anna’s heart as well as upon her eye.
To her surprise, she met with sympathy.
“’Tis not often,” said Stephen, “that I care about storm or calm. Wind
and weather may take their own course for me. But I had a choice for
this evening. I wished for a wind that would bring us here before
sunset, and for a sky that would let the sun shine.”
“You see those white towers,” said Anna, who perceived that he twinkled
and strained his eyes in that direction.
“See them! yes, indeed,” said Mrs. Le Brocq. “Those must be stone blind
that do not get dazzled with all that glare. I like Jersey, with the
green ivy hanging from the rock over the sea. I want to be at Jersey,
with my Louise.”
“All in good time, ma’am,” said Stephen. “We must land somewhere else
first, and find your Aaron. How like ghosts they stand!” he continued,
still looking towards the Caskets. “And one taller than the rest.”
“You see that too,” said Anna. “Then I am sure you must see Berhou. We
are coming nearer every moment. Hark to the splashing in the Swinge!”
“Ay, ay; I’ll listen with the best,” said Stephen. “And I can see
something in the Swinge, though the dark island is all one with the sea
to me.”
“Which dark island? And what do you see in the Swinge?”
“Berhou has nothing to mark it to my eye. I can just trace out Alderney
against the sky; but the something white that is leaping and gleaming
there, I take to be the foam of the waters in the Swinge. Ah! here we
go!”
While the vessel pitched and rolled, and took her zigzag course, as if
spontaneously, between the black points of rock which showed themselves
above the white billows, and seemed to tell of a hundred dangers as
formidable as themselves, Anna was sorry for him who, either physically
or intellectually blind, could see nothing in Berhou. Neither man nor
child was visible; no human habitation; no boat upon the strip of beach
which the rocks and the sea spared between them; but the grey gull sat,
spreading its wings for flight, and the stormy petrel, rarely met within
sight of land, were here perceived to lose the mystery of their
existence. While Anna observed them going forth and returning, and
hovering over the fissures of the rock in which they make their homes,
she found that Mother Carey’s chickens are probably hatched from the
egg, like other birds, and not wafted from the moon, or floated from the
sea depths,—the especial favourites of some unseen power. The slopes of
down which showed themselves in the partings of the rocks, looked green
in contrast with whatever surrounded them; though no hand of man
brightened their verdure, and they were not even trodden by any foot but
those of the wild animals who had the region to themselves. While she
was thus gazing, and her mother would look at nothing because it was not
Jersey, the master and one or two of his crew seemed to be watching the
coast of the other island in the intervals of their extreme care to
obviate the perils of the passage through the strait. At this moment, a
breath of air brought the faint sound of chiming bells from Alderney.
Stephen instantly turned to listen, and waited patiently till it came
again, and Anna was sure that it was wafted from a church-steeple, and
not from any region of fancy.
“Master,” said Stephen, “you will not be able to land us in Alderney
to-night, I am afraid.”
The master was just going to advise the party to proceed to Guernsey.
The state of the tide was such that he could not engage to set any one
on shore in Alderney. The party had better go on to Guernsey.
“The vraicking season begins to-morrow, master. You have no mind to lose
all your passengers that might like to stay and see the vraicking. Well;
that is fair enough. But we cannot go on to Guernsey, having no call
there. You may set us ashore on Berhou.”
The master supposed he meant some other place. The honey-bees and the
rabbits might make out a good night’s rest in Berhou, but there were no
lodgings for Christians. Stephen knew better; and knew, moreover, that
the master might feel well enough pleased at being spared performing his
promise as to Alderney, to land the party, without objection, in a more
practicable place. This was true. The master had not the least objection
to their supping with the rabbits, and sleeping among the sea-fowl, if
they chose. Moreover, if they found themselves starving by the time he
came back that way, he would toss them some biscuit, if they would only
hoist a flag of distress. Stephen did not care a whit for the master’s
mockery of his plans, or for Mrs. Le Brocq’s complaints at being landed
any where so far from her Louise. He showed so much respect to Anna’s
doubtful looks and words as to assure her that he knew what he was
about, and that no delay would arise from his choice of an uninhabited
island for a temporary resting place. Anna had no choice but to trust
him; but a feeling of forlornness came over her when, having landed the
old lady, and seated her on the sands to recover her breath and dry her
tears, she and Stephen stood to see the vessel recede in the strait, and
at length enter the open sea beyond, leaving them out of reach of human
voice and help.
“Could that bell be heard here from Alderney if the sea was quiet?” she
asked.
“I dare say it might; but this sea is never quiet,” he replied. “Day and
night, summer and winter, it plunges and boils as you see. You are
thinking that the sound of a church-bell would be cheering in this
solitude; but yonder bell keeps its music for the folks on its own
island; and a merry set they will be to-night on the south side,
watching the tide going down towards morning, that they may begin the
vraicking.”
“And what are we to do next?” asked Anna, with a touch of the doleful in
her voice which seemed to amuse Stephen.
“Catch Mother Carey’s chickens, and run after rabbits, to be sure. You
know there is nothing else to live upon here. We shall have a merry life
of it, shall not we?”
“I wish you would answer me, Stephen. My mother cannot bear joking. What
are we to do next?”
“You must watch for the lighting of the Caskets, and eat a biscuit in
the meantime.”
It was a comfort that some biscuits were secured; for Mrs. Le Brocq was
never wholly miserable while eating, whatever she might be before and
after. The sun was fast sinking behind the Caskets, so that it could not
be long before their now dark towers would be crowned with a yellow
gleam, and more of Stephen’s little plot would be unravelled. Anna
suggested that if they had to go any where to look for a boat or a
lodging, it would be better to move before twilight came on. She
concluded they were not to sit here on a stone all night, looking at
Alderney. Stephen begged pardon. He knew every step of the way so well
that he had forgotten how much more important daylight was to his
companions than to him. He rose from the vetch-strewn sand where he had
laid himself at ease, loaded himself with what he could conveniently
carry of the family luggage, saying that the rest might remain where it
was, as there was no chance of rain before morning, and set forward over
the heathery waste.
This was the first ground the party had trodden since they left London;
and even Mrs. Le Brocq observed the difference between Lambeth pavement
and the turf on which they were now walking, matted with fragrant heath,
with patches between of blossoming thyme. Little white-tailed rabbits
trotted in all directions to their burrows; and swarms of the celebrated
honey-bee (called the leaf-cutter, from its hanging its cell in the
sands with rose-leaf curtains) hovered and hummed over the thyme-beds
and the briar-rose bush which was now closing its blossoms from the
honey-searcher. The dash and roar of the strait were left behind, and
the deepest silence succeeded. None of the party spoke while they
proceeded with noiseless steps, Stephen leading the way, with his staff
for his protection. He would go first and alone, lest he should lose his
way by relaxing his attention. At last, his step slackened, and he felt
the ground about him.
“Is there a bit of grey rock hereabouts, like a sofa?”
“There is a stone seat that you might fancy like a sofa, twelve yards
from your right hand.”
“Give me your arm round to the other side of it. There! now there is a
path downwards, almost from your feet, is not there?”
“Yes; a very steep path,—difficult to get down, I should think. The
honeysuckles are like a hedge on either side. You smell the
honeysuckles?”
“It was the honeysuckles that guided me, after we had half crossed the
heath. You were too busy with the thyme to attend to them, I dare say;
but the honeysuckles were what I was on the look-out for. If we have to
go to Serk, you will find the air as sweet as Paradise with them.”
“Why should we go to Serk?”
“I may be able to tell you within an hour or two, or we may have to wait
till morning. In the last case, I know of a snug cave where we will
light a fire with a little of yonder furze; and it will be odd if we do
not fall in with something good to eat and drink, and something soft to
sleep upon.”
“I sleep in a cave!” exclaimed Mrs. Le Brocq. “I cannot do any such
thing. I never slept in a cave in my life.”
“If you see any place that you like better, I am sure I am very glad,”
replied Stephen. “Yonder sofa would not be a bad place on a soft
summer’s night. Only, a brood of Mother Carey’s chickens might chance to
flap their wings about you and startle you; or, if you woke, you might
happen to find yourself in the middle of a circle of strangers, all
smoking their pipes; and then you might wish yourself down with me in
the cave. If you look round, ma’am, you will see no blue roofs in all
the island,—unless they have altered it since I knew it.”
Mrs. Le Brocq shuddered as she said that it was too dark to see blue
roofs or any thing else.
“And there are the Casket lights,” cried Anna. “Only two! yes; there is
the third. Look, mother! like three red stars.”
“Now,” said Stephen, “one of you must be so good as to help me down this
path,—just to the turning.”
Anna guided him, her mother calling out all the way, that they must not
go far: she did not choose to be left alone.
While they were for a few minutes out of sight, she had recourse to her
prayers, finding herself in too strong a panic for tears. Those nasty
birds would come and pick out first her eyes and then Anna’s; and then
they two would be more blind than Stephen, and could never get away; and
their bones would lie stark and stiff on the cold ground. Before she had
done praying that she might live to die in her bed, her companions
re-appeared, to save her eyes for the present from the birds.
When Stephen and Anna had reached the first turn of the winding path, he
desired to know what was to be seen beneath. “Scarcely anything,”
replied Anna. “Between the Casket lights and these rocks, there is
nothing but the dark grey sea.”
“And nothing under these rocks?”
“Only a little patch of sand, with nothing upon it; and the white birds
sailing out and in. Not a boat on the sea, nor a living person on the
land! What a place to bring us to, Stephen!”
“Not a living person on the land! Do you suppose there are any dead,
Miss Anna? Do you see any white skeletons among the dark rocks?”
“The place gives one as horrible an idea as any you can speak,” Anna
replied. “This is a place where a poor wretch may be cast ashore, and
drag himself up out of sea-reach, and mark the sun set thrice while he
is pining with hunger and cannot die, and beholding land far off where
he cannot make himself seen or heard, till all is one dark cloud before
his dying eyes, and his last terrors seize him, and there is no one to
take his hand, and speak the word that would calm his spirit. O,
Stephen, what a place to bring my mother and me to!”
“Ay, is not it? You are making up your mind to die here, I see. Come;
this is all I have to show you yet. We may go up to the sofa again, and
see whether your mother is dreaming about dead men’s bones, or crying
because she cannot get away.”
Anna was not disposed to make any answer. She led the way back in
silence, and said no more to her mother than to remind her that
remonstrance was in vain. Nothing could well be more cheerless than the
companionship of the party for the next half hour, while the stars were
piercing the heaven, and the sea-birds dropping into the caverns below,
and the night breeze going forth on its course, and whispering the rocks
which stood as sentries over the restless tide. Mrs. Le Brocq sat bolt
upright on the stone sofa; Stephen lay down on the turf, as if to sleep;
and Anna walked backwards and forwards, harassed by uneasy thoughts. At
the same instant, she stopped in her pacing, and Stephen half raised his
head, as a watch-dog does at any sound brought by the night wind.
“What is it?” asked Anna.
Probably her half-breathed question did not reach Stephen; for he
yawned, and laid himself down as before. Anna could only suppose that
she had heard nothing. There was no use in asking her mother; for she
must doubtless be fully occupied with the noise in her head, of which
she complained at all times, and especially when under any sort of
agitation.
In ten minutes more, Stephen jumped up, saying briskly,
“Now, Miss Anna, I must trouble you once more.”
“To do what, Mr. Stephen?”
“To prevent my being lost in the honeysuckles, that is all.”
With some unwillingness, Anna again made herself his guide down the
path. When she reached the turn, she stifled an exclamation of
astonishment.
“Out with it, Miss Anna!” said Stephen. “You see none but friends. What
are they doing below?”
“They have set up a boat sideways, to prevent the fire being blown out;
or, perhaps, to hinder its being seen from the sea. What a fire they are
making! and every man has his pipe.”
“As is fitting for those that help so many to a pipe which they could
not otherwise get. How many are there? Do you see any face that you
know?”
“I can scarcely tell yet. The light flickers so! One—two—there are five,
I think. O, Stephen!—it never can be,—yes, it is,—Mr. Prince, the
shopkeeper at St. Peter’s, that—”
“Why should not it be Mr. Prince? The shopkeepers are as likely a set of
men to be out on a vraicking eve as any. Is he the only one you know?”
“Yes. I see all their faces now. There is no other that I have ever
known, I think. How very odd it is to see Mr. Prince look just as he
used to do when he stood smiling behind his own counter!”
“He smiles, does he? Well; I hope you ladies will not be afraid to trust
yourselves with Mr. Prince; I have no doubt he will be proud to take
care of you back.”
“To St. Peter’s! But we do not want to go to St. Peter’s. Stephen, I
believe we shall never make you understand how much we wish to get back
to Jersey. I wonder you can trifle with us so.”
“Have patience,” said Stephen. “You well know that there is one thing
that you desire even more than to get back to Jersey.”
“About Aaron. There he is! behind the boat!” cried she, passing Stephen,
and flying down the steep pathway, as if she had thought it possible for
Aaron now to escape her by running into the sea. Aaron had no wish to
flee away. Before his sister had made her way through his companions, he
had opened his arms to her; and he had no less pleasure in the meeting
than herself.
He was all surprise at finding Anna apparently alone on a desert island;
and she that he was not expecting her. He knew that his family meant
soon to return to their farm; but he would as soon have expected to meet
the queen of England in the wilds of Berhou as his sister Anna.
His mother there too!—And his father also? he inquired with an altered
voice. His father not being of the party, he became extremely impatient
to join his mother.
“That is the way by which I came down,” Anna explained. “There,—by
yonder little opening. Let me show you. And poor Stephen: I forgot him;—
he is there; and he can neither get up nor down by himself, and I left
him alone. O, Aaron, how could you go away as you did?” And all the way
up the ascent, Aaron had to justify himself for going away as he did. He
scarcely paused a moment to greet Stephen; but ran on to find Mrs. Le
Brocq. When the first tears and exclamations were over, the question was
heard again,
“Aaron, how could you go away as you did?”
“Why, mother, is not being here much better than drudging on the
tread-wheel, or even than doing nothing in a prison? I tell you, mother,
if you did but know the pleasant sort of life I have been leading
lately——Well; if that won’t do, let me tell you that it makes me so
merry to see you and Anna standing here,—so free, and so far out of the
reach of such fellows as Studley,—that I could find in my heart to whiff
away all laws like the smoke from one of those tobacco-pipes.”
Anna thought that the use of laws was to enable people to stand free,
and out of the reach of knaves and revengeful men.
“To be sure, such ought to be the purpose of laws; but is such the
purpose and effect of the excise laws? Nobody knows better than I, and
the other men below there, that the raising money for the state is
necessary for the security and quiet of the people; but if the money is
so raised as to spoil their security and quiet, who is not tempted to
wish the laws at the devil, and let the state take its chance for money?
It is a fine thing for us to be here, at any rate, under this open sky,
and with plenty of meat and drink below. Come, mother; we will have a
good supper to-night, without asking the king’s will about what we shall
have, or paying for his leave to enjoy one thing rather than another. We
have plenty of vraicking cakes from Alderney, and some fine French wine
to drink with them.”
“O, Mr. Stephen,” cried Mrs. Le Brocq, “we are much obliged to you for
bringing us here. Here is Aaron so free and happy! and vraicking cakes,
and French wine! We are much obliged to you, Mr. Stephen.”
“Yes, we are indeed,” said Anna, heartily. “I beg your pardon, I am
sure, for doubting what you were doing for us. But it did seem very
forlorn. How well and merry Aaron looks, to be sure! If we were but
certain it was all right!”
“How can it be wrong when we are all as merry as children let out of
school?” Stephen asked. “I found out your evil thoughts of me, Miss
Anna; but now, perhaps, you will trust me another time. I may chance to
hear more in a church-bell than the news that the vraicking begins
to-morrow.”
“Was it that bell that told you that Aaron would be here to-night? I
never thought of that. I never could have guessed it.”
“I dare say not. Some people that have more interest in such matters
than you, are no more aware than you of the sly little markets that are
held in many a cove and cavern, when an oyster-fishing or a vraicking
gives opportunity for many boats to meet together. Such a bell as that
we heard in Alderney is a signal to more ears than it is intended for;
and lights like those” (pointing towards the Caskets) “serve many eyes
for a dial, to show the hour of meeting. Aaron, are there many
foreigners off the islands just now?”
“Above fifty small sail of French off Guernsey this morning. The
Guernsey folks are fine customers to the French now; which is no little
help to our business. We can get anything to order; and when by chance
other things fail, there is always corn and wine for the boldest of us
to carry; and I, for one, have never had to wait for a port to get them
into.——But come; there will be no supper left if we do not make haste
down. We jumped ashore with fine appetites, and I would not trust any
body with a cooked supper, after such a pull as we have had to-day.
Besides, we have not overmuch time, for we must be off Little Serk
before the first farmer is up and overlooking the sea. We have a private
errand there.”
“And you are going to leave us—all alone!” exclaimed Mrs. Le Brocq.
“Not if you wish to go with us, mother. At Little Serk you will be all
the nearer Jersey, you know. We will take good care of you. Come, Anna;
you are not afraid of supping with my partners, are you?”
“O, no; and yet, if anybody had told me——But they do not look at all
wild and terrible, as I thought people did when they broke the laws.”
“It depends much on what sort of people break the laws,” observed
Stephen; “and that again depends on what sort of laws they are that are
broken. When it is not the violent and cruel, but such people as thrifty
shop-keepers——”
“I cannot help laughing,” said Anna, “to think of Mr. Prince. I am sure
nobody could ever dream of being afraid of him. Mother, will you come
down, and speak to Mr. Prince, and have some supper?”
“And he will tell us the best plan for getting to Jersey, I dare say. I
wonder whether he has been in the way of hearing anything of Louise
lately?”
The old lady made little difficulty about the descent; and she and her
daughter were presently so far demoralized as to be supping with a
company of smugglers, almost as comfortably as if they had been honest
men.
CHAPTER VII.
WELCOME TO SUPPER.
The party was off Little Serk, as Aaron willed, before the first farmer
was abroad on the upland to overlook the gleamy sea. Two of the company
had hastened over the heath, while the others were at supper, to bring
the larger packages which had been left behind; and all had put off
beneath the moon some time before midnight. Mr. Prince had found a
little leisure for being civil to his former customers, though he had
much to do, as well as his companions, in stowing in one of the caverns
the goods he had brought from France, and loading the boat with the
packages deposited there by some friendly vraickers and lobster-fishers.
It was not that in these islands any danger attended traffic of any
kind; except in the one article of spirits which had not paid duty.
There were here no guards patrolling the sands, or perched upon the
steep, to look for thieves in every bark that cleaved the blue expanse,
and anticipate murder when the twilight spread its shadows. There were
here no questionable abodes,—spy-stations,—niched in places convenient
for overlooking the traffic of housewifes with the fishermen who
furnished their tables. Here there were no deadly struggles in the
darkness, the comrade going down in deep waters, with the bitter
consciousness that he was thrown overboard lest his wounds should lead
his companions into danger; or left unclaimed upon the beach, while wife
or parents are secretly mourning, and longing to give the exposed body
the respectful burial which strangers will not yield. No such
extraordinary arrangements deform the simplicity and mar the peace of
the society of these islands; but, while the coasts of France and
England cannot enjoy the same freedom, the islanders are tempted to
share in the frauds and the perils of their neighbours. Not content with
having corn, wine, and tobacco at their natural cost of production and
carriage, they are willing to help others to the same privilege; and
will continue to be so willing as long as, by their office of
go-between, they can make a profit by the bad legislation of the two
kingdoms within whose embrace they lie. There is no remedy for this but
rectifying the faults of French and English commercial legislation. As
long as taxes are levied by raising the prices of necessary articles so
high as to make smuggling profitable, the island boats will steal along
the shores, or cautiously cross the straits on the dishonest errands of
a mediator between two defrauders; they will land their passengers short
of their point, because they have something besides passengers on board;
they will make a show of lobsters to hide tea and tobacco. To impose
restraints on them, similar to those by which they now profit in pocket
and suffer in morals, would only increase the evil by enlarging the
field of temptation, and adding the demand of the islands to that of the
two neighbouring coasts. There is no remedy but in putting all on an
equality, not of restraint, but of freedom.
The lord of Serk and his people had not yet opened their eyes on the
morning sunshine, when the boat containing Aaron and his party ran under
the perpendicular rocks of the island, and several voices announced that
they had arrived at their destination. No landing-place was visible; but
the women had by this time become inured to wonders, and resigned to
whatever of romantic might come in their way. They asked no questions,
even when their boat grated against the rock, and moved uneasily in the
ripple without being intended to make any progress. They made no
objection when desired to lay hold of a rope which dangled from a ledge
thirty feet above their heads; and quietly submitted to be hauled up
they knew not whither. Up and down, forward and round-about they went,
now seeing a cask taken up from a store-cavern, now dropping a message
in a lonely cottage; and at last sitting down to repose in a cavern
which was lighted only from a natural opening at the top, upon which the
blue sky seemed to rest as a roof. Here the echoes were already awake
with the blows of the mattock and the grating of the saw. Here
boat-building went on, early and late; for a certain Englishman had
found out how well the islanders are off for timber,—the best of timber,
which pays no duty; and many a good bargain he made by going forth in a
worn-out vessel, and coming home in a boat of Serk workmanship. Aaron
was right in supposing that here he should pick up the means of
conveying his mother and sister home with their heavy wares. Here he
insisted on their resting, after their many fatigues and long watching;
but it was not that he might himself repose. He had still a little trip
to make.
“My dear, you will be tired to death,” said his mother. “I never knew
you work all night in Jersey.”
Aaron laughed, and said that people are seldom tired to death when they
work at no bidding but their own: and, as for working at night——
“It is a bad practice, Aaron, depend upon it,” said his sister. “Honest
work is done by daylight.”
“Carry your objections to those who taught me to work at night,”
answered Aaron. “And not me only, but hundreds more. They are but few
who would naturally work when their part of the world is supposed to be
asleep;—the nurse beside the sick-bed, and the watchmen that walk the
streets of cities; the beacon-keeper that trims the lamps in his high
tower, and the helmsman that fixes his eyes upon those lights far out at
sea. All but these are supposed to be at rest when God has set his stars
for night-lamps, and drawn the darkness about us for a curtain: but
there are some who contradict his decree that night is the time for
rest;—and they are such as make harsh and unjust laws.”
“But for laws,” said Anna, nearly as she had said before, “we might be
subject to the robber by night, and the violent man by day. Without
laws, none of us could lie down and sleep in peace.”
“Without some wholesome laws: but, if it were not for certain unwise and
cruel laws, thousands more of us would lie down and sleep in peace. Ask
the country justice in England, whose business it is to enforce the
laws, how often it happens that labourers who cannot get work during the
day because their superiors have a monopoly of bread, toil unlawfully
all the night because their superiors have a monopoly of game. He may
dispute the wickedness; but he will not deny what comes of digging
pitfalls for men, lest they should set springes for birds. Ask,—(nobody
could have told better than poor Durell)—ask any exciseman what time is
chosen by certain traders for their traffic, and makers for their work;
and he will tell you of the burning, and the boiling, and the
distilling, and the packing and removing that take place by night. He
will tell you that the noblest works that men can do, and that they
ought to do proudly in the daylight, are done by night, because the law
has fixed a sin and a shame upon them. To make improvements in human
comfort is turned into a sin and shame, when those improvements are made
too expensive by a tax; therefore they are tried by night. The exchange
of the fruits of men’s labour is made a sin and a shame, when a tax
comes in to make such an exchange unprofitable: therefore it is done by
night. These innocent things being made a sin and a shame is the reason
why tax-gatherers prowl about, like so many robbers, when the sun is
down; and why the better men whom they entrap are carried to prison in
the morning, to come out blasted and desperate, as if they had committed
a crime against God’s majesty instead of against the king’s treasury.”
Mrs. Le Brocq stared in astonishment at her son. With a little
hesitation, she asked him whether he had not adopted a new vocation, and
turned preacher. The kindness of his manner to her, and the eloquence of
his speech, concurred to impress her with the idea. He smiled as he
answered, that there would be no lack of preachers or of eloquence upon
this subject, if every one who had suffered were allowed to bear
witness. A voice would rise up from all the land, and go forth over the
sea, if every Briton who is injured by the mode in which he is obliged
to pay his contribution to the state, might speak his mind.
But still,—Aaron talked so differently from what he used to do,—so
freely,—so cleverly.
“There is all the difference in the world, mother, between——But I do not
wish to say anything disrespectful of my father: so I will only mention
that the reason why it is found to be prudent for governments to allow
people to speak out, is because nothing makes men more eloquent than a
sense of wrong; and the stronger the eloquence that is suppressed, the
more doggedly will the sense of wrong show itself in some other way. A
whole nation can mutter and be sullen, as I used to be; and its
muttering and sullenness may prove of more importance than mine. Now I
have got an occupation of my own, and am under nobody’s management, I
could preach (as you would say) very strongly both to parents and
governments about not being spies and meddlers,—that is to say,”
(recollecting his father) “about not interfering more than is pleasant
with the doings of their children and subjects. To make wise and
merciful general laws, and then leave the will and actions free in
particular instances, is the only true policy,—the only kind of
government which is not in its nature tyranny.”
“But how do you apply that to the paying of taxes?” inquired Stephen.
“How is the state to raise money on such a plan of government?”
“Far more easily than in any other way, in my opinion. Under a general
rule that property is to pay such or such a proportion of tax, there is
the least possible room for partiality and oppression; for the
derangement of people’s affairs, and interference with people’s actions.
There is an open and honest calling to account, at times that are fixed,
in a manner that is established, and for purposes that are well
understood: while, by meddling as excisemen and custom-house officers
meddle, the king is defrauded of the affections of his people; the state
is wronged in purse and reputation; and its agents are made masters to
teach multitudes a livelihood which need never have been heard of. Which
of us would naturally have dreamed of living by defrauding the
government, for whose protection we were ready to pay our share?”
“Then you will not go on as you have been doing lately,” said Anna. “You
will go home with us, and serve the government as you yourself think the
government ought to be served.”
“I will see you home, and do my father’s errand at the custom-house,”
replied Aaron. “The States shall never have cause to complain of me, as
long as they go on to take our taxes as they do now. As for cheating
them, I could not if I would: and I am sure I have no desire to do it
while they treat me like a man, and ask no more from me than is due from
a subject.”
“I am sure I hope they will go on to do so.”
“You may well wish it. If ever they begin meddling with your cider or
soap-making, or setting spies upon me when I buy tobacco or hemp, I
shall be off to some country,—Turkey may be,—where taxes are demanded
and not filched.”
“Turkey! I thought that was a horrible country to live in.”
“So you would find it in many respects; but it is wise and free in its
mode of taxation; and the effects of this one kind of wisdom and freedom
on the happiness of the people, our neighbours on the north and south
would do prudently to study and admit. However, yonder lies Jersey; as
good a place as Turkey in this respect, and better in many others; so I
have no present wish to sail eastwards.”
It seemed to Mrs. Le Brocq this afternoon that nothing more was
necessary to happiness than to be sailing southwards, with Aaron
trimming the sail, Anna looking as tranquil as if she had never been in
an excise court or a prison, and the beloved island rising on the sight,
in which was Louise, probably with a pretty baby in her arms;—a pretty
baby, of course, as every thing belonging to Louise must be pretty. How
cheerful looked that picturesque coast from Grosnez to Rozel, as
promontory after promontory came into view, tapestried with verdure, or
crested with cairns or church towers, and casting each its dark shadow
to hide its eastern cove from the declining sun! How busy were those
coves to-day! how unlike their usual solitude and stillness! At almost
every other time, it was a wonder to see more than a solitary loiterer
on the narrow path whose precarious line circled the rocks, and
penetrated the bays, now winding up to the steep, now dipping to the
margin of the water; and, as for the yellow sands, they were left
printless from tide to tide while the islanders were busy about their
farmsteads. But now, all was as animated as if the land was joyful at
the Le Brocqs’ return. Carts were standing in the water to receive the
vraic; and the red-capped boy who rode the horse, or the white-sleeved
man who wielded his rake in the vehicle, looked bright in the evening
sunshine. Here and there, a horse might be seen swimming home from a
distant mass of rock, guided by a youth or maiden mounted on the heaped
panniers. Boats were plying from point to point; and on every ledge
where marine vegetation could be supposed to flourish without danger of
molestation, children might be seen tugging at the tenacious weed, while
their fathers did more effectual execution with their scythes. There was
not an exposed place all along this coast where the lobsters could
safely come up this day to sun themselves; and when the infant crabs
should next propose to play hide-and-seek in what was to them a sort of
marine jungle, they would find their moist retreat stripped and bare,
and must betake themselves again to the tide. High on the beach might be
seen parties busy at their work, or busier at their recreation,—
spreading and tossing the ooze as if it were hay, or broaching the cider
cask, and distributing the vraicking cakes. Mrs. Le Brocq once nearly
upset the boat, by lifting up her ponderous self with the view of
hailing the mowers on shore;—a feat about as practicable in her case as
shaking hands with one on the top of Coutances cathedral. She was glad
to reseat herself, and be no worse, and try to wait patiently till the
boat should have rounded Archirondel tower, and given her up to tread
one of the green paths from St. Catherine’s bay to the ridge, on the
other side of which was Louise.
From that ridge might be seen the farm-house, just as was expected. It
did not seem to have lost an ivy-leaf, nor to have gained so much as a
lichen on its pales. The pigeons looked the very same. The fowls
strutted and perched exactly as formerly; and the brook trotted over the
stones as if it had never grown tired all these many months.
“Who could have thought we had been away?” was Anna’s first exclamation.
Her mother was toiling on too fast to reply; but Aaron gave an
unconscious answer to her thought when he presently overtook them, and
delivered the result of the observation he had lingered on the ridge to
make with his boat glass.
“Who do you think is in the porch, mother?”
“Louise!”
“And who else?—No, not her husband, nor Victorine; but her baby. There
is a bundle on her arm; I am sure it must be her baby. Charles is out
vraicking, no doubt; and Victorine is milking, I see, behind there. Not
so fast, mother, if I may advise. Let me go first. She will be less
surprised to see me; and I think she cannot be strong yet, or she would
have been out vraicking too.”
It was, in fact, Louise’s first evening out of doors after her
confinement. What an evening it was!—Anna relieving her of all household
cares; her mother overflowing by turns with affecting narrative and
admiration of the infant; Stephen giving a droll turn to every thing;
and no paternal restraint to spoil the whole! It was a pity that night
was near, and that it would come to put a stop to the interesting
questions and answers that abounded.
“When do you gather your apples, love? I have been thinking we must soon
be setting about your cider.”
“But, mother, only think of your coming away from London without seeing
the king!”
“My dear, your father did write to him: so it is not as if we had had
nothing to do with him.”
“And what was the answer like?”
“Bless me, Anna! we never thought more of the king’s answer. But,
really, my head was so full of things, I never recollected to send to
inquire at the post-office. However, your father will be more mindful, I
dare say. Well, Louise, I cannot think how you managed with the calf, to
have such a misfortune happen, my dear. I never failed with one all the
time I lived here.”
“And you say you never so much as tried in Lambeth. I do wonder you did
not manage it, one way or another.”
“Nobody keeps cows there, love, but the brewers; and then the poor
beasts live on the grains, and seldom taste fresh grass. They flourish,
in a way, too. A great brewer near us had one brought in, intending that
it should have the range of the paved yard, on Sundays, when the gates
were shut: but the creature had fattened on the grains so that when the
people would have let her out, she could not turn in her stall. When
they had thinned her a little, so that she might get exercise, it was
thought that the fumes of the liquor had affected her head, she capered
about so among the casks. But I never heard but what she yielded very
good cream, which you do not always see in London.”
“I wonder how they get cream at all, if, as you say, there are no cows
but one in each brewery. Perhaps the excise makes the difficulty with
taking some of the cream for the king; as they say the tithing man does
for the parson.”
Aaron had not heard of an exciseman being yet instructed to thrust
himself between the cow and the milk-pail; but he should not be
surprised any day to hear of its being made part of an excise officer’s
duty to peep in at a dairy lattice, and see what the milk-maids were
about with their skimming dishes. Did not he hear horses’ feet outside?
Could it be Charles? No; Charles was not coming home to-night. What old
friend could it be? And he ran out to see.
“An old enemy,” the guest expected to be called. It was Janvrin, the
tax-gatherer. Every body was struck with the strangeness of the
circumstance that he should appear on this particular night,—to a party
who had had so much to do with taxes since they had met him last. There
was something much more astonishing to him in the cordiality of his
reception.
“The last time I saw you all here,” said he, “you certainly wished me at
the Caskets, or somewhere further off still; and now, you are heaping
your good supper upon me, as if I were come to pay money, and not to ask
it.”
“For our former behaviour,” replied Aaron, “you may call him to
account,”—pointing to Stephen. “You heard him say what taxation was in
England,—just paying a trifle more for articles when they were bought;—
such a mere trifle as not to be perceived. He is not laughing in his
sleeve now as he was when he told that traveller’s tale. It is to our
having taken him at his word, Janvrin, and made trial of English
taxation, that you owe your different reception to-night.”
Stephen expressed his sorrow that his words had taken so much more
effect than he had intended. He really would try,—he would do his very
best, to avoid telling travellers’ tales for the future.
“The oddest thing is,” said Janvrin, “that there are some who are no
travellers that tell the very same tale. There are dwellers in England,—
even speakers in her parliament, who ought to know the condition and
interests of the people, who go on to insist that the filching system,—
the taxing of commodities,—is the best way of raising a revenue. The
wonder to me is why the mouths of such men are not stopped,—how such
taxes come to be borne.”
“Because it is the ignorant who have to bear the worst of the burden,”
Stephen thought. “The payment is made unconsciously by those who pay in
the long run. The trader feels the grievance at first, and makes an
outcry; but when the time comes for him to repay himself out of his
customers’ pockets, he drops his cry, and nobody takes it up. It saves
some people much trouble that all should be hush. But the time cannot be
far off when honest men will be set to inquire, and then——”
“And what then?”
“They will report that the truest kindness to the people will be rather
to preserve the worst direct tax, be it what it may, that was ever
devised, than to go on taxing glass and soap, and many other things
nearly as necessary.”
“If the people are so little aware as you say, I am afraid that day is a
long way off.”
“I think it is near at hand; and for this reason; that there has been a
beginning made with the excise taxes. The government has set free
candles, beer, cider and perry, hides and printed goods. What should
hinder their going on to glass and soap, now that the mischief begins to
be understood?”
“Especially,” said Janvrin, “when they find what it is to have fewer
officers to pay, and smaller regiments of spies to provide for, and less
trouble in delivering money backwards and forwards, as they have to do
now with drawbacks and import duties, and all such troublesome things.
It is a pity they should not come here, and see what it is to have
houses made of free bricks, and filled with furniture made of untaxed
wood, and cleaned with home-made soap, andbut I need not tell the
present company what it is to live in Jersey, before or after living in
England. The English may have heard a little of our meadows, our cattle,
and our fruits, the like to which they cannot make in a season, at their
will; but they can hardly have heard much of our taxation, or else they
would come and live here by thousands;—or rather, mend their own plans
so as not to be beaten by us in butter-selling in their own markets,—not
to be obliged to us for helping them underhand with such corn and oil
and wine as we do not want,—not to reflect with shame that we have in
proportion five newspapers to their one, and one tax-gatherer to their
ten.”
“The comptroller at St. Heliers might well advise me not to go to
England,” said Aaron. “He knew well what he meant in saying it. I shall
tell him so to-morrow; and the more because I was inclined to take it
ill at the time?”
“Saying, I suppose, ‘What’s that to you?’ Hey, Mr. Aaron?”
“Just so. I have had my answer, I assure you. I hope he knows as well
how different his office is from that of an English custom-house
officer. When he has done his search about wine and spirits, he may put
his hands in his pocket and amuse himself. I well remember his doing so,
of old. In England, there is not a package that comes on shore that is
not suspected; and scarcely a thing that is brought over to be sold for
touch or taste, that is not taxed or to be taxed.”
“That is going too far for any body’s interest. If the English would
have no customs for protection, but only for revenue, they would
presently find out what would bear customs duty without doing harm to
any or all. They would tax outwards only what their country produced so
much better than other countries that others would go on to buy,
notwithstanding the tax; and inwards nothing at all. When China taxes
her own tea, and Russia her own tallow, timber, and hides, and England
her own iron and slates, and each country, in like manner, its own best
produce, and nobody’s else, the curse of the customs will cease from off
the earth.”
“Meantime, if the duties were proportioned to the natural prices of
articles, and made to fall with the price, instead of rising——”
“Some of our islanders must change their occupation; or fish lobsters in
earnest instead of pretence. Then there would be an end of the crowning
curse of smuggling.”
Aaron and Stephen made no answer,—the one applying himself once more to
his plate, and the other pressing the tax-gatherer again to eat. An
interval was left for Louise to repeat to him, while Victorine stood
open-mouthed to hear, some of the wonders of life in Lambeth;—the
nonexistence of cows, the dearth of baked pears and vraic, and the
actual presence of a river in which nobody thought of washing clothes.
This reminded Victorine to make haste and put away every stray article
of apparel before Stephen retired to rest.
CHAPTER VIII.
A WANDERER STILL.
“My mother is still asleep, I suppose,” said Aaron, the next morning,
when followed by Anna as he was going forth. “I do not wonder; for I was
drowsy enough to have slept on till noon, if I had not had this errand
of my father’s to do at the Custom-house. I will take care that the
certificate gets to his hands; and then you will soon see him. You shall
have news of the pottery from time to time, Anna. Farewell.”
“What do you mean, Aaron? Now, do answer me. Are you not coming back?”
“O, yes; I shall look in upon you now and then at odd times. I may
chance to enter when you are all asleep, or to drop in for a basin of
soup on a winter day. You do not want me, you know. The rope-walk is
Malet’s; and my father will take care of the farm.”
“No, no, Aaron. Nothing will prosper with us if you go out again with
those law-breakers on the sea. We shall never be happy if you live by
breaking the laws. God will never prosper us.”
“How can you say that, Anna, when I have prospered already as I never
thought to prosper? The worst that can happen to me is to have my
tobacco seized now and then. I assure you that is all; for I am only a
trader. It is no part of my business to meet the coast-guard, and get
murdered. They can only seize my goods; and that signifies little with
tobacco, which costs me next to nothing, and brings me a fine profit
from England, though I sell it far below the legal price there. Such a
loss now and then is no punishment compared with the having spies set
upon my honest business, as I had in London.”
“I thought that when we came back here, all would be right,” said his
weeping sister.
“And so it is. I am getting rich; and I love the sea and the freedom I
have upon it. You ought to be glad that I have found a way of life that
I like, and left one that I hated.”
Anna only shook her head and wept the more; and then Stephen came
groping out; and, guided by Aaron’s voice, approached also to say
farewell.
“O, do not go yet,” cried she to Aaron. “When will you come back? When
will your conscience be touched about your way of life, about living by
cheating the state?”
“Whenever the state shows a little more regard to the consciences of the
king’s subjects than it does now. What I do, I have been taught; and you
know how, Anna. I shall come back to live by the land whenever they cut
off my living by sea. Whenever the English un-tax corn and wine and
tobacco, I shall come and be a Jersey farmer, and you shall milk my
cows, unless——”
Stephen seized the occasion for a joke about the brown maidens of
France, into whose company Aaron’s wild occupations sometimes brought
him, and about the damsels of the neighbouring islets, who had learned
to know the stroke of his oar from all others, as soon as its flash
could be seen in the sunshine. Aaron laughed; and laughing, bade his
sister again farewell.
She could not even smile. Little did she once think that it could ever
make her sad to see Aaron merry; but as little did she then suppose that
Aaron would ever live by a lawless occupation. Sadly did she watch him,
leading away his companion till both were quite out of sight; and
disconsolately did she then sit down in the porch, and grieve over the
temptation which drew her brother away from the blossoming valley where
his days might have proceeded, as they had begun, in innocence and
plenty.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ILLUSTRATIONS
OF
_TAXATION._
---------------------
No. V.
THE
SCHOLARS OF ARNESIDE.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
831.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES,
Duke Street, Lambeth.
THE
SCHOLARS OF ARNESIDE.
=A Tale.=
BY
HARRIET MARTINEAU.
---------------------
LONDON:
CHARLES FOX, 67, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
---
834.
PREFACE.
In treating of some of our methods of Taxation, it has been my object to
show that they are unjust, odious and unprofitable, to a degree which
could never be experienced under a system of simple, direct taxation.
Believing that such a system must be finally and generally adopted, I
have endeavoured to do the little in my power towards preparing and
stimulating the public mind to make the demand.
If I had consulted my own convenience, and the value of my little books
as literary productions, I should have written less rapidly than I have
done. My conviction was and is, that the best means of satisfying the
interest of my readers on such a subject as I had chosen, was to publish
monthly. I am now about to compensate for my much speaking by a long
silence. It costs me some pain to say this: but the great privilege of
human life,—that of looking forward, is for ever at hand for stimulus
and solace; and I already pass over the few years of preparation, and
contemplate the time when, better qualified for their service, I may
greet my readers again.
H. M.
_July 1st, 1834._
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
1. The Mysteries of Wisdom 1
2. Maternal Anticipations 15
3. Lessons on the Hills 29
4. Signs in the Sky 42
5. Owen and X. Y. Z. 58
6. Press and Post-Office 73
7. The Policy of M.Ps. 96
8. Family Secrets 117
9. The Mysteries laid open 122
THE
SCHOLARS OF ARNESIDE.
CHAPTER I.
THE MYSTERIES OF WISDOM.
“Come, my maiden: come and tell me. You know what it is I like to hear
of a Sunday evening,” said Nurse Ede to her little girl. Nurse was
sitting with her hands before her, beside the old round table from which
she had cleared away the supper. As it was Sunday evening, she could not
work; and nurse had never been taught to read. Little Mildred was
standing on the door-sill, watching Owen and Ambrose who were engaged
outside. As she turned in at her mother’s summons, she said she thought
it rained; which the sheep would be glad of to-morrow.
Mrs. Ede went to the door to call in her boys, lest Owen’s best jacket
should suffer by the rain.
“Bless the lads!” cried she. “What are they sprawling on the ground in
that manner for?”
“Watching the ants home,” Mildred explained. “There are more ants than
ever, mother: all in a line. Ambrose found where they went to at one
end; and now he is looking for the other nest. They are running as fast
as ever they can go.”
“Though ’tis Sunday,” observed nurse. “Well! ’tis not every body that
Sunday is given to: and it is no rule, my dear, because the ants run as
fast as ever they can go, that you should not walk quietly to school and
to church, as the Lord bids. Come in, my dears, and leave the ants to go
to their beds. It is coming up for rain, and mizzles somewhat already.
Come in, and tell me about school this morning. I had not the luck to be
at a school in my day,” she went on to say, while the boys followed her
in, and brushed the dust from each other’s elbows and knees. “I had
nothing to tell my poor father of a Sunday evening, of what I had
learned. So let me hear now. I am sure you were steady children this
morning.”
On the occasion of Sunday evening, the children were indulged with the
use of the fine, large footstool, which the late Mrs. Arruther had
worked with her own hands as a wedding present for nurse’s mother. When
infants, it had been their weekly privilege to show their mother which
of the embroidered flowers was a rose, and which a heart’s-ease, and
which a tulip; and now that they were somewhat too old to confound the
rose and the tulip, they took it in turn to sit on the stool at their
mother’s knee, while they imparted their little learning to her who
meekly received from her own children some scraps of knowledge which she
had been denied the opportunity of gaining during her own young days.
“I warrant I know what set ye to look after the ants,” said she. “There
is a bit about the ants in the bible that I have heard read in church.
Which of ye can read it to me, I wonder?”
Ambrose looked at Owen, and Owen looked doubtfully at the large old
bible which Mildred reverently brought down from the shelf, at a glance
from her mother. Owen did not know where, in all that great book, to
look for the bit about the ant. While he was turning over the leaves,
stopping to consider every great A he came to, Mildred wanted to know
whether it was an ant that had tickled her face at church this morning,
and hung from her hair by a thread smaller than she could see.
It was of the nature of an ant, her mother thought. It had much the make
of an ant: but it was called a money-spinner.
“Does it spin money?” asked Mildred quickly.
“O yes. My father used to tell me it would spin penny pieces from the
ground up as high as our thatch.”
“And as high as the mill, perhaps?”
“I dare say. But my father did not tell me that, by reason of the mill
not being built in his time.”
“I wish I had not put the money-spinner away,” said Mildred,
thoughtfully. “I wish I could get another.”
“Perhaps one will be sent to you one of these days, if you be a steady
girl. And you will get penny pieces, and perhaps silver as you grow
bigger, if you look to the sheep as your master would have you. Now,
boys: have you found about the ant?”
No. They had found “Adam” near the beginning, and had got past “Aaron,”
and found that “Abimelech” was too long a word to be the one they
wanted. The “Ands” abounded so as to tantalize and perplex them
exceedingly; and when Owen recollected that “ant” might begin with a
small “a,” both came to a full stop. Their mother was kind enough,
however, to say that another part of the bible would do as well. They
might read her the piece they had read in school in the morning.
Owen began. He did his best; never looking off the book, or sparing
himself the trouble of spelling every word that he did not know: but his
mother gained little by what he read. He mixed his spelling with his
reading so completely, and varied his tone so little, not knowing that
he should render the stops as evident to his mother’s ear as they were
to his eye, that she could make nothing of the sense. The passage was
about some priests carrying the ark over Jordan; and this was a puzzle
to her. Her principal idea about Jordan was that almonds came thence;
and she now therefore learned for the first time that almonds came like
fish out of the water: and how the ark, which she knew had carried Noah
and his family, and a pair of every living creature in the world, should
itself be carried on the shoulders of a few clergymen, was what she
could not clearly comprehend. It happened that Owen had been told that
there were two arks, and the difference between them; but he did not
remember to explain this: so his mother, who would not for the world
wonder at anything that could be found in the bible, supposed that it
was all right, sighed to think that her poor husband had not lived to
witness his eldest boy’s learning, and then smiled at Ambrose when it
became his turn to try.
Ambrose was in the class below Owen. At present, he could read only by
spelling every word. While he was about it, Mildred’s eyes and attention
wandered. The rain was now pattering against the lattice, and dripping
from the thatch in little streams, which a ray from the parting clouds
in the west made to glitter like silver. Then the light grew almost into
sunshine on the wall of the room, and on the shelf where nurse laid up
the apparatus of her art. Mrs. Ede was employed by her few opulent
neighbours as a nurse only; but she was regarded as also a doctor by the
poor residents in the village of Arneside. She held herself in
readiness, not only to nurse them, night or day, when they were ill, but
to administer to them from the phials and bottles of red, yellow, and
black liquids which stood on her shelf. These medicines now shone in the
western light so brilliantly as to catch her little daughter’s eye; and,
while looking, Mildred observed two or three new articles of a strange
construction which lay upon the shelf, or hung against the wall. She
could not wait till Ambrose had done reading to ask what they were; and
she was answered as she might have known she would be,—by a mysterious
look, and a finger laid upon the lips. It was not only that Ambrose was
reading, but that it was utterly in vain to question Mrs. Ede about the
circumstances of her art. Whether she was persuaded that knowledge as to
her means would destroy faith in her practice, or that she wished to
preserve a becoming degree of awe in her little ones by mystery in the
one matter in which she was wiser than they,—it so happened that they
had never enticed her into the slightest confidence respecting the
furniture of the south wall of her room. When Ambrose brought in the
roots he had been directed to procure on the heath, the basket and rusty
knife were gravely delivered up, and received without a smile, and with
only a word of inquiry as to whether the roots had grown on a moonshiny
or shady piece of turf; and whether the dew was off or on when they were
dug up. Sometimes, when she was believed to be gone out for the day, one
little sinner placed a stool for another to climb, that the mysteries
might be handled and smelled as well as looked at. Tasting was out of
the question, so dreadful were the stories which they had heard of
little people who had fallen down dead with the mere drawing of a
forbidden cork. Once, also, nurse returned unexpectedly when Owen had
come in from the mill, and Mildred from the moor, and they were trying
experiments with the longest of her bandages; Owen in a corner, holding
one end, and his sister at the opposite corner, turning herself round
and round to see how many times the long strip would fold about her
body. What she heard said by way of warning to Ambrose, when the
exposure was made to him, might have taught her the uselessness of
questions: but she forgot the incident of the bandage when she this
evening offended again by her curiosity. She did what she could to
profit by Ambrose’s reading, rocking herself and crossing her arms in
imitation of her mother; but her eyes would still turn upon the shelf,
and her heart could not help envying the kitten which had made a daring
leap up, and was now thrusting in its nose, and making a faint jingle
among the sacred vessels.
“This is what you should attend to, my dear,” nurse explained, laying
her hand upon the bible, when the boy was at length taking breath after
his task. “The Lord gave the bible for little girls to understand; and
they should not ask what it is not proper for them to know.”
“How are we to find out what it is proper for us to know?” asked Owen.
His mother told him that there would always be somebody at hand to tell
him;—either Mr. Waugh, or the parson, or herself. She would do her best,
she was sure.
“I shall not ask Mrs. Arruther, I can tell her,” observed Owen. “She
never lets Mr. Waugh alone about the Sunday school; and she has done all
she can to set the parson against it.”
“She is very strong in her mind against that school, indeed, Owen; and
many’s the time when she has been sharp with me for letting you learn,
having herself a bad opinion of learning for such as we are. And often
enough I have been uneasy about what I ought to do: but, having great
confidence in Mr. Waugh, and having always heard my poor father and
others say that a little learning is a fine thing for those that can get
it, I hoped I was not out of my duty when I let you go to the school, as
Mr. Waugh desired. And I hope Ambrose and Mildred are both very thankful
for being allowed to go, as well as you, though not belonging to the
paper-mill, and able only to take their schooling every other week, when
it is not their turn with the sheep.”
“Ambrose can’t keep up in the class though, as if he went every Sunday,
like the other boys.”
“The more reason for his making the best of his time when he is there.
Only think, Ambrose, what it would have been for you to be out on the
hills every Sunday, away from the church, and no more able to read your
bible than I am. I trust, my dear, that you will be as well able as
Owen, though not perhaps so soon, (but you will have time before you to
go on learning when he is done,) to read a chapter to me when I grow
old, and maybe not able to hear the clergyman in church. But you must
none of you be bent upon learning more than it is proper for you to
know, lest you should bring me to think that Mrs. Arruther has been
right all the time, and that I have been doing harm when I was most
anxious for your good. Why can’t my little maiden,” she went on to say,
“play with the kitten, or look out at the door, as well as be for ever
glancing up at that shelf?”
Mildred lost no time in availing herself of this permission to play.
Puss had disappeared; but when called, she showed herself through a hole
in the crazy wall of the cottage, and jumped upon Mildred all the way as
she went to the door.
“Me! where are all the clouds gone?” exclaimed Mildred, shading her eyes
with her hand, and looking up into the sky. “’Twas right black when you
called me in; and now it is all blue. There’s not a cloud.”
“They are all fetched up above the sky, my dear, to make a fine Sunday
evening.”
“I doubt whether the sheep will like it altogether as we do,” observed
Ambrose. “There is a mist on their walk yonder; and it is my belief
their coats are heavy with wet at this very time.”
Ambrose was very consequential about sheep, there being no one at home
to contradict anything he might say about creatures that he had more to
do with than either mother or brother. All that could be done was to
question whether it signified to the sheep whether they were more in a
mist on a Saturday or a Sunday evening. If it made no difference to
them, and they were hidden and out of sight, it remained a fine Sunday
evening to people below; and that was enough to be thankful for.
While the whole party was gazing with shaded eyes towards the upland
which was enveloped with a white cloud, through whose folds neither
beast nor man could at present be discerned, somebody seized little
Mildred by the shoulders from behind. Of course, being startled, she
screamed.
“Dear me, Ryan, is it you?” exclaimed nurse to the old man who had
approached unawares. “And all dripping with the rain,—your sack and all—
and we have no fire! But I will get one presently. Boys, bring in some
furze from the shed; and Mildred, strike a light. Don’t think of
standing in your wet clothes, neighbour. But who would have expected to
see you travelling with your sack on a Sunday?”
Ryan would not be blamed for making a push to see an old friend. He had
a mind for an hour’s chat with nurse Ede, if she would let him dry his
sack, and lay his head upon it, in any corner of her cottage. As for the
hour’s chat, nurse was quite willing; and Ryan was welcome to
house-room: but she was engaged, she was sorry to say, to sit up with
Mrs. Arruther to-night. She had promised to be at the Hall by nine
o’clock. No time was lost. The fierce heat of the burning furze soon
made Ryan as dry and warm as on any summer’s noon, and quite ready for
chat and bread and eggs.
“So the poor old lady is ill, is she?” said he. “What, is she very bad?”
“Very bad. With all the trying, there is no getting down to the wound;
and she is sadly afflicted with spasms in the blood that make her heart
turn round till I sometimes doubt whether it will ever come right again.
She has awful nights.”
“If all be true that is said,” declared Ryan, “there is enough happening
to bend her heart till it breaks.”
How? What? Who was doing any harm to Mrs. Arruther?—There was no use in
the children’s asking and listening. This was one of the pieces of
knowledge not meant for them. They could find out no more than that the
news related to Mr. Arruther, the lady’s son, and the member for a small
borough in the district; and that the gentleman had done something very
wicked. What was his crime could not be discovered. Whether he had
overlooked seams in sorting rags, or let a lamb stray, or torn his
clothes in the briers, and forgotten to mend them, or played with the
hassock at church, must be ascertained hereafter: but some one of these
offences it must be, as the children had heard of no others.
“And what is your news, Ryan?” asked his hostess in her turn. “Sure you
must have some, so far as you travel this way and that?”
“Ay; I have news. I have news plenty; such as you have hardly chanced to
hear in your day, I fancy.”
“Why, really! and yet I have lived in the time when all the news about
Buonaparte used to come; when our people used to be hanging the flag
from the church almost every month, for a victory or something. It can
hardly be anything greater than that. Hark, children, hark! Mr. Ryan is
going to tell us some news. But I hope, Ryan, it is such as may be told
on a Lord’s day evening.”
“Certainly. If my news be not diligently spread, we may chance soon to
have no more Lord’s day evenings. You may look shocked; but what is to
come of all Christian things when the heathen come upon us? and what
heathens are so bad as the Turks, you know?”
Mrs. Ede quailed with consternation, never having heard of the Turks,
and having no other idea about heathens than that the bible called them
very bad people, and that (for so she had always taken for granted) they
lived upon a heath—probably after the manner of gipsies. She was afraid
this bad news was too true, so many opportunities as Mr. Ryan had for
knowing what was going on abroad.
“Indeed you are right, Mrs. Ede. It was a man from abroad that told me.
He has not been three months over from Hamburgh with his lot of rags
from the Mediterranean; and he informs me that the Turks are coming up
to take Russia and Europe, and make Turkish slaves of all the
Christians.”
“The Lord have mercy! And then, I suppose, I had better not let my boy
and girl go out on the hills after the sheep. It will be safer to keep
them at home, won’t it? I would do without their little wages, rather
than that they should light upon any Turks under the hedges, or in any
lane.”
“You will have notice in good time, neighbour. I myself will endeavour
to let you know, the first minute I can. And if I don’t, you will find
it out by all the church bells tolling, and the battles on all sides
through the country. O, yes; every bell that has a clapper will toll,
partly to give notice, and partly to see what the Turks can do against
the Christian bells of our Christian churches. Yes, every bell in the
land will toll.”
“Same as when the princess died,” said Mildred. “I heard the great bell
all the way from P that day, when I was on the hill-top. Maybe I’ll hear
it again, if the wind come from that way.”
“Indeed you shall not be on the hill-top, child, the day that the Turks
come. Could you give us an idea when it will be, Ryan? It would be a
pity but some of the ewes should yean first, if it is not dictating to
the Lord to say so.”
The enemy could hardly be coming just yet, Ryan thought, as the
Government was going to change the Parliament, in hopes of getting one
that would be more fit to preserve the empire than the present. Mr.
Arruther would be soon coming into the neighbourhood to manage his
election; and that event might serve in some sort as a token.
“Mrs. Arruther would have known all about the Turks, if everything had
been right,—you know what I mean?” said Mrs. Ede to her guest. “But I
suppose, as it is, I had better not mention anything of danger to the
poor lady, sick as she is.”
“By no means, unless she breaks the subject to you. Tell her other sorts
of news. Tell her that I and my sack are likely soon to come travelling
at the rate of a hundred miles an hour.”
“O, Mr. Ryan, where will you find the horses that will bring you at that
rate? Why, a hundred horses would not bring you so quick as that, if you
had money to hire them!”
Ryan smiled, and said that he meant to travel at this rate without
horses at all. Ay; they might wonder at any one travelling at such a
rate on foot; but the way was this:—there was a new sort of road going
to be made, on which never a horse was to set foot, and where, by paying
half-a-crown to get upon it, a man and his baggage,—and a woman too,—
might do as he had said. It was to be called a rail-road.
Because it was to be railed in, no doubt, to keep off those who could
not pay half-a-crown. Now, if the government could keep the enemy off
this road, and let all its own people upon it, all might run away, so as
to leave the Turks no chance of following. This seemed to open a
prospect of escape; and nurse rose in better spirits, to put on her
bonnet to go to Mrs. Arruther’s. A curious picture was before her mind’s
eye, of Ryan’s gliding along a rail-road with his sack on his back, as
fast as she had sometimes gone in dreams,—for all the world like boys
sliding on the ice in winter. The wonder was that, if Ryan spoke truth,
this curious road would be quite as efficacious on the hottest day of
summer as after a week’s frost.
When she had finished her little arrangements for the comfort of her
guest, and bidden him good night, she called Ambrose out after her, and
desired him to fetch cheese from the village grocer’s for Ryan’s
breakfast, the moment the shop should be opened. If he was there by the
time the first shutter was taken down, he might cut for himself and
Mildred a quarter of the cheese he should bring home. It would give a
relish to their bread when they should have been after the sheep for a
couple of hours, and feel ready for their breakfast on the hill-side.
CHAPTER II.
MATERNAL ANTICIPATIONS.
As there must be no communication with Mrs. Arruther about the most
important article of Ryan’s news, nurse would have had no objection to
talk it over a little on her way through the village; but she found no
opportunity to do so. There were no walkers to be seen enjoying the cool
of the evening by the side of the placid Arne, as it flowed on towards
the fall where it turned the wheel of Mr. Waugh’s paper-mill. There were
no husbands and wives sitting outside their doors, after having put
their children to sleep. There were no lingerers in the churchyard,
talking over the sermon of the morning. A low, confused murmur of
suppressed voices issued from the narrow opening of the ale-house door,
as it stood ajar, and let a gleam of light from within fall across the
road. Almost every interior was visible from being more or less lighted
up; but no one offered encouragement for a word of conversation in
passing. Mrs. Dowley was slapping her boy Tom because he would not go to
sleep as she bade him; and Mrs. Green, whose children were more obedient
in this one respect, was dozing with her head upon the table, by way of
whiling away the time till her husband should come home from the Rose.
Kate Jeffery was reading to her grandfather as he sat in his great
chair; and it would not do to interrupt her, lest it should be the bible
that she was reading. A knot of lads were gathered about the churchyard
gate; but their voices sounded so rude, that nurse, who was a somewhat
timid woman, made a circuit to avoid passing through them. The porter at
Mrs. Arruther’s let her in with a studious haste which seemed to
intimate that he thought her late; and she did not stay to be told so.
In the housekeeper’s room she only tarried to see that her close cap
looked neat, and to pin on the shawl she always wore when she sat up at
night. Mrs. Arruther had asked for her six times in the last ten
minutes; so there was not a moment to be lost.
“You were to come at nine o’clock, and it is ten minutes past, nurse,”
said the sick lady. “This is always the way people treat me,—as if there
was not a clock in Arneside.”
There were several clocks in Arneside, by one of which it was two
minutes past nine, by another it wanted a quarter to nine; a third was
at half-past eight, and a fourth was striking three as nurse passed its
door. But Mrs. Ede never contradicted her patients. She told of Ryan’s
arrival, and was admonished that no guest of hers could possibly be of
half so much importance as Mrs. Arruther.
“I know how it is, nurse. It is those children of yours that can do
nothing for themselves, any more than any other children that are
educated as the fashion is now. They will want you to wash their faces
for them, and put them to bed, as long as they live, if you go on
sending them to that Sunday school.”
Nurse was very sorry to hear this. She did not know, in such a case,
what they were to do to get their faces washed when she should be gone
to her grave, where she hoped to be long before her three children. But
indeed she must say for her little folks that they could all put
themselves to bed, and had done it, even the youngest, these two years
past.
“Ay, ay; that was before you sent them to the school. Keep them there a
little longer, and they will be fit for nothing at all. You never will
believe any warning I give you about it; but I tell you again, the three
last housemaids I had this year, one after the other, were the worst
that ever entered my doors; and they could all read and write. What do
you think of that? O, my head! My head!”
Nurse thought it was time that the draught should be taken, and proposed
to smooth the pillow, and shade the light. This done, she wound up the
lady’s watch, and sat down behind the curtain, in hopes that the patient
would sleep. Of this, however, there seemed but little chance. Mrs.
Arruther tossed about, and groaned out her wonder why she could not go
to sleep like other people, till nurse was obliged to take notice, and
ask whether there was anything that she could do for her.
“Do! yes, to be sure. Bring out the light from wherever you have hidden
it. It is hard enough not to be able to go out and see things, as I have
done all my life till now; and here you won’t let me see what is in my
own room. Where are you going to put the light? Not under that picture.
You know I can’t bear that picture. And, mind, to-morrow morning——Bless
me! what do you lift up your hand in that manner for?”
Nurse could only beg pardon. She had made an involuntary gesture of
astonishment on hearing that the lady could not bear that beautiful
picture of her own only son,—that picture which represented him in his
chubby boyhood, standing at his mother’s knee, with hoop in hand. She
was told not to be troublesome with her wonder, but to see that the
picture was carried up into the lumber garret to-morrow, and something
put in its place to hide its marks on the wall; anything that would not
stare down upon people as they lay in bed, as that child’s eyes did. By
rousing the wearied maid, just as she was falling asleep, nurse obtained
a muslin apron, which, when she stood on the table, she could hang over
the picture: and two or three pins, judiciously applied below, obviated
all danger of the veil rising with any breath of air, so as to disclose
the features of the boy.
“You had better take warning, and look to your children in time, nurse,
before they grow up to plague you as my boy has plagued me.”
She had drawn back the curtain, and now showed herself as much disposed
for conversation as if she had taken a waking instead of a sleeping
draught.
“And you lay it all to education, ma’am? You think the university to
blame for it? Well! ’tis hard to say.”
“What put such a notion into your head? Who ever dreams of objecting to
the university for gentlemen? You would not have my son brought up as
ignorant as a ploughboy; would you? No, no. I have done my duty by him
in that way. He had the best-recommended tutors I could get for him, and
every advantage at the university that was to be had; and the best proof
of what was done for him is the credit he got there, and the prizes, and
the reputation. He is a very fine scholar. Nobody denies that.”
Nurse pondered the practicability of putting the question she would have
liked to have had answered; whether learning had had the same effect
upon Mr. Arruther that the lady had anticipated for Owen and Ambrose.
Nurse would fain know whether Mr. Arruther could wash his own face, and
put himself to bed.
“Let us hope, ma’am, that the young gentleman will live and learn. If he
is not able to do little things now, perhaps——”
“Little things! What sort of little things?”
“Well, ma’am, I thought if your late house-maids could not polish the
fire-irons, or make your bed to your liking, and if you fear that my
boys should not keep themselves clean when I am gone, because of their
learning, perhaps.... But indeed, when I once saw the young gentleman,
his gloves were as white as my apron, and the sunshine came back from
the polish of his boots. I never saw a neater gentleman.”
“He is a puppy,” replied the tender mother. “I suppose it was that dandy
show of his that caught the eyes of the low creature he has married. If
I never get the better of this illness, she shall have none of my
clothes to wear. No shopkeeper’s daughter shall be seen in the laces my
mother left to me. I had rather give some of them to you, nurse, at
once.”
“God forbid, ma’am! What should I do with laces? Such as I!”
“Very true. Now it is strange that a sensible woman like you, who knows
what is proper, in her own case, should be so wrong about her children.
What have they to do with education any more than you have with laces?”
Nurse took refuge under the sanction of the clergyman and of Mr. Waugh;
and protested that she had as little idea of sending Owen and Ambrose to
the university, as of asking that Mildred should wear the lady’s family
Valenciennes and Mechlin.
“Well; I wonder what it is that you would have! I can’t make out what it
is that you would be at!”
“Ma’am, if I had all I wished for——but I may as well be setting on a
cup-full of broth to warm, as I fancy you may take a liking to a little,
by-and-by.”
The lady let nurse do this. When she was tired of wondering whether she
could take any broth when it should be warm, she languidly said,—
“Go on. What would you have for your children? Pray remember what I have
heard you say yourself—that pride comes before a fall.”
“And a much greater one than I said that before me, ma’am. But I would
not have my children made proud, because I should be sorry they should
fall below what they are. If I had my wish, it would be that Owen should
have work at the mill as long as he lives, so as to be pretty sure of
eighteen shillings a week for a continuance; and that he should marry
such a girl as Kate Jeffery, who would take as much care of his house as
I would myself; and that they should never want for shoes and stockings
for their children’s feet. And much the same for Ambrose.”
“Is that all? They might have all this without reading and writing.”
“Perhaps so, ma’am; but Kate reads to her grandfather of a Sunday
evening, as I saw when I passed to-night; and the neighbours think, as
well as I, that it is the boys that get on best with their learning that
go straightest to their work; not swinging on the churchyard gate, nor
swearing, to get a look that they may make game of from grave people
passing by. As for Mildred, I don’t well know what to wish. ’Tis hard
work for poor girls when they settle and have their families early: but
then, I should be loth to leave her to live solitary in our cottage,
spending her days all alone upon the hills. However, that will be as the
Lord pleases. Meantime, I should best like that fifteen years hence,
when the boys will be perhaps settled away, my girl should be keeping
our place clean for me, and giving me her arm to church, and helping me
with her little learning when, as often happens, I am at a loss to
answer, for want of knowing. I have no wish to be idle, I am sure. I
hope to knit her stockings and make her petticoats still, if she will
clean the cupboard out, and entertain the clergyman better than I can
do.”
The clergyman was not present to start the inquiry whether such were the
sum total of the purposes for which spiritual beings were brought into a
world teeming with spiritual influences. If he had been there, he might
not, perhaps, have got a curtsey from nurse by telling her that her
views were quite proper, and that she rightly understood what to desire
for her young folks. Perhaps he might have thought little better of Mrs.
Arruther’s aspirations.
“My boy has cruelly disappointed me,” she declared: “and yet I wished
for no more than I had a right to expect from him. I wished that he
should be a good scholar; and so he is. I wished that he should have the
looks and manners of a gentleman.”
“And sure, ma’am, so he has?”
“O yes: and I hoped to see him in parliament, if it was only for once;
and I carried this point, and mean to carry it again, if I can. He is in
parliament with my money, and he shall have enough for the next
election. But there’s an end. Instead of marrying as I wished, he has
taken up with a tradesman’s daughter; and he may make the best of his
bargain. Not an acre of my land, nor a shilling of my money that I can
leave away, shall he have. If I am disappointed in him, I will have my
satisfaction. I will do what I can to show people that they should take
care what they expect from their children. He sha’n’t have all the laugh
on his side. He sha’n’t say for nothing that my behaviour to him is
unpardonable.”
Nurse wondered whether at the university they taught to forgive and
forget. If they did, perhaps the young gentleman would be bent upon
making up matters, if be thought himself put upon; and then there might
be a coming round on the other side.
“I don’t know what they do there about forgiving; but I am sure they
teach the young men to forget. He never wrote to me above once, the last
year he was there; and that was for money. And he never thought more of
his cousin Ellen, though I told him to marry her, and requested him to
send her down a lap-dog like mine. When I asked him what he meant by it,
he said Ellen and all had entirely slipped his memory. I told him my
mind, pretty plainly; so I suppose it will slip his memory that I live
hereabouts, when he comes down to his election. If he tries the gate——”
“O, ma’am! You will not turn him away?”
“No: it might cost him his election; and I don’t wish that. I should
miss my own name from the newspapers then; and it would be hard to lose
my pleasure in the newspapers. I will do nothing to hurt his election.
He shall be let in to see me; and then I will say to him, ‘All that lawn
and those fields, and all this house and the plate would have been yours
very soon, (for I can’t live long,) if you had married your cousin
Ellen, as I bade you: but it is too late for that now; and Ellen’s
husband shall have every ——’—What do you look in that way for, nurse? I
am not going to leave it into another name. Ellen’s husband shall take
my name before he touches a shilling.”
“And if a judgment should come upon us meantime, ma’am. If the heathen
should——Did not you say there is to be a new election? Is not that the
same as the government getting a new parliament?”
“To be sure.”
“And that is done when a danger is thought to be at hand, is not it?”
“Not always; and if it was, no harm can come to my property. The deeds
are all in my lawyer’s hands,—in his strong-box,—safe enough.”
It was plain that Mrs. Arruther knew nothing about the approach of the
Turks; and it would be cruel to tell her, when she might very likely die
before they appeared in Arneside.
“What are you afraid of, nurse? I am sure you are in a panic about
something. It is too soon for your boys to be marrying against your
will, I suppose?”
“Yes, thank God. And they will never be able to marry so far below them
as your young gentleman may do; for the reason that they will never
stand so high as he. But yet I can fancy that if my Owen took to a
giggling jade, with her hair hanging about her ears, and a sharp voice,
it would weigh heavy on my heart.”
“And your money would weigh light in his pocket, hey?”
“I shall have no money to leave, ma’am; and as to——”
“No money to leave! I dare say. You never will have money to leave while
you throw away your services as you do. I did wonder at you last week,
when you managed to find somebody else to sit up with old Mr. Barnes,
that you might nurse Widow Wilks’s child. I saw beforehand what would
come of it. The child died, just the same as if you had been with Mr.
Barnes; and you missed your chop, and brandy and water, and the handsome
pay you would have had; and Mr. Barnes is a nice, mild old gentleman,
that you might have been glad to nurse. I thought you knew your duty to
your children better than to waste your services in any such way.”
Nurse was very sorry the lady was displeased with what she had done. She
had acted for the best, thinking what an aggravation it would be of the
weary widow’s grief for her child if she fancied, after its death, that
it might have been saved by good nursing. Having acted for the best, she
hoped her children would not remember these things against her when she
was gone.
“You seem to be always thinking how things will be after you are gone.
What will all that signify when you are cold in your grave?”
“It seems natural, ma’am, when one has children to care for. I hardly
think that God gives us children only that we may play with them while
they sprawl about and amuse us, and make use of them while they are
subject to our wills, having no steady one of their own. I think, by the
yearning that mothers have after their sons and daughters when they are
grown up into men and women, that it must be meant for us to keep a hold
over their hearts when they have done acting by our wills. And so, when
I talk of what is to happen when I am gone, it is with the feeling that
I dare not go and appear before God without doing my best to have my
children think of me as one that tried to do her duty by God and them.”
“But if Owen married as you said, how should he, for one, think
pleasantly of you?”
“Indeed I am afraid the thought of his folly would rankle. But my
endeavour would be to make the lightest and best of what could not be
helped. I would tell him that there could be no offence to me in his
judging for himself in a case where nobody has a right to judge for him;
and I should make no difference between him and the rest. My father’s
bible is, as they know, to go to the one that can read in it best when I
am on my death-bed; and the other few things are to be equally divided.
My girl is to have my spinning-wheel; and the deal table will be Owen’s;
and the chair and three stools——”
“Those things are to your children, I suppose, much the same as my lawn
and this house to my son?”
“I dare say they would be, ma’am; and, in some sense, all property that
is left by the dying to the living seems to be much alike, whether it be
great, or whether it be little. To my mind, it is not so much the use of
a legacy to give pleasures to those that can enjoy little pleasure when
a parent or other near friend is taken away, as to leave the comfort of
feeling that the departed wished to be just and kind. It is all very
well, you see, that my girl should have the use of my spinning-wheel;
but if it was made of King Solomon’s cedar wood, Mildred’s chief
pleasure would be to think, while she spun, that I remembered her kindly
when I lay dying; and for this, a spinning-wheel does as well as a room
full of pictures, or a mint of money. And when I see a family
quarrelling and going to law about their father’s legacies, I cannot but
think how much better it would be for them if each of the daughters had
but a spinning-wheel, and each of the sons neither more nor less than a
deal table, or the chair their father sat in.—But,” lowering her voice,
“here am I chattering on without thinking, while you are just asleep,
which I am glad to see.”
Whether from a disposition to sleep, or from some other cause, Mrs.
Arruther’s eyes were closed; and she did not move while nurse once more
softly drew the curtain. When, in the silence, nurse began to consider
what, in the fullness of her heart, she had been saying, she was
thunderstruck at her own want of good manners in uttering what must have
seemed intended for a reproof to the lady about her conduct to her son.
Her heart beat in her throat as one sentence after another of her
discourse came back upon her memory. What was she that she should be
lecturing Mrs. Arruther?—But perhaps the lady had been too drowsy to
listen. It was to be hoped so, rather than that she should suppose that
nurse was paying her off for her opposition to the children’s going to
the school.
When sufficiently composed for the nightly duty which she never omitted,
nurse added to her usual prayers the petition that this suffering lady
might be spared till she could see clearly what it was just that she
should do towards the son who had displeased her. Before she had
finished, there was another movement, and a mutter of “O dear!” from
within the curtain.
“I hoped you had been asleep, ma’am. Can’t you find rest?”
“No, nurse; but you cannot help that. I will see my lawyer to-morrow. It
is too late to be thinking about wills to-night. But I don’t believe I
shall sleep a wink to-night. Do you take that broth, nurse. I cannot
bear the thought of it. It prevents my getting to sleep. I believe I
shall never close my eyes all night.”
Nurse really thought she would, if she would only take the other
draught, and settle her mind to trouble herself about nothing till
to-morrow.
CHAPTER III.
LESSONS ON THE HILLS.
“Fetch down a plate from the cupboard, Ambrose, and cover up the beer,
while I cut the cheese. I suppose we may have a quarter of the cheese,
as mother said,” observed Mildred to Ambrose, as the early sun was
peeping in through the upper panes of the cottage lattice the next
morning.
“Yes; we may have the quarter. I was at the shop before the first
shutter was down. Here—here’s a plate for Mr. Ryan’s cheese. We will
carry ours in the paper I brought it in. How shall I keep puss from
getting at the things? Is not that Mr. Ryan stirring?—Mr. Ryan! Mr.
Ryan!” (calling through the door.) “Please to look to your breakfast
here, that the cat does not get it. We are going now; and Owen is gone
to the mill; and mother is not home yet.”
“Off with you, lad!” answered Ryan from within. “Leave the cat to me.
And if you can pick up any rags for me among the briers, you know I
always give honest coppers for them; and yet more for tarred ropes, if
such an article comes in your way.”
“Tarred ropes! How should we get them? If tar by itself would do, I
could help you to some of that. The shepherds always keep tar against
the shearing. Would tar by itself do?”
The loud laugh from within showed Ambrose that he had said something
foolish; and he hastily departed, supposing that Mr. Ryan had been
making a joke of him.
Cool and moist as all had been in the valley as they passed, the
children found that the dew was gone from the furze-bushes on the hills,
and that the sun was very warm.
“What had we better do?” asked Mildred, contemplating the yellow cheese,
which began to shine almost as soon as she opened the paper. “Shall we
eat it directly? I think I am beginning to be very hungry; are not you?
And it will be half melted, and the bread dry, if we carry it about in
the sun.”
“Mother said we were to keep the sheep for a couple of hours first,” was
Ambrose’s reply. “And besides, I have some leaves to get for her; and
they won’t be fit if I let them stay till the dew is off; and it is off
already, except under the shady side of the bushes. Put the breakfast
under the shady side of this bush; I’ll look to it.—Do you go about and
get some rags, if you can find any. The briers and hedges are the most
likely places.”
“There won’t be any Turks under the hedges, will there?” asked Mildred,
lowering her voice.
“I don’t know. I don’t rightly know what Turks are; but if anything
happens amiss, call out loud to me, and I’ll come. Go; make haste. The
sheep are quiet enough.”
“And how are we to know when two hours are over?”
“We must each guess, I suppose; and if we don’t agree, we’ll draw lots
with a long spike of grass and a short one. The long one for me, you
know, because I’m the eldest.”
In forty minutes, both were agreed that two hours were over; and each
complimented the other on the fruits of the morning’s work. Ambrose
exhibited a handful of leaves, which he placed under a big stone, that
they might not be blown away; and Mildred brought the foot of a worsted
stocking, which she had found in a ditch; a corner of a blue cotton
handkerchief with white spots, which had been impaled on a furze bush;
and a bit of white linen as large as the palm of her little hand, with
twenty holes in it. How many coppers would Ryan be likely to give her
for this treasure?
Ambrose rejected the worsted article, to which his sister gave a sigh as
she saw it thrown backwards among a group of sheep, who scampered away
in their first terror, but soon gathered together to look at the
fragment. The other two might be worth the third part of a farthing, if
Mr. Ryan should be in a liberal mood, Ambrose thought.
“I wonder how much paper they will make,” Mildred observed. “Mr. Ryan
says they are to go into his sack with the rest of his rags, for paper.
Mother did not tell you what she wanted the leaves for, I suppose?”
“No; and I sha’n’t ask her. Do you ever hear people talk about what
mother makes?”
“Why, yes; I do. Molly at Mrs. Arruther’s was telling the gipsy woman
one day about mother; and she said she had some strange secrets. And
then they asked me what one thing meant, and another. But they did not
mean me to hear all they said, any more than Mrs. Dowley when she winked
at her husband, and glanced down at mother’s apron where some green was
peeping out: but it was only cabbage that time. They all think her a
very wise doctor.”
“How they do send after her when they are ill! Mr. Yapp said one day
that she would be wise to bring up one of us to be a doctor after her:
but Mrs. Dowley was there then, and she said it could not be, because
mother’s was of the nature of a gift that could not be taught.—Here is
your other bit of cheese. Will you have it now, or keep it till dinner?”
Mildred had intended to reserve part of her cheese for dinner; but
having now nothing particular to do, and the sheep offering nothing
which required her attention, the whole of the delicacy at length
disappeared, crumb by crumb. Then she lay back, looking at a flight of
birds that now met, now parted, now crossed each other in all
directions, high in the air. Ambrose meanwhile stretched himself at
length, with his face to the ground, watching a hairy brown caterpillar,
which he took the liberty of bringing back with a gentle pinch by the
tail, as often as it flattered itself that it was getting beyond his
reach. He presently wished that they had a pair of scissors with them.
“Won’t the knife do as well?” Mildred languidly inquired.
“No. I want to cut off the creature’s hair.”
“What creature?” asked Mildred, starting up, but seeing no creature with
hair, but a remote donkey and herself.
“Here: this young gentleman,” replied her brother, exhibiting the
writhing caterpillar on the palm of his brown hand. Well might the
creature feel uncomfortable; for this hand which had carried cheese must
have been far from fragrant, in comparison with the thyme-bed on which
the poor caterpillar had been disporting himself. What Ambrose wanted
was to see whether it would come out a common green caterpillar, when
stripped of its long sleek hairs. The process of plucking was tried in
the absence of scissors: but the material was too fine. The knife was
next applied, but the creature was destined never to be shaven and
shorn. A slip of the knife cut it in two, and fetched blood on Mildred’s
finger at the same time. The perturbation thus caused completely
awakened her, and she was ready for the sport of shepherd and shepherd’s
dog. For a very long time, Ambrose supported his dignity of shepherd. He
strapped himself round with his sister’s pinafore and his own for a
plaid; took long steps; wielded a thick stick, and made grand noises to
the flock; while Mildred went on all fours till her back was almost
broken, and barked all the while, like any dog. The sheep were silly
enough to scud before her to the very last, as much alarmed as at first,
till she was obliged to stop to laugh at them. All play must come to an
end; and by-and-by the children were stretched, panting, on the very
spot where they had breakfasted. To panting succeeded yawning; and it
began to occur to both that they had yet a long day to pass before the
sheep would be penned. It was against the rules of their employment that
both should sleep at the same time; and, as Mildred could not keep
awake, it was necessary for her brother to watch. She was not, as usual,
wakened by his calling out so loud to some of his charge as to rouse her
before her dream was done. She finished it, opened her eyes, sat up and
stretched herself; and Ambrose was too busy to take notice.
“I had such a queer dream!” observed Mildred.—Her brother did not hear.
“I say, Ambrose, I dreamt that I was sorting rags at the mill, and there
was a caterpillar upon every one of them; and—What have you got there,
Ambrose? Did you hear what I said?”
“Come here,” replied her brother. “Here is a story! Help me to make it
out.”
“A story! what, upon the very piece of paper that held the cheese! What
is the story like? Tell me. You know I can’t read so well as you.”
“But you can help me with this part, perhaps. I will tell you what I
have read when I know this word. The man would not go in somewhere; and
this word tells where.”
Mildred pored over the soiled piece of print, and pronounced presently
that the word in question signified something about a comb. In her
spelling-book, c-o-m-b spelled comb. But of the rest of the word,—
“inat,”—“in,”——“What could it be?
“It ends with ‘nation.’ ‘Comb’—‘nation.’ Well: I must let that alone.
There was a man that would not go into this place,—whatever it is,—and
the people that were in it were angry because he went to his work.”
“Because he did not go to his work, I suppose you mean.”
“No; because he would go when they bade him not. And they watched for
him one day when he was going to work, and his little boy with him. They
call him a little boy, though he was eleven years old. They flew upon
the man, and thumped him and kicked him as hard as ever they could. And
when the boy cried, and begged they would not use his father so cruelly,
one of them caught up a thick rope, and beat the boy till it was a
shocking sight to see him.”
“They were cruel wretches. I wonder whether there was anybody near to go
for the constable? Did they get a constable?”
“I suppose so, for the people were asked how they dared to beat people
so.”
“And what did they say?”
“This that I can’t make out, about going in and not going in: but they
got a good scolding,—and that is as far as I have got.”
“See what is to be done to them, and whether there is anything more
about the boy.”
Another half-hour’s spelling and consultation revealed that the child
had pulled one of the assailants down by the leg, and thus turned the
fury of the man upon himself; that it was doubtful whether the boy would
recover; and that, this being the case, the decision of the magistrates
was that——
Here came the jagged edges of the torn newspaper, instead of the
magistrates’ decision. This was very disagreeable indeed. Not to know
what became of the aggressors, and whether the brave boy lived or died,
was cruel. Ambrose threw away the paper, and grew cross. Mildred’s
consolations,—that very likely the boy was well by this time, and she
had no doubt the cruel people were put in prison,—were of no use. A
better device than to imagine the issue suggested itself to Ambrose. He
would go and ask Mr. Yapp. The paper having come from Mr. Yapp’s shop,
he no doubt knew the end of the story. Could not Mildred look after the
flock while he ran down now? No harm could come to the sheep during the
little time that he should be gone.
Mildred did not like this plan,—was sure her mother would not like it.
Ambrose had better read the story over again, to try and understand it
better; and she would go with him to Mr. Yapp’s when the flock was
penned, in the evening. Never did the oriental scholar pore more
diligently over a new tablet of hieroglyphics than these two children
over the fragment of a police report which had fallen in their way. To
no scholar can it be so important to ascertain a doubtful point of
history, or to develope facts of the costume and manners of a remote
people, as it was to these young creatures to learn the issue of a case
in which rights like their own were invaded, and filial sympathies like
their own were aggrieved.
Again, during the day, Ambrose called to his sister that he had
something to say to her, and Mildred knew that it must relate to the
story he had read, so complete was the possession it had taken of his
mind. He thought the people round were great fools for not punishing the
aggressors on the spot. If he had been there, he would not have waited
to hear what the magistrates said; not he. He would have knocked down
every one of them that he could get at, if it were by pulling by the leg
as the poor boy had done.
“And then,” said Mildred, “they would have served you the same as the
boy; and if anybody had taken your part, they would have served him the
same. I don’t think that would do any good.”
“Nothing like a battle,” exclaimed Ambrose, waving his cap over his
head. “I like a good battle better than all the justices and gentlemen
in the world.”
“I don’t like battles,” Mildred observed. “I do not much mind seeing you
and Sam Dobbs fight here on the heath, where you only throw one another
down, and the grass is too soft to hurt you. But I saw the men fight
before the Rose; and one of them lifted the other up high into the air,
and dashed him down slap upon the pavement; and you might have heard the
knock of his head as far as the pump, I’m sure. There was such a
quantity of blood that I could not eat my supper! I should not like to
see such a battle often!”
“O, only tell me when anybody does you any harm, and see how I will
fight for you.”
“I am sure I shall not tell anything about it, if you go and fight in
that manner. I would ask mother or Owen to go with me to Justice Gibson.
If you consider, there would be fighting all day long in our place, and
much more in L——, if all people chose to battle it out instead of going
to the Justice. And besides, I think the Justice can take much better
care of this poor little boy than anybody that just fought a battle for
him, and then went away.”
Ambrose saw this; and before dinner was over, both the children had
learned, after their own fashion, how far superior law is to vengeance,
and security to retaliation. Confined as their ideas were (the picture
of their own little village and few associates alone being before their
eyes), this was a most important notion to have acquired. There needed
only the experience of life to enable them to extend their conceptions,—
Justice Gibson standing for the magistracy at large, and the little
village of Arneside for social life in general.
Evening came. The sheep were penned, and the children were standing
before Mr. Yapp’s shop-door, pushing each other on to the feat of asking
the grocer for the rest of the story. They saw Mr. Yapp’s eyes turned on
them once or twice; but they could not get courage to make use of the
opportunity. It was Mr. Yapp himself who at last brought on the crisis.
“Come, younkers,” said he, “make your way in or make your way off. Don’t
stand in my door, preventing people coming in.”
Mildred moved off; Ambrose bolted in; and then his sister came up to
reinforce him. As the grocer had nothing very particular to attend to at
the moment, he did not crush the aspiration for knowledge. He directed
the children to the package of paper from which their fragment had been
taken, and looked over the story himself. It would have been too long a
task for such poor scholars to seek for what they wanted by reading. To
compare the jagged edges of the paper was a much readier method; and
Mildred did this, while Mr. Yapp gave her brother some imperfect idea
(for he was not learned on the subject) what a Combination was, and why
a man was ill-treated for not entering into one. This was worth coming
for; but it was all. Mildred’s search was unsuccessful. The rest of the
story was irrecoverable. Many customers, some from distant farms and
cottages, had been at the shop to-day; and it was impossible to say who
had carried it off.
Ambrose begged for his paper back again. There was something on the
other side that he wanted to show to Owen.
“Let’s see,” said Mr. Yapp. “Why, this looks like magic,—all these
waves, and dashes, and dots, and signs. O, ho! it is short-hand, I see.
Somebody advertises to teach short-hand. There, take it to Owen, and see
what he makes of it.”
Ambrose turned the paper about, but could see nothing like a hand. What
could be meant by short-hand?
A way of writing short, he was told; and he remained as wise as he was
before. But now Miss Selina Yapp, who stood smiling behind the counter,
was desired to give the children half-a-dozen raisins apiece; and it was
quite time to be going home.
Their mother was looking out for them from the door.
“Why, mother, are you going to be out again to-night? Sure the lady must
be very bad!”
“I am not going to the lady till morning, dears. ’Tis poor neighbour
Johns I am now going to. Sadly sunk he is; and his old woman is nigh
worn out. So I’ve made my bit of a bed fit for her here; and it is full
time she was in it. So, troop to bed, dears. Get your suppers while ye
undress; and be as still as mice, sleeping or waking, when she comes in.
Put your learning away till to-morrow, Owen, my boy. Pussy won’t eat
your paper before morning, I dare say, if you put it where it will be
safe. You’ve had your supper; so now to bed, my boy. You’ll be fresh all
the earlier in the morning. But be sure you put on your shoes the last
thing, lest you should wake the old woman with your clatter.”
Owen’s eye had been completely caught by the mysterious figures of the
short-hand specimen. He held it between his teeth while he undressed,
and went on looking at it by the twilight, after he was in bed, till his
brother and sister had done talking; and then he put it under his
bolster. Ambrose, meantime, stuffed his mouth with his supper very
indefatigably, and yet managed to get out his story of the little boy
who had been beaten for defending his father. Following his mother about
wherever she moved, he made her mistress of the whole before he had
done.
Mrs. Ede was not disappointed at their saying nothing about her sitting
up again to-night. To them, it was so much a matter of course that she
should sit up professionally, and to her that she should do what she
could for a needy and suffering neighbour, that the circumstance did not
seem worthy of remark. All were more occupied with Mildred’s
disappointment. It was feared that Mr. Ryan was gone from the village
this evening, and that he would not come on his rounds again for
half-a-year. He had himself bid Mildred look for rags; and now he was
gone before she came home! Her bits of blue and white must stand over
till he appeared again; for Owen did not think any money would be given
for them at the mill. Nurse stayed yet five minutes longer, to comfort
her little daughter under this mischance; and within that five minutes,
all three were sound asleep.
“Bless their little faces, how pretty they all do look!” thought the
mother. “’Tis almost a pity to leave such a pretty sight. I wonder which
of them will stand so by me, when I am old and failing like neighbour
Johns; if it should please God I should live till then. But, dear me,
what a puckered old face mine will be then!—little like their smooth
rosy cheeks. ’Tis a cheerless thing for two old folks to be left without
children, unfit to take care of one another, like poor neighbour Johns
and his dame; and yet worse it would be for me that have laid my husband
in his grave so long ago. But if God spares me my little ones, and my
girl stays near me, I need not care what else betides. Bless them! how
sweetly they do breathe in their sleep! And now, I must go and send the
dame to her bed. I trust she will be thoughtful not to wake the
children; and I’m sure they will be thoughtful towards her in the
morning.”
CHAPTER IV.
SIGNS IN THE SKY.
A few years passed away, and Mrs. Ede was in possession of the blessings
she prayed for. Her children were all spared to her, in health, and, by
her and their own industry, secured from want. Upon the whole, she had
reason to be satisfied with them, though there was a wider difference in
their characters and attainments than she could have wished to see. She
did not grow restless about what, she supposed, came by nature. She
concluded it to be God’s will that Owen should be “as sharp as a briar,”
active in his business, ready about bringing home things pleasant and
wonderful to hear, and looked upon by his employer and the village at
large as a rising youth who would one day be a credit to his native
place. Nurse concluded it to be God’s will that Owen should be thus,
while his brother and sister were far from being like him. What had made
them dull she scarcely knew; unless it was being out so much on the
hills without companions, or anything to do but to look after the flock,
and knit. They had lost their little learning sadly, and did not now
like going to the Sunday-school, as they forgot during the week what
they had learned the Sunday before, and became ashamed of growing so
tall while they knew so little of what was looked for in a
Sunday-school. At home, too, it was a great temptation to nurse to apply
to Owen when she wanted to speak about anything that interested her, or
to have any little business transacted: he comprehended so much more
readily, observed so much more justly, and sympathised so much more
warmly than his brother and sister. But nurse was very conscientious
about making no differences in her treatment of her children; and she
took pains to bring forward the younger ones, continually saying to
herself, how very steady Ambrose was, and how thankful she ought to be
for a daughter who, like Mildred, made no difficulty of doing whatever
she was asked, as soon as she understood what was meant.
Contented as she thought it her duty to be, nurse could not be otherwise
than rejoiced when a change took place in the family arrangements, which
seemed to open to Ambrose some of the advantages which his brother had
enjoyed. Owen had risen from sorting rags in the mill to offices of
higher trust, and requiring greater accomplishments than were necessary
for the lowest operation of paper-making. He was now made a superior
personage in the mill. It was his business to superintend some processes
of the manufacture; to give the necessary notice to the exciseman when
any paper had to be changed, or to be reweighed by the supervisor before
it was sent out for sale; to see that the excise laws were observed as
to the lettering of the different rooms, and the numbering of the
engines, vats, chests, and presses; to remind his employer when the time
approached for purchasing the yearly license; and (fearful
responsibility!) to take charge of the labels which were to be pasted
upon every ream. Nurse used to call Ambrose to listen, and say how he
should like such a charge, when Owen related that if one label should be
lost, his employer would be liable to a penalty of 200_l._; and that, as
it was necessary to Mr. Waugh’s convenience to purchase five hundred
labels at a time, the destruction of one lot would subject him to be
fined 100,000_l._
Owen rather enjoyed his responsibility; and, with a new sense of
dignity, set about his studies in his leisure hours with more zeal than
ever.—What was better, he entered with all possible earnestness into his
mother’s project of getting his brother into the mill before his honest
influence with Mr. Waugh was exerted for any other object. Mr. Waugh had
not the least objection to make trial of another son of Mrs. Ede’s. He
had heard that the lad was not over-bright; but he could but try; and if
he did not succeed, there were still flocks to be kept on the heath as
before. So Ambrose, with a smile on his sun-browned face, made ready,
the next Monday morning, to set forth, with his brother, for the mill.
“If you find it rather close,” said his mother to him, “being under a
roof from six o’clock to six——”
“But I am to come out for breakfast and dinner, mother.”
“I was going to say, you can get a good deal of air in the two hours
allowed for meals. And you won’t think much of the air on the hills when
you have so much company about you. Think of there being thirty men in
the mill, and ten women, besides the children! You can never be dull;
and you must bring me home the news, as Owen always did.—The dullness
will be for Mildred, when she has not you for a companion any longer. I
say, Mildred, my dear; you must take care and not lose your tongue.”
Mildred did not know that she should have anything to say all day,
except calling to the sheep.
“Why, my dear, I have been thinking that you and Ambrose have never made
yourselves sociable with other young shepherds, as they used to do in my
father’s time. There must be plenty, I am sure, from end to end of
yonder hills; and why should you keep within such a narrow range as you
have kept hitherto? The sheep and you have legs to carry you farther;
and you have eyes to keep your flock from mixing with another. Why
should not you join company with somebody that may be sitting knitting
like you, all alone, and wishing for a chat?”
“There’s Maude Hallowell of the next parish, just above the Birchen
dale; but that’s a long way off,” replied Mildred.
“A long way! Well, I wonder what’s the use of young limbs, to call the
Birchen dale a long way! Try it, my dear; and tell Maude that she should
come over to your side in her turn. But she won’t see such a sight as
you may see, if the day be clear, when you come to the high point of the
ridge over Birchen dale. How I once saw the sea glistening, miles off,
through a gap of the hills!”
“And the island, mother?”
“Why, no. The island lies off there, they tell me; but it was too far
away, I fancy, for me to see it. But, do you try, when you go to look
for Maude Hallowell.”
The Isle of Man was spoken of with great affection by the people here,
as untaxed islands usually are by their neighbours of a taxed country.
Many were the little secret privileges enjoyed throughout this district,
even as far as the village of Arneside,—privileges of participation in
various good things slily brought from the island, in opposition to all
the preaching of the wine-merchants and wholesale grocers of L——, and in
Arneside, of the clergyman and Mr. Waugh the paper-maker. All the
children attached ideas of mystery to the island, which they perpetually
heard mentioned and had never seen; and the getting any nearer to it,—
the actually seeing the sea amidst which it lay, was regarded as an
approach to the revelation of a great secret. Mildred thought she should
like to go and look for Maude.
Nobody had imagined what an event these promotions would prove to the
whole family. It brought more new ideas into their minds than all their
Sunday schooling had done.
Maude was something of a scholar in her way. She might be found sitting
in the heather, her knees up to her chin, and her plaid drawn over her
head, poring over a particular sort of pamphlet, which was the only work
she was much disposed to read. Her distaff lay on the ground beside her,
while she was studying; and when she took it up, she was apt to look
into the sky, or far out seawards, instead of minding her spinning. She
invariably started when Mildred laid a hand on her shoulder, or shouted
on approaching her.
“Why, Maude, what makes your eyes look so big to-day?” asked Mildred,
one sultry afternoon, after having led her flock to a place where she
might possibly find a scanty shade under a birch.
“My eyes? I’m sure I don’t know,” replied Maude, winking, as if to
reduce her eyes to their natural dimensions. “I don’t know what ails my
eyes. But I’ve such a thing to tell you! It takes away my breath to
think of it.”
“The heat’s enough for that. The hill-breeze has hied away, and it is as
hot——Me! I wish the clouds would come up.”
“There will be clouds enough by-and-bye, or water enough at least,—
clouds or no clouds,” Maude solemnly averred. “Has your mother told you
anything about the comet?”
“No. If it is anything bad, I doubt whether she knows it; for she was
merry enough, this morning.”
“Merry enough, I dare say. Not know it! These are not the sort of things
your mother does not know, as I heard a person say last night. Do but
you ask her about the comet, in a natural way, and see what she will
say. No, don’t ask her. Safer not. I’ll tell you.—You see this book. If
you will believe me, there is a comet coming up as fast as it can come,
and it will raise a flood that will drown——O Mildred, ’tis awful to
think of.”
“What will it drown? Not our poor sheep?”
“Our sheep and us too. My dear, the sea will come pouring through that
gap, and fill up all below, and leave us no footing on all these hills.”
“Mercy, Maude! I must go and tell my mother; my poor mother!” exclaimed
Mildred, starting up from her blossomy seat.
“Your mother will be safe enough,” Maude replied constrainedly.
“Safe! How? Why?”
“Ahem!”
“Now, Maude, do tell me what you mean. Are you sure?”
“Yes, that I am; and you may know when it is coming, by the signs. The
book tells the signs; but you must hold your tongue about them, the book
says, for fear of bringing on the whole sooner than it need. There will
be black storms coming up first, with thunder and lightning. That is to
be this summer, while the stars stand in a particular way. I’m going to
stay out late to-night, to see how the stars stand. You’ll bide with me,
Mildred?”
Mildred shivered as she reminded her companion how far she had to travel
home: but Maude insisted that it would be necessary to see how the stars
stood, in order to find out afterwards when they began to move on and
cross each other. But before the three great stars came together in the
sky, a cruel enemy was to rise up against the land, and there were to be
some dreadful battles. This revived Mildred’s old terrors about the
Turks; and Maude looked more solemn than ever when she heard how many
years it was since nurse Ede had expected the Turks. By a natural
association of ideas, Maude went on to explain that those who were in
the confidence of the unseen powers, and who might be said to have
brought on these judgments, would be in no danger. They would be safe
amidst the storm they had raised, floating on the surface of the flood
like straws; while all others, as far as the flood should extend, would,
it was strongly apprehended, be drowned, unless they made use of “the
precautions recommended in the supplement to this pamphlet; sold, &c.
&c.” Those who were to be preserved would have warning of the approach
of the crisis by a tingling in the ancles, while the careless and
confident would have another warning given them by a slight, dull pain
near the nape of the neck. So, Mildred was to keep watch for any thing
her mother might say about her ancles, and to take fright directly if
she felt anything about the nape of her own neck.
When she was sufficiently recovered to lay hold of the book, she found
that it was a very curious-looking book indeed, with a great number of
little moons and stars, and the picture of a wise man, and of a large
comet with a fiery tail. She could not but believe now all that Maude
had told her.
How they were to get the other information,—about preserving
themselves,—was the next question. This book had come over from the
island; but not direct into Maude’s hands. It had found its way over the
moors from shepherd to shepherd; and no one now seemed to know to whom
it belonged, and who might be expected to procure the supplement. Owen,
who had so much to do with paper, and who knew all about printing and
books, was certainly the best person to apply to; and Mildred earnestly
begged the loan of the pamphlet, that she might show it to him.
“Ah, if I might!” replied Maude: “but William Scott is to have it next;
and then Bessy is to show it to her father. I dare not let it go direct
to your brother; but when the others have done with it——I’ll quicken
them in the reading, and then hide it under yonder big stone. See, here
is a dry chink where nobody will think of prying. You may find the book
here, early next week. But, for your life, don’t let Owen show it. If he
goes and blabs, there is no saying what will become of us all.”
Mildred did not know what worse could befall than, according to the
book, must happen at all events; and she thought Owen might as well be
trusted as the many people who were already acquainted with the
prophecy.
“I wish,” observed Maude, “the book said which quarter the first storms
would come up from.” And as she spoke she looked towards the sea.
“Ah, how black it is there!” Mildred anxiously observed. “It is coming
up for—for—rain. Don’t you fear so? O Maude, let us be gone! Maude, do,
for pity sake, go part of the way home with me.”
Impossible. Maude must make the best of her way to her own home. If
Mildred made haste, she might perhaps get to Arneside before the clouds
burst. And this affectionate friend hied down the hill as fast as she
could, saying she should send one of her brothers to look after the
sheep. The companion whom she had terrified to the utmost was left to
shift for herself and her flock. The cry of “Maude! O Maude!” followed
her far on her way; but she only turned and waved her hand, to advise
her friend to make haste homewards.
Mildred’s flock did not seem to have observed the signs of the sky. It
was still bright sunshine where they cropped the sweet grass; and they
were unwilling to leave their pasture. Mildred had never known them so
slow in their obedience; and when, at last, the overcast sky conveyed to
them that a storm was coming, they only huddled together, instead of
moving on, and began to bleat and frighten one another in a very piteous
way. Mildred began to cry a little in her flutter; but probably the
sheep did not find it out; for it made no difference in their
proceedings. Their mistress was not long in deciding that she must leave
them to their own wills, and take care of herself; and a crack of
thunder, nearly over head, confirmed her resolution. On she pressed,
along the ridge where there seemed to be no more air than in the closest
thicket in the dale. She panted with heat so violently that she was
compelled to stop, though chased by thunder-clouds, and dreading above
all things to encounter the lightning alone. It came in broad sheets of
flame, and not a drop of rain yet to put it out; as Mildred would have
said. When she reached the point of the ridge from which she must turn
into her own valley, she cast one more glance behind her towards her
flock. She had never seen the hills look as they did to-day. Their tops
were shrouded in darkness; and in the bottom all was nearly as murky as
if the sun had long set. The flock might just be seen in a cluster below
the mists upon the russet hill-side. At the moment when Mildred
discovered them, the clouds seemed to open, and let out a stream of blue
flame upon them. She shrieked; but there was no one to hear her. In
another instant, the poor animals were seen scattered far apart; and
their mistress believed that she saw one stretched on its side; the only
one now on the spot from which they had just fled. She loved every
individual sheep of her flock, more or less; but she could not at
present tarry to see which she had lost. She scudded on, tossed in mind
as to whether she should go home, or stop at some friendly house in the
village. Her mother’s presence had formerly been her refuge whenever she
was frightened; but now she hesitated between a desire to see what nurse
said about the storm, and a dread lest she should have had something to
do with it. She might have left the point to be settled by
circumstances.
It was impossible to walk the whole way with her hands before her eyes.
The next time she looked up, she found that the clouds had been too
quick for her: the storm was now before her. It seemed gathering about
the village, and the grey church looked almost white against the murky
back-ground. Another bolt fell,—fell into the midst of the large yew in
the churchyard, under which Mrs. Arruther’s handsome monument stood,
looking almost new with its bright iron rails round it. The tree was
riven, as if by magic. Mildred was too far off to hear the crash; and to
her it seemed as if the wide-spreading tree had been reached by a finger
of fire, at whose touch it fell asunder, and bestrewed the ground in a
circle. In horror she turned her back to the spectacle; and the dreadful
recollection came into her mind that some people said mysteriously, that
her mother had somehow obtained great influence over Mrs. Arruther; and
others, that it might have been better for Mrs. Arruther to have seen
less of nurse Ede latterly. At this moment, it seemed as if the storm
had been sent on a mission to Arneside churchyard; for westward all was
again bright; and the sea, which was seldom distinguishable from this
point, lay like a golden line on the horizon. Mildred could not but turn
again to watch the progress of the storm. On it sped over the hills,
giving out as yet no rain. It was a bleak and dreary district which now
lay beneath the mass of clouds. A single farm, two miles from Arneside,
was the only visible habitation. Once more the lightning came down among
the group of buildings; and before it had travelled far, a tinge of
smoke rose among the barn roofs, and a red glimmer succeeded, which
Mildred considered as kindled by some malicious power which wrought its
will through the elements. The rain now pattered heavily on the crown of
her head, and she ran, far more swiftly than before, down to the
village. Instead of turning to her mother’s house, she directed her
steps through the village street on her way to the mill. About the
middle of it she found Ambrose, standing very quietly with his hands in
his pockets, staring at a picture which headed a bill pasted up against
a dead wall.
“Look at the fellow! going to fly off from the sail of the windmill,
with a flourish of his long tail,” said Ambrose to a companion, as
Mildred came up. “I wonder what it means?”
“Why, read what it means, man; where’s the use of your learning?” asked
the other. “I am sure those big black letters stare one in the face so,
they might of themselves almost teach a child to read.”
“O, but I lost my learning while I was a shepherd. Mr. Waugh was right
mad with me the other day, because I could make nothing of the
directions of the parcels I had to sort out. I have been getting up my
reading a bit with Owen this week; but you may as well tell me what that
fellow is with the long tail. I shall be an hour making it out for
myself.”
“Well, then: ’tis a little rogue of a devil going out to see the world;
and——”
“O, Ambrose, the storm!” cried his sister.
“Ay, the tree is down in the churchyard. I have been seeing it; and here
is a splinter I brought away. Me! here comes the rain. A fine pepper we
are going to have.”
“I hope it will pepper hard enough. Farmer Mason’s barns are on fire.
Won’t you go and help?”
“Who told you so?—Which barn?—How did it get on fire?” and many other
questions which might wait till the next day, had to be answered before
anybody would stir to get the key of the engine-house; and then, so many
youths ran foul of one another, and differed as to where the key was
deposited, and were each bent on being the one to tell the clergyman,
that Mildred had given the alarm at the paper-mill before anything
effectual was done.
Mr. Waugh and Owen were together in the counting-house, looking at a
pamphlet which Mr. Waugh had just put into Owen’s hands.
“That’s the almanack, I do believe,” cried Mildred. “O, I wanted so that
you should see that almanack.”
Mr. Waugh explained (Owen being too much absorbed) that this was not an
almanack, but a tract which he was lending to Owen. Owen was going to
take it home, as he was very eager to read it; but Mr. Waugh feared
there would be little in it to amuse any of the family besides. It was
not so entertaining, he feared, as an almanack from the island: but he
hoped Mildred had nothing to do with those almanacks. It was not safe to
have anything to do with them, as they were against the law. It was all
very well for the island people to read them if they chose, as they were
not against the law there: but here people were liable to be put in
prison for them. “Put in prison!” exclaimed Mildred, forgetting for the
moment her errand. Yes;—Mr. Waugh knew of twenty-five people who had
been sent to gaol by one magistrate, in one month, for selling these
illegal almanacks.
“I don’t believe Maude has sold one to anybody,” Mildred thought aloud.
“Well; tell her (whoever she is) that she had better not. People should
never sell an almanack till they see that it bears a fifteen penny
stamp. The Government makes 27,000_l._ by the almanack-duty; and the
Government does not like to be cheated of the duty. It is but a small
sum, certainly, to punish so many people for; but let your friend Maude
take care of the law. No, no; your brother will tell you this is no
almanack; though it may tell him things nearly as wonderful as he could
find in any almanack. Bless me! the people are crying fire!”
“O, I forgot.” And Mildred explained what she came for. The tract was
thrust into Owen’s pocket: the population of the mill was turned out to
help; and all Arneside was presently on the road to farmer Mason’s.
CHAPTER V.
OWEN AND X. Y. Z.
From the moment that Owen saw the scrap of short-hand which his brother
and sister brought home from the hills, he had taken to the study of the
art of short-hand writing. Mr. Waugh had directed him to the clergyman
as the person most likely to give him information on the subject, and to
show him specimens. The clergyman acknowledged that the short-hand he
used was not the best yet invented; and that perhaps the best yet
invented might not be nearly so good as some one not yet devised. This
was enough for Owen to know, in order to excite him to enterprize. By
the help of his friends, he got possession of three or four kinds, made
his selection of what he considered the best, and introduced some
important improvements. He tried his success whenever he could find an
opportunity. Many were the curious conversations in the mill which he
took down for his own amusement; and many the sermons which, to his
mother’s amazement, he read over to her, word for word, on the Sunday
evenings, when she had heard them in the mornings. She was fast yielding
to the impression that her son Owen was now nearly as wise as the
clergyman.
In the tract which Owen thrust into his pocket on the alarm of fire
being given, there was an article about short-hand. Mr. Waugh had
accidentally met with it at L——, and had brought it home for Owen. When
farmer Mason’s house and barns were all burnt to the ground, and no more
was to be done for him, Owen came back to the counting-house to study
this paper. Mr. Waugh could not help being amused at the eagerness with
which he devoured the arguments about dashes and dots, as if they had
been tidings of peace or war, or of the greatest political event of the
age. This was not the first time that Mr. Waugh had had occasion to
observe the animation with which scantily-informed persons read what is
accordant with their particular tastes and pursuits. He had seen a
farm-servant, who happened to be able to read, excited for a whole day
about some new way of managing a cow, or the best method of treating a
sheep’s fleece; and a galloon weaver drinking in the news of the
alteration of a farthing a gross in the wages of his manufacture. He had
witnessed the effect of such appropriate communications in rousing the
sluggish, in soothing the irritable, by turning the course of their
thoughts, and in improving the arts of life, by stimulating the powers
of the workmen. He had seen none more eager than Owen.
“Sir,” said Owen, “I wonder whether I may ask if you know who this X. Y.
Z. is?”
“Not I,” replied Mr. Waugh, smiling. “I only know that I found the
article lying on the bookseller’s counter; and that when I made a remark
upon it, Muggridge told me I might bring it for you. If you have
anything to say to X. Y. Z., cannot you say it without knowing who he
is?”
“I—say anything to this person! In print! I should like—I am sure, if he
knew one thing that I could tell him——But, sir, do you really think they
would put in anything of mine, if I sent it?”
“That would much depend on whether they thought it worth putting in. If
you have anything to say as good in the eyes of the editor as what X. Y.
Z. has said, I suppose the editor will be glad to print it: but I hardly
think such a tract as this can pay the writers.”
“I never thought of being paid, sir! Let’s see where this editor is to
be found.”
It was soon settled that as Ambrose would have to go to L—— in the
course of a few days, he might carry a packet from Owen to Muggridge,
the bookseller and stationer, who would forward it, at Mr. Waugh’s
request, to the editor’s office in London. How absorbed was Owen, from
that time, whenever he was not at his business in the mill! How silent
at meals! How careful in making his pens! It would be scarcely fair to
tell how many copies he made of his letter to X. Y. Z., nor how many
beginnings he invented and altered. At last, he had to finish in a great
hurry; for the morning was come when Ambrose must proceed to L, and
there was no telling how long it might be before he would have to go
again.
“Now, Ambrose, you see this package of No. 2 has to go to Keely and
Moss’s.”
“Very well,” said Ambrose, turning it over, as if to fix its dimensions
and appearance in his memory.
“You can’t mistake it, for I have printed the direction instead of
writing it, that you may have no difficulty. See here! ‘Keely and Moss.’
This little parcel you are to drop by the way, at Mrs. King’s, near the
toll-bar. Then, that other great package is for Bristow and Son,—you
know where. And then comes Muggridge’s. This, largest of all, is for
Muggridge; and pray see Mr. Muggridge himself, and give into his own
hands this little brown parcel with Mr. Waugh’s letter outside. What
makes you look so puzzled? It is easy enough to carry these to their
places, is not it?”
“If I can carry in my head which is which. Let’s see: this big one——”
“Read the directions, and you can’t mistake. Why should you burden your
memory when the names are before your eyes?”
Ambrose showed that he could spell out the names, and suggested that, if
he should be at a loss, he might ask each person to whom he delivered a
package to help him to make out where the next was to go. He would try
to be sure to make no mistake about the little parcel and the letter for
Mr. Muggridge, and would not come home without a line of acknowledgment
from that important personage himself.
Owen was so evidently fidgety during his brother’s absence, that his
friend Mr. Waugh thought it right to remind him that his fate did not
altogether depend on the parcel being safely delivered. There were so
few printed vehicles for what such multitudes of people have to say,
that a very great number must be disappointed in their wish to be heard.
He owned that this was very hard; he held that printed speech should be
as free as the words of men’s mouths, and as copious as it was possible
to make it. He had reason to desire this; and he suffered not a little
from the arrangements which prevented the possibility of its taking
place.
“Because more paper would be wanted then, you mean, sir. I fancy,
indeed, we might make a fine business of it; if those troublesome
excisemen were out of our way. There is no saying how low you might
bring the price of your paper if it were not for them.”
“For them, and for the law which gives them their office. The duty in
itself, though the worst part of the grievance, is bad enough,—from
thirty to two hundred per cent., and actually lower on the fine paper,
used by the few, than on the coarse, which would be used by the many if
it were not for the tax. It is the coarse which pays the two hundred per
cent., and the fine that pays thirty. It is bad enough that this duty
amounts to more than three times the wages of all the workpeople
employed in the manufacture.”
“Do you really believe that to be the case, sir?”
“It is pretty clearly made out, I fancy. There are within a few of 800
paper-mills in the kingdom; and about 25,000 individuals employed about
the article; and the value of the paper annually produced is between a
million and a million and a half. The duty levied on this is about
770,000_l._;—a most enormous amount. The wages of the workpeople can
bear no kind of proportion to it. How much more paper we should make if
this burden was removed, so as to allow, as far as it goes, of freedom
of printed speech, one may barely imagine; or, if it is beyond our
imaginations, there is a person in my mill who can tell us. You know the
Frenchwoman there. She will inform you how cheaply her countrymen and
countrywomen can have their say through the press. The direct
interference of the government with the liberty of the press is, you
know, altogether a different question. Setting this aside, there is a
wonderful difference in the facilities enjoyed by the French and English
for the diffusion of their knowledge and opinions.”
“Then I suppose others besides their paper-makers are better off than we
for being without the duty. There must be far more printing to do; and
that would occupy, besides the printers, more type-founders and
ink-makers; and then booksellers and stationers and binders and
engravers; then again, more carpenters and mill-wrights, and workmen of
every kind employed in making the machinery and materials. It must cause
a vast difference between that country and this, where we see a want of
books on the one hand, and a want of work on the other.”
“Ay; your brother Ambrose and half-a-dozen more, standing by the hour
together before a placarded wall, for want of something better to read;
and scores of rag-sorters and vat-men applying to me for work which I
should be glad to give them if the paper-duty was off. It is really
grievous to think how few are employed in the diffusion of knowledge,
compared with the numbers who are occupied to much less useful purpose.
Look here. This is a list made out upon the best authority. See the
proportion which employments bear to one another here. On the one side—
_Literature_; on the other—_what_?
Printers 342 Publicans 61,231
Paper-makers 164
Bookbinders 599
Booksellers 327
Stationers, (mostly 797
booksellers)
Copper-plate Printers 663
(including calico)
Printsellers 593
———
25,485
So, if we exclude the calico-printers, (who do not seem to have much to
do with literature) we have not so many as 25,000 persons employed in
literature, while we have above 61,000 who sell beer. If we add the
gin-shops to the number, what will be the proportion?”
“I find, sir, that in Manchester they have 1000 gin-shops, and not so
much as one daily paper.”
“It is the fact. And as long as members go into parliament to uphold
such a state of things, while they raise an outcry against beer-shops,
none such shall have a vote of mine. Which means, that I shall not vote
for Mr. Arruther, if there should be an election; as I hear there will
be.”
Owen thought that gentlemen who upheld the paper-duty in parliament
might spare themselves the trouble of canvassing the paper-makers. He
understood that Mr. Arruther was one who had a terrible dread of the
people knowing too much.
“He would scarcely speak to you, Owen, if he knew you were trying to get
a letter of your own into print. Well: don’t set your mind too much upon
it, and I wish you success with all my heart. If we should see this
letter of yours next week, I am sure we may trust you not to neglect
your business for the sake of becoming a mere scribbler in small
publications. I think you will be careful never to take up your pen but
when you really have something to say.”
Owen was internally much surprised that Mr. Waugh had encouraged him in
his enterprize; for no one had a stronger horror than Mr. Waugh of the
effect of what he called “low publications” on the minds of his
work-people. The whole question lay in what Mr. Waugh considered to be
“low publications.” If he had meant low in price, it was hardly likely
that he would have brought this tract for Owen: but, as few publications
then happened to be low in price without being low in principle and
spirit, Owen’s surprise was natural.
One night of the following week, he came home with a bright countenance;
and with a trembling hand, he laid down before his mother, as she sat at
work at her table, a pamphlet, very like the tract she had seen him
poring over for so many evenings. He judged rightly that though she
could not read, she would like to see the page where O. E. was printed.
Long did she look at those black marks; and now, for the first time,
nurse Ede learned two letters of the alphabet. From that day, she never
passed the placarded wall in the village without picking out by her eye
all the great O-s and E-s in the bills there pasted up. She had now some
idea that her son’s letter must be altered by being in print. She had
heard it very often already, (without understanding much more about it
the last time than the first;) but she had now a humble request to
proffer,—to hear it again.
“If you are not tired of reading it, my dear boy; and then, when you
have done, I think it is not too late for me to put on my bonnet, and go
and show it to the clergyman. But I am afraid you will be tired of
reading it, my dear?”
There never was a more unfounded apprehension. It was not to be denied
that Owen had read it very often; but he did not yet feel himself tired.
There was no pretence, however, for his mother’s going to the clergyman.
Owen had met him; and had made bold to stop him, and show him what had
happened.
When all the compliments, hearty, if not altogether enlightened, had
been paid; when Ambrose had relaxed in his stare upon his accomplished
brother; and nurse had dried her few tears and resumed her needle, and
all reasonable hope had been expressed that Mildred would not be long in
coming home, the happy young writer began to look forward to the next
week, when there would or would not be an answer from X. Y. Z. He had
already consulted Mr. Waugh on the probability of there being any answer
at all, if there was not next week. Mr. Waugh had little doubt of there
being some reply; Owen’s remarks being made in an amicable spirit, and
very courteously expressed; and if no reply should be ready by the next
week, he thought there would at least be a promise of one. Owen counted
the days as anxiously as in the times of his childhood, when
Christmas-day and the fair-day were in prospect. He would have been much
ashamed that even his mother should know how glad he was every night to
think that another day was gone; and yet, perhaps, if the truth had been
revealed, his mother was little less childish than himself.
The reply appeared, on the earliest possible day; as courteous as Owen’s
own; not altogether agreeing with him, but modestly asking for further
explanation on two or three knotty points.—Who was happier than Owen?
His immediate success raised his ambition and his hopes to a height
which he had before reached only in imagination. He would write an
answer immediately; and when that was done, he would compose a work on
short-hand, giving an account of his own studies, and the improvements
he believed he had introduced into the art, with all the many ideas
which during his studies had gathered round the subject. A stray notion
or two about a universal language of written signs had entered his head.
He would pursue the idea, and try whether he could not do something
which would make him useful out of the limits of his native village. But
how was he to find the money to get a book printed? his careful mother
asked.—This he believed would be no difficulty: indeed, he hoped he
should make a great deal of money by it. He would show the probability.
In trying to do so, he proved something else,—that he had already
thought enough on the subject to have made inquiries as to the cost of
printing,—had actually seen a printer’s bill. He told his mother that
the paper for such a pamphlet as he meditated would cost 6_l._,
supposing five hundred copies to be printed. The printing would cost
about 14_l._; not more, for he should take care not to have any
alterations to make after it was once gone to press. This would be
20_l._; and the stitching would cost a few shillings more; and the
advertising the same, he supposed. Say, twenty guineas the whole. Then
if these five hundred copies sold for half-a-crown a-piece, there would
be 62_l._ 10_s._ to come in; above 40_l._ profit,—out of which he would
pay the bookseller for his trouble, and there would be a fine sum left
over; and he would tell his mother what he would do with it. He would——
She promised that she would hear all he had to say on this head when he
should bring Mr. Waugh’s assurance that he was likely to gain 40_l._ to
divide between himself and the bookseller, by writing a little book.
Meantime, she thought it too good a prospect to be a likely one; and
could not believe but that everybody would be writing books, if this was
the way money might be made by such a lad as her Owen.
Owen thought it a little unreasonable in his mother to doubt him, when
he offered her actually a calculation of the expenses he had fully
ascertained, and when she had nothing to bring against his figures but
an impression of her own. However, he would send his rejoinder to the
editor, as before, and think the matter over again before he said
anything to Mr. Waugh.
He did so, feeling pretty well satisfied that his second letter, (into
which he put some nicely-turned expressions of esteem and admiration for
his unknown correspondent) would bring X. Y. Z. and himself to a perfect
agreement: and anxious beyond measure for an answer to a query which he
proposed in his turn,—a query, upon the reply to which hung he could
scarcely say how much that was all-important to the art of short-hand
writing. But next week no tract arrived, though it had been positively
ordered; and twice over, to prevent mistake. It was so evident that poor
Owen was internally fretting and fuming, though outwardly no more than
grave, that Mr. Waugh kindly found it necessary to send Ambrose to L——,
and even to Muggridge’s shop.
“Perhaps, sir,” said the young writer, “you would be kind enough to send
one line to Mr. Muggridge; and then he would write an answer, if there
should be any accident, instead of sending a message which Ambrose might
mistake, not knowing much about book matters.
Ambrose brought back a written answer,—an answer fatal for the time to
Owen’s hopes. The tract was not to be had this week, nor at any future
time. It was suppressed. The publisher had been informed that if he went
on to issue it without putting a fourpenny stamp upon it, he would be
prosecuted. The publisher could not afford to sell it, if every copy
must cost him four-pence in addition to the other necessary expenses;
and still less could he afford to be prosecuted. The tract was
suppressed.
“Well, well; that is all right enough,” observed Mr. Waugh. “The laws
must be obeyed, and I am sure I should have been the last person to
bring the publication to Arneside if I had dreamed of its being illegal.
I am sorry for you, Owen; but the laws must be obeyed.”
Owen could not bear this; and he went home the first minute he could.
His mother was full of concern, and utterly unable to understand how the
case stood. She could not help having some hope that the tract would
come down, after all, sooner or later; and that Owen would surprise her
by bringing it in his hand some day.
No: no hope of such an event! Here was an end of everything. A most
useful intercourse between minds which would now become once more
strangers was interrupted. The improvement of a useful art was stopped.
There was no saying what might not have arisen out of this
correspondence,—how much that would have been advantageous to the
individuals and to society was now lost through the interference of
these Stamp Commissioners. If they had let the publication go on so
long, raising hopes and justifying expectations, they might——Owen could
not finish what he was saying. He had supposed himself beyond the age of
tears; but he now found himself mistaken. He put his hand before his
eyes, and wept nearly as heartily as a girl when the spirit of her pet
lamb is passing away.
This reverse had the effect of improving Owen’s eloquence. He grew very
fond of conversing both with the clergyman and with Mr. Waugh on the
impolicy and iniquity of restraining the intercourse of minds in
society, for the sake of a few taxes, so paltry in their amount as to
seem to crave to be drawn from some material or another of bodily food
rather than from the intellectual nourishment which is as much the
unbounded inheritance of every one that is born into the world as his
personal freedom.
All who knew Owen were surprised at the extraordinary improvement he
seemed to have made within a short time, in countenance and manner, as
much as in his conversation. It became a common remark among the
neighbours, that there must be a proud feeling in nurse Ede’s mind
whenever she saw her manly and intelligent-looking son passing through
the village, with a gait and a glance so unlike those of his former
school-companions, who seemed to have fallen back into a pretty close
resemblance to those who had never learned their A, B, C. Some of Owen’s
sayings spread, and were admired more than if they had arrived from an
unknown distant quarter. When the housewife lighted her evening lamp,
her husband told how Owen had said that it was bad enough to tax the
light that visits the eyes, but infinitely worse to tax the light that
should illumine the immortal mind; and the paper-makers quoted him over
their work, saying that no taxation is so injurious as that of the raw
material; and that books are the raw material of science and art. For
Owen’s sake all were glad, for that of the village all were sorry, when
it was made known that Mr. Waugh had resolved to part with his young
friend, in order to give him opportunity for further improvement and
advancement than could be within his reach at Arneside, and had procured
him a good situation in Mr. Muggridge’s establishment at L——.
Nurse spoke not a word in the way of objection. Such an idea as her
boy’s leaving his native village had never occurred to her; but she bore
the surprise and consequent separation very firmly. She happily felt a
secret hope that Ambrose would now rise into Owen’s place at the mill,
and in the society of Arneside; and really, when she saw how he was
getting on, in quickness and in the power of reading, she began to
believe that it was not yet too late for Ambrose to become a great man.
CHAPTER VI.
PRESS AND POST-OFFICE.
Owen promised, on leaving Arneside, not to forget the old place and
his old friends; and though he soon became a prosperous man, he lost
none of his interest in those who were proud of being regarded by him.
Reports arrived of the importance of the young Arneside scholar in L——;
in that large and busy town, which was like London to the
imaginations of the villagers. Owen was Secretary to the Mechanics’
Institute there, in course of time, after having won two or three
prizes, and introduced the study and practice of his favourite
short-hand. A straggler from Arneside had met him in the streets of L—
—; had been with him when he was stopped by three people within a
hundred yards, all eager to ask him something about the newspaper,—the
Western Star; and had finally watched him into the hotel when, well
dressed in black, he had passed in with several gentlemen who were
attending a public dinner there. Owen must have grown into something
very like a gentleman to be attending a public dinner, and to be
consulted three times within a hundred yards about a newspaper. One of
Owen’s tokens of remembrance was this weekly newspaper, a copy of
which he sent down regularly to the landlord of the Rose, Mr. Chowne,
to be circulated through the village when it had been read in the
tap-room. This was considered a very handsome present; and, indeed,
some of his careful friends, remembering that sevenpence-halfpenny a
week is 1_l._ 12_s._ 6_d._ a year, consulted together about sending
him word that he was too generous, and that they were scrupulous about
accepting so expensive a remembrance from him. His mother, however,
heard of this, and put an end to all scruples by expressing her
confidence that her son would do nothing which he could not properly
afford; and it afterwards transpired from some quarter that Owen had
told somebody that this newspaper cost him nothing, an intimation
which certain of the village politicians interpreted as meaning that
he wrote the whole of it. From the moment that their version of the
story was adopted, the eagerness with which the “Western Star” was
received was redoubled; and those who could not read listened with
open mouths while those who could told the news, and magnified as they
went along. The gossip about the Turkish Sultan and his Ministers now
became interesting, as well as the speculations about the magnetic
pole; and there was no end to the astonishment at Owen’s learning,
which seemed to extend from courts and cabinets down to razor-strops
and Macassar oil. No day of the week passed without his being
pronounced a wonderful young man.
The most incomprehensible thing to the whole village was that Owen sent
down warnings in his letters, more than once, that the “Western Star”
must not be trusted as if it told nothing but truth. Its reports were
declared to be often unfair, and its politics wavering and unprincipled.
There was some talk in L—— of trying to get up another newspaper; and it
would be a pity if (as was too likely) it could not be done; as an
opposition might improve the “Western Star.” This declaration seemed to
exhibit an unparalleled modesty and disinterestedness on the part of
Owen. Nobody would have found out that his newspaper was not perfectly
fair, if he had not himself said so.
One motive to such transcendent virtue might be discerned. The reports
which, Owen said, were the least of all to be trusted, were those of Mr.
Arruther’s speeches and conduct in the House. Owen was known to be no
admirer of Mr. Arruther as a Member of Parliament; and, that the
“Western Star” had always praised this gentleman, and called upon his
constituents for gratitude, was supposed to be owing to the laws of good
breeding, which might forbid any public blame of so rich and grand a
person as Mr. Arruther. But Owen’s private letters spoke very plainly of
the Member; of his idleness about his duty; of his prejudice in favour
of the aristocracy; and of his constancy in opposing every measure which
could tend to the relief and enlightenment of the working classes. He
wished that he could give his old friends the means of knowing what
grounds he had for saying all this; but the London papers took little
notice of Mr. Arruther, and nothing would be found against him in the
“Western Star.” He must beg any of the Arneside people who had votes to
try to ascertain how Mr. Arruther had voted on such and such questions,
and make up their minds for themselves whether they were properly
represented.
On the days when the “Western Star” arrived, man after man dropped in at
the tap-room at the Rose, to try for his turn, or to listen to any one
who might be reading aloud. Nurse would never be persuaded to go and
listen too, though a seat of honour would have been awarded her, by the
window in summer, and near the fire in winter. She felt that she had
rather wait; and a rule was made that she should have the first loan of
the paper. Such was the rule, if it had but been kept. But when she had
her proper turn, it did not always happen that Ambrose was ready to
read, or that she was at home that evening; and she never chose to
detain the treasure beyond a single day, when so many better scholars
than herself were longing for it. And there was some underhand work
about this matter. The newspaper had sometimes disappeared from the
table at the Rose; which happened because some impatient person had
bribed the pot-boy to let him or her have it first, or had slipped in
through the open door, and carried it off: and then, by the time it came
round to nurse’s cottage, it was so thumbed and dirtied and torn at all
the creases, that poor scholars read it at a great disadvantage; so
that, altogether, Nurse was not much enlightened by the “Western Star.”
Yet, the first thing that she remembered on waking, every Saturday
morning, was that this was the day of the arrival of the newspaper; and
Ambrose was sure to be reminded of it by some gentle hint during
breakfast.
He went in at the Rose, one Saturday evening, to see what was doing.
There sat Farmer Mason, looking more shabby than ever; as he had done
each time that Ambrose had seen him since the fire. He came to learn if
the advertisement and list of subscriptions in his favour were in the
“Star” to-day. Nothing like them appeared; and he was drowning his
disappointment in a third glass of spirit and water. Some Job’s
comforters were present who asked him how he could expect that his
friends should consume the little money they had obtained for him in
advertising; and added what they had heard about the unwillingness of
many people to assist a man who had shown himself so imprudent as not to
insure. Mason did not boast of any more patience than Job.
“As for the insuring,” said he, “it is all very well for the rich to
talk. They insure themselves; having several properties which they make
to secure one another; it being the last thing likely that all or many
should be burnt down. But the very cause which prevents their insuring
should teach them to excuse us poor men for not doing it.”
“Besides,” observed the landlord, “there are so many country people that
do not think of insuring against fire! Indeed, I scarcely know a farmer
that has done it; and why should Mason act differently from his
neighbours?”
“And why don’t the farmers insure? Why does not every body insure?”
cried Mason. “Because of the tax which the rich escape paying by making
one estate insure another. As long as the government is to have 200 per
cent. upon fire insurances, there will be plenty of people to keep me in
countenance for what some few are pleased to call my neglect.”
“What business has the government to interfere with a man, when he is
trying to provide against misfortune?” asked the shoemaker of the
village. “It is a direct reward to carelessness to tax carefulness. And
200 per cent. too!”
“Yes: 200 per cent. If the premium is calculated at 1_s._ 6_d._, the
government imposes a 3_s._ stamp. If you go and insure 1000_l._ worth of
goods at 15_s._, we’ll say, you must pay a duty of 30_s._ to government.
Where is the wonder that a man would rather trust to Providence to keep
the fire from his roof than submit to such a tax? The true matter of
wonder is, that any government could ever shut its eyes to this!”
“Something has happened about sea-insurances which might have opened
their eyes, as I know from my brother, who is now master of a ship from
the next port,” observed the landlord. “The last time he was here, he
told me what I had no idea of before. While we have more and more ships
passing in and out, the duty on sea-policies is falling off. Where the
business transacted has increased one-fifth, the duty has fallen off
two-fifths: that is to say, our merchants and ship-masters go and insure
in Holland, and in Germany, and in the United States of America, or any
respectable place where the stamp is not so high as in England. The
government might as well take off this tax at once, with a good grace;
for, in a little while, all the insurers will be driven across the
water. Since the duty will soon yield nothing at all, they may as well
let us keep a useful branch of business among us, instead of giving it
away to foreigners.”
“I am sure,” said poor Mason, sipping from his glass, and recurring to
the faults which had been found with him,—“I am sure it is no
unreasonable thing of me to look for another advertisement or two,
considering how little can be done by one. Only think how many people
may chance to miss seeing the paper that once, or may overlook that
particular advertisement, when they might be ready enough to give, if it
did but come often enough before their eyes. And I suppose it cannot
cost a great deal to print ten or twelve lines; and when once it stands
ready for printing, I suppose they charge less each time, as is done in
other cases where there is less charged in proportion to the greatness
of the custom.”
The landlord knew that this was the way in America. His brother was in
the habit of advertising the departure of his ship from an American
port. He paid for his advertisement (which happened to be a short one)
2_s._ 2_d._ for one insertion; for 3_s._ 3_d._ for two; and only 6½_d._
more each time, for as long as he chose. An advertisement of eight
lines, which would have cost him two guineas in England at the end of a
week, cost him in America only 5_s._ 5_d._ It is the advertisement duty
which makes an advertisement as expensive the twentieth time as the
first in England; and, bad as the duty is altogether, this is the worst
part of it; for, as Mr. Mason was saying, repetition is all in all in
advertising.
“There is talk of taking off a good part of the advertisement duty,”[A]
observed the shoemaker.
-----
Footnote A:
Since done.
-----
“There will be less use in taking off a part than the government
expects,” replied the landlord, “for the very reason that the principle
of an advertisement duty interferes with the lowering of the price on
repetition. If the government now make, as they say, 160,000_l._ a year
by this tax, they would find their profit in taking it off altogether
by——”
“The increase of the paper duty, from the multitude of advertisements
there would be.”
“That would be true; but I would have the paper duty off too; and so I
should look to another quarter for the compensation. Much more than
160,000_l._ a year would drop into the treasury from the increase of
traffic of every kind which must happen in consequence of freedom of
advertising. Our greater traffic of late years has not yielded more
advertisement duty. We had better try now whether giving up that duty
would not cause greater traffic, and so an increase of duties upon other
things.”
“One might easily find out,” observed somebody, “whether the Americans
advertise more than we do, from having no duty to pay. That would be the
test.”
“The only test; and what is the fact? There are half as many again of
advertisements in the daily papers of New York alone, as in all the
newspapers of Great Britain and Ireland.”
“Without London. You leave out the great London papers.”
“Not I. I include the great daily papers of London. We have twice as
many people as the United States, and more than twice as much business;
yet we have only one million of advertisements in a year, and the United
States have ten millions—that is to say, their advertising is to ours as
ten to one. And when you further consider, as my brother says, how many
of the Americans are busy on the land instead of in trade, and how many
more we have occupied in trade, from which the greater part of
advertisements come, it is hardly too much to say that their advertising
is to ours as forty to one. Depend upon it, we are under the mark when
we say that the duty suppresses nineteen out of twenty of those
advertisements which would be sent to the newspapers if we had the same
freedom as the Americans; and that no mere reduction will prevent the
suppression of millions which it is for everybody’s advantage should
appear.”
“Yes, indeed; and why we should be compelled to pay to the Government
for making known that we have something to sell ten miles off, when a
shopkeeper may freely put a bill in his window to tell what may be had
within, it is not altogether easy to see.”
“There is one thing easy to see,” observed Joy, the builder; “and that
is the figure that people make of our walls, sticking them all over with
bills. I have more trouble than enough with pulling them down from the
end of my master’s house; and as sure as I next pass that way, I find it
all covered over again with red and black letters, and ugly pictures. My
master calls it making a newspaper of his gable. And as for the
chalking,—it is said that men and boys are hired to go about chalking
all the walls in the country; and before ever our mortar is dry, there
is some unsightly scrawl or another on the new red bricks. ’Tis too much
for the temper of any builder. For my part, I make no scruple of
threshing any one that I catch with the chalk in his hand, man or boy.”
Ambrose stood up for the practice of plastering the walls with bills; he
having been often amused, and even led to read, by a tempting display of
this kind. But it did not take long to convince him that he might be
better amused, and more comfortably advanced in his reading, if he could
but be supplied at his own home with a sufficiency of pictures and
articles to study. He saw that it was pleasanter to sit down at his
mother’s deal-table for such purposes, than to stand in a broiling sun
or drizzling rain, looking up till the back of his neck ached like that
of a rheumatic old man.
Mason was at first equally disposed to advocate the chalking. He had
himself sent his poor boys about to represent on every conspicuous brick
surface within five miles, a large house in flames, with the inscription
underneath, “Remember Farmer Mason and his large young family, burnt out
of house and home.” He believed that he owed nearly as much to this as
to having employed Grice the crier to bawl his case through two or three
parishes.
The shoemaker hoped that fellow Grice did not take anything from Farmer
Mason for doing him this service. Grice was known to be prospering in
the world; and it was a cruel thing to take money from a ruined man, the
same as from a fortunate one. Mason sighed, shook his head, and applied
himself to his glass. Perhaps the landlord winced under the last remark,
conscious of being now actually running up a score against Mason for
drink, which he would never have thought of tasting if he had not been
tempted to the Rose, for the sake of seeing the advertisement of his
calamity. To have defended Grice would have been going rather too far;
but Chowne ventured to show that Grice was no worse than some other
people.
The Government, he said, took large sums of money from all distressed
people whose calamities are advertised. When there was a famine in
Ireland, several thousand pounds of the money subscribed for the relief
of the famishing went to the Government in the shape of
advertisement-duty; and when the floods of the last autumn had laid
waste whole districts in Scotland, the profit which the Treasury made by
the announcement would have rebuilt hundreds of the cottages which were
swept away. And this profiting was not only on rare and great occasions.
There was not a poor servant out of place who had not to pay to the
Government for the chance of getting a service; and to pay exactly the
same as the nobleman who wishes to sell an estate of ten thousand
a-year, and to whom a pound spent in advertisement-duty is of less
consequence than a doit would be to the servant out of place.
Mason sighed, and said that the thing most plain to him was that he was
destined to be stripped of all he had, since there was a pluck on every
hand,—first the fire, and then Grice, and the Government, and everybody.
But though he was disappointed in what he came to see in the newspaper,
he did not mean to go away without seeing it; and so he would trouble
the landlord for another glass of spirit and water. It would be hard if
he did not see the paper now, as he had no money to pay the pot-boy,
like some people, for a sight of it. He did wonder, and he was not the
only one that wondered, that the landlord chose to make a profit of what
was sent him as a present,—taking one little advantage from one, and
another from another; for nobody supposed the pot-boy put in his own
pocket all the good things he got every week.
Chowne wondered what his friend Mason meant. If people chose to make
presents to his servants, it was nothing to him: but,—as for his making
anything by the paper,—he could tell the present company, if they did
not know it already, that there was a law against letting newspapers. He
should now take care to tell his pot-boy the very words of the law,—
“that any hawker of newspapers, who shall let any newspaper to hire to
any person, or to different persons, shall forfeit the sum of five
pounds for each offence.” If, after this, the lad should choose to run
the risk, it would be at his own peril; and nobody would now suppose
that a prudent man like himself would run the risk of being fined five
pounds, a dozen times over, every week.
O, but that must be an old, forgotten law, that nobody thought of
regarding. Were there no newsmen in London, letting out newspapers at
twopence an hour?
The law was not so very old, Chowne said. Our good King George the Third
had been reigning just thirty years when it was passed. If it was
disregarded in London, he supposed people had their reasons for
disregarding it; and he was far from wishing to defend that bit of law;
but, for his own sake, he should not break it. So, perhaps, friend
Hartley, who had been getting the paper by heart, apparently, while the
others were talking, would have the goodness either to read aloud, or to
hand the sheet over to somebody who would.
The reader had been anxious to see what was said about Arruther’s being
absent during two nights,—the most important of any in the session to
some of his constituents,—and voting with the majority on another
question, after having led people to suppose he was of an opposite
opinion. But this paper was really ridiculous in its support of that
man. Here were a hundred reasons for his doing as he had done; and not
one good one. Hartley had no idea of being gulled as this paper would
gull him, just for the sake of whitewashing Mr. Arruther; and he began
to read what the paper said. A good deal of argumentation followed,
which, however animating and wholesome it might be to the persons
engaged, was dull and useless to Ambrose, from his knowing nothing about
the subject discussed. Seeing no chance of the party arriving at the
accident and murder parts in any decent time, he determined to go home
and tell his mother that they must wait, and that he did not know
whether the paper was entertaining or not, this time. All were too busy
leaning over the table and listening, to take any notice of him when he
went away; and, as he never drank anything, Chowne did not consider
himself called upon to bestow more than a slight nod on Ambrose, as the
lad made his rustic bow in passing out.
Whom should he meet at the next corner but Ryan? Ambrose’s wits were
certainly brightened by some means or another; for he bethought himself
of the use Ryan might be of to poor Mason, by serving as a walking
advertisement of his misfortune. The moment he had heard that the
rag-merchant was going to offer his company and his news to old Jeffery
to-night, instead of always troubling nurse Ede to entertain him,
Ambrose blurted out the story of the fire, the subscription, the
rapacity of the Government in regard to advertisements, and the
advantage it would be to Mason if the rag-merchant would take up his
cause, and beg for him through the country.
“Ay; that’s the way,” said Ryan. “Always something for me to do as I
travel the country! However, I’ll do it with all my heart. My errands
are not all begging ones, as I will show you. I give as well as beg
sometimes. Here, take this. This is Owen’s tract (I mean the tract that
was put down) come to life again. I’ll give it to you this once; and if
you can get anybody to join you in buying it at twopence a-week by the
time I come again, I can order it for you. Not that you can have it
weekly: the carriage would cost too much; but——”
“It can come by post, can’t it? The ‘Western Star’ always comes by post,
and no charge.”
“Very likely; but this is not altogether like the ‘Western Star’ or
other newspapers that come by post, as you will find when you look at
it. But you can have four numbers together, once a-month, when the
monthly things come for the clergyman and Mr. Waugh. Give my love to
nurse, and tell her rags are down. She must take a penny a pound less if
she has any to sell. The rags from the Mediterranean and the east are
not all wanted, and the American paper-makers have come here to buy; and
while that is the case, mine will be but a bad business. Our
paper-making is a joke to theirs; and, for my part, if something does
not happen soon to quicken the demand for rags. I think I shall give up
going my rounds, and bid you all good bye.”
“No: don’t say that, Mr. Ryan. We should be sorry not to see you twice
a-year, as we have done as long as I can remember.”
“Well; if you wish to help my trade, and so go on seeing me, do your
best to spread this publication. If you will believe me, there are ten
thousand a-week circulating of it already; and that requires a good deal
of paper,—see!”
Ambrose was approaching, as slowly as he could put one foot before the
other, the fifth time that his mother looked out for him from her door.
“So, here you are, my dear; and the paper, too!—and a picture at top of
it to-day! That’s something new. I wonder whether it be Owen’s drawing.
He could draw if he was to try, I’m sure.”
“’Tis not Owen’s paper, mother; but a much finer one, and not costing
scarcely a quarter as much as Owen’s.”
And he told how he had got it; and helped his mother to make out the
pictures, as she looked at them over his shoulder.
“Who is that lady, I wonder now,” said nurse, “with her hands fastened,
poor thing! and a great arm out of a cloud whipping her? What fine
feathers she has in her queer hat! and what a whip! with a man’s face at
the end of every cord.”
“That is Britannia and her task-masters, mother. Those are her
task-masters,—those faces in the whip; and they are our rulers: there
are their names. And below there is—‘Many a tear of blood has Britain
shed under those tyrants that make themselves a cat-o’-nine-tails, to
bare the bones and harrow the feelings of the sons of industry.’ How
cruel!—Then there is—here, in this corner——”
“A great chest all on fire. I see.”
“A printing-press, that is; but what the great light round about it
means, I don’t know; but it does not seem to be burning away. Then,
opposite, there is a black person, with an odd foot and a long tail; and
see what is flying off from the end of his tail!”
“A crown, I do believe; and what is the other?”
“A mitre. The lines below are—
‘My tail shall toss both Church and State,
And leave them, shortly, to their fate.’
And do look behind! There is the church window, and two men hanging. I
think the fat one is the parson. Who can the other be?”
“But, my dear, I do not like this picture at all. It seems to me very
cruel and wicked.”
“Well, let us look at the next. Here is a man that has tumbled into the
kennel; and a woman with a child in her arms falling over him; and
nobody helps them up; but all the boys in the street are pointing at
them. What is written over behind there? ‘Gin palace.’ Ah! those people
are drunk, poor creatures!”
“My dear, don’t say ‘poor creatures!’ for fear I should think you pity
them. They deserve all that may happen to them; and I hope the paper
says so.”
The paper said something very like it. It told the story of a man who
had beaten his wife, and turned her out of a gin-shop when she had
followed him there, with her infant in her arms. In his drunken rage, he
had pushed the door so violently as to squeeze the infant in the
door-way, and cause its death. This was related very plainly, and
followed by some forcible remarks on the disgusting sin of drunkenness.
Mrs. Ede was much pleased with all this, and with more which Ambrose
read when she had lighted her candle, and sat down to darn his
stockings. There was a story of a master who was kind enough to offer to
make another trial of a run-away apprentice; and the rebuke which a
magistrate gave to a mean-spirited wretch who would have frightened his
little daughter into telling a lie to save him from justice. Then came a
short account of what was doing at the North Pole; and afterwards,
directions how to keep meat from spoiling in hot weather. In the midst
of this, Ambrose stopped, quite tired out. When he came to “wiped with a
dry cloth,” his breath failed him, and the lines swam before his eyes.
He had never before read so much in one day. Nurse was sorry not to hear
what should be done next with the meat; but she hoped Ambrose would be
able to go on to-morrow. Meantime, she spent a few minutes in glancing
over what was to her an expanse of hieroglyphics.
“Ah! here is a song!” cried she. “This is the way the song was printed
in Owen’s paper.—Never mind, my dear. You have done quite enough. Never
mind the song now.”
Ambrose could not help trying, and for some time in vain, to make out
this bit of apparent poetry. It turned out at last to be a list of
country agents and their abodes: a list so long as to fill a quarter of
a column.—When the laugh at this mistake was done, nurse began to tell
her son what a very happy mother she considered herself. It was a pity,
to be sure, that poor Mildred did not get home in time to hear all that
her mother had heard; and, indeed, nurse sometimes wondered whether her
girl did not stay out later than she need; and whether it was a fancy of
her own that Mildred was not so fond of being at home as she used to be.
But still, everybody knew Mildred to be a very steady, virtuous girl,
unlike two or three at the mill who might be mentioned; and, while many
mothers were anxious about their lads, not knowing whether they passed
their evenings at the public-house, or playing thimble-rig in the lane,
or going into the woods after dark with a gun, nurse was wholly at ease
about her boys. Owen was doing honourably, which partly made up for his
being at a distance; and here was Ambrose improving his learning by
finding out for her how meat should be kept in hot weather, and meeting
with awful lessons about drunkenness. It made her feel so obliged to
him! and she knew he had a pleasure in delighting her: a sort of
pleasure that poor Mrs. Arruther and her son seemed never to have had
together, for all his fine education. And there were many much humbler
people than the Arruthers who were not near so happy as nurse. If she
could but make out whether anything heavy lay on her girl’s mind——But
the present was not a time to speak of the only great trouble she had.
It would be ungrateful to do so to-night.—There was one more thing she
should like to know, however; and that was why, when this paper blamed
violence and falsehood in men that got drunk, and in bad fathers, it was
itself so violent about our rulers, and told so much that she thought
must be false about them. She had no wish to find fault with anything
that Ryan had brought; but she had rather think the paper mistaken than
believe that our rulers were so cruel as it declared.
Ambrose looked again at the pictures; thought the people who wrote the
paper must be pretty sure what they were about before they printed such
things; feared that the rulers and the church must be a bad set; and
reminded his mother how virtuous this publication had proved itself
about gin.
If nurse had known all, she would not have felt the surprise she had
ventured to express; and if Ambrose had known all, he would not have
concluded that because some vices were condemned and some virtues
honoured in one page, the next must be pure in the morals of its
politics. This newspaper was an unstamped, and therefore an illegal,
publication. It was obnoxious to the law, and therefore an enemy to the
law, and to all law-makers. Moral in its choice and presentation of
police reports, and of late occurrences of other kinds, judicious in its
selections from good books, and useful in those of its original articles
which had nothing to do with politics, it was cruel, malicious, and
false in its manner of treating whatever related to law-makers. It was
what in high places is called inflammatory. Its tendency was, not to
enlighten its readers about the faults of their representatives, errors
in the practice of government, and the evils arising from former faults
and errors; but to persuade the people that rich men must be wicked men;
that the industrious must be oppressed; and that the way to remedy
everything was to strip the rich and hang the idle. Its object, in
short, was to make its readers hate an authority which it chose to
disobey.—If no injurious authority had interfered with the establishment
of this paper, (which establishment it had not availed to prevent,) the
political part of this paper would have been as moral as the rest. There
is no abstract and peculiar hatred in men’s minds against rulers, any
more than there is against poets, or jewellers, or colonels in the army,
or any other class; and no one class would have been selected for
reprobation here, if there had been no provocation, on the one side, to
defiance on the other. If there had been no fear of punishment for
saying anything at all, there would have been no temptation to say what
was unjust and cruel, to the injury of every party concerned. But, for
the sake of the four-penny stamp, a temperate and very useful
publication had been put down; and there had arisen from its ruins,—
another, not like itself, but seasoned high with whatever could most
exalt the passions, and thereby enlist the prejudices of the multitude
in its support against the law. This could have taken place only under
an unwise and oppressive law; unwise in affording facilities for its own
evasion; and oppressive in debarring the people from an immeasurable
advantage, for the sake of a very small supposed profit to the treasury.
As Ambrose unfolded the paper, on being satisfied with what he had seen
of two sides of it, two or three little papers fell out, and fluttered
down to the ground. They contained a puff of the paper, and were to be
circulated by him, no doubt.
“_The best and cheapest Newspaper ever published in England._
“THE TWOPENNY TREAT, AND PEOPLE’S LAW-BOOK.
“It shall abound in Police intelligence, in Murders, Rapes, Suicides,
Burnings, Maimings, Theatricals, Races, Pugilism, and all manner of
‘moving accidents by flood and field.’ In short, it will be stuffed
with every sort of devilment that will make it sell. For this reason,
and to make it the poor man’s treat, the price is only two-pence (not
much more than the price of the paper.) So that even to pay its way,
the sale must be enormous. With this, however, we shall be satisfied.
Our object is, not to make money, but to beat the Government. Let the
public only assist us in this, and we promise them the cheapest and
best paper for the money that was ever published in England.
OBSERVE! _s._ _d._
Advertisements under six lines 1 6
Each additional line 0 2
Published by E. Hamilton; and sold by all
courageous Venders of the unstamped.”
Why did not Ambrose read this announcement to his mother? Why did he
not, the next day, give her some of the benefit of the other two pages
of this paper? If nurse had been able to read for herself about the
“devilment” with which the publication was to be stuffed, and about the
nature of the contract between masters and workmen, she might, by a few
words of parental wisdom and love, have saved her son and herself from
future intolerable misery. One grief lay heavy at her heart already; a
grief which had its cause in the gross ignorance of one of her children.
Another was in store, arising from the imperfect knowledge and mistaken
credulity of her second son. In the enlightenment of the eldest lay her
only security for her maternal peace.
CHAPTER VII.
THE POLICY OF M.Ps.
Owen’s visions had not all been realized. He had not yet got his thirty
or forty pounds by publishing what he had to say on short-hand and
universal language. He had not even published at all. This arose, first,
from certain difficulties represented to him by Mr. Muggridge, and fully
confirmed by a London bookseller; and, next, from his having grown
modest as he grew enlightened. He was much less confident at L—— than he
had been at Arneside, that he could say anything very new and very
valuable on a universal language.
The bookseller’s first difficulty was about Owen’s remarks being
published as a pamphlet. He was right enough in saying that the young
man did not know what he was about in wishing to publish a pamphlet. In
order to intimate the risk, Mr. Muggridge told him that not one pamphlet
in fifty pays the cost of its publication; and showed him how clearly
impossible it was that any other result could take place. Pamphlets were
triple taxed; and by what means could so small an article pay its
expense of production, three kinds of tax, and the trouble of the
publisher, and leave any surplus for the author? First, the paper was
heavily excised; then there was the pamphlet duty of three shillings per
sheet; and then the advertisement duty. And the risk of not selling the
whole must not be forgotten. The duty must be paid upon every copy of
the largest edition, before a single one was sold; and if no more than
twenty were purchased, and all the rest went as waste paper to the
tobacconist, there would be no drawback allowed: not even time given to
see whether there would be any sale or not. There were no bonded
warehouses, where books might be lodged between their manufacture and
their sale. To issue a pamphlet must be a speculation of unavoidable
hazard——
To all but the Government, who makes sure of the taxes beforehand.
To all but the Government! And what did the Government get by it? The
practice tended to the suppression of pamphlets, and not to the profit
of the treasury. The very oppressive pamphlet duty yielded to the
Government 970l. a-year. For this mighty sum were hundreds of
intelligent men kept silent who might have uttered thousands of opinions
and millions of facts which would have been useful to their race, but
who had neither power nor inclination to issue in expensive volumes
thoughts which would have been worth setting forth in cheap tracts. For
this mighty sum were thousands of rational beings subjected to that
restriction of commerce which is the most to be deprecated, and the
least capable of defence,—the commerce of thought. What would be said to
regulations of commerce which should practically prohibit a silver
coinage, while it allowed but a very minute supply of copper? What would
be thought of the injury to those who had it not in their power to deal
with gold? Yet in the far more important interchange of knowledge and
opinion, this monstrous virtual prohibition subsisted for the sake of
the 970_l._ a-year which it brought to the treasury!
Owen could scarcely believe that the produce of the tax could be so
small till it was explained what its attendant expenses were. Fifty
prosecutions in the year cannot be conducted for nothing; and the
average of prosecutions in a year for the neglect of payment of the
pamphlet duty was fifty. In some years, the average of prosecutions had
been so much larger, or the horror of the tax had so availed in
deterring from that mode of publication, that the Government had
sustained an actual loss of 200_l._ under that head of duty. If Owen
meant to publish at all, he had better swell his matter into a good
thick volume—a ten shilling octavo, which would escape the pamphlet
duty, and cost no more in advertising than an eighteen-penny pamphlet.
And what chance was there of his making it worth his while to publish a
book? Owen would know. Little chance enough of his being recompensed for
his toil, and rewarded for his talent; though he might perhaps recover
the money he must lay out. If he printed five hundred copies, the
expenses would be about 170_l._, of which 30_l._ would be tax of one
kind or another. Then eleven copies must be given to various
institutions——
But Owen did not mean to give any away, except two or three copies to
old friends.
He must. There was a law by which eleven copies of every work entered at
Stationers’ Hall must be presented to institutions where they are as
sure to lie unread as if they were already the waste paper they will be
some time or other. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge are among
the eleven favoured places: those rich Universities, which are exempted
from that paper-duty which must be paid by every little tradesman who
issues a hand-bill about his stock, and every labourer who buys his
daughter a Bible when she goes out to service, or puts half a quire of
foolscap into her hand that she may write sometimes to her parents.
Well; these expenses being all paid, there would remain to be divided
between the author and the publisher, when every copy was sold, neither
more nor less than 20_l._ That is to say, the treasury would take
35_l._, and the author and publisher together 20_l._, and this in the
best possible case,—that of every copy being sold.
This statement disposed Owen to refrain from becoming an author at
present,—at least till he had asked an experienced London publisher
whether Mr. Muggridge did not labour under some mistake. The answer from
London was that Mr. Muggridge’s statement was perfectly correct; and
added that, in this country, not one-fourth of the books published pay
their expenses, leaving out of view all recompense of the author’s
ability and industry; that only one in eight or ten can be reprinted
with advantage; and that, in the case of the most successful works,—
works of which the very largest number is printed and sold,—the duties
invariably amount to more than the entire remuneration of the author.
From this moment Owen applied himself to make some other use of his
short-hand than publishing it. He became the principal reporter for the
“Western Star.”
Now a power came into his hands of whose nature and extent he had not
formed any conception before he made trial of his new occupation. Upon
him it now depended how much the good people of L—— and a wide district
round should know of the law proceedings, of the public meetings and
dinner speechifyings that took place in the town and neighbourhood. Upon
Owen it depended whether the misdemeanours of certain citizens should be
held up as a warning, or obligingly concealed; whether the corporation
should be allowed to take its own way in quiet, or subjected to be
watched by the townspeople; whether one side or both of a political
question should be presented. There was no competition, as the “Western
Star” was the only newspaper in the place; and nothing could be easier
than it now would have been to Owen to influence the opinions of the
whole reading public in L—— as to all matters of general concern, by his
own. Nothing could be easier than to give his own view of any question
discussed at a public meeting. It was only laying down his pencil, and
folding his arms till a speaker had done, and then making a note of his
first and last sentence; while the best speakers on the other side had
their best sayings put at length, and to the best advantage. As it was
impossible to issue the whole of what every body said, the most natural
process seemed to be to print what Owen liked most, and must therefore
think the most worth carrying away. Owen himself felt that this was an
unreasonable and pernicious power to be in the hands of any man; and,
earnestly as he desired not to abuse it, he was so well aware that every
man must have his peculiar tastes and political partialities,—he saw so
clearly that no one report of his in the “Western Star” was in matter
precisely what it would have been if prepared by any one else, that it
offended his judgment and his conscience to be left in a state of
irresponsibility in the discharge of a duty of such extreme importance.
He felt that responsibility to any one mind was out of the question. If
Mr. Muggridge, or any other censor, had been set over him, the only
difference would have been that the public would have seen affairs
through Mr. Muggridge’s medium, instead of through Owen’s: but there was
another kind of responsibility to which he would fain have been
subjected; and that was, public opinion. If he had known that other
papers beside the “Western Star” would also publish the proceedings he
was reporting, he must not only have avoided any gross act of
suppression or embellishment, but must have vied with other reporters in
selecting whatever was most weighty, by whomsoever said, and on whatever
aspect of a question. In free competition alone, he saw, lay his
security for his own perfect honesty, and that of the public for being
truly informed about public proceedings.
Owen was now in a somewhat similar position to that of the reporters of
the London newspapers, some years ago, when a very few journals,
compromising matters among themselves, and, secure from competition,
sported with public curiosity as they chose. If a fit of yawning seized
those gentlemen in the midst of a parliamentary debate, they went to the
next tavern to refresh themselves with a bowl of punch; and Burke and
Fox might take their chance for its being known beyond the House that
they had spoken at all. Thus, if Owen grew tired, he had only to go
away, and add next morning that “the meeting separated at a late hour,
highly gratified,” &c. &c. Again, the old London reporters did not like
having to work three nights together, and gave themselves a holiday on
Wednesdays. In like manner, Friday being a busy day with Owen, he might
have skipped over all Friday doings, and have allowed a dead silence to
rest on whatever happened on that unlucky day. He had been rather
roughly treated by one of the opulent friends of the Mechanics’
Institution; and, if he had not been too honest, he might have omitted a
hundred notices which he printed of this gentleman’s zealous exertions
for the good of the town; or have made nonsense of the sentiments he
uttered, or have taken care that his name should not remain upon record
in the local history of which reporters are the faithful or unfaithful
compilers. This is the way that Mr. Windham’s light was hid under a
bushel for a whole session, when he was most conscious of his own
brilliancy, and most eager to illumine the public. He had offended the
reporters; and to punish him, the people of Great Britain were kept in
the dark.
Besides the temptation which he had in common with them,—that of
suppressing through pique and prejudice,—Owen was subjected to another.
Again and again was he insulted by the offer of a bribe, or by an
attempt at intimidation. One day, when he had been reporting in court,
Mr. Arruther crossed over to him, and with a dubious manner, between
shyness and condescension, asked him to drop in and take a glass of wine
with him at his inn, that evening, as he had something to say to him.
Owen had never used any disguise as to his opinions of Mr. Arruther’s
parliamentary conduct; and he therefore believed that if the gentleman
bestowed any thoughts on him at all, they could scarcely be very
affectionate ones. He was surprised, of course, at finding himself
received with as much cordiality as a person of little sensibility could
throw into his manner. The wine on the table was excellent; the
invitations to partake of it hearty; and the object of the invitation
presently disclosed.
Mr. Arruther could not conceive why Owen troubled himself to report all
the law proceedings that took place in the court. Many of them could
interest none but the parties concerned. What had the public to do, for
instance, with his cousin Ellen’s quarrels with him about his mother’s
property? Where was the use of printing law-suits,—dull things to read,
as they were tiresome to manage? Owen explained that his business was to
report. It was the affair of the readers of the paper what they would
skip as dull, and what they chose to consider indispensable. He
understood from his employer that no part of the paper was more narrowly
watched than the law reports; and this was not surprising, as it was by
means of these law reports alone that a great number of persons could
gain accurate information respecting the laws to which they were
subject. If he were obliged to regard the representations made to him as
to what should be left out of the paper, there would soon be nothing
left in it: for there were few kinds of intelligence that it was not the
wish of some person or another to conceal: but, if he had to choose what
particular department should be omitted, it should certainly be almost
any rather than the law-reports. Other kinds of information had some
chance of travelling round by some different means; but the newspapers
were almost the only guides of the subjects of the State as to their
duty to the State. He knew that Mr. Arruther was of opinion that the
people had nothing to do with the laws but to obey them; but people
could not well obey the laws without knowing what they were: so that Mr.
Arruther, who wished the laws to be obeyed, should not grudge the people
the little they might learn of them through the newspapers.
“Then, pray,” said the gentleman, “do not cut short that cause about
Thirlaway’s road, that kept us all waiting such a confounded time this
morning. Give it all; let them have every line of it; and if you find it
likely to fill your paper, you can leave out my affairs, to make room
for it.”
“I hope to be able to manage both, sir. The leading arguments on each
side of all the causes tried this morning can be offered without
transgressing our limits.”
“Better print the other entire. Do you know, Mr. Owen, I will give you a
shilling a line to see how complete a thing you can make of it, provided
you leave out mine to make room.”
“You do not know the person you have to deal with, Mr. Arruther. A man
cannot be a reporter for a twelvemonth without knowing something of the
practice of ‘feeing the fourth estate,’ as people say. I am upon my
guard, sir, I assure you; and the less you say on this head the better,
for your own sake.”
“On your guard! Bless me! What an expression,—as if I had said anything
wrong! Do you suppose I do not know the customs of your craft? Till the
management of a newspaper becomes a less expensive affair than it is at
present, I do not know what better plan there can be than making out the
pay of reporters for what they bring to the compositor, by letting them
take fees for what they suppress. Such a custom is so convenient to all
parties, that I wonder at your pretending to dislike it.”
“When you call it convenient to all parties, sir, you seem to forget the
principal party concerned. However it may be with the proprietor of the
paper, and with the reporter, and those who tender the fee, it is not
very convenient to the public that their supply of information should
depend on the length of a few purses, whose owners may wish to make
private certain of their proceedings which ought to be public. It may
prove convenient to some of your constituents, sir, if not to you, that
it should be known exactly how you stand in that cause which was tried
this morning. It is always convenient to electors to know as much as
they can learn of the character of their representatives. I believe that
I have no right to keep back such information; and the report will
therefore appear to-morrow, at the same length as is generally allotted
to causes of that nature.”
Mr. Arruther explained in vain how particularly provoking his mother’s
will had been; how unexpected it was that his cousin Ellen should have
been stirred up to sue him; how little idea he had till this morning of
the extent to which his lawyer had deceived him about the merits of his
own case; how glad he should be if the whole could now be dropped and
privately arranged; and, finally and especially, how little the public
had to do with whether he tried to keep his mother’s property, or
quietly let it go to somebody else. It was in vain that he urged all
this. Owen could not see why any of these considerations should
interfere with the advantage which the readers of the paper would derive
from the knowledge of Mr. Arruther’s proceedings. That this gentleman
had a bad cause to maintain might be a very sufficient reason for his
present condescension, and for his offering to double and treble his
bribe; but it afforded the strongest possible inducement to Owen to
publish the whole, for the guidance of those who had it in their power
to withdraw this unworthy man from public life. Mr. Arruther grew angry
when all the offers he could make for the suppression of the report were
simply declined.
“I do not know, sir, what has made you my enemy,” he observed. “But you
are my enemy, sir. Don’t deny it. Do you think I am not aware of what
you have done, first in trying to deprive me of the support of the
editor of the ‘Western Star;’ and, when you could not succeed in that,
in exposing me privately wherever you could?”
“How do you use the word ‘privately,’ Mr. Arruther? If you mean that I
have whispered things to your disadvantage, or used any kind of secrecy
in what I have said, you are mistaken. If you mean that I have printed
nothing against you, you are quite correct; but the reason is, that I
have not had the power. If there had been any independent newspaper in
the district, where I might have said what you allude to, it would have
saved me the trouble of writing many letters, and have enabled me to do
my duty much more effectually than it has been done. If you feel
yourself aggrieved from the same cause; if you desire an opportunity of
publicly contradicting what has been said about your scanty attendance
at the House, and the course of your political conduct when there; if
you really wish for a fair discussion of your public character, you will
assist those of us who are anxious to set up a newspaper as nearly
independent as the circumstances of the time will allow.”
“Not I. We have too many newspapers already. I shall not countenance the
setting up of any more.”
“Too many already,” repeated Owen, smiling as his eye fell on a little
table on which lay seven or eight newspapers, received this morning, and
destined to be replaced by the same number to-morrow. “Too many! That
depends on how they are divided. Perhaps you forget, sir, that while
Members of Parliament have seven or eight to themselves every day, there
are seven or eight thousand people who see but one paper, and seven or
eight millions of persons who never see one at all. You may feel
yourself ready for your morning ride before you have half got through
such a pile of papers as lies there, and may find it a tiresome part of
your duty to read so much politics every day; but if you steal into the
dark bye-places of a town like this, and hear what people are saying in
their ignorance against being governed at all; if you go out upon the
sheep-walks, and see the country folks growing into the likeness of
stocks and stones, for want of having their human reason exercised; if
you will ride down any Saturday into our own village, and see the
scramble there is for a single copy of an inferior provincial paper, you
will presently lose the fancy that we have too many newspapers already.”
“Too many by that one copy you spoke of, in my opinion, Mr. Owen. The
people in Arneside did very well without any newspaper when I was a boy,
I remember. I wish you had been pleased to consult me before you took
such a step as sending them one. You should know better than to fall
into the propensity of the time, for pampering the common people. You
talk as wisely as anybody about putting gin in their way, and I do not
see that they want news any more than gin. That was one of the few good
things my mother used to say. When some complaint came to her ears about
the price of newspapers, she asked whether anybody thought any harm of
taxing gin; and whether the common people could not do without news as
well as without spirits. She was right enough, for once. The common
people can do without news. News is a luxury, as somebody said.”
“O, yes. News can be done without; and so can many other things. You may
lock a man into a house, and he will still live. You may darken his
windows from the sun at noonday, and the stars at night, and he will
still live. You may let in no air but what comes down the chimney, and
he will still live. You may chain him to the bed-post, you may stuff his
ears, and cover his eyes, and tie his hands behind him, and he can ‘do
without’ the use of his limbs and his senses, and of God’s noblest
works: but it was not for this that God sent his sun on its course, and
set the stars rolling in their spheres, and freshened the breezy hills,
and gave muscles to our strong limbs, and nerves to our delicate organs.
He did not make his beautiful world that one might walk abroad on it,
while a thousand are shut into a dark dungeon. Neither did he give men
the curiosity with which they watch and listen, and the imagination with
which they wander forth, and the reason with which they meditate among
his works, that the one might be baffled, and the others fettered and
enfeebled. And what does any one gain by such tyranny? Does the sun
shine more brightly when a man thinks he has it all to himself, than
when the reapers are merry in the field, and the children are running
after butterflies in the meadow? Would Orion glow more majestically to
any one man if he could build a wall up to the high heaven, and stop the
march of the constellation, and part it off, that common eyes might not
look upon it? If not, neither can any one gain by shutting up that which
God has made as common to the race as the lights of his firmament, and
the winds which come and go as he wills. That word ‘news’ is a little
word and a common word; but it means all that is great as the results of
the day, and holy as the march of the starry night. It is the
manifestation of man’s most freshly compounded emotions, the record of
his most recent experiences, and the revelation of God’s latest
providences on earth. Are these things to be kept from the many by the
few, under the notion that they are property? Are these things now to be
doled out at the pleasure, and to suit the purposes of an order of men,
as the priests of Catholic countries measured out their thimblefull of
the waters of life, in the name of him who opened up the spring, and
invited every one that thirsted to come and drink freely? To none has
authority been given to mete out knowledge, according to their own sense
of fitness, any more than to those priests of old; but on all is imposed
the religious duty of providing channels by which the vital streams of
knowledge shall be brought to every man’s door. If, in this day, any man
who seeks to be a social administrator desires that the few should cover
up their reservoirs lest they should overflow for the refreshment of the
many, it is no wonder if his cistern grows so foul as to make him
question in right earnest at last, whether there be not something more
poisonous in the draught than in gin itself; and much that is perilous
in the eagerness of the crowd who rush to lap whatever cannot be
prevented from leaking out.”
“You mean to say that our universities are fouled reservoirs, I suppose?
It would become you to speak more modestly till you have been there.”
“I know nothing of what is within the universities, further than by
watching what comes out. The vague idea that I have of the knowledge
that pervades them is perhaps as reverential as you, or any other son of
such an institution, can desire: but I own that my reverence would be
more ardent and affectionate if I could see that that knowledge made its
partakers happier than it does.”
“Happier! How can you possibly tell? How should you know, when I am the
only university-man, I believe, that you are acquainted with?”
“I judge by what I see. When men enjoy, the next thing is to
communicate; especially when by communicating they lose nothing
themselves. But it is not so in this case. What have the universities
done towards showing the beauty and holiness of knowledge, as the most
universal and the highest blessing which God has given to the living and
breathing race of man? What have the universities done to diffuse their
own treasures into every corner of the land? How have they applied their
knowledge towards the promotion of the happiness of the state,—opening
their doors to all who would come in, discovering or sanctioning the
best principles of legislation and government, countenancing public and
private virtue, and being foremost in proposing and enforcing whatever
might fulfil the final purposes of knowledge by making the greatest
number of rational beings as wise and happy as the circumstances of the
age will admit? While I see nothing of all this attempted by our
universities, I feel more respect and affection for the studies which
are going forward within a Mechanics’ Institution (crude and superficial
studies, perhaps, but tending to promote the substantial happiness of
the race), than for the pursuits of a university, or any other place,
where intellectual luxury is reserved to pamper the few while the many
starve.”
“I do not see much starving in the case, when we have not only too many
regular newspapers, but scores of unstamped publications, which
circulate their scores of thousands each. Precious stuff for your common
people to batten upon!”
“When we once come to the question of quality, sir, there may be less to
be said than about quantity. Is there anything here,—or here,”—taking up
the “John Bull” and the “Age,” “that will make the public wiser and
better than they would become by reading the ‘Twopenny Treat’ or the
‘Poor Man’s Guardian.’ That there is any such ‘precious stuff’ for
readers to batten on is the fault of those who, by keeping up one
newspaper monopoly, have created another.”
“What new monopoly, pray? And what public would ever endure two
monopolies of the same article?”
“There are two publics to suffer by the two monopolies. While the
tax-gatherers take five-pence out of every seven-pence that is given for
a newspaper; while the practice of advertising is so kept down by the
duty as to deprive the proprietors of their legitimate profits; while a
capital of between thirty and forty thousand pounds is required to
conduct a good daily paper, no journal will or can be honest, cheap, and
successful; and the middle classes, who can afford to see only one
paper, will suffer by the long-established monopoly of the old journals.
While men of more wit than capital are tempted or driven to evade the
law; while adventurers below the reach of the law are virtually invited
to defy and vilify it, the large class of poor readers will suffer by
the pernicious monopoly which not his Majesty nor all his Ministers can
break up, as long as legal newspapers are made to cost seven-pence,
while illegal ones may be had for two-pence.—Have you seen any of these
illegal publications?”
“Yes. Precious stuff! Falsehoods in every sentence; blunders in every
line; as any one who chose might show in a minute.”
“Unfortunately, no one will choose it, in the present state of affairs.
It must be easy enough to controvert any publication so bad as you
describe; but the opportunity is not allowed. These falsehoods and
blunders are crammed down the people’s throats, and no one can unchoke
them, because the law interferes to prevent the free circulation of
opinions. I know of a young man at Arneside who actually believes that
all master manufacturers make it a principle and a pleasure to oppress
and worry their workmen, and that all rulers study nothing so regularly
and strenuously as how to wring the hearts of the greatest number of
people. He reads this (among a hundred better things) in one of these
unstamped publications, which would either have never existed at all, or
have treated very differently of politics, if the Stamp Commissioners
had taught it no lesson of hatred against the law.”
“Ah! you mean that brother of yours. I heard how he was going, poor
fool!”
“If he is a poor fool, what is it that has prevented his being wise? He
has shown his disposition to become so by his eagerness after such
reading as he can obtain; and if he has got so far as to learn the
strength of a bad argument, alas for those who step in to prevent his
getting farther, and learning its weakness in the presence of a better!
If he cannot find sound political teachers, where lies the blame?”
“If you had newspapers quite free, who do you suppose would write for
the common people? We should be inundated with blasphemous and seditious
publications.”
“When a man goes with his money in his hand to purchase a newspaper, do
you think he is asked whether he is one of the common people? And when
newspapers sell for the cost of production and a fair profit, who is
likely to produce the best, and sell the most,—the respectable and
educated capitalist, or the ignorant and needy agitator? When newspapers
have fair play, their success will depend, I fancy, like that of other
articles, on their quality; and I never yet heard of any instance in
which any class of people failed to purchase the better article in
preference to the worse, when both were fairly set before them.
Moreover, I never heard of a wise and kind government, whether of a
single family, a city, or a nation, that did not desire rather than fear
that its proceedings should be known and discussed.”
“Ah! that shows how little you know of the plague and mischief of being
talked over, when any business is in hand. If you were in the place of
those who have to transact affairs on the continent, and in our
colonies, you would be too much vexed to laugh at the nonsense that
people believe about us. There is nothing too monstrous or ridiculous to
be credited. A plague on the foolish tongues that spread such things!”
“Or rather on the policy which allows such reports to be originated and
to pass current. If a multitude of the King’s subjects at home, and of
his allies abroad, believe all that is monstrous of his government, and
all that is ridiculous of his people, it seems time that better means of
knowledge should be given to both. While the world lasts, social beings
can never be prevented discussing their rulers and their neighbours; and
if we are annoyed at their errors, the alternative is not silence but
truth. When newspapers circulate untaxed, and not till then, there will
be an approach to a general understanding, and to social peace.”
“You are not exactly the person to talk of social peace, I think, Mr.
Owen, when you are bent on setting me and my electors at variance by
publishing my family quarrels, in spite of all I can say.”
Owen did not choose to remain to be insulted by further entreaties that
he would take a bribe. He rose, observing that this was a case in which
he had no more concern than with a quarrel in the Cabinet, and no more
option than in announcing an earthquake at Aleppo. He was a reporter,
and nothing more. If Mr. Arruther had anything further to say, he must
make his appeal to the proprietors of the “Western Star.”
A few last words were vouchsafed to him before he left the room. Their
purpose was to assure him that if this report appeared, he need never
apply to Mr. Arruther for assistance, in case of his fool of a brother
getting into any scrape, or he himself ever being tried for libel, or
any disaster, public or private, befalling him. If Owen should, on
consideration, decide to accommodate Mr. Arruther, that gentleman would
see what he could do on any occasion when he might be of service.
CHAPTER VIII.
FAMILY SECRETS.
Mr. Arruther’s evil bodings had had some effect in depressing Owen’s
spirits before he opened the following letter from his mother, which he
found on the table of his little apartment when he reached his lodgings.
Nurse’s share of the correspondence with her son usually consisted of
cheerful and loving messages, sent by some friendly mediator who might
be likely to see Owen, or was about to drop him a line on business. She
had never before sent a letter, but once; and that was when the
clergyman had stopped her in the churchyard, not only to ask after all
her children, but to praise them according to their respective deserts.
On that occasion, nurse had gone straight to the schoolmaster, and asked
him to give her a seat beside his desk, while she told him what she
wished to express to Owen. Then, how had her maternal modesty raised the
blush on her cheek while she made the effort to repeat the clergyman’s
words! and how, while she looked round on the blazing fire, the superior
lamp, the sanded floor, and neat shelf of books, did she assure herself
that her old narrow cottage, with its brick floor, was just as happy a
place to so favoured a mother as herself! She now wrote under different
circumstances, as her letter will show.
“My dear Son,
“This letter does not come out of the school-room you know so well, as
the last did; though your old teacher is so good as to be still the
writer. I have asked him to come home with me, though mine is but a
poor place compared with his. One reason is, that I did not wish
anybody to overhear what I am going to tell you; and there is no fear
of being overheard at home, as I am mostly alone of an evening. And
now I feel the disadvantage of not being able to write myself,—that I
am obliged to get another to write what I have to say against my own
children. Yet not against them, neither: for that seems a hard word to
say: but I mean I should have been loth anybody should know that we
are not altogether so happy as we once were, if I could have let you
know it in any other way than this. The short of the matter is, Owen,
that Ambrose is in such a way that I cannot tell what to say to him
next. He and Mr. Waugh have been quarrelling sadly. It is not for me
to say which is right; and, to be sure, many of Mr. Waugh’s other
workpeople have been doing the same thing: but all I know is that
there were no such troubles before Ambrose joined the Lodge, as they
call it; and Mr. Waugh gives the same wages as before, and living is
cheaper. I can only say now that Ambrose is tramping about, here and
there, when work is over, and at times when he used to be at home; and
that he is grown fond of show; attending a brother’s funeral, as he
called it, yesterday, and thinking more of the blue ribbons and the
procession, I am afraid, than that a fellow-mortal was gone to his
account. Indeed, he said in the middle of it that there is nothing
like ceremony after all; which is not just what the Lord would have us
think when he calls a brother away. I lay it all to the newspaper that
Mr. Ryan brought; and the more that Mr. Ryan was taken up for selling
it, and is now in prison on that account. I little thought that a
child of mine would ever have to do with what was unlawful; and I
never would have looked at the pictures in this paper if I had guessed
what the justices would think: but Ambrose was pleased with what Ryan
did when he was taken up; though folks suppose he will not be let out
the sooner for it. He made a great flourish in the street, and cried
out, ‘Englishmen, will you suffer this?’ It made my heart turn within
me to think that one that I have known as an honest man for so many
years should carry his grey hairs into a prison; and I never would
have believed that Ryan would do any thing wrong. Ambrose says he has
not, and is getting up a rejoicing against he comes out of prison: but
the justices say he has; and so what is one to think? But I wish your
brother would be persuaded to give up thinking of making a triumph
against the justices, when Ryan comes out. I tell him that it is no
triumph, after all, considering that Ryan will then have been in
prison all the time that it was thought fit he should be there. But
the time is past when anything is minded that I say; though I ought
not to complain, and do not; being aware, as I always was, that I say
little that is worth minding. Yet I never had to say this of you; and
I am much mistaken if Ambrose be wiser than you. You will be asking
whether I comfort myself with Mildred. My dear, I can only say now
that Mildred is no comfort to me; and if you ask me why, I can no more
tell you what has come over her than if I lived at L——. Sometimes I
think, God help me! that the poor girl hates me,—for never a word does
she speak to me now, when she can manage to hold her tongue; and, as
sure as ever any neighbour goes out and leaves us together, she is off
like a shot, and I see no more of her till some third person is here
again, even if that does not happen till morning. I should be truly
thankful if any one would find out the reason of such a change, for it
is more than I can well bear, if it is not a sin to say so. I try to
comfort myself, my dear boy, with thinking of you who are nothing but
a blessing to me. I try to be thankful, as in duty bound: but it so
happens, while you are so far away, and the others just before my
eyes, or expected home every moment and not coming, I cannot be
comforted as it is my duty to be. It is another trouble to find the
neighbours not what they were to me. Farmer Mason would not let me go
and nurse his wife yesterday, ill as she is, and with nobody to watch
her properly of a night. He said his cattle had pined of late, and he
had lost all his fowls; looking at me, just as if I could have helped
his losses, when there is nobody more sorry than I am that such
mishaps should have followed the fire that well nigh ruined him, so
long ago. And so it seems with others who do not look friendly upon me
as they did. Everything appears to be going wrong with everybody; and
we do not seem able to comfort one another as we used to do. This is a
sad saying to end with; so I just add that Kate Jeffery is the same
good girl, whatever changes come over others; and I depend on her
going on in her own right way. You will be glad to hear this; and I
hope you will not make yourself too uneasy about the rest: but I could
not help opening my mind to you, having always done so before, and
never with so much occasion. And now I shall wish to know if you have
anything to say upon this. He that holds the pen promises to read me
whatever you may write, very exactly, and to keep all a secret, we so
desiring. So no more now, except that Mrs. Dowley has got another boy,
and poor widow Wilks’s eldest has had the measles very bad, but is now
better,” &c. &c.
Owen had not the least doubt of his old teacher’s accuracy in reading
the letter now requested, or of his discretion about its contents; but
Owen had no intention of committing to paper what he had to say. He must
go down to Arneside, without delay, and see whether anything could be
done to make the people there happier than they seemed to be at present.
He obtained leave to go down, the next afternoon; and, in the meantime,
got no sleep for thinking of his mother’s sorrows, and of the hours that
must pass before he could do anything to relieve them.
CHAPTER IX.
THE MYSTERIES LAID OPEN.
While nurse was by turns dictating her letter and sighing, till the
scribe caught the infection, and lost his spirits; while the wind moaned
in the crevices of the ricketty dwelling, and the flame of the single
candle flared and flickered in the draughts of the poor apartment,
Ambrose was under a securer shelter, and Mildred under none at all.
Ambrose had been assisting in swearing in new brothers who had joined
his lodge. He had helped to blindfold them, and to guide them through
the mummeries which were calculated to answer any purpose rather than
that of adding sanctity to an oath. The jargon of the verse to be
gabbled over, the dressing up, the locking in, were more like the
Christmas games of very young school-boys than the actual proceedings,
the serious business of grown men. Mummery has usually or always arisen
from an inconvenient lack of shorter and plainer methods of explanation,
and of facilities for communication. This sort of picture-writing is
discarded, by common consent, wherever the press comes in to fulfil the
object with more ease, speed, and exactitude. When Ambrose declared that
“there is nothing like ceremony, after all,” he testified that he
belonged to a nation or a class which is stinted in the best means of
communication, and kept in an infantine state of knowledge and pursuit.
If he had been growing up to a period of mature wisdom, like his
brother, he would have told the brethren of his lodge that there is
nothing so childish as ceremony, after all. To form into a lodge, or a
company, or whatever it may be called, when a number of men have
business to do, is the most ready and unobjectionable method of
transacting that business; but if the brethren cannot be kept in order
and harmony without being amused by shows, or excited by mystification,
they had far better be playing cricket on the green, than pretend to
assist in conducting the serious affairs of their class. Much better
would it have been for Ambrose to have been playing cricket on the green
this evening, than frightening people even more ignorant than himself
with death’s heads, horrible threats, and oaths made up of the most
alarming words that could be picked out of the vocabulary of unstamped
newspapers. Much better would it have been for him to have been reading
anything,—book, pamphlet, or newspaper,—than to have sent his sister on
such an errand as she was transacting on the hills.
Mildred was made, without her own knowledge, a servant of the lodge, a
messenger from all the discontented with whom Ambrose was connected to
all the discontented in the district. This trouble was imposed upon her
because the country folks were unable to read, and paper was dear, and
advertisements were dearer still. The object was to bring people
together to consult on their fortunes, and the measures that should be
taken to mend them. Mr. Arruther would have said that it was well that
so improper an object should be frustrated by the absence of all
assistance from the press: but Mr. Arruther might have been told that
there is no frustrating such an object; and that the only effect of the
press not being concerned in it was, that the summons bore a very
different character from what it would have had, if there had been
perfect freedom of communication. In a newspaper, the notice would have
been that people were to meet at such a spot, at such an hour, and for
such and such a purpose. As it was, Mildred was scudding over the hills,
shivering whenever the gust overtook her, as if it must bring something
dreadful; starting if she found any one awaiting her at the appointed
places, and trembling if it was herself that must wait; and faltering or
gabbling in equal terror, as she delivered the circular which was to be
carried forwards by those whom she met; the circular being as follows:—
“Meet on Arneford Green,
Six and seven between.
Bring words as sharp as sickles,
To cut the throats
Of gentlefolks,
That rob the poor of victuals.
Hungry guts and empty purse
May be better, can’t be worse.”
The political wisdom of the district had discovered that all was going
wrong within it. Farmer Mason’s live stock was dying off, and his wife
had been long confined to her bed with some grievous affliction.
Neighbour Green’s dog had gone mad, and had been very near biting some
children that were playing in the road. The wheat on the uplands looked
poorly; and the mill-stream was dry; so that many of Mr. Waugh’s
workpeople were out of employ. It must be a very bad government that
allowed all this to happen at once, some people said: but there were
many who hinted that the blame did not all rest with the Government, and
that there was one person who might some day prove to have had more to
do with those disasters than everybody liked to say. This hint had gone
the round, and become amplified in its course, till it was considered a
settled matter by every one who entertained the subject at all, that
nurse Ede was quite as pernicious to Arneside as the Government and all
the gentlefolks put together; and that there should be no attempt at
rebellion till nurse had been called to account for her witcheries.
The affair had been brought to a crisis by this evening, when Mildred
was delivering her circular on the hills. She was expected and lain in
wait for. Suddenly she fell in with a party who would not let her
proceed till she had been sworn on her knees to tell all she knew of her
mother’s proceedings, of the nature of her intercourse with her black
cat, and of the uses of the mysterious apparatus which now filled her
cupboard as well as the shelf. The girl knew nothing of what she was
required to confess; but she did what she could to please her tyrants.
She poured out all the nonsensical fancies, all the absurd suspicions,
which had been accumulating in her ignorant mind from the days of her
childhood till now. The sum total proved even more satisfactory than the
party had expected.—There was now but one thing to be done. Nurse must
be forced to recant, and make reparation; and that as soon as possible.
The managers of the enterprise must not quit their hold of her till she
had begun to restore Mrs. Mason; revive the calves and poultry that
remained alive, if she could not restore those which were dead; set the
mill-wheel revolving again; brought showers upon the upland corn-fields,
and confessed precisely what kind and degree of influence she had
exerted over poor Mrs. Arruther: for it was not to be forgotten how the
lightning had split the tree beside the lady’s monument, the last thing
before it fired Farmer Mason’s barn.
While all this was passing, nurse had dismissed the good-natured
schoolmaster, and had looked after him from the door, shading her candle
with her apron, till she could see him no longer; and had sat down, with
a sigh at her loneliness, to mend one more pair of stockings for
Ambrose, to take the chance of one or other of her children coming home
for the night. She had nearly given the matter up when she thought she
heard a little noise outside the door. As she looked up, she saw a very
white face pressed close to the window, and looking in upon her.
“Come in! Who’s there? Lift up the latch and come in, whoever you are,”
cried she, who, having never wished harm to any human being, had no fear
of receiving harm from the hands of any. “My girl!” exclaimed she, as
Mildred stood on the threshold, looking uncertain whether to set foot in
the cottage, or to retreat, “My dear, ye are right enough to come home
to a warm bed to-night. It will be but a chilly night for sleeping
beside the fold, if that is really what ye do when ye don’t come home.
I’ve been looking for ye, my dear; so, come in, and shut the door, and
see what supper I’ve been keeping ready for ye. Why do ye keep standing
outside in that way, Mildred?”
As nurse sat at the table, looking over her spectacles, with her candle
on one side, and the cat on the other, drowsily opening and shutting its
eyes, as if quite at ease, there seemed to be something which prevented
Mildred from advancing a step towards the party. She only said in a
shrill tone,
“They’re coming.”
Who was coming,—whether Ambrose and the brethren from the lodge, or the
long-dreaded Turks, or any people more to be feared still, could not be
ascertained. All that could be got out of Mildred was, “They’re coming.”
The door was still standing wide, the parley was still proceeding, when
they came.
A night of horrors followed; horrors which were once perpetrated in the
metropolitan cities of mighty empires; and then descended to inferior
towns; and then were banished to the country; and now are seldom to be
heard of, even in the remotest haunts of ignorance. But such horrors are
not yet extinct. Since the sacrifice of nurse Ede, others, perhaps as
guileless and kind of heart, have met a fate like hers.
During the whole of the dreadful scene of violence and torment, the
mother called on her children. As if they had all been present, she
implored them to bear witness as to what her life had been, and to save
her from her persecutors. She had reared her sons with incessant
watchfulness, from the time that their little hands could only grasp her
finger, up to the manly strength which might have saved her now: but
Owen was far away, dreaming of no evil; and as for Ambrose, his face was
never seen, all that night. Mildred was present,—standing in her
mother’s view during all those fearful hours; but the call on her was
also in vain. She stood staring, with her arms by her sides, and her
hair on end, only wincing and moving back a little when her mother’s
appeals to her became particularly vehement. This was the child who had
been the object of as fond parental hopes as had ever been shed over the
unconsciousness of infancy. Hers was the arm which was to have been her
mother’s support to church on Sabbath days. Hers were the hands which
were to have relieved her parent of the more laborious of their homely
tasks. She it was who should have enlivened the day with her cheerful
industry, and amused the evening with the intelligence which nurse had
done her best to put in the way of improvement. This was the child! And
this was the contrast which flitted through her unhappy mother’s mind as
she was dragged past Mrs. Arruther’s monument, and taunted with the
memory of that poor lady.
Mrs. Arruther and she were both unhappy as mothers. The child of the one
was as destitute (whatever might be his scholarship) of all the
knowledge which is of most value in the conduct and embellishment of
life, as these his despised neighbours; and the protracted torment which
he caused his parent might, in its sum, equal that which nurse was
enduring to-night. The crowning proof of his substantial ignorance was
his desire and endeavour to keep others in that state of darkness of
which the deeds of this night were some of the results. There will be no
more mothers so wretched as Mrs. Arruther and her nurse when mothers
themselves shall know how to give their children true knowledge; and
when their children shall have access to that true knowledge without
hindrance and without measure.
One thrilling sound of complaint at last penetrated the chamber of the
clergyman; and, in consequence, nurse was presently in her own bed,
attended upon by Kate Jeffery, while Mildred sat in a corner of the
cottage, staring as before. She let Kate bring her to the bedside, when
her parent’s unquenchable tenderness was kindling up once more; but the
girl was pitiably at a loss what to say, and how to conduct herself.
“I never did, my dear; if you will believe the last words I shall ever
speak. I never did, or thought of doing such things as they say. Tell
them so, when I am gone; will you? Only tell them what I said. O
Mildred, cannot you promise me even that much?”
“She is mazed,” said Kate Jeffery, in excuse of her old play-fellow.
“She will come to, by-and-by.”
“I wish I was mazed, if it be not thankless to say so,” muttered nurse.
“But it will all be over soon. Well: it is God’s will that my son Owen
is so far from me at this time.”
She little guessed how soon her son Owen would be standing where Kate
was now. But, soon as it was, it was too late for nurse.
It was indeed a withered and haggard cheek (as nurse once anticipated)
that her children looked upon as they watched her rest;—not her
breathing sleep, but her last long rest. Owen must have been quite
overthrown by meeting such a shock on his arrival, or he could never
have spoken to Mildred as he did. He upbraided her for the stupidity
with which she had given ear to the ridiculous falsehoods which had been
hatched against one of the most harmless women that had ever lived:
falsehoods that any child in L would have been ashamed to be asked to
believe. But it was impossible that Mildred, or any one else, could have
really credited such things. It could have been only a pretence
“No; no pretence,” Kate interposed to say. “There would have been no
malice, if there had not been profound ignorance. No one could have
helped loving nurse, and doing nothing but good to her, up to her dying
day, if it had but been known why and how she practised her art; and
that no woman has really the power, by prayers and charms, of stopping
mill-streams and maddening dogs.”
“How could I tell?” mournfully asked Mildred. “They all said——I’m sure I
thought they would have killed me first. They all said, and they all
think, that she was an awful and a wicked woman; and what else could I
think? I’m sure I never durst touch her, or scarce anything that she had
touched before me, after what Maude Hallowell told me.”
“You are out of your mind, I think,” said Owen, bitterly. “To talk as
you do, and she lying there!”
“And if Mildred was out of her mind, Mr. Owen,” said Kate, in a low
voice, “is she to be taunted with it, as if it was her fault? I should
rather say that she has very little mind; for hers seems to me never to
have grown since we were at the Sunday school together. Surely, Mr.
Owen, it is the narrow mind that is least able to help itself under
foolish fears, and any horrible fancy that may be riding it till it is
weary. Surely it is not merciful to taunt a mind that is so miserable in
itself already.”
“Then I will not taunt her, Kate. It will be sorrow enough to her, all
her days, to have to pass my mother’s grave, and think how she was sent
there. Go, poor girl, and tell the clergyman that it is all over. Nobody
shall hurt you: I will take care of you. Nobody shall blame you: the
blame shall rest elsewhere.”
“Where?” asked the bewildered girl, as, in a flurried manner, she tied
on her bonnet to go to the clergyman. “What are you going to do now,
Owen? Where——what did you say last?”
“That nobody shall blame you, as I did just now, for what has happened
to our mother. It is no fault of yours, Mildred, any more than it can be
called Ambrose’s fault that he now lies in prison——”
“In prison!”
“Yes: he has been taken there (God knows whether according to law or
not) for the part he has taken about swearing in the brothers at his
Lodge. There he was, poor fellow, when my mother was calling upon him in
a way to break a heart of stone, they say.” Owen saw the convulsion
which passed over his sister’s countenance as he made this allusion; and
he resolved to refer to that dreadful scene no more. “Whatever may be
done with Ambrose, he has perished. His life is blasted, whether, as
some suppose, he is sent abroad, or whether his punishment is to be
worked out at home. How should he have known better? The only bit of law
he knew, he learned by accident from a newspaper; and when he would have
learned more, the only lesson-book he could get taught him wrong; and it
could never have taught him so wrong, if those which would have
instructed him better had not been kept out of his reach. The judge and
gaoler are to be his teachers now. Those little know what they are about
who take pains,—for any purpose,—to hold men ignorant. If they could
keep the light of the sun from the earth with the thickest of clouds,
they would do mischief enough in making the plants come up sickly, and
the tall trees dwindle away, and rendering every thing fearful and
dismal, wherever we turn: but all this is harmless trifling compared
with the practice of keeping the mind without the light which God has
provided for it. This it is that brings discontent towards God, and bad
passions among men; temptation to guilt to the careless, and long
heart-suffering to the kindest and best; and the fiercest of murders as
the end of all. O, mother! mother!”
THE END.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Transcriber’s Note
At line 4.42.18 in ‘The Jerseymen Parting’, the speaker ‘Le Brocq’ is
most likely ‘Durell’, Le Brocq being currently incarcerated.
Some compound words appear both hyphenated and unhyphenated. When the
word is hyphenated on a line break, the hyphen is either retained or
removed depending on the prevalent form elsewhere; e.g. ‘farmhouse(s)’,
‘lawsuit’, ‘shopkeeper(s)’, ‘thunderstorm’, ‘babyhouse’, ‘coast-guard’,
‘fourpenny’, ‘a-piece’, ‘haymakers’, ‘goodwill’, ‘re-appeared’,
‘runaway’, ‘seafowl’, ‘small-clothes’, ‘stone-ware’.
Other errors deemed most likely to be the printer’s have been corrected,
and are noted here. The references are to the work, page and line in the
original.
1.11.28 I shall have them taken care of[f].” Removed.
2.28.3 your[’]s was bad advice. Removed.
2.44.8 that[ that] thou wouldst make haste Removed.
2.65.21 of the church.[.] Removed.
2.88.26 by the tithe-proct[e/o]r Replaced.
3.66.13 as you did at St. Heliers.[’/”] Replaced.
3.94.22 “You can tell him to[ /-]morrow.” Replaced.
3.112.2 putting in metal after g[ua/au]ge Transposed.
3.115.27 the alkaline l[ey/ye] from the copper Transposed.
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