No. 133.—Vol. III.
Price 1½d.
SATURDAY, JULY 17, 1886.
{449}
MODERN SLAVERY.
IN ALL SHADES.
SOME PET LIZARDS.
WHERE THE TRACKS LED TO.
A TALE OF NASEBY FIELD.
THE GORSE.
No. 133.—Vol. III.
Price 1½d.
SATURDAY, JULY 17, 1886.
A WORD FOR OUR SHOP-ASSISTANTS.
That we, as a nation, are not lovers of change for the sake of change, can hardly be disputed; indeed, our conservatism in minor matters may justify the reflection cast upon us by our neighbours. But although we may be willing to continue patronising forms and institutions that may justly be considered antiquated and effete, yet it is nevertheless a fact that once get the public ear, and the cry of the oppressed will never be raised in vain, even though redress involves uprooting of old-established customs. Opposition to sudden and violent changes there may be; but the familiar instance of our factory laws shows that there is help for the poorest and weakest, let the need for help once be made known. But, unhappily, those who most need assistance are just those least able to plead their own cause, either from ignorance or from fear of the consequences of complaint. Such was the case with the children, who needed an outsider’s voice to raise their ‘cry;’ and with those women-labourers, the story of whose underground toils and miseries needed but to be heard, to awake indignant protest against the whole system which could produce such results. In the latter case, so sweeping was the reform, that the recurrence of the evil is impossible; and though the working of the Factory and Workshop Act may not be altogether perfect, it affords a considerable measure of protection to the helpless, and stands as a wholesome check between oppressor and oppressed.
By the Factory Act, not only are factories proper placed under government inspection, but all proprietors of workshops or workrooms are liable to the salutary visit of the inspector, whose duty it is to see that the terms of the Act are complied with; that is, that the ‘hands’ work only a certain specified number of hours; and that due regard is paid to ventilation and sanitary precautions. But the inspector’s boundary is the workshop or workroom, and beyond this he is powerless to interfere; although on his way to his department he frequently passes by large numbers of those who need supervision and protection fully as much as those on whose behalf his visit is paid, yet who, as the law now stands, are utterly and hopelessly in the power of employers, who are free if they will to work their victims to death with impunity.
Not, of course, that all employers are deaf to the claims of humanity and think only of their own gain; on the contrary, many large establishments are remarkable for the attention given to the comfort of employees, who work only a fair number of hours, are well housed, and treated generally with consideration. But even in such cases, the restrictions and regulations are purely voluntary, and it is quite conceivable that a change of proprietorship might involve a complete reversion of the order of things; and as a fact, the vastly larger part of retail business is carried on in a manner that makes the position of the shop-assistant practically one of cruel slavery. Not that the work is in itself laborious; though, as it involves of necessity an unusual amount of standing, it is not suited to the naturally feeble or delicate. The assistant’s chief hardships centre round the abnormal length of his working-day, a day so protracted that none but the strongest can bear the strain. The standing itself becomes very much a matter of habit to the robust, provided the hours are reasonable, and that sufficient time is allowed for meals to enable the worker to get a real rest at least twice during a day of twelve hours, in addition to a regular weekly half-holiday. The assistant’s working hours should number about sixty per week, certainly not a low percentage; but, as matters now stand, it is no exaggeration to say that a very large majority of shop-assistants work from eighty to ninety hours a week, out of which, in many cases, no regular meal-times are allowed, food being hastily eaten, and work resumed as soon as the too hasty meal is finished. Nominally, indeed, there are{450} stated times for meals in most establishments, in the better classes of which the assistants enjoy the meal in comfort; but in too many cases the unfortunate assistant has to accommodate his appetite to suit the tide of customers.
Thirteen or fourteen hours daily, with scarcely a break, would be considered hard work, were it carried on under the invigorating influence of fresh air, or were the work of a varied or partly sedentary nature; but when, in addition to the length of hours, there is the weary monotony of standing, the pain of which increases with every hour of violence to nature, and the fact that, in the large majority of cases, the air breathed is vitiated and impure, it needs but a little foresight to predict that a few years of such slavery will put an end to the working-power of its victims.
Let any impartial observer take note of the ages of shop-assistants—especially in poor, crowded neighbourhoods—and he can hardly fail to be struck by the fact that the very large majority are young, and that the apprentice-age predominates. Indeed, it is not the least sad part of the picture that the crushing influence of habitual overwork is brought to bear most heavily upon the young man or woman, hardly more than boy or girl, who begins the new career full of the illusions of youth, and finds, long before the years of apprenticeship are over, that the capital of health and strength is either entirely gone or fast declining. Cases have come within our own experience in which the rosy cheeks and exuberant spirits of fifteen or sixteen have at nineteen or twenty given way to the pale face and languid, artificial smile habitual to the overworked, who, in spite of pain and weariness, are forced to keep up the semblance of cheerfulness. In one instance, the gradual lowering of tone caused such a susceptibility to disease, that an ordinary cold was sufficient to extinguish the feeble flame of life; and in other cases, tendencies to special ailments have arisen, distinctly traceable to the overtaxing of immature strength.
This personal experience is fully corroborated by many who have taken sufficient interest in the question to study the causes and effects of a system involving such a large amount of avoidable suffering to an important section of society. To take but one instance. The Rev. J. S. Webber, chaplain of University College Hospital, writing to the President of the Shop Hours’ Labour League, says: ‘I have noticed the result of long hours amongst the assistants employed at the smaller houses of business—have met with many a young girl, broken down in health, with the brain weakened. Instead of getting a walk after business, or enjoying some other healthy recreation, they have resorted to stimulants in the shape of intoxicating drinks, to keep up, as they fancy, the poor fragile frame. We find in our Sunday schools that the poor teachers who are assistants in shops cannot get to school on Sunday morning. This also applies to church. The shop-assistant is at a terrible disadvantage compared with the mechanic. Many of the former cannot leave business until nine or ten every evening, and twelve o’clock on Saturday, with body and mind so exhausted, whatever educational advantages might offer, they are too exhausted to do anything but rest.’ This testimony from a man of large experience touches upon two or three of the incidental but by no means slight effects of overwork. Sunday, to the aching body and weary brain of the shop-assistant, whose Saturday, instead of being a half-holiday, is the crowning point to a week of toil, may bring with it something of physical refreshment; it certainly has little chance of affording that quiet time for reflection and spiritual exercise essential to the development of noble life.
Again, as to innocent recreation—the health-giving walk, stimulating game, and harmless musical entertainment, are as entirely beyond the reach of the shop-assistant as are the educational advantages offered by public lecture, picture-gallery, or library. His, or her, life is, in fact, an example of the ‘all work and no play’ which in the nature of things produces ‘a dull boy’—or girl. And with whatever ability or education the shop career is begun, it is a pretty sure thing that the mind will become so stupefied with the burden of physical weariness, that the inclination towards self-culture will quickly vanish, and the overworked assistant sinks into a state of apathy, which, especially in the case of the male assistant, reduces him to the dead-level of hopeless existence; and not only is his present life a burden, but the ordinary castle-building of the young man has very limited play in his case; for every dream of future bliss is checked by the reflection that should he dare to face poverty and found for himself a home, his services will very probably be at a discount, the married assistant standing a worse chance of employment than the single.
Who shall wonder if, under such circumstances, the young man or woman is not always proof against the temptations of those more than doubtful pleasures which present the only substitute for natural and rational enjoyments?
What is the medical voice on this question of overwork, need hardly be said. Whenever a doctor writes or speaks on the subject, he is sure to give unequivocal testimony as to the premature failure of health amongst shop-assistants in general, and especially amongst growing boys and girls, whose immature frames cannot, without injury, be made to habitually violate every physiological law. And yet, in face of all this, the market is so overstocked with volunteers for slavery, that the master has matters completely in his own hands, and is perfectly safe in defying rebellion, sure that were the whole of his assistants to leave to-day, their places could with ease be filled to-morrow.
Much of this over-supply is due to ignorance on the part of parents and guardians, who, finding a ‘genteel’ employment for the boy or girl, do not stop to inquire what goes on behind the curtain of gentility. And by the time his apprenticeship is over, the assistant is not at an age to mark out for himself a new career, and is bound to make the best of a bad bargain. Not only so, but one of the special drawbacks to shop-labour is the fact that if the employee offends his employer in any way, even to such matters as attending a meeting or taking in a paper that is disapproved of, he is liable to dismissal without a{451} reason and without a character; so that virtually the shop-assistant gives into his employer’s hands the absolute control of his time, his health, and his character; and whatever may be the results of that surrender, escape or redress is equally unattainable.
Again, we repeat that many employers refrain from taking advantage of their power; but nevertheless the fact remains, that a master who, through thoughtlessness or greed, overworks, under-pays, badly houses and badly feeds his employees, or dismisses them without a character, is at perfect liberty to do so, and is in no danger of being called to account for his actions!
The Early Closing Association has done something towards procuring at least an amelioration of the shop-assistant’s condition, by seeking to establish a universal half-holiday. It works on the persuasive line, and in some parts of London and in many provincial towns has succeeded in securing this boon of half a day’s rest; but persuasion alone will never be able to treat with an evil so widespread; for, as long as the early closing is purely voluntary, so long it will be in the power of any one man to compel a whole neighbourhood to refuse or abolish the half-holiday. If his shop is open when others are closed, he will to a certainty obtain customers; and this is an advantage his neighbours dare not allow him; therefore, they must follow suit and keep open at his pleasure.
In this one-man power lies the secret of the present abnormal length of hours; for it is a matter of experience that as long as shops are open, so long customers will continue to come; and hence competition has suggested lengthening of hours with a view to checkmating neighbours. Yet no method of doing business ever brought with it more disadvantage, for less gain. The public is certainly no better off than if shopping had to be got through in reasonable time; and beyond dispute, the shopkeeping class is not only no better, but very much worse off for this tyranny of custom, which compels even the unwilling employer to keep his assistants at work far beyond the ordinary limits of labour. And so deep-seated and established has the slavery become, that there remains nothing for it but an appeal to the State to interfere with an extension of the Factory and Workshop Act; and although we are by no means of those who believe in ‘grandmotherly legislation,’ this is a case, if ever there was one, in which the strong hand of the law alone can lift a whole section of society out of the misery in which it now lies, and from which, unaided, it can never escape. An extension of the Factory Act, although it would of necessity leave the shop-assistant’s hours longer than those of most workers, would at least protect him from unlimited labour, and would insure his work being carried on under fairly healthy conditions.
The grumbling section of the public would doubtless raise many objections to a shopping day of only twelve hours; but we confidently prophesy that a year’s probation would show the new order of things to be no hardship to the purchaser; and as regards employers, although, doubtless, many will make great capital out of the grievance of coercion, the more sensible and far-sighted will recognise the fact that on this question at least the interests of employer and employed are identical. Once insure that all shops shall be limited to the same number of hours, and there need be no anxiety as to loss of business. The consumer’s wants must be met, and if he has only a limited (and reasonable) number of hours in which to do his shopping, he will have no choice but to adapt his habits to the new order of things.
Hardship, of course, it would be if the law were limited to certain neighbourhoods, or if clashing trades were not all under the same restriction; but as long as there was one uniform code for all, the only difference to the shopkeeper would be greater personal leisure without loss of business. To those heads of large establishments to whom reference has already been made, this may seem a trifling matter; but many and many a small shopkeeper will rejoice, fully as much as his assistants, in freedom from the excessive toil which makes his life as much a slavery as theirs, and from which he is equally powerless to escape.
Under the name of the ‘Shop Hours’ Labour League,’ a scheme has been set on foot having for its object the presentation to parliament of such a bill as has been suggested; and the interest of every individual member of society is earnestly invited, in the hope of creating a public conscience on a question affecting thousands of workers, whose services are essential to the comfort of the community. The President of the League, Thomas Sutherst, Esq., barrister-at-law, has compiled a shilling volume on the subject, which, under the somewhat sensational title of Death and Disease behind the Counter, contains a large amount of sober fact, and can scarcely fail to awaken strong feeling in the mind of every reader who takes an interest in the welfare of his fellows. The League needs help, not in money, but in personal effort and influence; and Mr Sutherst (3 Dr Johnson’s Buildings, London), whose work is purely a labour of love, is ready to give information, or to suggest methods by which help may be rendered to a cause which thoroughly deserves the heartiest support.
At the dinner that evening, Macfarlane, the Scotch doctor, took in Nora; while Harry Noel had handed over to his care a dowager-planteress from a neighbouring estate; so Harry had no need to talk any further to his pretty little hostess during that memorable Tuesday. On Wednesday morning he had made up his mind he would find some excuse to get away from this awkward position in Mr Dupuy’s household; for it was clearly impossible for him to remain there any longer, after he had again asked Nora and been rejected; but of course he couldn’t go so suddenly before the dinner to be given in his honour; and he waited on, impatiently and sullenly.
Tom Dupuy was there too; and even Mr Theodore Dupuy himself, who knew the whole secret of Harry’s black blood, and therefore regarded him now as almost beyond the pale of human sympathy, couldn’t help noticing to{452} himself that his nephew Tom really seemed quite unnecessarily anxious to drag this unfortunate young man Noel into some sort of open rupture. ‘Very ill advised of Tom,’ Mr Dupuy thought to himself; ‘and very bad manners too, for a Dupuy of Trinidad. He ought to know well enough that whatever the young man’s undesirable antecedents may happen to be, as long as he’s here in the position of a guest, he ought at least to be treated with common decency and common politeness. To-morrow, we shall manage to hunt up some excuse, or give him some effectual hint, which will have the result of clearing him bodily off the premises. Till then, Tom ought to endeavour to treat him, as far as possible, in every way like a perfect equal.’
Even during the time while the ladies still remained in the dining-room, Tom Dupuy couldn’t avoid making several severe hits, as he considered them, at Harry Noel from the opposite side of the hospitable table. Harry had happened once to venture on some fairly sympathetic commonplace remark to his dowager-planteress about the planters having been quite ruined by emancipation, when Tom Dupuy fell upon him bodily, and called out with an unconcealed sneer: ‘Ruined by emancipation!—ruined by emancipation! That just shows how much you know about the matter, to talk of the planters being ruined by emancipation! If you knew anything at all of what you’re talking about, you’d know that it wasn’t emancipation in the least that ruined us, but your plaguy parliament doing away with the differential duties.’
Harry bit his lip, and glanced across the table at the young planter with a quiet smile of superiority; but the only word he permitted himself to utter was the one harmless and neutral word ‘Indeed!’
‘O yes, you may say “Indeed” if you like,’ Tom Dupuy retorted warmly. ‘That’s just the way of all you conceited English people. You think you know such a precious lot about the whole subject, and you really and truly know in the end just less than absolutely nothing.’
‘Pardon me,’ Harry answered carelessly, with his wine-glass poised for a moment half lifted in his hand. ‘I admit most unreservedly that you know a great deal more than I do about the differential duties, whatever they may be, for I never so much as heard their very name in all my life until the present moment.’
Tom Dupuy smiled a satisfied smile of complete triumph. ‘I thought as much,’ he said exultantly; ‘I knew you hadn’t. That’s just the way of all English people. They know nothing at all about the most important and essential matters, and yet they venture to talk about them for all the world as if they knew as much as we do about the whole subject.’
‘Really,’ Harry answered with a good-humoured smile, ‘I fancied a man might be fairly well informed about things in general, and yet never have heard in his pristine innocence of the differential duties. I haven’t the very faintest idea myself, to tell you the truth, what they are. Perhaps you will be good enough to lighten my darkness.’
‘What they are!’ Tom Dupuy ejaculated in pious horror. ‘They aren’t anything. They’re done away with. They’ve ceased to exist long ago. You and the other plaguy English people took them off, and ruined the colonies; and now you don’t as much as know what you’ve done, or whether they’re existing still or done away with!’
‘Tom, my boy,’ Mr Theodore Dupuy interposed blandly, ‘you really mustn’t hold Mr Noel personally responsible for all the undoubted shortcomings of the English nation! You must remember that his father is, like ourselves, a West Indian proprietor, and that the iniquitous proceedings with reference to the differential duties—which nobody can for a moment pretend to justify—injured him every bit as much as they injured ourselves.’
‘But what are the differential duties?’ Harry whispered to his next neighbour but one, the Scotch doctor. ‘I never heard of them in my life, I assure you, till this very minute.’
‘Well, you know,’ Dr Macfarlane responded slowly, ‘there was a time when sugar from the British colonies was admitted into Britain at a less duty than sugar from Cuba or other foreign possessions; and at last, the British consumer took the tax off the foreign sugar, and cheapened them all alike in the British market. Very good, of course, for the British consumer, but clean ruination and nothing else for the Trinidad planter.’
For the moment, the conversation changed, but not the smouldering war between the two belligerents. Whatever subject Harry Noel happened to start during that unlucky dinner, Tom Dupuy, watching him closely, pounced down upon him at once like an owl on the hover, and tore him to pieces with prompt activity. Harry bore it all as good-naturedly as he could, though his temper was by no means naturally a forbearing one; but he didn’t wish to come to an open rupture with Tom Dupuy at his uncle’s table, especially after that morning’s occurrences.
As soon as the ladies had left the room, however, Tom Dupuy drew up his chair so as exactly to face Harry, and began to pour out for himself in quick succession glass after glass of his uncle’s fiery sherry, which he tossed off with noisy hilarity. The more he drank, the louder his voice became, and the hotter his pursuit of Harry Noel. At last, when Mr Theodore Dupuy, now really alarmed as to what his nephew was going to say next, ordered in the coffee prematurely, to prevent an open outbreak by rejoining the ladies, Tom walked deliberately over to the sideboard and took out a large square decanter, from which he poured a good-sized liqueur-glassful of some pale liquid for himself and another for Harry.
‘There!’ he cried boisterously. ‘Just you try that, Noel, will you. There’s liquor for you! That’s the real old Pimento Valley rum, the best in the island, double distilled, and thirty years in bottle. You don’t taste any hogo about that, Mr Englishman, eh, do you?’
‘Any what?’ Harry inquired politely, lifting up the glass and sipping a little of the contents out of pure courtesy, for neat rum is not in itself a very enticing beverage to any other than West Indian palates.
‘Any hogo,’ Tom Dupuy repeated loudly and insolently—‘hogo, hogo. I suppose, now, you mean to say you don’t even know what hogo is,{453} do you?—Never heard of hogo? Precious affectation! Don’t understand plain language! Yah, rubbish!
‘Why, no, certainly,’ Harry assented as calmly as he was able; ‘I never before did hear of hogo, I assure you. I haven’t the slightest idea what it is, or whether I ought rather to admire or to deplore its supposed absence in this very excellent old rum of yours.’
‘Hogo’s French,’ Tom Dupuy asserted doggedly, ‘Hogo’s French, and I should have thought you ought to have known it. Everybody in Trinidad knows what hogo is. It’s French, I tell you. Didn’t you ever learn any French at the school you went to, Noel?’
‘Excuse me,’ Harry said, flushing up a little, for Tom Dupuy had asked the question very offensively. ‘It is not French. I know enough of French at least to say that such a word as hogo, whatever it may mean, couldn’t possibly be French for anything.’
‘As my nephew pronounces it,’ Mr Dupuy put in diplomatically, ‘you may perhaps have some difficulty in recognising its meaning; but it’s our common West Indian corruption, Mr Noel, of haut goût—haut goût, you understand me—precisely so; haut goût, or hogo, being the strong and somewhat offensive molasses-like flavour of new rum, before it has been mellowed, as this of ours has been, by being kept for years in the wood and in bottle.’
‘Oh, ah, that’s all very well! I suppose you’re going to turn against me now, Uncle Theodore,’ Tom Dupuy exclaimed angrily—he was reaching the incipient stage of quarrelsome drunkenness. ‘I suppose you must go and make fun of me, too, for my French pronunciation as well as this fine-spoken Mr Noel here. But I don’t care a pin about it, or about either of you, either. Who’s Mr Noel, I should like to know, that he should come here, with his fine new-fangled English ways, setting himself up to be better than we are, and teaching us to improve our French pronunciation?—O yes, it’s all very fine; but what does he want to go stopping in our houses for, with our own ladies, and all that, and then going and visiting with coloured rubbish that I wouldn’t touch with a pair of tongs—the woolly-headed niggers!—that’s what I want to know, Uncle Theodore?’
Mr Dupuy and Harry rose together. ‘Tom, Tom!’ Mr Dupuy cried warningly, ‘you are quite forgetting yourself. Remember that this gentleman is my guest, and is here to-day by my invitation. How dare you say such things as that to my own guest, sir, at my own table? You insult me, sir, you insult me!’
‘I think,’ Harry interrupted, white with anger, ‘I had better withdraw at once, Mr Dupuy, before things go any further, from a room where I am evidently, quite without any intention on my own part, a cause of turmoil and disagreement.’
He moved hastily towards the open window which gave upon the lawn, where the ladies were strolling, after the fashion of the country, in the silvery moonlight, among the tropical shrubbery. But Tom Dupuy jumped up before him and stood in his way, now drunk with wine and rum and insolence and temper, and blocked his road to the open window.
‘No, no!’ he cried, ‘you shan’t go yet!—I’ll tell you all the reason why, gentlemen. He shall hear the truth. I’ll take the vanity and nonsense out of him! He’s a brown man himself, nothing but a brown man!—Do you know, you fine fellow you, that you’re only, after all, a confounded woolly-headed brown mulatto? You are, sir! you are, I tell you! Look at your hands, you nigger, look at your hands, I say, if ever you doubt it.’
Harry Noel’s proud lip curled contemptuously as he pushed the half-tipsy planter aside with his elbow, and began to stride angrily away towards the moonlit shrubbery. ‘I daresay I am,’ he answered coolly, for he was always truthful, and it flashed across his mind in the space of a second that Tom Dupuy was very possibly right enough. ‘But if I am, my good fellow, I will no longer inflict my company, I tell you, upon persons who, I see, are evidently so little desirous of sharing it any further.’
‘Yes, yes,’ Tom Dupuy exclaimed madly, planting himself once more like a fool in front of the angry and retreating Englishman, ‘he’s a brown man, a mulatto, a coloured fellow, gentlemen, own cousin of that precious nigger scamp, Isaac Pourtalès, whose woolly head I’d like to knock this minute against his own woolly head, the insolent upstart! Why, gentlemen, do you know who his mother was? Do you know who this fine Lady Noel was that he wants to come over us with? She was nothing better, I swear to you solemnly, than a common brown wench over in Barbadoes!’
Harry Noel’s face grew livid purple with that foul insult, as he leapt like a wild beast at the roaring West Indian, and with one fierce blow sent him reeling backward upon the floor at his feet like a senseless lump of dead matter. ‘Hound and cur! how dare you?’ he hissed out hoarsely, planting his foot contemptuously on the fallen planter’s crumpled shirt-front. ‘How dare you?—how dare you? Say what you will of me, myself, you miserable blackguard—but my mother! my mother!’ And then, suddenly recollecting himself, with a profound bow to the astonished company, he hurried out, hatless and hot, on to the darkling shrubbery, casting the dust of Orange Grove off his feet half instinctively behind him as he went.
Next moment a soft voice sounded low beside him, to his intense astonishment. As he strode alone across the dark lawn, Nora Dupuy, who had seen the whole incident from the neighbouring shrubbery, glided out to his side from the shadow of the star-apple tree and whispered a few words earnestly in his ear. Harry Noel, still white with passion and trembling in every muscle like a hunted animal, could not but stop and listen to them eagerly even in that supreme moment of righteous indignation. ‘Thank you, Mr Noel,’ she said simply—‘thank you, thank you!’
The gentlemen in the dining-room stood looking at one another in blank dismay for a few seconds, and then Dr Macfarlane broke the breathless silence by saying out loud, with his broad Scotch bluntness: ‘Ye’re a fool, Tom Dupuy—a very fine fool, ye are; and I’m not sorry the young{454} Englishman knocked you down and gave you a lesson, for speaking ill against his own mother.’
‘Where has he gone?’ Dick Castello, the governor’s aide-de-camp, asked quickly, as Tom picked himself up with a sheepish, awkward, drunken look. ‘He can’t sleep here to-night now, you know, and he’ll have to sleep somewhere or other, Macfarlane, won’t he?’
‘Run after him,’ the doctor said, ‘and take him to your own house. Not one of these precious Trinidad folk’ll stir hand or foot to befriend him anyhow, now they’ve been told he’s a brown man.’
Castello took up his hat and ran as fast as he could go after Noel. He caught him up, breathless, half-way down to the gate of the estate; for Harry, though he had gone off hurriedly without hat or coat, was walking alone down the main road coolly enough now, trying to look and feel within himself as though nothing at all unusual in any way had happened. ‘Where are you going to, Noel?’ Castello asked, in a friendly voice.—‘By Jove! I’m jolly glad you knocked that fellow down, and tried to teach him a little manners, though he is old Dupuy’s nephew. But of course you can’t stop there to-night. What do you mean now to do with yourself?’
‘I shall go to Hawthorn’s,’ Harry answered quietly.
‘Better not go there,’ Dick Castello urged, taking him gently by the shoulder. ‘If you do, you know, it’ll look as if you wanted to give a handle to Tom Dupuy and break openly with the whole lot of them. Tom Dupuy insulted you abominably, and you couldn’t have done anything else but knock him down, of course, my dear fellow; and he needed it jolly well, too, we all know perfectly. But don’t let it seem as if you were going to quarrel with the whole lot of us. Come home to my house now at Savannah Garden. I’ll walk straight over there with you and have a room got ready for you at once; and then I’ll go back to Orange Grove for Mrs Castello, and bring across as much of your luggage as I can in my carriage, at least as much as you’ll need for the present.’
‘Very well, Captain Castello,’ answered Noel submissively. ‘It’s very kind of you to take me in. I’ll go with you; you know best about it. But hang it all, you know, upon my word I expect the fellow may have been telling the truth after all, and I daresay I really am what these fools of Trinidad people call a brown man. Did ever you hear such absurd nonsense? Calling me a brown man! As if it ever mattered twopence to any sensible person whether a man was black, brown, white, or yellow, as long as he’s not such a confounded cad and boor as that roaring tipsy lout of a young Dupuy fellow!’
So Harry Noel went that Tuesday night to Captain Castello’s at Savannah Garden, and slept, or rather lay awake, there till Wednesday morning—the morning of the day set aside by Louis Delgado and Isaac Pourtalès for their great rising and general massacre.
As for Nora, she went up to her own boudoir as soon as the guests had gone—they didn’t stay long after this awkward occurrence—and threw herself down once more on the big sofa, and cried as if her heart would burst for very anguish and humiliation.
He had knocked down Tom Dupuy. That was a good thing as far as it went! For that at least, if for nothing else, Nora was duly grateful to him. But had she gone too far in thanking him? Would he accept it as a proof that she meant him to reopen the closed question between them? Nora hoped not, for that—that at anyrate was now finally settled. She could never, never, never marry a brown man! And yet, how much nicer and bolder he was than all the other men she saw around her! Nora liked him even for his faults. That proud, frank, passionate Noel temperament of his, which many girls would have regarded with some fear and no little misgiving, exactly suited her West Indian prejudices and her West Indian ideal. His faults were the faults of a proud aristocracy; and it was entirely as a member of a proud aristocracy herself that Nora Dupuy lived and moved and had her being. A man like Edward Hawthorn she could like and respect; but a man like Harry Noel she could admire and love—if, ah if, he were only not a brown man! What a terrible cross-arrangement of fate that the one man who seemed otherwise exactly to suit her girlish ideal, should happen to belong remotely to the one race between which and her own there existed in her mind for ever and ever an absolutely fixed and irremovable barrier!
So Nora, too, lay awake all night; and all night long she thought but of one thing and one person—the solitary man she could never, never, never conceivably marry.
And Harry, for his part, thinking to himself, on his tumbled pillow, at Savannah Garden, said to his own heart over and over and over again: ‘I shall love her for ever; I can never while I live leave off loving her. But after what occurred yesterday and last night, I mustn’t dream for worlds of asking her a third time. I know now what it was she meant when she spoke about the barrier between us. Poor girl! how very wild of her! How strange that she should think in her own soul a Dupuy of Trinidad superior in position to one of the ancient Lincolnshire Noels!’
For pride always sees everything from its own point of view alone, and never for a moment succeeds in admitting to itself the pride of others as being equally reasonable and natural with its own.
BY CATHERINE C. HOPLEY.
Those who live near commons and turfy heaths may in the spring-time espy the lizards peeping cautiously out from among the weeds to court the sunshine after their winter’s sleep; or, on a warm day, boldly flitting across the grass, but hiding again on the slightest alarm. Much may the amateur naturalist find to interest and amuse him in these tiny lizards; to admire also, for their colours are often very beautiful, their eyes bright and watchful, their form and actions anything but ungraceful. Among these native lizards, the Slow-worm (Anguis fragilis){455} is included—the ‘deaf adder’ or ‘blindworm,’ as it is commonly but wrongly called. As a pet, Anguis fragilis has many recommendations. Small, clean, unobtrusive, inoffensive, and easily fed, are more than can be said of most pets: domestic qualifications which, indeed, may be extended to its little four-legged cousins, the British lizards, often found in the same habitat, and all of which can be caught and transferred to a large glass bowl with ease and satisfaction. One of the bell-shaped glasses with a perforated knob at the top answers capitally. Reversed and furnished with moss, turf, and sand, the hole serves for drainage, because water is indispensable for the lizards, and the moss and turf should be sprinkled occasionally. A stand into which the reversed glass fits can be purchased with it, and a large china plate completes the arrangement, which, with its pretty occupants, is an ornament for any window or conservatory.
By an accident, I soon discovered that a slow-worm—my first and then only pet reptile—requires water. Knowing that it fed on slugs, I was hunting in the garden, and at length found some small ones under a flower-pot saucer, and conveyed them undisturbed to a place in the cage. The slow-worm soon discovered the addition, but instead of selecting a slug for supper, began to lick the cold, damp saucer, putting out its tongue repeatedly, as if refreshed; and forthwith the saucer was reversed and filled with the beverage, which the little reptile soon lapped eagerly, continuing to do so for some minutes. After this discovery, fresh water was supplied daily. That little creature became quickly tamed, a fact which her history will easily explain.
‘Do you want a live viper?’ a friend in the Reading Room of the British Museum asked me, one day.
‘A viper! Here?’
‘Yes, a deaf viper. It was caught in Surrey last week. We had a field-day.’
My friend was a member of a Natural History Society, as was also the gentleman who had found the so-called ‘viper.’ His hobby being geology rather than zoology, he had been breaking and turning over fragments of rock in a sort of dell, when he had discovered the harmless little creature, which he—a scholarly man, by the way—would have immediately put to death, as a dangerous viper, had not my friend—also a learned man, though not versed in snakes—reserved it for me, and with much caution transferred it to a tin box. It was subsequently consigned to a bottle, and tightly corked until I could see it. My friend now promised me he would not put the ‘deaf viper’ to death, as his lady relatives were daily entreating him to do; and a few days afterwards, he shook out of its narrow prison on to my table—not a viper, but a feeble slow-worm, the poor little thing having had no food during those eight or ten days of captivity. No wonder, then, that the half-famished reptile grew easily reconciled to an improved home with fresh grass and moss and other luxuries, and soon learned to recognise its preserver. Soon a companion was brought for it, one freshly caught and full of health and vigour. This one was not so easily reconciled to a glass house, and only by slow degrees would it allow itself to be taken up and handled.
Another year, my saurian family increased to nine, including all the three British species, and all living amicably together in one large bell-glass. I will not trouble my readers with the nine names by which the nine lizards were known in the domestic circle. Scientifically, they were Anguis fragilis, Lacerta agilis, and Zootica vivipara; the last so called from its giving birth to live young. Anguis fragilis also produces its young alive; or, as in the case of one of my own, in a membranous case or ‘shell,’ quite entire, but easily ruptured. The specific name agilis has been applied to the larger lacertine; but a more agile, swift, and flashing little creature than Zootica vivipara can scarcely exist; so that the true names of these three species of lizard are not, after all, so truly descriptive. Zootica is much smaller, and must have acquired its astonishing celerity protectively, the wee animal having no other safeguard than in flight. And its suppleness equals its activity. Caught and held in the closed hand so tightly that one almost feared to crush it, it would nevertheless turn itself round, or rather double itself completely back and escape the other way, where no outlet seemed possible; or between the fingers, where you least expected. It is extremely restless and timid, and less easily tamed than lacerta. One of my zooticas had a peculiar dread of being handled, and was so ever on the alert, watching my slightest approach, and looking up sideways out of one eye, and with its head on one side in such a bird-like manner, that it acquired the name of ‘Birdie.’ Birdie seemed guided by intellect more than any of the family; and the devices she practised in order to escape me, when she anticipated my intentions to get hold of her, were truly intelligent. She vanished somewhere, but presently you caught sight of one bright eye peeping up from the depths of the moss, as if saying: ‘Ah, I know what you’re up to!’ Perhaps I did try to circumvent Birdie somewhat heartlessly, just to observe her manœuvres. She would peep at me and watch me through the glass, when I was sitting far away and had no intention of going near; but at last she learned to stay in my open hand, and I sometimes suspected there was as much play as fear in her hiding.
The lizards were also thirsty little creatures, and eagerly refreshed their tongues by lapping the wet moss, until they learned to lap out of a saucer. The male lacerta is of a handsome iridescent green, pale and delicate on the throat and belly, and a rich dark colour on the back. Lacerta is easily tamed. It soon learns to settle itself comfortably in a warm hand, and is quite appreciative of caresses in the form of a gentle stroking with the finger. In intelligence, both species certainly rank above Anguis fragilis; they more easily recognise the voice and the owner of the voice, looking up when addressed in the peculiar tone which was reserved for lizard training.
{456}
A large and handsome female lacerta that lived in a smaller glass by itself, escaped one day, and fell out of the window near which it was placed. It must have sustained some internal injury, and had, no doubt, suffered from cold and terror during the two days and nights it was lost, until found on a neighbour’s balcony. I had reason to suspect she would soon deposit eggs, but she grew gradually thin and feeble, refusing food, and was evidently suffering, though showing no outward appearance of injury. It exhibited a strong desire to climb against the side of its cage, or whatever upright surface it was near, and remain in a perpendicular position; or if it could find no such leaning-place, it threw up its head and thus held it, as if to relieve itself of some pain. Then, more and more it kept its eyes closed, or opened them only to seek some object against which it could rest in that perpendicular position. As winter approached, I allowed the little sufferer to lie on a table near the fire, and covered it over for warmth; but it never remained contented on the level. Though its eyes were usually closed, whenever I spoke to it in the peculiar tone with which it was familiar, it invariably opened them and came towards me. If it could not reach me, it would even jump from the table to my lap in order to gain its favourite perpendicular position on my dress, where it remained quiet until removed. It grew more and more feeble, until one could scarcely detect life in it, except in the effort to open its eyes and try to approach when I spoke to it, and this to the very last.
These little lizards are easily procured; and I trust the perusal of these memoirs may induce some kind and patient individual to try them as pets, when it will be found that their sense of hearing and intelligence is in no way exaggerated.
Lizards cast their skins at uncertain intervals during the summer, being greatly influenced by temperature. One very warm season, when they were much in the sunshine, mine changed their dress on an average once in three weeks. Some of the sloughs came off entire, even to the tips of the tiny, delicate fingers, like a perfect glove. Sometimes they were shed in fragments. The head shields are not regularly renewed with the skin, which was always reversed. Anguis fragilis on one occasion cast its skin entire and unreversed, a very unusual occurrence. All begin at the mouth, as snakes do; and you will see when the process is about to commence by the little creatures rubbing their mouths and their heads against whatever they are near, the loosening cuticle no doubt causing irritation. To watch the process is exceedingly interesting, especially when the lacertines free their limbs of the old garment, shaking off and dragging themselves out of it as you get off a tight sleeve.
A word about the voice of lizards, on which so much has been written. That these do utter a sound is certain; but it is very feeble; though, perhaps, in comparison with their size, not more feeble than the hiss of a snake. And only when much disturbed and annoyed do they ejaculate even this little sound, which is as if you half pronounced and whispered the letter t or th. Sometimes it resembles ts, only audible when quiet prevails. Both the lizards and the slow-worms expressed their displeasure by this same little expulsion of breath, scarcely to be called a hiss. But once when a slow-worm fell from a high stand to the floor, there was a singular sort of loud chirp or chuckle, as if the breath were forced suddenly from the lungs by the fall. It was wholly unlike its regular ‘voice,’ and was so remarkable, that if it had not been ejaculated simultaneously with the ‘flop’ on the carpet that announced ‘Lizzie’s’ fall, I might have thought a young bird or a frog was in the room. The slow-worms often got out of their cage and fell to the floor, seeming to be none the worse; but only on this one occasion did I hear the breath escape so audibly.
Recommending them as pets, it is important to say that they all like a change of diet; and herein lies the chief difficulty of keeping them, except to those who have gardens or who live in the country. Anguis fragilis will content itself for a long period on worms, but these must be fresh; and it enjoys a slug or a small smooth caterpillar for a change. But the lizards are more fastidious, as is perhaps natural; for in their wild state they catch such insects as are in season, and have a choice of these. In the suburbs of London, I found them glad of such varieties as could be procured from the shrubs in a garden, or by digging; and small worms, caterpillars, spiders, or insects were in turn eagerly pounced upon. ‘Birdie’ was particularly quick in detecting a rarity and in being first to seize it. Flies are liked by the lizards, but not by the slow-worms, the latter preferring less dry food. Centipedes were rejected by common consent.
The difficulty of meeting the dietetic requirements of certain pets reminds me of another pair of lizards that in turn inhabited the bell-glass. These were brought from Brazil, and introduced to me by the name of Taraquira Smith. An i or two should perhaps terminate and dignify the latter name, to commemorate the particular Smith who bestowed it on Taraquira; but Smith is simple and practical; and the Taraquira Smiths was the name of my two little Brazilian lizards. The smaller one measured about eight inches from the snout to the tip of his slender tail; the larger one was ten or more inches in length. They are, however, less agreeable to handle than the previous pets, their tails being armed with very finely-pointed sharp scales in whorls. The lizards seem to know how to use this long tail protectively, having acquired a habit of retrogression, and when held, of backing out of the hand, as if with the intention of pricking or inconveniencing you with these sharp spines, which are thus converted into weapons of defence. When persistently held or detained, the pricking effect caused by this backward motion is by no means agreeable. For food, they were provided with a supply of a peculiar kind of cockroach, which infested the reptile house at the Zoological Gardens of London, near which I happened to reside; but my two little foreigners persistently declined them and any other equally tempting food. Indeed, the poor little Smiths were in such a feeble condition from exposure to cold during their transfer from the ship to their glass home, that the smaller one soon died.{457} On the voyage, they had been kept in a warm temperature; and at the Reptilium they have been preserved by artificial heat. It was December when mine arrived, and though in the daytime they could be made comfortable near the fire, during the night a regular heat could not be maintained; notwithstanding, at the risk of suffocating them, warm woollen wraps were folded round and over the glass, to keep the frosty air from them.
When the smaller Taraquira died, redoubled care was bestowed on the survivor, but unfortunately, we could not transfer the Brazilian climate to a London residence, and my Taraquira Smith only lived long enough to display that peculiar and yet not vicious instinct of letting you know that its tail was armed throughout its entire length with those sharp prickly scales.
One more lizard-pet deserves an obituary notice.
‘I have a horned toad from Texas down at my office,’ said an Ohio editor to me, when I was visiting in that State. ‘Will you like to call in and see it, when you pass that way?’
The reader will surmise that a very short time elapsed ere I did ‘pass that way;’ and my friend the editor bade me welcome by beginning an immediate search for the ‘horned toad,’ which apparently was allowed the free run of the office. Has the reader ever been introduced into the office of a Western newspaper editor? A chaos of ‘exchanges’ is its principal characteristic. You wonder how one man in a lifetime, much less a week—this was the office of a weekly paper—could look over and ‘scissors and clip’ from that astonishing miscellany. However, the object now was to hunt up the toad, not news. Exchanges in compact piles and loose piles were moved from shelf to table and table to shelf; exchanges half-opened and unopened, exchanges already clipped and thrown under the spacious table; papers filed and papers not filed; books and magazines in vast piles to be reviewed; ink of all colours in bottles of all sizes, some full, some empty; penholders and pencils enough to kindle a fire; paper-knives, scissors, rulers, and clips anywhere but in their natural places; and as for manuscripts, advertisements, and advertising books—from the size of a bath-towel down to the daintiest card—not to mention samples and offerings presented to the influential man in order to win a good word in his paper (here is the office-boy with another armful by the mail just in), and ‘copy’ enough for six months’ use scattered about! All these things were moved, lifted, separated, swept on one side and swept back again, turned over again and again; but no toad rewarded that amiable editor’s search. ‘Toads like damp,’ I suggested, while offering my small aid in picking up a shower of literature which my friend scattered in his haste. ‘The poor thing can scarcely feel comfortable among this wealth of information and so near the stove.’
‘Well, it is an improvement on a boy’s pocket, anyhow,’ returned the erudite man. ‘I rescued it from a boy who had been carrying it about in his pocket for a whole fortnight. His uncle, just from Texas, brought it for him to play with. It was here half an hour ago, for I saw it,’ continued the editor, rummaging a shelf of exchanges for the fourth time. ‘It’s half dead anyhow; for horned toads won’t eat when they’re caught. Do, pray, take a seat.—Why, there he is!’ and down on the floor, in a dusty corner behind a chair which the editor drew out for me, was a poor, pretty little saurian, with a pointed tail, and a cornet of spikes round its head, which gave it a quaint and decorated appearance.
‘It is not a toad after all!’ I ventured to explain; but belief in vernaculars is strong.
‘Maybe it’s a frog, then; there are horned frogs, too, in Texas.’
On a first glance, the reptile has somewhat the appearance of a frog or a toad (with the addition of a tail). Its body was broader for its length than is usual in lizards, and its head was short and flat, looking all the more so for the horny spines, which stood out like a frill. The poor little half-dead thing was too feeble to struggle, and too thickly coated with dust to display any other than mud colour. From its long fast, it was merely skin and skeleton, painfully concave beneath. I gladly accepted it from the editor; and on reaching home gave it a bath, letting it remain in the water, and douching it thoroughly, which seemed to invigorate it, as it tried to crawl out of the basin, and opened a pair of bright black eyes. Gradually, its markings and true colour appeared, and it turned out to be an exceedingly pretty iguanian lizard; but, as my friend the editor had with reason said, it is generally known in Texas as ‘the horned frog’ or ‘the horned toad,’ or scientifically, Phrynosoma cornutum.
It now already gave signs of recovery, and when placed on its back, could right itself, and even crawl, and was a quaint, pretty little creature, worth preserving. But a tremendous obstacle here arose. There were young ladies in the house, and had they known I had surreptitiously brought home a toad to ‘sting them with its poisonous horns,’ the consequences are too appalling to conjecture! Such a terrific creature of four and a half inches long, tail inclusive, to be introduced into the family circle! So Iguana and I kept our secret; and I slyly smuggled a large, empty flower-pot into my room, and lined it with fresh grass and a clump of turf from the garden, and had the pleasure of seeing the poor little stranger nestle in it with evident satisfaction. I got its mouth open and gave it water, which it swallowed readily; and by-and-by administered a few flies, one at a time, which it also swallowed; and at night it crept under the turf. Next day, it meekly swallowed more food and drink, similarly administered, and was so greatly strengthened as to try to climb up the side of the flower-pot, then standing in the sunshine. This great flower-pot and its inmate caused me continuous alarm. When any one was expected in my room, it was hidden in all manner of places; but when there was no danger of interruption, it could stand on the window-ledge, fortunately hidden from outside view by a veranda beneath. And in this way Iguana lived for many days, during which it rapidly improved. It is not surprising that such reptiles do not eat in captivity. Their habit is to pursue insects, and swiftly too, or to pounce upon one that takes its fancy; and no half-dead fly or amputated spider thrown into its cage{458} would excite its natural instincts. But this queer little animal submitted to be fed in a ludicrous manner. Without much difficulty I got its mouth open; and after suspiciously swallowing the first mouthful, it took the second and third as passively as a baby fed with a spoon. In this way it ate four or six insects a day, varied by a few drops of water or the soft pulp of a grape.
When my visit in Ohio was terminated, Iguana was secretly packed in moss in a little flat box and put in my bag; and the huge empty flower-pot was left outside the window, to excite the wonder of the curious. The friends I next visited knew nothing of ‘horned toads’ and their ‘venomous spines,’ and all alarms were forestalled by my saying: ‘I have such a pretty little animal up-stairs—a tame lizard which was given me at B.’—‘Oh, do let us see it!’ was the encouraging reply; and when duly presented in my palm, whatever natural shrinking the ladies might have felt, was over-ruled by the ‘queer thing’s’ evident harmlessness and its undeniably pretty coat. And now it was made happy in a large birdcage with a carpet of turf and moss; and when placed in the sunshine, was—in unexaggerated language—‘wild with delight.’ My hopes were to feed and strengthen it for another week or two, by which time it might be safely consigned to a box and to hibernation. But—and it is sad to end this little history with a ‘but’—there came at the beginning of November some very warm days, and the sun had so much power, that when the cage was placed in the window, Phrynosoma must have imagined itself back in Texas. Only twenty minutes elapsed, and when I looked again, it was gone! How it could have squeezed itself and its long spikes between the wires, surpasses comprehension; but gone it was!
Great was the commotion throughout the house. The square of grass plot which separated the house from the pavement, and the neighbours’ front gardens, and the flights of steps leading to the street, and all the gratings, possible and impossible, were hunted over by the united family, neighbours included. Pavement, road, and cellars were carefully searched by my good-natured cousins, after, of course, every inch of the room itself had been well examined. We felt sure that the sunshine would have enticed it outwards, and we began to think poor little Iguana must have fallen a victim to some dog or cat, when one of the family, who had been out walking, came hurrying home exclaiming: ‘Why, here’s your lizard! I found it on the pavement wa-a-y up the street, with its mouth all bleeding!’
Strange that, in a public thoroughfare, it had escaped at all. Several of its horns were broken, and its mouth was wounded internally, giving evidence of a violent struggle against the wires of the cage. It must have partly pushed its head between them, and found difficulty in extricating itself, going sideways, and then falling from the window on to some iron bars beneath. The jaw and teeth on one side were much injured; for when, after this, I attempted to feed it, it struggled violently and swallowed nothing more.
It never regained sufficient energy to attempt another escape, but always held its head sideways, as if stiff or in pain; and after four or five days, poor little Phrynosoma cornutum died, and was buried.
I don’t know that I ever thought more closely or continually over any event in my life than I did over this queer meeting with Sam Braceby. There was too much of a coincidence about this matter; and my experience has been that coincidences do not happen unless there is something to bring them about. I could make nothing of it, however, and so set seriously to work in watching Mr Godfrey. But in this affair it seemed as though I was never to keep steadily on in any course, for on the very evening I was to begin my observations, I received a letter from Mr Thurles, asking me to call on him.
I found the merchant as harsh as before, and, in addition, a little inclined to be offensive; at anyrate, his banter on my want of success was particularly annoying to me. He did not seem able to say anything pleasantly, and his speech ended in his throwing down a number of letters and papers, and telling me that the utterer of the forged bills had been discovered; the man himself had escaped by the merest chance; but upon his lodgings being searched, there was found among his papers correspondence which proved that he was a friend of Mr Godfrey, from whom several letters, all on business matters—that is, relating to the borrowing of money—were found.
‘It was not to be expected,’ continued the merchant, ‘that these letters would state in so many words that they meant to forge bills or break into houses; but there is quite enough to show the footing they were on, and to convince us, if any more conviction were needed, that they were both in the forgery.—Look over the papers, and see if you can get a hint from them.’
I saw the name of the man to whom the letters were addressed, and knew it as that of a young fellow who had borne a doubtful reputation, although he had never been in actual ‘trouble.’ He was certainly a dangerous companion for Godfrey Harleston. I took the papers, and left Mr Thurles with the belief that the step-son was in an awkward position. Hitherto, I had by no means been a believer in his guilt; but I was obliged to own that things were now looking much blacker against him. Knowing as much as I did, I determined on a different course of action. I resolved to make some inquiries, and, if necessary, spend some money among the associates of this newly discovered accomplice, some of whom I knew pretty well.
But again I was destined to be balked in my plans—in fact, it was the continual drifting about, which seemed to be our luck just now, which made this undertaking so different from any other on which I had ever been engaged. This time the interruption came from Long-necked Sam, who had never been out of my waking thoughts for any one quarter of an hour since{459} I had seen him in the public-house. I found that Sam was remanded on a serious charge, which, if proved, would probably secure him, in his own phrase, ‘a lifer;’ and he wished to see me at once. It was rather sharp work, as only a few days had elapsed since I saw him, and now he had been apprehended, had his first hearing, and been remanded. But I knew that the police were constantly looking after him, and that he was always doing something which required him to keep out of their way as much as possible.
He would be a very fresh detective who would slight such a summons, meaningless as it might appear, for in such a business you can never tell what is going to turn up. I went, and saw Sam, who looked serious enough. Just as a matter of form and civility, I began to say that I was sorry to see him there, and so on.
‘Never mind that, Mr Holdrey,’ said Sam; ‘you may be sure I did not send for you to cry over spilt milk. I was sure to be “shopped” some time or another, although I must own I thought I should have had a little longer run. No; it isn’t that; it’s about that business of old Thurles.—You are working with the old fellow, are you not?’
This was a staggerer! If I had ever tried to keep a business quiet, this was the one. If I had been asked to name the job which had been completely kept from oozing out, I should have named this; and yet here was a notorious thief, a man who had nothing whatever to do with Thurles & Company, speaking confidently and correctly as to my share in the affair!
‘Well,’ I said, ‘what then?’ It was of no use denying it, as it was plain that Sam knew.
‘The old man,’ he continued, ‘is employing you to find out who broke into his office; but not so much for that as to find out about some forged bills. Well, I know all about the burglary, and pretty near all about the bills. The breaking-in was more in my way, as you know; but I could not do that without learning a good deal about the other.—Mr Holdrey, I have been badly used; the man who is deepest in the job has treated me shabbily, and means to act worse, I can see; so I must tell some one whom I can trust, and who will be honest with me. You know what my pals are, and that I cannot ask them, though some of them would be as true as the day; so I sent for you. Besides, you spoke up for me and helped me when you could get nothing by it. I would trust you for that good turn alone; and without it I would have trusted you, knowing your character. But I say again and again, there are not many who would have acted as you did. There’s a reward out, on the quiet, for this robbery; you can get it through me.—You know my wife, don’t you?’
I had seen her once or twice, and so I told him.
‘Well, she has been badly used in this affair; so have I; but I meant the money for her—I did honestly, to take her away where she was not known, and no one could bring her convict husband up against her, after he was sent off to Portland. Now, all I ask is, will you see to her and the young one, and share the reward with them? I don’t ask you to do anything which may seem in the least wrong, but so far as you can, consistent with your character as a man, very different from me, help her—will you do it? And will you share what reward you get?’
I did not see that there could be much harm in promising this, and on my saying so, Sam was at once satisfied.
‘Then here goes,’ he said. ‘These bills were forged by a friend of young Harleston—step-son to old Thurles, you know—but I am inclined to think the young fellow never got any of the money. He does not say so himself; but I have heard a little from others.’
He went on to tell me, in detail, what I had heard from Mr Thurles; but all this, he owned, was at second-hand; his own share did not begin till later. Mr Godfrey had found him out—how, Sam had no idea—and proposed an easy job to him, which was, of course, to enter the office and spoil the safe. The young man made no secret of his wish to get the bills into his possession—all the rest of the property found, Sam might keep for himself. ‘And there was precious little worth having, I can tell you,’ said the prisoner—‘only a matter of seven or eight pounds. I fancied I should have a rare haul, and, if you will believe me, I took a big bag tied round me, on purpose to hold the money. However, I gave him the papers he wanted, honourable, and in course expected him to act likewise in regard of my share. His game was to save himself in the first case, and then to get money from Mrs Thurles to buy off the people who, he pretended to her, had got the bills, and were threatening to give them up to the police.’
‘Mrs Thurles! Why, that is the young fellow’s own mother!’ I exclaimed. ‘You surely don’t mean to say that he was going to play such a fraud on his mother?’
‘It was not very nice, was it?’ returned Sam. ‘I don’t pretend to any fine feelings; but when I heard his plan, I had half a mind to knock him down. But there was my wife and child to be thought of, so I simply let the matter go. Well, I know for a certainty he has had some money from her, and expects a good deal more directly. All he ever gave me was two pounds. Two pounds out of five, he said; when I know from Bill, the potman at the Royal Blue, that he asked the landlord if he could cash him a cheque for a hundred that very night. The landlord could not do it, so Bill didn’t learn much more; but he saw the cheque was in a lady’s writing. But without all that, where could he get a cheque for a hundred, except from Mrs Thurles? He’s always worrying her. Why, he was on the business that night you met me at the public-house in the mews. He had not gone on there above five minutes, when you came in.’
Recollecting on what errand it was I found myself at the public-house in question, this bit of information seemed queerer than all that had gone before. It would have been so strange if I could have seen him and Sam together.
‘He deceived me then,’ continued Sam; ‘and as I am boxed up here and can’t help myself, he will deceive me again, and do me out of my lawful rights in respect of that money. So I mean to spoil him. What I have told you is the truth. I don’t know whether you can do anything about the bills, as he neither forged them{460} nor passed them; but that he arranged the cracking of his governor’s crib’—everybody knows the speaker meant the breaking into the step-father’s office—‘and had the best of what was got, is a fact, as you can call me as a witness upon. And I will tell you this, Mr Holdrey: I am a bad one, I own, and nearly all my ’sociates are bad uns too—they have all been in quod, and will all go there again; but none of us is worse than that young Harleston, and, in fact, very few of us are so bad.’
I was disposed to agree with him, and to think the worst of a young man who could cheat a fond mother so heartlessly. I felt that I would never believe in faces again; for if ever I saw a man who looked incapable of such conduct, young Godfrey Harleston was that person.
We had a long conversation after this, in which Sam arranged that his wife should meet me the next day; I was to write and tell her when and where—which I did directly after leaving the prison—then we were to go before a magistrate; the rest would be plain sailing.
Here, then, at last, I should be able to satisfy my employer; he would be proved to be right, and the business he had given me would be brought to a successful conclusion. I should make a handsome profit, and, as is always the case in such things, get credit for an immense amount of ability I had never shown. Yet I never felt so dissatisfied with anything in my life, and though all was now as clear as crystal, there was something in it which, like a wrong figure in a sum, would not fit.
I don’t know what induced me to do it, but before going home, I went round by Thurles & Company’s office, where I waited to see Mr Picknell come out. I thought as he came towards me, alone and thoughtful, under the shade of a big black wall which was there, I had never seen a more disagreeable-looking fellow. I was in his way, so that he almost ran against me. What a start he gave, to be sure! As I could see by the light of a lamp, he staggered and turned ghastly pale for an instant; but he rallied quickly, and exclaimed, with something like a laugh: ‘Ah!—David!’—he paused a moment before he uttered the name—‘is that you? I declare you almost startled me.’
‘Yes,’ I said; ‘you looked as if you had seen a ghost.’
‘Ghost! It would take a good many ghosts to startle me,’ he began; then at once changing his tone, continued; ‘Well, have you found a fresh job, David? It is just now a bad time to be out of work.’
I made some answer, and could not help keeping my eyes closely on him. He noticed this; I was sure enough of that, although he said nothing about it.
‘Look in next week, David,’ he went on. ‘I will ask among my friends, and perhaps I may have something for you. Do not forget; this day week. Good-night.’
In a friendly manner, he went away, nodding and smiling, as much as to say he would bear me in mind; and I felt as strongly as I had ever felt anything in my life that he knew I was no messenger—that he knew I was a detective. From the first moment I had spoken to him, I had never felt confident as to his motives for being so friendly, and now I was as certain of them as if he had told me plainly. Well, after all, that need not interfere with my making use of various hints he had given me, especially as they fitted in with what I now found to be the real state of the case. But I did not like him.
The end of my engagement was now, I considered, fairly in sight. In the morning, I should go with Sam’s wife to the Mansion House; young Godfrey would be arrested; I should get my two hundred and fifty of the reward; Sam’s wife would have the same; and there would be an end of it all. This was a great deal of money for me to clear; but I could not feel pleased over it. I don’t mean to say that I had any idea of giving up the job, now I had gone so far with it, or of refusing the reward; I was too old a bird for that; yet I could not wake up, as we may say, in the matter.
I was so absorbed in thinking of the change in my life I would make, and thinking, too, of the pleasure it would give Winny as well as myself, that I hardly noticed anybody or anything as I went along, and was so deep in thought, indeed, that I almost ran against two persons, as I turned into a quiet street which was a short cut towards my home. These persons were as interested in their conversation as I was in my reverie, for they seemed as startled as I felt myself to be. I began an apology with a smile; but the words and the smile at once died on my lips; and so with them. The girl was my Winny! my daughter, who had turned ghostly white when she recognised me; but it was her companion who had, I may say, petrified me. Little as I thought to see my Winny in company with a stranger, you may guess what I felt when I saw that stranger was—of all men in the world—Godfrey Harleston!
For the moment I could not believe my eyes; yet, as if by some magical vision, I recalled the night when I thought I had seen Winny in the crescent. I now knew I had seen her; and I recognised her companion as clearly as though I had seen him a hundred times over. Brief as was the glance I had had on that night of him, I knew him as being the same man to an absolute certainty.
Winny was the first to recover herself, although, by her colour coming and going as it did, I could see how unnerved she was. Turning to her companion, she said: ‘This is my father, Godfrey.—It is very strange we should have met him at this moment, is it not?—Father, this is’——
‘Silence, Winny!’ I exclaimed. My voice had somehow turned so hoarse and harsh that it was not like my voice at all. ‘I want no introduction here. You will come home with me, and I shall then be glad to hear an explanation of what’—— I could not very well finish the sentence.
Winny turned pale; she had never been spoken to by me in such a manner in all her life.
‘I trust, Mr Holdrey,’ said the young man—and his tone was very pleasant—‘you are not in any way displeased with—with your daughter; indeed, we were just agreeing to wait on you to-morrow morning’——
‘Do not come, then!’ I interrupted. I could{461} not help glancing at Winny, who looked as much astonished as frightened at hearing me speak like this, for I am not a rude man in general.
‘I am sorry to hear you say so,’ continued Mr Harleston. ‘It is my fault, not Winny’s, that we have not called on you long before. I have only waited to see some serious business settled which has troubled me a great deal. Yet now I think I was wrong. Let me walk home with you now.’
‘No!’ I said sternly—‘no, sir! I shall take my daughter home; and as I wish to have no further argument in the street, I shall bid you good-night.’
The tears, which had been standing in Winny’s eyes, had now overflowed, and were trickling down her cheeks. My heart ached as I saw this; but I grew angry, too, at seeing her, instead of at once joining me, turn her pale face to him with an inquiring look, as though asking permission—asking permission of him to obey her father!
‘Yes, Winny dear,’ he said gently, ‘you had better go. Your father does not understand all, and is naturally hurt; but I will see him to-morrow. Keep up a good heart, dearest!’ And with that he bent his head and kissed her, she lifting her face without the least shyness or shame.
I took her arm, and without another word, led her away. I hailed an omnibus, and we got in. I did this on purpose that there might be no opportunity for argument or pleading until we reached home. When we did so, I quickly lit the gas, drew down the blinds, and so forth; while Winny, having taken off her bonnet and pelisse, stood as pale and motionless as a statue, leaning on the table in the middle of the room.
I never felt a greater difficulty in speaking than I did then; not only was my voice hoarse, but my throat seemed blocked; however, it had to be done. ‘Winifred,’ I said, ‘I could not have believed it possible that you would have had an acquaintance unknown to me—and such an acquaintance! A man who’—— I could not help hesitating here—what I had to say was so dreadfully unpleasant.
‘Father!’ cried Winny—her voice was low but distinct; it was firmer than mine—‘Mr Godfrey Harleston is at least a friend of whom I need not be ashamed. I am not ashamed of him!’
‘Poor silly girl!’ I exclaimed; ‘you will be only too soon’——
‘Never!’ she interrupted, in the same low firm tone.
‘You little know what is before you,’ I continued; ‘and I only wish I had been aware of this intimacy earlier, to have saved you, perhaps, from some suffering. That young man is a suspected forger, and certainly an accomplice of burglars!—Hear me out, Winny! It will be best. I have been on his track for weeks, and at last all is brought home. I fear it will shock you to learn it, but he is a lost man; and in the morning I am under an engagement to apply at the Mansion House for a warrant for his arrest! There is no hope or chance for him; he will sleep in prison to-morrow night!’
I saw that Winny repressed a shriek by a great effort. For a moment a spasm convulsed her features, which quite frightened me, and then, in a strange gasping voice, which had nothing in it like my Winifred’s gentle tones, she cried, again clasping her hands tightly upon her breast: ‘He a criminal! He to be thrown in prison by you—by you, father! Never! You know not what you are saying. Father, you are talking of my husband!’
About four miles from Market-Harborough lies a little village, which we will call Bullenham. It is one of the most peaceful spots in all the peaceful Midlands. The houses are scattered here and there, divided from each other by orchards and farm-closes; one or two quiet shops supply the modest wants of the people; and several large farms provide the rude fathers of the village with labour. The old church, square-towered and gray, stands amidst the cottages. The curfew bell is still rung every night, and many another quaint custom survives the displacement of old-world life made all over England by modern manufactures and railways. The only disturbance to which the village is now liable is the invasion of its wide street and spacious green by foxhounds and scarlet-coated hunters, who, during the season, often meet there. But two centuries ago the village was invaded by the Cavalier army on its way from Harborough to Naseby, there to meet defeat at the hands of Fairfax and Cromwell and their undaunted Roundheads. The military events of that time, and the momentous national changes they effected, are familiar to every one; and as they form no part of our story, we shall not dwell on them; for on the edge of the splendid blazonry of history there are often homely incidents which the historian and philosopher reject, and it is such an event, full of domestic and human interest, that we propose to narrate.
A few days before the battle, a troop of Rupert’s horse was holding the village of Bullenham, and, with wild riot and plunder, terrifying the hearts of the farmers and their wives. The post was of some importance, for it lay just half-way between Harborough, where King Charles was staying, and that wide moorland on which the Parliamentary army was manœuvring. Nearly the whole of the Royalist soldiers passed through Bullenham, so that the villagers saw enough and to spare of the pomp and circumstance of war. The young officer who commanded the cavalry troop quartered in the village was named Henry Melford, and he had established himself in a small farmhouse. The household consisted of the farmer and his wife and one daughter, their only child. Captain Melford was not a rough soldier, but a refined man, accustomed to good society. At the same time, he had a delightfully frank manner, quick sympathies, and a homely naturalness and power of adaptation which went far to reconcile Dame Dimbell to the invasion of{462} her household privacies and the subversion of all her established hours and methods. Her husband’s talk was of oxen, and he took little interest in the questions that were then riving society to its centre. A stolid, characterless man, he rose with the dawn to go through his placid routine of occupations, and smoked his pipe in the chimney in the evening. The outdoor work of his small farm he managed almost entirely himself, while his wife and neat-handed daughter reigned inside the threshold. Barbara was a bright, plump, merry creature, who sang old ballads from morning till night, save when a snatch of some favourite church anthem broke in graver notes from her lips. She had lived in unwonted excitement since the soldiers had entered the village, and what mischief might have come about had she been allowed to yield to her own coquettish impulses it is hard to say. But Captain Melford had none of the licentiousness which characterised many of the Royalist soldiers: he had indeed something of the chivalrous purity of an olden knight, and he had not only warned Barbara against possible danger, but had made it well understood that the maiden was not to be approached by the soldiers. Consequently, the pretty damsel was comparatively safe; and honest John Sprayby, who for a year or two had been hovering about her, was not likely to be discarded for some bolder and lighter wooer.
One evening, after Captain Melford had received the reports of his sergeant, and had given orders for the various watches to be kept during the night, he began to take his ease in the spacious farm kitchen. The table was spread for supper, and he sat down to do hearty justice to the homely old English fare.
‘Come, dame,’ he cried, ‘give me a draught of your home-brewed. ’Tis the best drink I have tasted since Prince Rupert gave me a stirrup-cup a week ago.—And what’s this? By all that’s good, a stuffed chine! Ah! this is better than all your court kickshaws, and will stay my stomach well if there should be any fighting to-morrow;’ and so saying, he laid at once a pound or so upon his plate and applied himself vigorously to its consumption. ‘And where is your pretty daughter, Mistress Dimbell?’ he asked after a time. ‘Is she with her sweetheart? Ah, if you’ll only wait until we’ve beaten these confounded Roundheads, I’ll see that they get married. There’s a certain fair lady breaking her heart over me now, and so I can feel for pretty Barbara in these wild times.’
‘I’m sure your honour’s very good,’ said the farmer’s dame; ‘and I wish you were safe out of all this fighting, for I should be sorry to see you come by any hurt.’
Just then a loud knock shook the door, and going to it, Mrs Dimbell saw a trooper leading his horse. Both man and beast were covered with dust and sweat from hard riding. ‘Is Captain Melford in?’ he asked in a loud tone. Melford could not avoid hearing the question, for the kitchen opened directly on the road, and so he jumped up and hurried to the door.
‘These for you, sir,’ said the trooper respectfully on seeing the captain, and handed him a large packet of papers. ‘There are stirring times at hand, and we’re going to have at Old Noll.’
‘Ah!’ said the captain, ‘is that so? Well, come in, Radbourne, and eat something while I read these letters. You can tie your horse up to yonder tree; there is a sentinel will have an eye on him.’
‘Thank your honour,’ said the soldier: ‘I shall be none the worse for a comfortable meal. We’ve been on the march since sunrise this morning, and I’ve tasted nothing but a pot of small beer since noonday.’ Having fastened his horse’s bridle to the tree, he soon seated himself at the table, where he made a mighty attack on the stuffed chine, and emptied almost at a draught the brown jug of ale.
While he was thus engaged, the captain was busy reading his despatches and writing a reply to one of them. When he was ready, he called the soldier, and said: ‘Here, Radbourne; you must hurry back with all speed. Give this letter to the Prince, and say that all shall be done as he orders. You had better take your horse to the stable and rub him down and feed him, for it won’t do to break down to-night. But don’t delay starting, and keep your pistols loose.’
‘All right, captain,’ said Radbourne, as he prepared to carry out these directions, at the same time casting a fond look at the empty ale-jug.
The captain saw his glance, and said laughingly: ‘Come, good Mistress Dimbell, get this thirsty soul another draught, and he shall drink it to your health when he’s ready to start.’
When the trooper was gone, Captain Melford went to the door and whistled loudly, whereupon the sergeant of his troop came from a neighbouring cottage, and to him the captain gave certain orders, and then turned back to his interrupted supper. On entering the kitchen again, he found pretty Barbara Dimbell there, and seated in a corner was a rustic youth, who evidently, even in those exciting times, found in Barbara’s smiles an attraction of the most potent kind. Melford greeted him with a friendly smile, for he had found considerable amusement in watching the unsophisticated courtship of these two blushing lovers.
Mrs Dimbell said to him: ‘Come, sir, it’s a shame you can’t have a meal in peace; now, do sit down and finish.’
He looked graver than usual as he resumed his place at the table, and after a while said, almost as if he were speaking to himself: ‘This may be my last meal; who knows? I and my men are to set off by cockcrow, and I fear we shan’t all come back. Perhaps it’s my turn this time.’
‘Well, sir,’ said the farmer’s wife, ‘every bullet has its billet, as the saying is; but don’t be cast down. I hope we shall see you come riding back all right. But, God help us! these are bad times, when a man can’t be sure of his own life, let alone the beasts as he has brought up and the crops he has reaped. There’s our corn-stack has been carried half away this very week as ever was; and if it hadn’t been for your honour speaking up, we should not have had a cow left; and as for Barbara and John coming together, why, it’s my opinion as they’ll have{463} to wait years before we can turn ourselves again.’
The lovers looked up at this new view of things, and stared with undisguised dismay at each other.
But Captain Melford burst into a hearty laugh, and cried out: ‘Nay, things are not so bad as that.—Cheer up, my little apple-blossom, and see if you don’t get married before the year is out; and if I can’t come and dance at your wedding, I’ll send you something to remember me by.—But where is your husband, mistress, for I want to see him before I go to bed?’
The farmer, being called by his wife, made his appearance from one of the outhouses, where he had been attending to the wants of his cattle. He saluted the captain respectfully, and waited to hear what he had to say.
Beckoning them both into another room, the captain said: ‘Dimbell, I’ve got orders to march early in the morning, as a big fight is expected to-morrow. Now, I want you and your good wife to take care of this money for me. There’s nearly four hundred pounds in this bag, and it’s too much to carry about, especially when a man may get an ugly knock that will settle him entirely. So do you put it in some safe corner; and if I come out of the fight all right, you shall give it me again, and I’ll pay you well for what I’ve had here. But if I should be killed, you may keep the money for yourselves, and buy a bigger farm with it.’
‘Well, sir,’ said the farmer, ‘I’m sure I’ll do my best to keep it safe, and I hope as how you’ll come back to claim it; for your honour has been a civil gentleman to us, and has kept us from being eaten up by them soldiers, and I’m sure we all wish you might come back safe.’
‘Thanks, my good friends,’ was the reply. ‘And now I’ll go to bed and get a few hours’ sleep.’
The next morning he was up and away almost before the proverbial cockcrow. After his departure, Dimbell and his wife spent some time in searching for a secure hiding-place for the money intrusted to their care. That day, little work was done in the village, for the wild sounds of war came fitfully on the air as the incidents of the epoch-making battle of Naseby succeeded one another through the day. Some adventurous youths, who had followed the Royalist troops on their march, brought back fragmentary tidings of fierce strife and strange confusions, and of how they had seen the king’s carriage, and the king himself sitting in it. As the afternoon wore away, tumultuous bands of men came hurrying through the village and made with all speed for Market-Harborough. Their numbers increased, until it became evident that the Royalist army was in full retreat. At last, when the main bodies of both horse and foot had passed, and only wounded stragglers were to be seen, there came riding into the village a compact body of stern horsemen, who speedily occupied every point of vantage and took prisoners all the Royalist soldiers they found. The post was now in the hands of the Parliamentary army, and it was not long before trembling and terrified Mistress Dimbell was bidden to prepare accommodation for two officers in her house. The next day, fresh dispositions were made, and the village was left in comparative quiet, only a dozen soldiers remaining to prevent communications with the Royalist army.
The third day after, as John Sprayby was returning home from some rustic occupation in the dusk of the evening, he saw a strange figure crawling along under the shadow of the hedge. At first, it seemed like some beast; but as he drew nearer, he heard human groans proceeding from it. Evidently some wounded soldier was dragging himself painfully along, and John went towards him to see if he could render any help. He then saw that the poor man was crawling on his hands and one foot, the other foot being broken and crushed. Approaching still closer, he felt a shock of surprise and grief as he recognised Captain Melford.
‘Why, Master Melford,’ said he, ‘is that you, sir? Oh! what a pity! Here, lean on me, sir;’ and the good-hearted John blubbered lustily as he knelt down and strove to ease the poor man’s pain.
The captain was so exhausted that he could hardly speak, but he held John’s hand tightly as he said feebly: ‘How far is it to Mistress Dimbell’s? Are there any soldiers in the village?’
‘Well, sir,’ replied John, ‘there’s a few of ’em left; but there’s none at Dimbell’s now; so, if you would stop here a bit, I’ll go and fetch somebody, and we’ll make shift to get you there. Perhaps, if we take you the back way over the fields, none o’ the soldiers’ll see us.’
‘Do, John,’ said the wounded man; ‘and I’ll lie down here and stop quiet. But, for God’s sake, don’t be long, for I’m almost done.’
Upon this away went John, and soon returned with help enough to carry the wounded man to his old quarters in the farmhouse. The good dame and her daughter, who had prepared a bed immediately upon John’s report, hastened to wash and roughly dress the wound, and to feed the famished and half-dead man. All night they watched and tended him, but in the morning he was evidently worse, and seemed sinking down to death. There was no surgical aid near, and they dare not let his presence be known, for fear of the soldiery. All day he lay in a kind of stupor, hardly noticing the presence of any one; but in the evening he revived a little, and could speak. He called the farmer to him, and said brokenly to him and his wife: ‘My good friends, you’ve been very kind to me. I know I’m dying; you must be my heirs. Keep that money—the money I left with you. Let pretty Barbara get married. Tell John I thank him for bringing me here. I hope you’ll prosper. I shall be gone soon. May God have mercy on my king, and on my country! I die willingly for them.’
After this, he conversed no more, but lay breathing heavily, with his eyes fixed, and acknowledging only by a touch the kind offices that were done him. About ten o’clock at night, the farmhouse door was flung rudely open, and a loud voice called for the master of the house. Hurrying forward, Dimbell found himself confronted by a Parliamentary officer, and saw that the house was surrounded by soldiers. The officer said: ‘Whom have you got up-stairs? I{464} shall require you to answer for harbouring traitors. Come, show me the way.’
The farmer, with a sinking heart, showed the officer the room, and he entered noisily, crying: ‘Come, come, who are you?’
The dying man, somewhat aroused, turned his glazing eyes towards the sound, but took no further notice.
‘O sir,’ said the farmer’s wife, weeping and wringing her hands, ‘I’m afeared as he’s dying. Look at him, and you’ll see as he can’t be moved. O dear, O dear! Good gentleman, don’t you touch him.’
The officer, like most men of his class, though stern and uncompromising in duty, was far from unkindly, and was a deeply religious man. In the presence of death, all differences were dwarfed, and common humanity asserted itself. He turned to the dying man with a subdued manner and grave inquiries. ‘Ah! brother,’ said he, ‘this is an hour to prove the vanity of earthly things. I would fain ask if you have made your peace on high, and laid down your weapons of rebellion against the Divine Majesty? Bethink you that He is a God pardoning iniquity, transgression, and sin, and showing mercy unto all truly penitent souls. Look to the risen and glorified Mediator; for I am not one of those who would bid men fix their thoughts on Calvary, as if what was done there were still in course of being accomplished. But rest ye on a completed Atonement whereby thy peace is purchased for ever. Then thou shalt have no fear even in the gloomy valley.’
The dying man had recognised the officer as an opponent, and at first there had been a faint thrill of resistance to his words. But the tone was so sincerely kind, and there was such evident human interest and religious earnestness, that he accepted with a grateful look the exhortation addressed to him. No word passed his lips, but his eyes glanced upwards as if in silent prayer. The officer knelt down, and poured out with Puritan quaintness and fervour strong intercessions for the sufferer, praying that he might not fail of eternal glory. The awed farmer and his wife listened as to a strange tongue, and when the voice ceased Captain Melford was heard to say ‘Amen.’ They then saw one convulsive shudder pass through his frame, and all was over—Death had claimed his own.
What remains can be narrated briefly. The officer gave orders that the funeral should be conducted reverently; and on learning the name and rank of Captain Melford, undertook to communicate with his friends. After a time, the soldiers withdrew from the village, and its quiet life once more flowed into its former channels. John Sprayby and Barbara Dimbell were then married; and the old folks cautiously brought forward Captain Melford’s legacy, and set up the young ones on a farm. It was the beginning of assured prosperity to them; and to this day their descendants, still bearing the name of Sprayby, are found on the same farm. The little village of Bullenham bears no trace of the rough edge of war which once descended upon it, nor do many even of the neighbours know how from the red soil of battle sprang the large and peaceful prosperity of the Sprayby family.
Printed and Published by W. & R. Chambers, 47 Paternoster Row, London, and 339 High Street, Edinburgh.
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