_MARCH_
"To birdes and beestes
That no blisse ne knoweth,
And wild worms in wodes
Through wynter thou them grievest,
And makest hem welneigh meke,
And mylde for defaute,
And after thou sendest hem somer,
That is hiz sovereign joye,
And blisse to all that be,
Both wilde and tame."
_Vision of Piers Ploughman._
The winds of heaven were blowing, blowing; dust was flying on the
roads. The old saying that "a peck is worth a king's ransom" returned
to my mind. February fill-dyke had filled the springs and the
streams, and now March with his gay sun, and wild winds was drying
them as hard as he could. How pleasant it was to see the sun again!
He had been almost a stranger in the cold dark months of the young
year. Yet early as it was, Phoebus was proud and glorious and at his
fiery darts all nature seemed to begin and start life afresh.
Man, beast, and bird, all felt the mysterious influence of spring,
whilst up the stems of all the trees and plants, the sap began to
mount again.
I woke up early, but the world had already commenced its work, golden
rays of sunlight were pouring into the windows and I found, too, that
the restlessness of nature had seized me also, so I went and peeped
out of an old chamber that commanded the eastern garden.
Outside, there was a sense of great awakening--the sun flashed
merrily down on the frosty turf, and the congealed drops were already
fast disappearing into the ground. Starlings hurried, hither and
thither, like iridescent jewels, snowdrops lifted their heads and
waved them triumphantly in the breeze. The quice, as Shropshire folk
call wood-pigeons, I heard cooing in their sweet persuasive note in a
distant chestnut, and as I fastened back the window the musical hum
of bees sporting in the crocuses, caught my ear.
From the end of the border ascended the fragrance of a clump of
violets. How sweet is the return of spring, I murmured, and how
wonderful. What a joy, one of the joys we can never grow tired of, or
too old to feel afresh each year. Winter seems so long, and the
awakening and sweet summer all too short.
I returned to my room, dressed quickly, and then went out into the
garden.
[Sidenote: THE SONG OF BIRDS]
Life, life seemed everywhere. The wild birds were singing, calling,
flying backwards and forwards and seeking food. The speckled
storm-cock, as they call the missel thrush in Shropshire, was singing
gloriously on the top branch of a gnarled apple tree, whilst from a
bush of ribes as I passed along, a frightened blackbird lumbered away
with his angry protesting rattle. How handsome he is, the cock
blackbird, with his plumage of raven hue, and his golden dagger of a
beak. In the twilight how irresistible is the deep regret of his
song. It is a song, sweet, tender, full of old memories, and brings
back in its subtle melancholy, dear faces, and the touch of dear lost
hands that helped and loved us once. The blackbird's note is quite
different from the thrush; the thrush's song is all pure joy, and
glad expectation. He sings of morning, and all his notes are in a
major key. He chants of wholesome work, of brave endeavour, and of
spring gladness. His rapture is like that of the early poets. No note
of sorrow dulls his glorious morning. Joy, health, happiness, these
are the keynotes of his rhapsody--and we are grateful to him as we
are grateful for the sunshine, for the laughter of children, and for
the scent of flowers. It is hard to say which song we love best. But
why choose, for are not both God's feathered choristers, and their
songs our earliest melodies of childhood?
How feverishly busy everything was that morning, and how seriously
all living things took the annual dawn of life. The birds on the
lawns were pecking, pecking everywhere, finding food and seeking
materials for the future homes of their young.
[Illustration:
_THE SOUTH WEST VIEW OF WENLOCK ABBEY. IN THE COUNTY OF SALOP._
_From Buck's View._
WENLOCK ABBEY IN 1731.]
I stood quite still, against an ivied wall, and watched an old thrush
bring up a fat snail in her beak. In a second she had cracked the
shell upon a monastic stone, and was feasting greedily on the
contents. When she had flown away, I examined the bits of broken
shell, and discovered that they were of a dull brownish colour, and
that the snail was one of the kind that the Clugniac monks are said
to have brought with them from France, when Roger the great Earl of
Montgomery, brought over his band of monks from La Charité sur Loire,
and founded his monastery at Wenlock soon after the Conquest.
In the fourteenth and fifteenth century snails of this kind,
"Escargots" as they were then termed, and still are called in France,
were constantly used as a remedy "for restoring a right motion of the
heart, and for casting out melancholy." A cure, it is said, was also
wrought by a "cunning jelly" made from them, and this was supposed to
be "proper" food for those who "dwindered" or who were "subject to a
weak, or queasy stomach."
In the fourteenth century, I have been told, snails were sold at Bath
and in other towns in the west, to such as had consumptive
tendencies. Knowing this, and seeing how much escargots were used in
the Middle Ages, not only as a delicacy by the monks and nobles, but
also in medicine with herbs, presumably amongst the poor, it is
curious now, the horror that exists at the thought of eating either
snails or frogs. At first, when I gave some dinners to the very
needy, they would hardly dare come for them, and declared that they
were sure that in Auguste's ragouts there would be found some
lurking, somewhere.
"Us doesn't dare to search in the broth," one old man said, "for us
doesn't know what low beasts, slugs, snails, tadpoles, and what not a
foreigner mightn't mix in." But now happily they are reassured, and
old Ged Bebb told me only last week, "That, for all that they war
heathan (the cook men), the meat war good, and proper, and what
Christian folks cud eat."
[Sidenote: FLOWERS OF TWILIGHT]
I passed into the old red-walled garden and stopped to admire the
long line of brilliant yellow crocuses. They were all aglow in the
brilliant sunlight, and stood drawn up like a regiment of soldiers in
line. I stood entranced, for each soldier seemed to be holding a
lamp, and in each lamp, or cup, the sun was reflected in a wonderful
golden glory. It is hardly possible to exaggerate the beauty of
golden crocuses in golden sunlight. They seem to fill the world with
gladness and to be March's crowning glory. I stopped and looked at my
clumps of crocuses, they were coming up gaily, but were yet hardly in
blossom.
Burbidge put in for me strong clumps of Sir Walter Scott, Rizzio, and
of beautiful Mont Blanc. All these were pushing up bravely, out of
their mother earth. In fact, they were bursting, as Bess calls it, to
be out.
A minute later, I turned to inspect my chionodoxas and scillas. A few
were coming into bloom. Luciliae had several sprays of delicate china
blue and white flowers, and coppery two-blade leaves, and a patch of
blue _Scilla Sibirica_ had reared already a spray or two of gorgeous
ultramarine blossoms; but it was still early in March, and that is
the time of the promise of beautiful things, not yet the realization
of Flora's _fête_.
As I went by a bush of white Daphne, I heard that the bees had
discovered this spring delight--they were buzzing quite fiercely
round its tiny flowerets. What a perfume the Daphne has! What an
enchantment of rich odours! The pink bush on the other side of the
garden I noted would blossom shortly, but there is quite ten days'
difference in the flowering of the two varieties. The white follows
"on the feet of snow," as Burbidge expresses it, and the pink, "when
the spring has come." Of daffodils there was no sign as yet, save the
little hard green spikes, but the purple hellebores were proud in
their sombre magnificence. These always seem to me flowers that might
fitly have decked the brows of some great enchantress, Morgan le Fay,
or the Lady of the Lake. They vary from green to darkest purple, and
they seem hardly flowers of gaiety or morning, but rather the shadowy
blooms of twilight. Unlike their sister, the beautiful _Helleborus
niger_, they will not live, plucked, in water. When gathered, they
fade almost instantaneously and hang their heads in spite of salt or
charcoal being added to the water. I have heard it said that if the
stalks be cunningly split first, before being put in water, that they
will last some time; but I cannot say I have ever found this plan
successful, and have come to the conclusion that if you want to see
your purple hellebores in beauty, you must go into the garden to do
so.
Then, as I walked on, I noted that the white arabis was flowering in
places. Such a dear, homely little flower as it is, much loved by the
bees who had gathered to it like to a honey jar. As I stood watching
"the little brown people," I heard the guttural click-click of the
little common wren. What a tiny little bird she is, the Jenny Wren of
the old nursery rhyme--"God Almighty's hen," some of the old folk
still call her here. It is wonderful to think that so deep a note can
come out of so small a body.
Jenny hopped about from twig to twig, gaily enough, cocked her tail,
and was, according to Burbidge, as "nimble as ninepence."
[Sidenote: THE NEST IN THE KETTLE]
Here in Shropshire, in spite of the superstition that she was under
special Divine Providence, the wren was often hunted at Yule-tide.
Gangs of boys used formerly to chase poor Jenny with sticks, in and
out of hedgerows, and over banks and stones. Particularly did this
ignoble sport take place on the sides of the Clee Hills, and on the
flanks of the Wrekin. Now, happily, the time of persecution is past,
and Jenny no longer suffers ill from the hands of men. Hopping
fearlessly near me was the pet robin that I fed through the evil days
of snow and frost. How gorgeous he looked, with his scarlet
waistcoat, how sleek and plump; and how full and liquid was his great
brown eye. I begged Burbidge to leave, as last year, the old iron
kettle in the arbour of honeysuckle, where he and Madam had their
nest and reared their offspring last spring. How tame she was, with
her little breast of yellowish brown and her liquid great eyes that
used to watch me so keenly when I looked down upon her in the kettle.
How patiently she sat, and how sweetly he sang to her, amongst the
blossoms, his whole throat moving with his trilling rapture. For two
years he and "Madam Buttons" have built in the kettle and brought up
their nestlings there, and preferred that site to a hole in bank or
wall, branch of tree, or to the thick shelter of the yews.
The robin is looked upon in Shropshire as a sacred bird. Folks here
believe that some terrible calamity will surely overtake him who robs
a nest or kills "God's cock." A poor woman once gravely told me that
her little son's arm was withered, "be like," she considered, "that
he had robbed a robin's nest."
"Him who slays a robin, may look to his special damnation," an old
man once said to me, who had seen what he termed a "gallous lad"
throw a stone at one.
"Why thee cannot be content to rob the other birds, and leave God
Almighty's fowls alone, I canna' understand," was also an angry
remark I once heard addressed by a mother to a seven-year-old lad,
and the remark was followed by sharp correction with a hazel switch.
The old fear of, and reverence for the robin comes doubtless from the
legend that the robin pricked his breast against the nails of the
cross, and ministered by song and devotion to the Divine Master in
His agony, and thus gained for himself and for all his posterity the
affection of God, and the gratitude of man. In the old miracle plays
the robin was often spoken of as "God's bird," and this also may have
gained for him the love of many generations.
I passed out of the wrought-iron gates, and went into the meadows on
the east side of the Abbey. The fields lay brown still, and were as
bare as a billiard-table. They had been closely nipped by industrious
sheep during long winter months, and now there was but little for the
young life to feed on. Old, heavy, grey-faced ewes were bleating and
baaing, whilst skipping, capering and leaping about were some eight
or nine lambs. What jocund games theirs were, what heights they
jumped, and with all four legs off the ground at once. As I looked, I
wondered what were the rules of the game, and what impulse directed
their sport; for there seemed to be a leader in the revels, who ran
and skipped first, after which they all ran round, mounted an
incline, descended and mounted it afresh, cutting a hundred capers,
and playing a hundred pranks, but all according to some old unwritten
law and regulation. After a few moments of watching the pretty little
creatures, I made my way to the old embankment which runs across the
meadows on the southern side, and which formed once the mighty dam of
the artificial lake from which the prior of Wenlock drew up his fish
in Lent and on special fast days. There probably during the Middle
Ages the lake was well supplied with carp, eels, trout, and perch.
Old Dame Juliana Berners, the prioress of Sopwell, near St. Albans,
wrote much and praised warmly the pleasures of angling.
"If the sport fail," she wrote, "at least the angler hath his holsom
walke, and may enjoy at his ease the ayre and swete savoure of the
medes of floures that maketh him hungry and he may hear also the
melodious harmony of fowles." She then goes on to say that he can see
also, thus happily employed, "the wild broods of young swannes,
heerons, duckes, cotes and all other fowles," and declares that a
silent walk by stream or lake in her eyes confers a greater and
deeper happiness upon the angler "than all the noyse of hounds," than
"the blasts of hornes," or "the wilde scrye that hunters of fawkeners
can make."
I like to think of the holy brothers fishing here in their hours of
recreation, after their vigils, fasts, and prayers. As I walked along
I saw the group of willows that had turned crimson and brilliant
amber, and far away I heard the cawing of the rooks as they flew over
the plantation of poplars, which, too, were turning red. I followed
along the Abbot's Walk, as the townspeople term the dam, and then
passed through a hunting gate across a wild field of scrubby bushes
and rough herbage where the wild plover was uttering her melancholy
cry and wheeled in circles overhead. The mole-catcher had been at
work, a string of velvety moles hung like grapes upon a thorn.
Some years ago, "the ount catcher," as he is called here, old Peter
Purslowe, appeared in a moleskin waistcoat. Since then, however, he
has never worn another. "The missus," I was told, "found it too weedy
a job ever to make a second, although it furnishes well, but it had
more stitches than ever there be stones at the Abbey."
[Sidenote: THE RETURN OF THE ROOKS]
I approached the rookery; what a babel greeted my ears, yet if you
have ever listened carefully you will perceive that each rook has a
different note of voice, and I suspect, if you knew rooks
individually, you would notice, like in the songs of canaries, that
no two rooks ever caw precisely alike.
What a wonderful thing it is, the return of the rooks to any given
place.
For months they had been absent from this spot, gone nobody knows
where. Not a sign of them. And then, almost to a day, they
reappeared, and claimed their own tree and branch; and each pair, I
fancy, went back to the site of its former nest. Curious stories are
told of the sagacity of rooks, of their self-government, and of how
offenders who have disobeyed some common law have been executed
before large numbers, evidently as a judgment, and as a warning to
others.
As I watched them, a story bearing out the truth of this statement
came back to me. In the rookery of a friend there was hatched, I was
told, a rook with white wings. The community did not make any
objection to the youngster being reared there; but when, the
following year, the white-winged bird returned to an old avenue of
elms, where he had been hatched, exception was taken to his desire to
nest there. It seemed, said my friend, as if a congress was called,
and as if the strangely marked rook and his mate were given the
option to fly elsewhere, or receive some dire punishment; for at
intervals they were chased away, but kept on returning to the same
spot. All day, rooks seemed, said my informant, to flock to the
avenue, till the air seemed almost black with them. They flew, cawed
wildly, and seemed in a highly excited state. This went on hour after
hour, without any apparent change; until at last one old bird
descended from the branch on which he had been perched, and standing
on the grass, flapped his wings slowly, uttering a strange, low,
mysterious cry, more like the husky croaking of a carrion crow than
the cawing of a rook. In a moment the whole grove, said my informant,
resounded with the cries of the rooks, and one and all simultaneously
fell upon the unfortunate bird with the white wings, screaming and
cawing, and never rested until they had pecked him to death, and torn
almost every feather out of his helpless body.
I recalled this curious story, and then watched the birds as they
flew round, finding sticks for their nests. Ash sticks seemed to be
their favourite material, or twigs from the great wych-elm a field
away.
The rooks seemed, to quote a boyish expression, "to build fair,"
quite different from the mischievous jackdaws, "who will allus rather
thieve than work," as an old keeper once said to me.
It is curious how rooks change their food during the different months
of the year. They feed their young almost entirely on animal food
till they leave the nest. As a rule, they give the young rooks,
grubs, worms and cockchafers; but during the very dry summers that
closed the nineteenth century, being short of insect food, the old
birds took to robbing hen-coops, and fell also upon young pheasants
and partridges in the grass. Several keepers have told me that they
were obliged to destroy whole rookeries on this account, for when a
rook once takes to chickens or pheasants, like a man-eating tiger, he
will never return to humbler diet.
It is wonderful how tenacious rooks are, of returning year after year
to the same place, and how difficult it is for any one to start a new
colony. Nests may be put up, and young birds partially tamed, but it
is a hard matter, as a gardener once said to me, "to 'tice the rooks
against their will; 'tis like callin' the wild geese, unless they
wish to hear."
[Sidenote: ROOKS LEAVE FOR A DEATH]
In the South there is a strong belief that when the rooks abandon a
rookery some misfortune will happen to the owner. At Chilton Candover
it is said, there was much excitement because the rooks in Lady
Ashburton's park unaccountably forsook their nests. Almost
immediately afterwards occurred Lady Ashburton's death, and many
stories of a similar character are told.
As I leant over the fence, watching what was going on in the rookery,
I heard a strange low cry in the distance, as of something unearthly
and eërie--what Bess once said sounded like the "call-note of a
witch." I remarked in the great black bird that came overhead, a
different flight, slower and heavier than that of a rook, and I
recognized in the bird approaching a carrion crow.
I stood motionless. The rooks were too much occupied with their
building operations to notice the enemy, but the peewits, who lay
earlier in the meadow beyond, were calling uneasily, uttering that
strange cry of alarm which is their special note of warning. On flew
the carrion crow, the bird of ill-omen in the old ballads and a
messenger of death according to old belief. Anyway, if not quite so
evil as he has been represented, the crow is a bird that does great
damage to keepers and farmers and has few friends. As he flew away, I
heard at regular intervals, his creepy wicked cry.
Old Shropshire folks still repeat to their grandchildren, when they
see a carrion crow--
"Dead 'orse, dead 'orse,
Where? Where?
Prolly Moor. Prolly Moor.
We'll come, we'll come.
There's nought but bones."
In old days, Shropshire children used to imagine that carrion crows
flew off at night to Prolly Moor, there to roost. Prolly Moor is a
great tract of wild land that lies at the foot of the Longmynd, and
is said to be the sleeping-ground of crows and the place where
witches hold midnight revels. I kept my eyes on the bird, and saw him
sail away, skirting in his flight the old town, and at last I noted
that he flew over the top of the Edge, at the back of Wenlock Town.
[Sidenote: LIFE IS A DREAM]
As I retraced my steps homewards, I was greeted by the soft music of
the chimes. How prettily they sounded across the meadows; "Life is a
dream, life is a dream," they seemed to say; yet for all their dreamy
sound I remembered that they are calling out the hour of nine, and in
spite of the joy of spring, the cry of birds, and the charm of beast
and flower, I hurried up the stairs to the east garden and regained
the house.
On the threshold of the east entrance to the Abbey I met Bess.
"Mama," she said reprovingly, "where have you been? Your breakfast is
getting cold, and it is to-day, to-day I tell you."
The last part of Bess's speech referred to the gift--the present of
all the presents, as my little girl called it--which was to arrive;
in other words, to the pug puppy.
"Listen, mama," she cried, "it is to come by the train this
afternoon; and Mamie has sent me a ribbon, all blue," and my little
girl showed me a ribbon and a letter announcing the fact in a
childish round hand. "Pups," continued Bess, gravely, "cannot be
dressed in anything but blue. Then there is the day-bed to discuss,
his saucer and his supper plate--mamsie, there is a great deal to
do," and Bess hurried me upstairs to see the preparations.
We found together a white saucer, and Bess looked forward to washing
it. But Nan said severely, "Best let Liza, she understands such
things." And I feared, from the pursed-down corners of Nan's mouth,
poor master pug would get but a scant welcome. Bess noticed the
expression on old Nana's face and whispered, "Specs God never gave
Nan a dog-brother in all her life." Nan sat on stitching as if
nothing could move her from her seat, as she always does in moments
of irritation, and I must agree with Bess, that she was neither kind
nor helpful in her preparations for the arrival of Prince Charming,
as we christened our expected visitor.
As we left the room, Nan lifted her eyes from her work, and said
severely, "Might be a baby, I'm sure." We both felt rather chilled at
this, and Bess took my hand, and, while she jumped down two steps at
a time, asked if I didn't think my own bedroom would be better for
the Prince than hers.
"One dog more, mamsie," she urged, "couldn't make much difference.
Where there's place for Mouse, mams, I am sure there is place for a
pup."
"But supposing Mouse objected?" I said. "What a big mouth she has, and
what sharp teeth, and what a poor little thing the Prince would be in
her jaws! Besides," I asserted, "I must introduce them carefully; what
if our old friend should be jealous or 'unsympathetic' like another old
friend?"
"Whatever Mouse may be, she can never," declared Bess, "be real
cross, like a real live woman. Dogs aren't made that way." And so
that part of the subject dropped.
[Sidenote: PRINCE CHARMING IS COME]
I went down to breakfast, and Bess sat by me talking twelve by the
dozen; her whole soul was engrossed as to where the Prince's
day-basket was to be kept, and whether the miniature blanket was to
be tucked round his infinitesimal serene highness--or not.
As I got up from my breakfast, I saw to my dismay that the post had
brought me, what a friend calls, "an avenging pile of letters." How
many hours' writing they meant, and other people's work! Bess
standing by cried, "I wish they were all mine, I never get letters
except on my birthday, and at Christmas."
"And never have to answer them," I said. "Ah, my dear, when one grows
up, letters mean other things besides invitations and presents. They
can mean requests, bothers, worries, other people's work--and are
always sharp scissors for cutting up leisure, and preventing happy
hours in the garden or with one's embroidery."
"I shouldn't have them, then," retorted Bess, stolidly.
"What would you do?"
"Burn them and see what happened."
I looked at Bess and laughed. After all, the idea may be more
"Philosophe qu'on ne pense." But I was not strong enough to carry her
suggestion into action, so I kissed Bess, told her I could not carry
out her plan, and said I must write all the morning, but hoped by
industry to save the afternoon for myself, and to spend it as I
wished.
At last all the letters were answered--invitations, requests,
permissions, "characters," money sent to charities, and a great
packet was assembled in the letter-box--then when the last was
finished, I called to Mouse, and we wandered out together into the
garden.
I felt that I had earned the pleasure of a free time amid my birds
and flowers. I walked along the kitchen garden path and paused to
enjoy that most excellent and wholesome of all good smells, the odour
of newly upturned earth.
To the south is a hedge of thorn some four feet high, and facing the
same direction is a high wall where apricots, peaches and pears are
trained.
The pears were all in blossom in dense sheets of snow, and only tips
of green were visible here and there. To save the blooms from the
frost, Burbidge had put some tiffany in front of the trees, and fixed
down the coarse muslin-like stuff by laths of wood. There were also
cordons of pears running athwart the wall, and over these to protect
them he had put fir branches. These pears are of the magnificent
early dessert sorts such as Clapp's Favourite, Williams' Bon
Chrétien, Souvenir de Congrès, and beside these we have the earliest
variety of all, the delicious little Citron des Carmês, which often
yields a dish of pears the first week in August, before, so to speak,
one has begun to realize that summer is fleeting.
On entering our little kitchen garden, there is a hedge of roses on
each side trained against some iron rails. On one side ramps the
delightful Gloire de Dijon roses with all its many tinted blossoms of
orange, creamy white, and buff shades; on the other, is a hedge of
the superb old General Jacqueminot. The General is a magnificent
summer blossomer, he flowers in June even in Shropshire, and his
flowers are of the richest, fullest, crimson, and of delicious
sweetness--not as large as many of the new hybrid perpetual sorts,
but General Jacqueminot's rich red is of extreme beauty, and
whatsoever the season he always blossoms, and the scent is one of the
sweetest known. Then I paused to stop at my bed of Ranunculi, a
flower which once was held in great favour by English gardeners, but
which now seldom finds a place in English _parterres_. Nothing could
be seen but a few little curly leaves like sprouting parsley, but
later I hoped for and expected a glory of colour. I grow all colours,
crimson, vermilion, salmon, pink, fawn, cherry and black, and some
are of the darkest shade of sumptuous orange.
[Sidenote: THE VISIT TO CLUN]
These flowers are often found in old Italian Church work, and I have
read they were brought to Venice by the Moors, and so introduced into
Italy. I found Burbidge waiting for me as I came up to him. He said
he was pleased to see me. I had not seen the old man in the garden
for some weeks. He had been ill since his visit to Clun, and I had
only seen him in bed, and then in the presence of his old wife
Hester--an austere middle-aged woman "given to chapel ways," as
Burbidge expresses it, so I had heard nothing fresh of Benjamin or of
his granddaughter Sal. After we had settled the kinds of dahlias, and
how best to sow the sweet-peas, which last were to be sown in
separate groups in lines, I called my old gardener aside, away from
"his boys" as he calls them, although Roderick Pugh and Absolom
Preece are middle-aged men, and asked him in a whisper about his
visit to Clun.
"Was your brother better?" I asked. "Anyway, tell me about them all."
"Dahlias first," said Burbidge shortly, and touched his hat. And I
felt there was not a moment to be wasted, so we looked out a plot of
ground that was suitable to receive all the tubers, and then at last
I got him away, and to speak about his visit to his brother.
Poor Sal----
At first my old friend would not answer my questions, and only looked
grave, and shook his head. But at last he yielded to my entreaties,
and after calling out to his boys to attend to their business and to
do some "job" in the far distance, he followed me into a secluded
path.
"I would not for ever so much as them boys should hear," he began.
"It might clean scare they, and make 'em feckless about their spring
digging and fettling; but as yer have asked me, I'll make a clean
breast of the business. I looked in at the show, but," Burbidge
declared scornfully, "it warn't nothing better than I've seen scores
of times in my own apple-room; and as to the crocuses, hellebores and
scillas, they wern't nothing but what us has, and better."
My old friend always enjoys speaking disparagingly of shows and
exhibitions, whatever he really thinks, for even gardeners are not
without some particle of envy, I shrewdly suspect.
"Well," continued Burbidge, "after business," and I knew business
meant something connected with the garden, "I went on to Clun, and
there was a deal of getting to get to Clun--stopping, waiting, and
misinforming, but at last the job got done. When yer wants, yer gets,
as Humphrey Kynaston said when he made the leap."
"Yes, Burbidge, but how about your brother?" I said, trying to make
him keep to his point.
"I found him and Sal," answered Burbidge, "strange as bats in
sunlight. They were both overlooked, sure enough. Dazed and dimmy,
same as if they had been bashed and bummelled for a whole live-long
week."
"What did you do?" I inquired.
[Sidenote: I KNOW OF A CHARM]
"I just spoke," was his reply. "But I couldn't get no answer. One and
t'other, they looked like cats as had been fair nicked by a
blacksmith's dog, and they youped and trembled whensoever I
spoke--and wouldn't answer, more than bats in a rick-yard. As to Sal,
I couldn't get nothing out of she, save that a white dove had flown
again her bedroom winder, and had called out, 'Come, spirit, come;'
and as to brother Benjamin, he nodded and spoke Dutch, he war that
mazed and foolish, and while he war taking on like, who should step
inside but his son Frank. And Frank he come in bold as a lion, and
trim as a dandy with a bobbish tie, and he said, 'Here be Malachi,
him as was born under this roof when my missus war took worse all of
a sudden. He be a tall young fellow, hale, hearty, and fresh as a May
sprig. He have joined the volunteers, and has at home his uniform,
which be next best to a general's.' And when brother Ben heard him,
he fair burst out in a rage. 'What matters it,' he saith, 'what
generals, or kings, or thy sons clothe themselves in, or who has beef
or beer when _I_ sits in mortal fear;' and he shivered and quailed
same as a poor body in a Poorhouse as hasn't nought of his own, not
so much as his own pipe or the shirt to his back. And while father
and son were talking, Malachi he comed up, and he said, smiling like
an April day, 'Never you fear, grandad, for all I'm young, I know of
a charm as 'ull free you from all her hanky-panky ways.' And then,
without a word from his grandad, he kind of touched his stick as if
he war touchin' a pretty wench as he war keeping company with, and he
started whistlin' an old tune, and he called out over his shoulder,
'I'll cure ye,' and laughed as one who has a joke all to hisself, and
so out went Malachi.
"Then there was quiet for a bit, and I heard naught but a crying of
the wind outside; but suddenly voices got introduced, and we heard a
crying and a calling and a scuffling in the garden, or thereabouts,
loud as the cry of the Seven Whistlers; and I sat quiet till I could
stand no more, then I peered out, and there, sure enough, war Malachi
and the witch.
"And Malachi, he called out, 'Down on yer knees, yer old hathan, or
I'll beat yer--old witch as yer call yerself--black and blue if yer
don't stir yer old tongue and say arter me, "I hain't got no magic,
nor no charms neither, I be a born fool, and I swear I'll leave
Benjamin Burbidge and his granddaughter for ever more alone."'
"And the witch," continued old Thomas, "her did swear it. 'So help me
God, I will,' her cried out; and her spoke as true as Gospel truth,
for I think her meant it, for as Malachi said, 'tis wonderful, even
with a witch, the magic of a stout ash-plant."
Burbidge's words still rung in my ears when running up the garden
path I saw my little maiden approaching me.
"We shall be late," she cried excitedly, "if you don't come at
once--at once, I say. And think what a terrible thing it would be to
keep Prince Charming waiting."
I nodded to Burbidge and started off with Bess at a brisk trot up the
front drive, mounted the field that led to the station, and waited
panting on the platform for the little dog.
To my surprise Bess had a cloak on her arm.
"You are not cold, child?" I asked.
"No, no, mum; but what if the pug was to catch cold?"
"We must hope not, for that would be a calamity," I answered.
Bess skipped and danced up and down, clinging to my hand, jumping and
swaying backwards and forwards, as if her little body were made of
quicksilver. Then, after a while, she suddenly fell into a reflective
mood, and asked what are the best ways of forgetting that you are
waiting?
"To think of something else, or not to want so badly," I answered.
"I couldn't do that," answered Bess, gravely, "because I shouldn't be
me if I did, and he couldn't be Prince Charming if I didn't want him.
I feel," she gasped, "as if I just want, want till I am dying of
wanting."
I looked at my little girl. "Suppose he didn't come by this train,
what would you do then?"
"I don't know. Go to bed, I think, and cry."
[Sidenote: THE PRINCE ARRIVES]
But happily there was no need of so sad an ending to a bright spring
day, for as I spoke the train rushed in. The porter hurried forward,
and there was a general commotion. Two passengers got out, a couple
of old fowls were removed, and a second later, a little basket also
was taken out of the luggage-van.
"Shall I have this sent to the Abbey?" inquired the station-master.
But Bess would not hear of so slow a manner of getting the pug-puppy
down. In delirious joy the little mantle was flung on the ground and
her arms were tightly clasped round the basket. When one has been
sent a pug-pup there is only one place to go to--home.
So I picked up the mantle, and Bess, bearing her cherished
possession, led the way.
Then there was tea, which, as we have no bells, Bess saw to herself.
I heard her in the passage giving a hundred contradictory orders. It
is to come at once, and then, there's to be broth for the puppy and
cakes, "sponge and the other, and meat," and at last she returned
breathless to me.
"I have ordered everything," she cried, and took the little dog off
my knee. It was a sweet little baby dog with a crinkly-crankly black
phiz and dear little blinking, cloudy blue eyes. The ribbon that was
sent to adorn his neck was much too big to fasten round his throat,
but he looked contented and rested drowsily under Bess's continued
protestations of affection.
After tea we sat on before the chapel hall fire.
"I thought last Christmas," said Bess, "when I had the white bride
doll, that I never should want nothing no more. But now that I have
the pug Prince, I know I shall never want anything again, not if I
live to be a hundred."
"Wait till the next time," I laughed. At that moment I heard a
scratching at the study door, which opens upon the chapel hall. I
opened it and took Mouse gently by the collar.
"Bess," I said, while I held on tightly, "the introduction must be
made, but with tact," and I and Mouse returned together.
I put the puppy on the rug. Mouse looked at it sadly and then walked
severely away.
"Why does she behave like that?" asked Bess. "See, Mouse is whining
and wants to go out."
"She is jealous," I said.
"Why should she mind?"
"Think, Bess," I replied, "what would you say if there came here a
new baby, a new helpless little thing. Might it not be just a little
bit of a trial to you, don't you think, when you saw all the world
running about to welcome it, cake, tea, milk, cream, all ordered for
it at once? We none of us like being put in the shade, not even
Mouse."
Bess looked at me, and then putting the pug down, she cast her arms
effusively round the great hound's neck.
"You must forgive my little pup," she said coaxingly, "and not hate
presents, even if they are for other people," and a shower of kisses
followed.
[Illustration: "MOUSE" AT HOME.]
[Illustration: "MOUSE" ON A VISIT.
_Photos by Miss Gaskell._]
Mouse was mollified; she looked at me gravely. He has not the first
place, she seemed to say, and she came and laid her great head
solemnly on my knees.
"She knows," said Bess, "that not even Prince Charming can put her
nose out of joint."
Mouse watched the little pug out of the corner of her eye, but with
more sadness than malice. Bess fed her with slices of cake, whilst
the pug approached her future gigantic companion.
"All friends now," Bess whispered. "Nobody now to get nice but Nana;
but nurses always take longer to forgive than dogs."
[Sidenote: NANA IS KIND]
In the evening I stole upstairs and found Prince Charming sleeping in
his little basket by Bess's bed. Apparently old Nana had yielded to
his charms, or else was reconciled to his having a nursery existence.
She got up from her sewing and said with a smile on her good old
face, "Bless her little heart, how it do please her, the pup; but
then she must have what she has a mind to."
After this, I had a quiet hour with my books, and I took down for the
last half-hour a volume of Montaigne. What delightful company he is,
always bright and cheery, full of knowledge, and yet always so human.
I came to the passage which Madame de Sévigné always said brought
tears to her eyes. I refer to the "affection of the Mareschal de
Montluc for his son who died in the island of Madeira."
"My poor boy," wrote the Mareschal, "never saw me with other than a
stern and disdainful countenance, and now he is gone in the belief
that I neither knew how to love him, nor esteemed him according to
his deserts," and the remorse and pity of it all. In the silence of
the night it all came home to me. What a touching picture it is, the
reserved old man with no word of love on his tongue, and yet his
heart full of affection. "For whom," cries the grief-stricken old
man, "did I reserve the discovery of that singular affection that I
had for him in my soul?" What a pathetic tale it is, one of
Montaigne's many. What a homely tongue the great essayist has, and
yet what a wise one--possessing, as he does, the art of telling us
all the old tales of Greece and Rome clothed in summer verdure, so
that the leaves of his discourse never grow stale or faded. He makes
the ancient world live again, and gives men and women who lived and
died hundreds of years before he was born new life and beauty.
"Oh, do not let us love in vain. Let us find out our love before the
wave has gone over the dear one's head," is what I seemed to hear.
"Do not let our lips call in the coming time, 'Lord, too late, too
late!'"
I thought of little Bess, the happy owner of her dog, and I said, at
least, Lord, my little maid will look back on her childhood, I hope,
as a happy, happy time, a time of flowers, and joyous play. Bad times
must come, but let me be a happy parent in that I have given my child
no more unhappy time than I could help!
The next morning. I sauntered off into the garden. There were the
gladioli to plant, so that they might blossom well before the autumn
frosts.
[Sidenote: FLOWERS IN A GARDEN]
First of all, come the beautiful early summer sorts such as the
delicate Bride, Leonora, Mathilde, and Colvilli, and then in autumn
the brilliant Brenchleyensis, Gandavensis, and exquisite soft tinted
Lemoinei. Burbidge has a pocket-book in which the date of all
plantings as well as sowings are registered. "Them gladiolouses," as
he calls them, "war put in the 4th of March last year, so they this
year must be put in their places without delay in the red-walled
garden to enliven the borders, and there must be a large patch in the
kitchen garden for pulling" (picking), for Burbidge, in common with
most gardeners, cannot bear picking his blossoms in the real flower
garden. Blows for the garden is the old man's constant adage, and he
will sometimes say sourly, "What for do ladies want their places
littered about with jars and tubs and what not, same as if their
chambers was fresh-blown meads? Let 'em be, say I, where the hand of
the Lord hath put 'em." And he will add, "growing blows is right,
'cause it is in the way of nature, but I don't hold to parlour
bowers. They be unwholesome, not to say a bit retchy." I am inclined
to agree with my old friend in some of his strictures about the
modern drawing-room, for a room laden with scents, and that has
closed windows, is certainly a productive source of headaches.
As I stood by the garden watching Burbidge and his men plant the
gladioli, a little figure dashed up to me. "Mama," cried Bess, in a
state of wild excitement, "they've come, two real princes, I really
do believe."
I was puzzled for a moment, but at last I stammered out, "Where?
Where?"
"At the pond, at the pond," exclaimed Bess, trembling with delight.
I could not get anything more out of Bess, but Burbidge, hearing her
mention the pond, hobbled up.
"Bless her little heart!" he said, "the little lady means the swans."
And in answer to my inquiry, "What swans?" he answered--
"Didn't yer hear, mam, about the great birds? No?" Then he went on to
tell me how, in the early morning, when he and the under-gardeners
"war fettling up on the east side between six and seven, us suddenly
heard a kind of unearthly crying, like some one moaning and sobbing,
and whispering right up aloft. And then," continued my old friend, "I
seed such a sight as I've never seen afore. Fowls as big as chest o'
drawers flyin' round and round. They came on flying in great circles,
as if they couldn't stop, till down they flumped like a couple of
cannon balls, and struck slap into the great Abbey pool.
"I did," pursued Burbidge, "tell Miss Célestine later to let yer
know, seeing as you be interested in all fur and fluff, birds and
insects, and most varmint, but her have no sense, save for frills and
furbelows."
On hearing of the arrival of the swans, I seized hold of Bess's hand,
and off we went together to welcome our new visitors.
They were beautiful white birds of spotless plumage, probably driven
from the lake of Willey, or from further off, by the cruelty of their
parents. For old swans become terribly fierce as the nesting season
comes on, and will not even allow the offspring of a past spring to
remain on their own waters.
"How lovely they are," said Bess, enthusiastically. "It is a real
fairy-story, mamsie, this time."
[Sidenote: MOUSE FEEDS ON BREAD]
Then we returned to the Abbey, and brought out a basket of broken
scraps. Bess threw some pieces into the water, and the swans stooped
down their beautiful graceful necks and fed with avidity. Bess
watched them intently, whilst Mouse, who had followed us too, looked
on superciliously; and then, with great greediness, ate all the bread
that she could reach, so that, as Bess said, "too much food should
not be wasted on mere swans."
"Isn't she greedy?" cried Bess. "At home she hardly eats even cake!"
Poor old Mouse! She is made up of unamiable vices, excepting to us.
Then Nana appeared, and declared crossly that my little girl would
catch her death of cold standing on the damp grass by the water.
Bess fired up at this and retorted, "As if, Nana, people ever catch
cold when they watch swans. Why, my mother watches birds hundreds of
hours, and she never catches cold."
But, in spite of Bess's protestations, my little maid was carried off
by Nan, who, I heard, afterwards went off to the post-office to get a
postal order.
When Bess returned from her short turn, I noticed that she was grave
and silent, and not at all the usual bouncing Bess of Wenlock, as we
are wont to call her. I mentioned that I was going for a longer walk,
in search of white violets, and begged her to come with me, if she
was not too tired, and bring a basket in case we found any.
At first I thought Bess's reluctance sprang from the fact that Prince
Charming would have to be left at the Abbey, although I assured her
that Auguste would fully console the Prince for our absence; but say
what I would, Bess seemed out of spirits. And so, before we started,
I sat down on a bench and asked my little girl, who looked worried,
if she was not feeling well.
"Yes," answered Bess, "only, only----" And then I found out the
truth. "When Nan and I were walking in the town," Bess explained,
"Mr. James, Hals' father's coachman, came into the chemist's shop and
told us that Fräulein was dreadful bad, tumbled down and broke her
leg, he said. He laughed and said it was a judgment for being _that
nasty_ to Master Harry. But oh, mama, could it--could it really be?"
"No, Bess," I answered quickly, "don't think that for a moment. You
were very naughty, and very silly, but then you are only a little
child, and you did not know what you said, or understood what you
meant. Beside," I said rather grandly, to get over the difficulty,
"God has other work than to attend to the idle words of a little
child. So dry your eyes, dear, and be a happy little person again.
Run upstairs and fetch a basket, and we will go off together."
But Bess shook her head. "I will be a happy little girl," she said,
"but I'd rather not go all the same," and she left me.
So I started off alone with Mouse, who, nothing loth, followed me
gladly on my expedition.
We all have favourite flowers, or imagine that we have, probably
owing to some early association or to some tender recollection. Queen
Bess is said to have best loved meadow-sweet, with which her chambers
were strewn. The great Condé, they say, was devoted to pinks; and
Marie Antoinette is said to have loved sweet rocket, bunches of which
were brought her by Madame Richard to the Temple.
I called to mind these favourite blossoms, but my floral love is not
of the garden, it has no place in tended borders. I love it even
better than the choicest rose, or the most brilliant gladiolus, or
the most stately lily. It grows amongst the hedgerows of Shropshire,
and is known as the wild white violet.
[Sidenote: THE FLOWERS OF SPRING]
Its scent is sweet but often elusive, and as evanescent as a
beautiful smile. Our highly cultivated borders and _parterres_ are
beautiful, but our wild carpets in field and wood more beautiful.
Wild flowers come amidst the grass, and blossom at their own sweet
will in their own sweet place, and the moor, meadow, or coppice make
the most enchanting background for their loveliness.
I wandered along the green paths with hedgerows starting into life,
and came to the conclusion that the flowers we each love best are the
homely flowers of childhood that we played by, and plucked as
children. The dog-rose, the violet, or the primrose, whose leaves we
know the inside and the outside of, whose stalks we have handled a
hundred times, and whose scents recall dear faces, and gentle
memories, that go back to long ago.
I walked along, Mouse following dutifully behind me. The hedgerows
were full of green curls and twists, groups of wild arums glittered
on the banks below hazel and quickset hedges. Here and there little
patches of grass had burst into emerald green, and a few daisies were
turning their discs to heaven, whilst in sheltered spots dim
primroses were dawning shyly on the world, filling the atmosphere
with sweet dalliance and dreaminess. Once, as I wandered along, I saw
behind a cottage in a lane a mauve carpet of periwinkles, and once,
beneath a chestnut, I saw the glitter of golden king-cups, that
Wordsworth loved so well. The afternoon was very fair, purple and
golden lights flitted round the hills and rested on the freshly
ploughed hillsides; "longer days and sunshine," the thrushes seemed
to sing, and I heard them piping exultantly in every orchard as I
passed. I went by the Red Marsh Farm, past the old mullion-windowed
barn, which is said to have been a chapel in monkish days, and so
across the close-nipped fields to Sherlot Forest. I walked by a patch
of gorse all ablaze with golden blossoms. Tiny young rabbits dashed
under cover, showing their white scuts. My great hound lumbered after
them like a luggage train in mad career; but nothing happened--they
vanished like lightning, and Mouse joined me panting at the hunting
gate below. As I whistled her into heel, I noticed that the
honeysuckles in the hedgerow were clothing themselves in silvery
green, and that a willow by a pool was bursting into golden glory.
The earth was dry and I could not resist sitting down for a moment. A
squirrel dashed up an oak and scolded and chattered, Mouse, seeing
him, growled angrily; a greenfinch flew from out of a thicket, giving
me a beautiful vision of apple-green wings; whilst in the distance I
heard, far off, the note of a distant blackbird singing a song of
regret and tender longing. How enchantingly lovely all was, and on
all sides no sounds but country ones.
I peeped over the hedge, men were ploughing and sowing the grain, and
away to the west I heard a boy whistling a few notes of a
half-forgotten tune. What was the tune, I wondered.
How few folks whistle or sing now; the time was when everybody "sang
a bit," as Burbidge calls it, to their work--men in the hayfields,
women at the washtub. Was the world, when it sang at its work, a
happier or jollier world? I asked myself.
[Sidenote: "HEAVEN'S HIGH MESSENGER"]
I passed over a stile and walked across a clover field. How
prosperous it looked, how green after the seared and sad appearance
of permanent pasture, which still lay brown and lifeless. Overhead
the bravest of all West-country songsters was singing--the skylark.
What a speck he appeared throbbing in the sky, only a little dot
hardly bigger than a pin's head; but what a voice he had, what a cry
of exultant joy was his, what a melody of passion, what a glory of
triumphant music! I stood and listened like the poet, and wondered
how a bird could sing so; such joy, such passionate melody seemed
superhuman, and how the notes were produced in the tiny throat was
then and will always remain a mystery. He did not seem a living,
breathing bird; only a voice--a voice of incarnate joy and gladness.
Silver hammers seemed to throb within him and to beat out a prayer of
ecstatic joy, which no heart could measure, and no human tongue
pronounce. Then suddenly, as a leaf, he fell, and the exquisite
singer of a moment before became again only the little brown bird, a
dweller amongst green fields, and a familiar of everyday life. Yet
for all that we, too, dwell on earth and toil and spin, it is well to
have heard the music of heaven. I walked along refreshed and
gladdened, for in spite of the shadows that envelope us, "there burns
in each an invisible sun," and amid such scenes it is impossible not
to feel a passing ray.
At last I reached the well-known bank. A few shy violets were in
blossom--the afternoon sun was playing upon the opening blossoms. I
picked two or three tiny flowers, but only a few, for I like to leave
a spot as fair as I found it, and the little petals were still
tightly curled. Growing close to the violet was another charming
woodland flower, the wood-sorrel, or witches' cheeses as village
children often call it here. The little blossoms were of an exquisite
translucent white, with delicate lavender veins, and strange
triangular leaves that folded up at night like the leaves of a
sensitive plant.
Some people say that the wood-sorrel is the true shamrock used by St.
Patrick to illustrate the doctrine of the Trinity. Be this as it may,
it is a delightful little plant, and one of the most charming
inhabitants of our English woods.
Its veined delicate petals recalled to me the form and beauty of the
exquisite grass of Parnassus, which I have often discovered on the
moors of the west coast of Scotland and in a few spots in the wildest
parts of the Shropshire hills. A little further on, I came to a patch
under a hazel tree of bronze leaves. These I recognized to be the
leaves of the ground ivy, and its minute mauve blossoms were just
coming into blossom. This plant used to be called ales-hoof, and was
formerly put into beer as a flavouring, much in the same manner as we
put borage now into claret cup, or introduce into badminton a peach,
or a spray of nettles. From the ground ivy an excellent tea can be
made which possesses purifying qualities for the blood, and which was
formerly much used in Shropshire as a spring tonic. Tea from a
decoction of nettles is also constantly drunk in Shropshire, as is
also a drink made from wild mallows.
[Sidenote: THE BREATH OF SPRING]
As I retraced my steps the light was fast fading, and the gold
turning into lavender. All was dying, the reds and golds turning into
sombre browns and greys. Flowers were falling asleep, and far away I
saw a line of cattle gently driven to some far farm-steading. As I
walked across the meadows, I noted that the little lambs had crept to
their dams' sides, and meant to remain there quiet and snug till the
small hours of the morning. Alone in the dusk I caught here and there
the triumphant song of the throstle; all else was still. In the
gloaming I saw dimly brown figures crossing upland and valley to the
lonely hamlets that nestled amongst a starry mist of damson groves.
The bright March day of work and gaiety was over. Frost might visit
the earth in the night, but to-morrow, judging by the red sunset,
would be another day of gladness and hope and brightness. I told
myself spring had come, and that soon all our dear feathered friends
would return. The nightingales would sing in the south, in every
hazel coppice, and in the dusky groves of twilight, whilst all over
England swallows would fly, near smoky towns and over lonely meres
and rivers alike, carrying the message that sovereign summer was at
hand.
When I returned to the Abbey, I found that Bess was in bed.
"She be asleep," nurse said, "but she seemed wonderful busy about
something, all in a flurry like, and didn't take no notice, not even
of the pug; but her would say her prayers twice over. And when I
asked why for? She answered it war best so, for the Lord somehow
would make her happy, even if she had to pray twice over for a
blessing."
Then old Nana went on to say, "This afternoon, Miss Bess went out
with Liza after you left, and as they comed in they was whispering
together. I don't hold with slyness," and old Nana pursed up her
mouth, and I felt, as the French say, that Liza would have at some
future time a bad quarter of an hour, and that a storm was brewing in
the domestic cup. I didn't, however, ask for an explanation, but
waited for the morrow to reveal the acts of to-day.
I walked downstairs and sat down before my writing-table, and wrote a
long letter to a sister. What a comfortable relationship is that of a
sister, a very armchair of affection, for with a sister no
explanations are necessary. Then there is nothing too small to tell a
sister. Worries, pleasures, little heartaches, all may find their way
on paper, and not appear foolish or ill-placed. So I wrote away
gaily, a little about flowers, books, garden, embroidery, cuisine, a
little domestic worry, and I wound up with a quotation.
As I was folding up my letter, I suddenly heard a knock at the door.
"Come in," I cried, and I saw Liza at the door, candle in hand.
"Miss Bess is all right?"
"Oh yes, mam; but I thought I should like you to know----"
Then Liza went on to say that nurse had taken on terribly, and was
all of a stew because she had let Miss Bess spend her money as she
had wished this afternoon.
"Miss Bess," continued Eliza, "would have it so, and wouldn't take no
refusal; and, as Mrs. Milner was out at tea with Mrs. Burbidge, I had
to let the child do as she had a mind to."
"Well, what happened?"
"Oh, I hardly know," replied Eliza. "We went to ----" mentioning a
shop--"but there Miss Bess wouldn't on no account that I or Mdlle.
Célestine should come in. She called out, 'Stay outside till I have
done.' So Mademoiselle and I we walked outside up and down till we
was fit to drop, and then, I do assure you, mam," added Eliza, "I
knew nothing till I saw Miss Bess come out with a small parcel, which
she held very tight and wouldn't give up to nobody, and then I seed
as it was directed in Mr. Burbidge's handwriting--that is to say,
there was a label; and we sent off the package, and I paid twopence
in stamps for doing so, but Miss Bess wouldn't tell me, ask her as
much as I would, who it was for. Mademoiselle tried hard to make Miss
Bess tell, but she couldn't get nothing out of her, although she
caught hold of her; but Mr. James, the butcher's boy, coming up,
Mademoiselle let Miss Bess be, and so we went home; and I didn't
think much about it till I looked into Miss Bess's purse to-night to
see what she had spent, and then I saw there wasn't one penny left,
and she must, I fear, have spent it all on the packet. It's only
right, mam, as you should know," pursued Liza, flushing crimson,
"lest Mrs. Milner should say that I had taken some, for just now Mrs.
Milner be quite furious, fussing round and saying that Miss Bess has
been fair robbed."
"Never mind," I said, "when I see Miss Bess in the morning I will go
into the matter, and find out how she spent her money."
I wondered, as I sat down and began to embroider after folding up my
letter, what would be the explanation of the mystery. Probably, I
said to myself, a little present to Harry, for Bess is a very
generous little soul, and most of her pocket-money is spent in gifts.
[Sidenote: NANA IS ANGRY]
The next morning my old nurse, holding tightly Bess's hand, came
downstairs just as I had finished breakfast. She looked, as Burbidge
would say, "black as tempest," and I didn't envy Eliza's place in the
nursery.
"Miss Bess will tell you," she said, "and as for Liza, I think it a
most disgraceful affair to have let the poor lamb spend her money as
she and Mademoiselle did, and never so much as to turn their heads
back. Pack of fools talkin' to passers-by whilst the poor child was
bein' robbed. That's what I call 'em."
"I wasn't," cried Bess, stoutly. "It was my own money and my own
fault. I paid it all myself, and I won't tell nobody about it but
mama."
Old Nana took no notice of this outburst, and vowed that she would
get the money back somehow, and let everybody know what she really
thought of 'em. I said nothing, for the fat was in the fire, and the
one thing that I am sure of was, that you couldn't change anybody's
determination of over seventy; and what Nana determines to do, Nana
will do, for all the king's horses and all the king's men. When Bess
and I were alone, I turned to Bess. "Tell me, little girl," I said.
Bess answered, "Oh, mama, I know it is all right. Nana's very old,
but she couldn't get it out of me. I mean to tell nobody but you and
Hals, for a secret is a secret." And she added irrelevantly, "I
couldn't walk with you because I felt I must do it."
"What, dear?"
"_Making it up with God_," replied Bess, but quite reverently. "When
I heard that Fräulein had broken her leg, I knew that something must
be done, for, for all you said, mamsie, I couldn't help feeling that
my curse might have done something; not," explained Bess, "exactly
made Fräulein break her leg, but it might have made it easier for her
to do so."
"Yes, dear, but tell me what you did."
"Oh, you know, mamsie," answered Bess. "I went off for a walk with
Liza and Célestine, but first of all I slipped upstairs when nobody
was looking and got my purse. I didn't quite know what I had, for I
didn't stop to count the money inside, but there were three silver
bits and four copper monies.
"When I got into Mr. ----'s shop," pursued Bess, "I said I wanted
something that would be a comfort to somebody who had broken their
leg. And he said, 'Certainly, Miss, I have just what you want.' And
he gave me a little leather case painted all over with pink and blue
flowers, quite pretty, though not quite like any flowers that I know."
"Yes, Bess," I said, and took little Bess's hand encouragingly.
[Sidenote: A GIFT FROM BESS]
"Well," said Bess, "I don't rightly understand monies, so I told Mr.
---- to take out what he wanted. But he said there wasn't quite
enough; so I said I would bring the rest next Saturday, when I got
paid up for my good-conduct marks, if it wasn't very much. And he
said, 'Don't mention it, miss, only sixpence more.'
"So, then," pursued Bess, "he did up the little packet, and if a
shopman does not know what is good for a person with a broken leg,
who should, I should like to know," and Bess looked round her
triumphantly.
Then my little maid went on to say, "I stuck on the label that
Burbidge wrote for me, and that he did for me in the tool-house when
we two were alone; but he put Miss, not Fräulein, as we neither of us
knew how to spell it. But we wrote governess below, and Roderick,
who, Burbidge says, is a scholar, put in '_her_ with the broken leg,'
so they were sure to understand. And then Mr. ---- stuck it with his
tongue--for it was all gummy--and I and he pressed it down tight, and
then Liza and I carried it off to the post-office, and that is all."
Then Bess added, with a catch in her throat, "I haven't been wicked
this time. Nana says it's wicked to spend my money without telling
you; but I say I must _pay off_ God, for I want to be happy as
princes and princesses are happy in fairy-stories."
Bess's attitude of mind was a little difficult to follow, as is often
the case with children; but as I felt that the whole funny little
business had sprung more from childish kindness than anything else,
all I did was to kiss my little maid and say, "Fräulein will be
pleased."
Bess left me beaming. "My mama," I heard her say later to her old
nurse, "says there is no harm in what I did; and that I may give
cigarette-cases or whatever I like to governesses who break their
legs."
Two days later Miss Weldon received a letter from Fräulein Schlieman,
returning the case, and saying with some asperity--
"I do not smoke, whatever they believe of German women in England."
Bess, on receiving back her gift, was filled with indignation.
"Why cannot governesses smoke?" she asked. "If I was a governess I
should smoke to oblige." And then, in a fit of virtuous fury, she
handed over the case to Burbidge, with the lofty command of "Smoke at
once." Later on, my little daughter told me, "I couldn't help it if
Fräulein didn't smoke." And then added, "Anyway, God knows I spent my
money on her, and Burbidge says that's sure to count."