TIM
WHO was this guardian angel who was making an attempt to save from
threatening danger Jenny Salter’s boy and girl, who had risen from his
bed upon a holiday to deliver a warning in the grey light of the dawn,
this guardian angel in blue cap and corduroys, with lean, intelligent
face, and eyes bright beneath a scar? Let us pause for an instant to
listen to his story, which is not out of place in this tale of village
life, although it is one that advancing civilisation may help to render
impossible in time. Under no tender influences had poor Tim been
reared, no motherly hand had made life smooth for him.
This was his story.
His father had been a workman in a distant village, and after his
marriage had shared his brother’s home; his brother who, like himself,
had a wife, and also children, and rented a two-roomed cottage in a
narrow village street. These two rooms--they were both very small--made
but a limited space for two families, especially at night; it is,
therefore, not surprising, that after a little while the families
began to quarrel. And since it is the lot of wives to remain at
home all day, it is not wonderful that the disputes arose principally
between the two ladies of the house.
The mother of Tim was a little, feeble creature, absorbed in her own
ill-health, and the baby at her breast; her rival was a handsome,
coarse, and loud-tongued woman, who acquired an unbounded authority
over both the men in the house. Under her influence Tim’s father
learned to despise his wife, and to that contempt ill-treatment soon
followed; he complained that she did not work hard enough, and
attempted to enforce more work by chastisement. These efforts being
unsuccessful, he determined to get rid of her; and, after having beaten
her into submission, he provided her with a little money with which to
get back to her parents, and then turned her out of the house. But by a
refinement of cruelty, (which was also due to her rival,) he would not
allow her to take the baby too; but on that morning hid the little
creature carefully, so that the poor mother could not discover its
hiding-place. The neighbours all heard the wailing of the mother, but
they knew the household, and were afraid to interfere; and after she
had been turned out, and had gone away to ‘her people,’ they were
relieved by the comparative quiet that ensued. It was supposed indeed
that the baby would be claimed, but the poor mother soon died in her
parents’ house; and as these had no particular wish to rear the
infant, Tim was left to the mercies of his uncle’s home.
And what those mercies were it is not for me to say, for our ears are
tender for such subjects; our eyes just glance at them in the daily
papers, and we forget that the newspapers are describing facts. Tim
remembered, for instance--it was but one remembrance--that when one of
his little cousins wished to punish him, she thrust a spoon between the
bars of the grate before forcing his baby-fingers to close upon it.
Ragged, half-starved, alive only on sufferance, he had, however, the
advantage of school, because the blessed provision of the Government
does not now allow children to be uneducated. At first, indeed, his
progress was not extraordinary, for starvation and learning do not walk
hand in hand; and his father, uncle, and aunt began to realise that
this want of progress would prolong the days of school. Impatient at
this they applied the spur of beating, but this produced illness, and
delayed his progress more; so that, moved by interested motives, they
finally condescended to pay some amount of attention to his health.
This kind consideration produced a due result, Tim proved intelligent,
and passed his Standards well; and was eventually able to leave the
Board School when he was not very much more than twelve years old. His
father removed him as soon as possible, and hastened at once to put him
out to work.
And now let us for a moment, think of Tim, a little, lean, bright-eyed
creature, twelve years old, ill-clothed, ill-fed, not very much
educated, treated always with harshness from his cradle. From that
wretched household what else could be expected but the sort of beings
that such brutality rears; such creatures--one scarcely dares to call
them men--as we may find in our back streets if we go there to look. In
this life, however, we often have to deal with that strange element we
call the Improbable; and it is this want of absolute knowledge of the
factors in our sums which makes us unable to calculate results with
certainty. From out of that wretched, drunken, brutal home an
irresistible force rose in the boy; there awoke in Tim, and grew in him
with his years, the tendency that ‘makes for righteousness.’
How was this? I cannot tell; in such cases one often cannot tell. It
may have been inherited by him from his mother, or it may have been
induced from lessons learnt at school, or it may have risen as a
reaction from the absolute hideousness of the evil that was round him
in his home. I know that he could not remember any particular occasion
which he could mention afterwards as that of his conversion, the
tendency towards well-doing began in him at an earlier date than he
could himself recall. At school he sought out the steadiest companions,
on holidays he played with well-conducted boys; his nature, ill-taught
as it was, possessed the power of assimilating to itself that which
is good. ‘The wind bloweth,’ we read, ‘where it listeth, and thou
hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and
whither it goeth: _so_ is everyone that is born of the Spirit.’
And now let us think again of Tim, twelve years old, sent out day after
day to work, a member of a household to which it was a disgrace even to
belong, and allowed by that household no smallest chance of improving
his position or himself. His clothes were so ragged that respectable
boys did not like to be seen with him; his food so limited that it
barely provided him with strength enough to work; and every halfpenny
of his wages was taken from him as regularly as Saturday night came
round. Under such circumstances it is barely possible that a young
nature should not be overwhelmed--it is not surprising therefore that
Tim sank into despair, and for more than two years lived on in
hopelessness. But the irresistible strength that was in the boy refused
to be crushed even by such circumstances; a purpose grew in him like a
revelation, and inspired him with hope to mend his lot. One Saturday
evening Tim returned without his money, and announced that he intended
to keep his wages for himself.
The scene that followed need not be described. Tim lay on his bed
through the whole of Sunday to recover from it. On Monday morning he
returned to his work, under strict orders, seasoned with many oaths, to
bring back at night the money he had withheld. He returned without
it. This time there was no Sunday rest for him--but bruised as he was,
he rose with the dawn on Tuesday and went to his work again. To a
similar scene he returned on every evening of that week, but the close
of the week found him unconquered; and on Saturday he came back to his
family without his wages, as before.
This was too much. On the following Monday the father of Tim went to
his master, and desired that his son’s wages should be given into his
own hands in future--he added that his son was ‘a wicked boy who spent
his money bad.’ Tim’s master, who took an interest in his farm-boy,
replied to this request with a flat denial--he declared that the boy
deserved to have some money, and that, no doubt, on his side also there
might be ‘tales to tell.’ This last observation was too true to be
disputed, the father left him in a rage, and at once sought out his
son, and informed him that he ‘would have no more of this fooling--he
must bring the money that night, or he might look to be killed.’ In the
nature of Tim there was not that instinct of running away which belongs
to some natures in an eminent degree--with the fear of being murdered
heavy on his heart, he returned, as usual, to his home that night. A
terrible scuffle ensued, with regard to which I only know that a hot
poker was the instrument employed; and that burnt, scarred for life,
believing himself to be dying, poor Tim was just able to crawl to a
neighbour’s door at last. The outbreak proved his salvation, his
injuries excited sympathy, and the village rose in his defence--his
father, uncle, and aunt, were driven from it, work was offered to the
lad from all sides; and at the age of fourteen he found himself able to
begin his life again. From that time forth he prospered; he advanced
from one situation to another, he met with kindness and assistance; at
the age of twenty he was a skilful workman, and able without difficulty
to maintain himself. Of his past life, the life of his childhood, he
never spoke; and indeed such stories are only useful when they remind
us that our land has still dark corners into which we must carry
candles when we can. It is true indeed that Tim had emerged from the
darkness--but there are those whom the darkness overwhelms.
This then was the workman, lean, and lithe, and active, with an anxious
brow, and ‘poor Annie’ on his lips, who parted from Nat in the grey
light of the morning, and turned his footsteps towards the village
streets. Some hours later, with a face that was still anxious, and yet
with something like eagerness in his tread, he left the Farm where he
had been breakfasting, and went down the hill towards Jenny Salter’s
home.