DR. UPANDOWN
The practice of Flamborough was to listen fairly to anything that might
be said by any one truly of the native breed, and to receive it well
into the crust of the mind, and let it sink down slowly. But even after
that, it might not take root, unless it were fixed in its settlement by
their two great powers--the law, and the Lord.
They had many visitations from the Lord, as needs must be in such a very
stormy place; whereas of the law they heard much less; but still they
were even more afraid of that; for they never knew how much it might
cost.
Balancing matters (as they did their fish, when the price was worth it,
in Weigh Lane), they came to the set conclusion that the law and the
Lord might not agree concerning the child cast among them by the latter.
A child or two had been thrown ashore before, and trouble once or twice
had come of it; and this child being cast, no one could say how, to such
a height above all other children, he was likely enough to bring a spell
upon their boats, if anything crooked to God's will were done; and even
to draw them to their last stocking, if anything offended the providence
of law.
In any other place it would have been a point of combat what to say and
what to do in such a case as this. But Flamborough was of all the wide
world happiest in possessing an authority to reconcile all doubts. The
law and the Lord--two powers supposed to be at variance always, and to
share the week between them in proportions fixed by lawyers--the
holy and unholy elements of man's brief existence, were combined in
Flamborough parish in the person of its magisterial rector. He was also
believed to excel in the arts of divination and medicine too, for he was
a full Doctor of Divinity. Before this gentleman must be laid, both for
purse and conscience' sake, the case of the child just come out of the
fogs.
And true it was that all these powers were centred in one famous man,
known among the laity as “Parson Upandown.” For the Reverend Turner
Upround, to give him his proper name, was a doctor of divinity, a
justice of the peace, and the present rector of Flamborough. Of all his
offices and powers, there was not one that he overstrained; and all that
knew him, unless they were thorough-going rogues and vagabonds, loved
him. Not that he was such a soft-spoken man as many were, who thought
more evil; but because of his deeds and nature, which were of the
kindest. He did his utmost, on demand of duty, to sacrifice this nature
to his stern position as pastor and master of an up-hill parish, with
many wrong things to be kept under. But while he succeeded in the form
now and then, he failed continually in the substance.
This gentleman was not by any means a fool, unless a kind heart proves
folly. At Cambridge he had done very well, in the early days of the
tripos, and was chosen fellow and tutor of Gonville and Caius College.
But tiring of that dull round in his prime, he married, and took to a
living; and the living was one of the many upon which a perpetual faster
can barely live, unless he can go naked also, and keep naked children.
Now the parsons had not yet discovered the glorious merits of hard
fasting, but freely enjoyed, and with gratitude to God, the powers with
which He had blessed them. Happily Dr. Upround had a solid income of
his own, and (like a sound mathematician) he took a wife of terms
coincident. So, without being wealthy, they lived very well, and helped
their poorer neighbors.
Such a man generally thrives in the thriving of his flock, and does not
harry them. He gives them spiritual food enough to support them without
daintiness, and he keeps the proper distinction between the Sunday and
the poorer days. He clangs no bell of reproach upon a Monday, when the
squire is leading the lady in to dinner, and the laborer sniffing at his
supper pot; and he lets the world play on a Saturday, while he works his
own head to find good ends for the morrow. Because he is a wise man who
knows what other men are, and how seldom they desire to be told the
same thing more than a hundred and four times in a year. Neither did
his clerical skill stop here; for Parson Upround thought twice about it
before he said anything to rub sore consciences, even when he had them
at his mercy, and silent before him, on a Sunday. He behaved like a
gentleman in this matter, where so much temptation lurks, looking always
at the man whom he did not mean to hit, so that the guilty one received
it through him, and felt himself better by comparison. In a word, this
parson did his duty well, and pleasantly for all his flock; and nothing
imbittered him, unless a man pretended to doctrine without holy orders.
For the doctor reasoned thus--and sound it sounds--if divinity is a
matter for Tom, Dick, or Harry, how can there be degrees in it? He held
a degree in it, and felt what it had cost; and not the parish only, but
even his own wife, was proud to have a doctor every Sunday. And his wife
took care that his rich red hood, kerseymere small-clothes, and black
silk stockings upon calves of dignity, were such that his congregation
scorned the surgeons all the way to Beverley.
Happy in a pleasant nature, kindly heart, and tranquil home, he was also
happy in those awards of life in which men are helpless. He was blessed
with a good wife and three good children, doing well, and vigorous and
hardy as the air and clime and cliffs. His wife was not quite of his
own age, but old enough to understand and follow him faithfully down the
slope of years. A wife with mind enough to know that a husband is not
faultless, and with heart enough to feel that if he were, she would not
love him so. And under her were comprised their children--two boys at
school, and a baby-girl at home.
So far, the rector of this parish was truly blessed and blessing. But
in every man's lot must be some crook, since this crooked world turned
round. In Parson Upround's lot the crook might seem a very small one;
but he found it almost too big for him. His dignity and peace of mind,
large good-will of ministry and strong Christian sense of magistracy,
all were sadly pricked and wounded by a very small thorn in the flesh of
his spirit.
Almost every honest man is the rightful owner of a nickname. When he
was a boy at school he could not do without one, and if the other boys
valued him, perhaps he had a dozen. And afterward, when there is less
perception of right and wrong and character, in the weaker time of
manhood, he may earn another, if the spirit is within him.
But woe is him if a nasty foe, or somebody trying to be one, annoyed for
the moment with him, yet meaning no more harm than pepper, smite him to
the quick, at venture, in his most retired and privy-conscienced hole.
And when this is done by a Nonconformist to a Doctor of Divinity, and
the man who does it owes some money to the man he does it to, can the
latter gentleman take a large and genial view of his critics.
This gross wrong and ungrateful outrage was inflicted thus. A leading
Methodist from Filey town, who owed the doctor half a guinea, came one
summer and set up his staff in the hollow of a limekiln, where he lived
upon fish for change of diet, and because he could get it for nothing.
This was a man of some eloquence, and his calling in life was cobbling,
and to encourage him therein, and keep him from theology, the rector
not only forgot his half guinea, but sent him three or four pairs
of riding-boots to mend, and let him charge his own price, which was
strictly heterodox. As a part of the bargain, this fellow came to
church, and behaved as well as could be hoped of a man who had received
his money. He sat by a pillar, and no more than crossed his legs at the
worst thing that disagreed with him. And it might have done him good,
and made a decent cobbler of him, if the parson had only held him when
he got him on the hook. But this is the very thing which all great
preachers are too benevolent to do. Dr. Upround looked at this sinner,
who was getting into a fright upon his own account, though not a bad
preacher when he could afford it; and the cobbler could no more look up
to the doctor than when he charged him a full crown beyond the contract.
In his kindness for all who seemed convinced of sin, the good preacher
halted, and looked at Mr. Jobbins with a soft, relaxing gaze. Jobbins
appeared as if he would come to church forever, and never cheat any
sound clergyman again; whereupon the generous divine omitted a whole
page of menaces prepared for him, and passed prematurely to the tender
strain which always winds up a good sermon.
Now what did Jobbins do in return for all this magnanimous mercy?
Invited to dine with the senior church-warden upon the strength of
having been at church, and to encourage him for another visit, and being
asked, as soon as ever decency permitted, what he thought of Parson
Upround's doctrine, between two crackles of young griskin (come straight
from the rectory pig-sty), he was grieved to express a stern opinion
long remembered at Flamborough:
“Ca' yo yon mon 'Dr. Uproond?' I ca' un 'Dr. Upandoon.'”
From that day forth the rector of the parish was known far and wide as
“Dr. Upandown,” even among those who loved him best. For the name well
described his benevolent practice of undoing any harsh thing he might
have said, sometimes by a smile, and very often with a shilling, or a
basket of spring cabbages. So that Mrs. Upround, when buttoning up his
coat--which he always forgot to do for himself--did it with the words,
“My dear, now scold no one; really it is becoming too expensive.” “Shall
I abandon duty,” he would answer, with some dignity, “while a shilling
is sufficient to enforce it?”
Dr. Upround's people had now found out that their minister and
magistrate discharged his duty toward his pillow, no less than to his
pulpit. His parish had acquired, through the work of generations, a
habit of getting up at night, and being all alive at cock-crow; and the
rector (while very new amongst them) tried to bow--or rather rise--to
night-watch. But a little of that exercise lasted him for long; and he
liked to talk of it afterward, but for the present was obliged to drop
it. For he found himself pale, when his wife made him see himself; and
his hours of shaving were so dreadful; and scarcely a bit of fair dinner
could be got, with the whole of the day thrown out so. In short, he
settled it wisely that the fishers of fish must yield to the habits of
fish, which can not be corrected; but the fishers of men (who can live
without catching them) need not be up to all their hours, but may take
them reasonably.
His parishioners--who could do very well without him, as far as
that goes, all the week, and by no means wanted him among their
boats--joyfully left him to his own time of day, and no more worried
him out of season than he worried them so. It became a matter of right
feeling with them not to ring a big bell, which the rector had put up to
challenge everybody's spiritual need, until the stable clock behind the
bell had struck ten and finished gurgling.
For this reason, on St. Swithin's morn, in the said year 1782, the
grannies, wives, and babes of Flamborough, who had been to help the
launch, but could not pull the laboring oar, nor even hold the tiller,
spent the time till ten o'clock in seeing to their own affairs--the
most laudable of all pursuits for almost any woman. And then, with some
little dispute among them (the offspring of the merest accident), they
arrived in some force at the gate of Dr. Upround, and no woman liked to
pull the bell, and still less to let another woman do it for her. But an
old man came up who was quite deaf, and every one asked him to do it.
In spite of the scarcity of all good things, Mrs. Cockscroft had
thoroughly fed the little stranger, and washed him, and undressed him,
and set him up in her own bed, and wrapped him in her woollen shawl,
because he shivered sadly; and there he stared about with wondering
eyes, and gave great orders--so far as his new nurse could make out--but
speaking gibberish, as she said, and flying into a rage because it was
out of Christian knowledge. But he seemed to understand some English,
although he could only pronounce two words, both short, and in such
conjunction quite unlawful for any except the highest Spiritual Power.
Mrs. Cockscroft, being a pious woman, hoped that her ears were wrong,
or else that the words were foreign and meant no harm, though the
child seemed to take in much of what was said, and when asked his name,
answered, wrathfully, and as if everybody was bound to know, “Izunsabe!
Izunsabe!”
But now, when brought before Dr. Upround, no child of the very best
English stock could look more calm and peaceful. He could walk well
enough, but liked better to be carried; and the kind woman who had so
taken him up was only too proud to carry him. Whatever the rector and
magistrate might say, her meaning was to keep this little one, with her
husband's good consent, which she was sure of getting.
“Set him down, ma'am,” the doctor said, when he had heard from half a
dozen good women all about him; “Mistress Cockscroft, put him on his
legs, and let me question him.”
But the child resisted this proceeding. With nature's inborn and just
loathing of examination, he spun upon his little heels, and swore with
all his might, at the same time throwing up his hands and twirling his
thumbs in a very odd and foreign way.
“What a shocking child!” cried Mrs. Upround, who was come to know all
about it. “Jane, run away with Miss Janetta.”
“The child is not to blame,” said the rector, “but only the people who
have brought him up. A prettier or more clever little head I have never
seen in all my life; and we studied such things at Cambridge. My fine
little fellow, shake hands with me.”
The boy broke off his vicious little dance, and looked up at this tall
gentleman with great surprise. His dark eyes dwelt upon the parson's
kindly face, with that power of inquiry which the very young possess,
and then he put both little hands into the gentleman's, and burst into a
torrent of the most heart-broken tears.
“Poor little man!” said the rector, very gently, taking him up in his
arms and patting the silky black curls, while great drops fell, and
a nose was rubbed on his shoulder; “it is early for you to begin bad
times. Why, how old are you, if you please?”
The little boy sat up on the kind man's arm, and poked a small
investigating finger into the ear that was next to him, and the locks
just beginning to be marked with gray; and then he said, “Sore,” and
tossed his chin up, evidently meaning, “Make your best of that.” And the
women drew a long breath, and nudged at one another.
“Well done! Four years old, my dear. You see that he understands English
well enough,” said the parson to his parishioners: “he will tell us all
about himself by-and-by, if we do not hurry him. You think him a French
child. I do not, though the name which he gives himself, 'Izunsabe,'
has a French aspect about it. Let me think. I will try him with a French
interrogation: 'Parlez-vous Francais, mon enfan?'”
Dr. Upround watched the effect of his words with outward calm, but an
inward flutter. For if this clever child should reply in French, the
doctor could never go on with it, but must stand there before his
congregation in a worse position than when he lost his place, as
sometimes happened, in a sermon. With wild temerity he had given vent to
the only French words within his knowledge; and he determined to follow
them up with Latin if the worst came to the worst.
But luckily no harm came of this, but, contrariwise, a lasting good.
For the child looked none the wiser, while the doctor's influence was
increased.
“Aha!” the good parson cried. “I was sure that he was no Frenchman.
But we must hear something about him very soon, for what you tell me is
impossible. If he had come from the sea, he must have been wet; it could
never be otherwise. Whereas, his linen clothes are dry, and even quite
lately fullered--ironed you might call it.”
“Please your worship,” cried Mrs. Cockscroft, who was growing wild with
jealousy, “I did up all his little things, hours and hours ere your
hoose was up.”
“Ah, you had night-work! To be sure! Were his clothes dry or wet when
you took them off?”
“Not to say dry, your worship; and yet not to say very wet. Betwixt and
between, like my good master's, when he cometh from a pour of rain, or a
heavy spray. And the color of the land was upon them here and there.
And the gold tags were sewn with something wonderful. My best pair of
scissors would not touch it. I was frightened to put them to the tub,
your worship; but they up and shone lovely like a tailor's buttons. My
master hath found him, Sir; and it lies with him to keep him. And the
Lord hath taken away our Bob.”
“It is true,” said Dr. Upround, gently, and placing the child in her
arms again, “the Almighty has chastened you very sadly. This child is
not mine to dispose of, nor yours; but if he will comfort you, keep him
till we hear of him. I will take down in writing the particulars of the
case, when Captain Robin has come home and had his rest--say, at this
time to-morrow, or later; and then you will sign them, and they shall be
published. For you know, Mrs. Cockscroft, however much you may be taken
with him, you must not turn kidnapper. Moreover, it is needful, as there
may have been some wreck (though none of you seem to have heard of any),
that this strange occurrence should be made known. Then, if nothing is
heard of it, you can keep him, and may the Lord bless him to you!”
Without any more ado, she kissed the child, and wanted to carry him
straight away, after courtesying to his worship; but all the other women
insisted on a smack of him, for pity's sake, and the pleasure of the
gold, and to confirm the settlement. And a settlement it was, for
nothing came of any publication of the case, such as in those days could
be made without great expense and exertion.
So the boy grew up, tall, brave, and comely, and full of the spirit of
adventure, as behooved a boy cast on the winds. So far as that goes, his
foster-parents would rather have found him more steady and less comely,
for if he was to step into their lost son's shoes, he might do it
without seeming to outshine him. But they got over that little jealousy
in time, when the boy began to be useful, and, so far as was possible,
they kept him under by quoting against him the character of Bob,
bringing it back from heaven of a much higher quality than ever it was
upon the earth. In vain did this living child aspire to such level; how
can an earthly boy compare with one who never did a wrong thing, as soon
as he was dead?
Passing that difficult question, and forbearing to compare a boy with
angels, be he what he will, his first need (after that of victuals) is a
name whereby his fellow-boys may know him. Is he to be shouted at with,
“Come here, what's your name?” or is he to be called (as if in high
rebuke), “Boy?” And yet there are grown-up folk who do all this without
hesitation, failing to remember their own predicament at a by-gone
period. Boys are as useful, in their way, as any other order; and if
they can be said to do some mischief, they can not be said to do it
negligently. It is their privilege and duty to be truly active; and
their Maker, having spread a dull world before them, has provided them
with gifts of play while their joints are supple.
The present boy, having been born without a father or a mother (so far
as could yet be discovered), was driven to do what our ancestors must
have done when it was less needful. That is to say, to work his own name
out by some distinctive process. When the parson had clearly shown him
not to be a Frenchman, a large contumely spread itself about, by reason
of his gold, and eyes, and hair, and name (which might be meant for
Isaak), that he was sprung from a race more honored now than a hundred
years ago. But the women declared that it could not be; and the rector
desiring to christen him, because it might never have been done before,
refused point-blank to put any “Isaac” in, and was satisfied with
“Robin” only, the name of the man who had saved him.
The rector showed deep knowledge of his flock, which looked upon Jews
as the goats of the Kingdom; for any Jew must die for a world of
generations ere ever a Christian thinks much of him. But finding him not
to be a Jew, the other boys, instead of being satisfied, condemned him
for a Dutchman.
Whatever he was, the boy throve well, and being so flouted by his
playmates, took to thoughts and habits and amusements of his own.
In-door life never suited him at all, nor too much of hard learning,
although his capacity was such that he took more advancement in an hour
than the thick heads of young Flamborough made in a whole leap-year of
Sundays. For any Flamburian boy was considered a “Brain Scholar,” and a
“Head-Languager,” when he could write down the parson's text, and chalk
up a fish on the weigh-board so that his father or mother could tell in
three guesses what manner of fish it was. And very few indeed had ever
passed this trial.
For young Robin it was a very hard thing to be treated so by the other
boys. He could run, or jump, or throw a stone, or climb a rock with the
best of them; but all these things he must do by himself, simply because
he had no name. A feeble youth would have moped, but Robin only grew
more resolute. Alone he did what the other boys would scarcely in
competition dare. No crag was too steep for him, no cave too dangerous
and wave-beaten, no race of the tide so strong and swirling as to scare
him of his wits. He seemed to rejoice in danger, having very little else
to rejoice in; and he won for himself by nimble ways and rapid turns on
land and sea, the name of “Lithe,” or “Lyth,” and made it famous even
far inland.
For it may be supposed that his love of excitement, versatility,
and daring demanded a livelier outlet than the slow toil of deep-sea
fishing. To the most patient, persevering, and long-suffering of the
arts, Robin Lyth did not take kindly, although he was so handy with a
boat. Old Robin vainly strove to cast his angling mantle over him. The
gifts of the youth were brighter and higher; he showed an inborn fitness
for the lofty development of free trade. Eminent powers must force their
way, as now they were doing with Napoleon; and they did the same with
Robin Lyth, without exacting tithe in kind of all the foremost human
race.