Beloved Swarthmoor! Dear home, where kind hearts abode, where gentle
faces and tender hands were ever ready to welcome and bind up the
wounds, both visible and invisible, of any persecuted guest in those
troubled times. Surely, after his terrible experiences on the day of
the riot at Ulverston, George Fox would yield to the entreaties of his
entertainers, and allow himself to be persuaded to rest in peace under
the shadow of the Swarthmoor yew-trees, until the bloodthirsty fury
against all who bore the name of Quaker, and against himself in
particular, should have somewhat lessened in the neighbourhood? Far
from it. To 'Flee from Storms' was never this strong man's way.[13]
Gentle reeds and delicate grasses may bow as the storm-wind rushes
over them. The sturdy oak-tree, with its tough roots grappling firmly
underground, stubbornly faces the blast. George Fox, 'ever Stiff as a
Tree,' by the admission even of his enemies, barely waited for his
'yellow, black and blue' bruises to disappear before he came forth
again to encounter his foes. Certain priests had however taken
advantage of this short enforced absence to 'put about a prophecy'
that he had disappeared for good, and 'that within a year all these
Quakers would be utterly put down.' Great, therefore, must have been
their chagrin to hear, only a short fortnight after the Lecture Day at
Ulverston, that the hated 'Man in Leather Breeches' was off once more
on his dangerous career.
Fox's companion on this journey was that same James Nayler who had
followed him on his first visit to Swarthmoor, a few weeks previously.
Nayler was one of the most brilliantly gifted of all those early
comrades of George Fox, who were hereafter to earn the name of 'the
Valiant Sixty.' Clouds and sorrows were to separate the two friends in
years to come, but at this time they were united in heart and soul,
both alike given up to the joyful service of 'Publishing Truth.' The
object of their journey was to visit another recent convert, James
Lancaster by name, in his home on the Island of Walney that lies off
the Furness coast.
On the way thither the travellers spent one night at a small town on
the mainland called Cockan. Here, as usual, they held a meeting with
the inhabitants of the place, in order to proclaim the message that
possessed them. Their words had already convinced one of their
hearers, and more converts to the Truth might have followed, when
suddenly, at a low window of the hall where they were assembled, a
man's figure appeared, threatening the audience with a loaded pistol
which he carried in his hand. As this pistol was pointed, first at one
and then at another of George Fox's listeners, all the terrified
people sprang to their feet and rushed through the doors of the hall
as fast as their legs could carry them. Their alarm was natural;
probably most, if not all of them, had seen fire-arms used in grim
earnest before this, for the period of the Civil Wars was too recent
to have faded from anyone's memory.
'I am not after you, ye timid sheep,' shouted the man with the pistol
as the scared people fled past him. 'It is that Deceiver who is
leading you all astray that I have to do with. Come out and meet me,
George Fox,' he shouted, 'if you call yourself a Man.'
There was no need to ask twice. 'Here I am, Friend,' answered a quiet
voice, as the well-known figure, in its wide white hat, long coat,
leather breeches and doublet, and girdle with alchemy buttons,
appeared standing in the doorway. Then, passing calmly through it,
George Fox drew up scarce three paces from his assailant--his body
making a large target at close range that it would be impossible to
miss. The frightened people paused in their flight to watch. Were they
going to see the Quaker slain? The stranger raised his pistol; he
aimed carefully. Not a muscle of Fox's countenance quivered. Not an
eyelash moved. The trigger snapped....
Nothing happened! The pistol did not go off. As if by a miracle the
Quaker was saved.
Seeing this wonderful escape of their leader, some of the other men's
courage returned. They rushed back to assist him. They threw
themselves upon his assailant and wrenched the pistol from his hand,
vowing he should do no further mischief. Fox, seeing in his adversary,
not an enemy who had just sought his life, but a fellow-man with a
'Seed of God' hidden somewhere within him and therefore a possible
soul to be won, was 'moved in the Lord's power to speak to him; and he
was struck with the Lord's power' (small wonder!) 'so that he went and
hid himself in a cellar and trembled for fear.
'And so the Lord's power came over them all, though there was a great
rage in the country.'
The Journal continues (but it was written many years later, remember,
when the account of what had happened could not bring anyone into
trouble): 'And ye next morning I went over in a boat to James
Lancaster's, and as soon as I came to land there rushed out about
forty men, with staffs, clubs, and fishing-poles, and fell upon me
with them, beating, punching, and thrust me backwards into the sea.
And when they had thrust me almost into the sea, I stood up and went
into the middle of them again, but they all laid on me again and
knocked me down and mazed me. And when I was down and came to myself,
I looked up and saw James Lancaster's wife throwing stones at my face,
and her husband lying over me, to keep the stones and blows off me.
For the people had persuaded James's wife that I had bewitched her
husband, and had promised her that if she would let them know when I
came hither they would be my death.
'So at last I got up in the power of God over them all, and they beat
me down into the boat. And so James Lancaster came into the boat to me
and so he set me over the water.
'And James Nayler we saw afterwards that they were beating of him. For
while they were beating of me, he walked up into a field, and they
never minded him till I was gone, and then they fell upon him, and all
their cry was "Kill him!" "Kill him!" When I was come over to the town
again, on the other side of the water, the townsmen rose up with
pitchforks, flails, and staves to keep me out of the town, crying,
"Kill him! knock him on the head! bring the cart and carry him to the
churchyard." And so they abused me and guarded me with all those
weapons a pretty way out of the town, and there at last, the Lord's
power being over them all, they left me. Then James Lancaster went
back again to look for James Nayler. So I was alone and came to a
ditch of water and washed me, for they had all dirted me, and wet and
mired my clothes, my hands and my face.
'I walked a matter of three miles to Thomas Hutton's, where Thomas
Lawson the priest lodged, who was convinced. And I could hardly speak
to them when I came in I was so bruised. And so I told them where I
had left James Nayler, and they went and took each of them a horse,
and brought him thither that night. And I went to bed, but I was so
weak with bruises that I was not able to turn me. And the next day,
they hearing of it at Swarthmoor, they sent a horse for me. And as I
was riding the horse knocked his foot against a stone and stumbled, so
that it shook me so and pained me, as it seemed worse to me than all
the blows, my body was so tortured. So I came to Swarthmoor, and my
body was exceedingly bruised.'
Even within the sheltering walls of Swarthmoor, this time persecution
followed. Justice Sawrey had not yet forgiven the Quaker for his
behaviour on the day of the riot. He must have further punishment. So
right up to Swarthmoor itself came constables with a warrant signed by
two Justices (Sawrey of course being one of them), that a certain man
named George Fox was to be apprehended as a disturber of the peace.
And clapped into gaol George Fox would have been, wounded and bruised
as he was, in spite of all that his gentle hostesses could do to
prevent it, had it not happened that, just as the constables arrived
to execute this order, the master of the house, good Judge Fell
himself, must needs return once more, in the very nick of time, home
to Swarthmoor. His mere presence was a defence.
He had been away again on circuit all this time that George Fox had
been so cruelly treated in the neighbourhood, and had therefore known
nothing of the rioting during his absence. Now that he was back at
home again, straightway everything went well. The roof seemed to grow
all at once more sheltering, the walls of the old hall to become
thicker and more able to protect its inmates, when once the master of
the house was safely at home once more.
The six girls ran up and down stairs more lightly, smiling with relief
whenever they met each other in the rooms and passages. Long
afterwards, in the troubled years that were to follow, when there was
no indulgent father to protect them and their mother and their friends
from the bitter blast of persecution, many a time did the maidens of
Swarthmoor recall that day. They remembered how, weeping, they had run
down to the high arched gate of the orchard to meet their father, and
to tell him what was a-doing up at the Hall. Thus they drew near the
house, the Judge's dark figure half hidden among his muslined maidens,
even as the dark old yews are hidden in spring by the snowy-blossomed
apple-trees. When they saw the Judge himself coming towards them, the
constables drawn up in the courtyard began to look mighty foolish.
They approached with gestures of respect, giving a short account of
what had happened at Walney, and holding out the warrant, signed by
two justices, as an apology for their presence at Judge Fell's own
Hall during his absence.
All their excuses availed them little. Judge Fell could look stern
enough when he chose, and now his eyes flashed at this invasion of
his home.
'What brings you here, men? A warrant for the apprehension of George
Fox, _MY GUEST_? Are my brother Justices not aware then that I am a
Justice too, and Vice-Chancellor of the county to boot? Under this
roof a man is safe, were he fifty times a Quaker. But, since ye are
here' (this with a nod and a wink, as the constables followed the
Judge up the flagged path and by a side door into his oak-panelled
study), 'since ye are here, men, I will give you other warrants
a-plenty to execute instead. Those riotous folk at Walney Island are
well known to me of old. It is high time they were punished. Take
this, and see that the ringleaders who assaulted my guest are
themselves clapped into Lancaster Gaol forthwith.'
Well pleased to get off with nothing but a reprimand, the constables
departed, and carried out their new mission with right good will. The
rioters were apprehended, and some of them were forced to flee from
the country. In time James Lancaster's wife came to understand better
the nature of the 'witchcraft' that George Fox had used upon her
husband. She too was 'convinced of Truth.' Later on, after she had
herself become a Friend, she must often have looked back with remorse
to the sad day when her husband had been forced to defend his loved
and revered teacher with his own body from her blows and stones.
Meanwhile at Swarthmoor there had been great rejoicing over the
discomfiture of the constables. No sooner had they departed down the
flagged path than back flitted the bevy of girls again into the study,
until the small room was full to overflowing. It was like seeing a
company of fat bumble-bees, their portly bodies resplendent in black
and gold, buzz heavily out of a room, and a gay flight of pale-blue
and lemon butterflies flit back in their places. All the daughters
fell upon their father, Margaret, Bridget, Isabel, Sarah, Mary, and
Susanna; there they all were! tugging off his heavy riding-boots and
gaiters, putting away the whip on the whip-rack, while little Mary
perched herself proudly on his knee and put up her face for a kiss;
and, all the time, such a talk went on as never was about Friend
George Fox and the sufferings he had undergone, each girl telling the
story over and over again.
'Now, now, maids!' said the kind father at last, 'I have heard enough
of your chatter. It is time for you to depart and send Mr. Fox hither
to me himself. 'Tis a stirring tale, even told by maidens' lips; I
would fain hear it at greater length from the man himself. He shall
tell me, in his own words, all that he hath suffered, and the vile
usage he hath met with at the hands of his enemies.'
A few minutes later, a steady step was heard crossing the hall and
ascending the two shallow stairs that led to the Justice's private
sanctum. As George Fox entered the room Judge Fell rose from his seat
at the writing-table to receive his guest, and clasped his hand with a
hearty greeting.
The study at Swarthmoor is only a small room; but when those two
strong men were both in it together, facing each other with level
brows and glances of unclouded trust, the small room seemed suddenly
to grow larger and more spacious. It was swept through by the wide
free airs of heaven, where full-grown spirits can meet and recognise
one another unhindered. They disagreed often, these two determined,
powerful men. They owned different loyalties and held different
opinions; but from the day they first met to the day they parted they
respected and trusted one another wholly, and for this each man in his
heart gave thanks to God.
George Fox began by asking his host how his affairs had prospered; but
when, these enquiries answered, the Judge in his turn questioned his
guest of the rough usage he had met with both at Ulverston and in the
Island of Walney, to his surprise no details were forthcoming. Had the
Judge not had full particulars from his daughters as well as from the
constables, he would have thought that nothing of much moment had
occurred. George Fox apparently took no interest in the subject; the
most he would say, in answer to his host's repeated enquiries, was
that 'the people could do no other, in the spirit in which they were.
They did but show the fruits of their priest's ministry and their
profession and religion to be wrong.'
'I' faith, Margaret, thy friend is a right generous man,' the good
Judge remarked to his wife, that same night, a few hours later, when
they were at length alone together in their chamber. The festoons of
interlaced roses and lilies, carved in high relief on the high black
oak fireplace, shone out clearly in the glow of two tall candles above
their heads.
'In truth, dear Heart,' he continued, taking his wife's hand in his,
and drawing her fondly to him, 'in truth, though I said not so to him,
the Quaker doth manifest the fruits of his religion to be right, by
his behaviour to his foes. All stiff and bruised though he was, he
made nothing of his injuries. When I would have enquired after his
hurts, he would only say the Power of the Lord had surely healed him.
FOR THE REST, HE MADE NOTHING OF IT, AND SPOKE AS A MAN WHO HAD NOT
BEEN CONCERNED.'