THE GREAT SORROW.
JOHN TREVAN was among the most prosperous inhabitants of Newlyn. He was
an industrious man; his wife was thrifty, and he had a small family to
support. It consisted of one son, who had wandered far away from his
father's house, eight years before our story commences, and the twin
daughters.
John Trevan married Philippa Nance, at the age of thirty-five. He
brought his wife, who was six years his junior, to the whitewashed
cottage we have described, where his parents had lived before him. Her
father came too, for he could not be separated from his only remaining
child. When Philippa consented to marry John Trevan she stipulated that
her well-beloved parent should share her future home.
"He will be no burden upon you, John, for he has enough to keep him,"
she said.
To which her future husband replied, "He would be welcome for your
sake, Philippa, were he penniless."
A boy was born to them at the end of two years. This event brought
great joy to the little circle; but as the lad grew in years, his
parents had many reasons for deep anguish regarding him. He was
named William, after his grandfather; and known to all in Newlyn as
"mischievous Willy." He was brought up carefully, and taught to fear
God; but he spurned the good, and clung to the evil; yet sometimes,
when his mother took him into her room, and knelt in prayer to God,
with him at her side, his tears would come, and he would say,—
"Mother, it is so hard not to be naughty."
And she answered him, "I know it, my darling boy; but do not trust
to yourself, pray to God, Willy, to make you a better lad. Ask your
Heavenly Father to give you His Spirit to help you, and change your
heart of stone to a heart of flesh. He will not refuse to hear your
prayer if you ask in Christ's name."
For one or two days after an outbreak Willy was more obedient, and then
he began to be tiresome again. He had no regard for truth, and played
truant so often that at last either his father or mother took him to
school every morning, and gave him into his teacher's charge, before
they went about their daily work.
When Willy reached his tenth year, his twin sisters were born, and for
a few weeks all went smoothly with him. He loved the little baby girls,
and felt very proud when his mother allowed him to hold one of them in
his arms, but this novel pleasure wore off, and he was again running
wild with unruly boys.
"I must send him to sea a year or two hence, under some wise captain,"
said John Trevan to his wife, many times. "I can't keep him at home if
he does not turn over a new leaf. He'll have to think when he has to go
before the mast, and be obliged to obey; and he'll be quite away from
his bad companions."
But the mother clung to her prodigal; her love for him grew all the
more because Willy's friends were so few, and because he was the child
of so many tears and prayers.
A hundred years ago smuggling was rife in Cornwall, and contraband
goods and spirits were netted instead of fish. Then Wesley and
Whitfield roused the people up to better things by their preaching, and
taught them to reverence God and believe in His Son. Willy had heard
many wonderful stories about these smugglers, and he thought it was
just the sort of life that would have suited him. He wished those old
times were not over, for he disliked the hard work of a fisherman's
life.
So time passed on until Willy reached his fifteenth year. On the
morning of his birthday, he quarrelled with his father, and refused to
help him dry his net. John Trevan grew angry, and high words passed
between the two. The end of it was, that the boy packed on his clothes,
and when his father went out fishing and the rest were asleep, crept
to the old teapot where his mother kept her money, and having robbed
her of two sovereigns, stole away from his home, and took the road
towards Plymouth. He walked some miles before he ventured to get a lift
in a waggon, lest he should be recognised and taken back to Newlyn. At
Plymouth, he engaged himself to a captain who commanded a large ship
bound to Lagos, in Africa; but a bad unprincipled man. Thus far he had
been traced, and eight years had passed away without bringing him home
again, or a message or letter being received from him.
Mrs. Trevan was bowed down with grief when she found her son had left
his home without bidding her farewell. So soon as she discovered that
her little store of money was gone too, and thought of her first-born
as a common thief, she moaned out in the bitterness of her sorrow, "My
heart will break. Oh, Willy, Willy! What have I done that you should
treat me so cruelly?"
John Trevan was indignant. "Let him go," he said; "I do not own a thief
as my son."
But when year after year ran on, he forgot Willy's faults, and only
yearned to clasp him in his arms once more. No family prayer ever
closed without remembering him. His mother felt she could give him up
if only she knew what fate had befallen him, and that he had turned to
God.
The little girls retained a vivid remembrance of their brother; they
hushed their voices when his birthday came, it was so differently kept
to their own; there was no holiday-making. Their mother looked sad, and
always went out alone before breakfast, up the hill behind Newlyn, into
the fields, to a point which commanded a view of the broad ocean. Her
birthday prayer for Willy was that he might come home, not as he left
her, but with a new heart and a right spirit.
The little circle at Newlyn would have known but few cares had Willy
been with them, a steady well behaved boy.
"It's doing us good," John said to his wife, when they reverted to
their great sorrow. "Perhaps we should have grown away from God if our
boy had given us no trouble; but now He's chastening us, and teaching
us the value of having a Father in heaven, to whom we can tell out all
our troubles. I am like your father, Philippa, I believe God will help
Willy, as He has helped us, and bring him home again."
The mother sighed when her husband spoke thus, and answered, "God grant
it may be so."
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