marvellous bravery then. It was in the disastrous engagement of
Prestonpans, in the year 1745. The Highlanders surprised the English
army, turned their position, and seized their cannon. Colonel Gardiner
exerted himself to the utmost, but his men quickly fled, and other
regiments did the same. He then joined a small body of English foot who
remained firm, but they were soon after overpowered by the Highlanders.
At the beginning of the onset, which in the whole lasted but a few
minutes, Colonel Gardiner received a bullet-wound in his left breast;
but he said it was only a flesh-wound, and fought on, though he
presently after received a shot in the thigh. Then, seeing a party of
the foot bravely fighting near him, who had no officer to head them, he
rode up to them and cried aloud, `Fire on, my lads, and fear nothing!'
Just then he was cut down by a man with a scythe, and fell. He was
dragged off his horse, and received a mortal blow on the back of his
head; and yet he managed to wave his hat as a signal to a faithful
servant to retreat, crying out at the same time, `Take care of
yourself.'"
"Bravo! auntie, that was true courage if you like; that's old-fashioned
courage such as suits my father and me."
"I know it, Walter. But Colonel Gardiner showed a higher and nobler
courage; higher and nobler because it required far more steady self-
denial, and arose from true religious principle. I want you to notice
the contrast, and that is why I have mentioned these instances of what I
may call his animal bravery. I have no wish to rob him of the honour
due to him for those acts of courage; but then, after all, he was brave
in those constitutionally,--I might say, indeed, because he could not
help it. It was very different with his moral courage. When he was
living an utterly godless and indeed wicked life, it pleased God to
arrest him in his evil career by a wonderful vision of our Saviour
hanging on the cross for him. It was the turning-point of his life. He
became a truly changed man, and as devoted a Christian as he had
formerly been a slave to the world and his own sinful habits. And now
he had to show on whose side he was and meant to be. It is always a
difficult thing to be outspoken for religion in the army, but it was ten
times as difficult then as it is now, seeing that in our day there are
so many truly Christian officers and common soldiers in the service.
Drunkenness and swearing were dreadfully prevalent; indeed, in those
days it was quite a rare thing to find an officer who did not defile his
speech continually with profane oaths. But Colonel Gardiner was not a
man to do things by halves: he was now enlisted under Christ's banner as
a soldier of the Cross, and he must stand up for his new Master and
never be ashamed of him anywhere. But to do this would bring him
persecution in a shape peculiarly trying to him,--I mean in the shape of
ridicule. He would, he tells us, at first, when the change had only
lately taken place in him, rather a thousandfold have marched up to the
mouth of a cannon just ready to be fired than stand up to bear the scorn
and jests of his ungodly companions; he winced under these, and
instinctively shrank back from them. Nevertheless, he braved all, the
scorn, the laughter, the jokes, and made it known everywhere that he was
not ashamed of confessing his Saviour, cost what it might; and he even
managed, by a mixture of firm remonstrance and good-tempered persuasion,
to put down all profane swearing whenever he was present, by inducing
his brother officers to consent to the payment of a fine by the guilty
party for every oath uttered. And so by his consistency he won at
length the respect of all who knew him, even of those who most widely
differed from him in faith and practice. There, Walter, that is what I
call true and grand moral courage and heroism."
"So it was, so it was, dear auntie; but why have you brought forward
Colonel Gardiner's case for my special benefit on the present occasion?"
"I will tell you, dear boy. You think it fine fun to play off your
jokes on Amos, and nothing seems to please you better than to raise the
laugh against him and to bring the hot flush into his cheeks. Ah! but
you little know the pain and the misery you are inflicting; you little
know the moral courage it requires on your brother's part to stand up
under that ridicule without resenting it, and to go on with any purpose
he may have formed in spite of it. I want you to see a reflection of
Colonel Gardiner's noblest courage, his high moral courage, in your own
dear brother, and to value him for it, and not to despise him, as I see
you now do. You say you want to be free from moral cowardice; then,
copy moral courage wherever you can see it."
"Well, auntie," said her nephew after a minute's silence, "I daresay you
are right. Poor Amos! I've been very hard upon him, I believe. It
wasn't right, and I'll try and do better. But it's such a funny idea
taking _him_ as a copy. Why, everybody's always telling me to mark what
Amos does, and just do the very opposite."
"Not everybody, Walter; not the aunt who wants to see you truly good and
noble. There are a grandeur of character and true nobility in Amos
which you little suspect, but which one day you also will admire, though
you do not see nor understand them now."
Walter did not reply. He was not best pleased with his aunt's last
remarks, and yet, at the same time, he was not satisfied with himself.
So he rose to go, and as he did so he said, "Ah, Aunt Kate, I see you
are in Amos's confidence, and that you know all about the little
children and their cottage home."
"Nay, my boy," replied his aunt, "you are mistaken; Amos has not made me
his confidante in the matter. But I have formed my opinion of him and
his motives from little things which have presented themselves to my
observation from time to time, and I have a firm conviction that my
nephew Walter will agree with me in the end about his brother, whatever
he may think now. At least I hope so."
"So do I, dear auntie. Good-bye, good-bye." And, having said these
words half playfully and half seriously, Walter vanished from the room
with a hop, skip, and jump.
CHAPTER SIX.
MISAPPREHENSION.
Miss Huntingdon was not the only person in the family at Flixworth Manor
who entertained a deep affection for Amos Huntingdon, and highly valued
him. Harry the butler loved him as if he had been his own son. The old
man had been inherited with the estate by its present owner, who
remembered him almost as long as he could remember anything, and had a
sincere regard for him, knowing him to be one of those old-fashioned
domestics who look upon their employer's interests as their own.
Harry's hair was now snowy-white, but he retained much of his vigour
unimpaired, the winter of his old age being "frosty, but kindly." So he
had never gone by any other name than "Harry," nor wished to do so, with
his master and his master's friends. However, in the kitchen he
expected to be called "_Mr_. Frazer," and would answer to no other name
when addressed by boys and strangers of his own rank. When the first
child was born Harry took to her with all his might. He knew that his
master was disappointed because she was not a boy, but that made no
difference to Harry. Nothing pleased him better than to act now and
then as nurse to Miss Julia when she was still in long clothes; and many
a peal of hearty and innocent mirth resounded from the kitchen premises
as the servants gazed, with tears of amusement running down their faces,
at _Mr_. Frazer, by the nurse's permission, pacing up and down a sunny
walk in the kitchen garden, with steps slow and grotesquely dignified,
holding the infant warily and tenderly, affirming, when he gave her back
to the nurse, in a self-congratulatory tone, that "little miss" would be
quiet with him when she would be so with no one else; which certainly
might be cause for some wonder, seeing that he would usually accompany
his nursings with such extraordinarily guttural attempts at singing as
were far better calculated to scare any ordinary baby into temporary
convulsions than to soothe it to rest when its slumbers had once been
broken. And how the old man did rejoice when the little thing could
toddle into his pantry! And no wonder that she was very ready to do so,
for Harry had an inexhaustible store of plums, and bonbons, and such
like enticements, which were always forthcoming when little miss
gladdened his heart with a visit. So they were fast friends, and
thoroughly understood each other.
When, however, a son and heir was born, and there was in consequence a
perfect delirium of bell-ringing in the village church-tower, Harry by
no means entered heart and soul into the rejoicings. "Well," he said
with a sigh, "there's no help for it, I suppose. It's all right, no
doubt; but Miss Julia's my pet, and so she shall be as long as my name's
Harry." The new infant, therefore, received none of the attention at
his hands which its predecessor had enjoyed. When pressed by the
housekeeper, with an arch smile on her good-natured face, to take "baby"
out for an airing, he shook his head very gravely and declined the
employment, affirming that his nursing days were over. The name also of
the new baby was a sore subject to Harry. "`Amos,' indeed! Well, what
next? Who ever heard of an `Amos' in the family? You might go as far
back as Noah and you'd never find one. Mr Sutterby might be a very
good gentleman, but his Christian name was none the better for that."
And, for a while, the old man's heart got more and more firmly closed
against the young heir; while Amos, on his part, in his boyish days,
made no advances towards being on friendly terms with the old servant,
who yet could not help being sometimes sorry for his young master, when
he marked how the sunshine of love and favour, which was poured out
abundantly on Miss Julia, came but in cold and scattered rays to her
desolate-hearted brother.
This kindly feeling was deepened in Harry's heart, and began to show
itself in many little attentions, after the death of Mr Sutterby. He
could not avoid seeing how the father's and mother's affections were
more and more drawn away from their little son, while he keenly felt
that the poor child had done nothing to deserve it; so in a plain and
homely way he tried to draw him out of himself, and made him as free of
his pantry as his sister was. And when Walter came, a few years before
Mr Sutterby's death, putting Amos into almost total eclipse, Harry
would have none of this third baby. "He'd got notice enough and to
spare," he said, "and didn't want none from him." And now a new cord
was winding itself year by year round the old butler's heart--a cord
woven by the character of the timid child he had learned to love. He
could not but notice how Amos, while yet a boy, controlled himself when
cruelly taunted or ridiculed by his younger brother; how he returned
good for evil; and how, spite of sorrow and a wounded spirit, there was
peace on the brow and in the heart of that despised and neglected one.
For he had discovered that, in his visits to his aunt, Amos had found
the pearl of great price, and the old man's heart leapt for joy, for he
himself was a true though unpretending follower of his Saviour.
So Harry's attachment to his young master grew stronger and stronger,
and all the more so as he came to see through the more attractive but
shallower character of Walter, whose praises were being constantly
sounded in his ears by Mr Huntingdon. And there was one thing above
all others which tended to deepen his attachment to Amos, which was
Amos's treatment of his sister, who was still the darling of Harry's
heart. Walter loved his sister after a fashion. He could do a generous
thing on the impulse of the moment, and would conform himself to her
wishes when it was not too much trouble. But as for denying himself, or
putting himself out of the way to please her, it never entered into his
head. Nevertheless, any little attention on his part, spite of his
being so much younger than herself, was specially pleasing to Julia, who
was never so happy as when she and he could carry out by themselves some
little scheme of private amusement. Harry noticed this, and was far
from feeling satisfied, observing to the housekeeper that "Master Walter
was a nasty, stuck-up little monkey; and he only wondered how Miss Julia
could be so fond of him." On the other hand, Amos always treated his
sister, even from his earliest boyhood, with a courtesy and
consideration which showed that she was really precious to him. And, as
she grew up towards womanhood and he towards mature boyhood, the beauty
and depth of his respectful and unselfish love made themselves felt by
all who could value and understand them, and among these was Harry. He
could appreciate, though he could not explain, the contrast between a
mere sentiment of affection, such as that which prompted Walter to
occasional acts of kindness to his sister which cost him nothing, and
the abiding, deep-seated principle of love in Amos which exhibited
itself in a constant thoughtful care and watchfulness to promote the
happiness of its object, his beloved sister.
So Harry's heart warmed towards his young master more and more,
especially when he could not help noticing that, while Amos never
relaxed his endeavours to make his sister happy, she on her part either
resented his kindness, or at the best took it as a matter of course,
preferring--and not caring to conceal her preference--a smile or word or
two from Walter to the most patient and self-denying study of her tastes
and wishes on the part of her elder brother. The old man grieved over
this conduct in his darling Miss Julia, and gave her a hint on the
subject in his own simple way, which to his surprise and mortification
she resented most bitterly, and visited her displeasure also on Amos by
carefully avoiding him as much as possible, and being specially
demonstrative in her affection to Walter. Amos of course felt it
deeply, but it made no alteration in his own watchful love to his
sister. As for Harry, all he could do was to wait in hopes of brighter
times, and to console himself for his young mistress's coldness by
taking every opportunity of promoting the happiness and winning the
fuller confidence of the brother whom she so cruelly despised.
But then came the crash; and this well-nigh broke the faithful old
servant's heart. She whom he still loved as though she were his own,
following her own unrestrained fancies, left her father's house to unite
herself to a heartless adventurer before she had reached full womanhood,
and thus closed the door of her old home against her. Then followed a
frightful blank. An allusion by the old butler to "Miss Julia," when
the squire and he were alone together, was met by a burst of violence on
his master's part, and a threat that Harry must leave if he ever again
mentioned his old favourite's name to her father. So his lips were
closed, but not his heart; for he waited, watched, and prayed for better
times, even after a still heavier cloud had gathered over the family in
the removal of poor Mrs Huntingdon, and all the love he had to spare
was given to his poor desolate young master, whose spirit had been
crushed to the very dust by the sad withdrawal of his mother and sister
from his earthly home.
Walter too was, of course, grieved at the loss of his sister and mother,
but the blow was far lighter to him than to his brother, partly from his
being of a more lively and elastic temperament, and partly because he
did not, being so young a boy when the sad events took place, so fully
understand as did his elder brother the shame and disgrace which hung
over the family through his sister's heartless and selfish conduct. His
aunt soon came to supply his mother's place, and completely won the
impulsive boy's heart by her untiring and thoughtful affection. And one
lesson he was learning from her, which was at first the strangest and
hardest of lessons to one brought up as he had been, and that was, to
respect the feelings and appreciate, though by very slow degrees, the
character of his brother. His own superiority to Amos he had hitherto
taken as a matter of course and beyond dispute. Everybody allowed it,
except perhaps old Harry; but that, in Walter's eyes, was nothing. Amos
was the eldest son, and heir to the family estate, and therefore the old
butler took to him naturally, and would have done so if he had been a
cow without any brains instead of a human being. So said Walter, and
was quite content that a poor, ignorant fellow like Harry, who could
have no knowledge or understanding of character, should set his regards
on the elder son, and not notice the otherwise universally acknowledged
bodily and intellectual superiority of his more worthy self. No wonder,
then, that pity more than love was the abiding feeling in Walter's heart
towards his less popular and less outwardly attractive brother. And it
was a very strange discovery, and as unwelcome as strange, which his
aunt was now leading him gradually to make spite of himself, that in
real sterling excellence and beauty of character the weight, which he
had hitherto considered to lie wholly in his own scale, was in truth to
be found in the opposite scale on his brother's side of the balance.
Very slowly and reluctantly indeed was he brought to admit this at all,
and, even when he was constrained to do so, he by no means surrendered
at discretion to his aunt's view of the matter, but fought against it
most vigorously, even when his conscience reproved him most loudly. And
thus it was that a day or two after his conversation with Miss
Huntingdon on the moral courage exhibited by Colonel Gardiner, he was
rather glad of an opportunity that presented itself of exhibiting his
brother in an unamiable light, and "trotting him out with his shabby old
horsecloth on," as he expressed it, for the amusement of himself and
friends. It was on a summer evening, and very hot, so that Miss
Huntingdon, her two nephews, and two young men, friends of Walter, were
enjoying tea and strawberries in a large summer-house which faced a
sloping lawn enamelled with flower-beds glowing with masses of richly
tinted flowers. Mr Huntingdon was not with them, as this was Bench
day, and he was dining after business hours with a brother magistrate.
Walter, full of life and spirits, rattled away to his heart's content,
laughing boisterously at his own jokes, which he poured forth the more
continuously because he saw that Amos was more than usually indisposed
to merriment.
"By-the-by, Tom," he said suddenly to one of his companions, "what about
the boat-race? When is it to come off?"
"In September," replied his friend. "But we are in a little difficulty.
You know Sir James has lent us the Park for the occasion, and a capital
thing it will be; for we can make a good two miles of it by rowing round
the ornamental water twice. It is to be a four-oared match; four
Cambridge against four Oxford men, old or young, it doesn't matter. It
is to be part of the fun on the coming of age of Sir James's eldest son.
I rather think he was born on the eighth. Young James is a Cambridge
man and a capital oar, and I'm of the same college, and so is Harrison
here, as you know, and we shall have no difficulty in finding a fourth;
but we are rather puzzled about the Oxford men. We can calculate upon
three, but don't know where to look for the fourth. I wish, Walter,
you'd been old enough, and a member of the university."
"Ay, Tom, I wish I had been. But, by-the-by, there's no difficulty
after all. Here's Amos, an Oxford man, and a very good oar too--he's
just the very man you want."
It was quite true, as Walter said, that Amos had been a good rower at
the university. Rowing was one of the few amusements in which he had
indulged himself, but he had never joined a racing boat though often
solicited to do so.
"What do you say, Amos?" asked his young companion. "Will you join us,
and make up the Oxford four complete? We shall be really much obliged
if you will; and I'm sure you'll enjoy it."
"Thank you," replied Amos; "it's very kind of you to ask me, I'm sure.
I should have liked it had I been able to undertake it, but I am sorry
to say that it cannot be."
"Cannot be!" exclaimed Walter. "Why, what's to hinder you?"
"I cannot spare the time just now," said his brother quietly.
"Not spare the time!--not spare half-an-hour one fine afternoon in
September! Dear me! you must be oppressed with business. What is it?
It isn't farming, I know. Is it legal business? Have you got so many
appointments with the Lord Chancellor that he can't spare you even for
one day?"
"It will not be only for one day," replied Amos quietly. "If the race
is to be a real trial of skill and strength we must train for it, and
have many practices, and I cannot promise to find time for these."
"Oh, nonsense! Why not? You've nothing to do."
"I have something to do, Walter, and something too that I cannot give up
for these practisings."
"What! I suppose you think such vanities as these waste of precious
time."
"I never said nor thought so, Walter; but I have a work in hand which
will prevent my having the pleasure of taking a part in this race, for
it really would have been a pleasure to me."
"Ah! it must be a precious important work, no doubt," said his brother
satirically. "Just tell us what it is, and we shall be able to judge."
Amos made no reply to these last words, but turned first very red and
then very pale.
"Humph!" said Walter; "I guess what it is. It's a new scheme for paying
off the national debt, by turning radishes into sovereigns and cabbage-
leaves into bank-notes; and it'll take a deal of time and pains to do
it." He laughed furiously at his own wit, but, to his mortification, he
laughed alone. There was a rather painful silence, which was broken by
the gentle voice of Miss Huntingdon.
"I think, dear Walter," she said, "that you are a little hard on your
brother. Surely he may have an important work on hand without being
engaged in such a hopeless task as attempting to turn radishes into
sovereigns and cabbage-leaves into bank-notes. And does it follow that
he despises your boat-race because he prefers duty to pleasure?"
"Ah! that's just it," cried Walter, in a tone of mingled excitement and
displeasure. "Who's to know that it _is_ duty? I think one duty is
very plain, and I should have thought you would have agreed with me
here, and that is to give up your own way and pleasure sometimes, when
by doing so you may help to make other people happy."
"I quite agree with you in that, Walter," said his aunt. "It may be and
often does become a duty to surrender our own pleasure, but never surely
to surrender our duty."
"True, aunt, if it's really duty; but some people's duty means merely
their own fancy, and it's very convenient to call _that_ duty when you
don't want to be obliging."
"It may be so, Walter; but, on the other hand, if we have seen cause
even to impose upon ourselves something as a duty, we are bound to carry
it out, although others may not see it to be a duty and may call it
fancy; and certainly we should at least respect those who thus follow
what they firmly believe they _ought_ to do, even though we cannot
exactly understand or agree with their views of duty. So you must bear
with Amos; for I am certain that he would not say `No' to you about the
race if he were not persuaded that duty stands in the way of his taking
a part in it."
"Ah, well! happy Amos to have such a champion," cried Walter, laughing,
for he had now recovered his good-humour. "I suppose you are right, and
I must allow brother Amos to have his duty and his mystery all to
himself. But it's odd, and that's all I can say about it. Such short-
sighted mortals as I am can't see those duties which are up in the
clouds, but only those which lie straight before our eyes."
"And yet, Walter, there may be the truest and noblest heroism in
sacrificing everything to these self-imposed duties, which _you_ call
duties up in the clouds."
"O aunt, aunt!" exclaimed Walter, laughing, "are you going to be down
upon me again about moral courage? You have not crossed your hands this
time, and yet I daresay it will do us all good, my friends here as well
as myself, to have a lesson on moral courage from you; so listen all to
my dear aunt. She is teaching me moral courage by examples. Who is
your hero, dear auntie, this time?"
"Shall I go on?" said Miss Huntingdon, looking round on her hearers;
then seeing an expression of interest on every countenance, she
continued, "Well, I will, if you wish it. My hero to-day is John
Howard."
"Not a soldier this time, Aunt Kate."
"Not in your sense, Walter, but one of the truest and bravest in mine."
"Pray, then, let us hear all about his exploits, dear aunt."