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BIANCONI.
Charles Bianconi was altogether a very remarkable person, and not less
for his energy and perseverance than for his public services, ought
to be kept in remembrance. He was by birth an Italian—not, however,
an Italian of the lethargic south, but of the northern mountainous
district bordering on the Lake of Como. We might call him an Italian
highlander. Belonging to a respectable though not affluent family,
he was born on the 24th September 1786. At school he made so little
progress as to be thought little better than a dunce. People did not
quite understand his character. His impulse was to work, not to study.
He wanted to have something to do, and if put on a fair track, was not
afraid of being left behind in the ordinary business of life. With
this adventurous disposition, and with a good physical stamina, he was
bound for eighteen months to Andrea Faroni, who was to take him to
London, and there learn the business of a dealer in prints, barometers,
and small telescopes. Faroni did not strictly fulfil his part of the
contract. Instead of proceeding to London, he took the boy to Dublin,
at which he arrived in 1802; so there he was started in a business
career in Ireland when sixteen years of age. Helpless, friendless,
without money, and ignorant of the English language, his fate was
rather hard; but his privations only served to strengthen his powers of
self-reliance. Like a hero, he determined to overcome all difficulties.
Faroni, his master, seems to have made a trade of getting Italian
boys into his clutches. Besides Bianconi, he had several others, whom
he daily turned out to the streets to sell prints in a poor kind
of frames, always making a point that they should set off on their
travels without any money, and bring home to him the proceeds of
their industry. At first, Bianconi was at a loss how to carry on his
dealings. The only English word he was made acquainted with was ‘buy,
buy;’ and when asked the price of his prints, he could only count on
his fingers the number of pence he demanded. In a short time, he
picked up other words; and gave so much satisfaction to his employer,
that he was sent off to the country every Monday morning with two
pounds worth of pictures, and a munificent allowance of fourpence in
his pocket as subsistence-money until he returned on Saturday evening.
How he contrived to live on less than a penny a day, is not mentioned.
We daresay, he often got a warm potato as well as a night’s lodging
from the kind-hearted peasantry to whom he exhibited his wares. Opening
his pack was as good as a show. He carried a variety of Scripture
pieces, pictures of the Royal family, and portraits of Bonaparte and
his distinguished generals, all which were profoundly interesting,
and found willing purchasers. On one occasion, an over-zealous
magistrate, thinking there was a treasonous purpose in selling effigies
of Bonaparte, arrested the young pedler, and kept him all night in a
guard-room without fire or bedding, and only in the morning was he
liberated, almost in a perishing condition. Every Saturday night,
Bianconi returned to Dublin to deliver the money he had gathered, and
this he did with an honesty which commanded that degree of confidence
and respect which led to his professional advancement.
Bianconi’s rambles during three to four years took him chiefly
in a south-western direction from Dublin, towards Waterford,
Carrick-on-Suir, and Clonmel, in which neighbourhood he made many
friends in respectable circles, who were anxious to help him with their
countenance and advice, of which as a foreigner he stood in need. So
encouraged, he dropped the trade of pedler, and set up as a carver
and gilder in Carrick in 1806. Not long afterwards, he removed to
Waterford, and issued cards intimating that he was ‘a carver and gilder
of the first class.’ It was a bold announcement; but he resolved to
make up for deficiencies by incessant industry; and with the exception
of two hours for meals, he worked from six o’clock in the morning until
past midnight. Hear that, ye false friends of the working classes—ye
preachers of the gospel of idleness! Bianconi remained two years in
Waterford, and having improved in means and mechanical knowledge, he
removed to Clonmel, in which he settled down for a permanence. Clonmel
is a thriving borough of some importance, on the river Suir, chiefly in
the county of Tipperary, and fourteen miles south from Cashel. We shall
not go into any account of his growing trade in mirrors and gilded
picture-frames; it is enough to say that Bianconi, by his suavity,
integrity, and diligence in his calling, laid the foundation of his
fortunes, by which he was enabled to project and carry out a very
stupendous undertaking.
A grand thought burst on Bianconi. He conceived the idea of
establishing a system of cheap and commodious travelling through
Ireland. The only public conveyances were a few mail and day coaches
on the great lines of road. Across the country there was no means of
transit between market-towns, except by private or specially hired
carriages. The plan fallen upon was to start public cars, each with two
wheels, drawn by a single horse, and carrying six passengers—three on
each side, sitting with their faces outward, in the Irish fashion, with
the driver on an elevated seat in front. The attempt was made in 1815,
beginning with a car from Clonmel to Cahir, and subsequently extended
to Tipperary and Limerick. The thing took. A grievous public want was
supplied, and supplied by a foreigner. From town to town, this way and
that way over hundreds of miles, Bianconi’s cars spread, and became a
great institution. On certain routes, cars with four wheels drawn by
two horses, with accommodation for twelve passengers, were established;
and latterly there were cars drawn by four horses, accommodating
sixteen passengers. At Clonmel there was a gigantic establishment, the
centre of the organisation, and at the head of the whole was Bianconi,
like the general at the head of an army—his carving and gilding
business, of course, being given up, and nothing thought of but cars,
horses, drivers, and way-bills.
Bianconi’s head was not turned by his surprising success. He was
not one of your foolish persons who, having hit upon a successful
enterprise, leave it to its fate, and heedlessly take their ease. His
genius for organisation was exercised now only for the first time. The
smallest as well as the greatest matters occupied his attention; yet
Bianconi was not a mere business monster, set on making money. He was
generous in his gifts for pious objects and the support of schools;
nor was he less noted for his profuse and genial hospitality. He
had, however, higher claims to the character of a public benefactor.
When his cars were generally established, he realised the pleasure
of seeing the good they were doing. In a paper read by him at the
British Association meeting in 1857, he speaks of the many advantages
arising from the speedy and free communication he had set on foot.
‘As the establishment extended, I was surprised and delighted at its
commercial and moral importance. I found, as soon as I had opened
communication with the interior of the country, the consumption of
manufactured goods greatly increased. In the remote parts of Ireland,
before my cars ran from Tralee to Cahirciveen in the south, from
Galway to Clifden in the west, and from Ballina to Belmullet in the
north-west, purchasers were obliged to give eight or nine pence a yard
for calico for shirts, which they afterwards bought for three or four
pence. The poor people, therefore, who previously could ill afford
to buy one shirt, were enabled to buy two for a less price than they
had paid for one, and in the same ratio other commodities came into
general use at reduced prices.’ The introduction of railways naturally
deranged the car traffic. But in 1857, Bianconi had still nine hundred
horses, working sixty-seven conveyances, and travelling daily four
thousand two hundred and forty-four miles. There was in fact as much
car traffic as ever, only changed in many places into cross-roads, and
running short distances in connection with railway stations—a fact
which verifies what is obvious to everybody; for railways, instead
of diminishing the number of horses in the country, as short-sighted
people prognosticated, have greatly increased them. Bianconi felt a
pride in thinking how through the agency of his cars the fisheries on
the west of Ireland had been largely promoted, thereby contributing to
the comfort and independence of the people; and he was prouder still to
say, for the sake of Ireland, that his conveyances, though travelling
night and day, and many of them carrying important mails, had never
once been interrupted by any social disorder, and never suffered the
slightest injury.
From prudential considerations, Bianconi continued a bachelor
until he was well established in the car business, and was in good
circumstances. When, as he thought, the proper time had come, and
he had a handsomely furnished house in Clonmel into which he might
introduce a wife, he in 1827 married a young and amiable lady, Eliza
Hayes, daughter of a stock-broker in Dublin. Of this marriage there
was a family of a son and two daughters. The son died while still a
young man, and the eldest daughter, Kate, died unmarried. The youngest
daughter, Mary Ann, was married to Morgan John O’Connell, M.P. for
Kerry, and nephew of the famous Dan. O’Connell. Surviving her husband,
this lady has lately given to the world a memoir of her father,
‘Charles Bianconi, a Biography’ (Chapman and Hall, London, 1878), to
which we have been indebted for a number of interesting particulars.
Mrs O’Connell’s recollections picture her father in his early married
life as a man who gave little heed to home affairs. His time was
divided on his cars, electioneering, and getting into the corporation
of Clonmel. He was fond of his children, but too busy to think much
about them. ‘For a man of such excellent common-sense in most things,’
says his daughter, ‘he was not a judicious father. He suffered my
handsome brother to grow up without a profession.’ This is not said
disrespectfully, but to present a type of men in married life, who,
with excellent abilities and good intentions, habitually neglect the
rearing of their sons to any useful purpose. Who could not point to
lamentable instances of this indiscretion, and the unhappy consequences
which follow?
Bianconi had an ambition. It was to be Mayor of Clonmel. Some will
think this a weakness, but it was excusable. One who had begun life
as a poor alien boy struggling with poverty, and cared for by nobody,
wished to shew that by the revolution of fortune he was qualified for a
position of honour and dignity. His ambition was gratified. In 1844, he
was unanimously elected Mayor of Clonmel for the ensuing year; and such
was the satisfaction he gave as a magistrate, that he was elected for
a second term of office. For a position of this kind he was eminently
qualified. He had learned to speak English with perfect fluency, and
from observation was able to act his part in a manner equal to that of
any native-born citizen. Intuitively he had caught up the fervour of
the Irish character, as well as a knowledge of the legal disabilities
which had hitherto exasperated the majority of the nation. A friend to
justice and toleration, and on all sides desirous to promote peace and
good-will, it is not surprising that he attained to popular favour.
In Mrs O’Connell’s memoir of her father we have a glimpse of a few
of his eccentricities. So anxious was he to be helpful when his
interference could be of any use, that while acting as Mayor of Clonmel
he did not mind clambering on the top of his cars to pack the luggage
of passengers; and he would give himself any amount of trouble to get
situations for young men in whom he had confidence. While generous
in his charities, he was scrupulous to parsimony when there was a
chance of making a good bargain. This trait of character, however, is
not uncommon. We have heard related the anecdote of a wealthy London
banker, who one day saw his coachman taking home a pie of tempting
appearance for dinner. Inquiring the price of the pie, he learned that
it cost half-a-crown. ‘If you please, James, I’ll take the bargain
off your hands; there is half-a-crown for you, and you can easily get
another pie for yourself.’ So saying, the banker secured the pie,
which would last him for dinner for a week. Bianconi was equally acute
in trying to turn the penny. ‘One day, in Fleet Street, just after
he had engaged a four-wheeled cab, my father saw a stout gentleman
walking very quickly towards him, and who was evidently in distress at
not being able to find a conveyance. The spirit of Charles Bianconi,
carman, woke up too strongly to be suddenly quelled. “I have a cab,
sir,” he said. “If you will give me your fare, I will set you down
where you like.” The stout gentleman was profuse with thanks, and said
he wanted to go to the Exchange. When they were in the cab, he begged
to be allowed to know to whom he was indebted. “My name is Bianconi,”
said my father. “The great Bianconi?” replied the gentleman. “And what
is your name, sir?” replied my father, without half the politeness of
his companion. “My name, sir, is Rothschild.” My father, in telling me
the story, admitted that he was so much overawed by the presence and
the affability of so famous a man, that he had not presence of mind to
return the compliment and say, “The great Rothschild?” This was by no
means a singular instance of my father’s eccentricities in this way;
often at home, in Ireland, when he was driving in his own carriage
along the high-road, he would take in a traveller who would otherwise
have gone by the car, provided that he paid the car fare.’
In his broodings over change of circumstances, Bianconi had nourished
another ambition than that of being some day Mayor of Clonmel. He
wished to be a land-proprietor, but not being a natural-born subject,
he was not, according to law, eligible for buying land until he went
through certain formalities in 1831, after which he looked about for a
suitable investment. His first and principal acquisition was Longfield,
a property in Tipperary, extending to about a thousand English acres.
On it was a large and cheerful house, overlooking the Suir, and
well-wooded pleasure-grounds sloping down to the river. Here, with
splendid views of distant mountains, Bianconi took up his residence—at
his arrival on taking possession there being a grand flare-up of
tenantry with no end of cheering, for the new landlord’s beneficence
and means of disbursement were pretty well understood. Bianconi did
not disappoint expectations. When famine, from the failure of the
potato crops, spread over the land in 1848, he employed all who would
work, and no one died from want at Longfield. His many improvements in
fencing, draining, and building cottages with slated roofs gave some
offence to neighbouring proprietors of the old school; but he did not
mind being looked coldly upon, and by his independence of character
gained general esteem and respect.
Advancing in life, Bianconi disposed of his interest in the car system
which he originated, several new proprietors taking his place. In 1851,
he revisited Italy with his family, but found himself out of unison
with all that fell under his notice. Some family property that devolved
on him, he presented to several poor relations. It was a pleasure for
him to return to Ireland, with which all his feelings were identified,
and where he had made numerous warmly cherished acquaintances—among
others, Daniel O’Connell, with whom he was in frequent correspondence.
His daughter speaks of the immense mass of letters and papers which
he left behind him, and presents us with a few specimens from persons
of note, all in a complimentary strain. Referring to what he had
effected by his ingenious enterprise, Lady Blessington writes to him
from England—‘I thank you for discovering those noble qualities in
my poor countrymen which neglect and injustice may have concealed,
but have not been able to destroy. While bettering their condition,
you have elevated the moral character of those you employ; you have
advanced civilisation while inculcating a practical code of morality
that must ever prove the surest path to lead to an amelioration of
Ireland. Wisdom and humanity, which ought ever to be inseparable, shine
most luminously in the plan you have pursued, and its results must win
for you the esteem, gratitude, and respect of all who love Ireland.
The Irish are not an ungrateful people, as they have too often been
represented. My own feelings satisfy me on this point. Six of the
happiest years of my life have been spent in your country [Italy],
where I learned to appreciate the high qualities of its natives; and
consequently I am not surprised, though delighted, to find one Italian
conferring so many benefits on mine.’
In 1865, when seventy-nine years of age, Bianconi suffered a serious
misfortune. When driving a private car, part of the harness snapped,
and he was thrown violently to the ground. His thigh-bone was broken;
and rarely at his advanced age does any one recover from the effects
of such accidents. In a moment of time he had been made a cripple for
the remainder of his life. He now only moved about with crutches,
or was wheeled about in a Bath-chair; yet he undertook journeys, of
course with proper attendance, and did not lose his characteristic
cheerfulness. ‘When long past eighty, when he got to be stout, lame,
and helpless, he would visit the boys’ Reformatory in the Wicklow
Mountains,’ and encountered other risks inappropriate to his age and
infirmity. By the governing authorities in Ireland he was held in
much esteem for the benefits he had conferred on the country. ‘That
amiable, accomplished, and deservedly popular Viceroy, Lord Carlisle,
never failed to single out Mr Bianconi at the Royal Dublin shows, or
at the other places of public resort, when he happened to be present
in his wheeled chair, for they were great friends, and Lord Carlisle
esteemed him very highly. At first it was hardly expected he would have
lived long after his mishap; but by God’s grace he remained with us for
nearly another ten years.’
Afflicted with paralysis and confined to bed, poor Bianconi passed
peacefully away after a long and useful career. Mrs O’Connell, who was
attending on him at the last, strangely omits to give the date of his
decease, which was September 22, 1875, when within two days of being
eighty-nine years of age. His body was interred in a mortuary chapel,
which he had prepared for himself and family within the grounds at
Longfield. Although he had latterly been unable to appear in public
affairs, his loss was felt to be national. Looking to the manner in
which he self-reliantly rose from obscurity to distinction, and to the
success of his vast undertakings, his memory cannot but be endeared
to his adopted country, which stands particularly in need of men with
his sound common-sense and commercial enterprise. In conclusion, we
might almost be warranted in saying that Charles Bianconi did more
practically to advance the civilisation and the prosperity of Ireland
than all its professed patriots and politicians put together.
W. C.
HELENA, LADY HARROGATE.
CHAPTER XXXI.—TO REMIND.
‘Gentleman—that is, person—wanted most particularly to know—please to
see him, Sir Sykes!’ deferentially hinted the under-butler, sliding on
noiseless feet up to the angle of his master’s library table. ‘He was
very pressing—send in card,’ continued the man, slurring over the words
he uttered with that inimitable slipperiness of diction of which the
English, and indeed Cockney man-servant possesses the monopoly, and
which seems obsequiously to suggest rather than boldly to announce. Sir
Sykes looked up in some surprise.
‘Did he mention what he wanted?’ he asked.
‘No, Sir Sykes,’ replied the under-butler, edging the emblazoned tray
on which lay the card, a little nearer, as an experienced angler might
bring his bait within striking distance of the pike that lay among the
weeds.
‘You may shew him in—here,’ said Sir Sykes, as, without taking the
card, he read the name upon it, and which was legibly inscribed in a
big, bold, black handwriting. With a bow the under-butler withdrew to
execute his master’s orders.
Great people—and a baronet of Sir Sykes Denzil’s wealth and position
may for all practical purposes be classed among the great of the
earth—are proverbially difficult of access. It is the business
of those about them to hedge them comfortably in from flippant or
interested intrusions which might ruffle the golden calm of their
existence; and suspicious-looking strangers by no means find the door
of such a mansion as Carbery, as a rule, fly open at their summons.
The man who had on this occasion effected an entry was not one of those
whose faces are their best letters of recommendation. The card he had
given bore the name of Richard Hold, and under ordinary circumstances,
such a caller as the mariner would never have succeeded in being put
into communication with a higher dignitary than the house-steward
or the groom of the chambers. However, by a judicious mixture of
bribing and bullying, the visitor had induced the under-butler to do
his errand. Under certain circumstances, half a sovereign is a sorry
douceur, even to an under-butler, but when tendered in company with
enigmatical threats of ‘starting with a rope’s end,’ by a seafaring
personage of stalwart build and resolute air, such a coin becomes
doubly efficacious as a persuader.
Richard Hold, master mariner, came in with a curious gait and mien,
half-slinking, half-swaggering, like a wolf that daylight has found far
from the forests and among the haunts of men. He was dressed in very
new black garments, ‘shore-going clothes,’ as he would himself have
described them; and the hat that he carried in his hand was new and
tall and hard. He had even provided himself with a pair of gloves, so
desirous was he to omit no item of the customary garb of gentlemen; but
these he carried loose, instead of subjecting his strong brown fingers
to such unwonted confinement.
‘I cannot say that I expected this honour, Mr Hold,’ said the baronet,
stiffly motioning his unwelcome visitor to a seat.
‘’Tis likely not,’ coolly returned the adventurer, as he took a survey
of the apartment. ‘This sort of place, I don’t mind admitting, is a
cut, or even two cuts above me. Still, business is business, Sir Sykes
Denzil, Baronet, and has got to be attended to, I reckon, even in such
a gen-teel spot as this is, mister!’
There must be something in the American twang and the American forms of
speech which all the world over hits the fancy of British-born rovers
of Hold’s caste, for in every quarter of the globe our home-reared
rovers affect the idiom, and sometimes the accent, of Sam Slick’s
countrymen.
‘I am scarcely aware, Mr Hold,’ said the baronet with cold politeness,
‘what business it can be to which I am indebted for the favour of your
company, to-day.’
‘Aren’t you, though, skipper?’ echoed Hold, whose natural audacity,
for a moment repressed by the weight as it were of the grandeur around
him, began to assert itself afresh. ‘Well, let every fellow paddle his
own canoe and shoe his own mustangs. The question is, Are you dealing
fairly by me or are you not, Sir Sykes Denzil, Baronet?’
‘I assure you that you are talking Greek to me,’ said the master of
Carbery Chase, with a tinge of colour rising to his pale face.
‘A nod,’ persisted Hold, ‘is as good every bit as a wink—you know the
rest of it, mister. But since you want plain speaking, you shall have
it. You can’t have forgot, no more than I can, that our bargain was
just this: A certain young lady was to be married to a certain young
gentleman.’
‘I apprehend that you allude to—to my ward—Miss Ruth Willis,’ said the
baronet hesitatingly.
‘You’ve hit it exactly,’ exclaimed Hold, with a slap of his hard hand
upon the crown of his hard hat, which sounded like a muffled drum,
somewhat to the discomfiture of its proprietor, who eyed its ruffled
surface ruefully. ‘When is the wedding to come off?’
Sir Sykes contemplated his ruffianly visitor with a disgust which it
required all his prudence to dissemble.
‘In civilised society,’ he said coldly, ‘events of that sort do not
take place with quite so expeditious a disregard of difficulties as
your very apposite question suggests. In the backwoods it is perhaps
otherwise.’
‘In the backwoods,’ roughly retorted Hold, ‘we don’t shilly-shally
about righting a wrong, no more than about the marrying of a young
couple that hev made up their minds to it. And let me tell you, Sir
Sykes Denzil, Baronet, the superfine Saxony you fine gentlemen wear
covers bigger rogues, often, than ever did the deerskin hunting-shirt
with its Indian embroidery of wampum and coloured quills. Backwoodsmen!
I’ve been in white-fisted company less to be trusted than theirs.’
Sir Sykes had imbibed too much of the spirit of that modern civilised
society of which he spoke, to be readily nettled into a burst of anger
by such taunts as these. Cool, save for one moment, from the first, the
temperature of his calmly flowing blood seemed to grow more frigid as
Hold’s warmed.
‘You have, I assure you, Mr Hold, no cause whatever for irritation,’ he
said smoothly: ‘I mean—to use your own expression, which I willingly
adopt—fairly by you. I neither repudiate nor ignore our tacit compact.
It is my dearest wish that my son should become the husband of the
exemplary young lady in whose prosperity you interest yourself.’
Hold gave a growl such as a bear, suddenly mollified by the gift of a
glittering slice of toothsome honeycomb, might be expected to emit. His
distrustful eye ranged over the baronet’s plausible face, as though to
test the sincerity of the assurance which had just been given.
‘We’re in the same boat,’ he said, in a tone that, if dogged, was less
surly than before. ‘Our pumpkins, I guess, ought to go to the same
market, they ought. But fair words don’t put fresh butter into a dish
of boiled batatas. I’m a British bull-dog of the game old breed,’ he
added gruffly; ‘and I keep the grip, however I’m handled. Is there a
likelihood of the marriage coming off soonish?’
‘I hope so,’ returned Sir Sykes. He would have given much to have
avoided the slight embarrassment which he was conscious that his manner
indicated, and which was not lost upon Hold’s watchful eye.
‘No day fixed? No banns put up—stop! I forgot—you swells marry by
special license of the Archbishop of Canterbury—no cake ordered; no
fal-lals bespoken from the milliner; no breakfast; no orange-flowers,
eh? Well, I wish to be reasonable about it, Sir Sykes, but there must
be an end of this. Do the young people understand one another, or do
they not?’
‘It does not answer to _brusquer_ these things,’ returned Sir Sykes
apologetically.
‘It does not answer to _what_?’ interrupted Richard, to whose nautical
ears the French word sounded odder than would have done a fragment of
linguafranca or a scrap of Eboe or Mandingo.
‘To be too precipitate,’ explained the baronet. ‘I have spoken to my
son. He sees, I hope, the affair in a proper light. He is often in the
society of Miss Willis, but—but’——
Sir Sykes wavered miserably here. All his deportment seemed to fail him
before Hold’s merciless eye, the very gaze of which probed him to the
quick.
‘Aren’t you captain in your own ship?’ asked the adventurer curtly.
The baronet winced at the question. Captain in his own ship, in the
sense that some men are commanders at home, he had never been. His own
house, his own estate, had not from the first been managed in precise
accordance with the views of him who owned them. But he had been a
decorous captain, a captain who walked quarter-deck as solemnly as the
greatest Tartar afloat, and who got lip-service and eye-service as a
salve to his vanity, until quite recently.
Now there was a strong and not altogether an obedient hand on the
helm. A new broom was making, in the person of Enoch Wilkins,
attorney-at-law, a clean sweep of various time-honoured abuses such as
always do grow up about a great estate, and the wails of the indignant
sufferers could not always be kept from reaching the reluctant ears of
Sir Sykes. People who were docked of perquisites came in respectful
bitterness of soul to the baronet, and humbly prayed that he would take
their part as against Wilkins the lawyer and Abrahams the steward.
Captain in his own ship! The word was a telling one, and it hit him
hard. He was only captain in an ornamental sense, because Carbery
was his freehold, and the baronetcy his, and he alone could sign
receipts and draw cheques. He had loved his ease much; and now it was
perpetually invaded. He was sorry for dismissed gamekeepers, and for
tenants whose tenure was to expire on Lady-day. He gave them drafts on
his banker as a plaster for the smart which he nevertheless felt sure
was deserved. An unrespecting City solicitor, and the sharp London Jew
whom Mr Wilkins had inducted into the stewardship, were swelling the
rent-roll in despite of the feeble protests of the nominal lord of all.
‘I can’t compel Captain Denzil to take a wife of my choosing; that is
beyond the power of a modern English father, at least where sons are
concerned,’ said Sir Sykes with a sickly smile.
‘No; you can’t do that, skipper. To knot the ninetailed cat and give
the young fellow six dozen for mutiny,’ said Hold, chuckling over the
imaginary scene, ‘would be too strict discipline for mealy-mouthed days
like these. But you might let him have it, Sir Sykes, though not quite
so downright. Make him understand that his allowances and his liberty
all depend on good behaviour, and then see what comes of it.’
What Sir Sykes suffered during the delivery of this speech, could only
be inferred from the fact that his lips became of a bluish white and
that he drew his breath gaspingly.
‘Believe me, Mr Hold,’ he said in a thin broken voice, which gained
strength somewhat as he proceeded, ‘you may intrust the care of
carrying out your wishes—that is, our wishes—to me. I understand my son
best, and I’——
He stopped again, gasping for breath, and the lines about his mouth,
traced by pain, were visible enough to attract the notice of his
unscrupulous guest.
‘You shall have time, Sir Sykes Denzil, Baronet,’ he said
apologetically; ‘take a fortnight if you like. I’m to be heard
of meanwhile at old Plugger’s;’ and he threw the card of that
establishment on the table.
Then Sir Sykes rang the bell for wine, and the wine was brought. Hold
tossed off a bumper of sherry.
‘Your health, skipper,’ he said; ‘and success to the wedding.’ And so,
with an impudent leer, he picked up his tall shining hat and departed.
CHAPTER XXXII.—A DIFFERENCE OF OPINION.
‘It can’t be done, sir, at the price. I’d do a good deal to meet your
wishes and that, and I don’t pretend to be more sentimental than my
neighbours. But marrying is a serious sort of step, you know. One can’t
cry off and pay forfeit, if one changes one’s mind a bit too late. Miss
Willis is’——
Thus far Captain Denzil; but now Sir Sykes interrupted his son with an
irritation unusual to him: ‘Miss Willis is a great deal too good for
you, I am afraid. Indeed I trust to her sound sense to keep some order
in your affairs, and prevent you from driving at too headlong a pace
along the road to ruin. Of course her pretensions to pedigree are very
slight compared with our own, if that be the obstacle in your way.’
‘Nobody cares much about ancient blood, in a woman at least,
now-a-days,’ languidly replied Jasper. ‘She is lady enough to take the
head of a dinner-table, or figure creditably in a London drawing-room,
after a few weeks of training, and that’s as much as need be looked
for. And I admit that Miss Willis is—very clever.’
Except in the case of an authoress, no one ever applies the epithet
‘Very clever’ to a lady save as a species of covert blame. Sir Sykes
felt and looked uneasy as the words reached him.
‘If you have any personal objection’—— he began.
‘Not the least in the world,’ unceremoniously interrupted Jasper. ‘I’ll
even stretch a point, and say I rather like the girl than otherwise.
She’d go straight, I daresay, once the course was smooth and clear
before her. But I do not think, father, you are treating me quite well.
Carbery ought, you know it ought, to go in the direct line, as such
properties do.’
‘I apprehend your meaning,’ returned Sir Sykes in his coldest tone,
‘to be that you resent as a grievance the fact that the estate is not
entailed upon yourself. You should be more reasonable, and remember the
singular circumstances under which I became master here.’
‘It was a grand coup!’ exclaimed the captain, with an envious little
sigh. ‘Such a stroke of luck does not come twice to the same family.’
‘I got this great gift,’ pursued Sir Sykes, ‘from the hand of one who
thought less of what he gave to me than of what, by making such a will,
he took away from others. The old lord’s self-tormenting mind led him
to exult, in the hopes that his testament extinguished, in the injury
done to kith and kin.’
‘It was a sell for the De Veres,’ muttered Jasper; ‘they didn’t on
the whole take it badly.’ He looked up as he spoke at the glimmering
blazonry of the great stained-glass window, and realised, for the
first time perhaps, the vexation which the caprice of the late lord of
Carbery had inflicted on those of his own race and name.
‘The property,’ said Sir Sykes, ‘having become my own a score of years
ago, is mine to give or to withhold at my death, as in my lifetime I
may judge fitting.’
‘You have told me that, sir, pretty often,’ retorted Jasper testily;
‘of course it’s yours, and you can leave it to the Foundling Hospital
if you like.’
‘Common policy then would dictate,’ said Sir Sykes with deliberate
emphasis, ‘the study of my wishes. And I wish very much indeed that
Miss Willis should become your wife.’
‘I can’t, as I said, do it at the price; really I can’t,’ rejoined
Jasper sullenly, as he thrust his hand into a side-pocket and fingered
the cigar-case that lay there. He did not dare to light a cigar in
the library, much as he longed to seek solace in smoke; but he grew
impatient for the interview to come to an end, and to recover his
freedom.
‘I offered a handsome income,’ said Sir Sykes with an offended look.
‘Had not the sum proposed proved sufficient, that was a difficulty not
insuperable. You had the option of beginning married life with the
revenue of an average baronet.’
‘Yes; but you see, sir, you are a trifle above the mark of an average
baronet’ responded the captain; ‘and I naturally should like when
my turn comes—I hope it will be a long time first—to fill the same
position. A bare allowance, or a lump of settled money, won’t make me
the equal of an ordinary eldest son; and I don’t see why, since by
accident I’m not on a par with other fellows of my nominal rank and
prospects, and I am required to marry without being allowed to choose
for myself, I should not be put on a level with men of my own standing.’
Sir Sykes fidgeted restlessly in his chair, and the lines of pain about
his mouth, which grew more sharply defined every day, deepened almost
perceptibly.
‘Consider what you are asking of me,’ he said with an injured air; ‘to
make myself a mere tenant for life where I have been for twenty years
owner in fee-simple! Sons do not ask their fathers to entail an estate
for their benefit.’
‘I don’t see why I should be in a worse position than other fellows,’
sullenly responded Jasper. ‘I may have been extravagant and that sort
of thing; but there’s no reason why my extravagances should be totted
up against me to a heavier sum-total than those of twenty I could name.
Hookham, now, who let his father in for a hundred and eleven thousand
the year that the French horse Plon-Plon won the Derby, is as safe of
the Snivey estates as he is of the Snivey peerage.’
‘The Earl of Snivey and his prodigal heir Lord Hookham,’ answered Sir
Sykes with cold urbanity, ‘do not present a case, to my mind, precisely
in point. You cannot in reason expect me, after the sacrifices I have
already made on your behalf, to place you in the position, as you call
it, of heir of entail. I am speaking to you less as a father than as a
man of the world.’
‘And as a man of the world, sir,’ said the incorrigible Jasper, ‘I
trust you will excuse my saying that I scarcely care to be huddled and
hustled into marrying I don’t know whom, unless at a very heavy figure,
as my stock-broker, when I was fool enough to go on the Exchange, and
burned my fingers over time-bargains, used to say. I can’t think why
you should mind my coming next, as concerns Carbery Chase here.’
This was a home question which, if arraigned before the stern tribunal
of Minos and Rhadamanthus, Sir Sykes would not have found it easy to
answer. He was in the habit of telling himself that Jasper was not a
successor to whom the honour and welfare of a great family could with
prudence be intrusted. Were he master, the old oaks in the Chase might
soon be gambled down from their prescriptive loftiness, and mortgages
might spring up like mushrooms. Here was a noble estate unencumbered,
like some big diamond without a flaw to mar its lustre, and he was
asked to let his spendthrift son inherit as of right. There were Lucy
and Blanche to be provided for. They would marry, doubtless, and their
husbands would probably expect that the brides’ hands should be heavy
with much gold. The bulk of the property would devolve on Captain
Denzil; but then it might be tied up with an ingenious testamentary
rigour that should keep the future baronet in legal leading-strings
through life. Sir Sykes cherished too lively a recollection of the
shifts and straits of his own outlawed progenitor Sir Harbottle,
to wish the reins of government to pass unreservedly into Jasper’s
unsteady hands.
But Sir Sykes had an unavowed motive for rejecting his son’s
proposition. He was by no means sure how Enoch Wilkins of St Nicholas
Poultney would receive such a suggestion. Mr Wilkins, that over-zealous
pilot, who had insisted on assuming the guidance of affairs, might be
furious at hearing that Jasper was to be promoted from heir-presumptive
to heir-apparent. There was no alliance between the captain and the
shrewd turf lawyer, from whom so much of his lightly expended cash had
been extracted. Jasper by no means relished the elevation of Mr Wilkins
to be his father’s Mentor and right-hand man. Mr Wilkins might guess
that Sir Jasper would send his japanned deed-boxes elsewhere than to
St Nicholas Poultney. And yet Sir Sykes could not venture to offend Mr
Wilkins.
The conversation was protracted for some half-hour or more, since Sir
Sykes was sincerely desirous to carry his point; but it languished by
degrees, and involved, as conversations on important topics are in real
life apt to do, frequent repetitions of some stock phrase or threadbare
argument. Sir Sykes essayed threats, veiled ones of course, and not
very comprehensible even to himself. Jasper, however, was very little
moved by such threats. There are things that a gentleman cannot do, and
assuredly one of them is to turn his only son out of doors because he
declines a wife of the parent’s choosing. And to no other menace was
the captain amenable. He should probably, as a result of his father’s
displeasure, get no cheques for the next few months; but this stoppage
of pocket-money could not much affect the happiness of a graceless
prodigal who, had he once got a sufficient sum in his possession, would
have turned his back at once on Carbery and all that belonged thereto.
Jasper, then, was singularly stubborn. He was in general as morally
pliable as a jelly-fish, after the fashion of most so-called men of
pleasure, but now he seemed for the nonce to have developed a backbone,
and to be hard to bend. There was really some lurking sense of injury
at his heart, and he felt on better terms with his own conscience
than was often the case, as he resisted his father’s instances that
he should marry Miss Willis, commence housekeeping on five thousand a
year, and be a reformed character as well as a Benedict. He felt that
all was not right, and was assured that a bride worth the taking would
not be urged on his acceptance with such pertinacity.
‘I do not see,’ repeated Jasper again and again, ‘why I should be in a
worse position than other fellows.’
From that formula, behind which, as behind a breastwork, he strongly
intrenched himself nothing could drive him. It was not, as he explained
with almost unnecessary candour, that he had any undue delicacy with
regard to mercenary marriages; but that what he stipulated for was to
be on a level with other spendthrifts of his own degree and set, with
young Lord Hookham, with Lionel Rattlebury, and wild Lord Viscount
Squandercash, and the rest. Entail the estate, so that it _must_ pass
to him, Jasper, and post-obits would become practicable, and money be
easily raised; and then Miss Willis was welcome to be the partner of
his joys and sorrows—such was Jasper’s simple train of reasoning. It
was a heavy price, but he stood out for it.
Sir Sykes was not willing to pay the price, at the cost, it might be,
of a second contest with Mr Enoch Wilkins, and the negotiation with his
son came to no satisfactory conclusion. What was to be done? Hold had
named a fortnight as the period of grace that he was disposed to grant;
but the baronet was of opinion that it would not be politic to allow
the time to expire without communicating with this man—who was in some
sense his master. He would inform Hold of Captain Denzil’s unexpected
obstinacy, and plead for a further delay, and—yes—he would send money.
Money has often a wonderfully lenitive effect upon the temper, and its
softening effects should be tried upon this buccaneering fellow.
Sir Sykes penned his letter, touching as lightly as he could on
Jasper’s recalcitrancy, and expressing sanguine hopes for the future.
He said nothing about the entail, which had been the subject of the
haggling debate between himself and the captain. It would hardly be
prudent to tell Hold of that, lest Jasper should find an unexpected
ally to back his demand.
‘We had better, under the circumstances, give him, as I believe
whale-fishers say, a little more line,’ wrote Sir Sykes in his
confidential communication to Richard Hold, and he was weak enough to
pride himself on his neat use of a nautical metaphor sure to tell with
a seafaring man. And he signed a cheque for two hundred and fifty
pounds, payable to Mr Richard Hold, or order, and inserted it in the
letter, which he despatched by that night’s post. He could scarcely
have done a more foolish thing.
OUR VOLUNTEERS.
Some persons are old enough to remember the Volunteer system which
prevailed in the early years of the present century. It was an
enthusiastically patriotic movement, for the country was threatened
with invasion by Bonaparte, who, however, as is well known, never
got beyond preparations at Boulogne, and by the victory of Nelson at
Trafalgar received an effectual check. Volunteering at that time,
though very hearty, was at best never anything else than playing at
soldiering. The members of the various corps were only civilians in
uniforms. Discipline was imperfect. At any fancied affront, a man sent
in his gun and walked off.
We can mention a case in point, which occurred about 1807. The colonel
in command of the Westminster Volunteers, one day lost his temper on
parade, and struck a member of the corps with the flat of his sword.
Such was the general indignation at the outrage, that the greater
number of both officers and men at once sent in their resignation,
and the regiment was broken up. This anecdote was related to us by
one of the sergeants, who resigned and sent in his sword and musket.
Evidently, there could have been no solid reliance on a body of
Volunteers so ill governed and held together so feebly. The whole
fabric was at length dissolved, and was succeeded by militia regiments
strictly under the articles of war.
The volunteering system of our own day has step by step attained the
character of a Landwehr, or reserve force, liable, if the occasion
arises, to support the army of the line and the militia. It embraces
infantry, cavalry, and artillery, and is constructed on a proper
military basis. As in former times, each town or district has its own
regiment of Volunteers, which may be concentrated at a short notice
by telegraph. In the infancy of the present movement, the peer and
the artisan, the gentleman and the shopkeeper, all ‘shouldered arms’
together and marched gaily side by side. Dukes, earls, marquises,
and cabinet ministers joined the ranks—Lord Palmerston (then
Prime-minister) himself donning the uniform and learning his drill
as a private in the London Irish Rifle Corps; while in the London
Scottish, the Marquis (now Duke) of Abercorn did the same thing. This
was all well and good; but it could not last long, nor did it. Liberty
is the precious possession of all classes in this country, but perfect
‘equality’ and ‘fraternity’ such as the above incidents indicated
are virtues which have not yet attained to any very great degree
of perfection amongst us. And so it came to pass that these noble
recruits, whose support at that time to the Volunteer cause cannot of
course be over-estimated, were among the first who ‘fell out,’ to make
way for those who really meant ‘soldiering.’
Royal reviews and Easter-Monday field-days attracted to the ranks
of our citizen army all those who loved volunteering for the sake
of making a show; but now that the movement has settled down into
real earnest military work, the _true_ manhood of Britain is to the
fore—the spirit which looks upon hard work with as light a heart as
it looks on pleasure, when there is a lesson to be learned or a great
object to be gained.
The new movement was national in all its phases. The different corps
adopted titles and mottoes which had some distinct connection or other
with their country’s history, or with the local traditions of the
counties in which they were raised. In the former category are the two
national corps we have already named; and in the latter may be reckoned
the ‘Robin Hoods,’ with their uniform of Lincoln green, which is the
only thing about them, however, that reminds one of the days of Robin
Hood and his jovial band.
Though for some cause which we have never heard properly explained,
there are no ‘colours’ or ‘standards’ in our Volunteer corps, each
regiment has a motto, the favourite ones being _Defence, not Defiance_
(which is the motto of the National Rifle Association), _Pro Aris et
Focis_ (For our Hearths and Firesides), and _Pro Rege et Patria_ (For
King and Country). If ever our Volunteers are used at all it will be in
battalion formation, like the regular army, for an army of two hundred
thousand men cannot all act as skirmishers, and their colours would be
to them as much the embodiment of their country’s honour as those of
the line are to the regiments of the regular army. The Volunteers of
1804 possessed honourable emblems in the shape of banners or standards,
many of which still adorn the walls of London’s historic fortress—the
Tower.