WINCHESTER.
We again visited Grindelwald (in 1885), where we had the joy of
meeting once more the Meuricoffre family. We had magnificent weather,
favourable to mountain and glacier excursions. The nights were
especially beautiful towards September, when there was a fine display
of autumn meteors. It was my turn on this occasion to be obliged to
hurry home, leaving my husband for a little longer enjoyment of the
mountains. I was called home in order to advise in the matter of the
action of our poor protégée, Rebecca Jarrett, who had been engaged by
Mr. Stead to help him in his difficult researches. Two years previously
we had opened at Winchester, as we had done at Liverpool, a little
House of Rest, which served as a shelter for poor girls and young women
who were recognised failures, morally and physically. Some were sick,
rejected by hospitals as incurable; others friendless, betrayed and
ruined, judged for one reason or another not quite suitable for other
homes or refuges. We also took into the House of Rest however a few
persons of more mature age, not invalids, who had fallen into trouble
and misfortune, and who sometimes became excellent helpers in our work.
Among these latter was the woman I have mentioned, who had put behind
her and abjured her miserable past, and who showed much intelligence
and tenderness as our aid in the work of rescue. The task however to
which she was invited in London was of a different kind, and too heavy
a responsibility for her. Hence the summons I received to come home and
support her, and also in part to answer for her conduct, as she had
been living with us.
It will be remembered that Mr. Stead and Rebecca Jarrett were tried
on a charge of abduction, and sentenced to imprisonment. At the trial
this poor woman, being cross-examined about her past life, told an
untruth, and this was used by the prosecuting counsel as discrediting
her whole evidence, with the result that the case against her and Mr.
Stead was greatly damaged. Early in 1886 Josephine Butler published
the story of _Rebecca Jarrett_, in order“to present the exact truth
about her in justice to herself, and to Mr. Stead, for whom she acted;
and also to give some incidents of personal history, which may tend
not only to palliate these departures from truth, of which she was
guilty, but to show that the situation in which she was placed was
pathetic—even tragic—and one from which there was, humanly speaking,
no escape.” She tells how before the trial some old associates,
fearing what Rebecca might reveal concerning them, had gone down to
her at Winchester, and pursued her with appeals and threats; and how
she, after earnestly entreating them to lead a better life, had given
them a solemn promise that she would not get them into trouble; and
then how, under severe cross-examination in the court——
She answered truly as far as she could, until it came to the giving of
an address which would have involved _others_ in trouble. Then there
flashed across her the promise made in her evil days, and the promise
made later from better motives, under her new character. There rose
afresh in her mind the desire that those to whom she had given her
promise should see that a reclaimed woman would not break her word.
She was standing between two oaths—the first, made to her old friends;
the second, made in the witness-box, to speak “nothing but the truth.”
Reader, were you ever in such a position—between two solemn promises,
both of which you desired to keep, but which were opposed the one to
the other? If you ever were, you can feel for this weak young convert
to truth, and you can pity her weakness. Yes, she told a lie. She
looked across the Court at me with an expression on her pale face
which I shall never forget. That night, on returning to her lodgings,
she spent several hours on her knees, weeping as if her heart would
break; no word of consolation availed for her. It was in vain to try
to comfort her. She cried, and screamed to God,“O God, I have told a
lie; I have perjured myself in the witness-box; I have lied before the
world; I have ruined this cause, and I have got all my kind friends
into trouble! And yet, O God, Thou knowest _why_ I did it—oh, Thou
knowest _why_ I did it. Look into my heart; Thou knowest why I did it!”
To a friend.
_April 10th, 1886._
Last Sunday we had a delightful day at Pozzuoli, where Sir William
Armstrong is establishing great ironworks for making ironclads for
the Italian Government. He has sent out from England some forty or
fifty picked men. They are all Northumbrians, and choice men in every
respect for bodily strength and high character. They are also tried
and skilled workmen. Mr. Stephen Burrowes, my sister’s helper in her
work for the sailors, suggested that a Workmen’s Rest or Home for our
English workmen and others should be established at once at Pozzuoli.
Our party went in five or six open carriages to Pozzuoli—all the
Meuricoffre family and others of the Swiss and Protestant community
of Naples. Our dedicatory service presented a curious combination of
associations of different centuries and various countries. The spot
where we assembled was close to the ruined Temple of Serapis. It was
also in the near neighbourhood of the large Roman amphitheatre of the
times of Tiberius. Before us was the sea, its gentle waves beating
on the shore—the shore, as you know, where St. Paul first landed in
Europe, a prisoner, on his way to Rome. Opposite was Baiæ, where Nero
held his infernal court—itself lovely and peaceful in appearance—and
Capri, the sharp outline of whose steep rock, whence Tiberius used to
fling his slaves headlong into the sea as an after-dinner amusement,
stood clear against the pure blue sky. This whole neighbourhood has
all its old entrancing charm still, and that wonderful beauty which
made it of old the last resort of people satiated with every other
form of luxury. It was the ideal of a summer Sabbath evening. My
husband offered up a dedicatory prayer, invoking the blessing of God
on the design which we had come to inaugurate, on every workman who
should work there, and on the dear Meuricoffres and all who work with
them for the good of the people around them. He alluded in his prayer
to the advent in that very place of the great apostle of the Gentiles,
charged with the precious gift for Europe—the Gospel of our salvation.
Then we sang hymns, some of the old favourites of the English workmen.
It was strange to hear those familiar songs, pronounced with the
strong Northumbrian guttural, ascending from the ruins of the Temple
of Serapis—a blending of associations past and present, heathen and
Christian, ancient and modern. When the men found out that my sister
and I were Northumbrians they could scarcely suppress their joy; and
after that, whenever she or I made a remark, however trivial, they
cheered. Most of them came from Blyth and Morpeth. They were chiefly
Wesleyans, and politically supporters of Thomas Burt, M.P. Our drive
home in the evening was delicious beyond description. It was perfectly
calm, with a lovely sunset, the trees already flashing into their
summer tints, and the air full of that most delightful scent of the
early orange and lemon blossom which comes out while the trees are
still covered with their golden fruit. It was a memorable day for us,
as a pleasant family gathering and full of Christian hope.
This summer George Butler was very ill for several weeks with
rheumatic fever. On his partial recovery, he was advised to try the
baths at Homburg, and from thence they travelled to Aix-la-Chapelle
and to Switzerland, where he became seriously ill again, and had to
remain till December.
I must now record a passage of my own personal experience at this
crisis, which will be variously interpreted by any who may read it,
but which I shall state with all simplicity for the encouragement at
least of those who believe and know that there is a “God in heaven Who
heareth prayer.” I had passed a sleepless night, in vain attempts to
soothe the sufferings and allay the fever of my dear invalid, myself
weak and exhausted, and now full of pain. The night was long, dark and
cold, both spiritually and materially. Towards morning he fell into
a troubled sleep. I went softly into a little ante-room, leaving the
door open between. A feeling of despair came over me. My own strength
was failing, and he was worse. Who would now minister to him, I asked,
and was there to be no end to these repeated and heart-breaking
disappointments? When Elijah fled into the wilderness, and gave himself
up to bitter thoughts, in the depths of his discouragement the voice
came to him, questioning, “What doest thou here, Elijah?” bidding him
arise out of his depression. So to me it seemed at that moment that a
voice came—or rather, I would say, a light shone—into the very heart of
my darkness and despair. The promises of God in the Scriptures, with
which I had been familiar all my life, came to me as if I had heard
them for the first time. I fell on my knees and kept silence, to hear
what the Lord would say to me; for, for my own part, I had nothing to
say. My trouble was too heavy for speech. “The prayer of faith shall
save the sick.”“Call upon Me in the time of trouble, and I will deliver
thee.” “Is this true?” I exclaimed. Yes, I knew it was true. It seemed
to become a very simple matter, and grace was given to me, in my pain
and weakness, to say only, “Lord, I believe.” The burden was removed.
I returned to my husband’s room, and sat silent for a while until he
moved, and the day broke. I brought him his breakfast, and said to him
confidently, “You are going to be better to-day, beloved.” He smiled,
but did not speak. Two hours later our kind doctor came. He took his
temperature and felt his pulse, and with a sigh of relief he said,
“Well, dear Canon, a wonderful thing has happened. A great change has
come. You are much better.”
A lady told me later that at a party of friends in Berne, Dr. Demme had
spoken of this recovery, and said that it had been very remarkable,—a
“Divine interposition” in answer, as he believed, to prayer: he added
that my husband had had inflammation of both lungs and pleurisy, as
well as the serious heart attack, adding, “any one of which was enough
to kill most men.”
* * * * *
After my husband’s serious illness in 1886, I had resolved in my own
mind never again to be absent from him for more than a few hours, if
possible, during our united lives. I refused all invitations to attend
meetings in London or elsewhere, sometimes, I fear, to the surprise as
well as the regret of my fellow-workers in public matters. My choice
was however deliberate, and I have never had cause to regret it. He
had, I thought, sufficiently suffered by my frequent absences from
home, during many years of our married life, while engaged in opposing
a great social wrong, and he had borne this trial without a murmur. He
was now advanced in years, and less strong, and these things seemed
to me to constitute a most sacred claim to my personal and constant
devotion to him. Never, except for a day or two during the serious
illness of a dear sister, did I consent to be separated from him. Even
on that occasion I was told by those at home that he seemed to feel my
absence sadly, and that at the sound of a footstep or wheels on the
drive, he would go to the window to see if by any chance it was his
wife who had returned, though he knew that it was scarcely possible.
In this period of quieter life, Josephine Butler by no means rested
from literary work, or from active interest in the abolitionist cause.
Besides a large amount of correspondence, chiefly connected with the
work of the Federation, she issued in 1887 two pamphlets, _The Revival
and Extension of the Abolitionist Cause_, and _Our Christianity tested
by the Irish Question_. In the first she refers to the C.D. Laws then
in force in many of the Colonies and in India, and to the traffic in
women which the system had facilitated. These Laws were shortly after
repealed in most of the Crown Colonies and in India.
In the Irish pamphlet she shows how in the attempt to rule Ireland by
a succession of Coercion Acts the same constitutional principles had
been violated as in the case of the Acts against which she had so long
fought. She traces the long sad story of England’s treatment of the
sister isle, the real and solid grievances, which had naturally led to
the demand for Home Rule.
Certain classes of persons in England have always maintained that
successive Irish leaders and patriots were mere mischief makers,
the cause and not the exponents of the prevailing discontent. If
their mouths could be stopped, they imagine, there would be no
more disaffection in Ireland, or such as there was would be easily
repressed. This was their manner of judging of Flood, of Grattan,
of Curran, of O’Connell. They could not learn, and are as far from
learning to-day as ever, that you cannot heal the broken heart of
Ireland by gagging those whom she sends over here to plead for her.
They were relieved when the prison doors closed upon one after another
of Ireland’s patriotic but unhappy sons; they were hopeful of quieter
times when O’Connell died, worn out and sad. As one of their own poets
said, “They broke the æolian harp, and then wrote an epitaph on the
wind;” the wind which gave voice to the harp, a voice sometimes sad
and low, and wailing, sometimes giving forth a shriek full of agony
and vengeance. They imagined it was dead. Such has ever been the
manner of looking at national griefs by people who lack sympathy with
all aspirations after self-government, freedom, and the manhood of a
nation, and who believe you can beat the souls of men into submission
by physical force. They bring out their handcuffs and their cannon;
they create the silence of desolation, and then they call it peace.
* * * * *
In order to give a complete idea of my husband’s kindliness of nature,
and to fill in some characteristic touches of his home life, I must
speak of our affectionate companions—our dogs. Our first dog friend
was Bunty (the origin of the name is obscure). He lived with us many
years at Liverpool, and came with us to Winchester. He was a dog of
excellent parts; not of pure breed, chiefly otter hound. He had
beautiful eyes, full of human expression. He had a strong sense of
humour. It is generally said that dogs hate to be laughed at. This
was not the case with Bunty. He could bear to be laughed at, would
enter into the joke, and, so to speak, turn the laugh against himself,
by behaving in a manner which he well knew would excite laughter. He
shared many pleasant holidays with us. He died in 1883. My husband had
the free hand of a sculptor. A few things which he carved in stone were
worthy of preservation, among them a perfect likeness of this good dog
in an attitude of watchful repose. Beneath he carved the words—[Greek:
ΑΡΙΣΤΟΥ ΚΥΝΟΣ ΣΗΜΑ]. “Some of my friends,” he wrote, “find a difficulty
in believing that I carved Bunty’s likeness in stone. Froude says, some
centuries hence, when the monument is disinterred and its inscription
discovered, some Dryasdust will start a theory that a Greek colony
once inhabited the Close.” Bunty’s successor was Carlo, a handsome
thoroughbred retriever, quite black, with shining curls—a sensible,
gentlemanlike dog, excellent in his own special art of retrieving
birds, and an uncompromising guard and watchdog. His attachment to his
master, whom he outlived for two years, was profound. This poor dog
was very wretched and melancholy when his master left his home for
the last time and returned no more. He would seek him in every corner
of the house, and along the riverside where he had been accustomed to
walk with him or watch him fishing; and returning, would rest his chin
on the arm of his master’s empty study chair, as if waiting for the
familiar hand to pat his head. His dumb grief was very touching.
In May, 1888, Josephine Butler started _The Dawn_, a quarterly sketch
of the work of the Federation, and in the pages of this periodical
she continued to speak words of encouragement and warning to her
friends for over eight years, after which its issue ceased. She and
her husband attended the Conferences of the Federation at Lausanne
in 1887, and at Copenhagen in 1888; and to the end of his life,
notwithstanding his increasing weakness, they were able to enjoy
together peaceful visits to relatives in Switzerland and Italy. It was
on their way home from one of these visits, that George Butler died in
London on March 14th, 1890. Two years later Josephine Butler published
her _Recollections of George Butler_, from which we have already
quoted so much, and from which we must now make one more quotation.
We read in the Gospels that the disciples of Christ found themselves
one dark evening separated from the Master, “in the midst of the sea”;
that He saw them from the shore “toiling in rowing, for the wind was
contrary.” Such is sometimes the position, spiritually and morally, of
one who has up to a certain point “fought a good fight and kept the
faith,” but against whom arise contrary winds and buffeting waves;
one for whom “fightings without and fears within” have proved too
severe, and who is now “toiling in rowing,” with faint heart and gloomy
outlook—the presence of the Master no longer realised to reassure
and guide. “Old Satan is too strong for young Melancthon,” said one
of the reformers of the sixteenth century, and the same enemy has
proved many a time since then too strong for much humbler workers. The
problems of life at times appear so perplexing as to be incapable of
any solution. The lines of good and evil, of right and wrong, light
and darkness, appear blurred; and the weak and burdened spirit loses
the hold it had retained hitherto of the highest standard, fidelity to
which alone can bring us again out of darkness and trouble into light
and hope.
[Illustration: _Canon Butler and his retriever Carlo, in the garden,
at The Close, Winchester._]
Moses for the hardness of the people’s hearts allowed a relaxation of
the severity of the original law given from on high, and so suffered
the moral standard to be lowered in some of the most important
relations of life. There was a time when it seemed to me that hearts
are harder now than even in the old days, and when the stern ethics
of Christ—the divine standard—seemed to become impossible as a matter
of practical enforcement. Horribly perplexed, I was tempted to give
up the perfect ideal. It is in this way, I think, _through lack of
faith_, that compromises creep in among us—compromises with error, with
sin, with wrong-doing, unbelief taking root first in the individual
soul, and then gradually spreading until a lower standard is accepted
in family life, in society, in legislation, and in Government. And at
last, as even in our own land, we may see publicly endorsed and signed
what the Hebrew prophet calls “a covenant with death” and an “agreement
with hell.” Such an acceptance and public endorsement of a compromise
with evil proclaims the failure of faith of a whole nation, and the
beginning of a “downgrade,” in which virtue is regarded as no longer
possible for man.
To speak of clouded moments of one’s own life involves no small effort.
But in justice both to my husband and to the movement I have tried
to serve I am impelled to do so. There are some people who, if they
remember at all that moral uprising against national unrighteousness in
which we took part, still regard it as an illusion, and its advocacy as
a “fad,” or even as a blot on an otherwise inoffensive career—something
which must always require explanation or apology. But there are others
who understood from the first its true meaning and far-reaching issues,
and who have perhaps imagined that an unbroken consistency of action,
based on an immovable strength of conviction, must at all times have
characterised any man or woman destined to take a representative part
in it. A sense of justice forces me to confess that the fact (in regard
to myself) was not always as they imagined; for there was a time when I
resembled the faint-hearted though loyal disciple, who, when venturing
to walk on the waters, in an evil moment looked away from Christ and
around upon the weltering, unstable floor on which he stood, and
immediately began to sink. When moreover the sense of justice of which
I speak regards one who was and is dear to me as my own soul, then I am
doubly forced to speak, and to give “honour to whom honour is due” by
telling of the wisdom which God gave him in encouraging and supporting
through a few troubled years the tried and wavering advocate of a cause
in which both faith and courage were put to a severe test.
A deeply-rooted faith—a personal, and not merely a traditional
faith—in the central truths of Christ, and moral strength, the
fruit of that faith, were in him united with other qualities which
were needful for the task he so well fulfilled. Others whom I have
known—teachers and fathers in God—have had this moral and spiritual
faith in a high degree, together with an eloquence and power in
argument to which he had no pretension. But few—it seemed to me at
least—possessed such patience as he had, such long-suffering, such a
power of silent waiting, such a dignified reserve, and such a strong
respect for individuality as to forbid all probing of inner wounds, or
questioning of motive or action, even in the case of one so near to
him as myself. He had great delicacy and refinement in dealing with
the bitterness or petulance of a soul in trouble. He had great faith
in his fellow-creatures. And these, together with his unfailing love,
like the sun in the heavens surmounting the hours of cold and darkness,
gradually overcame the mists which had wrapped themselves round the
heart and obscured the spiritual vision of her for whom he never ceased
to pray.
At this time his voice, when simply reading the words of Christ at
family prayers, used to sound in my ears with a strange and wonderful
pathos, which pierced the depths of rebellious or despairing thought.
At times his attitude—probably unconsciously to himself—assumed in my
eyes an unaccustomed and almost awful sternness. Sometimes my unrest of
mind found vent in words of bitterness (which however only skimmed the
surface of the inward trouble), and I waited for him to speak. Then he
seemed to rise before me to a stature far above my level, above that
of other men, and even above his own at other times, while he gently
led me back to great first principles and to the Source of all Truth,
presenting to me, in a way which I could sometimes hardly bear, the
perfection and severity of the law of God, and our own duty in patient
obedience and perseverance, even when the ascent is steepest, and
the road darkest and longest. He very seldom gave me direct personal
advice or warning. He simply stood there before me in the light of God,
truthful, upright, single-minded; and all that had been distorted or
wrong in me was rebuked by that attitude alone; and a kind of prophetic
sense of returning peace, rather than actual peace, entered my soul,
and my heart replied, “Where you stand now, beloved, I shall also stand
again one day, perhaps soon, on firm ground, and in the light of God.”
And my soul bowed in reverence before him, although never could he bear
any outward expression of that reverence. It seemed to hurt him. He
would gently turn away from it. He spoke firmly when he differed from
any doubtful sentiment expressed or argument used. His simple “no,” or
“I think you are wrong,” were at times more powerful to me, than the
most awful pulpit denunciation or argumentative demonstration of my
error could have been; and then, even if he condemned, his love and
reverence never failed.
He knew the Psalms almost by heart, and the inspired words which he
always had so ready were more potent for me, when spoken by him, than
any other thing. His religion, and his method of consoling, were
not of a subtle or philosophical kind; and he was all the better a
comforter to me because he did not—perhaps could not—easily enter into
and follow all the windings of my confused thinkings and doubtings and
revolted feelings. Strong swimmer as he was, I felt in my half-drowned
state his firm grasp, and his powerful stroke upon the waters as we
neared the land; and when by his aid my feet stood once more upon the
solid rock, I understood the full force of the grateful acknowledgment
of the Psalmist, “Thou hast kept my feet from falling, and mine eyes
from tears.”
I have not up till now dwelt upon the wrongs and sorrows which we were
forced deliberately to look upon and measure, nor shall I do so. Could
I do so, my readers would not wonder at any suffering or distress of
brain caused by such a subject of contemplation. Dante tells us that
when, in his dream, he entered the Inferno and met its sights and
sounds, he fell prone “as one dead.” I once replied to a friend, who
complained of my using strong expressions and asked the meaning of
them, as follows: “Hell hath opened her mouth. I stand in the near
presence of the powers of evil. What I see and hear are the smoke of
the pit, the violence of the torture inflicted by man on his fellows,
the cries of lost spirits, the wail of the murdered innocents, and
the laughter of demons.” But these, it will be said, are mere figures
of speech. So they are, used purposely to cover—for no words can
adequately express—the reality which they symbolise. But the reality
is there, not in any dream or poetic vision of woe, but present on
this earth; hidden away, for the most part, from the virtuous and the
happy, but not from the eyes of God. Turning from the contemplation of
such unspeakable woes and depths of moral turpitude, it was a strength
and comfort beyond description, through the years of strife, to look
upon the calm face of my best earthly friend. It was a peace-imparting
influence. And now that I walk alone and look only at his portrait,
even that seems to take me into the presence of God, where he now
dwells among the “spirits of just men made perfect,” and to whisper
hope of the approaching solution of the great mystery of sin and pain.
I often recall an incident, which occurred at Winchester in the
cathedral, a trifle in itself, but which dwells in my memory as an
illustration of the help he gave to me spiritually in time of need. It
was during the service on Sunday. I suddenly felt faint, the effect of
a week of unusual effort and hard work. Wishing not to disturb anyone
or make a scene, I took the opportunity, when all heads were bowed
in prayer, to creep down from the stalls as silently as possible,
past the tomb of William Rufus, and down the choir, holding on when
possible by the carved woodwork of the seats. A moment more, and I
should have dropped. I could scarcely steady my steps, and my sight
failed, when suddenly there passed a flash of light, as it seemed,
before my eyes, something as white as snow and as soft as an angel’s
wing; it enveloped me, and I felt myself held up by a strong, loving
arm, and supported through the nave to the west door, where the cool
summer breeze restored me. It was my husband. He was in his own seat
near the entrance to the nave, and his quick ear had caught the sound
of my footstep. Quite noiselessly he left his seat and took me in his
arms, unobserved by anyone. The flash of light (the angel’s wing) was
the quick movement of the wide sleeve of his fine linen surplice, upon
which the sun shone as he drew me towards him.