A CHIME OF BELLS IN NOTTINGHAM.
SOME time after Uncle Benjamin, who became familiarly known as Uncle
Ben, had revealed to little Ben his heart's secret, and how that he had
for his sake sold his library of pamphlets, which was his other self,
the two again went down to the wharves to see the ships that had come
in.
They again seated themselves in an anchored boat.
"Ben," said Uncle Benjamin, "I have something more on my mind. I did not
tell you all when we talked here before. You will never forget what I
told you--will you?"
"Never, uncle, if I live to be old. My heart will always be true to
you."
"So it will, so it will, Ben. So it will. I want to tell you something
more about your Great-uncle Thomas. You favor him. Did any one ever tell
you that the people used to think him to be a wizard?"
"No, no, uncle. You yourself said that once. What is a wizard?"
"It is a man who can do strange things, no one can tell how. They come
to him."
"But what made them think him a wizard?"
"Oh, people used to be ignorant and superstitious, like Reuben of the
Mill, your father's old friend and mine. There was an inn called the
World's End, at Ecton, near an old farm and forge. The people used to
gather there and tell stories about witches and wizards that would have
made your flesh creep, and left you afraid to go to bed, even with a
guinea pig in your room.
"Your Great-uncle Thomas was always inventing things to benefit the
people. At last he invented a way by which it might rain and rain, and
there might be freshets and freshets, and yet their meadows would not be
overflown. The water would all run off from the meadows like rain from a
duck's back. He made a kind of drain that ran sideways. Now the pious
Brownites thought that this was flying in the face of Providence, and
people began to talk mysteriously about him at the World's End.
"But it was not that which I have heavy on my mind or light on my mind,
for it is a happy thought. There are not many romantic things in our
family history. The Franklins were men of the farm, forge, and fire. But
there was one thing in our history that was poetry. It was this--listen
now.
"What was the name of that man to whom I sold the pamphlets?" he asked
in an aside.
"Axel."
"That is right--always remember that name--Axel.
"Now listen to that other thing. Your uncle, or great-uncle Thomas,
started a subscription for a chime of bells. The family all loved
music--that is what makes your father play the violin. Your Great-uncle
Thomas loved music in the air. You may be able to buy a spinet for Jenny
some day.
"Now your Great-uncle Thomas's soul is, as it were, in those chimes of
Nottingham. I pray that you may go to England some day before you die
and hear the chimes of Nottingham. You will hear a part of your own
family's soul, my boy. It is the things that men do that live. If you
ever find the pamphlets, which are myself--myself that is gone--you will
read in them my thoughts on the Toleration Act, and on Liberty, and on
the soul, and the rights of man. What was the man's name?"
"Axel."
"Right."
Little Jenny, who loved to follow little Ben, had come down to the wharf
to hear "Uncle Benjamin talk." She had joined them in the boat on the
sunny water. She had become deeply interested in Uncle Tom and the
chimes of Nottingham.
"Uncle Ben," she asked, "was Uncle Tom ever laughed at?"
"Yes, yes; the old neighbors who would hang about the smithy used to
laugh at him. They thought him visionary. Why did you ask me that?"
"What makes people who come to the shop laugh at Ben? It hurts me. I
think Ben is real good. He is good to me, and I am always going to be
good to him. I like Ben better than _almost_ anybody."
"A beneficent purpose is at first ridiculed," said Uncle Benjamin.
Little Ben seemed to comprehend the meaning of this principle, but the
"big words" were lost on Jenny.
"He whose good purpose is laughed at," said Uncle Benjamin, "will be
likely to live to laugh at those who laughed at him if he so desired;
but, hark! a generous man does not laugh at any one's right intentions.
Ben, never stop to answer back when they laugh at you. Life is too
short. It robs the future to seek revenge."
Uncle Benjamin was right.
Did little Ben heed the admonition of his uncle on this bright day in
Boston, to follow beneficence with a ready step, and not to stop to
"answer back"? Was little Jenny's heart comforted in after years in
finding Ben, who was so good to her now, _commended_? We are to follow a
family history, and we shall see.
As the three went back to the Blue Ball, Ben, holding his uncle by the
one hand and Jane by the other, said:
"I do like to hear Jane speak well of me, and stand up for me. I care
more for that than _almost_ any other thing."
"Well, live that she may always speak well of you," said Uncle Benjamin;
"so that she may speak well of you when you two shall meet for the last
time."
"Uncle," said Jenny, "why do you always have something solemn to say?
Ben isn't solemn, is he?"
"No, my girl, your brother Ben is a very lively boy. You will have to
hold him back some day, I fear."
"No, no, uncle, I shall always push him on. He likes to go ahead. I like
to see him go--don't you?"