_One half-penny per week to be paid to the club by each member_
1.—Each member to draw the beer in order, according to the number of his
allotment; on failing, a forfeit of twopence to be paid to the club.
2.—The member that draws the beer to pay for the same, and bring his
ticket up receipted when the subscriptions are paid; on failing to do so,
a penalty of sixpence to be forfeited and paid to the club.
3.—The subscriptions and forfeits to be paid at the club-room on the last
Saturday night of each month.
4.—The subscriptions and forfeits to be cleared up every quarter; if not,
a penalty of sixpence to be paid to the club.
5.—The member that draws the beer to be at the club-room by six o’clock
every evening, and stay till ten; but in the event of no member being
there, he may leave at nine; on failing so to attend, a penalty of
sixpence to be paid to the club.
6.—Any member giving beer to a stranger in this club-room, excepting to
his wife or family, shall be liable to the penalty of one shilling.
7.—Any member lifting his hand to strike another in this club-room shall
be liable to the penalty of sixpence.
8.—Any member swearing in this club-room shall be liable to a penalty of
twopence each time.
9.—Any member selling beer shall be expelled from the club.
10.—Any member wishing to give up his allotment, may apply to the
committee, and they shall value the crop and the condition of the ground.
The amount of the valuation shall be paid by the succeeding tenant, who
shall be allowed to enter on any part of the allotment which is uncropped
at the time of notice of the leaving tenant.
11.—Any member not keeping his allotment-garden clear from seed-weeds, or
otherwise injuring his neighbours, may be turned out of his garden by the
votes of two-thirds of the committee, one month’s notice being given to
him.
12.—Any member carelessly breaking a mug, is to pay the cost of replacing
the same.
* * * * *
I was soliciting the attention of Philosewers to some old old bonnets
hanging in the Allotment-gardens to frighten the birds, and the fashion
of which I should think would terrify a French bird to death at any
distance, when Philosewers solicited my attention to the scrapers at the
club-house door. The amount of the soil of England which every member
brought there on his feet, was indeed surprising; and even I, who am
professedly a salad-eater, could have grown a salad for my dinner, in the
earth on any member’s frock or hat.
“Now,” said Friar Bacon, looking at his watch, “for the Pig-clubs!”
The dreary Sage entreated explanation.
“Why, a pig is so very valuable to a poor labouring man, and it is so
very difficult for him at this time of the year to get money enough to
buy one, that I lend him a pound for the purpose. But, I do it in this
way. I leave such of the club members as choose it and desire it, to
form themselves into parties of five. To every man in each company of
five, I lend a pound, to buy a pig. But, each man of the five becomes
bound for every other man, as to the repayment of his money.
Consequently, they look after one another, and pick out their partners
with care; selecting men in whom they have confidence.”
“They repay the money, I suppose, when the pig is fattened, killed, and
sold?”
“Yes. Then they repay the money. And they do repay it. I had one man,
last year, who was a little tardy (he was in the habit of going to the
public-house); but even he did pay. It is an immense Advantage to one of
these poor fellows to have a pig. The pig consumes the refuse from the
man’s cottage and allotment-garden, and the pig’s refuse enriches the
man’s garden besides. The pig is the poor man’s friend. Come into the
club-house again.”
The poor man’s friend. Yes. I have often wondered who really was the
poor man’s friend among a great number of competitors, and I now clearly
perceive him to be the pig. _He_ never makes any flourishes about the
poor man. _He_ never gammons the poor man—except to his manifest
advantage in the article of bacon. _He_ never comes down to this house,
or goes down to his constituents. He openly declares to the poor man, “I
want my sty because I am a Pig. I desire to have as much to eat as you
can by any means stuff me with, because I am a Pig.” _He_ never gives
the poor man a sovereign for bringing up a family. _He_ never grunts the
poor man’s name in vain. And when he dies in the odour of Porkity, he
cuts up, a highly useful creature and a blessing to the poor man, from
the ring in his snout to the curl in his tail. Which of the poor man’s
other friends can say as much? Where is the M.P. who means Mere Pork?
The dreary Sage had glided into these reflections, when he found himself
sitting by the club-house fire, surrounded by green smock-frocks and
shapeless hats: with Friar Bacon lively, busy, and expert, at a little
table near him.
“Now, then, come. The first five!” said Friar Bacon. “Where are you?”
“Order!” cried a merry-faced little man, who had brought his young
daughter with him to see life, and who always modestly hid his face in
his beer-mug after he had thus assisted the business.
“John Nightingale, William Thrush, Joseph Blackbird, Cecil Robin, and
Thomas Linnet!” cried Friar Bacon.
“Here, sir!” and “Here, sir!” And Linnet, Robin, Blackbird, Thrush, and
Nightingale, stood confessed.
We, the undersigned, declare, in effect, by this written paper, that each
of us is responsible for the repayment of this pig-money by each of the
other. “Sure you understand, Nightingale?”
“Ees, sur.”
“Can you write your name, Nightingale?”
“Na, sur.”
Nightingale’s eye upon his name, as Friar Bacon wrote it, was a sight to
consider in after years. Rather incredulous was Nightingale, with a hand
at the corner of his mouth, and his head on one side, as to those
drawings really meaning him. Doubtful was Nightingale whether any virtue
had gone out of him in that committal to paper. Meditative was
Nightingale as to what would come of young Nightingale’s growing up to
the acquisition of that art. Suspended was the interest of Nightingale,
when his name was done—as if he thought the letters were only sown, to
come up presently in some other form. Prodigious, and wrong-handed was
the cross made by Nightingale on much encouragement—the strokes directed
from him instead of towards him; and most patient and sweet-humoured was
the smile of Nightingale as he stepped back into a general laugh.
“Order!” cried the little man. Immediately disappearing into his mug.
“Ralph Mangel, Roger Wurzel, Edward Vetches, Matthew Carrot, and Charles
Taters!” said Friar Bacon.
“All here, sir.”
“You understand it, Mangel?”
“Iss, sir, I unnerstaans it.”
“Can you write your name, Mangel?”
“Iss, sir.”
Breathless interest. A dense background of smock-frocks accumulated
behind Mangel, and many eyes in it looked doubtfully at Friar Bacon, as
who should say, “Can he really though?” Mangel put down his hat, retired
a little to get a good look at the paper, wetted his right hand
thoroughly by drawing it slowly across his mouth, approached the paper
with great determination, flattened it, sat down at it, and got well to
his work. Circuitous and sea-serpent-like, were the movements of the
tongue of Mangel while he formed the letters; elevated were the eyebrows
of Mangel and sidelong the eyes, as, with his left whisker reposing on
his left arm, they followed his performance; many were the misgivings of
Mangel, and slow was his retrospective meditation touching the junction
of the letter p with h; something too active was the big forefinger of
Mangel in its propensity to rub out without proved cause. At last, long
and deep was the breath drawn by Mangel when he laid down the pen; long
and deep the wondering breath drawn by the background—as if they had
watched his walking across the rapids of Niagara, on stilts, and now
cried, “He has done it!”
[Picture: Forming the Pig-clubs]
But, Mangel was an honest man, if ever honest man lived. “T’owt to be a
hell, sir,” said he, contemplating his work, “and I ha’ made a t on ’t.”
The over-fraught bosoms of the background found relief in a roar of
laughter.
“Or—DER!” cried the little man. “CHEER!” And after that second word,
came forth from his mug no more.
Several other clubs signed, and received their money. Very few could
write their names; all who could not, pleaded that they could not, more
or less sorrowfully, and always with a shake of the head, and in a lower
voice than their natural speaking voice. Crosses could be made standing;
signatures must be sat down to. There was no exception to this rule.
Meantime, the various club-members smoked, drank their beer, and talked
together quite unrestrained. They all wore their hats, except when they
went up to Friar Bacon’s table. The merry-faced little man offered his
beer, with a natural good-fellowship, both to the Dreary one and
Philosewers. Both partook of it with thanks.
“Seven o’clock!” said Friar Bacon. “And now we better get across to the
concert, men, for the music will be beginning.”
The concert was in Friar Bacon’s laboratory; a large building near at
hand, in an open field. The bettermost people of the village and
neighbourhood were in a gallery on one side, and, in a gallery opposite
the orchestra. The whole space below was filled with the labouring
people and their families, to the number of five or six hundred. We had
been obliged to turn away two hundred to-night, Friar Bacon said, for
want of room—and that, not counting the boys, of whom we had taken in
only a few picked ones, by reason of the boys, as a class, being given to
too fervent a custom of applauding with their boot-heels.
The performers were the ladies of Friar Bacon’s family, and two
gentlemen; one of them, who presided, a Doctor of Music. A piano was the
only instrument. Among the vocal pieces, we had a negro melody
(rapturously encored), the Indian Drum, and the Village Blacksmith;
neither did we want for fashionable Italian, having _Ah! non giunge_, and
_Mi manca la voce_. Our success was splendid; our good-humoured,
unaffected, and modest bearing, a pattern. As to the audience, they were
far more polite and far more pleased than at the Opera; they were
faultless. Thus for barely an hour the concert lasted, with thousands of
great bottles looking on from the walls, containing the results of Friar
Bacon’s Million and one experiments in agricultural chemistry; and
containing too, no doubt, a variety of materials with which the Friar
could have blown us all through the roof at five minutes’ notice.
God save the Queen being done, the good Friar stepped forward and said a
few words, more particularly concerning two points; firstly, that
Saturday half-holiday, which it would be kind in farmers to grant;
secondly, the additional Allotment-grounds we were going to establish, in
consequence of the happy success of the system, but which we could not
guarantee should entitle the holders to be members of the club, because
the present members must consider and settle that question for
themselves: a bargain between man and man being always a bargain, and we
having made over the club to them as the original Allotment-men. This
was loudly applauded, and so, with contented and affectionate cheering,
it was all over.
As Philosewers, and I the Dreary, posted back to London, looking up at
the moon and discussing it as a world preparing for the habitation of
responsible creatures, we expatiated on the honour due to men in this
world of ours who try to prepare it for a higher course, and to leave the
race who live and die upon it better than they found them.