“The Lion of Judah shall break my chain,
And give us the victory again and again,” &c.
I then wended my way to my lodging at Mr. Atkins’, all the better for
having spent a couple of hours with the “Salvation Army;” and with good
wishes for its success, I dozed away, with a “captain” of the Salvation
Army for a neighbour on one side, and a clergyman of the Church of
England on the other, feeling sure that between these two good Christian
centurion brothers, and under the eye of my Master, I was pretty sure to
land safely, after the tossings of the night, at the breakfast table in
the morning. During my midnight wandering in mist and dreamland, the
following aphorisms, thoughts, and suggestions floated before my brain.
As the beautiful colours of the field, forest, dell, garden, and bower
are produced by the rays of the sun, so are the beautiful traits of
Christian life produced by the rays of Divine love, as exemplified and
manifested by the Son of God, our blessed Lord.
The nation that allows her children of tender years to drift about at sea
without rescuing them from ruin, has decay, or “dry rot,” at work among
her timbers, and will before long become a wreck.
The country that cannot find time to see to the interest of its little
children within its borders, has allowed the devil to throw dust into the
eyes of its leaders, to blind them against its happiness and prosperity
by leading all into the dark.
Why are some Christians little-loved, weak-kneed, and sickly? Because
they, like babies, live on “sop”—_i.e._, trashy fiction, shows, sights,
sounds, and unrealities, instead of the love of God and the pure milk of
His word.
When you see a Christian with the love of God burning deadly within his
soul, and without either light or heat being the outcome, it may be taken
for granted that a lot of worldly ashes are in the way choking up the
ventilation and air passages; and if he will not set to work at once to
clear out the ashes and dust of sin God will do it for him, either by the
chastening rod of affliction or losses and crosses in other forms.
Cloaks of deception and fraud are made out of the fibres of disease and
putrefaction, and those who wear them are exposed to the disgust and
loathing of all upright observers.
Cloaks of honesty and uprightness are made out of the fibres of love and
truthfulness, and the wearers of them are received with the smiles and
loving embraces of all classes of society.
When you see a Christian without either life or soul within him, you may
rest satisfied that bank-notes, musty-fusty deeds, or other things upon
which he has set his affections, are clinging round and coming across the
ventricles of his heart, and unless removed they will cause death both to
the body and to the soul. If the earth-bound Christian will set fire to
them by exposing them and his heart to a ray of Divine love, he will be
able to jump over a mountain and scale the battlements of heaven, and
with flag in hand shout, “Victory!”
Some dashing, flashing wicked men are like a balloon without a vent-hole
filled with the devil’s gas, which expands the higher it rises; and for a
time they float upon the surface of humanity, finally seeking pleasure
among the clouds of fascination and frivolity; and in this region they
burst and come down to earth and their senses with a tremendous crash, to
find when it is too late that they have been making fools of themselves,
and that their grappling irons will not save them from oblivion and ruin.
A clever, wise, thoughtful, sagacious, and Christian statesman may be
compared to an aeronaut, who sits in his balloon-car carried by public
opinion and pulling the strings of popular applause. Popular applause is
the gas by which a statesman floats in the air above his followers; the
cords and netting that hold the bottom together are his friends; the
treasury bench is his car and the press his strings, which, wisely
handled, enable him to land upon the desired spot. Poor wayward and
wrong-doing relations are the grappling irons that hold him to the earth;
hangers are paupers, and loafers are his sandbags. Infidels, Fenians,
Sceptics, and Communists are matches, fusees, and percussion caps, thrown
into his car by disappointed office-seekers and courtiers with the object
of sending him to Jamaica before his work is done. When those various
elements have either been thrown out of the car, stamped out, or brought
under proper control, he will then mount higher and higher till he
finally quits his car and finds himself seated by the throne of God.
The best stimulating food for an overworked brain, and containing more
phosphorus than a thousand fish, is the essence of Divine love, and grace
and truth in equal quantities, to be taken upon the knees as often as
circumstances need. Before applying to the Great Physician for this
medicine the patient should spend an hour in meditation and solitude.
When you see professing Christian parents setting their children to
ferret into other people’s affairs, it is a sure sign that they are
fonder of rat-catching than filling their souls with good things; and the
unwary should be on the look-out, or they will be trapped by these godly
rat-catchers and their skins taken to be made into purses.
The various denominations of Christian churches in the country may be
likened to an orchard of apple trees, most of which are bearing fruit in
one form or other. Some are just beginning to bear fruit, and there are
others dead or dying, while there are some trees producing larger
quantities of ripe, healthy fruit. In some cities, towns, and villages
the best kinds of fruit are to be seen, and in other places the little
hard sour crabs, which almost set one’s teeth on edge to look at them,
much less to taste. The best and largest fruit in any case is that which
grows upon the most healthy trees and branches, exposed to the sun’s
rays, and draws its nourishment the most direct from the parent trunk.
Fruit upon almost dead branches does not so soon get ripe as the fruit
upon healthy branches, and it is small and shrivelled up. In some
localities we shall see what we may call “Blenheim” churches, “Russett”
churches, “Crab” churches, “Keswick” churches, “Northern Green” churches,
“Whiting Pippin” churches, “Winter” churches, &c., growing side by side.
The “Crab” church is little, hard, and sour; the “Blenheim” church is
rich, large, delicious, and healthy; the “Russett” church is uninviting,
but juicy, and much better than it looks. So in like manner with other
kinds of Christian churches. The name of the churches answering under
these various names must be answered by the members themselves. As
digging, dunging, pruning, and grafting improves the trees and the
quality of the fruit, so in like manner our heavenly Father has to deal
with His churches, or they would all die together. Conscience,
surrounded with death-like stillness, asks the question, “To which do you
belong?”
A man who has forsaken the path God has marked out for him has stuffed
his ears with wool, and jumped upon the devil’s steam tug, and is being
taken into a long, dark, dark tunnel, with no light at the other end; and
the light of heaven and the gospel which he has left behind him are,
through distance, smoke, and steam, and his own bad actions, getting
gradually less. The only light he can see, and which will not help him
to grope his way in his wretched condition, is derived from farthing
rush-lights called science, made and placed in the dark watery cavern by
men’s hands; and these get fewer as he is being pulled along by evil
influences, until he is lost in despair, with horror upon his face and
wringing his hands in grief he passes away.
As children sitting upon a swing gate rocking to and fro are in some
degree being prepared for the storms of a life at sea, so are the little
foretastes of heavenly pleasure enjoyed by His children from time to
time, filling, preparing, and nerving them for the tempestuous ocean
which awaits them.
People without gratitude for God’s mercies may be compared to swine
eating chestnuts as they fall from the trees. Their refined senses are
only manifested in grunts and grumbles. Wise are the people who take
lessons from the little birds, and sing God’s praises while they enjoy
His blessings.
Gamblers are the devil’s cats set by his Satanic majesty to catch
children and fools, and woe be to those who are caught within their
clutches.
Those who cling to forms and ceremonies entirely as a means of getting to
heaven, will have their eyes opened some day to find out that they are
hugging and fondling an illegitimate child of a parent of a very
questionable character. The more they know of the child they have been
fondling and its mother, the more they will be disgusted with themselves
at having been such dupes and fools.
Those who disobey their parents will find that they are putting a noose
round their necks, and tying the other end of the rope to a gate post;
and when they have done this the words “love” and “duty” in letters of
fire will spring up as from the ground, which will keep getting larger
and hotter until the wrong-doers are strangled.
The devil’s butterfly is an unconverted clergyman, who gets upon the back
of a horse to gallop a fox to death on the week day, dresses in
fantastical colours on Sundays, dances before his congregation with
incense in his hands, and with his face towards the east, tries to carry
his congregation on his wings to a place he knows not where;
hypocritically singing the _Te Deum_ in Latin as they go from “pillar to
post.”
Those landlords who object to the cultivation of their waste lands for
food for man and beast will find that the scent of the gorse, perfume of
the heather, contains the fragrance of the bankruptcy court, with the
hares, rabbits, partridges, pheasants, woodcock and snipe flapping about
the doors uttering horrible noises for their folly. The horrors of the
court will be increased by hearing the cries of the children asking for
bread with none to give.
Those people who, with the aid of a glib tongue, cunning, and deception,
are weaving a cloak of soft words to cover a mass of iniquity, will find
out too late, unless very careful, that the mass of corruption they have
been hiding will burst out with a more horrible stench than that of a
dead corpse.
Infidels and sceptics who rest entirely upon science and nature as a
lever by which they hope to lift humanity into paradise, have only to
look into a bright black earthenware teapot to discover what sort of wry
and contortious faces they are pulling before the public.
The most powerful magnet in the world is the love of God. It can draw
the sting of the devil, disarm enemies, and lift all the human beings in
the universe into heaven. The more it is used the stronger and more
powerful it gets.
Sceptics and infidels, seeking for the so-called errors in the Divine
Word, may be compared to blind and foot-tied weasels, trying to catch
“Jack Sharps” in a broad, deep, clear stream of pure water. They leave
their sickening scent on their trail behind them, to be carried forward
to be lost in the great stream of truth from whence all our blessings
flow.
Children’s gifts to children produce more blessed, lasting, and
Christ-like results than any other gifts in the universe. Children’s
gifts to poor little outcast, forgotten, and neglected children are seeds
of kindness that will live as long as this world endures, and they will
then bloom in Paradise for ever.
Christians who receive their strength for the conflicts and trials of
life from reading light books while sitting in drawing-room slippers, and
under the sound of frothy conversation, instead of from closet prayer and
faith, and the rain and sunshine of heaven, are like window plants, which
derive their strength from cold and poisonous water put to their roots.
Plants, whether in nature or grace, grown under such circumstances soon
become unhealthy and drooping, and unable to stand the bare breath of
opposition.
Christians living upon the church roll in name only, without the cheering
and enlivening influence of the Holy Spirit, will become like plants
grown in a dark room, pale and feeble. Some Christian lives are weeds,
and may be known by their crotchets, tempers, and wrinkles.
The first signs of a withering church may be said to have manifested
themselves when the living members extend the dead hand of sympathy to
the suffering members of their own flock.
With the seeds of life are the seeds of death, and at the birth of any
child the mortal conflict begins, never to result in a “drawn game.”
Big Christians, like big plants, require more water than small ones; and
so in like manner Christians who have many cares, troubles, business and
state responsibility require more grace than little Christians, and those
who have it not will soon become bankrupt.
The “will” and “principle” are man’s own twin-sisters, the offspring of
life, and run side by side through the marrow of man’s nature; and who
derive their vitality, life, and power from the unseen spiritual
influences by which they are surrounded for good or for evil; and every
action that tends to cripple either the one or deform the other is soon
manifested in the crooked actions of a man’s life, shaping immortality.
Crooked Christians, like crooked trees, are neither so profitable nor
beautiful to behold as those who grow straight and stately.
Under the guise of an angel of light, Satan dangles false hope before
some Christians, as a basket made of finely-wrought and tender twigs, a
bouquet of delicate, beautiful, lovely, and richly scented greenhouse
plants, as a foretaste of what is before, or in reserve for those who
follow his advice—_i.e._, the influence of the ball-room, theatre, gay
living, high life, fashion, and fancy, &c.; and so dexterously does the
arch enemy hold these things before the simple ones, or entwine them
round their hearts, that they are ready to cry out, “hell” is heaven and
“heaven” is hell; and in this way the simple are groping after shadows
till they find themselves surrounded by a darkness blacker than midnight,
and without a friend in the world, with the devil laughing in their face
for having been such fools.
The best antidote against beer and hellish swears is cold water and
upward prayers.
To a troubled conscience, at midnight hour the ticking of a clock sounds
as loud as the death knell of the church bell.
Every act of good or ill we perform makes an indent upon the coil of
future life, which will speak and re-speak to us through the never-ending
ages of eternity as they roll along.
Every time a Christian looks at sin with a longing eye, the devil draws a
thin beautiful tinted film before his eyes, through which film, in
process of time, the fire in his conscience eye, kindled at the time of
his conversion, is unable to penetrate, or see the dangers lying across
his path.
Tears of penitence, joy, and gladness are the best eye-salve for those
whose eyes are growing dim.
Christians who have to live in and wade through the mud of slander and
lying pools of deceit have need to wear watertight boots, of the kind
described in the good old book.
By listening attentively to the prayers of a Christian, you will soon
discover whether he wants—like a run-down clock—winding up. Losses and
crosses, the death of a darling child, affliction, and a thousand other
things, God useth as He seemeth well to wind him up and set him a-going
again with fresh vigour.
A man who has a heart full of prejudice, spite, malice, and envy has an
extra eye upon his nose, eclipsing his other eyes, which can both smell
and see the dark side of a man’s character. So sensitive is this
nose-eye that it can detect faults and failings when there are none to be
detected.
The most lovely Christians are those who, like the beautiful butterfly
and charming songsters, live in the sunlight of His throne.
The more miserable Christians are those who, like bats, buzz about in the
dark.
Some Christians are like London dogs galloping about the streets after
froth, losing their masters, and then they howl out, “Oh that I knew
where I might find him!”
When the benevolent action of drawing-room philanthropy ends in nothing
but tall talk and carpet gossip, it may be compared to soap bubbles piped
forth for show.
Youths receiving their habits, nourishment, character, and stamina from
the pothouse and gin-palace may be compared to plants grown in a room
lighted and warmed with gas, which sicken and die.
Artificial Christians are like wax flowers, pretty to look upon; but
without scent and perfume, difficult to handle, and they will not stand
the fire.
Society is like a book of poems, and those members with the most
sentiment, poetry, or sympathy in their natures will be the most sought
after, prized, and used.
To a man who has done wrong, and has a troubled conscience, a louse upon
the window pane appears as an ugly monster.
Conscience is the soul’s looking-glass, and blessed is the man who has
courage to hold it up to behold what manner of man he is.
A sick room is often God’s pinfold, where He places in naughty wandering
children; and there they will lie until either our blessed Saviour
unlocks the gate or takes them over the top of the walls to heaven.
Authors and their books are like flowers: some are small, but send out a
rich fragrance, and may be used as button-holes in the drawing-room;
others are lovely to look upon, but as sour as crabs to handle and taste.
There are others as large and showy as the sunflower, with a perfume
anything but paradisical; and there are others with heavenly virtues
running through themselves and their books to such an extent that a child
will have no difficulty in gathering sufficient flowers to form a
beautiful bouquet; and not a few in this our day are actually poisonous,
and dangerous to meddle with.
Strong conviction, the offspring of thought and reflection, is the
handmaid of inspiration, and the agent through which this heavenly
soul-impelling power works out the Divine ends and decrees of Providence
in carrying on the affairs of the world; and those who are heavenly
inspired by means of the golden cord of love and sympathy, in full action
between themselves and God, may be said to be His cabinet ministers.
The food eaten by an idle man warps his body, stunts his mind, and sends
his soul to ruin.
An oak tree, or any other tree which stands the storms with defiance, are
those whose roots have hold of mother earth with the firmest grip; and as
in nature so in grace. A man to withstand all the storms of life must
have firm hold upon the Deity.
A crooked tree may be said to be faulty; and it is neither so valuable
nor beautiful as those that are straight and stately; so in like manner
it may be said of the crooked members of Christian churches and social
societies.
Some members of the community may he properly called “creepers,” for they
very much resemble the ivy. They have neither backbone nor principle.
Their object is to creep into religious communities and social societies,
so as to entwine themselves round the members. They harbour filth,
impede growth, hide beauty, and climb by the strength they steal from
others.
A church whose members are tipsters may be compared to a marsh with too
much water at the roots, bringing forth rushes, sedges, and buttercups.
Upon the tail of a snail a farmer’s weather glass is to be seen; so in
like manner the footsteps of an enemy will reveal to an observing mind
the dangers to be avoided.
Some Christian ministers are like the gas stove, warm-looking in the
pulpit, but cold at home.
A man with all sorts of wrong ideas, crotchets, and queer notions in his
head exhibits himself as a marsh with spots of green grass and daisies,
to get at which mud and quagmire will have to be faced and got through
before they are reached, and when this has been done the trouble will
have been wasted.
Selfish men and misers engaged in grubbing after mammon may be compared
to a swarm of flies feeding upon a dung-heap; and so long as the sun of
prosperity shines they can feed, buzz, annoy, and sting.
A man who kisses his wife to hide his sins is sowing seeds that will
produce a crop of anguish and despair that will hang heavier round his
neck than a millstone. A kissing deceiver is the devil’s major-general.
Every time a man or woman does a deceitful action they make and deposit a
grain of gunpowder, that only requires the light of public opinion and
truth to send the maker, according to the number of grains deposited,
into eternity to reap his folly.
Hungry-bellied politicians, whose object is to sting in order to feed,
are the gadflies of English society, settling upon John Bull to fill
their pockets and rob for fame.
Paupers and lawyers are leeches which fasten upon social life, often
sucking the blood of those who are the least able to stand them.
A wife who cooks her husband’s meals five minutes behind time is carving
furrows upon his forehead.
A mother who sends her children unwashed to school is embedding in the
child’s nature seeds that will one day bring a crop of poverty,
wretchedness, and despair.
A man who sits playing with his thumbs, hoping that something will turn
up to put him upon the pedestal of fame and fortune, is hatching addled
eggs, and the longer he sits upon them the worse they will stink.
Infidelity is a thick, muddy canal made by men’s hands, the bosom of
which is covered with the weeds of idiosyncrasies and Satanic doubts; and
beneath its surface it teems with all kinds of big and little, prickly,
dead, and dying venomous reptiles; and woe be to the man who trusts his
barque upon its stinking and putrefying surface with the hope that it
will carry him to the crystal river and sea of glass.
Something of the wonderful infinitude, love, and power of God, in
regulating and governing the external and internal relation of myriads
upon myriads of millions of worlds teeming with life, variety, and
beauty, may be gathered if we can grasp the idea that the separate
particles of the rays of light sent forth by the sun to illumine our
world each morning are, after they have done their work, whirled into
unknown and unbounded space, and transformed as they fly, at a rate
faster than imagination can travel, into suns to light up other worlds
and other systems. And yet He finds time to number the hairs upon our
heads; yea, a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice.
Wonderful! most wonderful! Past comprehension. None can fathom.
As the twelve precious stones—jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald,
sardonyx, sardius, chrysolyte, beryl, topaz, chrysoprasus, jacinth, and
an amethyst formed the foundation of the heavenly Jerusalem, the future
home of His saints, with pearly gates, as seen by John the divine in
apostolic days; so do hopeful, believing, fighting, wrestling, joyous,
singing, patient, benevolent, praying, working, and conquering Christians
form the foundation of the present-day heavenly temple, with love and
concord as doors, and walls of virtue, wherein God delights to dwell
among His children, witnessing adoration with loving eyes, and listening
to hymns of praise and thanksgiving with melodious ears.
A man may be said to be in a fog when he cannot see the hand of
Providence in all his dealings, or God’s finger pointing out his way.
A closet is a burrow into which a Christian who is hounded to death by
the dogs of hell can run and be safe. When once there, Christians can
smile at their howls and sing while they show their teeth with rage.
* * * * *
At seven o’clock I was unbolting the door, making my way out of the house
to a number of gipsy vans in an orchard on the outskirts of the town. On
going to the place I met a little _posh_ gipsy dressed in “rags and
trashes,” with the heels—what was left of the “trashes”—upside down. He
had just turned out of his bed, he said, and from his bed followed the
dog, both having snoozled under the van—in which his uncle and aunt
lay—on the ground, with a wet, damp rug as a covering. “Master,” said
the little _posh_ gipsy boy, “can you tell me where I can get a bottle of
ginger beer? I am so thirsty and hungry. I’ve had nothing since my
dinner yesterday.” I went with the boy to several houses where
“Ginger-beer sold here” was displayed in the window, but without success.
I gave the boy the price of a bottle and trotted him off lower down the
town to quench his thirst and satisfy his appetite.
The gipsies were just beginning to “turn out,” and the little gipsies,
half naked, were hunting up sticks out of the hedge-bottom to light the
fire to boil the water for breakfast. The men and dogs were collecting
together in groups, half-dressed, to relate to each other their successes
at the fair. Apart from the rest of the gipsies, owning a van of a
better kind than the others, two old gipsies were enjoying their
breakfast upon the ground. As soon as the old gipsy woman—whose face
betokened that it had figured in many an encounter, and was somewhat
highly coloured—saw me, she began to get excited, and called me to them.
I thought, “Now is the time for squalls; look out.” I drew near to the
old woman with a strange mixture of feelings. It was early in the
morning. There were now about a score of gipsy men and women looking on,
and a few of the dogs came sniffing at my heels. I tried to screw a
smile upon my face, and to dig and delve low for a pleasant joke, but it
would not come from the “vasty deep.” On my approach the old woman
jumped up from the ground, and with both hands clasped mine in hers,
which felt as rough as a navvy’s, saying while griping them tightly,
“Bless yer, my good mon, I’ve wanted to see yer for a long while. I’ve
long ’erd abaut yer, and ha’ never had th’ pleasure o’ puttin’ my een on
yer till this mornin’. Sit yer down on th’ gress, I want to tawke to
yer. Dunner yer be freetened, I’m not goin’ to swaller yer, bless yer,
master mon. Yer’ll ha’ sum brekust, wonner yer?” “Yes,” I said, “I did
not mind.” Although I did not exactly like the appearance of things, I
thought it would not do to say “no,” and I knelt upon the damp grass. In
a pan over their fiery embers were the remnants of bacon and red
herrings. There was only one large cup and saucer, without a handle, for
the pair of them. I thought most surely she would fetch a cup and saucer
out of the van for me. Such was not to be the case. A group of some ten
or twelve working men of Hinckley stood looking over the hedge only a few
yards away, at the old woman’s “megrims.” She handed me in the first
place a piece of bread, upon which was some bacon and herring. It took
me all the time to swallow this uninviting morsel. I munched a little of
it, and some I put into my pocket for another time. She now filled up
her cup with tea, and made her fingers do duty for sugar tongs. I could
see no teaspoons about, except one that was among the herrings and bacon.
This was fetched out and plunged into the tea, and round and round it
went, leaving upon the top of the dark-coloured tea—which I could now see
by the bright morning sun shining upon the scene—stars floating about.
The old woman first drank herself, and then handed the cup of tea to me.
I supped and nibbled the crust. I supped again, till between us the cup
was nearly emptied. She had a strong scent of “Black Jack,” and I kept a
very sharp eye upon what parts of the cup the old woman drank from. “Now
then to bisness,” said the old gipsy. “Yer see none o’ we gipsies con
read an’ write. I’ll show yer I con, if none o’ them conner. Han yer
got anythin’ wi yer for me to read?” I had a few copies of “Our Boys and
Girls,” with me, given to me by the Wesleyan Sunday School Union, and I
handed one to the old woman, dated September 1880, and she began
stammering at some of the verses in an excited frame of mind between
anger and pleasure, as if determined to read them whether she could or
not. “Ha—ha—ha,—Haste traveller—ha—ha,—haste! the night comes on.” She
got through one or two of the verses pretty well. I then gave her
another verse, which she read fairly well:
“He is our best and kindest Friend,
And guards us night and day.”
I gave her another verse, but I could see tears in her eyes, which
prevented her getting through it as well as she desired. She laid the
fault to her being without spectacles. Her reading these lines touched
her very much, and she became quite excited again, and jumped up and
clutched hold of both of my hands and said, “Yer see, my good mon, if
none o’ the t’other gipsies con read, I con, conner I? But I con do more
than read, I con say a lot o’ the Bible off by heart. The Creeds, Church
Catechism, Belief, and Sacraments, which I larnt by heart when I was a
girl. I went to the Church Sunday School at Uttoxeter. Yer’ll see by
that I have not allus been a gipsy. When I got married to my old mon I
had to go a-gipsying wi’ him, and have never been in th’ church since.
My name’s Bedman, of ‘Ucheter,’ and am well known.”
She knelt upon the grass again, and supped a little more of her strong
tea. The number of Hinckley working people and gipsies was increasing,
and up she jumped again, clutching both of my hands, after which she laid
her hand in navvy fashion upon my shoulder, and began to repeat the
Creed: “I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and
earth, and in all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus
Christ, the only begotten Son of God,” and on she went to the end in her
fashion. After this she knelt down again and began with the Decalogue;
“God spake these words and said, I am the Lord thy God; thou shalt have
none other gods but me,” and with a red face, and tears in her eyes,
trembling with emotion, she sung in the usual chanting tone, “Lord have
mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this law.” The old gipsy
woman went on to the end, to which I responded, “Amen.” Some portions of
the Litany were repeated, and then she struck off at a tangent into the
Catechism, commencing with “What is your name? May Bedman. Who gave you
that name? My godfathers and godmothers in my baptism, wherein I was
made a member of Christ, the child of God, and an inheritor of the
kingdom of heaven. What did your godfathers and godmothers then for you?
They did promise and vow three things in my name. First, that I should
renounce the devil and all his works, the pomps and vanities of this
wicked world, and all the sinful lusts of the flesh. Secondly, that I
should believe all the Articles of the Christian Faith. And thirdly,
that I should keep God’s holy will and commandments, and walk in the same
all the days of my life;” and then she sung out, “Amen.” “Ah!” said the
old woman, “you see, my good master mon, I know a little, don’t I?”
“Yes,” I said, “you know a little, and he that knoweth his Master’s will,
and doeth it not, ‘shall be beaten with many stripes.’” “Yes,” said the
old gipsy, “I do know my Master’s will, and I have not done it, and I’ve
been beaten with many stripes during the last forty years, and here I am.
Never mind, let bygones be bygones. ‘Let the wicked forsake his way, and
the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and
he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly
pardon.’” And I replied, “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be
as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as
wool.” “Yes, you are right, bless you,” said the old backsliding gipsy,
and with wet knees and wet eyes she sang out again, “Lord, have mercy
upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this law,” to which I responded,
“Amen.” I then left this penitent gipsy’s strong grips, the gipsy gang,
and the number of lookers-on to go to my “quarters” for my breakfast. I
then spent another half-hour with the Salvation Army. After a pleasant
conversation with the clergyman at my lodgings, I started homeward, and
on my way to the station I came upon one of my old gipsy families, who
were just having their breakfast in a very filthy, tumbledown van, with
their six poor ragged, dirty little children squatting about on the
bottom of it. The good-hearted _posh_ gipsy woman seemed to have lost
all spirit in her struggles to live a respectable traveller’s life, and
was now with her children in the depths of despair and poverty. She
would insist on my having a cup of tea as I sat upon the doorstep. I
could not drink all of it, but did the best I could under the
circumstances. She persisted in pressing me to take a cocoa-nut and a
sponge for my little folk at home, the cocoa-nut to eat and the sponge to
clean their slates with.
It is from two adjoining villages in the neighbourhood of Hinckley that
two of our present-day English tribes of gipsies spring. Many years ago
the father of one tribe was a “stockinger”—_i.e._, one who makes
stockings—and he conceived the idea that he would like to be a gipsy.
Accordingly he set up a pedlar’s “basket of trifles” and began to stump
the country. From this small beginning there are now between forty and
fifty “real gipsies,” as some backwood gipsy writers—who would delight in
seeing this country dragged backward into Druidism as a retaliation for
their own failure in the battle of life—would call them. Poor
little-souled mortals! they are to be pitied, or my feeling of disgust at
their wrong-doing would lead me to say hard things about them. To be
laughed out of school is a start bad enough in the wrong road in all
conscience, without a severe probe from me. My pleasure would be to put
out the hand to lead wrong-doers back to the wise counsel of a loving
Christian father, the decalogue, and the teaching of Christ.
The success of the first gipsies in their “rounds” led the second lot to
take up the “profession,” and to-day we have two full-blown tribes of
English gipsies in full swing, tramping the country in vans, carts,
surrounded in many instances with dogs, dirt, wretchedness, and misery.
Sometimes they will be fraternizing with kisses, and other times they
will be quarrelling and fighting with each other to the extent of almost
“eating each other’s heads off.” In these two families there will be
close upon one hundred and fifty men, women, and children, and not more
than three or four out of the whole able to read and write a sentence.
It is truly heartrending to contemplate the amount of evil that has been
done in the country by these two families of artificially-trained
gipsies. Thank God, some of them are beginning to see the error of their
ways.
I bade the Hinckley gipsies good-bye, and having dined off a slice of
bread-and-butter fetched out of the corner of my bag, at Nuneaton
station, I made my way homeward. As I was mounting the last hill on this
bright, lovely Christian Sabbath day the church bells were pealing forth—
“Come to church and pray
On this blessed day.”
Mr. George Burden, the Leicester poet, author of “The Months,” had heard
something of the cry of the gipsy children when he was prompted to send
me the following touching little poem:—
“THE GIPSY CHILDREN.
“From the remotest ages,
From many a lovely lane,
The cry of gipsy children
To heaven hath risen in vain.
“CHORUS. Then rescue gipsy children,
Who roam our country lanes.
Break off their moral thraldom,
That keeps each life in chains.
“Through many a bitter hardship
Their little lives have passed;
Round them the robes of kindness
As yet have ne’er been cast.
“From city, town, and village
They wander wild and free,
Too long despised, forsaken,
Amid their revelry.
“No influence pure and heavenly
Protects them night and day;
Nor wise and blest instruction
To help them on their way.
“From vice and shame and ruin,
That taint their early youth,
Ye English hearts deliver—
Shield them with love and truth.
“One hastens to their rescue
With earnest heart and will;
God bless the noble mission
Of George Smith of Coalville!”
Rambles among the Gipsies, Posh Gipsies, and Gorgios at Long Buckby.
DURING the Sunday night after my visit to Hinckley I more than once
thought that I was about to enter the great unknown and unseen world of
_Tátto paáni_ (spirits) from whence no _choórodo_ (tramp) returns.
After partaking of a light breakfast of the kind _Midúvelesko_ (Christ)
and _mongaméngro_ (beggars) eat, with my _Romeni_ (wife), _Racklé_
(sons), and _Raklia_ (girls) at our plain-fare _misáli_ (table), I began
with some of “_our boys and girls_” to wend my way through _poous_
(fields) and by-lanes and over rippling streams to Long Buckby. I had
not got far down one of the lanes before I came upon a scissors-grinder
(_posh_) gipsy, who, together with his _joovel_ (woman) and their six
_nongo-peeró chiklo chavis_ (barefooted dirty children), were _beshing_
(sitting) upon _chiklo drom rig_ (muddy roadside) _rokering_ (talking),
_chingaren_ (quarrelling), _sovenholben_ (swearing), and eating their
_shooker manro_ (dry bread) for breakfast and _paáni_ (water) out of the
rippling stream for _múterimongri_ (tea). Their _yogoméskro_ (fireplace)
was upon the _chik_ (ground); their _kair_ (house) was a barrow covered
with rags. Although belonging to _Anghitérra_ (England), and priding
themselves on being _Gaújokones_ (English), not one of the eight men,
women, and children could tell a letter. _Shóshi_ (rabbits) were not to
be seen, and _kanegrós_ (hares) were out of sight, where they _Taned_
(camped). Rooks were “caw”-cawing overhead; _baúro-chériklo_ (pheasants)
and _ridjil_ (partridges) had flown. After a chat with them I
distributed a few pictures and little things to the _chabis_ (children),
and then bade them good (_saúla_) morning.
A further trembling stroll by the hedges, ditches, daisies, and
buttercups brought me to the edge of the canal, where I sat down to watch
the darting, jumping, and frisking of the _mátcho_ (fish) as they shot to
and fro before me. Every now and again a perch would pop up out of the
clear water, as if anxious to have a peep and a game, and then it would,
with a whisk of its tail, shoot off like an arrow. The lark was singing
overhead. While meditating, musing, and observing upon the surroundings
and unregistered and uninspected canal boats and cabins packed to
suffocation with uneducated poor canal children, in face of an Act
passed—for which I worked _hard_ and _long_ from 1872 and onward to
to-day, to prevent this sad state of things—I began to aphorize, and
entered into my pocket-book the following aphorisms:—
Some little-brained, over-sensitive, dwarfish mortals, who spend their
time in running after little annoyances, may be compared to a policeman
running with his staff after a fly which has been tickling the end of his
nose on a summer’s sunny afternoon.
A clever man who has found his way into the gutter through his own
misconduct may be compared to a piece of granite, with a rugged
squarishness about him that would have enabled him to find his upward way
into the world and good society; instead of which his ruggedness has been
rubbed and kicked off, and to-day he is as a boulder upon the pavement,
and undergoing the process of being kicked from pillar to post, with no
reward for him but the gutter.
A man who builds up his fortune out of ill-gotten gains, and the grinding
sweat of the poor, is feathering his nest in a dead carcase that will
stink long in his nostrils, notwithstanding fine feathers, plausible
excuses, and sanctimonious looks.
When present unhappiness is the outgrowth of honest conviction and
hard-working strivings, a crop of immortal pleasures will be seen where
least expected.
Immortal, golden fame is the everlasting perfume of eternal flowers,
grown out of immortal deeds, sown upon immortal soil by unselfish hands,
and watered by tears of sorrow shed in trial’s darkest hours.
When ignoramuses and fools mistake the artificial light of science for
that of the sun, it may be taken for granted that they are in a fair way
for having their fingers burnt in the candle.
A shallow headed trickster, with a hungry belly and an empty pocket,
clothed in trickery, wringing the watery drops of sympathy and
benevolence from his nature to paint virtuous smiles upon his face to
deceive his friends while he lightens their pockets of gold, for which he
has never worked, has earned the title of the devil’s grave-digger, with
_perfidus fraudulentus_ engraved upon the buttons of his coat.
Round boulder-stones are awkward things with which to build up new
churches, so are the round members of the community, without principle,
fidelity, and piety, awkward members of society to found new Christian
churches.
A London smoke prevents healthy vegetation, as do London morals and
influences prevent healthy spiritual life and vigour.
A loan office is a social whirlpool that has shipwrecked thousands of
honest families, and as the little ones have gone down they have cried
for help, but there has been none to deliver.
The man to gauge your pocket correctly is a lawyer, for he can tell what
filthy lucre you have in it with his eyes shut.
A lawyer’s office is coated with birdlime, strong enough to fetch the
clothes off your back and keep you riveted to the spot; and then the
lawyer, with a laugh upon his face like Solomon’s leeches, cries out for
more.
As rusty old nails put into pickle produce poison for the body, so do
rusty, deceitful old sinners put into social and religious societies
produce moral poison.
In the darkest heart, riven with anguish and despair, there lies embedded
in the human breast a spiritual vein that only requires one touch of the
match of heavenly sympathy to cause it to shed seraphic lustre upon
hellish actions, at once transforming them into Divine.
A dandy is fashion’s painted sparrow, whose wings will be sure to be
clipped, and who will find a final resting-place in the gutter.
A gin-shop is the devil’s headquarters, with the landlord as his
recruiting serjeant, and rags as the standard colours of his army.
In all societies the devil has his “gad-flies,” whose only mission in the
world seems to be to sting and annoy.
Slanderers and backbiters are the cats of hell, with eyes of fire,
poison-steeped claws, and tails of blood, running wild, and woe be to
those who come in their way.
As the light proceeding from the natural sun produces the seven cardinal
colours, viz., red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, and
with a proper mixture of these colours a spotless white is produced; so
in like manner with the light proceeding form the Son of God, the seven
cardinal graces are the outcome of His glory, viz., love, joy, patience,
faith, meekness, temperance, and charity, which, when blended together in
human natures, produce a perfect Christian, reflecting His glory and
image.
Imagination is the ethereal unseen car that carries the twin angelic
sisters, love and sympathy, through space and matter to visit the darkest
and brightest spots of creation as a mission of affection, consolation,
reproof, help, and encouragement to every fallen son of Adam.
A mother’s prayers are a life-belt that has saved thousands of young men
and women from being lost amid the dark storms and wrecks of life, until
they have been lifted into the life-boat and carried safe to shore
beneath the silver rays of Biblical truth, which the lighthouse of heaven
has been shedding o’er the troubled waters dashing against the rocks of
land and rugged earth.
As the rose, pine-apple, and other deliciously scented fruits and flowers
send forth the best fragrance when clouds are the darkest and lowest,
atmosphere the heaviest, and rainstorms flying threateningly about, so in
like manner do the most child-like, Christ-like, modest, and heavenly
Christians send forth heavenly graces tinted with seraphic splendour when
the storms of persecution are flying savagely about, afflictions weigh
heavily, and Providence hidden from view.
As the beautiful white snow that flappers and flickers about us in winter
appears shapeless and ragged to the naked eye, but when seen through a
microscope presents prismatic forms and crystalline beauty beyond
imagination, so in like manner the blessings, bounties, and mercies of
God do to the eye of sinful nature and a bad heart; but when they are
seen by the eye of sincerity, child-like simplicity, and faith, then the
beauty and wonderful variety of God’s goodness to us are manifested as
they descend with heavenly stillness in our rooms and round our paths.
Children seeking innocent, pure, and moral precepts among wicked street
boys and girls, are running barelegged and barefooted after butterflies
in a field of nettles and thistles.
A bed of affliction is the “gridiron” upon which God often puts His
children when either their keel or propeller—faith and love—gets out of
order. Sometimes when they have been very wayward, and have suffered
severely, nothing less than being run into “dry dock”—afflictions and
earthly losses—will meet their case.
As pearls and other precious gems can be brought out of the sea only by
diving—no magnetic hand of an idle man is powerful enough to cause them
to swim—so can a Christian fetch up the much more precious hidden
mysteries of heaven by retiring from the world and engaging in closet
prayer, and diving into God’s wonderful system of Divine love. The gems
out of the sea adorn the body, while the pearls of heaven beautify the
mind, enliven the soul, put a lustre upon the actions, and illumine the
countenance with heavenly radiancy.
As the eyes and nose convey the delicious scents and beauty of creation
to the natural man, so in like manner do faith and prayer convey to the
soul the fragrance, delight, and beauty of heaven.
A man who seeks to be a philanthropist for worldly fame, with a heart
full of pride, selfishness, vanity, levity, lust, babbling, hate, and
deceit, has a compass upon his ship out of order. And he may also be
compared to a vessel with eight “fo’c’sles” and no “poop,” with helm to
steer, trusting to his flimsy sails of false hopes flappering in the
breeze to guide him to heaven, but sure to run him aground to hell.
The heavenly prayer of earth tinged with grief and sorrow will become the
golden picture of heaven illuminated with joy and tinted with God’s
radiant smile.
The face of a good man is the best heliograph in the world. The
heliograph used in war-time, as a signal, shines best with the brightest
sun, while the heliograph produced upon a man’s face by love shines best
in the darkest hour. Dismal cellars, squalid hearths, wretched garrets
and prisons, are good places in which to reflect a radiant splendour that
will last for ever.
To get a faint idea of God’s goodness and infinite splendour we have only
to imagine all the leaves and petals of vegetation, differing in shape
and size, teeming with silvery dewdrops of an infinitude of delicate
tints, which, as they drop among the flowers of earth, instantly turn
into pearls and diamonds of the first water; and while you are picking
them up, a doubling and multiplying process is everlastingly going on to
fill their places. So God gives, and so are the recipients of His
mercies, ever blessed with an infinite number of mercies daily and hourly
as we pass along.
* * * * *
After another slow walk I felt drowsy, and sat down upon a mossy bank
under a shady tree to rest my bones and wearied limbs. The whistling of
the sweet songsters and the bleating of the sheep and lowing of the oxen,
together with the lovely summer’s enchantments, sent me into a doze with
my elbows upon my knees. I had not been long in this position before the
meadow appeared as one vast gipsy encampment, composed of tents, vans,
dogs, wretchedness, misery, devilry, ignorance, dirt, filth, and squalor.
The gipsy men, women, and children were playing, singing, preying,
banging, shouting, fighting, thieving, lying, swearing, poaching,
cheating, and fortune-telling to their hearts’ content. Among this vast
concourse of English gipsy heathens, there were not a few “spoony”
Gorgios, and “_posh_ gipsies.” At one side of the meadow there was a
gipsy tent covered with rags and old sheeting. There were several little
lost gipsy children playing about it on the grass. Near them stood two
gipsy women talking to two silly young ladies, and telling their
fortunes. The young ladies, of course, were both in love with fair
gentlemen, but the fair gentlemen would prove deceitful and dark
gentlemen would take their places; and they would marry well, after
crossing the water, and become rich, and have a number of children, who
would become dukes and lords, and would live and die rolling in gold and
splendour, with horses, carriages, and servants to wait upon them “hand
and foot.” One of the young ladies, with glittering wealth hanging about
her, would have much trouble and many disappointments before she realized
her wishes, but all would be removed and made right as time went on. One
of the old fortune-telling wicked hags, who could not read a letter, took
out a small pocket Bible, and pretended to read a few verses. The old
gipsies made a few signs, repeated some gabble, and looked into the hands
of the young ladies, and told them to come again, as they had something
of great importance to tell them the next time, which would add much to
their happiness, beauty, and pleasure; but before the secrets could be
successful they must bring the best and most valuable ring they had in
the house for her to make crosses with, so that she might rule her planet
properly and dispose of the fair man, who was haunting one of them to
make her his wife, but would bring her to ruin. To the other young lady
an old gipsy woman said, in a kind of snake’s whisper, “You, my dear
young lady, have living with you in your family a fair woman and dark
man; they don’t mean you any good. You must have nothing to do with
them; be sure and hear what I say. Now mind, you must not listen to what
they say, or it will be your ruin, and all my words of counsel will turn
to curses.” “But,” said the young lady, “there is no fair woman or dark
man in our house, except my father and mother.” “Well,” said the old
gipsy, “hear what I have to say. Your father and mother are no friends
of yours. Now mark that; goodbye, my sweet girl. The Lord bless you, my
dear girl. I shall see you again soon; good-bye. Be sure and bring the
best ring in the house. Good-bye, and may the dear Lord bless you. If
you can bring two rings it will be all the better for your happiness and
fortune. The young gentleman who will be your husband will never be
cross. He will always be smiling. He will be beautiful, and he will let
you go where you like and do what you like. Bring two rings for your own
sake. Good-bye, my darling child. I wish I stood in the way for a
fortune and happiness as surely as you do; but all depends upon you
bringing me the rings. Good-bye, my sweet child. If you can bring me a
spade-ace guinea, or a Queen Victoria sovereign of the present year, it
will be all the better. I can influence the planets so that you can have
your dear charming little husband, horses, carriages, and footmen to wait
upon you earlier. The planets will do anything just now. Good-bye, my
sweet darling child. You are so much like your dear aunt; she was one of
the prettiest and best ladies I ever knew, and it would be a thousand
pities for you not to have a good husband. Bring the two rings, and the
guinea or sovereign, and it shall be all right. Good-bye.” “But,” said
the young lady, “I have not got any diamond rings and sovereigns. They
are my father’s and mother’s.” “Never mind. Hear what I say; you must
bring them if you want to be happy. I’ll influence the planets to send
your father and mother,” said the old hag, closing her fist, and with
fire in her eyes, and a devil’s anger in heart, and frowns upon her face,
“more in their places of greater value to them. The planets will not be
ruled, my dear young lady, except by the rings that your father and
mother have worn; and the sovereign would be all the better if taken out
of either your father’s or mother’s pocket. The gold and rings of your
mother have the most influence with the planets.”
After the young ladies had gone, the woman winked at me with a twinkle,
and said, with her arm raised, “Don’t you spoil my game, and I will bless
you. If all goes on right we shall have lots of money the whole of the
winter. If you do spoil my game, I—I—I will curse you to death; to death
will I curse you, and shall call you a vile wretch for ever; to death you
shall be sent.”
While this was going on, a little bird was singing in the trees overhead,
which caused the old gipsy woman to look up at it and me, and in a
softened voice said, “What does it say?” I said, “If you could but read
it rightly, it says, ‘Be not deceived, God is not mocked; for whatsoever
a man soweth, that shall he also reap.’” This seemed to startle the old
gipsy, and she vanished into the crowd.
Among the crowd of gipsies I noticed several gipsy men clustered
together. In the centre of the group there was a dead sheep. Sticker
said to Nobbler, “How did you come by it?” “Never mind,” said Nobbler.
“I’ve got it and that’s enough, but I may as well tell you a little. I
went round the villages a few miles away selling some pegs and skewers,
and just outside one of the villages there was a large lot of sheep in
one of the fields in prime condition, belonging to a farmer who, they
say, is a sleepy sort of a chap, and will never put any of the bobbies
upon your track. I conceived a liking for one of the sheep. I knew
Goggle Fletcher would be passing by the end of the field in which the
sheep were with his cart; and so I hung about in the public-house in the
village till it was dark. I entered the field through a gap, and drove
them into a dry corner. I kept upon the tufts of grass as much as I
could, so that I could not be traced. I was not long before I made short
work with one of them. After this I dragged him to the ditch by the side
of the road by which Goggles was to pass. I lay in the ditch for a long
time. It seemed as if he never would come. At last about eleven o’clock
he came. I could tell the sound of his trap. On coming up to me I
bawled out in a soft voice, ‘Goggles, Goggles, step down. I’ve got
something for you. It will be a treat for Sunday’s dinner.’ ‘Is that
you, Nobbler? What! You’ve been up to it again, have you? You will
have the “long wools,” if they are to be got, without either love or
money.’” Goggles jumped down and helped Nobbler to lift the sheep into
the cart, and off they bowled, arriving in the meadow about one o’clock
in the morning. Gipsies always take their plunder far away. The skin
was buried, and they set to work dividing the carcase among their kith
and kin.
[Picture: A scissor-grinding gipsy. “Scissors to grind”]
Another gang had been out on a poaching expedition with their lurcher
dogs, and brought to their tents and vans some hares, rabbits, and
pheasants; these were also divided. Among this vast gipsy encampment,
numbering some hundred men, women, and children, I saw an aged couple of
gipsies with some of their grandchildren round them. The old woman had
learned to read the Bible a little, and she was telling the children to
be good and love God. She was the only one who could read among the
gipsies, except a few riffraff Gorgios, who were studying gipsying with a
view to leading an idle vagabond’s life, free from parental restraint and
elevating social influences.
In the camp I noticed a _posh_ gipsy “scissor-grinder” from one of our
alleys, and his gipsy wife; every few minutes he bawled out, “Scissors to
grind!” “Scissors to grind!” While he was grinding away at his knives
and scissors, his wife was stitching umbrellas and “minding her baby.”
I found that the man had had a good education at a high-class school, but
had taken the “wrong turning,” and now spent part of his time in
“scissor-grinding,” singing gipsy “slap-dash songs,” and during the short
days of winter “dotted down” gipsy love tales, &c. He had smudged
thickly over the soul saving golden letters embedded in his memory in the
days of childhood—as all young men and maidens do who take to
gipsying—the fifth commandment: “_Honour thy father and thy mother_;
_that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth
thee_.” Poor follow! I felt sorry to see his dirty knees through the
rents in his breeches. In his childhood he had been taught by his
Christian parents to lisp as he knelt with his head bent low against his
mother’s knees—
“Teach me to live that I may dread
The grave as little as my bed.”
“I lay my body down to sleep,
Let angels guard my bed.”
Now he could sing out with his wife’s assistance—more jovially, of
course, than Hubert Smith sung it on his tramp to Norway—
“My father’s the king of the gipsies—that’s true,
My mother, she learned me some camping to do.
With a packet on my back, and they all wish me well,
I started up to London, some fortunes for to tell.”