Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: "ONE MIGHT DO," THOUGHT TOM, LOOKING AT THE BRIGHT COINS.
_Frontispiece._]
MOTHER'S GOLDEN GUINEAS.
BY
ANNETTE LYSTER
AUTHOR OF "GRANNIE," "FAITHFUL," "OUT IN THE COLD,"
"THE WHITE GIPSY," "ALONE IN CROWDS," ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY F. G. KITTON.
—————————————
PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE COMMITTEE
OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION APPOINTED BY THE
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE.
—————————————
LONDON:
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE
NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, CHARING CROSS, W.C.;
43, QUEEN VICTORIA STREET. E.C.
BRIGHTON: 135, NORTH STREET.
NEW YORK: E. & J. B. YOUNG AND CO.
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CONTENTS.
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CHAPTER
I. BURDECK
II. TOM MAKES A HORSE-SHOE
III. TOM GOES TO SEA
IV. PRESSED
V. OLD GIDEON
VI. THE ARTICLES OF WAR
VII. "THREE CHEERS FOR CAPTAIN EGERTON!"
VIII. A "CUTTING-OUT" EXPEDITION
IX. PAID OFF
X. TOM'S ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY GUINEAS
XI. THE JOURNEY HOME
XII. BETTER THAN GOLDEN GUINEAS
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[Illustration]
MOTHER'S GOLDEN GUINEAS.
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CHAPTER I.
BURDECK.
SOMEWHERE between Wakefield and Doncaster, but much nearer Wakefield,
there is a little village called Burdeck, which even in these days of
progress is but a small place, and of no importance in any way. But in
the days of which I am about to tell you something, it was so utterly
insignificant, so little known except to the few who lived there,
and to the nobleman of whose estate it formed part, that had it been
swallowed up by an earthquake, some time might have elapsed before
it was missed. Yet to the twenty or thirty families who lived there,
Burdeck was just as interesting and important as London is to such of
my readers as may happen to live there; nay, perhaps more important,
because you know other places as well as London, while to the people of
Burdeck, Burdeck was the world—with Wakefield at a distance. No coach
came near Burdeck; it returned no member to Parliament; a newspaper
would have been of little use, for there were few who could read, and
fewer still who cared to do so.
In Burdeck it was held to be not quite commendable to do anything but
what one's parents had done in their day. The farms were not very
extensive, but the farmers throve and employed a good deal of labour,
the labourers living in the little village. There was almost no actual
poverty, and no discontent. Things were as they had always been, and
therefore were as they ought to be. I do not mean that there was no
grumbling; the Burdeckers were Englishmen, and they grumbled heartily
at many things. At the weather, at the charges Giles the blacksmith
made for shoeing horses, etc., at the extortion practised at the one
little shop, at the length of time the cobbler took to "welt" the
shoes; oh yes, they grumbled, but then they enjoyed it. If all these
small afflictions had been removed, if the weather had always suited
them, the blacksmith had lowered his prices, the bread, bacon, and
cheese had been cheaper, and the cobbler more punctual, Burdeck would
have been at a loss for something to talk about. There were many things
they could have better spared than their little grumbles.
All this took place early in the present century, now growing very old.
Of course in these enlightened days no one grumbles.
It was a lovely evening in June; the work of the day was done, and the
labourers had reached home, and were most of them employed in making
a solid meal, each in his own clean and comfortable kitchen. Burdeck
was a very clean place. The good women, not being overworked, kept a
bright look-out on each other, and to have a dirty, untidy house, or to
send out one's children ragged and unwashed, were sins soon visited by
general condemnation.
But if there was one cottage more trimly-neat, inside and outside,
one garden better stocked with vegetables of the common sorts, and
brighter with the sweet old common flowers than the rest, that cottage
and garden belonged to Thomas Adderley, ploughman at the Hill Farm.
For Thomas was a sober, industrious man, and he had a wife who was a
treasure in herself; a good, busy, thrifty woman, who found time for
many small industries, besides bringing up her family carefully and
comfortably.
There was a certain peddler who went his rounds regularly in that part
of the country, and he always brought to Mrs. Adderley a quantity of
woollen yarn, which she knit up into stockings, mittens, cuffs, and
comforters, all of which he bought from her at his next visit. Then,
too, she kept bees, and every autumn a dealer from Wakefield came out
with his light cart, and bought all her honey and spare wax. She also
kept a few hens, and if she did not make money by her eggs, she saved
money by them, which is as good; she seldom sold eggs, but the bacon
went twice as far when there was a fine dish of fried eggs with it.
She worked in the garden herself, and taught the children to help her,
so that honest Thomas could rest after his hard day's work, instead of
having to turn out after supper to dig his garden. There was a fine
apricot on one side of the cottage door, and a pear on the other, and
the Wakefield shopkeeper bought all the fruit. Mrs. Adderley pruned and
trimmed those trees herself, and woe betide the child who should be so
misguided as to touch the fruit.
"I'm saving up against a rainy day," she said, "and you must help
instead of hindering. Look, now—I'll take down the box and show you my
golden guineas. One of these days you may be very glad to get help from
that box, and when you want it, you'll be welcome to it. But you must
not waste our substance now. Health and strength don't last for ever,
and I mean to have something saved against a rainy day."
But even before a "rainy day" came, mother's golden guineas were called
upon for help. When Sam, the eldest son, set up the horse and cart by
which he now earned such good wages, mother gave him every penny she
had to help him, the rest he had saved himself. When Dolly, the only
girl, married Harry Sands, mother's golden guineas bought some useful
furniture for the young couple. And when poor Harry was killed by a
kick from a vicious horse, within a year of his marriage, and Dolly
broke her heart and died, leaving her baby to her mother's care, the
guineas had to pay for the two funerals. Poor mother! Little joy had
she in that expenditure, though you may be sure she was pleased to do
things "creditably."
You may imagine that, with all these calls upon the hoard, the number
of guineas was not at any time very great. There would often be only
one, with a few silver coins on their way to be transformed into a
second by-and-by. Mrs. Adderley always got her friend the peddler to
take her silver and give her gold, for, she said, "one might be tempted
to spend a shilling or two, when one would not break into a guinea."
Sometimes there were three, and more than once there had been five—but
at the time when my story opens there were actually ten! For Sam had
saved up by degrees, and had repaid his mother what she had given
him when he bought his horse, and the fruit and honey had been very
abundant last year. They promised well now, and Mrs. Adderley, standing
in her doorway on the evening in June of which I spoke, mentioned this
pleasing fact to her good man Thomas, who was steadily eating bread,
bacon, and eggs, and drinking milk, in the cheery kitchen.
Beside him sat his son Sam, and on his knee was perched little
Dolly, his grandchild, now three years old, and the pet of the whole
household. Mrs. Adderley's cup and plate showed that she had been
partaking of the meal; and there were another cup and plate on the
table, not used as yet.
"Come your ways in, woman," said Thomas, as he popped a specially crisp
morsel of bacon into Dolly's ready mouth, "and finish your supper. I
doubt Tom wants no supper to-night."
"Dear, dear, Thomas, I wish the lad was home! I don't know how he
expects to keep a place if he behaves like this!"
"If he behaves like what?" inquired Thomas. "Come, my woman, you'll
have to tell me."
"Well—but you won't be hard upon him, Thomas, for he's a spirity,
wild lad, and hardness will only harden him.—Oh, there's old Jerry
Dwight. Tom's always after him, with his talk of Hull and Liverpool and
sea-going that he's always gabbling about. Maybe he'll know.—Master
Dwight! Master Dwight! Stop a bit!" She ran to the little gate. "Did
you see our Tom to-day, Master Dwight?"
"Did I see who?" said old Dwight, putting his hand up to his ear—only
to gain time, for he heard well enough.
"Our Tom! He hasn't come home yet."
"Your Tom? Ah yes, Tom—young Thomas Adderley. A fine, strapping,
stirring lad, is Tom. And don't you believe, Mrs. Adderley, that you'll
ever make such another as Sam out of Tom. Tom has notions. You just
give him a little money, and let him go seek his fortunes. Tom would—"
"Master Dwight, I'm not one bit obliged to you for giving words to such
a notion. Seek his fortunes, indeed! Seek a halter, you mean. Your
wanderers do mostly end like that. Since I can remember, only two lads
left Burdeck, and one of them 'listed for a soldier, and was shot dead
in forran parts. The vicar rode over on a week-day to tell his mother,
and you might have heard her screams a mile off. And the other was
hanged in York city for sheep-stealing. Tom's a little bit idle and
rampagious, but he'll settle down and be a comfort yet, if you'll let
him alone with your talk of seeking fortunes. If fortunes are so easy
to come by, why didn't 'you' get one with all your wandering? You just
leave my Tom alone—do now, Master Dwight; I ask it as a favour."
"I leave your Tom alone?" old Dwight piped up in his shrill, cracked
voice. "You get Tom to leave 'me' alone, and 'tis little I shall run
after him. Your Tom is just the plague of my life. I be three score
and ten years old, and 'twould become me to be thinking frequent of
my latter end. And just when I'm set down in a sunny corner most
conformable for a quiet think, with maybe a little nap to rest me after
it, comes your Tom, begging and praying to hear of my adventures when
young. Not that I blame him, for he's got some spirit and is clever
beyond most Burdeck folk, and no doubt he finds me better company than
a lot of fellows that never saw anything but Burdeck, and can scarce
believe that the sun shines on other places.
"I've been to Hull, I have; and was born in Liverpool, and was once in
London. If you disbelieve me, ask my darter. No doubt Tom likes to hear
what one like me can tell him. But, anyhow, I didn't eat him alive this
time, for here he comes. Good evening, Mrs. Adderley. I must be getting
towards home."
Mrs. Adderley looked, and beheld her hopeful Tom just parting from a
boy and girl of about his own age—Lucy Trayner and one of her numerous
brothers, part of a family which lived in the next cottage. Tom stood
talking to Lucy for a few moments, then came on, meeting old Dwight on
his way.
"You'll catch it, my boy," said Dwight; "there's your mother on the
look-out for you."
Tom laughed and ran on—a fine, well-grown, handsome lad of about
fifteen, tall for his age, and strong and active beyond the common.
"Tom, where have you been all this day? Master Minchin sent a lass to
see about you, at twelve—and I thinking you had gone to your work like
a good lad!"
"Well, mother, I told old Minchin last night that I'd never take hold
of a hay-fork again for him at fourpence a day. I do a man's work, and
he must give me a man's wages. I want to save some money. So, you see,
it's not my fault I wasn't at work. And I've had a grand day in the oak
wood with Lucy Trayner, and I'm as hungry as a wolf, so come along and
give me my supper."
"Supper's over," she said, "and father's ill-pleased, and said you'd
get no supper to-night."
Tom whistled a lively tune as they both walked up to the house.
Thomas Adderley was now standing in the doorway.
"Where have you been, Tom?" said he.
"In the wood, father."
"Not at your work at all, then? I suppose Farmer Minchin will be
dismissing you now—as Farmer Bell did at Christmas, and Farmer Cunlip
at Hallowmass! Tom, I never lifted my hand to one of ye yet, but seems
to me you'd be the better for a leathering."
"Farmer Bell dismissed me because I said 'twasn't fair to make me work
Christmas Day, minding his horses, without paying me for it. Farmer
Cunlip said I was idle, but 'twas his own son was idle. Old Minchin
didn't dismiss me—'I' dismissed him."
At these audacious words the whole family—father, mother, and
Sam—exclaimed, "Oh, laws!" Even little Dolly said it, but she was a
little late with it, and ended by a delighted burst of baby laughter.
"I haven't said aught to surprise you so. I told old Minchin I would
not work for him any more at fourpence a day. I do as much as any of
the men, and he knows it, and I want to be saving money. He said he'd
see me further, so I didn't go to-day."
"Mother," said Thomas, "this boy of yours will be a credit to us yet.
He'll come to the gallows as sure as eggs is eggs. The boldness of him!
I've had too much patience with you, Tom, that's how 'tis. Go to bed
this moment, without any supper, not so much as a crust. I'll go to
Farmer Minchin, and see if he'll overlook your folly just this once.
You're a boy till you're eighteen, as all Burdeck knows, and, boy or
man, you're bound to do as good a day's work as you can. Let me hear
no more of this nonsense. If Farmer Minchin won't take you back, I'll
go to Giles the blacksmith. Little Ben that blows the bellows is sick,
and I'll hire you to him. It's small pay, and Giles is as like to give
you a blow as a word—but 'twill do ye good. Now, mother, not a bite
of anything is he to get, but go to bed empty. Idle, saucy fellow, as
doesn't know when he's well off!"
It was not often that quiet Thomas Adderley made so long a speech, and
that he should scold one of his children was a thing unheard of, as he
"left all that to the missus" generally.
Accordingly, every one was much impressed. Dolly cried; Mrs. Adderley
looked vexed and sorry; Sam made his escape from the scene, and went to
visit Jane Waters, the girl he was slowly "courting;" even Tom failed
to whistle as he stole off to bed, and lay down, hungry and weary, to
think over his evil doings.
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